‘Our Liberals’ and Minority Psyche

#627 by majumdar

[PS: I hope I have explained my position. I would like to get your response to the points I have raised –rationally without aspersions being cast on my parentage, patriotism or integrity. ]

The rarest of commodities on this forum, and indeed most any forum, is someone who debates on point. I would be more than happy to oblige you in this regard.


[Now as far as the mutineers were considered let’s remember that they were living in a generation where the concept of nationality was not known at least in India. They joined the British Indian Army as it was a good respectable employer and when they found that they were allegedly violating caste, religious rules, they rebelled. They rebelled when they found their beliefs being smashed, not for any particular material advantage. As far as Laxmibai, BSZ and Nanasahib were considered they were only fighting for their own petty states and not for the Indian nation. These ladies and gentlemen were fighting for their own small causes but they couldn’t have known the big picture, anyways.]

I thought you were making the point that the INA people were going against a contract they had signed with British, so to speak, a deal they had made. So in other words, you are saying that if you break a deal, you deserve to get punished for it, and furthermore, lose all credibility regarding your integrity (and thus should not have been incorporated into the newly formed Indian Army).

If that is indeed your point, then the various reasons anyone might or might not have for going back on a contract (e.g. getting their beliefs smashed, getting material advantage, getting their own petty state, getting the whole big Indian nation etc.) should be immaterial.

Therefore, going by your own theory, in this regard the mutineers are just as guilty as the ``INA thugs`` - isn`t that what you are saying?


[Now to return to the INA thugs. The leaders of the INA were largely educated elites who were born and grew up in the midst of a “freedom movement” of sorts. They had the faculty to make a considered choice between joining the struggle (whether of the peaceful INC variety or the revolutionary Bhagat Singh variety) or joining the BIA. They chose to join the BIA and remained faithful to it till they were captured by the Japs. Then possibly they found it expedient to join the INA rather than do time in Japanese Gitmos.]

So you are saying that it is somehow wrong to choose fighting against the British and possibly be free, as opposed to rotting in a Japanese war camp? In other words, if it were you, you would have chosen to rot and die in a Japanese labor camp, but not have gone against the British?


[Please note that I don’t blame SC Bose as he was never in the payroll of the Brits and thus he remained consistent in his hostility to the Brits from the time he hurled his gora prof from the college staircase. ]

Actually a lot of freedom fighters had worked for the British before they became freedom fighters. Some of them were in the Freedom movement even while they were getting paid by the British Govt. What do you think of them?


Also, an unrelated request (unrelated to the arguments that is). Are you linked to the INA movement by family history in any shape or form? I am just being curious here.


Regards

Krishnaji,

It is no surprise that the daughter of one of these INA thugs was put up as a Pres candidate by the commie b******s against the fine gentleman APJ.

Regards

(Um, would you mind sharing with us your views on the mutineers of the Sepoy Mutiny? )

Krishnaji,

I am happy to note that you have described these gentlemen as mutineers not as Freedom fighters. Shows that you too are an intellectual who has not been corrupted by GoI paid historians (usually of the left variety) or Amar Chitra Katha comics.

Now as far as the mutineers were considered let’s remember that they were living in a generation where the concept of nationality was not known at least in India. They joined the British Indian Army as it was a good respectable employer and when they found that they were allegedly violating caste, religious rules, they rebelled. They rebelled when they found their beliefs being smashed, not for any particular material advantage. As far as Laxmibai, BSZ and Nanasahib were considered they were only fighting for their own petty states and not for the Indian nation. These ladies and gentlemen were fighting for their own small causes but they couldn’t have known the big picture, anyways.

Now to return to the INA thugs. The leaders of the INA were largely educated elites who were born and grew up in the midst of a “freedom movement” of sorts. They had the faculty to make a considered choice between joining the struggle (whether of the peaceful INC variety or the revolutionary Bhagat Singh variety) or joining the BIA. They chose to join the BIA and remained faithful to it till they were captured by the Japs. Then possibly they found it expedient to join the INA rather than do time in Japanese Gitmos. Please note that I don’t blame SC Bose as he was never in the payroll of the Brits and thus he remained consistent in his hostility to the Brits from the time he hurled his gora prof from the college staircase.

