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PAKISTAN:
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ASIA | February 23, 1998 VOL. 151 NO. 7 |
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Star-Crossed Lovers In a real-life version of Romeo and Juliet, an inter-ethnic romance sets Pakistan's largest city on edge By HANNAH BLOCH Karachi
Rifat's departure had the extraordinary effect of paralyzing Karachi (pop. 14 million), Pakistan's largest city and its commercial hub. A one-day transportation strike called by the enraged Pathan community-without Jabbar Afridi's knowledge, or apparently, his approval-to protest the police's inability to solve her disappearance turned violent. Mobs rampaged through the city toppling vendors' carts, smashing cars and attacking bystanders. By nightfall, two people were dead and at least a dozen injured. How could a star-crossed romance bring a megacity to a screeching halt? The answer lies in the layers of Karachi's society and troubled politics. The city has long been plagued by ethnic hostilities, primarily between Pathans and Mohajirs. The accidental death of a Mohajir girl, who was hit by a minibus driven by a man thought to be a Pathan, sparked months of Pathan-Mohajir violence and a thousand deaths in the city more than a decade ago. Things have calmed down since then. To some extent, commerce has blurred the boundaries between the ethnic groups, which are no longer as polarized as they once were. Neighborhoods, for example, are mixed. From the steep steps leading up to her family's six-room house nestled on a brown hillside, Rifat could easily have glimpsed Kanwar Ahsan, who lived just a few streets away. Rifat is a member of the Afridi tribe of Pathans, whose women are celebrated for their beauty. "Rosy and fair to the eye are the daughters of the Afridis," wrote the 17th century Pathan poet Khushal Khan Khattak. "Lovely, how lovely they are." Afridi men are known for their bravery and volatility; like all Pathans, they practice the code of honor known as Pukhtoonwali. It includes principles of sanctuary, revenge, and protection and seclusion of women, who represent the entire tribe's honor. "The most precious thing to a family is women, and if someone touches them, it is intolerable," says Tariq Khan, the chief of Karachi's Pathan tribal council. The idea that a Mohajir like Ahsan could run off with Rifat inflames the Pathan sense of pride-and revenge. But in a modern city like Karachi, social strictures erode and it becomes more difficult to maintain long-held traditions. Khan, for example, is a savvy 25-year-old in a job normally reserved for wizened elders in the rugged, ultra-conservative tribal area from which his family comes. And, as Jabbar Afridi must know, it is increasingly difficult to sequester girls and women from the city's temptations, opportunities and variety. "He told the family it would be much better if he and all the family had died before the incident took place," says a nephew. "We should have all died before witnessing this." Pathans began migrating in large numbers to Karachi from the tribal belt between Pakistan and Afghanistan in the 1950s, seeking jobs and economic security. They have become the city's second-largest ethnic group, after the Mohajirs. But the reality of Karachi is that it belongs to no single group. Just about everyone is a foreigner here, and each ethnic community has struggled to carve out an economic niche for itself. The Pathans, for instance, monopolize the transport industry, and their brightly decorated buses, trucks and rickshaws-adorned with images of flowers, birds and hearts-are everywhere. But economic progress has not obliterated the old ways. "It is no fault of her brothers or father, but when she returns, the family will receive taunts," says Sultan Khan, 58, a gem dealer and father of Karachi's young tribal council chief. "And to avoid this, the girl will be killed. Our tribal rule is to kill this girl." By week's end, no one was quite sure where the couple had gone. Some said they had fled to interior Sindh province or Lahore; others believe they had slipped out of the country. A Pathan proverb says that a woman leaves her house only twice in her life: once to go to the home of her husband and once to the graveyard. Rifat Afridi has left her parents' home, and those who know her story believe it would be unwise for her to return.
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hite-bearded jabbar afridi, 79, is referring to his youngest daughter in the past tense. "She was a simple girl," he says sadly, "a religious girl, down-to-earth and obedient." The daughter, 16-year-old Rifat, is almost surely alive, but to him she might as well be dead. Her abrupt disappearance in a taxi one evening early this month with a man from another ethnic group has brought such shame to her conservative Pathan family in Karachi that many are convinced the girl's days are numbered no matter what. The family says Kanwar Ahsan kidnapped her, but neighborhood gossip has it that the two were in love and eloped, even though Rifat was already engaged. Ahsan, a dubious Romeo wanted in a number of criminal cases, is twice Rifat's age and has ties with the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, a political party representing Urdu-speaking immigrants known as Mohajirs.