Black Pakistan and White Pakistan

Black Pakistan is Pakistan’s skeleton that it would rather not have. Black Pakistan is largely unknown and undefined. Like Voldemort it rises unannounced to strike and then disappears we know not where. It is among us yet we know nothing of it. It seems quiescent but we don’t know if it is vanquished or if it will rise bloodier than before. What is Black Pakistan? Perhaps it is made of the country’s 70% illiterate people who have no support system other than their clan or religious center. Perhaps Black Pakistan is the army camp of the Middle-East or even that it is the Iceberg of which Al-Qaida is the tip. We can only speculate since Black Pakistan won’t come out.


The extent of devastation and the world’s so-called inadequate response to the earthquake in Pakistan is a subject of grief, analysis and continued discussion. The fact is that the earthquake coverage had poor information, hardly any images and no real analysis on CNN. So far, adequate disaster relief funds have not been raised. Even though CNN is subtly different everywhere, CNN worldwide did not provide as much coverage on the ‘quake compared to other recent disasters. Other news sources such as BBC, CBC provided it as headline news for a few days after which it sank into the daily round-up spots. In other words, no long interviews, no analysis and no mention of the one thousand or more aftershocks and the human devastation. Why did CNN deem it of less importance? That is a question that haunts Pakistanis. Was it because of prejudice against Pakistan? Many theorize but no one knows for sure.

But why did we even wonder? Perhaps that concern is a symptom of a deeper issue; the difficult terrain of being Pakistani that we traverse because of the disconnected worlds of Pakistan. A disconnect so deep that it seems that there is a hidden country in Pakistan responsible for all the bad things, yet Pakistanis don’t know it and cannot control it.

Whenever Pakistani news is quoted abroad, we feel a sense of let-down. Pakistani news channels frankly don’t do a very good job of covering local news. Perhaps the problem is even deeper. There isn’t a well-developed system of community news in Pakistan. In Pakistan you get a lot of talk shows or discussion programmes. But the fact is that 80% of the people in Pakistan are not represented in the news other than perhaps as a perpetual backdrop of poverty in images or in statistics. We don’t have local community news because of a fractured ‘we’. When local straw huts burn down, it isn’t the subject of media interest. The role of media in public life is not very advanced even though it is far ahead of what it was like 10 years ago.

In Pakistan you will be able to read news about the entire world but very little local news. There is also very little local business news. In the business sections you are more than likely to hear about multinational corporations and aid donations but not about indigenous business houses. When a leading local chain grows phenomenally, Pakistani news does not cover it or analyze the reasons for success. This is a small example of how weak Pakistani media institution is—like a set for a movie, they are there but not so functional.

Pakistani media tends to look externally at what the world thinks of Pakistan. Editorial opinions range from conspiracy theories to a sense of failure arising from the deep fascination with what the world thinks of Pakistan or its President. Quite amazingly, you can find some excellent analysis, wonderfully erudite editorials, deeply thought out opinion pieces in the newspapers on a regular basis.

But all in all, going by the media, instead of the guy in the burnt hut being your general conscience, your conscience seems to be what the world thinks of you. But Pakistanis are generous donors and very charitable people. The local mosques have free food and people donate Zakat generously however tax evasion is very common. For the earthquake, people burst the bank donating. And the world gave a lot of money. The fact that so many people gave so much is recognized yet there is a general complaint of how other disasters got more money (again, the same paranoia around what does the world think of me and why didn’t it give more money to us?). Some people feel that the rest of the world does not respect or empathize with Pakistan. Is that really fair on the world or even true? This internalized comparison with the rest of the world seems to be a typical trend. Criticism is good, but self-flagellation is a part of the national character that points to another issue.

This self-flagellation is because of a conflict in identity. The disconnect between Black Pakistan and White Pakistan is profound. Some people have tried to describe this—they have called it the brown sahib syndrome or the english vs. urdu speaking people syndrome. But, neither concept is sufficient. This disconnect is really about the two countries in Pakistan. ‘Black Pakistan’ is made-up of largely voiceless and unknown personalities. They are categorized as Black simply because their agenda is hidden. It is unclear what they want. Apart from some religious rhetoric, one is left guessing about who these people are or what they want. These unknown voices emerge only as unexplained violence and crime. We’d get the hint, but they don’t really tell us what they want. They seem to really just want to blow up people. This country, like elsewhere in history (e.g., USSR) is better known outside Pakistan than inside Pakistan.

