Time to Reflect, before it is too late

Sir, The events of recent 72 hours, when citizens were left at the mercy of baton carrying, stone throwing zealots, brainwashed by TLP to believe that they were waging Jihad. Two policemen were mercilessly beaten to death. This should be enough to awaken those in deep slumber, involved in petty political games, exploiting religion. Quaid-e-Azam realized the diversity in terms of faith, ethnicity, etc. of citizens and he elaborated this in his 11 August 1947 address to the First Constituent Assembly of Pakistan. Quaid expected the Muslim majority to emulate the Islamic concept of justice and equality before law of all citizens, irrespective of their caste, creed, sex etc. On 22 March 1947 MAJ quoted a letter written by a Hindu nationalist Lajpat Rai in 1924 to Bengals CR Das, where he stated that Hindus and Muslims are two separate nations who cannot live as one nation. It was precisely for this reason that a Hindu Dalit leader Jaganath Mandal and his party made common cause with Muslim League in favor of Pakistan to escape exploitation by Hindu supremacist mindset. Today Modi has proven this if any proof was needed. Unfortunately, after Quaid’s death, those who took over, lacked both commitment and intellect and they wavered from his vision. The nobility of the Holy Prophet is ordained by Almighty Allah SWT and over 1.6 Billion Muslims who follow him are willing to sacrifice their lives. It cannot be so fragile to be weakened by irresponsible acts of a cartoonist. Over the past few decades, men of average intellect assumed power and they wanted to stage manage, choice of political leaders. They exploited religion to wage a proxy war in Afghanistan, and created many groups like MQM, TLP etc. Enough damage has been inflicted on our economy. It is time to follow MAJ’s vision and let the will of people prevail.
Tariq Ali
Lahore