[Reader-list] Role-playing at a Karachi Madrassa

[Ajmal Kamal]

By Ajmal Kamal

Passing by a madrassa in any urban area of Pakistan these days is likely to
evoke a feeling of near-nostalgia for the old madrassa. These religious
schools were attached to neighbourhood mosques and were run with the meager
support from the resident community which also closely monitored its
working. These institutions now belong to the past. During Gen. Zia's
military rule, which was characterized by a long USA-sponsored jihad, these
were replaced by grand, multi-crore-rupee structures now dominating urban
Pakistan. These new, non-traditional structures, in many cases occupying
amenity plots, have no relationship to the local community residing around
them, as the main declared source of their support are the non-resident
Pakistanis and their concerns are none less than international jihadi
politics.

This was evident by the role-playing show organized on the independence day
at the Jamia Rasheedia, located in the northern-most suburb of Karachi. Many
of the players currently on the international scene were there — George W.
Bush, Osama Bin Laden, Kofi Annan, Afghan President Hamid Karzai, his
Pakistani conterpart, in addition to unnamed representatives of India,
Israel, Iran, Hamas and Hizbollah — mouthing what the students playing their
roles and their teachers took to be their positions on the present status of
jihad. But the exciting thing was that all this was being done in English.
Apart from the few people specially invited to witness and appreciate the
special English learning batch of the Jamia's students, practically none of
the spectators followed a word of English, which did not in any way diminish
their rapt attention to the proceedings. The "talk show" was organized more
or less like the regular TV fare, although all kinds of images of human and
other creatures are banned. Drama, as far as the visual representation goes,
is a despised act in orthodox Islam. The result was that hardly any effort
was made to make the players look like the roles they were enacting. As it
happened, Bush displayed a much longer beard than Osama as the latter was
played by a young boy with a dismal growth at his chin.

The "debate" was quite revealing as it chracterised all the favourite
fantasies of the Pakistani fundamentalist mind which shares its distorted
version of today's world with that of the fundamentalist neocons: that it is
a worldwide struggle between Jihadi Islam and the West. However, the
participants had a highly unrealistic view of Pakistan's capabilities,
nuclear and otherwise. Near the end of the show, when Bush and Osama looked
tired of calling each other "Terrorist!" at the top of their voice, suddenly
the unnamed Hamas leader broke into a longish sermon directed specifically
on President Musharraf sitting peevishly next to Karzai. As soon as the
sermon came to a close, the President of Pakistan rose saying "you have
opened my eyes, now I will wholeheartedly support the Jihad the world over."
In a rare display of action, all the anti-Jihad characters, led by Bush,
stood up and ran out of the performance hall, and Musharraf embraced the
Hamas leader, encouraged by a big applause from the audience.

The rather unrealistic, comical view of the world did not in the least
bother the sponsors of the show at the Madrassa, whose sole obsession
reflected in the question they eagerly put to the 'special guests' before
inviting them to a sumptuous lunch: Angrezi to achhi boli na ladkon ne?"
(The boys spoke impressive English, didn't they?)
15 September 2006

-- 
Ajmal Kamal
City Press
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