Regards

PS: I hope I have explained my position. I would like to get your response to the points I have raised –rationally without aspersions being cast on my parentage, patriotism or integrity.

#625 by majumdar

[INA people were traitors and betrayed the British Indian Army that they were employed by. They deserved what they got.]

Ah! The brilliance of unconventional thinking! Unexpected yet pithy. An intellectual tour de force, if I may say so.

Um, would you mind sharing with us your views on the mutineers of the Sepoy Mutiny?

Regards

Salimbhai,

(You completely ignored my remark about the role of the Nehru government in the treatment of the INA people - all at the behest of the British. )

INA people were traitors and betrayed the British Indian Army that they were employed by. They deserved what they got. One of the few sensible things JLN did (apart from doing Lady M, of course) was to keep the INA thugs out of the army after they came back. Had they re-entered the army they would have infected politics into army and India would have gone the Pak way.

Regards

btw, read your own reference #620 to refute your own arguments.

About consociationalism in the Netherlands, it says:

``However, this occurred in a society renowned for its welfare system and overall economic prosperity. Thus, the dilemma of the Netherlands’ success in the utilization of consociationalism may be tied to the very fact that it was in a society not divided on profoundly deep, ethnic lines and that it was not a society (also) burdened by social cleavages lining up to the religious division.``

This is not true in most parts of united India which possesses a hundred or thousand times more diversity than the Netherlands, with numerous cleavages along religious, intra-religious, ethnic, intra-ethnic, linguistic inter-regional and class lines.


``It is here, in the example of Belgium that we witnessed the most troublesome aspect of Lijphard’s recipe for consociationalism: the stipulation that a minority veto must exist, allowing elites of each group to challenge decisions unfavorable to their particular groups.``

``In Belgium, the 1970 constitutional reforms introduced a minority veto on non-constitutional matters for the purpose of protecting the Waloon minority against the Flemish majority. Since the two communities were in most cases territorially divided, in Belgium the consociational model was deemed less effective than in Holland. Indeed, whereas in the Netherlands territorial segmentation (Catholics living in the south and Protestants in the north of the country) existed, the two religious community shared a common language and sense of belonging to a common state. ``

Paul Brass quote Barry who ``argues that it is dangerous to extend the relevance of this model based on a method of resolving church-state and working class issues in these two countries(the Netherlands and Belgium) to ethnically divided societies, including Belgium where, he insists, it has not in fact been used to deal with the conflics between Flemings and Walloons.``

In the Hindustan-Pakistan consociationalism scenario, the regions were indeed territorially divided and the political oarty claiming sole ownership of the Pakistan section did not share a sense of belonging to a common state with Hindustan, far from it.


``Thus, Belgian consociationalism was much more turbulent, with political constraints and deadlocks becoming a usual occurrence. Unlike the Dutch experience where consociationalism eventually produced a much greater societal cohesion, in Belgium it brought an increased alienation of the two entities vis-à-vis the common state, and a lessened identification of the two communities with Belgian nationhood. ``

There were just such deadlocks in the Indian Interim Government of 1946-47 in which the Muslim League exercised the minority veto which finally convinced both sides that a common state was unworkable.

There are plenty of examples of potential deadlocks in the future arising from fundamental differences of opinion between the Muslim League and the Congress over most state and governance matters, internal and external.

1. As I pointed out earlier, the veto system could not have enabled Hindustan to prevent Pakistan from pursuing a jihad policy in Afghanistan. The mutual vetos would also have occured over the use of the united India Army as Muslim League and Congress had widely differing ideas about foreign policy and defense.

The questions of raising of finances for the Union government, whether trade, credit and customs policies were necessary elements of foreign affairs etc were among many questions on which Muslim League and Congress had previously differed as well and a mutual veto would have inevitable lead to deadlock on these.

