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Pakistan’s 50th Anniversary – Reasons for optimism, a season for optimism

Relatively speaking, in comparison to Pakistan, India has far greater problems, some of them without limits both in scope and magnitude. Yet Pakistan’s media have so immersed themselves in a “doom and gloom” syndrome that they have managed to condition the populace to accept a possible doomsday scenario, in contrast India is brimming over with excitement in the celebrating of the fiftieth year of independence from British tutelage. If one were to see BBC’s documentary or read the TIME magazine “Special” on the occasion, Pakistan is incidental to the whole process, as if this vibrant nation of 130 million people almost did not exist on the face of this earth. While we have plenty of problems and most of the wounds are self-inflicted, they pale in comparison to our neighbour, but in the battle of perceptions one must acknowledge that we have been overwhelmed. Because of the events of governance in the past four years in comparison to India’s economic progress under a relatively stable government during the same period, we started to look like any other “banana republic”. Part of this problem also stems from the Islamic nature of our culture where we cannot use sex as a medium in the media in contrast to the gyrating, oscillating bare midriff as seen in “Vipul” and “Rainbow” saree-type ads which acts as opium for the masses. Unfortunately we are at the receiving end of virulently anti-Pakistani propaganda. What do you expect if BBC uses rabidly anti-Pakistan Mark Tully or Salman Rushdie to talk about Pakistan? Fairplay is an attribute of a gentleman, one cannot give them that same label. This failure of our “dream merchants” to create fantasies is not for want of talent and/or expertise but it has adverse connotations in universal perceptions. Just to put the record straight, one may ask the rhetorical question, in which country does the average citizen enjoy a better quality of life, India’s or ours? The qualitative edge enjoyed by Pakistanis is so overwhelming even given our much maligned socio-economic infrastructure, that one may be forgiven for referring back to the punch line of a famous (and eternal) ad, “Furq Saaf Zahir Hai”, the difference is very apparent!

Our major problem is the breakdown of law and order due to ethnic reasons in Sindh and sectarian reasons in Punjab, yet in a recent issue (June 26, 1997), the FAR EAST ECONOMIC REVIEW, quoted Journalist Sankarshan Thakur in describing Behar, the second largest Indian State, as “the closest you can get to an address to hell”, mainly because of the very macabre statistic of 16 violent deaths every hour (the average for Beharis killed, robbed or kidnapped every hour by armed guerillas), a figure for one State that far exceeds similar mortality in the whole of Pakistan by many multiple times, ethnic and sectarian issues taken together. Each day’s total (about 400 on the average) is equal to that of Karachi for one whole year. Phoolan Devi may have made it to the Assemblies but she and bandits like Veerapan are very much existing nightmares for Indian law enforcers. In a graphic display of helplessness the Indian Army warned the Federal Government they could only control 28 of the 57 districts if asked to. If Laloo Prasad Yadao has shown up the farce of India’s democracy by the elevation of his wife Rabri Devi as Chief Minister (CM) of Behar, people seem to forget that in almost a similar farce, Ms Megawati is the CM in the largest Indian State, neighbouring Uttar Pradesh and Ms Jayalakshmi, former CM of another gave the world’s largest wedding feast (cost approximately US$ 25 million) for her “adopted” son during her incumbency only a couple of years ago. And this buffoonery is not confined to women alone, if Bal Thackeray was not a dangerous and sadistic murderer, he could be passed off as a clown. So could a number of politicians at the national level, including Babu Kesri Ram, the Congress President. Are the atrocities in Kashmir symbolic of Indian democracy, were the elections in Held Kashmir free and fair? There is a continuing war of independence being waged by freedom fighters, more violent in the last ten years or so, but real insurgencies also exist in Khalistan (Indian Punjab) where the Sikhs are demanding an independent homeland, in Gorkhaland, Bodoland, Meghalaya and in Assam where the United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA) has virtually paralysed the economy. Other than the Muslims and the Sikhs, Indian secular apologists may kindly give an answer to why for 50 years, a largely unknown war is being waged by Christians, by Nagas in Nagaland, by Mizos in Mizoram and Manipuris in Manipur. The regular Indian Armed Forces have been constantly engaged in a dozen plus such major insurgencies at any one time, along with Indian paramilitary units such as Border Security Force (BSF), Central Reserve Police (CRP), etc. Why does not the world media target them as a failed State? In comparison not a single regular soldier, sailor or airman in Pakistan is committed in a similar exercise in any part of the domain. Furq Saaf Zahir Hai!

