When the sale of alcoholic beverages was banned in 1977 in Pakistan, it was more of a political decision than a moral

one. Under pressure from an animated protest movement by an alliance of various right-wing political parties (Pakistan National Alliance [PNA]), Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto began to pragmatically address and agree to some of the demands made to him by PNA leaders. Bhuttos six-year-old government had come to power through the popular vote and had made a number of socialist and secular promises. However, by its sixth year in power, the government was facing harsh criticism from its right-wing opponents (especially in the major urban centers of the country). By the time Bhutto went in for a reelection in 1977, his government was facing grave economic problems (triggered by the international Oil Crises stemming from the 1973 Egypt-Israel War), subsequent inflation and the failure of the Bhutto regimes nationalization policies that had seen a number of nationalized industries, banks and educational institutions suffering from incompetent management and rising corruption. During his tenure he had also tried to fuse populist socialist and secular notions of social democracy with a more progressive version of Political Islam (which his ideologues called Islamic Socialism). Though the idea was to blunt the opposition coming from the right-wing religious groups with this fusion, it actually regenerated these groups that had otherwise been swept aside during the 1970 general elections. For instance, as a catch-all slogan, the PNA, led by fundamentalist parties such as the Jamat-iIslami (JI), Jamiat Ulema Islam (JUI) and Jamiat Ulema Pakistan (JUP) demanded that Pakistan be governed by a Nizam-e-Mustafa (Prophet Muhammads system of governance). Even though this supposed system of governance was explained with the help of various unrelated hadiths (Islamic traditions based on hearsay about Muhammads sayings) and on the modern writings of Islamic scholars such as JI chief, Abul Ala Mauddudi (one of the founders of 20th century Political Islam), Bhuttos Islamic Socialism had unwittingly given credence to certain myths that began being advocated as historical facts. The historical framework of PNAs Nizam-eMustafa was one such myth. Secondly, when in 1973, Bhutto purged his own party, the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), by expelling a number of its left-wing ideologues, he (like Anwar Sadat in Egypt), overestimated the threat posed to his government by the pro-Soviet far-left groups. And again like Sadat, Bhutto thought that he could deflect opposition from the Islamists by giving them a free hand on university campuses that were until then hotbeds of left-wing thought and action. By 1973 college and university campuses in Karachi and Lahore had witnessed a surge in the popularity and influence (through student union elections) of the JIs student wing the Islami

Jamiat Taleba (IJT). However, it was also true that in the event of the ineffectual and divided opposition against Bhutto in the parliament and the streets, his opponents, especially in the shape of the mohajirs (Urdu speakers) in Karachi and the right-wing anti-Bhutto bourgeoisie in the Punjab, largely expressed their opposition to Bhuttos populist socialist/secular regime through the IJT in educational institutions. During the campaigning of the 1977 elections, the PNA accused Bhutto of being a drunk and resolved that if the people voted PNA into power it would rid the society of the evils of alcohol. During a rally in Lahore the same year, Bhutto responded by telling the crowds that, Haan mein sharab peeta hoon, laikan awam ka khoon nahi peeta! (Yes I drink, but I do not drink the peoples blood). He was lashing out in this respect at the alliance of right-wing religious parties with those industrialists whose businesses he had nationalized. This was not the first time that the right-wing religious parties had blamed alcohol for the economic, political and social sufferings of the people. The youth wing of the fundamentalist Majlis-e-Ahrar had attacked coffee houses serving alcoholic drinks in Lahore during the 1953 anti-Ahmadi riots. Then in the late 1960s the student wing of the JI, (the IJT), began a movement against liquor stores and bars in Karachi when (in 1968) the progressive Islamic scholar, Dr. Fazalur Rahman Malik, (who was appointed by the Ayub Khan regime to head the Central Institute of Islamic Research), publicly claimed that beer (or any alcoholic beverage with less than five per cent alcohol content) was not haraam (unlawful) in Islam. In response to Rahmans statement, JI asked for his resignation and IJT activists attacked a number of liquor stores and hoardings and billboards advertising the Pakistani made Murree Beer in Karachi. Nevertheless, the IJT campaign did not resonate with the public that was already embroiled in the largely left-wing student movement against the pro-US Ayub dictatorship, even though Rahman did decide to resign after realising the weakening of the Ayub regime. After the loss of East Pakistan (that broke away and became Bangladesh) in 1971 and the subsequent defeat of the Pakistan army at the hands of their Indian counterparts, JI accused the Pakistani generals liking for wine and women as one of the main causes of Pakistans defeat in the war. In 1974 prime minister Bhutto banned alcohol in the army mess halls, although no such action was taken against bars, nightclubs, coffee houses and liquor stores. Throughout the Bhutto regime IJT tried to initiate various campaigns against liquor stores and nightclubs but it failed to find much public support until the 1977 PNA movement.