2. So too in internal affairs which would affect the Hindustan-Pakistan equation in the Union Constitution.

For instance a minority veto by the Muslim League would have forced a deadlock in the Union Constituent Assembly over incorporating or not incorporating the Communal Award 1932 in the Union Constitution in matters relating to the Union. This was inevitable because the Congress and Muslim League had unresolved fundamental disagreements over franchise extending to the early 1920s including over the Communal Award.

A minority veto exerted by Pakistan could have forestalled land reforms in Hindustan which had been in the Congress electoral platform since well before independence but which Muslim League considered a threat to its interests and Islam as was seen by the Muslim League performance in the U.P Assembly in 1937-1939. Though land reforms were not `defence` or `foreign affairs` they would have affected the Union Constitution - land reforms would have changed the pattern of limited franchise granted in the Communal Award 1932 to landholders and special groups and would have made francise more universal in Hindustan. This in turn would have necessitated changes in the Pakistan-Hindustan equation at the common Union central legislature, executive and administration, necessitating a change in the Union Constitution which Pakistan could have vetoed. Ergo no land reforms or extension of franchise in Hindustan because Pakistan says no or go ahead with land reforms in Hindustan then have a total deadlock on extension of franchise at the Union center hereafter.

A minority veto exerted by Pakistan could also have created a deadlock over the linguistic reorganisation of states in Hindustan(which was part of the Congress manifesto since the mid-late 1920s) because these would have required changes in Union Constitution, including relating to the Central executive, legislature and administrative services.

The same with affirmative action for oppressed classes.

All these examples are apart from the basic puzzle of why should one region A recognise no constitutional responsibilities towards, and common goals with, another region B yet exert a veto over region B. In other words, mutual vetos wouldn`t have worked and would have made no sense either.


``In Belgium, on the other hand, the state was younger, with a short legacy of statehood, and inhabited by two major communities speaking distinct languages and strong identifying with separate regions (the French-speaking Belgians with Wallonia and the Dutch-speaking ones with Flanders). Thus, Belgian consociationalism was much more turbulent, with political constraints and deadlocks becoming a usual occurrence. Unlike the Dutch experience where consociationalism eventually produced a much greater societal cohesion, in Belgium it brought an increased alienation of the two entities vis-à-vis the common state, and a lessened identification of the two communities with Belgian nationhood. ``

Precisely what would have happened in a united India where one section(Pakistan) had years before independence expressed its intent to go its own way.

This is seen in the Macedonian example as well:

``Macedonia’s experience with consociationalism has confirmed the shortcomings of this societal model- that the veto power exploited by minorities causes deadlocks in government deliberations. Thus, the effectiveness of government, one of the fundamental principles of democracy, has decreased. Consequently, Macedonia throughout the whole course of the 1990s suffered constant strain. Invariably the so-called “Albanian issue” was pushed to the very top of the political agenda. Little space was left for other segments of societal reform to be enforced. ``

As pointed out earlier, the minority veto did indeed create deadlock in the Indian Interim government in 1946-47 and it became effectively became non-functioning. United India would also have had the ``Pakistan issue`` which would have left no space for anything else.

``Another aspect of the consociational democracy theory is the principle of proportionality, which aims at a fair distribution of power. In theory, it ought to provide for the equal representation and participation of all segmental groups. In Macedonia, as in many other divided societies, proportional representation guaranteed minorities an opportunity to shape policies at both the national and subnational levels. More specifically, this principle suggests that proportionality must be the standard principle for political representation, civil service employment, and the allocation of public funds. However, though this may be regarded as being genuinely democratic, there are problems, because proportionality, quota-based allocations and duplications across the civil service and in public funding only serve to intensify segregation along ethnic lines. In Macedonia’s case, this proved to be the case. With the introduction of affirmative action, Macedonian society became even more ‘ethnicized’ and polarized along ethnic lines. ``

In the United Indian case, the situation would have been much worse as it was not the principle of proportionality in the Union govenrment which the Muslim League sought from 1939 onward, it was the principle of out of proportion parity between two disproportionate communities(Hindu-Muslim) and two disproportionate regions Pakistan and Hindustan. The segregration and disaffection at the forced disproportion on religious and regional grounds would have intensified the polarization and segmentation many times more.

