Page 8 - Pakistan Link - August 21, 2020

P8 – PAKISTAN LINK – AUGUST 21, 2020
n By Karamatullah K. Ghori
W Toronto, Canada
hat could be a more appropriate
and opportune time than the In-
dependence Day of Pakistan to get
your perspective right on its history and gen-
esis?
The marked exuberance
and festivity of this Indepen-
dence Day of Pakistan couldn’t
be lost on anyone keeping a
regular watch on the Pakistani
scene. It was just unprecedent-
ed in its warmth and enthusi-
astic participation of the people, both at home
and abroad.
The news media has, no doubt, been a huge
catalyst in the triggering of mass awareness
about the importance of the day. On their part,
the people, knowing that a news-hungry media
will lap up whatever show of festivity is staged
by them, haven’t disappointed. They mustered
the kind of resources rarely seen before to usher
in a carnival-like spectacle to underline the sig-
nificance of the day in their hearts. It was, in a
convoluted sense, a team work of the media and
the people of Pakistan that catapulted the event
to unprecedented heights of celebration.
But while none could, now, have any reason
to doubt how positively cued the people of Paki-
stan—including the world-wide Pakistani dias-
pora—are on the importance of the most notable
date on their national calendar, it wouldn’t be ir-
relevant to pose the question: are they getting the
right perspective on Pakistan and its history?
Am I being cynical in asking this question?
Has it any reality with the times, or have it just
plucked it out of the blue to come up with a rhe-
torical argument?
Not at all; I stand on solid ground.
What has forced me to ask a ticklish ques-
tion—which may look odd to many, especially
those accustomed to believing whatever is seen
by their eyes as the only and whole truth?
Forcing me to wade into murky waters is
the feedback I got from the social media on the
history and genesis of Pakistan, especially the
Freedom Movement of the Muslims of India that
ultimately spawned from its womb the sovereign
State of Pakistan on August 14, 1947.
Those closely—or, in this case, not even so-
closely—following the rise of Pakistan’s social
media, in tandem with the public news media,
would agree that the growth of social media is
like mushrooms proliferating in the salubrious
clime of the desert.
The cyber age has empowered the individu-
al as never before. Gone are the days when even
those with a flourishing pen found it hard to tap
into the medium of news or information to get
their message across.
No more that sense of helplessness—none
at all. Anyone with a mouse and curser, and
handy with a tablet, lap-top or a smart phone,
is now his own master and free to get on to the
scene like a party gate-crasher. No barriers, no
censors, no one, absolutely no one, in a position
to prevent an internet-savvy person from put-
ting his message across the whole blue world of
the cyber age.
But—and it’s a huge but—this unbridled
freedom to say what one wants to say is also a
dangerous thing. It’s dangerous because in the
wrong hands—like any other invention of man-
kind—it can be used to corrupt minds and viti-
ate their whole thought process.
There’s no argument that cyber age’s con-
nectivity is being abused with impunity by those
whose message is hate, not love; brain-washing,
not the flowering of healthy debate or cultivation
of novel ideas.
According to surveys, there are at least 300
websites freely propagating their lethal messages
of hate and terrorism in the name of their be-
nighted take on religion. Isn’t that a thing much
worse than trafficking in drugs?
Likewise, there are cyber junkies and cyber
criminals pouring out their bile against Islam.
Suffering from the now-commonly-prevalent
Islamophobia of the West, these hate-mongers
are targeting the younger generation of global
Muslims because it’s easier to brain-wash a
young, callow an uninitiated mind than an old
and jaded one.
The tool most commonly wielded by Is-
OPINION
Getting the Right Perspective on Pakistan campaign has also been on against the rulers
and denizens of the Muslim-majority Princely
states of British India, which were technically
free to decide their own future under the law
that had subjected them to the British Raj. But,
as known to all, the rulers of those states whose
political leanings were a matter of doubt had
their arm twisted by Nehru and Mountbatten to
bend in favor of Hindu India. Character-assassi-
nation of those working for these princely states
has been fodder to the grisly cannons of these
detractors of Muslim Pakistan.
It was serendipity that led to me a won-
derful book, Evocative Epistles, which, in its
historical contents, forcefully nails this persis-
tent canard of perceived perfidy committed by
the princely states. The book is based on letters
exchanged between Khan Sahib Mahmood Ah-
mad Faruqui and some ex-British civil servants
in UK who, during their illustrious careers, had
served in various distinguished capacities in the
administration of the Raj.
MA Faruqui had served on commission in
the Royal Indian Navy but made his mark as a
civil servant. He was Development Minister in
the princely State of Tonk on the eve of the 1947
partition, whence he moved to Pakistan and
served in the Foreign Office with dedication.
Evocative Epistles is a compendium of let-
ters exchanged between MA Faruqui and mainly
three retired British civil servants in India—Sir
Arthur Lothian, who had served as Resident of
the Raj in Hyderabad State, the largest of India’s
Princely States but later acquired great fame as
author of The Kingdoms of Yesterday; Sir Dun-
can Mackenzie, who was Resident in Jodhpur,
among other prominent assignments; and Sir
Conrad Corfield.
