On 11 October 1947, the Quaid said: “God has given us a grand opportunity to show our worth as architects of a new state; let it not be said that we did not prove equal to the task.”
Was the Quaid doubtful about our ability to run Pakistan in 1947? If so, did his fear relate to our intellectual capacity to visualise and implement the idea of the new state? Or was he fearful of the general consciousness of the people? The first fear focuses on the ruling elite, the second on the conditioning of the masses. The Muslims had struggled for almost a hundred years for freedom, but this struggle was not all for Pakistan. Their mind had been formed by a long-drawn out Khilafat Movement which the Quaid and his Aligarhian Muslim League elite had diverted to the quest for Pakistan.
While he was alive, his party leaders had ideas about the Constitution that didn’t jibe with his own. He knew that the modern Islamic State could survive only under democracy in an environment of freedom and equality. He was a secularist and made it clear many times. He insisted that a theocratic state was not viable in modern times. The Muslim clergy of the time was in no doubt about Mr Jinnah’s views; that is why the dubbed his creation “Napakistan”.
The first test came while we were still living under the Government of India Act. The Constitution was not framed till 1956 while India’s was duly promulgated in 1951. Instead, our Governor-General dismissed the Constituent Assembly. When we finally got our first of many constitutions, the government under survived only for two years. Looking back, the martial law era of Ayub Khan was our best years, which indicates the sort of fitness we possessed to rule ourselves.
Pluralism was thrust upon us in the shape of East Pakistan. Our monistic vision was repelled by cultural diversity. We compensated for it by creating One Unit, which was abolished only after the fall of Dhaka. The Quaid’s fear about our ability to run the new state was confirmed by this instinctive dislike of diversity and freedom of regional expression.
We got another chance with what was left over. Democracy came back after Pakistan’s first real elections in 1970, twenty years after India was well on its way with five elections. Even during the “liberal” 70s, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto’s contact with the masses was through the dream of redistributive nationalisation but when, under threat from the clergy, he sought to commence with their subconscious, it was through the apostatisation of the Ahmedis.
The way we ran democracy from 70 to 77 can be judged from the fact that the people and the state welcomed martial law once again when it overthrew democracy in 1977. The changes that General Zia brought about in his long rule all but wiped out the legacy of the founders. He had history rewritten saying that it was absurd for the Quaid to have proposed secularism as the basic tenet of the state. He rejected Allama Iqbal’s liberal interpretation of Islam and imposed his own brand of Shariat.
If the idea was to make Pakistan a modern state, it was rejected. Society began creeping back to the worldview of the Khilafat Movement with the clergy that had turned away from the Pakistan Movement. The idea of a modern liberal Pakistan was crowded out by the worldview of a society that lacked a middle class and was ruled by a feudal elite.
And if the political elite was not equal to the task of running Pakistan, the generals proved even less equal. The economy was allowed to run down even as windfall dollars poured into Pakistan during the Afghan war. Islamisation was reduced to an irony as corruption mounted under the new laws.
After General Zia’s providential death, we were once again put to the test. We could not remove the 8th Amendment inserted into the Constitution to undermine democratic rule. As governments fell one after another under this law, our leaders failed to grasp what was happening. Politics in Pakistan is a pavlovian reflex, not an evolutionary process in which lessons are learned and the state carefully guided towards freedom and prosperity.
Subjected to internal stress, the state has become almost unviable. Constitutional amendments over the years have killed the spirit of democracy. Laws framed under it persecute the minorities while threatening others with exclusion. The judiciary, which ensures enforcement of democratic values, has been mauled out of shape with a resultant loss of respect. Where we have proved most unequal to the task is in learning the lessons of world history. We have tragically embarked upon the creation of a political entity that has been repeatedly shipwrecked.
Confusion persists about what kind of state Pakistan should be. After half a century, there are revolts on the question of state law. Clerics denounce democracy as being against Islam, processionists agitate for a conversion of the state into an identity that the Quaid and Iqbal had both rejected. Reason has been waylaid by passion, desire for peace and prosperity has been conquered by lust for aggression. Thus far, we have definitely proved unequal to the task of running Pakistan.