The Mard-e-Momin as a form of national identity is overrated. So is the concept of the collective morality and the religious honor that gets everyone keyed up, ready to take up arms against an aggressor. The biggest aggressor, after all, remains poverty, bread within. Real tyranny is that which the state practices against its own citizenry, mostly by ignoring them.
Enough with the heroic machismo, I say. It hasn’t bought Pakistan any bread or butter, although it has surely strung us into becoming a state famous world over for its radicalism.
Zard Patto Ka Bann Jo Mera Dess Hai. Faiz Ahmed Faiz (1911-1984) brews in his poetry a gentle reminder of a wilting nation, he calls each of the forgotten, by their own name: the weary armed mother who can’t calm her crying child at night, the postmen, the clerk, the railway driver and the factory worker. These form the majority of our nation – they also form a group that we don’t like to talk about. Our ‘national poet’ Allama Mohammad Iqbal for instance has no mention of these no-name people. Neither does he mention shame, which is what a realistic self-introspection deserves. How can we talk of a national poetry without the people who form its working class?
Nisar teri gallion mey aye Watan, Key koi na saar utha key chaley. Faiz has asked for a soul check, a delving into what brings real honor to the country: protection of the rights of its citizens, a level playing field and recourse to justice. As a member of the International Labor Organization he was astute about the rights of the blue collar workers. His concept of patriotism wasn’t a jingoistic one. Evident in his piece mourning the death of the founding father Mohammad Ali Jinnah, he said: “Short-sighted fanaticism and heartless greed are preparing to plunge both the dominions into another suicidal devil-dance and the voice of the common man is getting feebler through exhaustion.”
Faiz’s nationalism focused more on the cultural aspects of what it was to be Pakistani, the art, the music, the folk tradition. In his compartmentalized life, between his work as a writer and his jail sentences, he was also the head of the Ministry of Culture in Islamabad where he established the Lok Virsa museum, chronicling the unique regional art embedded in our nationalism.
Umeed-e-Seher ki baat sunoo. Far from being a pessimist, he believed in the message of hope. Listen, he said to the dawn of the new morn.
What is missing today, especially among our youth is a concept to anchor them in. A cultural identity of what it is to be a Pakistani. Childishly we believe that fighting the other fulfills our need to congregate around a cause. Pakistan is in the search of Bulleh Shah, the Khudi of Iqbal, the voice of Reshma, the Horse and Cattle show, the Polo matches, the fashion shows, the billboards and the TV Serials, no matter how variant the spectrum, each contributant to the creativity form a mosaic of multiculturalism forms a piece of the modern Pakistan we have today. Anyone with a green passport can claim it as their own.
In the same eulogy Faiz adds that Pakistanis should, “complete the task that the Quaid-i-Azam began, the task of building a free, progressive and secure Pakistan, to restore our people the dignity and happiness for which the Quaid-i-Azam strove, to equip them with all the virtues that the nobility of freedom demands and to rid them of fear, suffering and want that have dogged their lives through the ages.”
The Pakistani cultural identity is infused with religious sentiment. It is important to divorce those two concepts because we have not one but many religious avenues which describe what it is to be a Pakistani, and these avenues cannot be excluded, because Pakistan was not created out of an exclusionary identity. Pakistan was formed for a minority community, through a democratic and constitutional process; it must therefore amongst all its principles uphold the protection of the underdog as its highest moral principle.
Tum yey Kehtey ho vo Jang ho bhi chuki, Jiss mey rakha nahi hey kissi ney kadaam. Vehemently anti-war, Faiz cautioned against those wars that were fought on the behalf of an unseen force, and lost at the cost of many lives and much blood. His focus instead was on educating the youth. As principal of a local school, he introduced at first education for women, brought enrollment to an all time high and instituted excellence at this school. His versatility as a nation builder was evident in the devotion with which he completed each assigned task, no matter what the field.
Bahar Aaee. Above all else, Faiz brought alive that Pakistan which bloomed endlessly, even after loss.
Adil Bhai, I am reading these childish and immature comments from our two fundamentalist friends, and am reminded on the conversation you had with out group in Chicago: Tangay walla khair mangda!
http://pakistaniat.com/2006/11/25/tangay-walla-wal lah-khair-atp/
yawnnnnnnnnnnnnnn….yeh gadha pan kab khatam ho ga,,,,, abhi tu hum mowazna-e-anees o dabeear or mowazna mir-o – ghalib pay saar pharna band nahin kiya tha kay yeh moarka faiz o iqbal shuru kar diya. woh mar gaye…unko galian denay kay bajai khud kuch kar kay dhikao…..bari baat ho gi.
I wish all of you , who commented think little different. Ask yourself, what can we do for now the people of Pakistan. Both Iqbal and Faiz are dead. Let us do something to save Pakistani People from terrorism and poverty.
Iqbal and Faiz both were better than us. They did something. You may love one over the other and praise any one over the reality, but does it make any different to the real people. Remember they were human.
Please plan something to help and save the people of Pakistan from tyranny of Religious fanatics and corrupt government.
O! M! G!
This is not OMG!
This is not even OMG!!!
This is O! M! G!
As in Ohhhhhhhh Myyyyyyyyyyy Gooooooodddddddddddd!
