LAHORE: ‘Nobody knows whether they will come home alive or not,’ said Khalid Mahmood, a 52-year-old taxi driver in Lahore, after the latest bloody strike on Pakistan’s once peaceful cultural capital.
Residents are living in fear after the deadliest attack yet on Lahore — twin bomb blasts on a busy market in the heart of the city at nightfall on Monday that left 49 people dead and scores more wounded.
Home to ancient Mughal monuments and grand colonial buildings, Lahore residents like to think their city is a cut above the rest of Pakistan — a hallowed centre of education, intellectual thought and a cultural bellwether.
Students mill around cafes and galleries and flock to the theatre at night, but Pakistan’s second biggest city had recently found itself in the Taliban’s cross-hairs, with six militant strikes this year killing about 133 people.
‘Bloodshed is spreading in the city, people are afraid and worry about their future,’ Mahmood said.
‘Life is becoming miserable, there is fear and threats to our life everywhere... We are very worried about our children — we feel restless until they come back from school.’
On Monday, two bombs planted 30 metres (yards) apart blew up within seconds of each other at the bustling Moon Market in central Lahore, engulfing the area in flames as people were milling around the shops and restaurants.
Police and rescue officials have put the death toll at 49 with 150 others injured, and government officials have blamed Taliban militants avenging a military offensive against them in the northwest.
‘You never know when the curse, the terror will hit and where. I lost several friends in the Moon Market bombing. Just 15 minutes before the blasts, I passed through that market,’ said Suhail Iqbal, a 48-year-old filmmaker.
‘Now the militants are targetting women and children. They want to destroy our families and it makes me more worry, everybody is worried.’
Residents have watched in recent months as road blocks, sand bags and blast walls have sprung up around the city, backing up already congested traffic where land cruisers compete for space with horse-and-carts.
Tahir Kamran, who heads the history department at Lahore’s Government College University, told AFP in an interview last month that militants wanted to destabilise Pakistan, and thus targeted Lahore.
‘Lahore is very, very important. In many ways it’s more important than Islamabad and Karachi because of culture, because now it has become the knowledge centre — opinion is formed mostly from Lahore,’ he said.
Many of the nation’s senior military figures also hail from Punjab province, of which Lahore is the capital.
In March, masked gunmen opened fire on the visiting Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore, killing eight people, wounding six players and destroying Pakistan’s hopes of hosting international cricket.
Similar commando-style assaults hit three police centres on October 15. Forty people were killed after gunmen attacked with suicide vests and grenades.
Although most Taliban attacks hit the northwest and are plotted in the tribal belt near Afghanistan, analysts say extremism has taken root in Punjab, the most populous province in Pakistan.
Its residents are taking no chances. Taxi driver Mahmood has already lost a friend and a relative in bombings, and he says he must protect his family.
‘My wife and family members are avoiding bazaars and markets. We are living a restless life, a life of fear,’
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