Adil Najam
Mohammed Hanif, the brilliant author of the engrossing book “The Case of Exploding Mangoes†(I have been planning to write about it ever since I first read it many months ago; and I will) – known to many for his stint at Herald before he joined BBC’s Urdu Service – has just written a most cogent and readable op-ed in The Times of India which is wroth reading; whether you agree with it or not. It is a good argument as well as a good read. And I say that even thought there are more than one points here that I might quibble with. But before we quibble, lets give Mohammed Hanif the floor – and a full and proper hearing. Here is the op-ed he wrote in The Times of India, in full:
Ten Myths About Pakistan
Living in Pakistan and reading about it in the Indian press can sometimes be quite a disorienting experience: one wonders what place on earth they’re talking about? I wouldn’t be surprised if an Indian reader going through Pakistani papers has asked the same question in recent days. Here are some common assumptions about Pakistan and its citizens that I have come across in the Indian media.
1. Pakistan controls the jihadis: Or Pakistan’s government controls the jihadis. Or Pakistan Army controls the jihadis. Or ISI controls the jihadis. Or some rogue elements from the ISI control the Jihadis. Nobody knows the whole truth but increasingly it’s the tail that wags the dog. We must remember that the ISI-Jihadi alliance was a marriage of convenience, which has broken down irrevocably. Pakistan army has lost more soldiers at the hands of these jihadis than it ever did fighting India.
2. Musharraf was in control, Zardari is not: Let’s not forget that General Musharraf seized power after he was fired from his job as the army chief by an elected prime minister. Musharraf first appeased jihadis, then bombed them, and then appeased them again. The country he left behind has become a very dangerous place, above all for its own citizens. There is a latent hankering in sections of the Indian middle class for a strongman. Give Manmohan Singh a military uniform, put all the armed forces under his direct command, make his word the law of the land, and he too will go around thumping his chest saying that it’s his destiny to save India from Indians. Zardari will never have the kind of control that Musharraf had. But Pakistanis do not want another Musharraf.
3. Pakistan, which Pakistan? For a small country, Pakistan is very diverse, not only ethnically but politically as well. General Musharraf’s government bombed Pashtuns in the north for being Islamists and close to the Taliban and at the same time it bombed Balochs in the South for NOT being Islamists and for subscribing to some kind of retro-socialist, anti Taliban ethos. You have probably heard the joke about other countries having armies but Pakistan’s army having a country. Nobody in Pakistan finds it funny.
4. Pakistan and its loose nukes: Pakistan’s nuclear programme is under a sophisticated command and control system, no more under threat than India or Israel’s nuclear assets are threatened by Hindu or Jewish extremists. For a long time Pakistan’s security establishment’s other strategic asset was jihadi organisations, which in the last couple of years have become its biggest liability.
5. Pakistan is a failed state: If it is, then Pakistanis have not noticed. Or they have lived in it for such a long time that they have become used to its dysfunctional aspects. Trains are late but they turn up, there are more VJs, DJs, theatre festivals, melas, and fashion models than a failed state can accommodate. To borrow a phrase from President Zardari, there are lots of non-state actors like Abdul Sattar Edhi who provide emergency health services, orphanages and shelters for sick animals.
6. It is a deeply religious country: Every half-decent election in this country has proved otherwise. Religious parties have never won more than a fraction of popular vote. Last year Pakistan witnessed the largest civil rights movements in the history of this region. It was spontaneous, secular and entirely peaceful. But since people weren’t raising anti-India or anti-America slogans, nobody outside Pakistan took much notice.
7. All Pakistanis hate India: Three out of four provinces in Pakistan – Sindh, Baluchistan, NWFP – have never had any popular anti-India sentiment ever. Punjabis who did impose India as enemy-in-chief on Pakistan are now more interested in selling potatoes to India than destroying it. There is a new breed of al-Qaida inspired jihadis who hate a woman walking on the streets of Karachi as much as they hate a woman driving a car on the streets of Delhi. In fact there is not much that they do not hate: they hate America, Denmark, China CDs, barbers, DVDs , television, even football. Imran Khan recently said that these jihadis will never attack a cricket match but nobody takes him seriously.
8. Training camps: There are militant sanctuaries in the tribal areas of Pakistan but definitely not in Muzaffarabad or Muridke, two favourite targets for Indian journalists, probably because those are the cities they have ever been allowed to visit. After all how much training do you need if you are going to shoot at random civilians or blow yourself up in a crowded bazaar? So if anyone thinks a few missiles targeted at Muzaffarabad will teach anyone a lesson, they should switch off their TV and try to locate it on the map.
