Tragedy of Red Mosque in Islamabad

It is the night of 7 July 2007. The ‘Red Mosque’ in the heart of Pakistan’s capital Islamabad is under siege by the Pakistan Army and Civil Armed Forces for over a week. The Government is continuously conveying to the public that the young girls and boys studying in the Mosque School are held hostage by the mosque management and armed terrorists. Fire exchanges between the armed forces and the ‘terrorists’ are taking place day and night.

Over the past six months since early January 2007, the ‘enlightened moderate media’ is insisting on rather harsh dispensation towards ‘Red Mosque’ inhabitants. The saner elements in the media and public at large, on the contrary, look forward to a settlement with no loss of life.

The ‘enlightened moderates’ in the Government, media and the society had the final say. They made it sure that nothing short of a massacre of the innocent inhabitants of ‘Red Mosque’ takes place in the early hours of the morning following that dreadful night.

Let us hear the events of this dreadful night from someone who participated in the last moment decision making process. That person is no one other than Ch. Shujahat Hussain formerly the Prime Minister of Pakistan and the President of the then ruling party Pakistan Muslim League. What he narrates about the happenings of that night is not easy to believe!

Ch. Shujahat Husain says that the ongoing dialogue among the Government, Mosque leadership (Abdul Rashid GhaziAbdul Rashid Ghazi) and several political/religious leaders had led to an Eight Points Agreement. The ninth point of the agreement which required Government approval was that as soon as the Capital Development Authority of Islamabad would start building several demolished mosques in Islamabad (which had originally triggered the Red Mosque issue in January 2007) the Red Mosque inhabitants would vacate the ‘Children Library’ which was held as token of protest by Red Mosque Students and had remained a bone of contention between the Government and the Mosque inhabitants. When this point was raised before Prime Minister Shaukat AzizShaukat Aziz, he was not willing to accept and said, “If the Red Mosque issue is solved, the entire nation would shift its focus on the ongoing lawyers’ movement for restoration of Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry. And this must not happen.”

“Everything is settled with Red Mosque Administrator Abdul Rashid Ghazi. He and his companions would leave the Red Mosque and vanish in the darkness of the night; women and children would be freed; Government library would be vacated and return to the Government; Madrassa attached to the Mosque would be shifted outside the city of Islamabad; and the conflict would be amicably over”, Ch. Shujahat Hussain tells Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz.

“Shaukat Aziz did not agree and looked bored with the discussion”, Shujahat says. He asked his permission to leave as he had to take his wife to the ice cream parlor!

Disappointed with Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, Ch. Shujahat at 1530 hour of the dreadful night reaches the Presidency in Rawalpindi and endeavors to seek President Musharaf’s approval to the ‘safe exit’ formula. Musharaf does not listen. His standpoint is no different than that of Shaukat Aziz. He also says: “If Red Mosque issue is settled, lawyers’ movement would attain such a momentum that everything would be lost (from his standpoint)”.

In the early hours of the morning, Shujahat returns home! What follows is the massacre of unknown number of young men and women students at the Red Mosque and the attached Madrassa! How many – hundreds, thousands, no one can tell! All what is shown to the Media after the dreadful events are a couple of polished weapons, torn copies of Quran, personal effects of the students and charred bones!

Men and women with conscience cry, but can do nothing. Enlightened moderates are happy that they have succeeded in eliminating thousands of terrorists hiding in Red Mosque! Authorities are proud of their success over the innocent young students mostly orphans of the October 2006 earth quack tragedy in Kashmir!

Ch. Shujahat Husain does not leave the Government in protest and is living just to tell the story of that dreadful night and shed his tears!

Why the public conscience remained silent when all this was happening?

Where were all those pious souls who are not tired of advocating the cause of human life all the time?

Where were those NGOs fighting for liberal values?

We don’t find the answer. Has the society lost its right to exist as honorable people??? Most probably YES.