Veeru Kohli was born into a scheduled caste of Hindus in the Sind province of Pakistan. The Kohlis are bonded laborers. Veeru Kohli was born into bondage since her family owed money to their feudal lord and was unable to pay it back. Veeru had to go into slavery, too, in order to make enough money and repay the landlord to buy freedom for herself and her family.

Despite the fact that the entire family worked day and night to raise money, they were never able to free themselves because their landlord kept increasing the sum. Just as every other bonded laborer, Veeru’s family also suffered relentless physical and mental abuse at the hands of their landlord and his armed guards. Rape and sexual harassment would be common. Women would regularly have to witness their men being beaten up by guards in front of them.

Unlike many others, however, Veeru Kohli managed to escape the prison of her landlord. A detailed story on her life and endeavors can be found here. What this article intends, on the other hand, is to ask a few questions about Veeru’s election campaign. She is running from Hyderabad for the upcoming elections in Pakistan. No doubt that Veeru is an inspiration but an investigation on her election campaign reveals a different kind of story.

Veeru Kohli is portrayed as the emblematic figure in the fight against bondage and debt slavery. One would expect a highly charged election campaign, pitting her supporters against the big feudal lords who dominate the province and its political scene. However, a visit to Hyderabad would leave you disappointed. There is no trace of any political campaign whatsoever around this issue. The campaign has been centered around the personage of Veeru Kohli instead of being centered on the larger issue of land reforms and peasants’ rights. Veeru herself is being flown around the world – three weeks ago she was in Ireland and before than in Los Angeles – to receive awards for her courage, even though the elections are going to take place in no time. Green Rural Development, which is the NGO supporting Veeru, is nowhere to be found on the ground.

A look at the dynamics of bonded labor and the social and political realities of a quasi feudal country like Pakistan would help us understand things better.

The bonded labor phenomenon spread in the south-eastern regions of Sind with the acceleration of mechanization in agriculture and adoption of cash crops, such as sugar cane, at the expense of food crops. Therefore, it is a rather recent development. The peasants in Sind are generally perennial – Moroosi Hari as they are called in Sindhi. They are attached to the land; they are part of the land and are sold with it if it ever changes hand. The system of equal sharing of the crop between the landlord and the peasants which exists in Sind is off-set by the application of the same principal to the cost of agricultural inputs – seeds, pesticides, fertilizer. But, over and above all, there are between the landlord and peasants reciprocal affective ties rooted in the land and transmitted from one generation to another. The peasants live on the land of the landlord; their whole life cycle evolves in the shadow of the family of the landlord. They are always available as domestic servants and for guarding the land, the cattle and the harvest. They also form a captive vote-bank for the landlord in local, provincial and national elections. The electoral mandate is, as a matter of fact, the privilege of the family whichever the political party it may belong to.

This system has so far worked without much difficulty in the case of big feudal lords, but it has developed deep cracks in the case of average landlords. With the spread of cash crops, the landlord does not need to take care of the land and the peasants round the year. His income has multiplied. He lives most of the time in cities. He needs a work-force only for some weeks at the time of sowing and harvesting. With the abandoning of food crops there is little for the peasants to feed on. Instead of sharing the harvest, as in the past, the landlord prefers paying the peasants in cash for the worked period only. In order to make ends meet for the rest of the year, peasants are obliged to borrow money from the landlord. The landlord is only too happy to oblige in order to keep them tied for the next sowing and harvesting. The landlord in Sind, specially the big feudal lord, is traditionally a spiritual head as well: a Pir, a gaddi nashin, belonging to a lineage descending from a real or supposed saint, by virtue of which he is considered possessing a moral and religious authority. He is the custodian of the tomb of this saint, thereby extending his social influence over and above his own domains.

The introduction of commercial transactions, however, has robbed the landlord’s relationship with the peasants of all its sanctity. Having become wage-labors, the peasants refuse to pay back the debts tied with exorbitant and unilateral interest rates. The traditional system of reciprocal obligations which bound the landlord and the peasants together in a complex social relationship has been eroded. This has given rise to forced detention of defaulting peasants and their families by the landlords.

Meanwhile, the peasants gained awareness regarding the legal possibilities offered to them by the Bonded Labor Abolition Act enacted in 1992 through the efforts of organizations such as Human Rights Commission of Pakistan. Veeru Kohli and her family were held prisoners by their landlord. After escaping from the forced detention, Veeru Kohli obtained the release of the rest of her family through courts. Afterwards, thousands of peasants won their freedom through courts and petitions to the administration.

But the entire process unwounded without the creation of a general awareness in the peasantry and without any political party incorporating the cause of peasantry in its program and in its political action. While initiative and courage were shown in obtaining the release of the victims of bonded labor, the released prisoners were left to rot in camps around some cities of the province. As they knew no other skills than those linked with agriculture, many of them turned into beggars or became involved in petty crimes. What is worse is that some NGOs used them to muster numbers for their poster-shows aimed more at impressing foreign donors than making social impact. They were paid meagerly out of generous grants. No political force came forward to use them as example for spreading a message of emancipation in the rural society, which remains as always under total ideological sway of feudal lords.

While the state in Pakistan has gradually abdicated all its social responsibilities such as education and health, the political parties also have evacuated the social reforms agenda towards the NGOs. Land reforms do not figure in the program of any political party worth the name. Less than 500 feudal families possess 60% of the total cultivable land in Sind and in southern Punjab. Two dozen feudal families, with their captive constituencies, dominate elected representation in these regions. They dictate their terms to the political parties, whether it be Pakistan People’s Party or Pakistan Muslim League (N), which  court them. None of the major political parties in contention for the next elections has proposed tax on agricultural holdings. That is what has locked the political system in Pakistan and rendered all economic reforms and social changes impossible. The public mandates of feudal lords serve only to reinforce their social power.

Without real politicization, the bonded labor issue has become the exclusive domain of the NGOs. Figures like Veeru Kohli, instead of serving as an authentic source of inspiration for putting into motion a process likely to lead to a real challenge to the current social system, are reduced to being objects of publicity, tradable commodities in the international market-place of icons, visible in the media but absent from the field.

Adapted, with permission, from Actualites Pakistanaises.

Photo credit: Dawn.com

The latest waves of attacks on Shia, Hazara, Christians, and women’s rights in Pakistan have been met with curious reactions by the people of that country, either living in Pakistan or abroad. I have not done any scientific analysis of this but I am basing my view on what I have witnessed and experienced in the past months. What follows is an attempt to make sense as well as to critique some of the responses coming from Pakistanis in the face of rising militancy in the country.

As someone who was born and grew up in Pakistan, I have to admit that sentiments against religious minorities are present at every level of the society. In my own home and family, it was, and still is, very common to use degrading terms for Shia, Christians, Hindus and a host of other people. Many would say that hatred against others exists only in the lower and illiterate classes; however, the example of my family is the case in point that such animosities are well present in the so-called educated classes. In fact, the classes that like to pretend that they are educated and enlightened are the bastions and main pillars of support for intolerance and backwardness in Pakistan. Their inability and unwillingness to look in the mirror cast doubts on the honesty of their views, opinions and beliefs, and  shows sheer hostility toward any criticism no matter where it comes from. It results in institutionalization of exclusion, self-righteousness, arrogance, distrust and hatred.

This is the centre and the basis of fanaticism in Pakistan: the people who carry in themselves the conviction of their superiority over others and institutionalize it. It is not only the overtly militant groups who have institutionalized sectarian hatred; these violent groups and individuals are just emanations of the dominant institutions that have been established by the mainstream society.

By the mainstream society, I mean to target a specific type of people. These are people who, first of all, pretend to be educated and enlightened. They occupy dominant positions in government, economy, media, education, and above all in the army. They are part of the high society and the high culture of the country and their voices are also heard all over the internet sphere thanks to social media.

The main problem that these people have, from what I have noticed during my time in the country, is their refusal to think outside of the box. Thinking outside of the box has been repeated to the point of clichés but it is nevertheless true for the dominant society and culture in Pakistan. The narrow world view that they are caught in is a result of nationalism, patriotism, mixed with religion.

There are two fundamental reasons why the Pakistani national and world view is informed in this way. To begin with, Pakistan was created on the premise that the Muslims of South Asia cannot live together with Hindus because Hindus being in majority would ultimately and necessarily dominate Muslims. The Two-Nations theory, as it is called, still is the prevalent view of history from the Pakistani point of view, despite the fact that the theory was largely disproven by the events of 1947 when Pakistan was created (majority of Muslims stayed in what then became India and did not move to Pakistan) and then by the independence of Bangladesh from Pakistan in 1971 when it became clear that a country cannot exist simply because its inhabitants share the same faith.

The second reason stems from the first one. After the embarrassing defeat of Pakistani army in Bangladesh and the subsequent independence of Bangladesh, Pakistan needed a new ideological sense in order to come to terms with what had happened during the war with one of its own provinces and the breakup of the country. Instead of introspection, the entire nation was told that Pakistan broke up because of Hindu, Christian, and Zionist conspiracy in an attempt to destroy the Muslim nation. Given these two reasons, there is an ideological framework in which Pakistanis look at themselves as perennial victims of outside conspiracy.

However, the attacks on minorities this year has caused some unease inside the country, even among those who had until now mastered the art of denying the obvious. These attacks are so heinous that it has become impossible for Pakistanis to turn the blind eye. For long periods of time, the Pakistani society had blamed such attacks on one thing or another, refusing to accept that their country, which they see only as victim, could also be an oppressor. They had refused to accept that militant outfits were being financed by their army not only for using them as proxies in India and in Afghanistan but also as a counterweight to progressive movements inside the country. Not only it was ignored that extremist groups were breeding in the heart of Pakistan – in Punjab – but these groups were looked up to as soldiers of Islam fighting the infidels. The infidels were not only outside the country but also inside. The ones inside were the Shia, Christians, Hindus and Sikh. While fighting the infidels outside the borders was normally cheered, the murder of the ones inside was in most instances conveniently ignored.

