The Two-Nation
Theory
By Pervaiz Alvi
US
In the Opinion columns of Pakistan Link a lively
and interesting debate on the subject of Two-nation
Theory is going on. The questions being asked
are: a) was the concept genuine or bogus; b) whom
the argument was made for; c) is the theory dead
or still alive; d) if dead, then who killed it
and when?
Mr. Karamat Ullah Khan Ghori from Canada (April
29, 2005) and Mr. Mohammad Ashraf Chaudhry of
Pittsburg, CA. (May 27and June 3, 2005) present
two diametrically opposed opinions on this subject.
Mr. Ghori is a retired civil servant now residing
in the safety and comfort of North America. He
has spent his entire career serving various governments
in Pakistan. One must assume that he knows what
he is talking about. In his contemptuous words
the two-nation theory is one of the many ‘holy
cows’ produced and artificially kept alive
in Pakistan by its oligarchs, while in reality
the concept died in 1949 when the country imposed
restrictions on the immigration of Muslims from
India by “shutting its doors on those who
were late in making up their mind about Pakistan”.
In other words Pakistan should have kept its doors
open to Indian Muslims till they felt ‘Pakistani
enough’ to cross the border. After all the
core of the two-nation theory was that ‘all
Indian Muslims’ were one nation, so Pakistan
should have let them in whenever they wanted to
come.
Mr. Ghori also states that the birth of Bangladesh
virtually rang the death bell on the sacred two-nation
theory and “knocked the bottom from under
the barrel of Pakistan, draining all its legitimacy,
in the process, from the heady concoction of the
two-nation theory”. He doubts its validity
and other than holy cow, he also describes it
a bogey, a dead horse, a foil, a fig leaf, a mantra
and a defunct concept; pretty strong words from
a former ambassador of Pakistan.
On the other hand Mr. Chaudhary considers the
two-nation theory as a holy script and ideological
bedrock of Pakistan. He observes that the likes
of Mr. Ghori has joined in with the enemies of
Pakistan to undermine the ideological foundation
of Pakistan. What Indians could not do in 1965
and 1971 in the battlefield, some are now trying
to accomplish by waging an ideological warfare.
He writes, “Ideas form ideologies, and nations
breathe them as they breathe wind. Ideas matter,
ideas influence and ideas make history. The best
way to destroy a people is not to drop lethal
bombs on them; but to rob them of the purpose
they stand for”. “India could not
obliterate Pakistan” by force. Now she is
going “to waft and whisk away the very spirit
that breathes in it, and to unhinge its very central
kingpin around which its whole body spins”.
Mr. Chaudhary also thinks that the 1971 Indian
effort to half Pakistan has in fact put a second
Pakistan on map under a different name. “Before
1971, India had to deal with one; now it is constrained
to tackle two”.
Perhaps answers to the various questions raised
by this debate lie somewhere midway between the
two extreme positions taken by Mr. Ghori and Mr.
Chaudhry. The debate is not yet over. Let us see
what else they and others have to say on this
subject.
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