Pakistan-
A Personal History
by
Imran
Khan(2011)
Imran Khan amazes
me. That’s why I picked up this book.
To my mind he had it all - film star looks, oodles of talent, a heart-throb to women, an
icon……
Not to forget
his ‘minor’ exploits in the cricket field.
Counted
amongst the best all-rounder’s the world has ever seen, Imran was one of the
few Captains who inspired his team to withstand the West Indies fearsome pace
onslaught in the 80’s and lived to tell the tale with pride. And of course
the crowning moment was lifting of the
World cup in 1992.
Post
retirement a life of leisure and contentment awaited him- writing books, becoming
a sought after cricket commentator etc, having achieved what most folks can only dream
of.
But Imran was
made of sterner stuff. To quote him:
“I could never
imagine…., just making a living out of cricket journalism. For me that would
have been a purposeless existence, I cannot even imagine life without a passion
and a purpose”
That is what
drew him to politics. Into the world of Pakistani politics.
Pakistan,
today, is in a mess. It doesn’t inspire much hope. It has been variously
described by commentators as ‘the nation
on the brink’ , ‘failed or failing state’ etc.
Who would want
risk getting into the murky world of Pakistani politics? Even Imran initially
had come to the same conclusion:
“…like most of the privileged class, I was coming to the
conclusion that, since Pakistan’s problems are so many and so insolvable, the
best thing to do was to just look after myself. Besides, what could politics
possibly give me? I had life that many young people in Pakistan and elsewhere,
dreamt about – I was a rich and glamorous cricket star, jet-setting all over
the world. Politics was considered a dirty business for those who could do
anything else.”
But those were
the years when he was immersed in Cricket and had little time to ponder over
the state of affairs of the country. As he makes it clear:
“To tell the truth, I had no interest in interest in
politics in the 1970s or much of the 1980s………. I had been so single-mindedly
and obsessively involved in international cricket that I had no time to think
about much else. Anyone who has played professional sport would understand how
it completely takes over one’s life. One lives and breathes the sport, so
intense is the competition and hence the focus. Over the years, I came to the
conclusion that ‘genius’ is being obsessed with what you are doing.”
But in the 90's, in the twilight of his career, Imran’s thoughts turned to politics. However
instead of being just being an armchair critic of Pakistani politics, he
decided he needed to do something to make a difference. He was contemptuous of
those who kept talking about Pakistan’s imminent doom but didn’t seem to want
to do anything about it:
“What amazed me was that while almost every dinner-table
conversation in the country condemned the politicians for destroying Pakistan’s
potential, no one was prepared to do anything about it. The affluent classes’ response to the country’s downward spiral was to get
Canadian passports or US green cards.
They just did not have the guts or the will to give up their comfortable
lives and take on the corrupt political class.
In Islamabad it was quite common to see members of the elite, who
denigrated the politicians in private, groveling at their feet at public
functions.”
The scenario
is pretty similar in India also. We find a lot of arm-chair specialists who
give their ‘expert views’ on what ails the nation, but why don’t they get up
and do something about it?
This is what
prompted me to pick up this book by Imran Khan. What was it that drove Imran?
Where does he get his amazing energy from?
One thing that you must not expect from Imran is modesty.
Remember that infamous speech of his after Pakistan won the world cup in 1992? He
had completely neglected to mention his team-mates contribution in his victory
speech. But he is candid about the incident in his book:
“So happy was I for this dream of mine that at the
presentation ceremony after the game, I forgot to thank the team for their
brilliant performance. I was criticized for it and I must confess the speech
was terrible; thinking about it still makes me cringe. But quite frankly I had other things on my
mind than making a speech. It also has
to be said that I was the kind of person who had trouble speaking to a small
room of people and suddenly a microphone was thrust in my face without warning
and I was expected to address a crowd of 90,000 people and hundreds of millions
of television viewers around the world.”
Not very convincing.
But so what ? Imran is not very modest, probably. But that doesn’t take away any
of his achievements from him.
Imran definitely
feels he is a man of destiny. See how he brings parallels with other legendary
figures with his own life:
“All the truly great people in history- Jinnah, Gandhi,
Mother Tereas, Nelson Mandela-have had a vision and ambition beyond themselves,
often achieving more than others not because of more talent but because they
had bigger ambitions and selfless dreams.
