Awareness or Fairness?
By Mowahid Hussain Shah
Awareness is the common refrain amongst the chattering classes and political pundits. Awareness is being equated with change. But, in Pakistan, the slogan of revolutionary change repeatedly has been proven fraudulent.
Awareness is focused on misconduct and misrule of others. Undoubtedly, there is more furious expression of public grievances being magnified and amplified by non-stop TV coverage. It has led to more aggressive finger-pointing, more of the blame game, and more abuse. It is also creating a bubbling volcano of hate, inflaming class resentment.
Misdirected rage is like an over-speeding train whose brakes have failed. Already, there is no shortage of hate in society.
Change doesn't come through non-stop noise. The bigger issue is moral awakening. It comes through awareness of one’s own faults and compassion for the human dignity value of others. It comes through a collective conscientiousness. It doesn't come through keeping one’s own dwelling clean while throwing litter outside on the road.
A weak community ethic is a recurring hallmark of the sub-continental culture. It has helped entrench a grabby mindset wherein privileges are hoarded at the expense of the rights of others.
The fault is always someone else's. It would be a dangerous over-simplification to continue to persist in the belief that there is rot at the top and cleanliness at the bottom. Much of the cruelty in the lower strata is inflicted by women on women. A lot of brutality is poor-on-poor. These habits and attitudes have been transferred from generation to generation.
Revealingly, the ongoing agitation has now morphed into demand for more provinces. It is a thinly disguised ploy to break up Punjab – the veritable backbone of the nation. It is a scheme that has long been brewed abroad, using the hijab of more efficient administrative units and less dominance of one province. It has successfully enlisted local proxies, and duped gullible and naive politicians. The consequences could be disastrous. When the need of hour is unison, the rallying call is for more division. Pakistan can ill afford this at a moment of polarization and severe national disagreements.
The system caters to the well-connected rather than meeting the concerns of ordinary citizenry. It is programmed to perpetuate dictatorship of the super rich. It is incapable of public betterment.
On display are the same stale male faces. There is an old maxim that when you seek equity, you should come with clean hands. How many are educating the public on punctuality, to keep commitments, to respect the queue, to eat with decorum in public functions, not to usurp, not to litter, to be aware of one’s obligation to treat others with courtesy, to clean up after using toilets, to fight prejudice and to be aware of the population time bomb? All of the above connects with self-respect.
In this turbulence, all factions have been tarnished – the government along with its foes. The tussle is highly personalized. If it continues to linger on, it will only mean replacing one set of faces with another set of faces. Cosmetic change is no change. The challenge is to find a remedy. Would awareness lead to fairness?
