Gun-runners are untouchables in Pakistan. This is a fact for those who know the nexus between crime and politics and crime and police. Why have we failed to carry out de-weaponisation? Despite big gains in the operation against terrorism, this question remains unanswered.

Over the last 40 years, Karachi became the hub of gun culture and despite all intelligence reports and decisions at the highest level the city could not be de-weaponised.

A file sent by a former Rangers director general is still lying in the Prime Minister’s House. It suggests ways and means to clean the mess, recommends closure of arms markets and alternative businesses for arms dealers. But it seems the gun mafia have the last word in the matter.

I have been following stories of gun-runners for over three decades. I still remember an interview with Malik Mushtaq, also known in the underworld as Black Prince in the Karachi Central Prison.

He looked calm when I inquired about his narco business. “Hum andar ho ya bahar kam chalta rahay ga.”

Years later, when a former chief minister, Arbab Ghulam Rahim was quoted as saying that the city police chief had had links with the underworld it caused a stir. He was forced to issue a clarification regarding his talk with a group of journalists.

On the outskirts of Karachi there is a place called, Sohrab Goth, on Super Highway where one can spot a board. It reads, “Welcome to Karachi” for all those coming from other parts of Sindh. During the 1980s it became the hub for Afghan refugees. Looking at Al-Asif Square plaza, for a minute one would feel that one was in Kabul or another Afghan city.

In 1983-84 stories started coming out about arms and narcotics being dumped in the area to be later supplied in the city and abroad. Within years, Karachi became a lucrative market for both guns and drugs, with rise of ethnic and sectarian strife.

Later, drugs and guns also made inroads into the city’s katchi abadis. When former chief minister, Syed Ghous Ali Shah, ordered a clean-up operation in Sohrab Goth, Aligarh and Qasba Colony, it resulted in the killing of over 100 people and violence erupted throughout the city.

Shah once told me in an interview that the government had received intelligence of planning of widespread violence by drug and gun mafia. But the authorities succumbed to the ‘pressure’ and the operation was stopped.

Rasheed Alam, who was district West deputy commissioner at that time of Aligarh-Qasba tragedy, told me that an inquiry had revealed that the weapons used in the violence were acquired from the Bara Market. The report recommended that the city could be de-weaponsied if all arms markets were closed and all entry and exit points of Karachi properly monitored.

Karachi became a hub for terrorism as local and global terror networks set up sleeper cells here. They could easily get anything from a bomb to a rocket-launcher, and an automatic gun to a hand grenade. You could name a weapon and you could get it for competitive price.

This is the story of the City of Lights where I have spent some of my best and worst days. It was such a colourful and liberal city.

The news of a death did not make big news till the late 1970s. Now it is the only news. Even on the day of my wedding in 1990, at least 60 people were killed. There was no choice but to postpone the wedding reception.

In 1997 I filed a story with the headline, “Agency identifies nine top gun-runners in Karachi.” It was based on a comprehensive report with names of people involved and their connection with political and business circles.

An intelligence agency had identified top gun-runners. The then governor of Sindh, Lt General Moinuddin Haider and former chief minister, Liaquat Jatoi had asked the then prime minister Nawaz Sharif for action. He gave go ahead for the operation but it was never launched.

Fast forward to 2019. When I met a former Rangers DG he said that he had sent an identical report regarding the de-weaponisation of Karachi, suggesting that all arms markets should be closed and those affected given alternative businesses or jobs.

No wonder, Karachi could not be de-weaponised despite three major operations led by the army in 1992, by the police in 1995 and the on-going one launched in 2013 by the Rangers who have been handed extraordinary powers.

“I have suggested that alternative jobs or businesses should be offered to the arms dealers. I even calculated the number of people who could be affected. Believe me, it is not a huge number,” he said, adding that de-weaponisation was essential for a lasting peace.

“We have recovered huge arms caches during the last few years but unless we block the supply, arms would continue to pour in,” he says.

Who knows better than Brig Ejaz Shah (retired), the man who is holding the important portfolio of the Interior Ministry and has served as head of the Intelligence Bureau, from where the arms and ammunitions are coming and how to stop it.

Only a few years ago, some 19,000 containers, mostly carrying weapons, including those used by NATO forces in Afghanistan, went missing after they left the Karachi Port. A high-powered investigation was conducted by a team led by a former IGP, Dr Shoaib Suddle, who submitted a comprehensive report in which he estimated the loss at Rs 50 billion. He also identified those responsible.

To date, neither the containers nor the weapons have been recovered. A few junior officers were suspended from service and some were arrested.

During interrogation some of the ‘militants’ made sensational disclosures about how they had smuggled arms into Karachi. In the 1980s, these weapons used to be dumped on the outskirts of Karachi, like Sohrab Goth, but after the first operation against arms in 1986 terror groups and arms suppliers moved the hideouts.

As long as Karachi remains a huge market for drugs and guns, stories about death will remain the only stories. Although there are quite a few success stories, terror can again hit the city unless there is a complete de-weaponisation.

The writer is a senior columnist and analyst of GEO, The News and Jang

Twitter: @MazharAbbasGEO