Economy matters: ‘Culture, not religion, holds back progress’

Burki says the country is going through the worst recession in its history.

LAHORE:

World Bank former vice president Shahid Javed Burki and Flinders University President Emeritus Riaz Hassan gave a talk on Friday on Pakistan’s Economic Prospects and its Islamic Identity at the Forman Christian College (FCC) University.

The talk was organised by the History Department of the FCC.

Burki, who has also served as a caretaker finance minister, said there was a dearth of work on economic history of Pakistan.

He said people were largely unaware of the economic trajectory of the country.

He said the economic growth rate had stagnated at less than 3 per cent. The country, he said, was going through the worst recession in its history.



He said the need to innovate and develop should be the main driver of growth.

“How can people grow if we leave to God doing everything for us?” Burki asked.

Hassan spoke on the relationship between the Muslim identity and practices.

He said a majority of people in the country often behaved in an ‘Islamic’ way because they were born Muslims. He said a large number of Muslims, when asked why they practised the religion, responded that they had been born into it.

Hassan said their cultural influences had held back the development of the Muslim world more than any religious precepts.

He said the role of women in economic development needed to be highlighted in Islamic history. He said little work had been done in this regard.



He said patriarchal control had thwarted the development of a liberal outlook towards women in a society more than any religious doctrines.

Hassan said while Hazrat Khadija, wife of the Holy Prophet (peace be upon him) was the first entrepreneur in Islamic history, there were no good biographical accounts of her life.

He said it was tragic that her success and independence had gone largely unrecorded.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 14^th, 2013.