Even more so given the huge diversity and numerous sectarian, ethnic, linguistic and class cleavages existing unrecognised within the two artificially monolithic `Hindu` and `Muslim` classifications which would have been imposed on the United Indian state by the two nation theory.


``The pluralist or civic approach is oriented towards openness and participation. Consociational approaches are at best elitist, and at worst anti-democratic in character.``

Now I have to take prior approval to use smileys.

Paul Brass essay also critiques Lijphart`s examples; I just didn`t post those portions. The topic on this thread was not general consociational theory or countries in Europe, the topic here was specifically the subcontinent.

I started laughing long before I got to that last sentence in the essay because I wondered what would happen when the Pakistani masses stopped being inert and deferential towards the Pakistani elites, would Pakistani political theorists then throw their political theories books at the masses to keep them at bay. Then I encountered that last comment by Paul Brass and found the coincidence of thought positively hilarious.

#619 by Mantolives

Dear Yasser,

The answers to your meaningless rant were given earlier – which you chose to ignore!

Let me summarize it in a way that even you can connect to – in spite of the obviously missing connection between the truth and your thought process.

First, this article is about Pakistani liberals – yes, those cowards! They are Jinnah’s illegitimate (read BAAASTARD) progeny – not Gandhi’s.

You were earlier challenged to get an academic scholar to come and corroborate the crap you have been relieving here – you have NEVER responded – because it is a lot easier for lawyers to lie than it is for academicians!

Just to get a FEW items right under your myopic eyes!

Pakistani liberals live in a state of vacuum – and under the thumb of an ideologically unreliable army – with Musharraf as figurehead. Yes or no?

The values of basic human rights, democracy and security are nowhere to be seen. Mushy is in trouble and has been for some time – facing almost direct rebellion in two of Pakistan’s four provinces! Yes or No?

In Jinnah’s made-up world real politics are conducted in such a way that reason fails and principles of morality disappear. It has undergone military coups as regularly as ladies of the right age group undergo their periods. Yes or No?

Pakistanis have no concept of democracy or law – or fair play! Because your master himself showed by personal example how easy it is to grab things by force – things which make little logic to anyone outside of that exclusive mindset! Yes or no?

Government writ does not hold in the northwest frontier where al-Qaeda and maybe Osama bin Laden are sheltered. Yes or No?

All these people together – with little to string them together – except that they are all Muslims – and they made sure of that by expelling all the minorities! Yes or No?

While the cowardly liberals looked on, the khakis and their Inter-Services Intelligence agency created and nurtured the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) alliance – the group of Islamist parties – which believes only in basic freedoms of the afterlife and never in concepts such as equal rights for women, freedom to worship according to one’s conscience, or freedom of expression. Its members schooled and trained the Taliban and it makes known in no uncertain terms its wishes to impose sharia – the Islamic law, which always ends up as the logical conclusion of all thought processes that are rooted in the concept of Islamic exclusivity. Yes or No?

Pakistan today competes with Saudi Arabia in being a source of Islamic militancy for the world. Islam provides an identity above ethnicity, tribe, or clan. The madrassahs teach uneducated boys to memorize the Koran in Arabic (not their own language), and no other subjects at all. Thousands of mullahs preach incendiary sermons in order to mobilize the mob against unbelievers. In the supposed cause of Islam, successive rulers have sponsored and exploited a variety of militant groups, notably the Taliban in Afghanistan, and Jaish-e-Muhammad and Lashkar-e-Taiba to terrorize Kashmir. The military and its most powerful agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence force, the ISI, has exploited Islamic extremism by means of a doctrine of “strategic depth” whose purpose was to spread Pakistani influence in Kashmir and throughout Central Asia.
Yes or No?