Nevertheless, from what I have seen in the past few months is that the even the most indifferent of the people in the country are now showing some signs of waking up. Those who were awake to some extent came out on the streets, while the ones who were in their right senses to begin with are picking up courage and becoming more vocal in their denunciation of extremism.  As the militant groups are becoming more and more violent, even the common people are seeing through the hollowness of their ideology. Even the mainstream Muslim groups have come out strongly against the targeted killings. There is hope that these groups can be isolated from society thus making it easier to deal with them.

But there some problems, in this regard, which need to be looked into. Despite some positive signs coming from Pakistan, I still do not think that the society as a whole, especially the mainstream, is capable of facing the challenges and asking itself some tough questions. Nationalism and patriotism mixed with religion prevents those impregnated with it to get to the roots of extremism in Pakistan. If the reactions that came out as a result of the attacks lead to true introspection, it will be seen that extremism and militancy in Pakistan is sponsored by its army, police, and intelligence services. But in a country where a siege mentality has been inculcated into people and where the early Islamic conquests are so glorified that it makes the support for the army so deeply entrenched, how can anyone tackle the ideology behind these militant groups? Who has the courage to point out that the army and the extremist groups use the same ideological cover at the end of the day? That many in the army and intelligence services ideologically sympathize and materially support the ethnic cleansing of Shia, Hazara, Christians, and Hindus? Who will dare to say that the army which claims to be defending the nation is in fact the country’s biggest enemy and that the ideology that seemingly is keeping Pakistan together is in reality a cancer which is eating the country out slowly? Who has the strength to question the founding myths of the nation and the way it has functioned ever since it was created?

I think one runs the risk of being labeled as apostate if he dares posing these questions. Pakistan is facing an existential crisis. If it goes down it will most likely also damage the religion which it has been using as fig-leaf. The present moment should be taken up as an opportunity to expose the deceit which is at the very roots of the country.

But what is the hope that this challenge will be taken up? From what I can see, Pakistan’s mainstream society is consistently failing in that respect. There is no indication that the required questions are being asked. In fact, I see the mainstream society recoiling and taking refuge in the same old delusion – all which is abominable cannot possibly be coming from within, that our army will protect us and we should stand by it, that Pakistan is victimized by outside forces because it is a Muslim country, and that Pakistan should remain the “citadel” of Islam.

Jahanzeb Hussain is the editor of Collateral Damage.

Photo credit: Jahanzeb Hussain

Associate Professor at Simon Fraser University’s International Studies department Tamir Moustafa gave a lecture on Islamic law and women’s rights in Malaysia in mid-March at the school’s downtown campus. Mr. Moustafa has been doing his field work on women’s rights within the framework of Islam in Malaysia and his talk was an occasion for SFU’s students to get an insight into his research. Collateral Damage Magazine was present at the event to give this report-back.

The focus of Tamir Moustafa’s talk was around Sisters in Islam, a Malaysian women’s rights group which advocates rights for women based on Islamic legal traditions. The group is in the forefront of pushing for progressive legislation in the country for rights of women within a religious framework.

Malaysia has over the years embraced its Muslim identity and declares it an Islamic state. Women’s rights groups are normally accused of undermining Islam in Malaysia but Sisters in Islam because of its Islamic character is able to ward off such accusations. What Sisters want to show is that the Malaysian state implements arbitrarily selected and patriarchal laws from suitable Islamic legal traditions.

Since Islamic law or fiqh is man-made and is the human interpretation of Sharia or God’s will, there is an undeniable human agency involved in the formulation of Islamic laws. Since Islamic law is formed by humans, it is fallible and imperfect. Neither is the fiqh rigid and unchangeable. Islamic legal tradition contains diversity of views and interpretation on different issues and thus it is pluralistic.

Religious authority in Islam is not considered absolute and a fatwa is a non-binding opinion from a scholar of Islam. A scholar’s opinion cannot be absolute or a religious edict. Since it is a human being’s opinion, it is not infallible.

However, with the introduction of British laws and the creation of nation-states, Islamic laws have become codified, including in Malaysia. This is contrary to the Islamic legal tradition which was always a continuously evolving body of laws.

In Malaysia, a fatwa is legally binding despite the fact that it is not supposed to be so in Islam. The state therefore subverts Islamic traditions. By ignoring the fact that these laws are man-made, the Malaysian government claims to be making laws in the name of God. Many of the laws in that country should thus be understood as state sanctioned instead of Islamic per se. Malaysia actually ranks 6^th in the list of countries where the state interferes the most in religion matters.

This is where Sisters in Islam come in. They examine different views with the Islamic legal tradition on family law for example and try to demonstrate that the Malaysian state selects interpretations of Islamic law that are inimical to women’s rights. They show that many of the laws are invalid for today’s society. Since they challenge the religious councils on common ground – that is within the framework of religion – they not only do not face accusations of harming Islam but they have been able to win some important legal victories. One such victory includes the passing of a law of domestic abuse. Not only are Sisters in Islam able to face religious conservatives who argue that Islamic law in monolithic and untouchable, they are also able to dismiss conservative secularists who reject Islam on the basis that the religion’s laws are unchanging.

Sisters in Islam also do a large amount of educational work and media outreach. They give legal advice and hold seminars related to all the relevant issues.

In addition to the state, Sisters in Islam also face several challenges from the public. Polls show that most of the people in Malaysia are of the erroneous view that Islamic law does not contain human agency and is perfect. There are other misconceptions too that make it difficult for Sisters in Islam to win support from the general public. Nonetheless, Sisters in Islam persevere in their mission.

Jahanzeb Hussain is the editor of the Collateral Damage

Well-known professor of sociology and Middle Eastern studies Asef Bayat from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign came to Vancouver’s Simon Fraser University in February to give a talk on non-social movements in the Middle East and their role in forging change in several of the countries of the region. Collateral Damage Magazine was present at his lecture to give this report-back.

Non-social movements refer to networks that people such as urban youth and poor have been able to create in order to change the societies they live in. These movements exist outside recognized social movements like trade unions. The study of non-social movements looks at social change and agency of disenfranchised groups outside the realm of established agencies.

Before the Arab Spring started, people in countries such as Egypt were of the view that revolutions do not promise change. They are uncertain and do not guarantee a just society. Since a revolution cannot be planned, people were waiting and hoping that it would happen from somewhere one day.

What does one do while waiting for the revolution? In such a scenario, collective action to push for changes within the system is what people resort to.

By focusing on non-social movements, one does not intend to downplay organized social movements such as labor movements, women’s rights groups, including communist parties that exist in the Middle East. However, the political regimes need to be tolerant of such trends if they are to exist, which is often not the case in Arab countries. Organized social movements also have an ideology and a recognizable political leadership.

In absence or outside of established movements, you have non-social movements that are social collectives formed by un-collected and fragmented people.

There are three main examples. The first is that of the urban poor. Social non-movements are a salient feature of this group of dispersed people. Their collective action entails a silent and sustained invasion on the property of the rich in order to improve their lives. Rural-urban migration, which is another component of this, leads to a steady build up of communities in slums. These atomized people are able to thus come together and transform the cities of Middle East and create lively communities of life and labor. By creating slums outside major cities, they automatically raise issues of urban governance and are therefore able to engage with the state. All of this is done without a formal organization, leadership and ideology.

The second example is of women. Since the political regimes impose harsh conditions on women and deny them gender, working and other fundamental rights, they are forced to negotiate with the state in forms of non-social movements. Despite the challenges they face, women fight to occupy social space by taking up work that is normally performed by men, working in the media, etc. Basically, they do the same work as men do parallel to them. By pushing boundaries thanks to their daily actions, they have been able to gain many rights through proper channels such as legal courts. A part from legal victories, women have been changing social mentalities by insisting on getting higher education, jobs, and living independently. They have been particularly empowered by supervising men at work, getting ahead of men at school, and not depending on male members of their family for income.

The network that these women have is informal. They recognize each other’s struggles and when they face collective danger they are able to come together and defend each other.

The third example is that of youth. By youth, one does not mean to talk about student movements, youth wings of political parties or youth movements based on any ideology. This youth movement is about reclaiming youthfulness, creativity and expression. The youth reclaim social space and resist control by expressing their desires and wants through avenues such as fashion, art, etc.

Social non-movements are not conventional protests or resistance movements; they are an attempt to redress the society through daily actions directly. These actions might not even be deliberate but they become part of the movement. Since these actions are a part of life, it is impossible for the state to stop them. Daily practices set up alternatives, alternatives become the norm and norms become de facto laws. De facto laws can also become de jure.

Jahanzeb Hussain is the editor of Collateral Damage

I’ve seen their silent faces

They scream so loud
If they were to speak these words
They’d go missing too
Another woman on the torture table
What else can they do ?

One day we’ll dance on their graves

One day we’ll sing our freedom

One day we’ll laugh in our joy

And we’ll dance (twice)

Hey Mr. Pinochet, you’ve sown a bitter crop

It’s foreign money that supports you
One day the money is going to stop
No wages for your torturers
No budget for your guns
Can you think of your own mother
Dancin’ with her invisible son?

These lines taken from They Dance Alone, a protest song composed by the English musician Sting and dedicated to the persons who went missing during the reign of terror unleashed by the military dictatorships in Chile and Argentina, which also fully depicts the grief and the determination of the mothers, sisters, daughters, sons, wives, brothers and fathers of the persons who have gone missing in Baluchistan like in the southern cone of Latin America in 70’s and 80’s. The song is a metaphor referring to mourning Chilean women who dance the Cueca, the national dance of Chile, carrying the photographs of their disappeared loved ones in their hands. The last lines addressed to Pinochet could very well be addressed to the generals of Pakistan army.