The idea of constantly striving towards ever higher goals struck a chord
with me, dovetailing with my own philosophy that I had developed through
sports-the more you challenge yourself, the more you discover greater reserves
of strength within you. The moment your
relax and stop pushing yourself is the moment you start going downhill.”
This aspect of Imran is what most fascinates and inspires
me. He doesn’t believe in living on past laurels. He keeps pushing himself. Here’s
how he explains his drive and energy:
“I first strove to play
cricket for Pakistan, then my goal became to be my country’s best all-rounder,
then the best fast bowler. From there I
wanted to become the best all-rounder and the best fast bowler in the world. When I was
made captain the ambition became turning the team into the best in the
world. And once the cancer hospital I
founded in memory of my mother became a success I set about building two more
hospitals, one in Karachi and one in Peshawar.
Now my challenge in life is to bring about a socio-economic revolution
in Pakistan. After one goal has been achieved, there are
always more to conquer. As Iqbal says :
‘Other worlds exist beyond the Stars/More tests of love are still to come.”
This passage
describes Imran in a nutshell.
Can you ever
put him down? He epitomizes the George Bernard Shaw quote:
Life isn't about finding yourself.
Life is about creating yourself.
Imran Khan's Idea of pakistan
Ok. Enough eulogizing Imran.
Let’s
talk of Imran and what he is doing now. As Imran would agree – why waste time
talking of past laurels?
So
how does Imran intend to get Pakistan out of the quagmire that it finds itself
in? How does he intend to bring about the ‘socio-economic revolution’ in
Pakistan?
Firstly, before one looks at the solutions offered by
Imran, one aspect which he covers at length in the book, is on how he has become
a ‘born again muslim’ and discovered his ‘Faith’:
“Faith answered two of
the most important questions, which had always nagged me. Questions that science could never answer. What is the purpose of existence? What
happens to us after we die?”
No queries
there. After all ‘Faith’ is a personal issue.
So what is
Imran’s solution to the mess that Pakistan finds itself in?
‘Back to the Quran’
says Imran. He calls for an ‘enlightened Islam’ and a pure Islamic society as envisaged
by Iqbal and Jinnah:
“A true Islamic society would be no different from the
democratic welfare states of Europe. Human rights are, after all, at the centre
of the Quran. The right to life, justice, respect, freedom of speech and
movement, privacy, protection from slander and ridicule, a secure place of
residence and a means of living are all enshrined in the Quran.”
And the only
difference would be:
“The main difference Islamic sharia has from Western
secular society is in the realm of public morality. This protects our family
system, one of Pakistan’s greatest strengths.”
So a pure Islamic
society is akin to the present western ‘welfare
state’ but with stronger ‘family and moral
values’
The Two Nation Theory
And partition was necessary because:
“Iqbal and others, …. argued that this vision of an ideal
society could never be achieved as long as Muslims remained in a minority in a
Hindu-dominated India.
It was not only that India, with its caste system and
social inequalities, was the antithesis of everything they wanted. It was also
that such a bold experiment of recreating the ideals of Islam could never be
achieved in a country where Muslims were in the minority."
So
that was the basis of the ‘Two nation theory’.
Does it still hold good after the creation of Bangladesh
in 1971?
Imran maintains that, it was because of the fact the Pakistani establishment
shifted away from the ideals of its
founding fathers, that East Pakistan broke away.
There is another school of thought doing rounds these
days.
That it is not 'Religion' but ‘Geography’ that makes Pakistan a separate state-
i.e people of India and Pakistan can be classified into people of the Indus valley and Ganges valley.
Marvi Sirmed, a prominent social activist in Pakistan quotes
Aitaz Ahsan in her blog ‘the ideology of Pakistan’ :
“The crux of Mr Ahsan’s
study was the inherent difference between the Indus valley and the Ganges
civilisations, which he argues, bound all the people living northwest of the
Gurdaspur-Kathiwar salient, as one, irrespective of their religion. The
southern side of this cultural border constitutes Mr Ahsan’s Ganges man, who
considers every intruder from the south or from the central Asia as an invader
rather than a hero. He identifies his Indus man more with the Central Asian
culture than the Ganges civilisation—a more ‘Indian’ civilization.”