……..

And the list goes on!

The progeny of Jinnah – a shining example of “civilized” co-existence like no other in the world!

But one never finds the Pakistani liberal talk of such issues – because at their core, they are plainly cowards – and that is about the kindest thing one can say of them!

The Pakistani liberals say “Pakistan’s constitution must be respected.” This is fantasy. In Pakistan, the constitution is what the ruler, the army, and the ISI decide it is.

Like Jinnah, the Pakistani liberal is the statesman without a state.

Their pathetic voices ought to be heard not as expressions of freedom but as anguished cries of bondage.

Pakistanis are only as free as those “golden” chains let them be – which is to say – not much more than the “green” chains let them be!

It is kind of sobering to talk about this endangered species!

Re: #620 by Mantolives

[Therefore, each country should first and foremost consider, when making political and societal arrangements, the unique characteristics of the state in question. Any implementation that merely replicates another country’s successful experience with a certain model cannot be guaranteed to meet with similar success. ]


Yes of course. This is what the Nazis, as well as Fascists used to say when they were critcized about the lack of true democracy.

Consociationalism

http://www.balkanalysis.com/?p=266

By Darko Angelov

How to make two peoples live together within one state boundary when both, or at least one of them has no ’sincere’ intention for co-existence, and does not uphold the necessary commitment to the state’s general prosperity? The answer is, many would argue, to force them to remain together and to cohabitate at any price, as contemporary international relations seldom support changing of internationally established and recognized boundaries. And here in the cases of divided societies, the oft-prescribed recipe is the enforcement of a consociational democracy.The key feature of consociationalism is that it is a power sharing arrangement encompassing a set of institutional devices (proportionality, grand coalition, mutual veto etc.) as well as related cooperative attitudes of political elites in segmented societies, leading them to transcend the borders of their own groups, to be receptive to the claims of others and to accommodate the divergent interests and claims of the segments (Lijphart 1969: 216).
History knows of positive experiences of consociational power sharing. One such example is the Netherlands, with its consociational democracy up until the 1960s. Another is neighboring Belgium, over the last couple of decades relatively successful in the implementation of consociational power sharing between the country’s two main entities. Aside from these positive examples of consociational democracy in practice, an example of complete failure was the short-lived attempt to implement consociational power-sharing mechanisms in Cyprus in the 1960s.

The following will refer to the three above-mentioned cases, and relate them to Europe’s latest experiment consociational democracy- the case of Macedonia, following the Ohrid Framework Agreement and the 2001 conflict.

The Netherlands

The birthplace of consociationalism is the Netherlands, where Arend Lijphart first hammered out the theory. And it was the Netherlands that provided one of the earliest, if not the earliest, and surely one of the most successful consociational arrangements in practice. The Netherlands is a relatively ethnically homogeneous society with a small minority of Friesians in the northwest of the country. But what made it fruitful soil for consociationalism to take root was its religious and hence cultural heterogeneity, reflected in relatively deep societal cleavages witnessed up until the late 1960’s. (It had been in the 1950s when consociational concepts of governance were introduced).

However, this occurred in a society renowned for its welfare system and overall economic prosperity. Thus, the dilemma of the Netherlands’ success in the utilization of consociationalism may be tied to the very fact that it was in a society not divided on profoundly deep, ethnic lines and that it was not a society (also) burdened by social cleavages lining up to the religious division. As the following examples will show, the more societal cleavages have to do with ethnic antagonisms and division, the less the consociational model is effective and the less it can offer a state sustainable viability.