After Bhuttos PPP swept the National Assembly polls in the 1977 elections, PNA claimed that the results were manipulated and that there were widespread cases of fraud undertaken by government agents during the polling. After boycotting the Provincial Assembly elections, PNA began a tense protest movement. The movement demanded Bhuttos resignation. It got its strongest support in Karachi where thousands of students, shopkeepers, businessmen and professionals agitated in the streets and clashed head-on with the police. A number of liquor stores and nightclubs were also attacked and looted. So when Bhutto got into a dialogue with the PNA, he agreed to close down all bars, liquor stores and nightclubs, also banning gambling and announcing that the Muslim holy day of Friday would replace Sunday as the weekly holiday. Just when it seemed that a breakthrough was on the horizon between the PPP regime and the PNA, General Ziul Haq pulled off a military coup in July 1977. Although he also arrested PNA members along with PPP ministers and Bhutto himself, Zia adopted the PNAs Islamic overtones and then invited the JI to help him turn Pakistan into becoming a true Islamic state. The bans imposed on alcohol by Bhutto remained, but Zia added a punishment of 80 lashes to anyone defying the ban. Today, sale and usage of alcohol beverages is still banned in Pakistan (for the Muslims). Wine shops licensed by the government to cater to Pakistans Hindu, Christian and Parsi communities are allowed to function but only if they sell locally brewed beer, whisky, gin, vodka and rum and only serve the countrys (or foreign) non-Muslim consumers who have a permit. However, according to the owner of Pakistans largest brewery, Murree Breweries, Isphanyar Bhandara, almost 90 per cent of the consumers of his brewerys products are Muslim. Karachi and the interior of the Sindh province have the largest number of legal wine shops and getting alcoholic drinks from these shops has always been easier and less harassing than it is elsewhere in Pakistan. The province of Punjab has the strictest of laws compared to the more liberal ones found in this regard in Sindh. That is why the JI and IJT have continued to try initiating campaigns against the wine shops in Sindh and Karachi. But these campaigns have failed to enjoy any public momentum whatsoever. Whereas some anti-alcohol crusaders suggest that such campaigns have been a failure due to the bigger problem of heroin addiction in the cities, JI and IJT blame Karachis leading political parties, the PPP, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) and the Awami National Party (ANP) of having economic interests attached to the liquor business.

In the rest of Sindh, JI accuses PPP ministers and members belonging to nationalist Sindhi parties of being the real owners of the liquor shops. It is also interesting to note that the use of deadly drugs such as heroin increased (almost tenfold) in Pakistan after the ban on liquor went into effect in 1977. For example until 1979 there was only a single reported case of heroin addiction in Pakistan (reported to the Jinnah Hospital in Karachi), but by 1985, Pakistan was burdened by having the worlds second largest population of heroin addicts. Also starling is the fact that there has been little or almost no action by the countrys mainstream religious parties on the issue of heroin usage and sale.

Nadeem F. Paracha is a cultural critic and senior columnist for Dawn Newspaper and Dawn.com.

DISCLAIMER: The following article is a work of satire and fiction and in no way attempts to depict events in real life. In September 2012, a 15-year-old school girl from Pakistans Swat valley was reported to have been shot in the face and head by a Taliban activist. The attack caused outrage around the world and the news was given widespread coverage in the local and international media. Malala was reported to have barely survived after doctors in Pakistan and then England performed multiple surgeries on her face and head. Today Malala lives in the UK and has repeatedly vowed to continue working for the cause of womens education in Pakistan, especially in those areas of the country where extremists and militant outfits are said to have been blowing up girls schools. But this is just one side of the whole story. The narrative about what really happened on the day Malala was allegedly shot has mostly been weaved by the Western media. In April this year, Dawn.com sent a group of its most seasoned reporters to Swat to undertake an intensive five-month investigation of the event. Their collective findings unearthed a series of

