My heroes By Dr Farrukh Saleem
The News, October 1, 2006
My hero, Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan. On May 28, 1998, at 3.16 p.m. (PST), my hero shook the granite mountains of Ras Koh Hills in the Chagai Division of Balochistan generating a seismic signal of 5.0 on the Richter scale. My hero gave us accumulated destructive power of up to 40 KT (equivalent TNT) and made us the first Islamic country to emerge as the seventh nuclear power on the face of the planet. My hero has also given us some 800 kg of highly enriched uranium enough for three-dozen nuclear weapons.
Thank you, Doctor sahib, we can now instantly kill at least a million people and cause leukaemia, other radiation-induced cancers, cataracts, bloody discharge, anaemia, nausea, diarrhoea and abnormally low white blood cell count in an additional 10 million. We can now generate temperatures of 300,000 degrees centigrade and melt glass, tile and every combustible material. We can crush concrete ceilings and kill additional millions. We can now ignite heat and light brighter than a thousand suns (even looking at the flash will cause blindness). We can poison the food chain and kill even more. We also have the capability of causing radiation poisoning.
On February 4, 2004, my hero appeared on Pakistan Television (PTV) and "confessed to selling nuclear weapons technology secrets to Libya, Iran and North Korea (so that they can cause cancer too)." On February 5, 2005, President General Musharraf called him "his hero" too and then went on to fire him (according to "In the line of fire: A memoir", Dr AQ Khan is "self-centered and abrasive …. huge ego … lavish lifestyle and tales of his wealth, properties, corrupt practises, and financial magnanimity at state expense were generally all too well known…." pages 288-294).
Time magazine has called my hero as "The merchant of menace". Of the 192 member states of the United Nations, some 15 dozen countries refer to him as the world's most dangerous "nuclear trafficker". Either the 15 dozen are all wrong or I am on the wrong side of history.
My other hero, is the Afghan warrior-king Sultan Mahmud of Ghazni. To be certain, Sultan Mahmud of Ghazni was the grandson of a Turkic (Northern and Central Eurasian) general from Balkh (Balkh is a small town in the Province of Balkh, Afghanistan). How this Afghan warrior sultan became my hero I will never know.
Ghaznavi is now our long-range nuclear-capable missile. Intriguingly, Sultan Mahmud's military campaigns were mostly against other Muslims particularly the Shias of the Fatimid Caliphate (where the ruling elite belonged to the Ismaili branch of Shi'ism). Mahmud's military expeditions always took back a train of slaves as plunder.
My other hero, Sultan Muhammad Ghauri, another Afghan warrior king (Ghauri is one of the 34 provinces of Afghanistan). Ghauri is now our medium-range, nuclear-capable ballistic missile and Prithvi is theirs.
Interestingly, in 1191, Prithvi Raj Chauhan defeated Sultan Muhammad Ghauri. Under Kshatriya rules, Prithvi let Ghauri escape. The following year, Ghauri came back captured Prithvi, had his eyes gouged out and took control of his kingdom. Prithvi, with no eyes, was then challenged to an archery competition. When Ghauri's generals ordered Prithvi to shoot his arrow he refused demanding orders directly from Ghauri himself. When Ghauri shouted at Prithvi, the skilled archer that Prithvi was, turned around located the source of the voice and shot his arrow right through Ghauri's threat (Ghauri died instantly).
Why are my heroes associated with death, destruction, annihilation, devastation, loss of life, brutality, murder, cruelty and violence? Can't I have heroes who have actually contributed to human civilisation? Isn't the 'preservation of life' Islam's fundamental premise?
Why can't Shirin Ebadi be my hero? After all, she is the only Muslim woman -- of the 600 million alive -- to have won the Nobel Peace Prize. Shouldn't Shirin be my hero for her pioneering work for the rights of Muslim women and children? Why can't Prof. Dr Abdus Salam be my hero? Here's someone from Jhang who actually made a contribution to human civilisation. Why can't Naguib Mahfouz be my hero (the only Arabic language writer to have won the Nobel Prize)?
The writer is an Islamabad-based freelance columnist. Email: farrukh15@hotmail.com
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