In Argentina the missing persons were called Desaparecidos. The people of Baluchistan have their own term for their missing persons: Bygwahiin – those without any witness. They do not have any witness who can testify to their present status, whether they are alive or dead. Those who have gone missing cannot be mourned until the day their mutilated body is found in some deserted place, killed and then dumped by the paramilitary forces and the secret services of the Pakistan Armed Forces. The tragedy which has been unfolding in Baluchistan for the last ten years is the direct result of the license given to the Pakistan Army by the international powers in exchange for the facilitation it provides to them in the so-called War on Terror.

The parents and children of the Bygwahiin have set up a camp in front of the Press Club of Quetta where they protest silently, carrying the portraits of their missing near and dear ones. The Baluch resistance media and the Urdu service of the BBC have been lifting the veil on the extent of the missing persons’ phenomenon in Baluchistan, how they are kidnapped and how their mutilated bodies are discovered.

Some of the interviews of the close relatives reported by these media, and the special report of Human Rights Watch on the missing persons of Baluchistan entitled “We can torture, kill and keep you as long as we like,” gives a blood-chilling account of the bestiality of the Pakistan security apparatus which should, if justice and impartiality were to prevail, lead to the arraignment of those responsible for these acts before the International Crimes Court.

Saman is twenty years old and daughter of one of the Bygwahiin. She is post-graduate student in chemistry at the University of Baluchistan in Quetta. Every day she, on one pretext or other, takes leave from her teachers in order to join the other protesting parents in front of the Press Club. As she does not want others to know of her identity, she put on a Burqa and silently slips among the wives, mothers and daughters of the other missing persons. Saman does not like telling lies to her teachers but at the same time she is afraid of their reaction if she informed them of the true reasons for her absence. Saman’s father, Dr. Din Mohammad, was a member of the executive committee of the Baluchistan National Movement, a perfectly legal political party which is fighting for the democratic rights of Baluch people and against the arbitrary practices of the security forces. He was a physician in the government hospital of Arnaj near the city of Khuzdar which is about 200 kilometers from Quetta. In the night of 28 June 2009, about a dozen persons in civil dress descended from two pick-up trucks in front of his house situated within the precincts of the hospital. They knocked on his door. Guessing some foul play, he refused to open the door. It was broken open; Dr. Din Mohammad tied up and tossed into one of the vehicles. Since then, his family which lives in Quetta is without his news. All attempts on its part to contact the authorities were fruitless. Thus, one more family was added to the relatives of the other Bygwahiin. The family fears that someday his mutilated body, like many others, will be found in some deserted place. Saman has become so depressed due to this state of permanent tension that she prays to God that, if after all the fate of her father is to be killed, then better it be soon so that the family may be delivered of the constant pain and wait.

In the protest camp, Saman came across another student of the University of Baluchistan, Farzana, whose brother, Zakir, a masters’ student and activist of the Baloch Students Organisation was kidnapped eight months ago. Contrary to Saman, Farzana does not hide her commitment and her fury. She held a press conference to demand that the whereabouts of her brother be revealed. She went with some other relatives of Bygwahiin to Karachi and Islamabad to stage protests. She has no confidence in the state authorities, judicial system and the political parties of Pakistan. She now reads, among other things, the biography of Che Guevara, the novel Spartacus and dreams of the day when she could take her revenge against the bloody drama which is being staged in Baluchistan.

There are thousands of families in Baluchistan which are mourning their missing relatives. The five year old son of Jalil Reiki, a leader of the Baluchistan Republican Party, at last saw his father three years after he was kidnapped – but in what shape! During that time his mother consoled him that his father was away in Karachi for some business. Recently, the mutilated body of Jalil Reiki was found near the Iranian border. His face was so disfigured that he could only be recognized due to his identity card which was found in the pocket of his shirt. The grand-father made it a point to show Jalil’s dead body to his grand-son for informing of the fate that the Pakistani state reserves for the sons of Baluchistan.

Among the Bygwahiin, there is an eighty year old man who belongs to the Qalandrani tribe. According to his son, he can hardly stand what to say of wielding a gun. Many other members of Qalandrani tribe young as well as not so young were picked by the security forces because this tribe is suspected of harboring sympathies for the insurgents. The mutilated body of one of the young men, who was member of the Baloch Students Organization, was recently discovered.

There are also three minors among the Bygwahiin; the youngest one being twelve years old. He, along with his fourteen year old cousin, was playing in a street when they were picked up by soldiers of Frontier Constabulary – the dreaded FC – a paramilitary force headed by Pakistan army officers. The crime of these two children was to have inquired around them about the circumstances of the disappearance of their uncle.

Students are the favorite targets of the security forces. Most of the missing students were members of the Baloch Students Organization. Many of them were picked up from campuses. According to a professor of the University of Baluchistan, he has lost sixteen of his students.

In its report on the missing persons of Baluchistan, Human rights Watch has documented forty five cases of forced disappearances, most of which occurred in 2009 and 2010. The kidnappings are usually carried out by armed men in civil dress, driving in pick-up trucks. Witnesses describe them as men of  Pakistan’s intelligence agencies – ISI, Military Intelligence and Intelligence Bureau.

Pakistan army and its intelligence agencies maintain secret detention centers all over the province. Even though these agencies care little about the social or political status of its victims, their task becomes easier when the victim is a relatively less known person. They keep them in their detention centers for as long as they like. The main detention center called Kuli Camp is situated near Quetta.

Human Rights Watch in its report gives a young man’s account of torture inflicted on him at Kuli Camp:

I was stripped naked, tied-up and strung to the ceiling. My face was covered and many men beat me up with batons. They had only one question and only one reproach: why you Baloch want independence? When I was finally brought down I could hardly stand and my entire body was covered with blood.

According to Human Rights Watch, the climate of fear prevailing in Baluchistan due to the forced disappearances has become unbearable for the relatives of the missing persons. They are afraid of contacting the authorities for inquiring about the whereabouts of their relatives. They fear that if they did so they will go missing as well.

The exact number of missing persons is not known but the interior minister of Pakistan admitted in 2008 that there were 1102 cases of missing persons in Baluchistan. According to the latest Human Rights Watch report, “the situation of human rights is worsening; the forced disappearances of Baloch activists by the army, the intelligence agencies and Frontier Constabulary are continuing. Pakistan army continues to resist the attempts of the government to reconcile with the Baloch groups and its efforts to locate the missing persons.” According to Pakistani press reports seventy dead bodies of the missing persons have been found between July 2010 and February 2011.

Pakistan has not yet signed the international covenant on the protection of all persons against forced disappearance. Although it has signed the covenant on civil and political rights as well as the convention against torture, it has neither the political will nor the institutional possibilities of implementing them.

Strangely enough while the international press is so prolix about the terrorist danger against Western countries emanating from Pakistan, silence is maintained regarding the not so secret war waged by the Pakistani military machine against its own people.

The Bygwahiin of Baluchistan deserve the same level of international solidarity as did the Desaparecidos of Argentina and Chile. It is only international solidarity which can make Pakistan accountable in front of international justice.

 Jahanzeb Hussain is the editor of the magazine

The answer to this question is not given from a tactical or a military point of view but from a moral stand point. Is the Obama administration humane in its policies in the War on Terror or what we are seeing today under the new president a continuation of the past?

Obama came to power after 8 outrageous years of George W. Bush, which were plagued by his administration’s use of torture of prisoners and the conditions they were kept in places like Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay. Obama ran on the platform of hope and change, which made many believe that his government will break off from the trends of the Bush government and embark on a new era. Nevertheless, Obama’s tenure in office has not led to any significant change as far as the reality of the American empire is concerned and the impacts of the American foreign policy on the victims of the American empire.

What we have noticed so far is a redistribution of the economy of punishment instead of a fundamental, moral shift from the Bush era. Granted, the use of torture has disappeared as far as we know and the hardcore policy outlook of Bush administration is no longer there. On the surface, this seems to be a humanization of American foreign policy, apparently based on St. Augustine’s just war theory. However, contrary to what most liberals think, Obama’s drone policy is not a departure from the conservatives’ torture policy. In terms of its impact on the human body, for example, drones are the same as torture. As during the torture era, the body of a “terrorist” remains a site of amputation, decapitation and everything in between. Obama’s policies are evidently not as hateful and vengeful as they were under his predecessor but they are nonetheless another technique of killing. Unlike torture, drone attacks are precise and it takes a second to execute the target but the effects of a drone attack are as vulgar and visible as the effects of torture on a human body are, if not more. The difference between Obama and Bush is that the Republican president preferred torture and humiliation of the detainees, while the Democrat president skips those stages to instant death and carnage.

Bush’s policies had a human element to it. It was an ugly spectrum of human beings degrading and torturing other human beings for the sole sake of humiliating them and taking revenge. In his era, the US had no real reason to go to war in Iraq and Afghanistan except for ideological hatred and showing off their muscles to the rest of the world. Similarly, the only purpose why prisoners were held in inhumane conditions, tortured and abused was to humiliate them. In this, the Americans were like Al Qaeda since both of them liked to use terror for terror’s sake.

Under Obama, on the other hand, the human element has been taken out. We now have drones instead of humans who kill in the battle field. Combined with the fact that Obama does not have the same hateful and extremist blend to his foreign policy, the use of drones is seen – rightly or wrongly – as a more effective way to combat a mobile and transnational Al Qaeda, as well as other militant outfits. As a result, the use of torture is no longer there, not because under Obama the American policy has humanized or has gone through a moral shift, but simply because there is no longer a need to intake prisoners. The target is no longer held in prisons and tortured, but is killed on the spot by the drone. The Obama administration has changed tactics, nothing more. It has shifted from one mode of warfare to another, while remaining as savage as ever.

