There is a barrage of negative propaganda orchestrated by the media about a very obedient kid named Zahir Jaffer. His upbringing is the model for the parents to follow. If you don’t believe me, trust the words of the policemen who have been heard testifying in the media that “he is a very capable child”. On another occasion, he trembled while getting into the police mobile and guard just standing beside chanted, “easy there, Zahir”.
Police encounter wicked people every day, therefore in a glance they can recognize an individual. Obviously, they must have seen something in Zahir Jaffer that made them so fond of him.
The misconceptions that have been spread in the media about this docile child need to be dispelled. SP City Rana Wahab said he had learned that Zahir had been jailed in the UK for snatching mobile phones and in the US for drug use. He is also said to have been reported in the UK for violent behavior against his mother.
In my opinion, even if all this is true, it will be due to a misunderstanding. Why does such a rich man need to snatch a mobile phone from somebody? At most, it would have taken Zahir just to show his powerful family background. And what about drugs, they must have been fed by a stranger to him by getting the better of his innocence.
Now, take the case of Noor Mukadam’s murder. This too must have been done by mistake at the hands of this fine-natured young man. He used to do psychotherapy for people. He also did courses at ‘Therapy Works’, a well-known institution. Some people are saying that he used to see patients from this institution even though that institution is denying this. The bottom line is that his heart was full of the spirit of helping people in need.
Our traditions claim that if a young girl is possessed by a ghost, if she has hysteria or any other such case, she is taken to an elderly pious person who beats the girl for as long as possible. Either she is freed from the shackles of dark possession or dies. In both cases the praise is for the godly elder man.
We should assume and believe that Zahir was doing the same. He must have seen some dark-spirit on Noor Mukadam, so he first tried to help her with punches and slaps, but it didn’t work, so he hit her with a sharp iron fist. Noor probably didn’t know that Zahir was helping him. She must have thought that she was being subjected to inhumane and degrading treatment, so at about 4:30 AM she jumped on the lawn below the second floor terrace and tried to run away.
It must have been a routine for domestic workers too. It is thought that Zahir Jaffar may have been treating patients in the same way before. So they did not help Noor escape and handed her back to Zahir.
Now the question here is, why did Zahir cut Noor’s neck? He may have heard from his parents that on the day of Eid-ul-Adha one must let go of their dearest belongings. Hence, Zahir had to put a sharp knife to her throat, eliminating any questions on his evil intentions, and it is thought that he considered Noor to be his dearest thing. The only negative element of parental training which could be learned from this incident is that he could not differentiate between a girl and a goat.
This assumption is further strengthened by the fact that Zahir’s father, Zakir Jaffer, was in constant contact with his domestic workers at the time of the incident. It was Zakir Jaffer who informed ‘Therapy Works’ about 7 AM, two and a half hours after Noor Mukadam tried to flee. In a leaked recording attributed to Therapy Works, which was brought to light by a prominent journalist Mehreen Zahra Malik, it was learned that Zakir Jaffer had told the agency that there was a girl in Zahir’s room whom he was probably trying to solicit. While ‘Solicit’ is a difficult English word that should mean sexual intercourse in this context.
In other words, Zakir Sahib was satisfied that this was not a very serious matter and the screams and shouts from Zahir’s room were just because a girl was being sexually assaulted. In his opinion, it is not the case of the police but of the psychologist.
SP Rana Wahab also said that on the night of the incident, when the victim’s father called Zakir Jafar and asked about his daughter, Zakir Jafar had expressed his unawareness even though he was aware of it. In other words, the alleged statement of the police and the psychiatric department shows that for Zakir Jaffar, it was really a matter of routine and he was giving full support to his well-trained obedient son in this matter.
Killing and beating women is an old celebrated tradition in our society anyway. In the name of honor, we kill women and later inherit what is left off them. It is also a routine to beat the mother of four children to relieve some masculine tension. And in this year-long beating, the whole neighborhood, hearing the screams, thinks that the girl must have done something wrong, that she is being beaten, or that her husband is angry, and so is the girl’s family. They will understand but would not lend a helping hand to the poor soul. Then one day when the woman is beaten so badly that she dies, the whole neighborhood would come to bury her with patience and gratitude.
Probably in their heart they would believe that it wasn’t the intention of the killer to kill but the fate suggested otherwise.
A young man who blindly follows the tradition and the footsteps of ignorant religious clerics, slaughters a young woman, with complete backing of his parents, and then the police state “he is a very capable child” and takes full care. Then it has to be said that Zahir Jaffar is a model of our high social values and we love these values. This love will not allow him to get punished, will it?
As far as all those murdered girls are concerned, we can only say that this is what was written in their destiny and there is nothing wrong with the killers, and they are innocent. Yes, once our society begins to consider girls as human beings, and violence as oppression, then maybe the situation of women might change. Until then, this is a society of vultures and predators.
Isn’t this the same Pakistan that Jinnah demanded for the protection of Muslim-majority areas? Isn’t this the same Pakistan that promised all the nations living here would have equal rights? Isn’t it the same Pakistan, which claimed freedom from the slavery of the influential monarchy?
But maybe we have only ourselves to blame as in the past 74 years we could not find the way to this Pakistan. We take U-turns again and again and return to where Manto’s Pakistan is still in motion!
Where even today, girls like Sakina, daughter of Sirajuddin of Manto’s story “Khol Doh” are lying like crushed corpses, who are raped even while wrapped in ‘Abayas’.
Where even to date the crowd of Manto’s “Toba Tek Singh’s” insane madhouse is constantly growing and according to Manto “those whose minds have not yet completely lost senses are still caught in the dilemma of where is Pakistan?” In the bedlam of Toba Tek Singh, Manto’s written conversation between two lunatics is still going on about India and Pakistan.
Manto writes:
There was one Muslim lunatic who had read the newspaper “Zamindar” every day for twelve years. One of his friends asked him: “Maulvi Sahib! What is Pakistan?” After careful thought he replied: “It’s a place in India where they make razors.” Hearing this, his friend was content.
To this day, we and India are making “razors” and are busy butchering our own. Manto anticipated where Pakistan would go, but I think he would be quite horrified with some of the trends that have occurred. He would have been a blistering critic of all that has happened in Pakistan over the course of 74 years.
I am confused about where we will go with these “Dole Shah” rat-like generations that we have manufactured over time. Even today, the world of chaos is the same as in 1947. People have been looking for protection of lives and honor, and the irony is that now we don’t have those ancient deep wells to jump into with life and honor!
Fatwas of infidelity have become a norm against those who want a “real Pakistan” with Jinnah’s promises and the Maulvi is still standing on the pulpit of the powerful and misleading the people in the name of religion that “Muslims! Surrender to the mighty. This is the rule of religion, and it is your welfare. Come and swear allegiance to the mighty. I guarantee the hooris”. Even today Pakistan is like the booty!
Properties and lands of poor farmers are still being plundered by the vulturesque thugs while the real owners are begging for rights and seeking refuge. Even today, Pakistan is just like Jinnah’s fuel-less rusty ambulance that picks up the “unwanted patients” and stands still on the dark roads waiting to see when the patient dies.
In my poor Pakistan today, sane voices are dragged into a dark “insane asylum” and are forcibly disappeared from the scene upon which fearless Manto pops in the mind. Manto is still spitting blood and Pakistan is still being formed. Sometimes new and sometimes ol