In the Netherlands today, the Protestant, Catholic, and secular societal groups have lost most of their significance. This modern Western country is now culturally homogeneous. When this homogenization really occurred (throughout the 1970s and 1980s as a follow-up to the successful implementation and practice of consociationalism) there was no need to continue practicing consociationalism as a scheme for creating government coalitions or for safeguarding the well-being of state and society. It was precisely when consociationalism became part of the political mentality and culture that it also became unnecessary to continue rigidly and instrumentally enforcing it. After a successful decade of enforcing consociational democracy (in the 1950s), it was no longer necessary for the leaders to practice consociationalism in order to hold the Dutch subcultures together. Simply, the decline of consociational democracy in the Netherlands since the 1960s was an indicator of its success, not its failure. Societal cleavages became relativised as the consensus-based, cohabitation approach to practicing politics became a core characteristic of the ‘Dutch way’ of doing politics and running a state.

Belgium

Moving to a society divided not on religious, but on linguistic grounds, Belgium presents a case where consociational democracy was and is harder to implement and maintain. Nevertheless, it seemed the only answer for providing greater self-government. It had been the Walloon, French speaking community of the country (a minority vis-à-vis the majority Flemish, Dutch-speaking community) that pressured for a greater autonomy.

It is here, in the example of Belgium that we witnessed the most troublesome aspect of Lijphard’s recipe for consociationalism: the stipulation that a minority veto must exist, allowing elites of each group to challenge decisions unfavorable to their particular groups. According to Lijphard, this consociational method aims to protect minorities from a tyrannical majority by providing their representatives setting out a mechanism of checks and balances. In Belgium, the 1970 constitutional reforms introduced a minority veto on non-constitutional matters for the purpose of protecting the Waloon minority against the Flemish majority. Since the two communities were in most cases territorially divided, in Belgium the consociational model was deemed less effective than in Holland. Indeed, whereas in the Netherlands territorial segmentation (Catholics living in the south and Protestants in the north of the country) existed, the two religious community shared a common language and sense of belonging to a common state.

In Belgium, on the other hand, the state was younger, with a short legacy of statehood, and inhabited by two major communities speaking distinct languages and strong identifying with separate regions (the French-speaking Belgians with Wallonia and the Dutch-speaking ones with Flanders). Thus, Belgian consociationalism was much more turbulent, with political constraints and deadlocks becoming a usual occurrence. Unlike the Dutch experience where consociationalism eventually produced a much greater societal cohesion, in Belgium it brought an increased alienation of the two entities vis-à-vis the common state, and a lessened identification of the two communities with Belgian nationhood.

Cyprus

Cyprus symbolized the most extreme case of consociationalism’s complete failure as the remedy for a thoroughly divided society. The Cypriot consociational experiment begun with the 1960 constitution introduced a very rigid formula for achieving a delicate balance between the two groups’ desires: the majority Greek Cypriot preference for a unitary state and the minority Turkish Cypriot demands for recognition as a separate political entity. Although making up only 20% of the population, the Turkish inhabitants of Cyprus were given prime status as one of the state’s two communities.

However, the fundamental differences between the Greek and Turkish Cypriots (starting from the numerical imbalance between the two, the long legacy of violent conflict between their kin nations and states, and the clear distinction in terms of religion, culture, language and national awareness) proved insurmountable. Soon it became obvious that the Cypriot experiment was doomed to fail. The state collapsed and violence took center stage. What followed in the Cypriot case is yet another example of violence replacing dialogue, affirming the incapability of current international political theory to provide replicable, durable solutions with universal applicability.

Macedonia

Macedonia is the latest, but surely not the last example of a divided society striving to preserve its integrity as an indivisible entity. It is a newly independent state with a short and unstable legacy of statehood. It is a society deeply divided along ethnic, religious, social and political/ideological lines, a country both internally and externally contested and challenged.

