Worse, it must change or
simply grow progressively weaker. A
propped up military serves no purpose as it stands except as a jobs for the
boys program in a feudal society. That the
military remains intact and capable is purely a legacy of the British. Otherwise it is surely obsolete.
In practice, they are
ignoring real country building to preserving ethnic and feudal privilege. One only has to look at India to know that
this can at least be tackled however imperfectly. Land reform did take place there imperfectly
but it did. Other issues also were taken
on and will continue to be challenged.
The real problem is India’s
steady growth. Right now, half of
Pakistan has every reason to rejoin India itself and that idea could be
promoted inside Pakistan. This would be
seen as leading to a second partition and the isolation of the Punjab based
governing class. That of course then
sets the stage for reuniting with India itself on friendly terms.
The hard reality is that
separate political power in the Indian subcontinent serves only to enrich a few
local clichés, all of whom would do as well or better been part of a larger
more successful state. Of course there
are local cliques in India with separatist tendencies as well.
Why Pakistan Is Not Changing
Saturday, 05 April 2014 11:25By Zulfiqar Shah,
"Change" and
"Pakistan" are the words of significant disconnect for Pakistanis and
the world outside. The world outside has many illusions about Pakistan. The
federation of the Indus civilizations' muslim majority states is merely 70
years old, but houses a contemporary history of global geo-political
engagements and is the epicenter of terror and violence in the name of Islam. It's
also a hot spot for ethnic chauvinism that runs through the tectonic plates of
the iron-clad military headquarters at Rawalpindi.
The vast majority of
Pakistanis at home and abroad, as well as the stakeholder international
community, have one common concern: why Pakistan is not changing for the
better. A quest to seek answers needs a microcosmic reading of the ingredients
and dynamism of change in Pakistan society vis-à-vis its state oligarchy and
power matrix.
Class Complexities
Pakistan has highly
peculiar and complex traits of class formation, evolution and transformation,
which have no match in the rest of the world in terms of social engineering by
the state and its omni-powerful security establishment. During the period of Indian partition, Pakistan was
predominantly a rural society comprised of mostly
sharecroppers, peasants and landless agriculture laborers. It also had
traditional feudal figures called
zamindars, who owned arable land traditionally, and feudal lords known as jagirdars, who also held large amounts of
arable land that was awarded to them by British colonizers in exchange for
their loyalty and collaboration in British imperial endeavors in India. They
were predominantly Muslims. Despite three attempts between 1965 and 1978, no
effective land reforms took place. The fear of socialist inroads led to
Pakistan's establishment - with international support - gradually nationalizing
emerging industry. Thus the process for the emergence of industrialists was
barricaded. Led by the refugee feudal leadership of the ruling Muslim League
and the Punjabi military, feudal lords were strengthened to cement the
foundations of the military establishment in politics so that they might remain
unchallenged, as urbanization and industrialization were the basis for change.
It is worth mentioning here
that during the Indian partition of 1947, the Punjab Regiment of the undivided
Indian Army was carved out to become the Pakistan Army. In the later phase of
the military takeover of the state in Pakistan, despite leveling the playing
field for the development of industrialists, the military itself turned its
retired and serving officials into industrialists, thus creating a militarized
industrialist and trading class. This ensured the status quo as well as a
cushion for military-controlled change in Pakistan. Moreover, by facilitating
the employment of state institutions for legitimate use of violence (police,
second-tier military outfits like Pakistan Rangers, Frontier Constabulary and
Bajwaur Wing) by the feudal loyalists in rural areas, and urban land grabbers,
thugs, mafias, mullahs and terrorists in urban hubs like Karachi (Sindh), and
to a certain extent in Quetta (Balochistan), Peshawar (Khyber Pakhtunkhuwa) and
Lahore (Punjab), the security establishment created a "third state"
to safeguard its interests. Thus, the elements of change were permanently
resisted in Pakistan.
This resistance was further
fueled and infected by the funded seminaries (madrasas) preaching the Salafi brand of Islam among the majority Sunni
muslims of Pakistan, who were mostly Sufi by
the cultural virtues of the Indus civilization. Hence, the mechanisms to
transform Pakistan from rural and feudal into modern; from religious extremism
of central Punjab and parts of South Punjab and Pashtun tribal areas into liberal;
and urban mafias, thugs, and terrorists into change-monger city dwellers has
been taken over by the military and its broader security establishment.
Therefore, the shrinking of civil and liberal spaces in Pakistan has become
phenomenal - despite the fact that the majority of the citizens in Pakistan
that reside in the Sindh, Balochistan, South Punjab and Pashtun belt are either
secular (as in the case of Sindh) or liberal. Consequently, talking about change in Pakistan means coining terms
like "pro-civilians of the military" and "pro-military
civilians." Maverick terms like "liberal extremists" are usually
used by the extremist component of the Pakistani security establishment to
describe the vocal Sindhi classes and socio-political elements.
Ethnicity Faultlines
A broader ethnic diversity
that could have become a vital motor for progress in Pakistan has now converted
into the source of an ethnic divide and antagonism - mostly due to the military
and security establishment's preference of some ethnic groups over the others.
