National Service

Third world countries must learn to mobilise their manpower resources at the ab-initio youth stage for the ultimate future of both, the individual and the nation. Countries with diverse ethnicity and other problems emanating from sect if not caste, religion if not race, etc must evolve a process to bring the young together in one giant melting pot that will merge all the differences and bind them together to promote national integration. No country has a mix of more nationalities and religions in its populace than the US of A. It did not become a Superpower purely on its economic and military strength, USA became a Superpower because of the proper exploitation of its manpower potential, Along with the freedoms of democracy, universal conscription was mandated by law at a critical part in its domestic history, finessed by the Peace Corps initiative by John F. Kennedy that reached out to the world. Community service is at the heart of the American society and it is because of this selfless hands-on labour by a cross-section of the populace that the US has been able to cope with the major fault lines in its multi-ethnic multi-racial diverse religious populace. All four major wars, the First and Second World Wars, the Korean War and Vietnam, brought together whites and blacks, rich and poor, the educated and the illiterate, into one massive cauldron that wiped out all differences in the same manner as we envisage in Islam. In Pakistan, we have a major polarisation of society as the rich become richer and the poor poorer, all men becoming unequal. This further manifests itself in the Sindhi-Mohajir divide, the Shia-Sunni fault lines, etc. The penchant for separation along regional/religious lines is not confined to Pakistan alone but is increasingly a problem all over the world, in many cases in bloody manifestation thereof e.g. Bosnia, Rwanda, Kosovo, East Timor, etc. We pride ourselves in having the basis of our nationhood in Islam, yet we do not take concrete steps in ensuring all are equal in all senses of the word.

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