With the PML[Q] and the MQM now pulling the race card against the Sindhis, it seems obvious who was behind the majority of the ‘motivational’ destruction in Sindh…
By Shahid Shah
KARACHI: The people of Sindh are currently suffering a double trauma. After burying their beloved leader Benazir Bhutto, they are today being blamed by some of being the villains rather than victims of the violence that broke out in Sindh in the aftermath of the tragedy. To rub salt in their wounds, the former ruling party, the Pakistan Muslim League (Q), has even tried to target the Sindhis through an unsavoury advertisement campaign.
The total loss in the province was above Rs 80 billion, Shamim Ahmed Shamsi, President Karachi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) told The News. These losses, it emerges, were indiscriminate and occurred across ethnic lines.
According to details collected by The News, and contrary to the propaganda, Sindhis were as much the victims of the violence that broke out after Benazir Bhutto’s tragic death on December 27 as members of other communities. The police left the field open to criminal elements across the province who took advantage of the tragedy and looted citizens indiscriminately. Some of them even used the disturbances to settle old scores.
In Ghotki, for example, notorious dacoit Qadroo Chachar looted banks in broad daylight and that too near a police station. Professional dacoits also entered Jacobabad and other cities in the aftermath of the tragedy.
Benazir Bhutto’s home district Larkana was where the largest number of people, mostly Sindhi-speaking, fell victim to the violence. Property in the area was either burnt or looted. **More than 50 shops were looted in the city and only one of them was a shop owned by a non-Sindhi.
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Nazir Shaikh, the owner of the City Bakery, died of a heart attack as a result. His two storeyed building worth around Rs 100 million was burnt down by a mob. The PML-Q did not mention his death anywhere in its expensive advertisement campaign, perhaps because he was a local.
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More than 28 shops in Shahi bazaar and 18 shops in Resham bazaar were also looted along with other shops on the main roads. One eyewitness told The News that flag-waving PPP workers came and forced the shops to close, and then some others moved in to wreak havoc. Locals did not recognise them as PPP workers. The men chanted slogans of ‘Jeay Bhutto’ and burnt and looted the shops. Police arrested three persons after shopkeepers identified them but they were freed after some ‘understanding’.
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In Jacobabad, 70 shops were looted. Almost all of them belonged to Sindhi-speaking people and they had no connection with any political party. More than 50 shops were looted in Kandhkot alone. They also belonged to ethnic Sindhis. According to one resident, Babal Khan Jakhrani, ex-MNA and Taluka Nazim Sajjad Khan Jakhrani protected the property of the citizens when the police went into hiding after the trouble began. The Jakhranis are local leaders of the PPP. Their private guards, in fact, saved the citizens from further violence and losses.
**With the exception of former federal minister Liaqat Ali Jatoi’s house, a majority of damage in Dadu was also not targeted. Here, criminal elements looted whatever came in their way. Around 10 shops, including one shop selling arms and ammunition, were looted near the police station. The owner of the shop also happened to be a Sindhi and had no connection with any party.
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In Khairpur, the party office of the PML-F along with several shops was burnt. According to locals, one relative of a PML-F top leader allegedly used the occasion to settle his personal scores. Workers of an ethnic party were also identified in the looting. Three mobile phone shops in the city were also looted and burnt. They belonged to ethnic Sindhis who were not supporters or workers of the PML-F.
In Hyderabad and Hala, property of PPP supporters was also damaged and looted. A majority of the victims were Sindhi-speaking.
Despite the concerted efforts of certain elements in spreading ethnic hatred in Sindh, non-Sindhi speaking people by and large also termed these tactics as being against the solidarity of the country.
Dilber Khan, an ethnic Pakhtoon and vice president of the damaged Light House market in Karachi, said Sindhis were generally peace-loving people and he was not afraid of them. Talking to The News at the Light House bazaar, where more than 10 shops were burnt during the violence, he rejected the stories of ethnic hatred being a motive for the strife saying he had lived in the interior of Sindh and found the Sindhi people as patriotic as anyone else in this country. In fact, Khan said that locals, including Sindhis, helped them in controlling the fire.