Re: Imran Ismail attacked by MQM goons
I am also born in Karachi and have spent entire thirty plus years of my life here. Urdu is my mother tongue although I don’t consider myself a Mahajir because I never migrated from another place. This is my city and Pakistan is my homeland.
My constituency (not NA-246) comprises of a pre-dominantly Urdu speaking populace. Still MQM won here by not too big a margin in 2013, that too after rigging rigorously. I personally know a dozen guys who casted between 100 to 500 votes each on different polling stations. I am a witness of around ten MQM workers beating an opposite party’s three supporters until they started bleeding from various places. They pulled them from the same cue I was standing in, waiting for my turn to vote. People in my circle who served as returning officers (in other parts of the city) consider it one of the worst and most shameful days of their official lives.
The general feeling and atmosphere here in Karachi about the on-going operation is of joy, and is of hope. A huge part of hardcore fan base MQM once had doesn’t just feel indifferent towards the party but abhors it entirely. Some people say that MQM can still prosper if it gets rid of Altaf and change the methods of its politics. I think even that will be too little and too late. Things for MQM and its limited support/leadership only seem to go downhill now onward, and hidden in their agony is a million of others’ bliss.