A Tale of Two Pakistanis

Wasif Ali Wasif once compared the Pakistani green passport to a default membership into a chain of spiritual blessings, Tareeqat, led by the Peer-e-tareeqat, Qaid-e-Azam. The institution of Tareeqat in Sufi tradition usually focused on an individual’s personal growth and development, often at the expense of his constructive participation in social and national affairs. In this context, this was a bold statement by Wasif Ali, perhaps tenable only by his personal authority on the subject, which re-established, and even sanctified, the superiority of serving one’s country over any other form of religious service. And beyond that, for a few others, it also unmistakably alludes to the fact that Wasif Sahib himself considered Pakistan as a central focal point in the confluence of our Islamic identity and the contemporary world order.

It needs no context then to re-iterate that Pakistan is all that we have, and we must stand for it, united, along with all our brothers who hold this blessed green passport. I write in this spirit then, to dispel some of the misgivings that some of us have against each other, and allow ourselves to rise above these differences and realize that we have much more I common to stand internally disunited.
Specifically, this is my version of an attempt to “defend reason” in a useless war of words that seems to have erupted between Nadeem Farooq Paracha and Zaid Hamid. We respect the view point of all those people who hold different opinions than us, but any attempt by one opinion holder to belittle the other must not only be avoided, but also resisted and refuted. Let us go through this exercise then, “with malice towards none”, with as much objectivity as we can muster.
Nadeem Sahib starts by sharing some emails that he received from enthusiastic supporters of Zaid Hamid, indicating disappointment over Zaid sahib being portrayed as a “conspiracy theorist”.

This is similar to someone claiming that any irresponsible statement made by any Muslim in the streets of Bombay somehow owes its responsibility back to Muhammad Ali Jinnah. What the world does not learn from that sample is the scores of emails we receive every day from people all around the world, some abandoning their plans to leave the country, some returning home who are already abroad, all because Zaid Hamid induced them to practically change the course of their lives and return to Pakistan as its citizens willing to take up the challenge of national reconstruction. What the world also does not learn from that sample is the scores of people who email us every day thanking us for having induced them to undertake in-depth study of history and religion once again, or to teach their children Urdu poetry and Iqbaliyaat, who had abandoned it.

If there is ever a question of the kind of people that Zaid Hamid is galvanizing towards him, one only has to look at the workers of our political parties – participants of the fabled democratic process that we will come to later – and compare them together to see which group of youngsters truly has the potential to uphold our intellectual and cultural identity.

The next most common charge raised against Zaid Hamid is his bold and uncompromising stand on the two nation theory. Many arguments and counter arguments can be given on this subject, all emotionally charged with conflicting feelings of our desire for peace and a common South Asian ethos on the one hand, and our fierce, unflinching commitment to our sovereignty on the other. But let me just summarize it all in one simple statement. I guarantee that the day our dear track two diplomats and cultural ambassadors will successfully convince the secret services of India to discontinue supporting the BLA, we will take all of our BrassTacks programs offline from YouTube. You have our word!

Now the next point is very important, and deserves careful attention. No journalist or historian in the world can claim that he has exhaustively dealt with and exposed every injustice that ever took place! BrassTacks organization has a particular focus, and a limited number of resources. Claiming that our not highlighting the plight of Muslims in some Chinese province and tying it into some “grand strategy” of purposefully not doing so, is against stretching one’s imagination too much. As for giving credits for external and western contributions in our research, one only has to look at the Weekly Security Reports published by BrassTacks for the past twelve years: Anytime a news source is quoted, there is also a reference in accordance with the best standards of Academic and Journalistic honesty.

BrassTacks, like any other institution on this planet, is not an island: We consult and take advantage of research published all around the world, as well as make our own contributions and research available to them. Our security reports, and more recently, our online publications and TV programs, contain a large amount of original pieces, the most strikingly outstanding examples coming to mind being the refutation of the Mumbai Attacks dossier, and the pieces on the 11th Century Scholar, Naimutullah Shah.

One point to which I must agree with Nadeem, though, is that many of our problems have their root cause not in any external actor alone, but also inwards in our own society. This is something that I have never seen Zaid Hamid deny either. There is absolutely no doubt that we have a long and arduous journey ahead of us where we need to invest in our selves, our education, our institutions and our infrastructure.

BrassTacks has always encouraged all those of our fans who had wanted to undertake social and civic initiatives, and at one time, we even had a forum dedicated to supporting those on our website, but which could not be maintained owing to lack of resources. However, the slight difference here lies in one simple point, for which we will let our readers be the judges: Zaid Hamid holds that we would be better equipped to take care of our social and internal problems ourselves, once we are left alone by the external actors interfering in all aspects of our national lives, from trying to tell us what the true definition of Jihad in Islam is, to graciously helping us choose who our leaders for us! The second point of course, is a matter of priorities, and specialization. An infantry soldier’s job is not to treat wounded patients, and nor is it the job of the medical corps to advance towards the enemy lines! BrassTacks is playing its role in our national defense and reconstruction, and the rest of the nation should play its.

Lastly, I must acknowledge that some points mentioned in the article so unbecoming of Nadeem’s regular style of authorship, that I doubt if he really wanted to include those, or they just slipped by. Ali Azmat is famous for always calling Zaid Hamid as “Hakeem” because it’s a well known fact that Zaid Hamid is not a Ph.D. doctor, and neither has he ever attempted to pass himself as such. Picking on such a small typographical mistake by the channel authorities really makes one wonder if there weren’t any more substantial arguments to be made against the man who is quickly becoming the heart beat of this nation.

But before we leave, I must address the piece of about democracy too. This is a favorite among Zaid’s critics. Let me start by quoting a beautiful verse from the Quran. It begins something like, And when God said to the angels that verily, I am about to place a vicegerent on earth. The Quran goes on to tell us that when the angels raised their doubts on Adam being eligible to become the vicegerent, God did something special. What was that? Did he say that you must prostrate “because I said so”? Or did he resort to force or violence in making them comply? He could. After all, if God himself is not the all powerful dictator, who is? And yet, he “won them over”.

He demonstrated to them how Adam was indeed superior, and then gained a near unanimous consensus on the angels admitting that they indeed were wrong. Only then did the famous prostration to Adam take place. This, consensus building, this taking everyone along by force of reason is the true spirit of democracy. Democracy is not the narrow notion of electing a set of rulers through the multi-party parliamentary system! Democracy is ruling the hearts of people, it winning their obedience and favor. This is where Zaid Hamid is perhaps the biggest democrat that we have had in years. Without throwing around any black money to influence public opinion or secure an assembly seat, without belonging to any elite family that people look up to, without being a feudal or a Gaddi-Nasheen, this one man, rising from the grassroots, from “among us”, has molded the public opinion of this nation that they have started listening to him. Have started believing in him! Why else, do all the TV channels invite him to their programs? For the simple reason that people tune in to him: he makes their channels sell.

Why then, do the people objecting to Zaid Sahib’s anti-democracy stance not follow the dictates of their own democratic instincts and accept the majority vote that people have already cast in his favor? To claim that they are being led to follow him not by any intrinsic strength of his ideas, but merely by the strength of his personality, is really to me an effrontery on the intellect and judgment of our nation. On the one hand, you want us to believe that a nation should be allowed to “elect” their leaders, and when their silent, but definite, vote for someone they love, now you come to object their very ability to choose?

The fact remains, whether one likes it or not, that Zaid Hamid, is now the voice of our youth, and if you ask me, it’s a great and fearless voice to have!