Of Bagiari Friday prayers that could not be offered

By Afzal Hussain Bokhari

The view of the Khyber Pass Mountains outside the speeding van reminded the Kabul-bound travellers of the grandeur shown in the late British director David Lean's exquisite films.

Counting at the string of beads hanging down their strong wrists, the home-sick Afghan passengers peered out of the capsule-shaped Toyota Hiace van.

The fresh morning breeze in the tribal Khyber Agency had cleared their minds.

The end-of-March sunshine indicated that it was about midday. The prayer call from the Jamia Mosque near Bagiari check post sounded so sweet to the ears.

The driver jumped on the brakes and brought the van to a halt near the mosque, some five kilometres to the west of Jamrud.

The worshippers proceeded on to perform ablution. Sense of equality appeared typically Islamic.

Drivers, conductors, khasadars, the refugees, the sons of the soil, the ill-clad and the well-dressed all walked into the Jamia Mosque and formed ranks shoulder to shoulder.

It might have been a similar sight that inspired 'Poet of the East' Allama Sir Muhammad Iqbal to say that: 'Aik hi saf main kharay ho gai Mehmud-o-Ayaz!' The footwear left behind at the entrance in semi-wet condition looked annoyingly identical.

The ‘pesh imam’ stood at the head of the medley crowd to lead the Friday prayer.

Raising his hands up, he touched the lobes of his ears and confessed to the fact of God being Great by saying aloud ‘Allah-o-Akbar’.

A deafening explosion at the very start of the prayer shook the place of worship and within seconds brought down the two-storey mosque over the heads of the faithful.

Those who personally witnessed the tragedy were badly overawed.

Allama Iqbal’s line (na koi banda raha, na banda-nawaz) had suddenly assumed a different, satiric connotation.

Fifty-three deaths were confirmed with nearly 173 injured.

The mobile phones wailed and the message was passed on to the near and dear ones.

The news presenters swallowed a lump in their throat while breaking the tragic news.

Known as the fortress of Islam in the Muslim Ummah, things had apparently taken an ugly turn in Pakistan where mosques, shrines, imambargahs and funeral processions were being bombed with a sickening frequency.

There were emotional scenes at the time the dead were laid to rest.

Just imagine the pain and agony of the Jamrud family that lifted as many as five coffins from one single home.

These included the tiny coffin of a minor Hafiz-i-Quran, Naimatullah, who had memorised the Holy Book at a visibly tender age. The boy insisted on attending the Friday congregation with his grandfather.

The explosion set the main gate of the mosque on fire.

Those who noticed the smoke and the flames rushed to the place but in order to dig out the dead bodies out of the entangled masonry the rescuers had to use the bare hands.

Not even a spade was at hand at the time.

At one stage, the people were in a state of shock and fear.

Some eyewitnesses were so confused that they rejected the suicide attack theory and said that they saw a pilotless drone hover twice over the mosque. The bulldozers arrived at the scene within minutes. So did the reporting teams from the print and electronic media.

The incident appeared so shameful and scandalous indeed that most Pakistani television channels avoided replaying the footage.

Political figures were quick to react to the tragic development.

Leader of Awami National Party, Asfandyar Wali Khan, condemned the blast in the strongest possible words: "Those fond of waging a holy war should go to Israel," he said.

Qazi Hussain Ahmad, the former chief of Jamaat-i-Islami, received the news in Islamabad. He said that blasts were usually carried out with the help of improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and he personally believed that it was not a suicide attack.

Political Agent of Khyber Agency, Captain (Retd) Tariq Hayat, said that no Muslim would be callous enough to commit such a heinous crime of putting dozens of practising Muslims to a collective death.

The PA ordered the personnel of the law-enforcing agencies under him to 'shoot at sight' any miscreants they saw.

The security forces took into custody two suspects who were moved to some unidentified place for necessary interrogation. Those who lost their relatives in the blast fainted with grief.

As the hard luck would have it, some students were playing volley-ball near the targeted mosque.

As the muezzin gave out the call for Friday prayers, they stopped the game and rushed to the mosque to join the congregational prayer.

The playfield still waits for the volley-ball players who got buried under the debris.

Toyota Hiace vans waited for their drivers by the roadside but they would never return to the steering. Members of the aggrieved families stayed awake all through the night to dig graved for the departed souls.

Those who acted as grave-diggers belonged to Jamrud, Landi Kotal, Ali Masjid, Shahkas, Teddy Bazaar, Kafirtangi, Soorqamar, Rehkala, Spaira, Jamalkhel and Ghwandi villages.

Traders in Jamrud Bazaar pulled down the shutters on their shops and staged a protest demonstration.

A peace rally was also taken out from the border town.

By Saturday, the administration cleared up the mess and belated visitors could not even suspect that a mosque ever stood at the place.

The political administration confirmed that out of the dead, 18 belonged to the paramilitary 'khasadar' force whereas four of them belonged to the Frontier Constabulary.

The administration gave compensation money amounting to Rs100,000 per head to families of 12 of the dead officials including a 'naib subedar' and a political 'moharar'.

Many of the businessmen, shopkeepers, students, government servants and taxi-cab drivers belonging to various places in the Khyber Agency have moved to Peshawar so that their children can continue their studies without being disturbed by the clatter of guns.

Peace activists amongst us will have to wake up and organise themselves at the earliest to save the breaking social fabric.