Obama will not change his policies because the current policies are what is required by the American empire. The liberal class that supports him also supports the American empire project. They justify the drone attacks because it fits their moral compass, which does not go beyond their desperate and embarrassing attempts to set themselves apart from the conservatives. In reality, liberals are half conservatives – their conservative side believes in the American empire, while at the same time, their remaining liberal side wants to distinguish itself from the conservatives. Since Obama’s drone policy does not include the hideous torture of the Bush era, the liberals have been able to find a justification of Obama’s policy, portraying it to be nicer, gentler and more humane and thus finding solace and satisfaction for their liberal conscience. In their eyes, they and their president are morally superior to the Republicans because they can reach their foreign policy objectives without resorting to torture. That is the only difference between liberals and conservatives. For the victims, though, there is no difference between Bush and Obama. It matters little if one is killed by Obama’s drones or tortured by Bush’s thugs. Their bodies carry the marks of American savagery, whether on the orders of Bush or Obama.

Furthermore, it cannot be said that Obama’s drone policy is free of ideology and ideological excesses. His policies also contain a human element, albeit different from that of Bush’s. Obama’s policies involve planning, decision making, judgment, aims, objectives, emotions, sentiments – all of which make them very man made and human. The drone policy is yet another foreign and war policy which goes through the same process and investment like any other government policy, including the   torture policy of Obama’s predecessor. The drone policy is just as ideological with ideological excesses as Bush’s torture policy was and the current president and his administration should be held responsible and accountable for it, just as Bush should be taken to court for his policies.

Added to this band of criminals should be the intellectual class that specializes in justifying such policies. Liberals have found refuge in their president’s drone policy because it allows them to clean their conscience and wash their hands off Bush’s era. American liberals carry guilt because of what George Bush did in the name of their country, therefore Obama’s “nicer” policies gives them solace. However, the liberal exercise of lightening their burden is a very self-centered, self-congratulatory and a selfish attempt. They do not do so to ease the suffering of the oppressed but they do it to feel good about themselves. They have least concern for brown people in Asia but have a lot of concern for their own well being and feelings. Just as conservatives, liberals are ardent supporters of the American empire and its supposedly divine mission of civilizing, helping and bringing democracy to other (darker) nations. Liberals would rather rescue the world in a “nicer” way, rally around Obama and feel good about it than support the vulgarity of the Republicans.

American liberals might think that they have redeemed themselves in the eyes of the world by getting Obama elected and supporting his policies, but they are mistaken. They might have redeemed themselves in their own eyes and mind, but the eyes of the victims perceive reality in a slightly different manner. Bodily repression, harm to life and psychological torture has not gone and is the same as it was under Bush, if not worse. The colored clothing, the head masks and the chains are no longer there but the spectacle of the exercise of power is intact. Drones leave behind a spectacle of tortured minds and bodies, as well as a clear example of how America can subjugate others through its technological power. Under Obama, the economy of punishment has changed but the fact is that the element of punishment has remained intact. Liberals support punishing “terrorists” as much as conservatives did, but they would rather let the drones do it rather than get their own hands dirty. Liberals might think that, just because bodily contact between their boys in uniform and the “terrorists” is no longer a part of warfare, they have found a better and more moral way to fight war; but if they are, for once, able to set aside their hubris and love of imperialism, they will see the reality from the other end of the barrel. However, as things stand, they are happy deluding themselves and take joy in their ignorance. The American liberal class does not have the maturity and courage to look in the mirror and see what is wrong with them.

Drone attacks are not only a new technique of fighting wars; it is also presented as the new moral economy of warfare. Despite the claims by liberals of their own moral and technological sophistication, drone policy is drenched in blood. Under torture, the prisoner is given a thousand deaths and is subjected to the most exquisite of agonies; whereas using the drone, these steps are skipped and the target is given instant death. What difference does it make if a person is inflicted with gradual death or has the pleasure of being killed in a second?

Drones are the new guillotine. Gone is the torture of the Ancien Régime and in comes the instant, apparently de-personalized method of death. The liberals like it because they do not want to be associated with the methods of the previous government. It is de-personalized since the physical contact between American soldiers and “terrorists” is no longer there and liberals take respite in the fact that their boys can fight wars without going to distant lands; but as we saw above, drones are not a de-personalized policy, especially when each and every drone attack is personally approved by Obama. As far as the victims are concerned, it is far from a de-personalized issue. The torturer has reappeared in a new way: he is now the drone operator instead of the Gitmo guard. The intensity of the use of drones is the same as that of the use of torture, if not more. So is the liberal approval of the use of drones.

The liberal justification for drones revolves around the same rituals of national defense, protecting our values and way of life against the menacing Other. All these traits are found readily among liberals as they are among conservatives. Liberal intellectuals have the same discourse and pretend to have the same expertise as their fellow conservatives when it comes to qualifying the Other and telling the nation that they can measure for sure the threat that the Other poses to America. Both of them stand by the “terrorist” hypothesis and engage in the same intellectual acrobatics of designing the boundaries between Us and Them.  The same military, political and legal structure is in place that holds up the War on Terror and the liberal intellectuals play the exact same role as conservative intellectuals and justify each and every action of their respective president.

Liberals might think that the torture during Bush era was inexplicable but in reality it was not an irregular or a one-off occurrence. Just like torture is a measured technique of sodomizing someone’s body, so is a drone attack. While torture is shrewd and gradual degradation of a person, drone strikes eviscerate a person on the spot, which is also a shrewd calculation by the American policy makers. Drones and torture are two different modes of the same process. Victims of drone attacks bear the mark of American terrorism on their minds and bodies just as the victims of torture carry the marks of American hatred inflicted upon them.

Drone attacks are a ritual like torture was – they both are a mark of savage American power hovering on everyone, taking them prisoners. For liberals, drones are a sign of American triumphalism similar to how the conservatives see or saw torture as justified revenge over the Other. Last but not the least, both Bush and Obama can carry out their respective policies based on a mere assumption that their target is a terrorist. The US, which is the judge, jury and the executioner, designating someone as an enemy is a straightforward task, especially when there is a huge intellectual class at their disposal which lives by paying tribute to the state and legitimizing each and every decision the state makes.

Jahanzeb Hussain is the editor of the magazine. 

Renowned British journalist Robert Fisk stopped over in Vancouver on Saturday, February 2^nd during his Canada-wide during. Collateral Damage Magazine was present at the St. Andrew’s-Wesley church to listen and report back Fisk’s talk.

Mali

The veteran journalist started off by remarking that French intervention in Mali could potentially be a quagmire if the French do not have a political solution for Mali in addition to their military action. However, Fisk was just as confused as many of us as to why François Hollande has decided to take such an action in Mali. There is an on-going civil war in the African country for the past 30 years and France has directly entered the equation, whereas previously it had backed the military coup in Mali which is still in place. Fisk also informed the audience that Canadian special services trained the Malian army that carried out the coup. Citing Human Rights Watch, Fisk spoke of the abuses the Malian army has already committed against Arabs and the Tuareg. Apart from the lack of strategy from France, the military adventure risks to give further impetus to Al-Qaeda who, according to Fisk, aim to humiliate Western troops wherever they set foot in the Muslim world. The timing is unfortunate since it comes at a moment when the Arab world has collectively rejected Bin Laden and his message during the uprisings in the past two years.

Origins of the Arab Spring

According to Fisk, the origins of the Arab Spring are not in Tunisia but in Lebanon. After the murder of Rafik Hariri, millions of Lebanese took to the streets of Beirut to peacefully demand the withdrawal of Syrian troops from their country, which they subsequently got. This was the first time the Arabs got what they wanted. The Lebanese example inspired the Iranian Green Movement in 2008. Fisk correctly marked that the protests in Iran were against Ahmadinejad – who actually did win the elections but not by the same margins he proclaimed – and the corruption he symbolized and not against the Islamic Republic. The fact that the color of the movement was green meant that the people were with the Islamic Republic and wanted to return to the founding principles of the government that came out of the Iranian Revolution. Therefore, it was a reformist movement and not a revolutionary one like the Arab Spring.

Reasons for the Arab Spring

Robert Fisk highlighted three main reasons that led to the Arab Spring: Education, travel, and technology. Fisk went to Cairo for the first time around 1970. At that time, according to him, the education level in that country was appalling. However, in his most recent visits prior to the Arab Spring, he noticed the exponential improvement in the education levels among Egyptians and other Arab nations. Fisk said that Arabs travel more now than they did before, which has given them first hand access to the realities of other countries and continents, inspiring them to improve the conditions of their own countries. Lastly, modern technology and means of quick and mass communication was an important tool for mobilizing the public.

Fisk believes that, once a people break the fear barrier, they can never be afraid again; and this is what he notices now in Arab capitals such as Cairo. Everywhere he goes, he sees people talk about politics, whereas previously Egyptian civil society was completely covered with a dictatorial blanket.

Importance of trade unions

One vital aspect which is largely ignored by the media when it comes to understanding the Arab Spring is the role of trade unions. In 2006, workers in cotton factories of Mahala staged a strike – which was led by women – and took over the town’s central square. They were eventually beaten away by Mubarak’s thugs but they did manage to win some rights. The workers also used technology to call in peasants from other towns to join them. The strike actions were repeated in the following year. In 2011, it was the workers who made the call to gather in Cairo and occupy Tahrir square.

President Morsi has made some overtures toward the unions. Morsi needs as much support as he can from different power centers; therefore he has looked toward the unions. There still is an ongoing battle between the Muslim Brotherhood and the Egyptian army, while the US has its grip over Egypt through institutions such as the IMF and the World Bank.

On Hosni Mubarak’s trail, Fisk was of the opinion that the former dictator’s trail is prolonged so that he could stay in jail and no judgment be given during the present fragile political situation. He also said that the fact that Egyptians sent Mubarak to court – as opposed to lynching him like Gaddafi – shows that Egyptians believe in the rule of law.

