Benazir Bhutto is No More

So, Benazir Bhutto is dead, so is the hope of democracy in Pakistan. The gruesome death was no different from that of Rajiv Gandhi: public meeting, an explosion, a stampede, and dismembered, naked bodies lying on the streets. The grief, the pain, the loss, a man shouting, “Loot gaya, barbad ho gaya,” another group attacking a vehicle, all so familiar now. Even the naked bodies with underwears exposed. Too gruesome for words, too simple a solution for a confused nation, too easy way of getting rid of dissent. Whatever we say, we aren’t ready to accept dissent. The world is too egoistic and undemocratic to tolerate dissent.

Benazir was attractive, no, I would term her beautiful with a skin so mooth and blemishless. (Fatima Bhutto, her neice and writer, whom I saw from up close at the Kitab festival, also has smooth skin, and some of her aunt's charisma.) Come to think of it Rajiv too had a very good skin. One a handsome man, the other a beautiful women, killed by the most ugly of recent social upheavals - terrorism - both blown up by suicide bombers. Not for nothing did the poet say, "beauty deserves the beast in all of us." I guess I am more than a bit grumpy, and I need sleep, so I will end this post here.