February 14, 2020
80 Years After
By Mowahid Hussain Shah
80 years after the Pakistan Resolution of March 23, 1940, Lahore, the personality of Quaid-i-Azam Mohammed Ali Jinnah towers.
The Quaid’s motivating impulse was inclusive fairness. So much so that, 100 years ago, the nightingale of India, Sarojini Naidu, wrote a book on him, “Mohammed Ali Jinnah: Ambassador of Muslim-Hindu Unity.” But the Quaid soon ascertained that the replacement of British Raj would not be a democratic order, but the imposition of majoritarian tyranny.
2020 India under Modi reaffirms the Quaid’s stance. India Congress leader Shashi Tharoor, nearly selected as UN Secretary General, said, “Jinnah is winning.”
What propelled the Quaid forward was his being immune to material avarice and personal ambitions. He was practically a dying man during the peak of the Pakistan Movement, but he kept it to himself. It motivated him to redouble his never-say-die strivings.
Even his foes vouched for his incorruptibility. Mahatma Gandhi always treated him with utmost respect and went to the extent of asking Jinnah how he would prefer to be addressed. Also, the Quaid had no dynastic agenda. His sole living daughter, Dina, became estranged from him. No member of the family of the creator of Pakistan benefited from Pakistan.
Ascertain again what the Quaid was not. He was not a billionaire. He was not a military chief seeking greener pastures post-retirement. He was not a man of the cloth or a feudal landowner baron. Nor was he a populist demagogue spewing hate. He believed in a Pakistan where minorities would have a sense of belonging and co-equal expectation of being first-class citizens.
The Quaid had seen first-hand the impact of pervasive and entrenched discriminatory bias in India, which left minorities and the underclass with an abiding sense of being excluded, voiceless, and left out. It is significant that the white band on the Pakistan flag represents the dignity and security of minority rights. Jinnah had a natural belief in fair-play and was cognizant that a widening perception of unfairness can divide and polarize a nation.
The Quaid took the long view and had an overarching sense of pan-Islamic solidarity to the extent that, during the 1937 Lucknow and 1940 Lahore sessions of the Muslim League, resolutions were concurrently passed supporting Palestinian rights.
Today, there are 57 Muslim member states in the OIC with stupendous wealth and resources. Zero impact. The needle has not moved on Kashmir and Palestine – the twin issues remaining unresolved in 70 years. The reason? Poor representation and poor presentation. Would this have occurred had the leadership like that of the Quaid endured?
The so-called “Mideast Peace Plan” unfurled by Trump and Netanyahu speaks volumes about the incompetence of Muslim governing elites. This has been followed by expanding the travel ban to 6 countries with substantial Muslim populations. The indirect impact on Pakistan is unmistakable.
US-Pakistan relations are marked and marred by strong likes and dislikes. The liking is for the rule of law in America, its meritocratic culture, accessibility to public officials, and courtesy and fairness in daily public dealings that the average citizen encounters. The dislike is mostly because of US militaristic interventionist policies abroad and imperial hubris. In effect, US-Pak ties have been reduced to a pattern of transactional quid pro quos.
Central to the damaging of Quaid’s dream has been the monopolistic fostering of plutocracy and kleptocracy under the hijab of democracy.
Concurrent to it has been the unleashing and proliferation of TV channels for which the local culture was unsuited and unprepared. It is a veritable Fifth Column polluting the public mind with hate, bigotry, and discord. It has made media anchors rich and the public know-how impoverished.
The media easily can be better deployed in the nation-building exercise of instilling a sense of civic discipline, including forming queues, eating decorum in weddings and public functions, showing courtesy to the average citizen, punctuality, cleaning up after oneself, hygiene, curbing adulteration and fake medicine, avoiding litter, returning phone calls, honoring pledges, and respecting commoners in police stations, hospitals, and government offices. By not doing so, it consigns the land to be infested by the uncouth and the unscrupulous.
Three key elements drove the Pakistan Movement forward. First, defeatism was not in the DNA of Mohammed Ali Jinnah. Sustaining it was his unwavering self-belief and personal integrity.
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