Pakistan today has a Prime Minister by virtue of his winning the majority of seats for the National Assembly (NA). Mian Nawaz Sharif has an overwhelming mandate of the people, in contrast Inder Kumar Gujral, with all of his devious brilliance, cannot extend his fiat even in the municipality of New Delhi and survives on the sufferance of Babu Kesri Ram, who for the moment finds it politically convenient for Congress to prop up the fractious Minority Front Government (and continue to exact an extra pound of flesh) rather than face a drubbing at the hands of the Bharitya Janata Party (BJP) at the polls. Who has more democratic and political credibility, the PM of Pakistan or that of India’s. To put it bluntly, our democracy exists on a positive note in contrast to that of our neighbours. And talking about poverty and hunger and deprivation, how many people in how many cities daily sleep on the pavements in Pakistan, hungry and without shelter? We can proudly state, NOT ONE! Every town and city in India has thousands and thousands on the pavements. The real India is not that created by STAR or ZEE TV but the one found on the pavements of each of its cities and towns. Furq Saaf Zahir Hai!

As a reflection of how open and democratic our society is in contrast to that of India, one can take as a case in point our doomsday scenario cheerleaders holding forth on atrocities by our law enforcement agencies (LEAs), both real and imagined. Catch an Indian journalist talking about Kashmir or Assam or Manipur! When Kuldip Nayar came here for the elections he sidestepped all questions about Kashmir. One of the most restrictive Parliamentary Acts in the world was the Indian Maintenance of Internal Security Act (MISA) under which a person could be held for upto a year without charges or trial, the incarceration could be rolled over every year. Recently it has been replaced by one with another name. As much as we love to target our judiciary, our judges have again and again upheld the various freedoms enshrined in the Constitution, becoming targets of violence themselves, more frequently than occasionally. Can a Muslim in India raise his voice as can a Hindu in Pakistan and they are a secular State and we are not! My good friend Ardeshir Cowasjee, of whom I am very proud, is a Parsi and writes boldly, brilliantly and openly on all issues, MJ Akbar could not dare print my articles in his Indian newspaper “Asian Age” in India. Yet many Indian journalists write articles openly inimical to Pakistan in Pakistani newspapers, that is the essence of democracy, to have the courage and self-confidence to permit open criticism. Furq Saaf Zahir Hai!

Pakistan has tremendous problems, we cannot use India’s problems as an excuse to shove them under the carpet, the major one is the crisis in leadership but it is nothing that we can only count our successes by building our own positive ambience. In contrast to our large neighbour, we have an abundance of resources, we can feed and clothe ourselves. We are the conduit to three different geographical entities, South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East, as such we command a geo-political importance far greater than we can ourselves imagine. Our human resources are the best in the world, the concrete bastions of the oil-rich kingdoms in the Middle East have been built on the back of the sweat and toil of our unskilled labour. For at least two decades our skilled workers virtually managed these countries. Today if we are out of fashion in the Middle East it is because our people cannot offer them the mores of the western civilisation they now aspire for. Yet again and again and again, when they look for loyalty and integrity, the only option is Pakistanis. And talking about quality, which other country in the world have been world champion in three different sports at one time, hockey, squash and cricket, which other country in the world is renowned for its pilots and its bankers? And even the British were forced to admit that “the Punjabi infantrymen is the best in the world”. We have the manpower, we have the resources, if Mian Nawaz Sharif can provide us the quality of leadership that we need, we shall really go places, there is no limit that this country cannot achieve, no obstacle that we cannot surmount. Just look up to how the economy has been turned around in a few months from virtual apocalypse. The Indians used TV as an effective medium to create an amazing fantasy world devoid of reality for their population, our TV reflects only stark reality, that in essence is the problem. While we live with our problems on a daily basis, the general public perception is contrasts ours to their projected “world” we arrive at very wrong assumptions, that somehow we seem to have failed where they have succeeded. This is far from the truth, in contrast India’s is much more major than ours.

Pakistan is a resilient, dynamic and vibrant nation. In this season of hope, we have many reasons to be hopeful, for optimism. Far from being a failed State, we have the human skills as well as the natural resources to make this country really great, to be the most successful State in the entire region within a decade, if not earlier.

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