Revolution in the Gulf

As far as the uprisings in the Gulf are concerned, Fisk said that Bahrain was too rich to go down – not to mention the country’s importance given that the American 5^th Fleet is stationed there, as well as the repressive role of the Gulf Security Council. Bahrainis came out on the streets and demanded dignity, but the West only talks about dignity but is not ready to give them the chance to live with dignity.

Journalism today

There is a strong relation between journalism and power, according to Fisk – so much so that the media is wind tunnel of state power. One of the ways in which the media neutralizes – which benefits the oppressor – a conflict is by modifying the semantics. For example, Israeli colonies in the West Bank become “Jewish neighborhoods”; the annexation wall that snakes through the West Bank is bigger and taller than the Berlin Wall but it is called a “fence” and a “barrier.” The conflict is therefore normalized. Moreover, giving everyone equal space – or as Fisk calls it “50/50” journalism – a conflict such as Israel/Palestine is treated as a football match where both teams have an equal chance of winning and the viewers can pick their favorites. Fisk though retains that a journalist ought to have a moral conscience when reporting and realize that it is their duty to speak in support of the victims. The oppressor and the oppressed cannot be given equal time and stage. The job of the intellectual is to monitor the lies of the powerful when they go to war. However, journalists use clichés like soldiers use bullets.

On Syria

Fisk described the situation in Syria as a holocaust. Both sides involved in the conflict feel that they can come out on the top, therefore the fighting will drag on and initiatives such as the ones offered by the UN will not work. However, the Syrian regime has shown signs of changing its tactics recently. For example, President Assad is his last speech did not mention the Assad family at all and only mentioned the Baath Party only once. The Syrian regime is perhaps trying to win back some of the army defectors. It might find it easier to win them back first than reclaim the lost territories.

The so-called Free Syria Army is not made up just of Sunni fighters; it also has Alawite, Christians and Druze officers. Nevertheless, there are many Al-Qaeda elements present in the FSA who are being funded and armed by the West (ironically the West is now fighting the same types in Mali). As far as Western involvement in Syria is concerned, Fisk says that its aim is to weaken Iran and cut it off from its only Arab ally.

Future of Palestine

Fisk was candid about his take on Palestine. There will be no Palestinian state because Israel has taken over too much land in the West Bank, to the point that there cannot possibly be a viable state for the Palestinians. There is simply no room for Palestine. When asked by a member of audience what will happen if there is no Palestinian state, Fisk replied that such a situation will only increase violence in the Middle East and the American relationship with Israel, which is a taboo in the US, will eventually come under stress.

Iranian issue

When asked about Iran, Fisk told the audience that the American policy toward that country is not only hypocritical – given how American allies such as Israel and Pakistan, who also happen to be religious states, have nuclear weapons – but is rooted in imperial hubris. Under the Shah, the US helped the Shah to develop nuclear weapons. The Shah actually said openly in a press conference in Washington that Iran wants to have nuclear technology. At that time Iran was an American ally and the Shah was called the “policeman of the Middle East”, but this is no longer the case with the present Iranian government. American policy differs based on who is a friend and who is an enemy. When Khomeini came to power, he stopped the nuclear program that had been initiated by the Shah. However, when the US backed Saddam Husein to attack Iran and use chemical and biological weapons against the Iranians, Iran’s military advised Khomeini to restart the nuclear projects. The Iranian nuclear program should be understood as self-defense in face of American aggression.

Jahanzeb Hussain is the editor of Collateral Damage Magazine. He is a 24 year old student in Vancouver, where he goes to Simon Fraser University. His personal blog can be viewed here.

Robert Fisk was also interviewed on Vancouver Co-op Radio by Jahanzeb and Derrick O’Keefe, the editor of Rabble.Ca. The 25-minute interview can be heard here.

Tahir-ul-Qadri has certainly taken a lot of Pakistanis as well as the Pakistan watchers abroad by surprise. Who is he ? He made himself known before the general public with his program Minhaj-ul-Quran on Pakistan state television in the 80’s. His erudition and the qualities of an orator were noticed even then. He more or less disappeared from the political scene after that despite small irruptions now and then. But he continued to run his religious teaching center Minhaj-ul-Quran as well as his network of madrasas and charitable organizations under the same name. He came back in limelight after the 9/11 attacks and the start of the war against terrorism. He denounced Islamic extremism and terrorism. However, at that time he could find little echo in press and in public. He settled abroad, first in Great Britain and then in Canada where he acquired the nationality. In England he organized, with official support, dis-intoxication programs for young Muslim British citizens influenced by Islamic extremism.

Since the very beginning he had a circle of devotees around him. His appeal was more of a charismatic than ideological nature. This is an age-old phenomenon in the Indian sub-continent among Muslims as well as Hindus that saintly qualities are attributed to charismatic figures who then exercise considerable social influence over and above the religious sphere. Their following often cuts across the social and gender distinctions. Whole families become their devotees or mureed.

His fatwa issued in 2010 entitled Dehshat gardi aur fitna-e-Khawarij – Terrorism and the war inside Islam – taking as reference the opposition within the Muslim community against the early Caliphs of Islam, is in diametrical opposition to the prevalent religious discourse in Pakistan characterized by an apology of Islamic extremism and a strong anti-West rhetoric. Nevertheless, his line of argument is actually very similar to that of the loyal Ulamas of all times, according to whom Muslims should obey the existing political and social order and the revolt against Uli-ul-amar – those vested with authority – is prohibited in Islam. This trend enjoyed official patronage under the British colonial rule in India when the Indian mutant of Wahabism was considered the greatest danger posed by the Muslims to the colonial government. Nowadays, journalistic and reductionist clichés have turned Wahabi and Deobandi into generic terms for designating orthodox and jihadi interpretations of Islam. This is to ignore the historic conditions of the penetration of the ideas of Muhammad Ibn Abd-al-Wahab, the founder of Wahabism, in India. Shah Waliullah, who spent years in Mecca in the second half of the 18^th century, was a student of Abd-al-Wahab and the pioneer of this school of thought in the Indian sub-continent. His approach to Wahabism was a reformist and enlightened approach against the backdrop of the moral and social decadence of the twilight of the Moghul era. He was most preoccupied by the imminence of the complete subjugation of India by the British. Later on his son and one of his disciples Syed Ahmed organized an armed opposition against the British. The madrasa of Deoband which greatly drew from the teachings of Shah Waliullah was also a nursery for the Muslim opposition to the colonial rule and its Ulama allied themselves with the Indian National Congress during the struggle for independence. Even Maulana Abd-ul-Kalam Azad, who underwent his religious education in Mecca, was very much influenced by the teachings of Abd-al-Wahab. The historical trajectory of Wahabism in the Indian sub-continent was right from the beginning very different from Saudi Arabia. But even there the House of Saud had to tame it over the decades and get it custom-made to suit itself and then evacuate its Salafi and Takfiri residue with the help of petro-dollars towards the other Muslim countries. Similarly the fate of the Deoband tradition in Pakistan is very different from the highly learned and intellectually developed traditions of Deoband. Lot of water has flowed under the bridge since the partition of India. Cut-off from its source it has become perverted and denatured like everything else in Pakistan. What the international press and with it the Pakistani liberals call Deobandi madrasas in Pakistan are as remotely related to Deoband as is lizard to dinosaur.

After the heavy turnout in Islamabad on the call of Tahir-ul-Qadri, the internationally accredited experts of Islam were first puzzled and then jubilantly discovered that only 20% of Sunnis in Pakistan are Deobandi and the rest are Barelvis. Deobandi would be the orthodox, conservative and jihadi Islam and Barlevi the open, syncretic and liberal Islam. In fact there are no such things as Deobandi and Barelvi sects.  Being influenced by one of these schools of thought or any other school of thought does not translate itself into a specific political conduct.

We should rather look into the Tahir-ul-Qadri phenomenon in the context of the unprecedented crisis of the Pakistani state. This crisis is all pervasive. It envelops all domains: institutional, political, economic, social, moral and ideological. The Pakistani state is in a blind alley: On the one hand, the army which has all along the history of Pakistan imposed itself as the dominating force in the country is caught in its own trap of using Islamic extremists as tools – they are now posing a mortal danger for the country. The army has lost all its credibility in front of its main foreign patron, the United States, as well as its aura of incorruptibility and infallibility before the people of Pakistan. On the other hand, the political government has led Pakistan to bankruptcy and total dysfunction; it has broken all records of corruption and incompetence; there is complete break-down of public order; there is war not only in the tribal areas but also in Karachi where 10 to 15 persons fall victim every day to targeted political, sectarian and criminal killings; Islamic terrorists strike everywhere at will all over the country; the ongoing massacre of the Hazara Shias in Quetta has exposed the absolute incapacity of the government to protect the life and property of the citizens.

Over and above all, the Pakistani state has become ideologically bankrupt. The moral hollowness of the ideology propagated  by the state at all levels of society has become too  apparent to remain concealed from the public since the Islamic extremists turned against the state and started indifferently killing innocent people in suicide and other terrorist attacks. The total loss of public confidence due to the institutional and ideological collapse has created a vacuum which has created fertile ground for all sorts of power ambitions.

The impasse is all the more grave as the coming elections are least likely to offer an exit. The captive constituencies of the feudal lords in the rural areas render any revamping of the system impossible. In this situation, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court has been trying to present himself as the savior. But more than anything else his actions are making the situation more confused. Imran Khan also thought that his hour had struck. But his anti-drone and anti-American platform meant little to a people faced with the day-to-day problems like 10-12 hours of load-shedding every day, gas shortage, unemployment, inflation, criminal violence, terrorist attacks.

As compared to that the message of Qadri was net and clear: the people need jobs, electricity, gas and peace, the government should quit and order restored before going to polls. Some elements of his political platform are surprisingly refreshing: absence of the eternal allusion to the great enemy which is India as well as the anti-West paranoia and most remarkable of all the unequivocal condemnation of terrorism.

