An Ass By Nadeem Akram

We must congratulate each other; the press has discovered a new species of suicide bomber, the donkey bomber. The headline in an English newspaper read, Donkey bomber kills three. Employment of animals in warfare is not new; all sorts of animals have been exploited by mankind but never a donkey. The donkeys belong to the scheduled class of animals and therefore were never considered for combat duties. Their inclusion in armies of the world is restricted to menial work and that too as a substitute for their infertile cousins, the mules. But then there is always a first time. A donkey who was somehow, trained, coerced or goaded into carrying a few kilograms of explosive material and collide with h a NATO convoy in Wardak, Afghanistan, by Taliban is clearly a work of art. Animal trainers all over world need to take a bow. All sorts of thoughts trotted in my mind. The foremost was the pity that I felt for the fallen ass. No matter what has been said or written about donkeys in the world, this particular specie is no push over. I remember a story I read about a donkey that would shed few kilograms of the salt it was carrying while crossing the river by feigning to trip in the middle of the river, till such time that the master outsmarted him and replaced the salt with cotton. The donkey had no choice but to mend his ways. Given the ridicule and humiliation the poor animals have been subjected to since the publication of that story, the ass who got himself blown in Afghanistan stood up for something far more noble than just killing a few humans; emancipation of asses around the world. Despite the realization that it was not an act of animal cruelty but that a courageous act of a single ass to reclaim its rightful place in the animal world, I could not help but to grieve for the departed soul! I was still trying to overcome my angst when conspiracy theorist in me remembered another story about donkeys in the same newspaper. It was reported that followers of a certain saint present donkey as xenium-nazrana at his shrine, every time they wanted the departed soul to intercede on their behalf. I wondered whatever happens to all those donkeys, at the prime of their youth, left with mujawars-caretakers of that shrine. I mean, really, its not exactly cash in the till is it? One has to make boarding and lodging arrangements for all the animals left behind by the devotees, and that requires money. Selling them would be the obvious choice, but then donkey market is a niche market and you dont see buyers queuing up, do you? And then I was struck with a horrible thought. What if Talibans a supply-chain department had established a working relationship with these unsuspecting caretakers for a cost-effective and low profile procurement of asses, the kind of arrangement they had with unscrupulous institutions providing them with human fodder for their holy war. It could very well be given the high cost and risk involved in recruiting young boys, especially after a dozen or so were nabbed around

Quetta a few months back. With missing persons issue a national issue, like energy crisis, alternate sources is always a good option. After all no one is going to miss an ass, especially the ones left to its own peril in a shrine. The next question to be answered was where and how these donkeys are trained to become suicide bombers. Once again, my fertile imagination came to my rescue. If Taliban can build training camps for humans all along the AfPak operational area, setting up a training camp for asses would be simple enough task. By that time, I had myself convinced that a linkage exists between the two pieces of news, and it was not a coincidence that one followed the other. I found solace in the thought that I was not the only one who had made this rather important discovery, some of the brightest minds in Langley and Pentagon must have arrived at the same conclusion. Spy satellites and ground intelligence networks would have been launched to detect any suspected movement of unusually large number of asses being hauled in a military formation. Special forensic teams would have been, by then, flown to Wardak to ascertain the genre of the deceased donkey. I could see a command and control center being set up in a basement of a descript building somewhere in Nevada with renowned animal trainers from all the world flown in, especially from Indian Gujrat being home of some the finest wild asses found on this planet, to prepare a detailed briefing for the National Security Advisor. Wonderful, I thought, and tuned in to Fox News for the breaking news to break! Then I recalled it was not the Fox News that established Ajmal Kasabs nationality in matter of hours after the Mumbai attacks; Pakistani media beat them to it. So I switched my television to single digit channels on the cable network. I was wringing my hands in anticipation. I was convinced that soon, I would be watching a video clip of the fallen donkey having his last meal while posing for the camera. The meal, we would be told, comprised of the best oats Taliban could find this side of the Atlantic. That would be followed by clips of confessions of the donkey recruiter, trainer and the also ran category that somehow manage to appear in such videos. All available defense analysts, animal rights activists, this expert and that expert would be wrangled in to proffer their expert advice which in the end would leave us bemused if anything else! Bemused actually means confused and not amused, if that is what you thought! The spectacle would go on for few hours or till such it is time to break yet another breaking news about the baby crocodile gifted to the Royal Baby! That ass that was the talk of the town, so to speak would become yesterdays news before you know it!