Forget for a moment the justification or otherwise of the heavy-handed violence visited upon the residents of Sri Saral and Pind Sangrial, the two villages on the outskirts of Islamabad waiting to be gobbled up by that inhuman piece of engineering called the Capital Development Authority (CDA).

In what other country claiming to be civilized would policemen use live bullets against unarmed civilians? In what other country would policemen aim their 7mm rifles to kill?

This is what happened in these two unfortunate villages and if all those sham NGOs which earn a living in the name of human rights are not aghast or up in arms, it is because there is one set of values for the well-heeled and another for the poor.

How many were killed? Two or five? How many injured? How many beaten black and blue by the police? How many indicted before, of all things, an anti-terrorist court? It doesn't matter. Since when have hapless peasants counted for anything in the scales of justice of the Islamic Republic?

Could the CDA and the Islamabad police have carried out such an assault in one of the capital's richer sectors? You must be kidding. There is a law which bars residential houses in Islamabad from being used for commercial purposes. Will the CDA ever be serious about enforcing this rule? Again, you must be kidding.

Whose fault was the firing? The threads of responsibility stretch right up to that master of the inept statement, the interior minister, Lt Gen Moinuddin Haider. He it was who chaired a meeting a few days ago and directed that 'development' work should start with full vigour in the two affected villages, 'development' being the standard euphemism for the knocking down of old villages. Thus getting its cue from on high, the CDA set to work with the help of the Islamabad police, with what deadly results we all know.

Surely, however, the order to open fire on unarmed villagers did not come from the interior minister. This was the work of the officers on the spot. Confronted by angry villagers brandishing nothing more lethal than sticks (the thing about villagers with firearms being a canard) these officers panicked. Or did the constables under their command panic and open fire on their own? We do not know and perhaps never will, because the police machinery has already gone into overdrive in trying to fabricate a cover-up story.

But someone has to carry the blame. After all, unarmed people were killed and wounded, violence was carried out on a large scale. Who was responsible for these excesses? Thanks to the atmosphere he is nurtured in, the ordinary constable is easily prone to brutality and the use of excessive force. But he doesn't give the orders. That is the responsibility of his high-ups, in this case the inspector general, Major (what else?) Akram, the additional IG Rao Iqbal, and the senior superintendent, Kaleem Imam.

Will any heads roll? Perish the thought. Such things are not done in Pakistan. Will there be a cover-up? Something far more effective than anything seen in Watergate has already started. Will the villagers get justice? Stop kidding. Should they keep knocking at the doors of the courts? Well, two days ago they tried going to the court of the Islamabad sessions judge and for their pains the Islamabad police, the very institution they were trying to protest against. We talk so long and hard about democracy. This is the state of democracy in the federal capital.

I have a whole posse of good friends among retired and serving police officers. Among them, Zafar Iqbal Rathore, former interior secretary and head of the Intelligence Bureau, great lover of books - his study stuffed with high-grade learning from floor to ceiling; Nawaz Malik, the founding IG of the Islamabad police; Nazir Malik, former IG. Also a host of lesser fry, DIGs serving here and there.

All these friends of mine are great mahatmas of police reform and on the rule of law and its requirements can hold forth endlessly. I have a simple request to make of them. Could they ask the leaders of the Islamabad police, in the name of God if nothing else will do, to stop brutalizing the villagers of Sri Saral and Pind Sangrial?

What these villagers have already suffered is great enough. In order to cover their own butts why must the Islamabad police terrorize them further?

My Lord Chief Justice, Shaikh Riaz Ahmed, is making a name for himself by taking suo motu notice of rapes and other such offences in far off places. Can he spare a moment to take suo motu notice of the rape of justice right under his nose on the outskirts of the capital?

As for the genial interior minister, there is no cure for his malady. Far from being chastened by the chain of events starting from his door and ending on such a bloody note, he has chaired another meeting and ordered that the development work in D-12 (the sector covering the unfortunate villages) should be restarted with renewed vigour. This is pouring salt over open wounds but who's to stop him?

Let me draw an analogy. Moin Haider's counterpart in India is L. K. Advani, the home minister. Can anyone in his wildest dreams imagine Advani concerning himself with the acquisition of land for municipal purposes in New Delhi? Is this the interior or home minister's job? Has he nothing better to do?

But if, suppose, having inadvertently set in motion a train of events leading to the killing of two or five villagers, would Advani have the gall to order that the work interrupted by the killings be resumed? Sanjay Gandhi, during his mother's Emergency, was crucified in popular legend for much less. But nothing it seems can puncture Haider's complacency.

With what cheek can we talk of human rights violations in occupied Kashmir when without the least sense of shame we commit mind-blowing human rights violations right in the capital of the Islamic Republic?

Of one thing, however, we can be proud and that is the role of the press, especially the Urdu press, which has done a great job of highlighting the excesses in the two calamity-hit villages. While newspapers gone corrupt are a curse, those guided by a sense of duty and freedom are a blessing, especially in a climate such as ours.

A word about 'land acquisition'. The foundations of Islamabad rest on one of the most gigantic frauds ever carried out in the name of development. Islamabad has been built on land forcibly occupied from its original inhabitants in lieu of nominal sums in compensation. State resources were then used to 'develop' this land by laying roads and providing electricity, water and gas.

This developed land, its value immeasurably enhanced, was then doled out through a less than transparent process to members of the gentry, the salaried classes and the privilegentsia. As this seizure proceeded apace, old habitations which had existed along the foothills of the Margallas for centuries were obliterated.

It is on this vast enterprise of plunder, the appeasement of privilege and the displacement of people that the glories of Islamabad rest. No wonder the star of this city is crossed. No wonder nothing has ever worked here. Why is every government that comes to Islamabad doomed from the start? Why is there no stability in our affairs? Might this have something to do with the desecration of old places, the curses of suffering people?

Come to think of it, we said goodbye to East Pakistan when the capital was shifted from Karachi to Islamabad. The people of East Pakistan could relate to the cosmopolitanism of Karachi. How could they relate to the insularity and military mindset of the Pothohar Plateau?

In any other scheme of things the old villages of Islamabad would have been made part of the new city, to lend it colour and piquancy, instead of being razed to the ground and covered in concrete. Instead of the CDA looking through hostile eyes at places like Saidpur, Noorpur Shahan, Golra and the rest, it would have interwoven the charm of these old villages into the planning of Islamabad. But this would have required a revolution in taste and culture, something that has yet to hit Pakistan.

To look at what we've done to tradition, just visit the shrine of the great Barri Imam. Once a place of infinite peace, it has been transformed in the name of development into a concrete quadrangle. We presume too much upon divine indulgence. For some sins there is no forgiveness.