However, when Qadri challenged the government, he was not really going against the underlying theme of his fatwa: not to go against those in whom the authority is vested. The real authority in this country in not vested with the government which is in place. The real authority is there where it has always been in this country. His slogan “save the state rather than the politics” is certainly not disliked by the army. But it would be too simplistic to see a link between him and army. If we consider the Qadri phenomenon only from the angle of conspiracy or collusion, we would be risking losing sight of the discontent of the people and their desire for peace and economic well-being; we would also be neglecting the fact that over the years he had created a following through patient work and that he has dedicated followers not only in Pakistan but in every country where there are Pakistanis. People who attribute his financial resources to some secret source should not forget that he is not the only charismatic religious figure to reap funds from his followers. There is more than one religious community in Pakistan whose leaders benefit from very generous donations from their followers. Similarly, for his original attire and head-gear parallels can be found in other charisma-based communities. His oratory talent contributes in no small measure to his magnetism.

Jahanzeb Hussain is the editor of Collateral Damage Magazine. He is a 24 year old student in Vancouver, where he goes to Simon Fraser University. His personal blog can be viewed here.

Going through the special supplements of Pakistani newspapers on the occasion of his 136th birth anniversary on 25 December, one had the impression of reading about a superhuman who, despite all odds and all opposition, succeeded singlehandedly in winning a homeland for Indian Muslims facing extinction at the hands of cruel Hindus. In fact, Jinnah is not only considered above any criticism in Pakistan but he is also exalted as an epitome of steadfastness, perseverance and determination. He is presented as a model human being to be emulated by all. When, on the one hand, a TV interviewee assures that the prophet of Islam appeared to some eminent Ulama and told them that Jinnah had His blessings, and on the other, when some liberals insist that what Jinnah actually wanted was a secular and democratic state, it is clear that his personality has been placed on such a pedestal that to prove their view-point people have to center their arguments on some real or supposed aspect of his personality or some of his declarations. Mere suggestion of any fallibility on his part is considered tantamount to blasphemy. However, as the crisis of the Pakistani state and society deepens, there is increasing receptivity for a critical examination of the whole ideological construction whereby this country is a gift of God and Jinnah its center-piece (if not a Prophet). In order to help advance this emerging introspection it is important to evaluate Jinnah in the light of his actions and their objective effect on the destiny of undivided India and subsequently on that of Pakistan.

Jinnah’s real rise to political stature began in the wake of the formation of Congress ministries in the Muslim minority provinces of Bihar, Bengal, U.P and C.P as a result of 1937 elections. Although, the Muslim League performed dismally in these elections, the cultural backlash from Muslims against an independence movement which increasingly referred to the Hindu cultural symbols for creating national pride, led to the aggravation of communal tension in these provinces. This provided a fertile ground for the thriving of political ideologies based on communal hatred. The Muslim League as well as the Hindu Mahasaba increased their audience. The communal tension was not a new thing in large parts of India but its nature and its intensity differed from one place to another. Among Muslims in north India, there existed a very elaborate, erudite and structured discourse on the past glory of Muslims and their religious and cultural difference with Hindus. This discourse was employed to the fullest in the new political context in which the Muslim landed aristocracy felt threatened by a Congress rule catering to the interests of urban middle classes. In other Indian provinces where Muslims were in majority, although a sentiment of solidarity with the Muslims of the minority provinces existed, there was no fear of religious, economic or cultural domination by the other community. The political discourse among Muslims in northern India increasingly developed pan-Islamic overtones. From here on, the Muslim League underwent a radical change. From a party advocating the community interests of Muslims in constitutional, political, economic and cultural terms it evolved into an ideological party firmly anchored into Muslim identity in terms of religious faith, common history and over and above all a common, divine ordained destiny.

With this evolution of Muslim polity, Jinnah metamorphosed from an in-door politician into a mass leader portrayed as the savior of the Muslims of India. Having a well-knit party structure across India at his disposal, he acquired an authority which he used to the optimum for imposing himself as the main, if not the only, spokesman of Indian Muslims. A personality cult was created around him by a vast network of scribes, ideologues and orators. A schizophrenic Muslim intelligentsia glorified him, in the same breath, for his detached English manners, his skills as a lawyer and as a God-sent leader of Muslims.

The Lahore session of the Muslim League in March 1940, where the so-called Pakistan Resolution was passed, was the culmination of one process and at the same time the beginning of another. Culmination of the process of the Muslim League being a ‘defender’ of the Muslim minority and the beginning of the process when the Muslim League and Jinnah adopted an aggressive posture for the ‘conquest’ of a homeland for Muslims. Previously, there was no question of a separate nationhood for Muslims, but now it was forwarded that there was such an incompatibility between Hindus and Muslims that they could not live together.  Not very far back in 1933, when for the first time leaflets advocating Pakistan were distributed by Chaudhry Rahmat Ali to the members of the round table conference, no Muslim took any interest in it. The initiative for raising the question of a separate homeland came from British. They pressed their questions while the Indian Muslim delegates were uninterested.

Although the Lahore resolution was open-ended and left the possibility for a common central government of India, it did open the flood gates for the surging of a separatist sentiment among Muslims. Much more than that, by defining a geographical configuration of one or more Muslim states i.e. the Muslim majority provinces of North-West and East India, it displaced the whole question of winning constitutional safeguards for Muslims, particularly in the provinces where they were in minority, towards the creation of a homeland for Muslims in provinces where Muslims had no apprehensions regarding their cultural and economic survival. More than anything else, it was the announcement of a battle-plan to convert the provinces where the Muslim League was extremely weak and had no historical roots to a particular idea of nationhood based on religion.

Each of the provinces which were intended to form Pakistan (Punjab, Sind, N.W.F.P, Baluchistan, and Bengal) had its specific political reality and aspirations which were very different from those of the province where Muslims were in minority and which were the most worked up in favor of separatism. In Sind, the Muslim sentiment was initially aroused during the struggle for the separation of Sind from Bombay. As the Congress leaders of Sind were opposed to the separation of Sind from Bombay, Muslim leaders looked towards the Muslim League for support. However, Muslim League did not win a single seat in Sind provincial legislature in the 1937 elections. In fact, it did not have any organization there at that time. The independent Ittehad Party led by G.M. Syed emerged as the largest party with 24 seats out of 60. G.M. Syed, who was originally a member of Congress, joined the Muslim League in 1938 out of disappointment for the lack of interest that the Congress showed for the particular problems of Sind. According to G.M Syed, “I had reached the conclusion that the attitude of Congress towards the people of Sind was different from its policies in the rest of India. I tried my best to form a government in Sind which could work for the welfare of its people without communal considerations. Despite the fact that the Muslim League was founded on communal principles and most of its leaders were the lackeys of British and that this party had no program for welfare of common man, we joined it because it was the only other all-India party after Congress. We felt that this party does not have any sincere workers and if workers like us join it perhaps we will be able to transform it into an anti-imperialist and pro-people party.” Subsequently, G.M. Syed became the president of Sind Muslim League and member of the Working Committee of the All-India Muslim League. Few months before the partition, however, he was expelled from the Muslim League and saw the same feudal lords against whom he had fought become governor and chief minister. The political and social context of Sind was very far away from the intense communal hatred which prevailed in Muslim minority provinces of northern India and sincere Muslim leaders joined the Muslim League more for the welfare of the province than out of a common religious affinity with Muslims of the provinces where the Muslim League had its historical roots. In Bengal, Muslim upper classes were apprehensive of the economic power of Bengali Hindus. However, both communities had a common revulsion against being ruled by a central government. The Governor of Bengal, Richard Casey, said in a note to the Viceroy in July 1945 that “I don’t think that I have made it clear in earlier letters that the conception of eastern Pakistan held by Nazimuddin- who later became Governor-General of Pakistan – is not the standard idea of a Muslim state. He paints the picture of a wholly autonomous sovereign state with a bare Muslim majority of population in which Muslims and Hindus will live in amity and share the responsibility for the business of government in approximate proportion to their numbers.” Till the day of partition, the leader of the Muslim League in Bengal and the chief minister of the united Bengal, Hussain Shaheed Suharwardy, endeavored to preserve the unity of Bengal and reach an understanding with the provincial leaders of Congress to keep Bengal as a separate entity without any binding ties to either of the two states which were being created. He never saw eye to eye with Jinnah and was later accused of being a ‘Hindu agent’. Maulvi Fazal Haq, the Bengali leader, who was the co-mover of the Lahore Resolution with Saradar Sikander Hayat of Punjab, had a completely different understanding of the Lahore Resolution as compared to Jinnah.  He believed in the concept of ‘autonomous Muslim states within India’ as laid down in the wording of the resolution. He fell out with Jinnah, was expelled from the Muslim League and engaged legal proceedings against him for the illegality of his expulsion. N.W.F.P had a strong popular movement called the ‘Khudai khidmatgar’ – servants of God – which was engaged in a non-violent struggle against British rule. This movement led by Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan was allied with the Congress. The Muslim League never had any roots in this province. In fact, this province was a thorn in the side of the Muslim League and Jinnah because it defeated the very idea of Pakistan. Baluchistan did not have a provincial legislature. Muslim League had an organization only in Quetta and some surrounding areas. It did not have any Baluch figure in its ranks. Its local leaders were some Pashtuns of Quetta. In Punjab, Muslim League was not in a dominant position but as the movement for Pakistan gathered steam the provincial dignitaries saw it as a chance to dominate the future state, and as the partition became inevitable they threw their weight behind the Muslim League. Lord Wavell, the Viceroy, in a note to Pethick-Lawrence on 31 August 1945 remarked:

“I am sure that the Pakistan idea is stronger in the Muslim minority provinces than the Pakistan provinces. At first sight this may seem surprising but the Muslims in Sind, Baluchistan, the NWFP, and the Punjab are already well on top and with a little forbearance keep their minorities fairly contented. They would gain little or nothing by Pakistan which would create for them large and perhaps uncontrollable minority problems. In Bengal the Muslims though numerically dominant are inferior to the Hindus in wealth and education and they too would probably lose moiré than they would gain by Pakistan. Assam is not really a Muslim majority province and its inclusion in Pakistan seems to me very doubtful.”

