A new dawn of hope and triumph

“Surely Allah does not change what is in a people until they change what is in themselves” (13:11).

This is a powerful statement from the Holy Quran which if understood properly by our nation can change its destiny with the will of the Almighty. The verse implies that we as a people have the agency and freedom to choose our future, if we wish to do so. We are not destined to perpetual economic and political slavery if we choose not to go on this path. We have no establishment or a political party which will rescue us from the pit which we have dug for our self. It is we as a people who are sovereign in making our decisions of our future. The powerful verse is a statement of hope and triumph which is conditional. What is that stipulation and how can we implement it?

We as a nation have gone through this journey from hope to despair since our inception. As bleak as conditions are today, they were far worse in the age before own freedom. We had ‘religious’ fanatics on one side which implored the people to forego English and secular sciences so we can go back to our past. We also had enlightened leaders like Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, Allama Iqbal and Mohammad Ali Jinnah who implored us to compete with the modern world by education, hard work and moral ethics. We as a nation chose the path of enlightenment and rallied behind the cause of independence and self-respect. It was neither the British nor our political elite which gave us our freedom. It was we, the people, who chose to vote and struggle for own independence. That change of mindset and action was the condition before the approaching triumph of a new country after a century of servitude.

Today, we have forgotten our past lessons of the struggle for political and economic independence. We rely on modern crutches of IMF and World Bank, loans from friendly countries, and their subsequent dictation which is slowly eroding our freedoms like termites hollowing out the foundation of a structure. We do not need an army to conquer us, anymore. We already have an economy which cannot sustain itself without loans. Interest payments are increasingly taking the lion’s share of our budget. What changed in the mindset of a nation which generations ago was a beacon of hope and self-respect?

In my opinion, the collective mindset of the people changed over time. We started to think that freedom can be sustained without any struggle. We became the nation of shortcuts and our political and military elite is the reflection of this mindset. We became obsessed with material progress without the foundations of a moral and religious code. Our elite started to binge on loans to give us shiny infrastructure because we never chose to ask that from where this ‘free’ money is coming from. Are interest based loans not prohibited in our religion? Isn’t it ironic that a nation created in the name of Islam is now hooked like a drug addict to interest payments? When we make our religion a joke and an afterthought, we ourselves have become a laughing stock in the community of nations.

We will have to go back to our religion to change our destiny from despair to triumph. It means not just to memorise but to comprehend the book of the Almighty. It means asking hard questions to ourselves. How much are we truly implementing the religion in our personal and public life? Are we giving our children taaleem and tarbiyat? Publicly, are we demanding of our rulers not to take any more interest based loans in our name? Are we changing our national character from shortcuts to discipline and hard work? I will conclude with the famous saying of Caliph Umar (RA): “Verily, we were a disgraceful people and Allah honoured us with Islam. If we seek honour from anything besides that with which Allah honoured us, Allah will disgrace us.”

Published in The Express Tribune, February 16^th, 2023.

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