THE brutal attack on the Muharram procession, taken out in observance of Imam Hussains chehlum at Karachi on Friday, and later at the hospital where the dead and the injured had been transported, are reminiscent of the blasts that took place 40 days earlier. Again, both the strategy used by the perpetrators of the crime, and the circumstances under which the attacks occurred, were more or less the same, and the bloodbath was no less substantial. Again, the security agencies were found wanting and, again, the equipment they used to scan the suspected sources of danger turned out to be primitive and utterly ineffective; their methods were, in fact, dangerous as well. It was only human intelligence that worked when the machine, so inadequate it must have been, had cleared a 20kg bomb container as a 'safe deposit in the hospital parking lot, before it was defused by the bomb disposal staff. Again, Jundullah, an organisation, whose existence one is not even certain about, has been blamed for the carnage without presenting any solid evidence. If it is an attempt at telling the people that the motive behind was sectarian hatred, lest they should think about the possibility of any sinister political factors at work that the recent crossing of swords between the two big parties in the province suggested, it is an extremely dangerous game. The authorities must come out with concrete evidence to substantiate their claim. They must understand that they cannot be absolved from their principal responsibility of ensuring a stable security environment in the country by putting up false pretexts. As for the notion of sectarian enmity, the people have become wise enough not to concern themselves too much with how other sects in Islam perform their rites and rituals. The tragic scenario brings another painful reality into sharp focus: The callousness with which the countrys ruling classes treat the ordinary people. When the leaders come out of their secure niches, their frightfully expensive bullet-proof limousines are escorted by a large contingent of security vehicles, keeping at a safe distance commuters, whether healthy or direly sick needing immediate medical attention, and causing long queues of vehicles that would inevitably remain stuck on the roads as a result of hours of wait and blocking all other connected arteries of transportation. In the face of all sorts of safety measures that they take for themselves, the common man is left to the dangers the rulers policies have given rise to; left to him, he would never have designed such policies or even endorsed them. The continuing blood-soaked drama is a clarion call to the leaders conscience that their policies are taxing the peoples nerves beyond endurance, putting their lives and properties at peril. It is time for a serious review of them.