The Islamabad Melodrama

by

Col. Riaz Jafri (Retd)

What Zamurrad Khan did could have been done much earlier by SSP Dr. Rizwan or Mr. Nabeel Gabol who have had similar opportunity of holding negotiations with Sikandar and his wife – Kanwal.  Actually, from all counts it appeared that though Sikandar rattled two assault guns one in each hand he never intended to kill or shoot straight at anyone. Or else, he would have easily killed Zamurrad Khan lying on the ground helplessly at his feet from close quarters when the later fell after making an unsuccessful attempt to grab the former.

 He had even put up his arms as if in surrender when fired upon and raided by the commandos in civvies. Zamurrad Khan was shown running after the children – may be to use them as the human shield for himself but which he as a good politician later claimed to the admiration of all present and the media in particular was to save the lives of the children. 

 Save from whom?  Their own father – who would have never shot a t them, or the law enforcing agencies – who should have had no reason to fire upon them in any case?  Approaching the armed Sikandar who had a threatening posture all along for talks and negotiations by SSP Dr. Rizwan and Messrs Gabol and Zamurrad could at the best be called a foolhardy bravado and totally uncalled for. 

 There were hundreds of other ways to deal with such a simple situation which for reasons totally beyond my comprehension was prolonged unduly and un-necessarily into a five and half hour of Maula Jat drama.  It is sheer nonsense to say that it was all done not to endanger the lives of the children and his wife.

There were dozens of occasions when the wife and the children were away from Sikandar and any good sharp shooter or sniper could have fired at his legs to incapacitate and capture him alive. A simple APC could have drawn within feet from his car, trained its gun on him and ask him to surrender.

 He could have been doused with the w ater canon and raided simultaneously.  Even rubber bullets could have done the trick. Once the qanats were erected around his car, a substantial quantity of smoke and tear gas shells could have been thrown in the limited area inside the qanats which would have forced him to run out of there coughing and crying.  Army dogs could been set upon him that would have made run wildly and surrender. 

Hundred of similar other methods could have been employed provided and that’s a big proviso, if the police knew its job.   Similarly handling of the scores of media men covering the episode and hundreds of tmashbeens standing dangerously close to the alleged terrorist by the police was highly amateurish and unprofessional.  The entire area could have been cordoned off with a simple 2 inch yellow tape and none allowed to go inside it. Had Sikandar broken down under some stress and resorted to indiscriminate firing with the au tomatics at that close quarters,  and killed dozens of the spectators and media men, who would have been responsible for such wanton deaths?  The media, probably in a rat race for the ratings, behaved in a very irresponsible manner. 

Did anyone note that there was hardly a commercial break on any of the channels covering the event live!  The over enthusiastic tv cameramen and reporters refused to leave or vacate the area when asked by police which resulted in a scuffle between them and manhandling of the media men by the police.  What a poor sense of responsibility and respect for the law by the so called educated media people?  I think the best way to teach them a lesson to behave in future would be to call all of them to the concerned police station to record their statement as eye witnesses. 

Since there will be only one sub Inspector or so recording the statements and scores of the media men to appear before him taking their turn, they will have to sit in the police station for at least 24 hours or more, without food and drinks and not allowed to leave or mix with others to ensure that they do not exchanging notes about what they adduce.  Once they undergo such a treatment, none of them would dare defy the police orders in future.

All in all it was a poor show on the part of all those who took part in the melodrama in the Blue Area Islamabad on the evening of August 15^th, 2013.  We have a great deal to learn to deal with such a situation in future.

Col. Riaz Jafri (Retd)