At headline moments Pakistan usually goes into denial, starts and aborts definitive action of the kind the rest of the world wants to see (e.g., it tempers extreme opinion and hate rhetoric instead of changing legislation) while it worries about whether New York Times writes well about Pakistan, and world opinion. Interestingly, Pakistan is so well habituated in this cycle that the first government reaction to the earthquake was ‘all is well, under control’.

Pakistan’s two worlds are reflected in public and private life both in Pakistan and abroad. Even though a perpetual racism exists in Pakistan, White Pakistan cares deeply about the racism that it encounters in the world. It is one thing to criticize Pakistan oneself, but quite another when Tinku Vhatever does it in Washington Post, under banner of ostensibly speaking for the modern world. Pakistanis are usually impressed when they travel abroad that the world does not really care much about the local Pakistani phobias of clothes, accent or class. In the marketplace of the global world, what seems to matter is an individual’s competence in getting things done and marketability. Pakistanis abroad generally blend in however many wear local dress. From jeans to hair coverings to shalwar suits Pakistanis come in all packages. But, Pakistanis feel that one cannot take too many chances on wearing the ‘Muslim’ identity in the West. It is best to blend in. Also, it is thought best to answer the question, ‘So, where are you from?’ with prevarication and care. You have to make sure you put across the subtle differences and that your speech conveys that you are a worker of Pakistani origin and not ‘Pakistani.’ American’s have the shortest attention spans in the whole world, but are very alert to body language, so you should ideally do this with a slow blink, a slightly twisted grimace and a very nonchalant shrug. Your expression and body language is key. It has to convey the right amount of indifference yet have direct eye contact.

The professionally trained Pakistani is a paradox of gray. He or she is lately in heightened conflict between the two identities of Black Pakistani and White Pakistani. On one hand He/She is convinced that the only way for Pakistan to be successful is to blend in with the modern values rather than to live by a pre-modern code of life. (Translate: Mukhtaran Mai good, rapists bad or US people good, Bush bad). The professional knows that money comes via very simple principles that don’t really care about who you pray to or your natural assets. Frankly, the professional Pakistan likes the marketplace of the global world and wants a part of the material wealth and success on the bandwagon of globalization. Pakistan is a consumption loving society that absorbs foreign influences easily (black or white). Even though it may seem contradictory, since 95% of Pakistanis are strong believers in Islam and Islam is firmly rooted emotionally in a deep awe and fear of death, the Muslim world are mostly trade-oriented travelers who love to spend. In fact accumulating wealth is considered a bad thing to do because we will all die. (And that too way before Keynes.)

Most Pakistani cosmopolitan types are also quite attached to their Pakistani identity and accord high priority for the next generation to speak fluent Urdu, to know the basic tenets of Islam and to dedicate a small corner of their hearts as permanently Muslim and/or Pakistani. The Pakistani worker has the same dreams as anyone in the world. He wants a big house, a car or cars, nice bi-cultural clothes, access to open media, the right to listen to music, foreign food and trips abroad.

Most Pakistanis feel that the world doesn’t like Muslims and Pakistanis. Pakistanis even avoid mentioning their national identity in public abroad. White Pakistanis will tell you they are Pakistani after a flick to the side and a shoulder check.

The professional Pakistan is outraged and afraid that the Pakistani identity will be seen as a stigma, and somewhat neurotically he is completely convinced that his Pakistani identity is a stigma. Pakistanis guess that it must be talk about Islamic extremism visavis Black Pakistan and, the crazy stories of Daniel Pearl, of Taliban, of Karo kari and of Kashmir in the media. More recently, since all events must become assimilated in the general sense of discontent with the world, the lower earthquake donations are also seen suspiciously.


The professional Pakistani, uncomfortably characterized as gray, in the world polarity, is actually quite helpless to change Black Pakistan either in Pakistan or abroad. He is to his own eyes whiter than white and can’t get any whiter. But, somehow BBC will talk about the worst of Pakistan and not anything else. They will speak of the dictator not the absolutely amazing cotton that Pakistan makes. They will speak of Butter Chicken but not the symphony of culinary delight that is Biryani. Perhaps the Pakistani forgets that it is not just them who write but they who provide the news. We are living in a PR world after all. But instead of reaching out, the Pakistan has sunk into a neurosis; more and more people wonder is it a conspiracy after all and does the world after all care more about his black spots than him?