After the Lahore Resolution, Jinnah shed his image of constitutionalist lawyer of Home-Rule years; his declarations became rabidly communalist and his methods of running the party extremely autocratic. He became the sole decision maker in the party for political as well as organizational matters. After the passing of the Quit India resolution by the Indian National Congress on 8 August 1942, Jinnah, certainly in consultation with the British, tried to portray this movement as anti-Muslim rather than against the British. He called a meeting of the working committee of the Muslim League in Bombay. G.M. Syed in his book Sind speaks writes:

“On reaching Bombay we were informed by Nawab Bahadur Yar Jung that he has learned that Jinnah has met the Viceroy and promised him that he will get passed a resolution from the working committee of the Muslim League that the “Quit India” movement is in fact against Muslims rather the British. He said “Mr. Syed try to stop such a resolution because at this juncture it will be most inappropriate”. Despite my difference with Congress, I felt as progressive Muslim that the way the alien government is trying to suppress the sentiment of freedom among the people, an agreement between the Muslim League and Congress will foil its attempt o divide the people. The working committee of All India Muslim League met on 16 August. Mr. Jinnah presented a resolution against the Quit India resolution of Congress. I raised my objection and said “It will be inappropriate for us to say that the Quit India resolution of Congress is against Muslims. We should not torpedo the struggle against the British Imperialism. Such a resolution will close the path for all future agreements with the Congress.” Mr. Jinnah got annoyed and said “I am not prepared to make any compromise with Congress.” I objected and said “My amendment may kindly be accepted that first we should talk with Congress. If it accepts our conditions then we should have an agreement with it. If, on the contrary, it is not prepared for any agreement then we can pass a resolution.” Mr. Khuro supported me. Raja Sahib of Mahmoodabad supported me as well. Mr Jinnah scolded him, on which Raja Sahib of Mahmoodabad walked out of the meeting in protest. Mr. Hussain Ispahani wanted to talk but Mr. Jinnah did not allow him. Nawab Ismail wanted to present his point of view but he also was not allowed to talk. He (Jinnah) rejected my amendment and got passed his resolution.”

As his authority among Muslim masses increased and the British became more and more accommodative towards the idea of some sort of separate Muslim entity, Jinnah became venomous towards those Muslims who did not accept him as the sole leader of Muslims. As the British authorities made their intentions clear after the Second World War to quit India, Jinnah became extremely inflexible towards any kind of accommodation with Congress for resolving the communal divide and ensuring smooth transfer of powers to the representatives of India. No particular principles except his insistence that only the Muslim League can represent the Indian Muslims and the Muslim leaders of Congress should be refused recognition as Muslim leaders led to the failure of Simla Conference called by the Viceroy in June 1946. It was proposed by the British that Congress and Muslim League both nominate five members each for the interim government but Jinnah insisted that Congress should not nominate any Muslim because it represents only the Hindus even though at that time the Muslim League did not have government in three of the Muslim majority provinces namely Punjab, N.W.F.P and Bengal. According to some members of Muslim League Working Committee present at that time in Simla, Jinnah consulted the working committee only nominally and never revealed what transpired between him, the Viceroy and the Congress leaders. According to the account of G.M. Syed when he requested Jinnah to drop his objection regarding the Muslim members of Congress, Jinnah lost temper and said “I want to prove that Congress is a Hindu party.” When he insisted Jinnah said “Syed, your attitude is becoming more and more unbearable. It would be better if we part ways.”

Jinnah’s dictatorial control of the Muslim League and the confiscation by him of all rights of representing it in talks with the British and the Congress are shown by the following extract of the minutes of his meeting with Mountbatten on 5^th and 6^th April 1947:

“He gave me an account (which worries me a great deal) about his previous negotiations with Mr. Gandhi, including his version of the Gandhi/Jinnah correspondence in September 1944. He emphasized and tried to prove from his account that on the Muslim side there was only one man to deal, namely himself. If he took a decision it would be enforced, or if the Muslim league refused to ratify it, he would resign and that would be the end of Muslim League. But the same was not true of the representatives of congress – there was no one man to deal with on their side. Mr. Gandhi had openly confessed that he represented nobody- he only agreed to “endeavor to use his influence”- he had enormous authority with no responsibility. Nehru and Patel represented different points of view within congress- neither could give a categorical answer on behalf of the party as a whole.”

Elections were held in India in February 1946 for the central and provincial legislatures to prepare eventually for the transfer of powers. Muslim League presented these elections as a referendum for Pakistan. More simply the electors were told that the question they are called on to answer at the poll is “are you a true believer or an infidel and are you for Hindu Raj or for Pakistan?” The governor of N.W.F.P wrote in a note to the Viceroy in February 1946 that:

“The Muslim league on the other hand has talked about little but Pakistan. This is not really an intelligible war cry to 90% of their hearers. To the average Pathan villager in these parts, the suggestion that there can be such thing as Hindu domination is only laughable.”

Having agreed to the partition, the British were unwilling to countenance a situation in which the provinces earmarked for Pakistan expressed a desire not to join it. In a note from the Viceroy’s office to the Secretary of State’s office in London it is said:

“Similarly the isolated NWFP might ask what constitution it would have and whether it would be a separate dominion. For financial reasons the NWFP would obviously have to tag onto some more prosperous neighbor, but I think we are brought up against the necessity of deciding what is the minimum amount of territory that must exceed to Pakistan before Pakistan can be recognized as a separate dominion. The defection of NWFP would I suppose be fatal. The right way to treat the NWFP would be to compel it to join Pakistan if Pakistan came into being. But it seems to me that if both the NWFP and Sind object to join Pakistan, His Majesty’s Government should not be bound to recognize Pakistan.”

Jinnah made sure that only those candidates be given Muslim League tickets in Sind who will not raise any discordant voice regarding the partition plan. He suppressed the Sind Muslim League Council’s right to select the candidates in favor of the Central Parliamentary Committee of All-India Muslim League. When G.M. Syed, the president of Sind Muslim League, protested he was dismissed and subsequently declared traitor. When even then Muslim League could not obtain clear majority in the assembly, the British governor called for fresh elections which were heavily rigged in favor of Muslim League in order to ensure that the partition plan did not die.

In N.W.F.P, the situation was very difficult for the Muslim League. Despite all the efforts of the Muslim League, the Khudai Khidmatgars under the Congress flag won the elections. Dr. Khan Sahib, the brother of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, formed the provincial government. Muslim League started a civil disobedience campaign against the provincial government. Fatwas were issued that it was a government of infidels. Muslim League National Guards acting as storm troopers committed wide-scale arson and violence against Hindus and Sikhs who had never before faced such a situation in this province. Despite there being a Congress government, the partition plan of 3^rd June 1947 called for a referendum to decide whether the people wanted to join India or Pakistan. In such circumstances when N.W.F.P was not contiguous to India and no third choice i.e. the independence was given, the result was a foregone conclusion. Khudai Khidmatgars boycotted the referendum and called for the establishment of an independent Pashtunistan. But the British ensured that N.W.F.P joined Pakistan. One of the first acts of Jinnah after the independence was to dismiss the democratically elected Dr. Khan Government.

In Baluchistan’s case Jinnah concluded, just before partition, an agreement with the Khan of Kalat for negotiating the nature of its future ties with Pakistan. He recognized the fact that Kalat was an independent state at the time of its treaty with the British in 1876 and that it is in this capacity that the state will enter into negotiations with future state of Pakistan. However, after independence, he unilaterally got approved allegiance to Pakistan by an unrepresentative Jirga.

As the parleys with the British went on for the final determination of the territories which will form part of Pakistan, Jinnah pleaded that the whole of Punjab and the whole of Bengal be made part of Pakistan. In Punjab Muslims were 16.2 million and non-Muslims 12.2 million. Two whole districts namely Jullundur and Ambala had Sikh majority. In Bengal, Muslims were 33 million and non-Muslims 27.3 millions. Whole contiguous areas of western Bengal had non-Muslim majority. His double-standards and unprincipled and ridiculous approach to the question of partition is shown by the following account of the meeting on the subject between him and Mountbatten held on 8^th April 1947:

“I invited Mr. Jinnah to put forward his arguments for partition. He recited the classic ones. I then pointed out that his remarks applied also to the partition of the Punjab and Bengal, and that by sheer logic if I accepted his arguments in the case of India as a whole, I had also to apply them in the case of these two provinces. Whilst admitting my logic he expressed himself most upset at my trying to give him a “moth-eaten” Pakistan. He said that this demand for partitioning the Punjab and Bengal was a bluff on the part of Congress to try and frighten him off Pakistan. He was not to be frightened off so easily; and he would be sorry if I were taken in by the congress bluff. I replied “I would not be taken in; because if I agreed to such partition, it would be on your able advocacy; but I could not of course allow your theories to stop short at the provinces.” He was most distressed, and said that it would greatly weaken his Pakistan, and appealed to me not to destroy the unity of Bengal and the Punjab, which had national characteristics in common: common history, common ways of life; and where the Hindus have stronger feelings as Bengalis or Punjabis than they have as members of the congress. I said I was impressed by his arguments; and was therefore beginning to revise my ideas about any partition anywhere in India; since any argument that he produced for not agreeing to partition within the Punjab and Bengal applied with even greater force to India as a whole. For if he was to insist on the partition of India, he would be breaking up a great subcontinent of numerous nations, which could live together in peace and harmony; who could, united, play a great role in the world; but who, divided, would not even rank as a second class power. I am afraid I drove the old gentleman quite mad, because whichever way his argument went I always pursued it to a stage beyond which he did not wish it to go.”

