Karachi has long been considered a jewel in the proverbial crown of the State of Pakistan. Though it may not possess the magisterial allure of Lahore or the eccentric sights of the northern cities, it has a charm that no other city in the country can lay a similar claim to. It is the economic hub of the country, it has a prime port and is the front of generating a lion share of Pakistan revenue by being the epicenter of its economic framework. Its charm is its industrial might and the resolve of its inhabitants. Inhabitants who not only hail from many distinct ethnicities from within the country, but of foreigners as well. It is a country that has shouldered the burden of growing refugee settlements over the decades and has still continued towards its march to progress. There is no other city with this kind of diversity and hope that this city both illuminates and represents.
However, its problems, of which there are many, serve a special purpose in defining the character of the city and those that have inhabitance in it must not allow these problems to linger on. Especially when some of them cause greater harm than any illusions of grandeur. One such problem, is the city violent history related to Gang wars.
Lyari, one of the most established neighborhoods of Karachi, was at one time an obscure residential village, known for its inhabitants of African heritage and their furor for football. However, it has transformed into a Mafia zone throughout the years.
Neighborhood inhabitants and police endeavored to remain protected as bandits battled out in the streets. The dons of Lyari are ruthless and absolute – men are shot dead in the city without any trigger warning. At the height of the gang wars in the previous decade, more than 800 kicked the bucket. Residents in the area can vividly recall the grim and gruesome fates that have marred the lives of countless individuals, simply for being at the wrong place at the wrong time. If one ever needed a stark recollection of how ghastly these feuds are, one incident particularly symbolizes it when in 2013, Arshad Pappu, leader of one of the factions active in the area, was captured, tormented and decapitated . Rival Gang leaders Baba Ladla and Uzair Baloch played football with his incapacitated head…a scene fit for one of Martin Scorsese classic gangster screenplays, was enacted in real life.
The carcasses of Pappu and his sibling were paraded on a donkey before being hacked and burnt. At last, their fiery remains were dumped in a sewer. This was Baloch vendetta against his victim father, Haji Lalu, who had allegedly rendered the same fate to Baloch father, Faiz Muhammad. Pappu had likewise profaned the grave of Dadal, the father of Rehman Dakait, a standout in the harrowing list of Lyari dons. Attempting to coerce and intimidate Rehman Dakait, implied welcoming quick revenge and was only a matter of time that he had evaded a fate similar to that of Pappu.
Till 2009, Rehman Dakait was the undisputed king of Lyari Black market. He was once near the former Prime Minister, Benazir Bhutto and was viewed as a Robin Hood. He ran schools and clinics, while his gang sold medications and liquor and was associated with land-grabbing and prostitution rackets. In Lyari alone, he had 33 nooks for illicit exercises, for example, selling medications, betting and trafficking in huts disguised as shops.
Rehman Dakait utilized his riches to prevail upon Lyari and fix his hold on the zone. He met his end in a way that befits most gangster, riddled with bullets during a police operation in 2009.
Uzair Baloch who was his cousin, took control of Dacait gang or what was left of it, and grew both his recruits and sphere of influence in the region. At one time Pappu and Rehman Dakait fathers were accomplices. Things used to different, and yet in the criminal underworld, alliances are only tool from which one hopes to prosper without hesitating for a second to betray his confidants for greater benefit. Violence is the undeniable truth of the underworld.
Haji Lalu was also one of the dons of Lyari, and Dadal was his partner. However, Dadal split away after a row had emerged between them over the division of the ransom received from a routine kidnapping. That was the point at which the gang split and duplicated into groups. Gangs don’t just split over monetary issues - there was territorial control at play as well . Rehman Dakait had the backing of the Pakistan People Party while Arshad Pappu was upheld by Karachi fundamental Political force, the MQM.
Governmental issues have constantly had an influence in Lyari abysmal fall into gang territory. In the 1970s, Benazir Bhutto father, at that point, Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, gave a plethora of civil rights to Lyari inhabitants, as an extension of his various Socialist policies.
They always remembered his contributions towards the aim of turning Lyari into a modern architype of progress. In the 1980s, the general population of Lyari were most vocal against Gen Zia-ul-Haq administration. The military rebuffed Lyari by curbing medical aid and halting all social welfare programs initiated by the Bhutto regime. Residents old enough to remember frequently recall, an entire generation, an entire age was lost when the military junta in their short sightedness, gave no heed to the vacuum it was creating in an already underprivileged area of the city. Despair fans hatred. Thousands of young men, enraged, without education, without social and moral upbringing, were time bombs waiting to explode…the gangs knew this . This is where the likes of Uzair Baloch, Arshad Pappu and Rehman Dacait were made into what they became. One cannot help but wonder what fate would have awaited these names if they too had had access to education, healthcare and basic social services.
At the point when Benazir Bhutto came to power, her legislature took a shot at trying to curb the growing epidemic of Lyari gang problem. In any case, other political powers had infringed on its turf, most outstandingly the MQM, which utilized its muscles through Pappu group.
After Benazir Bhutto demise in 2007, it was her widower Asif Ali Zardari government that bolstered Rehman Dakait to frame the “People Aman Committee (PAC) to go up against the MQM. The PAC had its work cut out and wars emitted between the posse of Rahman Dakait and Arshad Pappu.
The PAC took control, and kidnappings climbed fundamentally in Karachi. PAC individuals began gathering “protection money over the city. Be that as it may, its greatest slip-up was the point at which the PAC declined to embrace Zardari stepbrother as a contender for MP from Lyari. A political blunder from an organization that needed Zardari backing to keep on level pace with MQM. Therefore, the hand that protected it, backed out, PAC knew it had committed a gaffe of epic proportions.
Due to this the relations between the PPP and the gangster soured and the PAC was banned in 2011. A crackdown resulted in the eventual gunning down of Rehman Dakait in 2009. As mentioned earlier, where Rehman chose disobedience, Uzair Baloch found it wise to continue serving the PPP prospects. This was challenged by Baba Ladla, a partner of Rehman Dakait and Baloch, who formed his own faction having fallen out with Uzair. After an especially wicked round of savagery in Lyari, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif requested Pakistan Rangers to take control . The operation began and within months more than 1,000 men suspected of direct or indirect affiliations with the gangs were arrested, including Baloch, who had fled to Oman and after that to Dubai. Baloch was captured by Interpol in December 2014 while crossing into the United Arab Emirates from Oman by land. This was a leap forward for the Sharif government, as a special police unit, which went to Dubai to look for Baloch whereabouts from UAE officials, had returned with nothing to show.
Since the operations reached its twilight, gang related violence has subsided enormously within the region. A blanket of calm has so far covered the area where many social programs with an added incentive for high achievers have been launched to avoid the folly of 4 decades back. Uzair Baloch has made a number of shocking testimonials while in custody. Such as allegations of payments of ransom amounts to members of the Provincial and Federal governments. The PPP has expectedly labelled this a ploy of the establishment against their party. Be that as it may, it is a separate issue, one for a different time. For now, Lyari is without a major organized criminal enterprise for the first time in decades, if the correct steps are taken, the area can get back up on its feet and leave its violent history in the past and a stark reminder of what governmental negligence can result in.