The same idea is propounded by Robert Kaplan in his recent
article “What’s wrong with Pakistan?”:
The more one reads this
history, the more it becomes apparent that the Indian subcontinent has two
principal geographical regions: the Indus Valley with its tributaries, and the
Ganges Valley with its tributaries. Pakistani scholar Aitzaz Ahsan identifies
the actual geographical fissure within the subcontinent as the
"Gurdaspur-Kathiawar salient," a line running from eastern Punjab southwest to
the Arabian Sea in Gujarat. This is the watershed, and it matches up almost
perfectly with the Pakistan-India border.
I can only respectfully submit to folks who propose the
theory that ‘Ganges is India’ that they have no clue of what India is all about.
They have never been to the South or North-East of India.
They simply have no idea of the bewildering diversity of India.
Enough said.
Similarly
to label Pakistan as simply an ‘Indus valley civilization’ is also a tad bit
simplistic.
Punjad and Sind, yes. What about Baluchistan , FATA and other areas bordering
Afghanistan?
The Indian Model for Pakistan?
To my mind even Pakistan is a mini India in terms of its
diversities, albeit not on that scale. So to address an ideology of a nation in
narrow terms of 'geography' or 'religion' is a recipe for disaster.
I don’t believe either Imran’s ‘Islamic state’ or Marvi
Sirmed’s/ Kaplan’s ‘geography of Indus valley’ theory aptly describes the plurality of
Pakistan. They need to understand that a nation is much more complex than that.
They could in fact take a leaf out of how India has been
nurtured by Nehru, Patel, Ambedkar etc in its formative years and take a clue. It
is an apt case study.
Jinnah in 1948, declared ‘Urdu’
as the state language of Pakistan, causing a great deal of resentment amongst Bengali East Pakistani’s, sowing seeds of discontentment which eventually led to the
creation of Bangladesh.
Nehru was firmly convinced that ‘Hindi’ had to be the national
language of India and he personally felt it was necessary to bond the nation
together. But unlike Jinnah, he was far more pragmatic and he understood the
diversity and complexity of the nascent nation.
He delayed making a decision for 15 years, and when
it came up again for discussion in parliament a decade and a half later, the different
langauage lobbies , especially the DMK, were up in arms and the idea of a ‘national language
‘ was quickly scrapped.
You need to ‘soft sell’ the idea of a nascent nation to
its citizen’s over a period of time. You cannot shove it down somebody’s
throat. That’s where the Indian leaders showed Statesmanship in the initial years.
Drone Attacks : How Wrong
Similarly it is inconceivable to think of any part in
India wherein there is no writ of the central government.
In FATA, Baluchistan
and other tribal areas, there is no influence of the central establishment whatsoever. Even India has
tribal and remote areas, much more than Pakistan in fact. But slowly and steadily
over the years the establishment has made inroads, not to subvert the
indigenous culture but to subtly make them come to terms with the idea of India. It has all been about ‘soft selling’ the idea of India.
And that explains the impunity with which the Pakistani establishment allows drone and
gunship attacks on FATA , SWAT valley and parts of Baluchistan, both by own
forces as well the US. These regions have never been integrated completely.
Will any Pakistani allow such drone attacks on Lahore?
I totally agree with Imran’s condemnation of drone attacks by US and
the use of Pakistani military might, to include helicopter gunships, to quell
the dissidence in FATA,Swat valley and Baluchistan.
These actions will only further radicalize the already
alienated population. Every innocent civilian killed, will breed a hundred more
terrorists. The drone attacks have found favor by some in the Indian media
however.
An Alternative to Drone Attacks
@Pragmatic_desi a highly respected commentator on issues of national
interest writes in his blog why drones are necessary:
“A major source of angst
and anger is over the death of innocent civilians. Some innocents are surely
dying in the missiles fired by these drones. But no one has made a cogent case
so far that the US is deliberately targeting innocent civilians in tribal
areas. They are, to use the unfortunate military term, “collateral damage”.
But all of this still
misses the fundamental point of this debate. What is the alternative to these
drone strikes? Bombing raids by fighter aircraft, strafing by helicopter
gunships, use of missiles or pounding by artillery fire. These are the methods
used by Pakistan in Balochistan and in tribal areas against the ‘bad’ jehadis.
They have all the disadvantages of drone strikes, and worse. They are far more
inaccurate, more visible and would be more violative of Pakistan’s sovereignty
than any pilotless aircraft.”
Here again I would point out to the ‘Indian’ way of
dealing with insurgents and the ‘Statesmanship' and understanding shown by the leadership.
