Bodyguards: Emerging Apprehensions, Reasons and Redressal

by PIRZADA M. AMIN and ADFAR RASHID SHAH

After Salman Taseer’s murder by his own bodyguard in Pakistan a few months ago, yet another guard, Sardar Mohammad, has killed President Hamid Karzai’s half-brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, pumping three bullets into him.

Sociologically speaking, militia as an institution in South Asia, and especially in Pakistan and Afghanistan, is breaking the cocoon of professio-nalism and staunch and reliable military discipline. The prime factors responsible may be rampant political corruption, taken-for-granted human rights abuse, injustice to common masses, radicalisation of military personnel, increasing religious fundamentalism and proliferation of various venomous ideologies and the extreme indoctrination among the youth who are highly vulnerable, the military’s growing links with evil elements, lack of sense of duty, declining professional discipline, weakening tolerance, mounting arrogance, creeping lethargy and slothfulness, carelessness among soldiers, hunger for anarchy and power wielding, socio-psychological frustration among cops out of their lifestyle and heart-wrenching behaviour towards them by their respective commanders or bosses or officers, chaotic and life-threatening duty and vulnerable working atmosphere, etc. Also the growing indiscipline among men in uniform may be due to religious fundamentalism or corruption and the mind-set of shifting blame to the public for security loopholes accompanied by the factor of personnel background, impact of levels of tough training, lack of proper education of military ethic, defective and dysfunctional policies and procedures, extreme boredom, family back-ground and effect on the mental state out of their problems and generally incompetence in the human nature etc.

Another equally valuable argument for this murderous behaviour among guards may be out of the ruling and governing style of leaders or politicians, especially in conflict zones, solely based on exploitation, corruption, negligence toward the welfare of the masses and redressal of basic public issues, further aggravated by growing political instability resulting in the common masses’ anger and the holistic geography of hatred and disarray. The security guard or an elite guard, who always remains in contact with his boss, is an active witness to this whole process of injustice and phenomenon of exploitation but simultaneously represents the common masses. In order to give vent to his alienation and frustration with the whole system, guards or armed men have more tendencies to resort to such brazen and anger-ridden inhuman acts. In addition to this, the security system overall needs to be revisited on a priority basis as a new alarming and most deadly situation has come to existence in the wake of the assassinations of Indira Gandhi (killed by her security guards, Satwant Singh and Beant Singh), Salman Taseer (shot by Qadri), and now Wali Karzai (by Sardar Mohammad).

Fundamentalism and Security Threats

DESPITE a democratic form of government almost everywhere on the globe, religious fundamentalism is gaining ground, because of a myriad of reasons. As the editorial in Economic and Political Weekly (January 29, 2011), titled ‘Taseer’s Omen’, aptly narrates, Asiya Bibi’s (the Christian woman who committed blasphemy in Pakistan) social status as a lower caste chamar woman, poor, illiterate, and her hostile relationship with her co-workers, at workplace, which itself was discriminating, oppressive, provoked and prompted her to commit the blasphemy. It is totally unjust and unfortunate that the circumstances under which she committed blasphemy were not considered and later the matter was so exaggerated by her co-workers, panchayat and courts, etc. Although the lady was at fault, she was provoked for the act. A man like Taseer, who got fed up with such a closed system, himself committed the blasphemy by calling the blasphemy law a black law (he could have been dealt with by law but he was murdered brutally).

The same was the fate of Shahbaz Bhatti—Pakistan’s Minister for Minorities and belonging to the Pakistani minority Christian community. He too was shot dead for the crime of campaigning to reform the country’s medieval blasphemy laws. We need to recognise that Islam is the religion of peace and egalitarian in ethos and preaching. Pakistan or Afghanistan is sending a wrong message of Islam to its minorities and neighbours branding Islam as violent, non-flexible, oppressive and despotic by patting such acts which are simply un-Islamic. On the other hand, why was a bodyguard so lauded by everyone for his act of breach, indiscipline and a dreadful murder? If such morale boasting of men in uniform will continue, what will happen to the institution of security? It will lose its credibility and reliability and it will in itself make every VIP full of self-doubts and feel insecure everywhere with his own security, especially in Pakistan, and will foster and encourage nothing but indiscipline and criminality among the soldiers on the globe.

On one hand we have witnessed royal guards of executed Sadam Hussain and Muammar Gaddafi, who conveyed through their acts strong resentment towards those who attacked their bosses, despite knowing that they were despots, authoritarian, etc., but on the other we have come to a situation where a VVIP’s life-threat can be his bodyguard. So this needs a strong and speedy redressel.

Tailpiece and Suggestive Measures

THERE is a dire need for tamper-detection technologies in the security monitoring systems and to have appropriate back-up or secondary defence. Moreover, proper counselling, personality assessment and horizon-building measures need to be incorporated in the security institutions. The recruitment and training should be exclusive in nature, so that they are specialised as elite bodyguards with a multi-disciplinary training. It should not be just a sound body but an assessed socio-psychological make-up in terms of education, community structure, ideology, national spirit and their perception of the nation as such. The last solution to this challenging trend can be the establishment of an exclusive regiment or group of elite guards, who can be trained with modern education, safety tactics, nationalistic spirit, professional military ethics, loyalty to their bosses, free from sectarian or religious ideas, a single agenda of protection and safety to their leaders and bosses, and they can be trained at some international security institute. In this way can this deadly and alarming trend be wiped out in the long run.

Dr. Pirzada M. Amin is a former Deputy SP and currently an Associate Professor of Sociology at the Department of Sociology and Social Work, University of Kashmir, and Adfar Rashid Shah is a Doctoral Candidate of Sociology at Jamia Millia Islamia-Central University, New Delhi. The latter can be contacted at e-mail: adfer.syed@gmail.com