Price one has to pay

KARACHI: "Thank you Sarfaraz. Thank you very much. I will talk to you later," said Salmaan Taseer in response to the greetings of this writer, who had worked for his newspaper Daily Times as its Karachi Bureau Chief and later as Karachi Resident Editor for about six years, while leaving Sukkur airport for Naudero to offer Dua at Benazir Bhutto's grave upon his appointment as Governor Punjab.

His becoming the governor of the country's largest and the most important province was no small feat for a Taseer as he used to say that one has to be a Janjua, a Wattoo, a Nakai, a Daultana, a Chaudhry, etc, from Punjab to become a ruler. Despite the fact that he was not from the families of one of the traditional Punjab rulers, he had been vigorously pursuing his dreams and Punjab governorship was the realisation of one such dream. But one wonders what his wildest dreams really contemplated for his future: death at the hand of one of his own security men.

Salmaan fell down and the man who reportedly fired at him threw down his gun and raised both hands immediately, which brings to mind the assassination of Indira Gandhi in 1984. "Mummy", shouted Sonia, who had seen the armed assault on her mother-in-law by prime minister's own security guards, from the window of her bed-room, before she took a critically injured Indira to hospital.

It was the cost that the daughter of Jawaharlal Nehru had to pay for her decision of storming of the Golden Temple, according to Katherine Frank whose works include a highly-acclaimed biography of Lucie Duff Gordon, and the more controversial biography of Indira Gandhi, Indira: The Life of Indira Nehru Gandhi.

In a review of her book, Wendy Smith says: "Frank depicts Gandhi as having more faith in her personal bond with the Indian people than in the messy workings of democracy. But the religious and political divisions inflamed by her policies came home to roost in 1984, when she was assassinated by her own bodyguard, a Sikh enraged by the massacre of militant Sikhs in the Golden Temple. This sympathetic but unsparing portrait makes it clear that Gandhi was a flawed leader but evinces compassion for a woman striving with a difficult personal and political legacy."

Similarly, Salmaan has apparently paid the price of his opposition to country's blasphemy laws. It would be rather unfair to draw legitimate and exact parallels between the deaths of the two, it is nonetheless important that one must embrace the fact that both were politicians, high public office holders and their end was preceded by their respective controversial stances over religious sentiments.

In the case of Indira, it was the minority but significantly sizeable and highly influential Sikh community while in the case of Punjab governor those who found his utterances with regard to blasphemy laws as highly objectionable and even blasphemous happen to be from the overwhelming Muslim majority.

It is after one's death, particularly a tragic one, you reflect profoundly despite your serious differences, even enmity, with him or her. Salmaan Taseer was a shrewd accountant, an enterprising entrepreneur and a successful politician. He is said to be both an opportunist and an optimist because he believed that pessimism sucks. At times he was stubbornly unyielding as he was widely known for his dogged persistence and dour determination.

His worldview was quite well known: he was ultra liberal and even careless in his approach to life and religion, he was considerably controversial in his business and political dealings, and he was more than courageous in defence of his views that he espoused throughout his life as a political activist and a member of civil society.

"It was mainly due to the influence of Faiz Sahib," was his answer to a question in a TV interview. According to him, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, who was the husband of his mother's sister, helped shape his worldview.

He launched Daily Times under the editorship of Najam Sethi soon after the 9/11 and the US invasion of Afghanistan with DT's mission to be a `new voice for a new Pakistan'. Although, his intentions were seen with an eye of doubt by many who thought that Salmaan's newspaper had dredged its voice from the colonial past and that it had only altered its pitch and delivery to appease the West, Salmaan was far from being apologetic as he would show no signs of abandoning the path that his newspaper and he had chosen to tread.

Unfortunately, however, little did he know that the operation of the US and its allies in Afghanistan would be about to surpass the Soviet operation in terms of length with Taliban only getting stronger during his life. Salmaan was one of the few old PPP leading lights who did not visit, at least immediately, Asif Zardari when the latter made his stay in Lahore at Bilawal House-II there, after his release in 2004. He was quite candid and straight when Asif protested on his "lack of courtesy". He told Asif that he had a plausible reason not to call on him because he was deeply involved in his business and as a businessman he did not find it appropriate to again become political in a way so as to annoy those at the helm.

Who was then at the helm is quite well known. Musharraf was his benefactor, although Salmaan tried to unsuccessfully dilute this impression quite emphatically on several occasions by saying that what Musharraf did was his signature on the summary, which was moved by Prime Minister Gilani. Arguably, Salmaan earned the dubious distinction of being a true reflection of Musharraf's enlightened moderation slogan.

It was more due to Musharraf's insistence and less due to Zardari's generosity that enabled Salmaan to become the governor of Punjab. It was an open secret that Salmaan had strengthened his friendship bond with the dictator over a period of time for his support to government's policies in relation to madrassas, operations in FATA and Lal Masjid. Not only did Salmaan fail to accept the restoration of deposed judges that took place under his watch as Punjab governor with an open heart, his newspaper had not supported the lawyers who took to the streets to demand restoration of the Chief Justice sacked by an Urdu-speaking Musharraf.

In contrast, Salmaan was not generally found too cordial towards Urdu-speaking community, although he loved and liked Karachi more than any other part of the country as once he told this writer that for him Karachi is the most important place than the rest of the country put together. History tells us that the killing of Mrs Gandhi led to the massacre of hundreds of thousands of Sikhs across India.

The persecution was so blatant and vicious that a large number of Sikhs were forced to remove their turbans and beards in order to avoid becoming a visible target of revenge. This mass bloodshed, which was only reminiscent of 1947 killings of people at an unprecedented level at the time of India's partition, gave birth to a secessionist movement in the Indian Punjab.

Although, the Sikh struggle for an independent homeland has died down, the Congress-I of Indira Gandhi still has to do more to assuage the feelings of an alienated Sikh community even after its decision to appoint a Sikh prime minister of India for two terms. What will possibly happen in Pakistan in reaction to Salmaan's killing is a question which can possibly find its best answer in the deepening of the present political turmoil and further deterioration in law and order, particularly in Sindh and Punjab.

The writers is the newspaper's News Editor