Losing count of the many Muslim Leagues

A historian who tries to compile an account of the many Muslim Leagues that surfaced in Pakistan after Partition would face a daunting task. Because just when he thinks he has covered the field and has gotten the full count, he will exhume and uncork another Muslim League, which disappeared almost as soon as it was formed and was never heard of again. Actually all the PMLs are offshoots of the Pakistan Muslim League which was founded as an original party by Nawab Liaquat Ali Khan in 1949 to consolidate the political position of the movement. But none of the factions that followed had any ideological connections with the original Muslim League. Some individuals like Arbab Ghulam Rahim and the late Pir Pagara probably chose the suffix either because they felt they had a patriotic duty to hang on to the moniker given by the founding fathers, and by doing so were achieving some kind of moral turpitude, or because they decided to hitch on to the Muslim League convoy as it would do no harm. And that’s where the chronicler had to use bifocals. Curiously enough, it was under military dictatorships that one or the other brand of the League flourished.



The first significant event in the Muslim League saga took place during the reign of General Mohammed Ayub Khan. Once the dictator decided he wanted to start wearing suits, the Pakistan Muslim League was split in two. A Convention Muslim League was formed in support of the military regime and consisted of a bunch of right wing reactionaries. Naturally, a Council Muslim League had to pop up in opposition as a sort of antithesis. It consisted of a clutch of five heavyweights who were also right wing reactionaries. But it was all very civilised and friendly. The country was still secular. Aid started to pour in. Twenty-two families started an industrial revolution. Pakistan was ahead of South Korea in GDP. A dollar cost Rs4 and a pound six. But after 11 years, Ayub had to call it a day.

The second significant event was the creation of the New Muslim League during the reign of General Ziaul Haq, Pakistan’s most retrogressive and intolerant dictator. Paradoxically, Pakistan’s highest industrial growth rate took place under Zia. The dictator appointed Mohammed Khan Junejo as prime minister who turned out to be the best prime minister this country had ever seen. But Junejo shot himself in the foot when he publicly announced that he wanted an inquiry conducted into the Ojhri Camp disaster. Zia’s Afghanistan adventure, with the connivance of the CIA, laid the foundation stone for the rise of obdurate militancy which no successor has been able to tackle successfully. On Junejo’s dismissal, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s star was in the ascendancy.

The third significant event was the rise to prominence of General Parvez Musharraf and the Pakistan Muslim League (Q), of the Chaudhry Brothers. The Q, of course, stands for Quaid-e-Azam, though any connection with the founder is pure fiction. For the first two years, Musharraf did remarkably well. A dollar in his time cost Rs60. But then he also got the urge to wear suits and rule as a civilian dictator, and in the process made two cardinal mistakes: taking on the chief justice on the insistence of the prime minister and introducing the NRO on the instigation of the Americans. It was a heady cocktail which brought about his ignoble exit and ushered in an era where both the PPP and the Muslim League (N) have had cracks at the national cherry. The dollar has crossed Rs105 and is likely to touch Rs130 by 2020. When that happens, will any of the Leagues survive?

Published in The Express Tribune, September 6^th, 2015.

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