Adil Najam
This picture is interesting at so many levels.
The official caption reads: “Pakistanplayers pray after winning the ICC Women’s World Cup 2009 round two group stage match between Sri Lanka and Pakistanat Manuka Oval on March 9, 2009 in Canberra, Australia.”
What should one comment on? The achievement of the Pakistan women’s cricket (we have written earlier about Urooj Mumtaz Khan, who was again instrumental in this victory). The significance of the women’s team’s achievement when the men’s team is in doldrums. The fact that this was against Sri Lanka, given the horrible incidents of last week. Or just the gesture of gratitude and prayer (and whether this was synchronized for the cameras or spontaneous!).
I will leave the commenting to our readers.
I put this up, because seeing the picture I felt good at the news. Felt good for our womens’ team. And felt good that at least there is some hope for Pakistan cricket. Most of all, because I think its a great picture.
Nostalgic, read the history of Islam (or several other religions). Read it over smaller or bigger time ranges. Read it in the regional or globall context. You will find that whenever Muslims have been strong and prosperous, they’ve been less worried about outward and rhetorical religious symbolism. They’ve produced world leading thinkers, scientists and progressive societies and developed rich and vibrant cultures. Realised their religion and spirituality in its true sense without feeling any absurd need to wave it around. They’ve put the guidance in to practical use, instead. Whenever muslims have faced reverses, failure and a crisis of self-confidence, they’ve ultimately tried to find refuge in hiding behind a bloated, exaggerated rhetoric and facade of religion. Look at Indian history and contrast Akbar with Aurangzeb. In Pakistan, compare Jinnah with Zia. Or even Bhutto of 1967/8 with that of 1976/77. This coorelation between self-confidence and reducing religous rhetoric and rigidity and advances in Islamic thought, and crisis of confidence and increasing rhetoric and closing minds applies even to muslim minorities. Look at the Indian muslims. Compare the backward British Pakistani community with the more successful American Pakistani community. Apply this to any number of muslim countries today, and you will find it to be true. If not religion, then you will find the scoundrel seeking similar refuge in the mere rhetoric and exploitative exaggeration of nationality. Indeed, both bloated religion and nationality are the refuge of the devious, the incompetent, and the failed… more often than not.
Well, its just that the urge to wear our religion on our collective sleeves is quite a recent phenomenon… Where has the urge come from? What is the urge? Why now, after a thousand years or so of being Muslim? Is it an attempt to prove something or the other to the rest of the world, or to ourselves?
There are other manifestations of this too, besides the sajdas… young women deeming the shalwar kameez inadequately modest and resorting to the ninja look for instance, the profusion of beards on young men, and the refusal to persevere with the traditional Khuda Hafiz as a parting greeting…
I don’t “get” it…
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with wearing one’s religion on one’s sleeve if that’s what one wants to do. Dinesh Kanaria says “Allah ka shukar hai” and “Insha’Allah”. He is happy to be called “Danish” instead of the original “Dinesh”. The only time he has not able to join in is when the team is saying namaz. It’s all fine.
But just a thought. No criticism. How does it make us better muslims or the country more Islamic by calling it the “Islamic” Repucblic of Pakistan? There is absolutely nothing wrong with calling it that, if that’s what we want. But what do you think is more Islamic… closer to the true nature of the Prophet (PBUH): Insisting on calling the country the “Islamic Republic” making it very clear that all living within it are fully included as equal citizens? Or, out of generosity of spirit, and no other compulsion, whatsoever, to voluntarily ’sacrifice’ our right to call our country “Islamic Repubic” in order to make sure, out of sheer Islamic generosity, that no non-muslim Pakistani child ever feels even slightly less included or equal than any other Pakistani child? It’s just a question. Better muslims and better humans than I would know better.
The photograph is good.
When you are happy, delighted and overwhelmed, you feel like praying, thanking God. But I don’t know what to speak about this overt religiousity on the ground that seems to have become a ritual for Pakistani cricketers. If there is ever a non-Muslim in the team, what he or she would feel like?
I am delighted by the success of this team, and there is nothing wrong with thanking the Almighty, but what I find disconcerting, not only with this picture but also with other such acts of public piety, is this insistence on wearing one’s religion on one’s sleeve…
Why make a spectacle about one’s beliefs? Were sportspeople in the past any less pious? Before this newly discovered love to broadcast our faith at every conceivable opportunity, were we any less Muslim?
That said, if this is how the girls want to commemorate a victory, all power to them… if the maulvis have their way they wouldn’t be playing, and I wonder if this is their way of hitting back…
there are two things in this picture
women:
its a awesome thing for the society when _everyone_ has the right to follow their dreams, irrespective of their gender/religion/color. this is what civialized and democractic societies are for. cheers for this and i wish for more of these kind of initiative where everyone and especially women are given the freedom to make their decisions.
religion:
its not a good sign to bring religion into everything especially things like this cricket match which was between two countries and not two religions. thanking god is a good thing but that should have been a personal gesture and not in the middle of a stadium. sports and religion shouldn’t be clubbled. isn’t mixing the religion with _all_ aspects of life one of the biggest problem for the country ?
Beautiful comment by Atookmook. I am speechless after that. May our women stand strong and be able to attain freedom that they deserve.
In addition to giving thanks, these young, talented, Pakistani women are most probably praying as well. I pray that their prayers will come true. It’s not difficult to guess at least part of what they might well be praying for. When we try and deceive ourselves in to thinking that by leaving the girls of Swat at the mercy of the beastial Taliban, we are ’saving’ the rest of Pakistan. We forget how Ms Nilofar Bakhtiar had to resign because of the skydiving issue. How her pictures were hung all around ‘Islam’abad, and no ‘Pak’istani cared to tear them down and stand up for her. We forget how the marathons were attacked in 2005. We deceive ourselves when we deny the only natural trajectory and destination of these acts and mentality. When we fail to stand up and fight. We, men, will only have to grow a beard and pull up our shalwars above the ankle. But think about these girls. They stand to lose everything. Once again, please think about the hundred of thousands of girls in Swat who are no longer able to go to school or college, and have become prisoners in their own homes. Who really is paying the price for this ‘peace’? The team has two girls from NWFP. Both from Abottabad. Which is right next to Malakand. These 11 girls symbolise what is at stake for the women of Pakistan… far more than for the men of Pakistan. Let us all stand together against the enemies of women, and of freedom.