9. RAW would never do what ISI does: Both the agencies have had a brilliant record of creating mayhem in the neighbouring countries. Both have a dismal record when it comes to protecting their own people. There is a simple reason that ISI is a bigger, more notorious brand name: It was CIA’s franchise during the jihad against the Soviets. And now it’s busy doing jihad against those very jihadis.
10. Pakistan is poor, India is rich: Pakistanis visiting India till the mid-eighties came back very smug. They told us about India’s slums, and that there was nothing to buy except handicrafts and saris. Then Pakistanis could say with justifiable pride that nobody slept hungry in their country. But now, not only do people sleep hungry in both the countries, they also commit suicide because they see nothing but a lifetime of hunger ahead. A debt-ridden farmer contemplating suicide in Maharashtra and a mother who abandons her children in Karachi because she can’t feed them: this is what we have achieved in our mutual desire to teach each other a lesson.
So, quibble if you will. But do tell us what you think about the argument that Hanif is making.
Unfortunately, this and some other posts are being highjacked by our visitors from India. I have seen this happen before at ATP. They come, they get excited about the forum and then they lose sight of forum rules and the fact that they should respect the subject of the post. I would request everyone to please respect the rules and traditions of the form. It is really annoying when someone tries to take teh whole discussion in a totally different direction.
@Arjun
Indeed this is a Pakistan-related forum. If that is your defense then what are you, an Indian, doing here? If you Indians do bother to post on Pakistan related forums, why do you bring India-centric and barely hidden anti-Islamic views here ? Do you think you are going to find any takers?
Pakistan has many many problems, but unlike you Indians, we don’t think they are because of Islam, or because Pakistan should not exist. We Pakistanis discuss our problems like normal people in a normal country which has serious problems. That is difficult to do when Indians enter the conversation.
first of all, limited space or not, to our Indian friends, I do appreciate your sentiments and admire your honesty, and am glad you did not surprise me.
bonobashi, i wear the nick with pride. so don’t worry. it’s like the plaque on some cars/bikes on pakistani roads saying simply “common citizen”. (the difference between us and how you described egypt is that their dictators never lost sight of how dangerous the mullah can be, while ours tried to ride the monster to their advantage with predictably disastrous results).
can it be that you’re talking of or at least picturing today’s india with its 60 years of history since ’47? whereas i’m talking of the options the leaders of india had when contemplating a post-colonial india coming up to ’47. unlike you, the leaders then were looking at immediately before 1857, and what had happened since. (which is a longish story.)
i’m not talking of religous beliefs or practice, only of religous identity. ask any jew – religous, agnostic or atheist – what religous identity is and what it means to have the right both to claim and or unclaim it voluntarily. that is precisely what gives you the right not to identify yourself as a hindu, if that were your wish (again, i’m not talking of beliefs but identity).
if a minority agrees to be assimilated, on whose terms should that be? should there be a one-way or two-way assimilation? coming up to 1947, congress wanted a strong centre and got it at the price they were prepared to pay for it. the muslim league had to settle for their second best option, the cabinet mission plan being no longer on the table (as a result of nehru’s press conference of 10 juy 1946 in bombay which abul kalaam azad termed the ‘most tragic day in the history of the independence movement’ in the famous 30 pages of his book).
arjun, we know we each have our own battles to fight with our hawks. its’ just that sometimes we feel tired and lazy so we indulge in a bit of wishful thinking imagining that India despite being a flawed democracy as many equally admirable others, will suddenly stop providing fuel to our hawks and thereby make our fight 10x easier. that modi will never become a PM. that advani was never practically the PM despite his role in the babri masjid thing.
our arsonists are mainly interested in burning our own house down but they are equally glad when an ember or two land in our neighbour’s. recently you had reason to suspect what we had always suspected (because of the pogroms of 2002, 1992, 1984, 1967) that you have little arsonists of your own too, who too are (unknowingly) burning their own house down. sadly, at least one of the brave men who unearthed some evidence (alarmingly linked to a serving lt col), got claimed by one of the embers.
