Chaos – Thy Name is Pakistan

The Indian Muslims demanded Pakistan before 1947 as a separate homeland because they were afraid that the Hindu Majority in India would deprive them of their right to practice their religion unhindered. They also thought that they wouldn’t receive equitable treatment in other social and administrative areas. I was twelve years old when India was partitioned and Pakistan, a country of the pure, was born. At that time, I could empathize with the feelings of the majority of Indian Muslims and believed Pakistan would be a better place to live. We paid a heavy price in blood and human suffering for Pakistan.

After partition, Bharat (Hindu India) became a democratic country quite effortlessly and remains so while Pakistan moved from one political crisis to another. Democracy was hotly debated in the public arena but didn’t get much of a chance in Pakistan. Even now after 60 years, Sufi Muhammad, the leader of Tehrik-Nifaz-i-Shariat-e-Muhammadi, has declared that there is no room for democracy in Islam. Democracy was killed together with Liaquat Ali Khan, the first Prime Minister of Pakistan, in 1948. Later, General Ayub Khan launched the first army coup and deposed the civilian government. He became the first military dictator to be followed by several others in due time. He played with a sort of democracy which he called the “Basic Democracy� but it was only a thin veil to shroud his dictatorship.

The mullahs who were deadly opposed to the formation of Pakistan started clamoring for the establishment of Islamic government in Pakistan. Many of them were possessed by the name “Islamic� but could not explain what the Islamic government would be. While the country moved from one crisis to another and lost one of its two wings (East Pakistan) to Bengalis who seceded to form Bangla Desh, the tangles of political chaos became increasingly more tangled.

After 60 years of mis-rule, Pakistan is in the grips of a civil war which has been launched by Taliban. Apparently, they want to install Islamic government by force. Islamic government is just a label; even if it is established, majority of Pakistanis wouldn’t be happy with its harsh restrictions. The Islamic government of Taliban would take the country some fifteen centuries back in to the desert culture of Arabia in which the women would lose all the freedom that they now have. Music will be banned and the television abolished. Women wouldn’t be allowed to go to schools (the women schools will be abolished); to become professionals such as nurses and the lady doctors and they would be banned from any public life. These are the only common denominators of the various brands of Islamic government. Oh yes! There are as many brands of Islamic government as are different brands of Islam. There is Sunni Islam, there is Shia Islam, there is Wahabi Islam and so on and so forth. Islam has become a sort of Pandora Box; you take out of the box whatever you want and call it Islamic. The tragic thing is that you believe that every thing else is un-Islamic. And now Taliban are waging jihad to install Islamic government in Pakistan. It has become a militant struggle; a revolt if you will.

Reflecting on the current situation in Pakistan, I tend to believe Pakistanis wouldn’t have gotten a worse deal from the Hindus had India not been divided. Islam has become so much individualistic in form and practice that it is better to leave it alone for individual and private practice. It is not suitable for making a government. I have said it in the past and repeat it here also that different articles concerned with civic and social life be taken from different branches of Islam and included in the country’s constitution. Such a constitution should then be called Islamic constitution. Islamic constitution of one Muslim country may be different from that of another. The mullahs who are bent upon encroaching upon the rights of their fellow Muslims by imposing their own brand should be treated harshly. Such an action has already begun in the troubled areas; the government should take this action to its logical end. This seems perhaps the only way that the country can be saved. Pakistanis should realize that these are the very same mullahs who were against the formation of Pakistan and now they are bent upon destroying it.