Folks, I am laughing and crying.
But priceless!
Thank you ATP for exposing the charade of the the self-proclaimed liberals. And double thanks on the heals of the exposing the charade of that resident ignorant who has now self identified himself as eAbu Jahil in another thread.
The exposure of self-proclaimed fake liberal and the nakedness of the self-proclaimed religious nut in a span of a week or so.
So, this is really icing on the cake.
Now we move to close the deal. Laughingly.
McCarthyism?
McCarthyism is a term used to describe the making of accusations of disloyalty, subversion, or treason without proper regard for evidence. (Source: Wiki)
McCarthyism would be if the allegations about Faiz are false. The complicity of Faiz with USSR is true.
Perhaps some good folks may find this as news, but in In 1962, he was awarded the Lenin Peace Prize by the Soviet Union. (Source: Wiki). And they did not do it for avowed capitalists. That was exactly the time Pakistan was a first strike nation on the list of nuclear targets of USSR. And that was exactly the time Faiz was a paid servant of USSR. And well into 70s, Faiz was peddling scholarships for the universities of the failed Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (He offered one to my cousin. Thankfully, her father, said, “thanks, but no thanks”.)
Seems everyone knew this about Faiz, except the three people who are running up his flag here by putting down the Great Allama.
I have said here, Faiz deserves and space and place, but it is not at the cost of put downs of the Great Allama.
Given an opportunity, a softball by Adil, the author of this post dug deeper and called the Great Allama “manufactured”. Relentless. Gratuitous. YLH called Allama a “joke” (no pun intended on the poster’s name). And who said Great Allama was a founding father in this thread? Manufactured allegation, I say! (Frankly, I have been laughing at all those people who want to associate all sorts of people as founding “fathers”! Someone called Sir Zafarullah Khan as one of the “founding fathers” at ATP.)
McCarthyism would be if I said YLH is a socialist and on payroll of Russians. I have no evidence. That would be a false allegation.
A form of McCarthyism would be if I called YLH as “liberal”. That too would be a false allegation. He is not. He is a fake, fraud and phony self-proclaimed liberal as already established. He does not consider Pakistanis whose faith is not Islam as Pakistanis in his mental calculus.
And no liberal would ever call Iqbal a joke either. It would be against the tenants of liberalism to call someone by a name other than those who admire that person.
Now, the most bizarre. (These folks do not stop from digging to the other side of the Earth.) Are you saying Pakistan should stop sending students abroad to the US, China, Great Britain etc?
Wow! This needs a deep breath. OK. I am ready.
Did US, China, Great Britian ever point their nuclear missles at Pakistan? Are they friends? Foes?
If you are YLH (or his admirer), please do not answer. You are clueless. The others, know the difference.
I am crying.
YLH is a Pakistani. A “gitter-mitter” Pakistani, but nevertheless a Pakistani.
The fact he is clueless really makes me sad. Such poor logic and understanding would be expected from a high school student. (I am not insulting high school students, because some of them give me headaches.) I am sad that on a given day, folks like him would be considered as cream of the crop of Pakistan. The best bet of Pakistan.
What a bad crop we have!
We have work to do. I do have audacity of hope.
Miles to go before we sleep!
P.S. ATP, thanks one more time for setting the stage for exposure of these self-proclaimed fake liberals and equally self-proclaimed ignorant religious nuts.
I keep saying, Pakistanis are middle of the road people. And middle of the road Pakistanis have been marginalized in the last few decades by the shouts of the religious nuts and liberal freaks.
About time, the vast middle expose both extremes.
There I agree with you YLH. Allama Iqbal was not at par with Quaid-e-Azam. Actually there is no comparison rather I should say there is no ground for comparison.
Allama was a revolutionist and Quaid was a politician.
Allama was a visionary and Quaid was an activist.
Allama was the architect and Quaid was the engineer.
I shall put literary greatness and visionary acumen of Allama Iqbal on hold here because you totally deny it in the same way many like you deny Ahaadith as authentic source of religious beliefs and commandments. Rather I shall discuss the relationship between the two great personalities.
It was Allama, who made Quaid the leader of the movement. Can you deny the fact that Quaid, disappointed with feudal leaders of Muslim League, had retired to Britain following the break up of round table conferences? It was only after some convincing correspondence between Allama and Quaid, that the later returned to India and re-organized Muslim League as a MOVEMENT for Muslim representation, which it was previously not.
It was Allama’s vision of separate Muslim state which he share with Quaid in his letter on June 21, 1937.
“A separate federation of Muslim Provinces, reformed on the lines I have suggested above, is the only course by which we can secure a peaceful India and save Muslims from the domination of Non-Muslims. Why should not the Muslims of North-West India and Bengal be considered as nations entitled to self-determination just as other nations in India and outside India are.”
No need to mention that this very message was taken up as Lahore Resolution three years later. This very message was the guideline for Pakistan Movement and undoubtedly transformed into reality in ten years time.
So can you please answer the question:
Had there not been an Allama Muhammad Iqbal, will Muhammad Ali Jinnah ever become Quaid-e-Azam? I, in no way, mean to diminish the respect for Quaid even slightly, but wouldn’t he remain just a lawyer-politician in an undivided India, had he not been given the vision and full political support by Allama Iqbal?