Retracing our historical roots

The debate about the ideological orientation of Pakistan is as old as the country itself. The debate itself has not reached any definite conclusion or consensus across various sections of Pakistan’s society and each side follows its own specific narrative. Based on the historic evidence, it is established beyond any doubt that Mohammad Ali Jinnah was wholly secular both in terms of his political ideology and everyday conduct of life. His frequent references to religion both in his speeches and public statements do not suggest anywhere that he wanted Pakistan to be a theocratic state in any sense. His August 11, 1947 speech to the members of the Constituent Assembly laid bare in clear terms that he envisioned Pakistan to be a modern, secular and nation state rather than a religious theocratic state. One needs not go all the way in the past and narrate all the subsequent efforts by the successive military and civilian governments to make religion the central part of the ideological basis of the creation of Pakistan. We have all seen what that thinking on the part of ruling class in Pakistan has done during our last 75 years of existence as a sovereign national state.

Way back, an effort had been made by Barrister Aitzaz Ahsan in the form of a book, Indus Saga and the Making of Pakistan, to trace the ancient origins of Pakistan. He had established in the light of historical facts that the land we call Pakistan now actually is the modern day version of the old Indus Civilization which grew along the banks of river Indus and is among the oldest human civilizations. The current geographical setting of what we call Pakistan covers all that area and its different regional cultures are the different variations of the same common Indus Civilization which bloomed collectively thousands of years back. It saddens one to see that we do not pay any heed to our deep history and have lost the sight of a common bond which connects all the cultures and different regional groups since the ancient times.

This is not an easy debate in itself and any deviation from the traditional narrative propagated since the creation of country is bound to attract a lot of criticism. Islamic ideology of Pakistan, if it ever existed at all, died the day Bangladesh was born out of Pakistan. The common religious ideology shared and followed by the people could not keep the country united and we fought and committed horrific atrocities against each other as the Bengali people could not withstand the attack on their language and culture and exploitation of their economic resources in the name of common religious identity by the narrow minded West Pakistan-based politicians and military-led establishment.

Whatever has been sold or bought in terms of Pakistan ideology, the reality staring us in the face tells that the debate is far from settled. Basing the identity of the nation on religious grounds goes against all the norms of modern-day concept of a nation. The continuous efforts on the part of the establishment powers to portray Pakistan as an Islamic state have not yielded desired results, rather creating its own set of problems in the form of sectarian strife in the country which has claimed thousands of innocent lives over past decades.

Our leaders are fond of reminding us through their speeches and statements of the need to learn from the past and try not to repeat the mistakes. If anything is true in this country, it is that we don’t learn from history or have even the vaguest idea of historical national sense itself. If there is one thing which defines us best as a nation, it is that we lack cohesive sense of nationalism or national pride. The various regional and ethnic populations in the country have each got their own set of grievances — like unfair resources allocation, discriminatory development spending, cultural hegemony, etc — against the Federation and the country’s largest province i.e. Punjab. Although there are decision-making mechanisms in place at both provincial and federal levels, the smaller provinces have always complained about getting neglected in the name of so-called national unity. Such a situation can never promote national cohesion and unity, instead leading lead to distrust among the federating units.

There is always a time to revisit our respective ideas and explore other possibilities if what we are doing is not yielding the desired results. In my humble opinion, there is a dire need to rethink and redefine our national ideological basis. Pakistan in its current form is both geographically and culturally a homogenous country with well-defined natural boundaries on all sides of our national territory. While it is good to have a common religion, the religion itself can never form the basis of national identity if the regional cultural identities born of thousands of years of cultural evolution of the people constituting Pakistan are not fully acknowledged and made subservient to the religious identity.

Pakistan is a land of rich cultural diversity which needs to be acknowledged and celebrated. We may not be the direct descendants from the Indus Civilization — the great civilization existing in the times when most of the world was living a pre-civilized life. Thinking about it and knowing the reality of being born in this very land thousands of years back fills one with a sense of pride and a common spiritual connection stretching back to tens of thousands of years ago. No one can ever deny the important role the Islamic Civilization has played in the progress of human race. However, times have changed and we have to come up with something more organic and solid than our mere religious identity imposed from outside. We need not trace back our history to Arab conquests of this region and their aftermath. We have a better, richer, more interesting, awe inspiring and historical narrative to make sense of our common national identity rooted in the culture and traditions of the land we all belong to, stretching from the valleys and mountains of Himalayas to the shores of Arabian Sea.

Through this piece of writing, I hope to rekindle the debate about the idea of ideological basis of Pakistan and hope that more learned and academically qualified people will contribute to the debate to enrich our understanding.