No one has ever taken any serious notice of the biggest media house of the country, the mosque and its loudspeaker! While talking loudly of containing TV channels and print media, we conspicuously forget keeping a close watch and making strict laws for the Imams of the mosques, who enjoy the biggest following. The success of operations, like the recently started ‘Zarb e Azb’, depends not only on the priceless sacrifices of our soldiers and officers but also on plugging all loopholes which are giving way to propaganda.
The loudspeaker, which invoked killing of many in Rawalpindi recently, should have woken the state to the need for strict laws to control all hate-mongers. There is no regulation, such as PEMRA, Auqaf or Information Ministry ‘regulatory’ mechanisms to control speeches given by Imams, especially during the Friday prayer sermons. Years have passed, and yet we have not set any criteria of appointing Imams and Moazzins, and questions of what qualification they should have remain unanswered, because they can easily, through their exploitative oratory tactics, brainwash followers in the name of religion and spread venom against our own people.
In the last Juma speech, I heard the Imam inciting the public against operation ‘Zarb e Azb’, which has commenced with full public and government support. The government must keep watch over such a sensitive aspect of our weak society. The fact that most of the people belong to the ‘Deobandi school of thought’ and are appointed in mosques are Taliban sympathizers, must be dealt with. They are virtually the supply line for the terrorists and the government must take initiatives to curb them if they want the operation to be successful and stop further spreading of this ethnic rift.
PROFESSOR ALYA ALVI,
 Rawalpindi, June 19.