Shame on Us
By Shireen M. Mazari
Amid all the
economic good cheer and apparent wealth which one
sees increasingly in the urban areas of the country,
there is also something amiss. For me the disconnect
became clear when I heard that one of our last surviving
classical musical greats was about to leave for
California -- having been offered a professorship
in musicology. So Ustad Farid Nizami will move in
the hope of being better able to provide for his
family, and students at Berkeley will be beneficiaries
of his wealth of classical music knowledge. Now
where in our midst of wealth and allocations for
education did we think of providing fertile ground
for our classical musical heritage?
While belatedly musicology is being introduced in
our universities and colleges, our denial of this
aspect of our culture for decades has had its negative
impact. Where are the concerts and performances
by these classical greats -- not just Ustad Nizami
but also Ustad Raees Ahmed? They have been reduced
to performing background music at official banquets
where, barring President Musharraf, no one even
bothers acknowledging their music. In fact, the
applause, such as it is, between courses, only occurs
because the President begins it! But given the stature
of these musicians is it not demeaning to have them
as background performers only while the after-dinner
events primarily focus on featuring our minimalist
fashion designs? It is to our everlasting shame
that musical greats like Pathaney Khan died in abject
poverty.
There are individuals and some organizations that
still encourage classical and other indigenous music,
including the Peerzadas and their annual arts festivals,
the Pakistan Music Conference and TIMS, to name
a few, but by and large our public has lost its
capability of appreciating classical music. Why
even ghazals are seen as heavy going by audiences
at musical shows, so we are fast becoming a nation
that is losing its soul. For it is the living arts
with their historic traditions, and the humanities,
that are the soul of a nation.
But we are in a mode of self-destruct soul-wise.
Look at the HEC's doings -- a complete neglect of
social sciences and humanities as well as a negation
of all things indigenous! So the HEC sees it quite
fitting to invest in research for a modern rickshaw
but no one has come across the HEC funding music
and arts scholarships. And while foreign scholars
are being transported here ad nauseum, talented
domestic scholars, especially in the social sciences
are being ignored! It is as if just developing a
good scientific base with no parallel development
of the humanities will ensure a rich and developed
nation. Shame on us! While we do need technocrats
and scientists, we also need our historians, our
poets, our musicians, our artists and so on.
Let us not blame the HEC only. Take a look at our
schools -- both in the public and private sectors.
How many of them take their children to art galleries
or teach them some form of music? Yet that is where
it all begins. One does not have to cite the example
of the West. In Brazil, I saw large groups of elementary
school children spending the afternoon at the Museum
for Contemporary Brazilian Art. They were allowed
to roam around and absorb it all without long dull
lectures. But then where do we have art galleries
where our children can go? The PNCA has a sort of
gallery, but it comprises two stuffy and dark rooms.
While we have been building conference centers and
high rises of all varieties, could we not build
at least one proper art gallery for this nation
with a rich cultural tradition that is being wiped
out. The threat from our aggressive neighbor to
the east may have been made redundant by our nuclearisation
(though we should never let down our vigilance even
on this count), but the more longstanding threat
is from our abdication of our cultural space to
India.
But these days we are on a building spree -- it
is as if we have decided that our development as
a nation is dependent on the concretization of the
urban areas. Look at the massacre of our capital
which had its unique character embodied in its natural
beauty. Instead of providing good public transport
and controlling the entry of new cars on the roads,
the CDA (Capital Destruction Authority) has chosen
to build roads and more roads -- all of which will
be inadequate again in a decade or so! As if that
was not bad enough, we are building one housing
scheme after another and it is no wonder that one
such scheme is claiming that it is the new "identity
of Pakistan". And no one is affronted by this
clear insult to our rich cultural and historical
heritage. Shame on us.
What is left of our living cultural heritage is
fast becoming a commodity for the rich elite with
their expensive events organized in exclusive venues.
The public has been deprived of experiencing its
cultural heritage for so long, it is now totally
addicted to the alternative it had within its grasp
-- cheap Indian films and songs. But then we have
dealt a bad deal to our nation at large for decades
now. Every so often we rewrite our history and re-devise
our curricula. In the process we swing from one
extreme to the other – there seems to be no
middle path. In the Zia dictatorship, we obliterated
the Quaid's message of equality for all citizens
and his call for tolerance and harmony.
Now we are set to rewrite our history books again.
But instead of accepting the hatred that was a reality
between Muslims and Hindus and the evils of the
caste system, we want to deny all this and yet show
the necessity of partition! If the intolerance and
hatred that existed between Muslims and Hindus was
not a reality what were the communal riots all about;
what was the razing of Babri Masjid all about and
what was the massacre of Muslims in Gujarat all
about? Yes, we must correct all the earlier distortions,
but it is no use replacing one distortion with another.
We cannot replace religious bigotry and extremism
with secular bigotry and extremism. After over fifty
years of existence as a nation, let us arrive at
a rational account of our history which also must
begin with the Indus civilization.
And while we are rewriting our English language
curricula, let us acknowledge some of our leading
English language poets, especially Taufiq Rafat,
who was the first poet of the subcontinent to use
indigenous imagery and metaphors. Receiving accolades
from abroad, Rafat was never given the national
recognition he deserved in his lifetime.
Thanks to the machinations of the bureaucracy that
continues to control our cultural space, the Australian
government's request to have his play "Foothold"
performed at the opening of the drama theatre in
the Sydney Opera House was sabotaged with Rafat
being denied an NOC and another play, written for
the radio, being offered -- an offer which was obviously
refused. Perhaps at the end of the day it is the
bureaucracy that will eventually kill our soul and
all that is so precious from our past and in our
present.
(The writer is director general of the Institute
of Strategic Studies in Islamabad. Courtesy The
News)
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