Offhand, there are atleast two significant aspects to this May 31 incident, which took place at the Naudero rest house where a scheduled open kutchery by the Sindh Chief Minister, Syed Qaim Ali Shah, actually brought disorder and stirred "chaos". The first is that we have reached a stage that the media (print and electronic) are able to report the obvious failure of the open kutchery as against the days when this was not possible.
The other aspect is the reported reason why there was this disorder, chaos (read failure of the purpose of the meeting with the public). The Sindh Chief Minister came three and a half hours late (said a TV channel on Sunday night) to the open kutchery, which enables one to underline the late coming in this society. It is not limited to VIPs and chief guests alone. Everybody comes late, and takes it as his or her right. Whether it is at work or off work the absence of punctuality is something that appears to be a cultural value, cherished, and upheld as an indicator of status. And late coming has a reason which seeks to justify and transfer blame elsewhere.
A leading English daily reported on Monday morning that the chief minister was three hours late, and carried details of the event - as a result of which Syed Qaim Ali Shah had to leave the rest house and return to Larkana.
Some points from the incident reflect the impatience, the resentment and the anger of the citizens who came to the open kutchery, where they also waited for the 180-210 minutes in the suffocating heat of May in the heart of Sindh. Not just the Chief Minister but also some provincial cabinet members were late, it may be added here.
The meeting began after an address of welcome followed by speeches about issues like delay in the payment by Passco to growers and de-silting of Tayyab and Dakhan (minor) canals -the offshoots of the Warah canal. It was when the Provincial law minister Ayaz Soomro called the engineer of Warah canal to explain the situation that the "people became unruly and thronged the stage".
The Chief Minister asked the people to maintain decorum and show discipline but that did not deter the workers from coming to the stage. Eventually the chief minister and his cabinet colleagues went inside the rest house. The workers followed them, broke the windows and doors and entered it. Syed Qaim Ali Shah decided to leave the rest house, but that too wasn't orderly.
The people had job applications in their hands, and pushed each other so as to reach him, and wanted to narrate their grievances, as they had waited that long, in that heat. We want jobs, not development, one worker was quoted as saying. The police on duty ensured that the chief guest leave as early as possible.
Possibly, in one limited way, such an incident is easy to understand. We have reached such a stage of poor governance or no governance, and public faith in public dealing departments is so low, and belief that justice will be provided to those who have been wronged in a variety of ways, is so weak and flimsy, that it is typical to view it with cynicism. To believe that this is how it will always be. But happily enough, that cannot be.
It seems that things are changing. I am putting it simply, and carefully. Public perception of what is wrong with this society, and how it needs to be improved quickly, is changing; and public impatience is on the low side. Whether the ultimate, final and comprehensive change will take place soon enough is some thing that remains to be seen.
What Pakistani society will do in the immediate future is something that will be critical to its survival, it seems. For among others, injustice has become widespread, and is almost a daily happening, in the lives of hapless citizens. Decision-makers have wronged Pakistan, and its people and got away with it. And the affluent elite have so organised their lives that their vested interests are actually abroad. Where is the punishment, the accountability? Ask humiliated belittled ordinary citizens.
It is absolutely relevant to bring in here the fact that the new judicial policy has come into effect from Monday, 1st June 2009 and it aims very categorically at the speedy disposal of cases. It has been stated that all fresh and pending cases in the Supreme Court and high courts will be decided in one year and those from Balochistan within six months.
This was one of the major decisions taken at a meeting of the National Judicial Policy making committee chaired by its secretary, Dr Faqir Hussain, at the Supreme Court registry in Islamabad, on Saturday. The committee decisions have been published in 39-page booklet - and the policy seeks to ensure the independence of the judiciary and the expeditious disposal of cases. The available details make interesting reading and I hope that this 39-page booklet will be available to the people in the country. It would not only enable us to stay informed of what lies ahead, but also reflect the specific problems that the country is faced with.
For the subject of injustice, the suffering of the ordinary citizens in almost walks of life, have reached alarming levels, threatening to undo further the stability and solidarity of this society.
The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Pakistan Mr Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, said in Lahore on Saturday that Pakistan was passing through testing times, that "the restoration of the people's confidence in the judiciary was a must." He also warned "anyone bringing disgrace to the judiciary would not be tolerated even for a minute". He was speaking at a reception hosted in his honour and also other judges as well by the Punjab Bar Council.
It is also pertinent to mention a news report from Islamabad in which President Asif Ali Zardari has asked bureaucracy to tackle the challenges that lie ahead, and to formulate such policies that would win the "hearts and minds of the people". He said and more while talking to the federal bureaucracy at the Aiwan e Sadr on Saturday.
The participating bureaucrats were reported to have opined that the "cumbersome rules and lengthy and complicated procedures had handicapped the performance of the government", and they suggested that there should be a simplification of the government's rules of business so that they could take quick and efficient decisions. Interesting indeed.
Finally, this is how I may end today - a report says that the "contractors seek government help against corrupt officials". This was said by a contractor in Lahore at a meeting of the Federation of Punjab Contractors Associations.
He further said that "nearly 30 percent of every project cost is invariably kept for bribing the corrupt among government officials to get reimbursements and completion certificates at the cost of quality" (of the project).
I would like to hope and pray that much of this rot will become history with the new judicial policy having come into effect and that the change that Pakistani society is desperately seeking at this critical stage of it turbulent history will atleast begin to surface. What are the signs of our times? We wonder sometimes.
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