there are two UN SC resolutions on Kashmir with the same moral authority of the int’l community espressed through the UN as the very recent resolution relating to the 4 LeT terrorists. it is only and only for the kashmiris and no one else to give up any part of that right given to them by that moral authority. i’m sure that the indian forces in kashmir in their v large number are thoroughly professional (despite the findings of Justice Pandian, AI and HRW, the draconian immunity laws enjoyed by the SOG, CRPF and Elite Police, and the iron curtain stopping foreign journalists and indian jounalists not bothering) but collateral damage happens despite the best of intentions and over 22 years it accumulates. there is terrorism due to outside interference. the kashmiri people are a victim of both and will not easily forget either of their tormentors. there is hope, as the recent J&K elections showed, though partially boycotted. hope is a pre-requisite but not a substitute for a lasting solution. there are at least two sides to every story or picture. why do kashmiris deserve to remain divided?
we’re grateful for the IMF thing. whenever a crime straddles an int’l border, evidence cooperatively brought together completes the jigsaw and makes for the strongest evidence. this extradition thing: does india want justice for the victims or also to humiliate pakistan? the PM and home minister saying that they must presume that there was state involvement unless proven otherwise: guilty until proven innocent? how does any one prove a negative? india’s wound is too fresh right now, and the arguments above could be revisited in a few months time when it would be more appropriate to do so.
to end, let me share a couple of dreams of mine. i sometimes dream about the childish, macho stupidity that passes for ceremony at wagah border that pakistan would do the full stupid military drill thing and in reply, on the indian side a solitary office babu would leisurely walk to the gate, smoking a cigarette, unhurriedly close the gate for the night, pull out the pen resting on his ear and the tattered register tucked under his arm, scribble something on it, walk back to his bicycle and cycle back to his happy home and homeland whistling an old kishore song. or, at other times i dream, paksitan having comletely disbanded its military forces after letting the generals have one final lottery of the choicest real estate and parts of corporate pakistan they want. leaving the wagah border gate wide open round the clock with a banner hanging over it saying “Welcome to Pakistan, enter unarmed if you want to have fun, or armed if you want the headache of taking over us lot.”
A good post is one than challenges the reader to think. After reading Bonabashi
re. aamir ali’s post: 587k armed force vs even an armed politician is no mathc; or to use a metaphor likely to be more pleasing to you ‘tank vs thug’ is no competition. competition is that magic ingredient that makes a free market of absolutely selfish free agents work!
as for pakistanis condoning or wishing to appease the extremists. the army spent at the very least a decade (under zia) brain washing the people in to all kinds of perversions of jihad and religion. now you blame the very same generation, robbed by zia of all light, for not standing by the army against the very mullah they were brain washed by the army in to espousing the cause of, however violent his means!
not just the army, but the people too are reaping the evil that zia and his army sowed.
re. bonabashi’s post: gillani is a feudel of low intellect who went and joined the muslim league (always too eager to play the role of the military dictator’s king’s party) when he first entered politics in 1979 (most probably after seeking advice from the local ISI major in multan, and probably the blessing from the Garrison Commanding Officer – some general). it was his good fortune that by some calculation of how best to hedge his bets by looking at which parties his relatives and business associates belonged to, he joined BB’s PPP. it was him who sacked the Nat Sec Advisor for accepting – a couple of days ago(?) – that the mumbai terrorist in custody was a citizen of pakistan.
is gen kayani on board? i see that ‘bloody civilian’ has already ‘answered’ you on that score. i might add that the deal that the US carried through between mush and BB, despite its obvious moral shortcomings was an improvement on their previous stance of total support to the dictator. kayani and zardari both have to stick by that deal as the ‘legitimate’ usccessors of the original principals.
the US influence is not all bad. with obama taking over it will become even less palatable for most pakistanis except the most farsighted. what medicine good for you is not bitter! but since the influence is ultimately about US national interest and not Pakistan’s, it will only take us so far on the road to recovery, and at some point we’ll have to be prepared to and be capable of taking full responsibility of purging ourselves and fully correcting our orientation. a bit sordid, but the more brutal the terrorists get within pakistan, the more quickly and widely is the zia indoctrination shaken and thrown off (aamir ali is right in that particular conclusion even based on his totally wrong analysis).
as for the rest of what you’ve said, that is, the first 3/4 paragraphs, it is quite inspiring to see how you have managed to be completely objective without compromising one bit on grace and generosity. teach us north indians how to do it ;-) may be at the kind of forum that Gorki has suggested.
all the best