some stunning disclosures (with evidence) that are bound to affectively challenge the mainstream narrative of the Malala story. The following are the major findings of the investigation: Malala was not born in Swat and neither is she a Pushtun. A respected medical doctor in Swat, Imtiaz Ali Khanzai, who runs a private hospital and clinic in Swat told our reporters that he has a DNA report that proves that Malala is not Pushtun. Showing us the report, he said he extracted Malalas DNA when as a child she visited his clinic (with her parents) complaining of an earache. After she was supposedly shot last year, I remembered I had a bottle where I had kept some of her earwax, the doctor explained. Collecting earwax of my patients is a hobby of mine, he added. He went on to claim that according to the DNA, Malala is a Caucasian, most probably from Poland. After the discovery, the doctor called Malalas father and told him that he knew who Malala was. He was stunned and began to stutter, the doctor said. He pleaded that I did not make my findings public. I told him I wouldnt but only if he told me the whole truth. Malalas father told the doctor that Malalas real name was Jane and she was born in Hungary in 1997. Her real biological parents were Christian missionaries who, after traveling to Swat in 2002, left Malala as a gift to her adopted parents after they secretly converted to Christianity. When our reporters asked the doctor why he was revealing Malalas real identity now, he said he was convinced that Malala was planted in Swat by anti-Pakistan elements. He then added that he can also prove that the young man who shot her was not a Pushtun either. I have his earwax as well, he claimed. After extracting the DNA of the shooters earwax, the doctor discovered that he was probably from Italy. He then invited our reporters to look at the mans earwax under a microscope. Those tiny yellow bits that you see in the wax are bits of pizza, he explained.

The doctor told us that in January 2012 he emailed his findings to some senior members of Pakistans intelligence agency, the ISI. After a few days his clinic was raided by the police. He was in Saudi Arabia at the time collecting earwax samples of some members of the Saudi royal family. His staff at the clinic was harassed by the police who wanted to know where he kept the earwax samples. In June this year, the doctor was visited by a young ISI officer who apologised to him about the police raid and told him that the ISI were well aware of Malalas real identity. After much coaxing on our part, the doctor eventually gave us the cell phone number of the ISI officer. However, the officer kept refusing to talk to us but finally relented on the condition that we refer to him as Master X. Master X met one of our reporters at an abandoned girls school in lower Swat. To hide his face, the officer wore a Spiderman mask. Talking to the reporter he said: This had to come out one day. And I just couldnt let myself continue to keep such a dangerous secret hidden. I am a true patriot. He then added: My father once told me, Peter, with great power comes great responsibility. His revelations led us to our next shocking discovery (with evidence): Malalas shooting was staged by intelligence agencies. The officer told the reporter that the whole shooting incident was a stunt planned by Pakistani and US agencies to pave the way for the Pakistani armys invasion of North Waziristan: It was all a drama, he explained. It was staged so the Pakistan army would have an excuse to invade North Waziristan. When asked why he was using the word invasion when North Waziristan was a part of Pakistan, the officer replied: North Waziristan is an autonomous Islamic Emirates. It has been like that for centuries. But our history books distort the facts and teach our children that it is part of Pakistan. The area has unimaginable amounts of oil, gold, copper, silver, bronze, coal, diamonds, gas and fossilised dinosaur remains underneath its rugged grounds. Thats what the Americans are after. Our reporter then asked whether he had any evidence to prove his claim. The officer pulled out a few photographs and showed it to the reporter. The photographs showed a few bones. Dinosaur bones, he explained.

He added: These were excavated in North Waziristan by the archaeology division of the Taliban. After they were studied by the geology division of the Taliban, it had traces of oil, gold, copper, silver, bronze, coal, diamonds and gas. What about the evidence proving that the shooting was staged by American and Pakistani agencies? Pulling out a piece of paper, the officer said: This is the evidence. It was decoded by the Talibans division of quantum physics. The paper had screen shots of a brief exchange of tweets on Twitter between one Lib Fish and Oil Gul. The officer said that Lib Fish was actually a CIA operative based in Qatar and Oil Gul was an ISI sleuth on Twitter based in Lahore. The exchange was intercepted and decoded by one Tsunami Mommy who is based in Swabi in the Khyber Pakhtunkwa province in Pakistan and is an engineer by profession. We are publishing the Twitter exchange between Lib Fish and Oil Gul that was provided to us by the officer: @LibFish Yo, @OilGul, how goes life? @OilGul Lifes kool, mate. @LibFish @OilGul Any chance of visiting Qatar soon? @OilGul @LibFish Haha. Soon after Im done with my O level exams. They suck. @LibFish @OilGul Haha. Yea, they do, dont they? The officer told us that Tsunami Mommy jumped in after he realised what was taking place: @Tsunami_Mommy Agents! I know what you two do. Anti-Islam anti-Pakistan bastaaas. @OilGul @LibFish @OilGul Dude, who are you? Why are you trolling us? @Tsunami_Mommy Shup ut fake liberalz fascist agents IK is best you bastaaas NA250 rigging 1 billion fake liberalz votes anti-Pakistan anti-Islam inshallah Nya Bakistan tabdeeli