Examples of our internal conflict between the White and the Black are all over. For instance our concern over which day Eid is. When it is time for Eid and every mosque declares an alternate day as Eid—when no one knows which day Eid will be, we shake our heads and laugh that these crazy Mullahs should use technology to figure this out. December 25th is one day and here we have multiple Eids all over the world. We criticize as though Islamic rituals are not ours but something we suffer as a common problem. We view moon sighting as an ignorant practice, rather than a cultural artifact that persists in many parts of the world. Many call the multiple Eid problem the failure of the Muslim world to unify. People propose a set Eid day against the Eid in Mecca/Medina. But why does tribal Islam need to unify? Against what and for what?

Ok, so there is an internal conflict but is there a real conflict between the desires of the Black Pakistani and the White Pakistani? Isn’t it possible to be both successfully? Wear a Suit but use a Lota? Study Anthropology but pray to Allah? Isn’t it ok to work at Microsoft and bitch about the US invasion of Iraq? To go along with colleagues to a bar yet not drink? Not to pray, yet to celebrate Eid? Do we have to test the fault lines, the deeper contradictions between Black Pakistan and White Pakistan? Must we all become White? Or Black? Isn’t it ok to be gray?

Yesterday was Eid. Proudly a fully covered up Muslim woman spoke of how the local mosque is so beautiful and exulted that it is ‘middle-eastern’ as if to say it is somehow genuine. A pause emerges. I see her speculating at my reaction to that word. She wonders which side of the Black and White divide I belong. My clothes signal White, yet I am here at Eid and I am admiring the mosque. The mosque is beautifully designed with high ceilings and a style of architecture unique to the Muslim world. But, ‘middle-eastern’ now why is that so cool? Because it is categorized as ‘Muslim.’ I don’t understand the respect that some Pakistani Muslims feel for Middle-East as perhaps they cannot understand the ambiguity that I feel.

I notice subtle signals. The Imam insists on how open and welcoming Canada is to Muslims (The Imam is a psychotherapist deeply concerned that the sanctity of his allah is being destroyed by terrorists). Yet the mosque does not have a board saying that it is a mosque. Instead the board announces ‘Cultural Center.’ From inside it is a mosque, from outside a ‘cultural center.’ Black is graying. And isn’t white more grey than before?. Why are we so painfully aware of every allegiance and every loyalty?

And what of Pakistan and the Pakistani Government?

The Pakistani Govt. is from the White, of the White or so the world must think, even if it is black here and there. It has concluded that the big challenge to the progress of Pakistanis is its image, not its religion. It is keen to change the image of Pakistan. It is a tough thing to do. Where should they start? Over the last few years, they have tried to give an alternative view of the Pakistani identity. Here are the terms one hears, ’moderate muslims’, ’the Indus Valley civilization’ ‘Jinnah’s vision’ and even Ata Turk’s moderate Islam. Meanwhile the hidden country is regularly discovered on the front-page headlines. Pakistan’s hidden country is a drafting ground for a different kind of war. The war for global power is fought with soldiers drafted from the Pakistan that White Pakistan knows little about. Every now and then the hidden country carries out a Jihad, pushes the LOC, bombs a public place abroad or gets a village to rape a woman for revenge. This hidden country, though little understood or analysed in Whiter Pakistan, comes into the world media’s attention quite often. Black Pakistan is an enemy of the World order, while White Pakistan struggles to become one with the global World and conform to the unwritten rules of the World today. And even as it does so, it keeps its grayer leanings to itself, hidden from the world.

The government is trying to make Pakistan appear an attractive spot for business. It appeals to Pakistani immigrants to do business with Pakistan. It has adopted computerized IDs to try and control aberrant Pakistanis. It even tried to regulate Madressahs and register them. The initial years of Musharraf were quite anti-black but now people aren’t that sure. I am guessing the government of Musharraf has to keep both black and white sides happy enough to co-operate in achieving the objective. For now the strategy seems to be, ‘get money into Pakistan’ and toe the line. And only he, it seems, can play the subtle game of mixing Black and White enough to keep the delicate balance of Pakistan intact.