It was almost a year-and-a-half ago that Geo Television – a leading Pakistani satellite television channel – splashed footage of a police raid on a Karachi cinema house. It showed overzealous policemen dragging women by their hair and calling them “dancing girls” [a term usually used for prostitutes and women of ill-repute who do public dance performances]. As I watched, I was wondering who would tell General Pervez Musharraf that dancing girls are also human beings, with hair as delicate as any other woman’s. Furthermore, the women who were being dragged on the road had been branded “dancing girls” by the police, notorious in Pakistan for their heavy-handed ways.
Raiding people in a cinema hall on the pretext that they are involved in immoral actions is just like asking couples at a picnic spot in Pakistan for their marriage papers. If no marriage papers are made available, the cops fine these civilized good men for being womanizers and these girls from respectable families who are with them for being “dancing girls.”
Geo showed footage again this evening of girls at the college of the Overseas Pakistanis Foundation – a state-run organization that looks after Pakistanis living abroad – who were protesting not having received their degrees despite having fulfilled all the academic requirements. Here too the police dragged the protesting girls by their hair; it was a repeat of what had happened in the Karachi cinema.
Only yesterday, I was telling my 12- and 13-year-old daughters that I feel disenchanted with the United States and wanted to go back home to Pakistan. My oldest daughter was prompt to oppose the idea, saying Pakistan has hot, with sweltering summers, lots of dust and noisy with the sound of the auto rickshaws, all this while she plugged her ears. I asked if she didn’t have all of life’s comforts at home, would she stop calling it home?
This debate has been going on at my home for a long time now. I say that I have to go back to “my” home and my children say that we are already in “our” home. No doubt, what they say is true. America is their home just like Pakistan is mine. However, today I feel frightened and ashamed after watching this latest report on the Geo channel, broadcast every 10 minutes. My daughters are back from school by now and certainly they too have seen this footage. What will I say to them if they ask me about the incident?
My daughters have a new and powerful argument in the long list of arguments to oppose my yearning to return to Pakistan. They will now tell me: “Daddy, girls are dragged by their hair in your Pakistan while here the police stops traffic on the road to protect us when we come out of our school.”
Professionally, Geo has done its job by showing the violence against these female students. However, it has also brought lots of shame to parents like me. I cannot say that Geo should not have shown this footage because, as a journalist, I know that journalism mirrors society and Geo has contributed to the high standards of journalism by splashing this report on the mini screen.
But, I am afraid Geo’s professional standard has put me in a nasty situation. I don’t know how many of you saw the footage of police excesses against the female students. I am saddened and perturbed when I recall the sobbing girl student saying, “The college administration charged us 40,000 to 50,000 rupees ($900) per semester. Who knows how our parents managed to pay this money? And now they tell us that we will not get our degrees and the police dragged us by grabbing the hair.”
The report also showed a girl who in a fit of rage threw a stone at her school. Her expression reminded me of my daughters; after a long day of putting up with their younger brother’s naughty behavior, their eyes filled with tears while begging him to stop. This girl student had picked a stone in the same manner and had thrown it towards her school; she seemed to have exhausted her options.
