The Taliban threat

IT has become quite a routine with the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan to give warnings of disaster but its recent threat to take the war to Karachi and other cities of the country is chilling indeed. Not long ago, it successfully displayed its skills and created havoc in several major towns. Maulvi Umar in an interview with a news agency on Tuesday revealed the presence of Taliban in Karachi and said that highly motivated boys and girls between the ages of 10 and 20 were waiting for orders to go ahead. Equally frightening was the TTP’s concern over the vulgarity in the metropolis and its promise to eliminate it.

The TTP’s threat once again underlines the extreme and, undoubtedly, wrong interpretation of Islam. Besides, it points to the wicked method of corrupting the minds of the innocent youth befooling them with visions of the Hereafter to mould their minds to suite its ends. To date, according to official estimates, the TTP has bombed or set ablaze at least 70 girls schools, most of them in Swat and its adjoining areas. Barely a week ago, the TTP gave an ultimatum to womenfolk in the peaceful city of Kot Addu in southern Punjab not to step out of their homes without a burqa. The authorities must take stock of the situation. The growing threat of Talibanisation under the garb of enforcing Islam whose version tends only to twist its real message of peace and harmony out of recognition ought to be taken seriously. Is it this version of religion that the Taliban crave for and wants it enforced in the country. Are they not challenging Islam when they do so? The government would have to take the threat seriously and address the issue on a war footing.