This is a summing up of

Pakistani Politics summed

up in Daily Nation
Lahore.The article ruffled
many feathers in the
tinpot Musharraf Junta

Essence of the Matter

Published in the Daily Nation Lahore in
September 2002

A.H Amin
While analysis of todays Pakistani politics is outwardly subtle and
convincing at the face value , serious historical analysis remains the
weak point .What is lacking is the long view , the inability to penetrate
through appearances,the motivation to write with an ulterior
motivation to please to secure personal business objectives and worse
of all to criticise simply because a writer has acquired the reputation of
a cynic and his writings are read simply because his cynicism provides
a catharsis for many ! This does not mean that all is well or all military
or civil rulers are well meaning reluctant coup makers !
 This article is an attempt to capture crux of the whole issue in a
few paragraphs ! An ambitious but certainly not impossible
endeavour ! First of all the basis of modern Indo Pak politics was
initially a type of liberal set of beliefs based on faith in British
parliamentary system and liberalism mixed with the philosophy of self
rule ! The British introduced Western democracy in India with a view to
afford a vent to the Indians desire for participation and sense of
involvement ! The urban professional classes picked it up as a means
for self realisation or self advancement ! The feudals picked it up as a
means of continuing their unfair advantage or position of influence in
the Indian society. The middle classes ran after government jobs as a
means of self advancement and economic benefit ! The Indian soldiers
served in the army as mercenaries motivated by economic benefits
and part propelled by espirit de corps ! The politicians came into
conflict with the British not because all of them were heroes or martyrs
but because it was a struggle for power ! The civil servants and
mercenary pre 1947 Indo Pak soldiers collaborated with the British
because it improved their prospects of self advancement ! The pre
1947 Indian Army , the father of the post 1947 Indian and Pakistan
Army had nothing to do with Indo Pak political struggle at least in what
they voluntarily or deliberately did less a platoon of Garhwal Rifles
which refused to open fire on Muslims demonstrating in Peshawar in
1930 ! After all who was shooting down Indo Pak civilians like
partridges in Wana , Razmak ,Sindh and Jallianwalla Bagh other than
the British Kings Indian Army ! Four brigades in tribal areas , two
brigades in Sindh in the Hur Rebellion ! The Indian or Muslim civil
servant, soldier and policeman till 14 th August and some to date were
collaborators of the Western power which ruled India till the transfer of
power !
The Hindus were better organised politically since the Indian
National Congress was dominated by a strong Hindu professional and
business class while the Muslims were condemned to be politically
more backward since because of peculiar historical reasons Mr Jinnah
had no choice but to accept the Muslim feudals who dominated Muslim
politics ! Mr Jinnah was forced to ally with the Unionists in Punjab and
the Sindhi landlords in future against the advice of Punjabi Muslim
urban leaders like Dr Iqbal because it was a strategic compulsion.Thus
from August 1947 India inherited a strong political culture while The
Muslim League was destroyed by the feudals who had joined it out of
fear of land reforms and because of being in debt to Hindu money
lenders just a few years after Mr Jinnah’s death ! Here again economics
played a major role ! It has been estimated that in pre 1947 Punjab
and Sindh money lending was the most important occupation after
agriculture and that while the net revenue of Irrigation Department of
Punjab was 267 Lakh Rupees that of money lenders was 500 Lakh
Rupees ! In 1911 out of a total of 803,560 money lenders in India
some 25 % or 193,890 lived in Punjab alone ! Thus while the total
population of pre 1947 Punjab was one eleventh of India ,it had some
one fourth of India’s money lenders ! All this ensured that the feudal
elements jumped in the Muslim League band wagon not out of genuine
motivation but because of economic compulsion !
Now the post 1947 era ! While post 1947 Indian Congress leaders
like Nehru and Patel chided the Indian Army for their un nationalistic
role in British rule and reduced their basic salary Pakistan was
condemned to be ruled by a civil military clique within eleven years of
independence ! Men who had collaborated with the British before 1947
became Pakistan’s rulers within seven years of Independence !
Officials of Indian Audit and Accounts Service like Ghulam Mohammad
and Mohammad Ali ! Feudals like Kalabagh who before 1947 were
faithfuls of a man no higher than the British Deputy Commissioner of
Mianwali ! Compare the fact that while Nehru abolished Cantonment
Boards within no time after independence even today a Pakistani
civilian living in a plot of land bought by paying through his nose in a
cantonment area lives within perpetual awe of the cantonment boards
simply because no Pakistani statesman had the courage or the vision
to reduce the military or civil bureucrats to size !
A man who spent his life in sycophancy of the British was this
country’s governor general within four years of independence while
genuine freedom fighters like Raja Ghazanfar Ali were outcasts within
four years of independence ! A political agent whose pre partition
training was to intrigue and lie and make the frontier tribes fight so
that British rule was prolonged was this country’s president within
eight years of independence ! A soldier who was guilty of tactical
timidity in Burma was this country’s first Muslim Army chief within four
years of independence ! While this country’s first military ruler came
with a pledge to modernise this country the culture of police gang rape
was a direct result of the Ayub-Kalabagh style of governance ! Who
can forget the Miss Akhtar Case of Lyallpur or the Kharian Police Gang