The unwritten constitution of the Pakistani establishment has one guiding
principle - the dividing line between "hard-core" Pakistanis and
second-, third- and fourth-level Pakistanis. Hence, trust and participation
in statecraft has been prejudicial and exclusionary since the predominantly
Punjabi security establishment buys the idea that of citizens belonging to any
of the 11 Punjabi-speaking districts of Punjab province, religious
Salafi/Wahabi or Sunni muslims are the most trustworthy, hard-core
Pakistanis. Urdu-speaking Indian
partition refugees from northern India fall into the second "level";
the Hindko-speaking people from Hazara Division of Khyber
Pakhtunkhuwa, the third; the Persian-speaking Hazara refugees from Afghanistan in Balochistan, fourth; and Salafi /Sunni
Pashtuns are the fifth in the category of so-called "defined priority
categorization" of "hard-core" Pakistanis.
This
"prioritization" resulted in the inclusion of some ethnic groups in
statecraft and the exclusion of others like Sindhi and Baloch, as well as
Hindu, Christians, Shia and, to a certain extent, Ahmadis, creating the foundations for ethnic
conflict, interest strife, freedom movements and warfare in Pakistan. This
matrix of conflict may be categorized as Sindhi, Baloch and Pashtun versus the
Punjabi-dominated establishment. It can also be categorized as a competition
over participation in governance and access to resources between Baloch and
Hazara refugees in Balochistan; Sindhi and Urdu-speaking Sindhis in Sindh and
Pashtun and the Hindko-speaking communities in Khyber Pakhtunkhuwa; and between
Siraki, Potohari and Punjabi in Punjab. This dynamic has been created in the
first instance and is now utilized for furthering the Punjabi-dominated
establishment. Eventually, the phenomena has created a Bangladesh (previously East
Pakistan)-like situation in Sindh and Balochistan.
A State of Anarchy
Anarchy has engulfed the
Pakistani state apparatus. The conflict between the civilian population and
noncivilians is at center stage. The former includes the pro-civilian fold, the
upholders of civilian dominance in statecraft in the form of political parties:
social groups, dissenter individuals and pro-civilian elements. The
pro-military fold includes serving and retired armed forces personnel and the
military-associated intelligence fraternity, pro-military elements within the
political parties and civil bureaucracy and parts of civil society.
Moreover, two groups are
crosscutting elements in Pakistan - military and mullah. They have inroads into
almost all social groups and schools of thought of the state and society, with
the only low-scale "infected elements," the larger majority of
activists in Sindh and Balochistan who strive for freedom or secession. This
great puzzle of state and society in the South Asia of our times is a
predecessor of the ongoing and upcoming worst form of anarchy in the state and
the society among the federations of the world.
Road to Change
Achieving positive change
in Pakistan would be like an attempt to wash the dirt out from a cowboy's jeans.
In the context of socio-economic complexities, political traits and the
ethno-religious composition of the military-dominated state apparatus and
establishment of Pakistan, there would be some necessary prerequisites.
Changing the ethno-religious composition of all civil, military and security
governance segments of the state would be a primary requirement. Cutting off
the nexus between feudal and urban lords and the criminal security regime of
the country - misused for the manipulation of society and polity in favor of
military interests - would be necessary. That would also lead to an ultimate
shutdown of religious-terrorist factories in Punjab. It is important to
de-Punjabize the state apparatus and reduce the existence of Hindko, Urdu and
Hazara ethnic minorities, proportionate to their civilian population, however,
it is worth mentioning here that the Shia Hazara of Balochistan are also the
worst victims of state-sponsored Salafi terrorism.
The change in the ethnic
composition of Pakistan's military is the unavoidable prerequisite, given that
Sindhis are almost nonexistent in the Sindh Regiment, Baloch in the Baloch
Regiment, and Siraki in the Punjab Regiment. The same is evident in the technical
corps and specialized formations of the military. Surprisingly, the residents
of coastal Sindh and Balochistan are not part of the Naval Forces, and
inhabitants of high-altitude mountains are nonexistent in the Air Force.
Moreover, the hegemony of Punjab in the Parliament needs to be altered.
According to the arrangements under the 1973 constitution of Pakistan, Sindh,
Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhuwa provinces together do not form a numerical
two-third majority in the parliament to amend the constitution of Pakistan. If
desired, the Punjab, in association with its collaborating ethnic minorities,
can amend and legislate the constitution. In such a situation, religious
extremist Punjabi-speaking Punjabi, eyeing Afghanistan and the Indian Kashmir,
can never be willing to undo the Jihadi machinery and repeal notorious laws
like the blasphemy law, as well as arrangements that bar nonmuslims from
holding the offices of president, prime minister and armed forces chiefs.
Moreover, the preamble to
the Constitution of Pakistan should be excluded, as it was, in fact, a
resolution by the All India Muslim League's central working committee to turn
Pakistan into an Islamic Republic after the death of Jinnah. If these changes
are not made, the existence of Pakistan will be disastrous for its own
victimized majority of the people in Sindh, Balochistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhuwa
and Siraikistan (South Punjab) and pose a danger of greater anarchy and
instability in South Asia and the Central Asian region. There are only two
options for Pakistan, according to the realities of our times: Exist after
undertaking wider drastic reforms or vanish by dividing into two or three new
sovereign countries on the world map. There is no middle path.
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