Tribute to the saint of Sann

GM Syed believed in the separation of religion and state, rekindled flame of political courage and political defiance.

I am grateful to Naseer Memon for exhuming and disinterring the soul of Syed Ghulam Murtaza Shah in his article in The Express Tribune published on January 18. Except for a few nooks and crannies in Karachi, Hyderabad, Jamshoro and Sann, GM Syed, as he was popularly known, has been more or less forgotten in this neck of the woods. If his name does pop up, it would be more as a passing reference than an article in a newspaper. To say that he was a controversial figure is a gross understatement. Though he was one of Sindh’s greatest sons, who had among his admirers the leader of the MQM, I am intrigued that while he has been misunderstood, vilified, called a fifth columnist and all sorts of unflattering things, not one of his detractors has been able to hit on any particular aspect of either his life or his philosophy that has induced the rebuke. At the same time, while he is something of a semi-deity to his followers, most of them are not sure just what it is about the man that has so captivated them. Most of them are not aware of the role he played in the freedom movement and very few have got a grip on his thoughts. Some still remember his left-wing leanings, his amazing scholarship and his love for the poor.

Some of my Sindhi friends have asked me why I so admired the man when he never really left anything positive behind except his concept of Sindhu Desh in which Sindhis and Mohajirs would live in peace. And yet, it is strange that when I spoke about the man and the myth at Hyder Manzil in Karachi, in the presence of my very good friend Dr Hamida Khuhro, and GM’s grandson, Jalal Mahmood Shah, and subsequently at the PACC in Hyderabad, there were no questions; just a stony silence of acquiescence, a string of bowed heads acknowledging what I had to say. I pointed out that one of the reasons why he had been so heavily criticised was the fact that he had parted from the Muslim League because of their unquestionable support of the landlords. But … he had earlier also chucked the Indian National Congress because of its support of Hindu moneylenders and its lack of concern for farmers.

Syed was at first, critical of another important Sindhi leader, Allah Bux Soomro, of the Sindh United Party and subsequently admired him. In The Case for Sindh published in 1995, there is Soomro’s famous comment, which considerably irked the Muslim League: “Our difficulties will begin after Pakistan comes into being … At present the Hindu trader’s and moneylender’s plunder is worrying you, but later, you will have to face the Punjabi bureaucracy and soldiery and the mind of the UP … You live in a dream world about the 1940 Resolution … In practical politics, there is little room for resolutions … Pakistan will pose a threat to Sindh’s independence, Indian unity and the peace and progress of other Indian nations.”

But when my Sindhi friends persisted in wanting to know why a cynic like myself was such a great admirer of a man who was incarcerated for 30 years for his political views, I told them it was because he believed in the separation of religion and state, because he had rekindled the flame of political courage and political defiance. Because he had revived the Sindhi spirit and Sindhi traditions of patriotism and humanism preached by mystics like Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai and Sachal Sarmast. And above all, because he was a great human being.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 20^th, 2013.