In the short span of time that Jinnah remained alive after independence, one of his major pronouncements was to declare in Dacca that Urdu and only Urdu will be the national language of Pakistan. It was indeed taken as insult by the whole Bengali nation and it snowballed into the Bengali language movement of 1952 which proved to be the first assertion of Bengali nationalism and put into motion the process culminating in the separation of East Pakistan.

Another trait of Jinnah’s personality which is less known was his real talent of real-estate speculator. In fact, right when India was awash with human blood, much of it Muslim blood, Jinnah , apart from  his political activities, was extremely busy buying and disposing off properties . I let the compiler of ‘Jinnah papers’ published by the government of Pakistan describe this ability of his in his words:

“His financial empire bore the hallmark of the self-made man. He dealt far-sightedly in the purchase and resale of property in some of the principal cities of India – a process marked by his personal involvement in such transactions. By 1940 he had no less than four large residential properties: his house at 10 Aurangzeb Road, Delhi, 7 posh Mayfair flats – fetching a monthly rental of Rs.2,295 – his bungalow at Little Gibbs Road and his palatial residence and at Mount Pleasant Road, Bombay, occupying an area of 15,467 square yards. This house was started in 1938 and completed at a cost of more than 2 lacs of rupees by Gregson, Batley and King, chartered architects of Bombay. He had sold his Mayfair flats in 1943 and was even prepared to sell his bungalow at Mount Pleasant Road for Rs.20 lakh. He owned a house in Lahore, residential plots in Gulberg, Lahore, and agricultural land in Malir near Karachi. Even in the hectic days of 1946, we find him negotiating the purchase of “The Retreat” in Katrain situated in an isolated place in the Kulu Valley. In March 1947, he is again found interested in “Sandow Castle”, a large property near Bombay on 19 acres of land and with an “unrestricted view of the sea” at an advertised price of rupees five lakh. Immediately after HMG’s Statement of 20 February 1947 he entered into a deal to purchase the Flag Staff House, Frere Town Quarter, Karachi, and made queries for a number of properties including a houseboat in Kashmir.”

It would be worthwhile if those who have put the prefix of Hazrat and the suffix of Rahamatullah with the name of Jinnah apart from giving him the title of Quaid-e-Azam as well as those who have declared him a democratic, liberal and secular politician took the pain to study the events and situate the man, his actions and their consequences in their correct context.

References: 

Sind Speaks by G.M. Syed.

Jinnah Papers by Cabinet Division Government of Pakistan.

Jahanzeb Hussain is the editor of Collateral Damage Magazine. He is a 24 year old student in Vancouver, where he goes to Simon Fraser University. His personal blog can be viewed here.

Photo credit: Wikipedia

The attack on Malala Yousafzai has given rise to a wave of anger and indignation in Pakistan. The spontaneity and the intensity of the reaction have surprised many inside Pakistan, not to say those outside Pakistan.

Worse things have occurred previously in Pakistan which did not give rise to such indignation all across the country.  However, this time the condemnation was universal from the top to the grass root level. Everyone – from the army chief to the mainstream religious political parties, from the parliament to all the newspapers whether English or Urdu, from school children to the man in the street – was unanimous in their condemnation of the attack. Special prayers were offered in mosques for Malala. What is most important is that the wave of condemnation of the attack and the sympathy for Malala was accompanied by a clear pointing of fingers at the type of ideology which is at work behind the attack on a little girl who symbolized the urge for education in Swat valley, a region where hundreds of schools were destroyed and education of girls banned during the bloody two-year reign of Taliban.

Previously, it was generally thought or taken for granted that only the English language press and the English speaking elite of the country dissociated itself from this particular brand of Islamism which uses death and carnage for conveying its message and as the means of terrifying the society into submission. But the Urdu press has come out very strongly and in much more convincing terms against the attack – thus a columnist in an article titled The iron girl wrote in the Urdu daily Jang:

“Why has the nation come to realize only now that it has to choose between terror and peace? The answer is Malala, who with the help of the modern means of communication has emerged as a symbol of courage, enlightenment and the rights of women … Those who plotted to assassinate Malala should know that Malala is the voice of education, which is the right and the duty of all believers, whether men or women. This was the first lesson of Quran to all humanity and Malala has done nothing else than spreading this message of the Quran.”

Very surprisingly, a party like Jama’at-e-Islami, which up to now has avoided openly taking position against Taliban, did not mince its words and condemned them on this particular issue. Qazi Hussain Ahmed, the ex-Amir of Jama’at, wrote in Jang:

“Which cruel person can justify this attack? Whether we base ourselves on human values, Islamic teachings or Pashtun traditions, targeting women even in wars is a shameful act. And even more so this attack on a 14 year old girl who is not even adult … Whoever knows the basic Islamic teachings and who considers himself answerable before God cannot sentence this girl to death. I think that those who have committed this crime are savages.” Although, he attenuated these remarks by adding: “But I also condemn those who have utilized this innocent girl for their propaganda”. In light of his comment, Qazi Hussain Ahmed was targeted with a suicide attack in Mohmand Agency in the Federally Administered Tribal Area (FATA); however, the attack failed and the ex-Amir was not harmed.

After the attempt on his life, Qazi Hussain had to resort to damage control; thus instead of going further in his dissection of the Taliban ideology and drawing the necessary conclusions, he attributed the attack on Malala to American machinations. It is important to note that Jama’at-e-Islami’s position on this particular issue should not be taken at face value. Qazi Hussain’s u-turn shows that the Jama’at cannot go very far in condemning the Taliban since that would lead to putting into question all other tenets of their ideology from which it is hard for Jama’at –e-Islami to dissociate itself without simultaneously undermining its own overall ideological and political stance. In addition, Taliban’s penchant for violence also has to be taken into consideration before anyone, including a violent group like Jama’at –e–Islami, could take a clear position against them. Notwithstanding these two factors, the fact that the Qazi Hussain did initially speak out against the Taliban shows the even reactionary parties like the Jama’at find it necessary to show their indignation against such acts.

Even Hamid Mir, a prominent TV anchor, who had up till now excelled in the art of denying the obvious, could not help condemning the attack on Malala. He also was the target of a failed attempt by the Taliban to blow him by placing explosives under his car. Will it enable him to carry his criticism to its logical end? It is very difficult. The vested political and ideological interests are too strong to be abandoned.

The Pakistani society, on the other hand, has no such vested interest in this particular frame of mind. It might have been duped, but not by choice. The one-sided interpretation of the crisis of social and moral values and the crisis of ideological bearings of Pakistan was accepted more by default and due to the absence of an alternative discourse than on the strength of the argument. But there is a threshold beyond which the lies become ineffective; the very facts of the life militate against them.

Girls go to school in Pakistan in their hundreds of thousands. When the Taliban were evicted from Swat in 2009, girls flocked back to schools with great enthusiasm. They were fully supported by the community which showed great resilience after two-years of the bloody reign of the Taliban. Hundreds of schools were re-constructed within no time. Malala was not alone in her determination to overcome all the odds which stood against the education of the girls there and elsewhere in the areas which had fallen prey to Taliban domination not due to the public support but due to the weakness and complaisance of the state authorities.

Although on country-wide scale their proportion in schools is far below than that of boys, but in cities and especially in the middle classes they go to school as much as boys do. As they go up the ladder their proportion increases and most often they do better at school than their male counterparts. In universities and professional colleges their numbers are catching up with those of men, while in some medical colleges they are edging ahead of them. By their sheer example, they inspire other girls in all areas of the country to pursue education.

Malala has become a symbol that the society was long searching to resolve its own contradictions. On previous occasion, similar incidents have been ignored and the calls to look at the problems of Pakistan were repelled. Such was the case when a video showing the whipping of a 16 year old girl in Swat by Taliban was circulated. The apologists of the Taliban ideology salvaged the day for themselves by casting doubts on the authenticity of the video. When suicide attacks targeted the shrines of the most revered Sufis of the country like Data Darbar in Lahore and Abdullah Shah Ghazi in Karachi, the indignation was there but the disbelief was too deep to allow the anger to spill out. When the Sri Lankan cricket team was targeted in Lahore, eyes were opened but the tongues accustomed to some other vocabulary hesitated in calling the beast by its name.  A society fed on a delirious rhetoric right from childhood that all that is wrong with this country is the result of the machinations of its enemies (Hindus, Jews and Christians) found it hard to come to terms with the naked reality. Confronted with the suicide attacks in crowded markets, mosques, and destruction of schools (thousands of them in the tribal areas), they were left dumb-struck but there was no one in the media, on the public forums and in the mainstream political parties to explain to them that what was happening was not emanating from the faith but was the result of its perversion, and that the destruction of the Pakistani society was not to be attributed to a reaction against American drone strikes. The target was the Pakistani society itself, the people of Pakistan in all its diversity and the social attainments like the education of the girls and the ever increasing place occupied by the women in the society. Apologists of the Pakistan ideology who dominate the media, apprehensive of the collapsing of the entire ideological edifice which props up the Pakistani state, went on damage control and through some improbable intellectual acrobatics tried to convince an ever incredulous audience that what was happening was due to a foreign conspiracy. The attack on Malala, however, while not the straw that breaks the camel’s back, was not to be brushed under the carpet so easily.

The present indignation is also, in a wider context, a protest against the inability of the rulers to check and counter the elements that are imposing themselves on the society due to the sheer ineffectiveness of the state. To be carried to its logical end, the present indignation needs to be supported by an alternate ideological and political discourse explaining the present crisis by putting into question all which has been injected into the society as the Truth: Pakistan is the country of Pure, which is encircled by enemies all around, that the Other is to be hated, that all that is dispensed by the dominant discourse in the name of Islam is the quintessence of Islam, that if the reality does not concord with our beliefs the reality is to be denied and not vice-versa.

Hidayat Hussain is the author of the book Ce soir oppressant n’en finit pas de finir- Le Pakistan raconté par ses poètes.

Photo Credit: Wikipedia