Rape case of 1968.
Since the Pakistani military has had the best of all in most of
Pakistan’s history we will confine this discussion to the military’s role !
A study of history proves that while the Roman Republic was great the
citizens were poor or lived a Spartan living ! While the first four Muslim
caliphs practised austerity the Muslim Kingdom touched Central Asia at
one extreme and Egypt at the other ! Now compare Pakistan ! Three of
the four of Pakistan’s military rulers till to date were from humble
background less Yahya Khan whose father was from the Indian Police
Service ! All three less Yahya Khan departed richer than they were
when they took over while the Pakistani state successively became
poorer with their departure ! Compare Ayub Zia’s or any of todays
three or four star generals assets with what they had at the time of
passing out from the miltary academy whether it was the Sandhurst or
OTS Dera Dun or Kakul ! As per Feldman a reliable authority Ayubs
studies in college were financed by Nawab Kalabagh ! Major General
Tajammul states that in 1950 the then major general Ayub had just
one green suit ! Zia of 1960s is remembered by Gul Hassan as a meek
obsequeous soldier , a man unfit to be an officer of the Pakistan Army
in words of his immediate senior Major General Nawazish !
Why these man acted the way they did ! Was it because of
ideology or self interest ? From necessity or from choice ? Mustafa
Kemal had saved Turkey from disintegration , a direct consequence of
the Treaty of Sevres ! Degaulle was a military hero of France ! What
were our military rulers ! Ayub destroyed the Constitution of 1956 , a
direct consequence of which was the separation of East Pakistan within
fifteen years ! General Zia destroyed the Second Constitution of
Pakistan simply because he feared a prime minister who could
threaten his personal authority !
 We had one who came to wipe out corruption and
institutionalised corruption in the Pakistani society through route
permits and industrial permits ! We had one who attempted to undo
what his soldier predecessor had been doing for eleven years in order
to perpetuate his rule and presided over this country’s partition in
1971 ! We had one who wanted to hold hands with God Almighty in his
dishonesties and in the process introduced extremism in this country’s
politics ! He came with a Morris Minor and today his sons are in Land
Cruisers ! We have one who professes to be a liberal and is
strengthening the police and faces the most serious religious threat in
Pakistan’s history ! All were motivated by self interest ! All three came
poorer and left the country poorer if not economically then politically !
What is the conclusion ! All military rulers acted out of self
preservation ! They had no ideology ! Less Yahya all started from the
lower middle class or middle class and ended as business tycoons !
They destroyed constitutions , promiscuously destroyed the political
system by introducing test tube babies in politics who they later
condemned as corrupt and defective ! They destroyed Pakistan’s
constitution transforming the office of prime minister from that of a
potent statesman and respectable political chief executive to that of a
glorified eunuch ! All to preserve one man’s head ! All to ensure
personal power !When they acted out of choice it was for self
preservation , when they acted out of choice it was for self
advancement ! In a nutshell Pakistan’s political history is a story of
soldiers of humble origins motivated by intense ambition and rising to
the highest political office ! Entering the stage with one green suit and
departing the stage leaving a dynasty with phenomenal riches whether
it was Zia or Ayub or todays Crore Commanders ! While admirals guilty
of worst sort of bribery are allowed to go scot free politicians against
whom one single charge even one tenth of Mansoorul Haq is not
proved are rotting in Jails since last five years !
Our memories are short , we have been brought up doctored
through propaganda,through censured press and are made to believe
that our present rulers are honest while their predessors were
dishonest ! Alas we have reached a stage when no one seriously reads
the newspapers any more ! The self proclaimed Messiahs of this nation
administered so many injections of falsehood and distortion to it that
today that the average man has lost all political awareness ! He is well
meaning and motivated but no longer has faith in the state or in those
who lead him ! Inflation and depression has reduced him to a robot !
 From those who day and night praise this regime motivated by a
large number of reasons of self interest one may ask this question !
Has human nature changed ! Is personal interest not the ideology of
todays military government ! If submarines were bought in the past
are not Boeing 777 being purchased today ! If there was a polo ground
constructed in the past what about many hundred acres leased to a
foreign company for a commercial golf course today ! Defaulters who
cannot enter Dubai are heading banks in Pakistan ! If all was divided in
between cousins and inlaws yesterday , is not the same happening
today !
In the worst Machiavellian phrase in todays Pakistan dominated
by the soldiers self propagated image as one who NABs the corrupt
what is it all other than a simple proof of Machiavellis dictum “ Assume
a virtue,Prince,if you have it not ! Honesty and Spartan living are not
virtues in todays Pakistan ! Machiavelli was not wrong when he said “
men are easily corrupted and let themselves become of the opposite
nature,no matter how good they are and well taught". We are
condemned to rigged elections,manipulation of like minded lotahs and
palace intrigues ! We are condemned to long term insecurity simply
because some individuals are not secure with a strong and stable
political system for this country ! This is our tragedy from which we can
only be rescued albeit ironically by unforeseen air crashes or war !