The officer said he used famous Pakistani linguist and WW-II code-breaker, Mustansar Hussain Tarar, to decode the suspicious Twitter exchange and that is when he discovered that the CIA and the ISI were planning the fake shooting. He also gave the reporter the manuscript of the book that Tsunami Mommy was writing on the shooting after piecing together the evidence (with evidence) provided by the doctor, the officer and Mustansar Hussain Tarar. The books title will be A Fake Shooting of a Fake Liberal by a Fake Liberal, You Bastaaas. Below is the brief summary of what the manuscript claims: October 1, 1997: Malala is born to Hungarian parents in Budapest and named Jane. October 4, 2002: The parents are recruited by the CIA and given a crash course in evangelical Christianity, hypnosis and karate. October 7, 2003: They land in Pakistan and head for Swat posing as NGO workers. They get in touch with a low-level ISI agent, and convert the family to Christianity, leaving Jane with him. He changes her name to Malala and instils in her the fear of Jesus. October 30, 2007: Malala starts to write a blog that asks the militants of Swat to put down their weapons, pick up a Bible and boogie. October 21, 2011: The militants request her to stop writing her evangelical blogs and finish her homework instead. October 1, 2012: CIA recruits a Pashtu speaking Italian-American loner (Robert) living in New York and gives him a crash course in gun-slinging and acting. October 7, 2012: CIA shares plan of Malalas fake shooting with the ISI. The ISI agrees and gives Malala and her parents a briefing. October 11, 2012: The Italian-America arrives in Swat posing as an Uzbek homeopath. October 12, 2012: Robert is given a gun that is loaded with blanks. He intercepts Malalas school van and fires blanks at her. She pretends to be hit and squeeze opens a small pack of Mitchels Tomato Ketchup she is hiding in one of her hands and rubs the ketchup all over her face. A fake

ambulance suddenly arrives on the scene and takes away Malala. The world is told that she was shot in the face and head by a Taliban fanatic. The story that ran in the media quoted Malalas friends in the van saying that the gunman asked for Malala and then shot her. But the officer shared with us the testimony of one of Malalas friends that was repressed by vested interests in the media. According to the testimony, a man stopped the van and shouted (in Pashtu), who is Jane I mean, Jeanette no, Alberta Joan Lucas? The girls looked at each other in confusion and the driver was about to drive away when the gunman pulled out a gun and started to shout: Uno momento, un momento Then looking at a girl he asked: You lookin at me? At which Malala threw down her school bag and shouted (in Italian): No you idiot, I AM lookin at you. Malala, Malala, remember? Fool. Saying, Oh, he shot her (with the blanks). The girl that the media was shown in the hospital was not Malala. The officer shared with us some photographs to prove this. He first showed us a video (on his iPhone) that he shot hours after the shooting. It shows Malala joyfully bungee jumping on the hills near River Swat. Then the officer informed us that the doctor had the earwax samples of the girl in the hospital. When we contacted the doctor again and asked what the samples proved he said that the DNA he extracted from the sample suggests that the girl in the hospital was not a girl at all. It was a pillow. He said he had managed to sneak into the operating room (posing as a postman) and while he was secretly drawing out earwax from the girls ears, he managed to take a picture of the girl with his Nokia phone. I came back and was shocked when I enlarged the picture, he said. He then gave us a printout of the picture We believe there is now enough evidence for Pakistan and the international community to have a serious re-look at the Malala story and demand that the United Nations orders a full investigation into the matter.

DISCLAIMER: The above article is a work of satire and fiction and in no way attempts to depict events in real life.