Not too long ago we had insurgencies galore in every nook
and corner of India, barring the South. We had armed ‘freedom fighters’ in Mizoram,
Assam, Tripura, Manipur, Nagaland as also
in Punjab and Kashmir.
Today the so called insurgents in North-Eastern states
are simply a bunch of hooligans out to make a quick buck. In Punjab, the 80’s
are considered a lost decade and the insurgency is long dead and buried.
In Kashmir, it simmers on. But consider the facts.
The previous year has been the most peaceful so far in decades of fighting insurgency;
and tourism in the valley is at its
peak.
Why so?
Because the Jehadi’s are busy fighting the US in Afghanistan and
the ‘bad Jehadi’s ‘ are targeting the military-ISI complex in Pakistan.
It goes to prove that, left alone, the insurgency in
Kashmir would also have died a slow but sure death. It’s Pakistan’s shenanigan’s
that is mucking up the waters there.
So how has India been so successful in tackling
insurgency? We never used helicopter gunships and obliterated villages in our
attempts to quell insurgency. Then how did we bring down violence to tolerable levels?
We did it the hard way. We had Jack boots on the ground
and concerted Counter insurgency operations were carried out by our
professional army, with the credo ‘no collateral damage’ and ‘no alienation of
the indigenous population’.
Simultaneously a political solution was being
offered. A concerted effort of ‘soft selling ‘ the idea of India was on.
And that’s the Indian story. It’s been difficult period
for the Indian establishment and the highest levels of statesmanship was
displayed by the Indian leaders, which has actually brought us back from the
brink. But of course, no one talks of these ‘success stories’. We are too busy
highlighting the negative side.
And that is what Pakistan needs to do. With due respect
to Pragmatic_desi, the Pakistani Army and the NATO forces should keep its gunships and drones in
the hangers and move out of their comfort zone and do some hard soldiering on
the ground. The credo should be the same what India has -i.e No collateral
damage and No alienation of the locals. And simultaneously find a political
solution to the problem.
It’s a long drawn and tougher way out, surely. But it is
the only way out.
To conclude I do not believe that Imran’s ‘back to the
Quran’ is the way ahead for Pakistan. He is making it too simplistic and his idealism
is getting the better of him.
I totally agree with what Omar Ali has written in ‘three
quarks daily’
……And instead of moving away
from their dangerous national narrative and learning to live with
our actually existing cultures and history, the establishment is doubling down
on the effort to create a new culture and a new history out of little more than
wishful thinking and pictures of Jinnah and Iqbal.
To most outsiders (and many
insiders) it seems hard to believe that they are serious. But for the
supporters of the deep state, the current disorder and economic crisis is
entirely due to the corruption and mismanagement of the hapless Zardari regime
and of “failed politicians” in general. Believing their own propaganda, these people
are convinced that Pakistan's cooperation with the United States in
the so-called war on terror and its pro-Western policies in general are to
blame for all its internal and external crises; once the current coterie of
corrupt and treacherous foreign agents is removed from power and corrupt
politicians in general are sidelined or beheaded, the state will magically
transform into an Islamic version of the People's Republic of China.
It will be
run by the best and the brightest of the security establishment and its chosen
technocrats, cleansed of corruption, economically vibrant, and able to assert
its strategic priorities in the region in the face of any and all hostility
from India, Iran or NATO. That this is not even remotely close to the real
situation of Pakistan is neither here nor there. Unless the corrupt and venal
civilian regime is able to assert some level of control, matters may be headed
into uncharted territory. Not because everyone in the military high command has
gone nuts, but because there is just enough nuttiness around to slip into
disaster. We may be, as columnist Kamran Shafi says, in for a very
tall high jump. Not for sure, but certainly “maybe”. And that is a very dangerous maybe.
Behind the corruption and the material interests so beloved of leftists there
is also a dream. And our “dream of the blue flower” may lead to dangerous places.
And as @EchoOfindia tweets:
Pakistan is regressing
from modernity(Imran Khan is a classic example) while India is (fitfully)
embracing it.
I firmly believe that Imran has got the best interest for
Pakistan at heart, and that he is a breath of fresh air in the murky land of
Pakistani politics. But ‘enlightened Islam’ as the future of Pakistan just does
not seem to be the right answer.
He needs a rethink probably.