Corfield had the distinction of being Politi-
cal Advisor to Mountbatten but fell out with him
with regard to the uncouth last Viceroy’s openly
lamophobes is to conjure up fantasies and tales Back at the core of this ‘intellectual’ offen- pro-Congress shenanigans that crudely twisted
with no relevance to history of Islam. The object sive against the citadel of Pakistani belief in their the arms of many a prince to fall in line behind
is to sow doubts in the minds of their targets. It’s history is to sow doubts in their mind about the Nehru. The most blatant abuse of the Viceroy’s
clever, it’s disingenuous. Create doubts about the very genesis of Pakistan. exalted position was witnessed, of course, in
foundations of a building, or its architect, and it Imagine, you make a person diffident or Kashmir—the poisonous fallout of which we are
becomes easier to induce the target to agree to doubtful about his date of birth and a train of still saddled with.
raze the whole structure. That’s why there has questions sets off in his mind about a lot of other MA Faruqui distinguished himself in the
been a well-oiled and well-funded campaign in things related to his life. It opens up myriad av- letters he wrote his former English superiors
the West, since 9/11 in particular, to target the enues for his critics and detractors to knock the and colleagues—by then comfortably nestled in
Holy Prophet of Islam (PBUH) and caricature bottom out of his faith in life. their retirement groves in England—as a forth-
him in colors that are, to say the least, disparag- The persona and character of Jinnah has right advocate of Pakistan’s position in regard
ing. been in the sights of these rogues for some time. to the tangled issues of the partition, especially
Those whose phobia is to tarnish Pakistan Jinnah not walking into Mountbatten’s trap on the palpably unjust and dishonest deal given to
and its founder, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, seem to Pakistan.
have styled their own, vicious and snide, anti- Faruqui had a powerful pen, no doubt. His
Pakistan campaign exactly on the paradigm of c r y s t a l -clear and lucid English prose is de-
Islamophobia. Its protagonists are going about lightfullyevocative of the mastery civil ser-
their work with single-minded devotion to paint vants in India had acquired, through their brains
Jinnah as a misguided soul with no sense of his- and dint of labor, in the alien ruler’s language.
tory—exactly on the model of Jinnah, the sub- But what should impress any student of
continental ‘villain’ as portrayed in the Indian Pakistan’s history, especially its formative phase
and some of the British narratives on the Parti- of the Freedom Movement, is the boldness of Fa-
tion of 1947. ruqui’s conviction that Pakistan was dealt a very
The anti-Pakistan and anti-Jinnah cam- rough deal in the garb of the Boundary Award
paign is also subtle, fine-tuned to make it hard of Cyril Radcliff. He doesn’t mince words or
for the novice to see through the Satanic spirit pull any punches in hammering the disgusting
of the game. cloak-and-dagger tactics deployed by Mountbat-
I was horrified, when I came across a long- ten and some English civil servants to tailor the
winded petty intellectual, claiming to have award in favor of India.
boned into the freedom movement that spawned What the deadly-duo of Nehru and Mount-
Pakistan, and stridently ridiculing the Pakistanis batten—who were in an unholy axis and, more
for celebrating their Independence Day on Au- than that, in an immoral partnership—pulled off
gust 14. To him the real date was August 15 of with success at Pakistan’s expense is history too
Pakistan’s independence. well known to need any repetition here. But ku-
The logic for August 15 being the real date dos to Faruqui that he boldly pointed out to his
of independence is that the so-called Instrument British friends the abiding shame Mountbatten,
of Transfer of Power, from the British Govt. to in his lust, had brought to the traditional claim
the new Dominions of India and Pakistan, be- of British fairness.
came effective from mid-night between August Credit is due also to Faruqui’s inter-
14 and 15. A clever logic, its proponents might locutors that they conceded his masterly expose
think and give themselves a pat on their back be- the issue of GG hurts these mealy-mouthed par- of Mountbatten & Co.’s unholy shenanigans,
cause it can’t be refuted on technicalities. tisans of the Raj a lot. Instead of complimenting though doing so with characteristic English trait
But Mohammad Ali Jinnah was sworn in Jinnah for standing up to Mountbatten’s shenan- of understatement.
as Governor-General of Pakistan on August 14, igans, they have been slinging mud on him for Books like Evocative Epistles should be
in the presence of Lord Mountabtten, who had being ‘obstinate’ and ‘unbending.’ read with scholarly interest by those keen to re-
aspired to head both the new dominions but was Jinnah wasn’t obstinate; he was resolute and fresh their knowledge, or memories, of the Paki-
brow-beaten in his clever and nefarious game firm because he had the vision to see through the stan Movement and the birth of Pakistan as a
by Jinnah. So why shouldn’t Pakistanis celebrate British game. What a mockery of sovereignty of sovereign state. If nothing else, they are useful in
August 14 as their Day of Independence? Didn’t the new state it would have made if the last stan- seeing through the mischief of those whose mis-
they say good-bye to the oppressive British yoke, dard-bearer of the heinous and exploitative Raj sion—inspired by their pay-masters—is to heap
as personified by that mischievous Mountbatten, were its first head. Jinnah was far too astute and scorn on Jinnah’s sterling character and make
on that day, August 14? Why should anyone dis- upright to be led down the garden path by the light of the historic struggle of Muslims of India
pute or ridicule their right to mark the anniver- likes of an Indian National Congress-aficionado for their own independent state. - K_K_ghori@
sary of their country on the day they got their Mountbatten. hotmail.com (The writer is a former ambassa-
Quaid proclaimed as their leader and ruler? A similarly snide and vicious vilification dor and career diplomat)
www.PakistanLink.com