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A TV grab of the incident shows the victim pleading to the law enforcers. - Dawn Photo
According to eyewitness accounts, and footage made by cell phones on the spot, Sarfraz Shah was unarmed and shot at point blank range by security personnel present at the scene. The footage reveals that Sarfraz was pleading for his life but he was shot and then left to bleed to death, his pleas falling on deaf ears. Neither the security personnel nor others present at the scene tried to make any effort to save his life.
After the footage hit news channels, the authorities came into action, and according to news reports, two Rangers personnel, Shahid and Afzal, of the Abdullah Shah Ghazi Rangers 32 Wing were arrested. This was followed by the usual statement of Interior Minister Rehman Malik who said that action would be taken against those responsible and arrests would be made. He also said that a ‘judicial inquiry’ had been ordered. But how many times have we heard that? How many times has anything been done? It seems like a sheer waste of time.
But more importantly: What is wrong with us? Why does death and murder fascinate us so? And why are our inhumane instincts taking over our compassion and humanity? This murder is not the first nor will it be the last. The Kharotabad incident is still fresh in our minds, where a group of people, including two women, were gunned down by security personnel for no apparent threat. Such incidents should sound alarm bells for experts who are responsible for the psychological evaluation of our security personnel.
It is common knowledge that a trained soldier will not unleash a splay of bullets on an unarmed person who poses no threat; these men are trained not only to control their emotions but also their fire. Trained to follow orders, they are well aware that one wrong move will land them into severe trouble, especially in situations like the ones mentioned above. They are aware that they will not only be held accountable for their actions but severely punished which could include termination. Keeping this in mind, the actions of the men involved in these two episodes need to be closely investigated and their mental state evaluated, so that such incidents don’t recur.
Without justifying this murder in Karachi, it has been noted that people working in such high risk jobs like the armed forces in combat seemed to be suffering from extreme stress, which in most cases is not identified timely and results in such sad incidents.
Soldiers experiencing overwhelming combat situations may sometimes give vent to their frustration and stress by ‘taking out’ their own colleagues. There have been gruesome incidents in many countries in India and USA, where soldiers have been known to turn their fire on their own colleagues due to extreme stress that has remained undetected.
According to news reports, in 2009 a soldier of the Assam Rifles elite paramilitary force shot dead six soldiers in the north-eastern Indian state of Manipur after an argument. The report further stated that the accused had been suffering from stress which was caused because members of the security forces are denied long leaves during severe counter-insurgency operations. Similarly, in 2010 US army Major Nidal Malik Hasan, a psychiatrist at Fort Hood, Texas USA killed 11 soldiers and wounded 31 one more before he was wounded by a SWAT team.
Unfortunately for Pakistan, such incidents of venting ones stress by murder are not only restricted to the security personnel. There have been reported cases of similar incidents where unarmed common people have been involved. In such cases, the number of people involved in these murders has been quite large, which could indicate the state of mind that the majority of Pakistanis are in.
There have been incidents in cities like Karachi and Lahore where unarmed common people have used their bare hands to inflict the worst kind of death on alleged ‘robbers’ by torturing and at times burning them to death. Serving ‘brutal quick justice’ seems to satiate some bloody instinct of the torturers.
And who can forget the Sialkot torture and murder incident where a mob lynched two young brothers alleging that they were robbers. These men were tortured to death in front of a whole village, including police personnel but no one came to their rescue despite their pleas. The crowd watched in awed silence as these ‘robbers’ were subjected to the worst kind of slow torture possible. The cold hearted murderers didn’t stop at torturing and killing their ‘prey’ and getting over it, but they seemed to enjoy the prolonged torture these men were being put through, which is evident by the torturers using various torture methods on these men. Even pleas to end their torture by killing them quickly didn’t seem to make any difference on the murderous mob.
It seems that in countries like Pakistan, signs of frustration, stress and other psychological issues are not taken into consideration. Traditionally we seem to accept violence, even cold blooded murder at times as is seen in the most common one of karo kari, and allow it to prevail in society under some guise or the other. We allow our children to be brutal and severe with pets and regale tales of the times our kids have mistreated or killed chicks, thrown stones or tied roped around cats, dogs and other helpless animals without remorse.
It is time for us to look inside ourselves and work on ‘civilising’ ourselves. We must give life, human or animal, importance and value it. We must not allow ourselves to be overwhelmed by our murderous instincts snuffing out more lives.
Annie Sibtain Rizvi is a freelance journalist and tends to ponder over the socio-political happenings with an empathetic outlook.
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