Macedonia gained its full independence in 1991 out of a federal arrangement having many consociational features. It was first of all Yugoslavia’s collapse, following a decade of dysfunctional power sharing between its six constituent republics that set the context for the fledgling state’s arrival. Thus, the larger picture out of which independent Macedonia emerged hardly provided reason for optimism. From the beginning (1991), it seemed hardly plausible that the consociational model would work. The country was faced by conflict between the majority ethnic Macedonians and the largest minority, the Albanians. Their perceptions of not only the country but also the whole process of the disintegration of Yugoslavia diverged sharply. While the Macedonians saw it conceivable to have the country proclaim independence within the boundaries and with the structure inherited from Yugoslavia, the Albanians in Macedonia (and Kosovo), saw the collapse of Yugoslavia as an opportunity for secession. Almost parallel to Macedonia’s independence referendum of 1991, the Albanians of the country ran their very own plebiscite for the establishment of a territorial Albanian autonomy in the western parts of the country, where the bulk of that population lived. Thus, the very start of Macedonia’s road to statehood was marked by a clear conflict of interest between the country’s Macedonians and Albanians.

Throughout the whole course of the 1990s, because of both geopolitical circumstances and the continued democratization within the state itself, Macedonia remained relatively peaceful, without any significant violent inter-ethnic conflicts. However, on the political level there was much turmoil and constant bargaining between the political elites of the Macedonians and Albanians. It was the continued zero-sum game of give-and-take between the political representatives of the two communities that produced a de-facto consociational system of governance. This model was introduced by the first government in 1990. Proportionality, grand government coalitions, and minority veto power as key instruments of the consociational model were all gradually introduced into the formal and informal order of the country. Legislative and practical developments were based on the consociational concept of governance. Nevertheless, even this did not prevent yet another outbreak of Balkan violence.

Many argue that the 2001 conflict in Macedonia was merely a spillover of the earlier 1999 crisis in Kosovo, and see a geopolitical rationale of the follow-up events. However, some would also explain it as the failure to transform Macedonia into a complete whole where ethnic differences could be reconciled with the idea of a common state.

For their part, the Macedonians saw their independence as too fresh and too problematized by external factors to support an outright consociational model where the Albanians of the country would be the one of the two constituent nations. The Albanians, on the other hand, had a wider, regional national cause in Kosovo; they had lesser interest in participating in a Macedonian state. With this dichotomy in perception between the two communities vis-à-vis the state of Macedonia, the dilemma has been whether consociationalism, or any other societal model, can be a viable solution, when there is little interest between the Macedonians and Albanians for having a common state.

Macedonia’s experience with consociationalism has confirmed the shortcomings of this societal model- that the veto power exploited by minorities causes deadlocks in government deliberations. Thus, the effectiveness of government, one of the fundamental principles of democracy, has decreased. Consequently, Macedonia throughout the whole course of the 1990s suffered constant strain. Invariably the so-called “Albanian issue” was pushed to the very top of the political agenda. Little space was left for other segments of societal reform to be enforced.

Another aspect of the consociational democracy theory is the principle of proportionality, which aims at a fair distribution of power. In theory, it ought to provide for the equal representation and participation of all segmental groups. In Macedonia, as in many other divided societies, proportional representation guaranteed minorities an opportunity to shape policies at both the national and subnational levels. More specifically, this principle suggests that proportionality must be the standard principle for political representation, civil service employment, and the allocation of public funds. However, though this may be regarded as being genuinely democratic, there are problems, because proportionality, quota-based allocations and duplications across the civil service and in public funding only serve to intensify segregation along ethnic lines. In Macedonia’s case, this proved to be the case. With the introduction of affirmative action, Macedonian society became even more ‘ethnicized’ and polarized along ethnic lines.

One may ask whether Macedonia’s direction towards an even deeper and more formalized consociationalism after the 2001 conflict was the right road to take. The consociationalist approach institutionalizes ethnic segmentation in the state itself, and this presents a problem when introduced into societies with a profound level of segregation, as with Macedonia. It is the pluralist approach that denies the state and state institutions to be defined in ethnic terms. The pluralist or civic approach is oriented towards openness and participation. Consociational approaches are at best elitist, and at worst anti-democratic in character. The 2001 conflict in Macedonia proved this; initially the conflict was an intra-Albanian one, wherein the then-incumbent Albanian political elite severely criticized the rebels, who represented an emerging, wannabe Albanian political structure, coming from the Diaspora and externally supported from Kosovo.

Conclusion

Consociational democracy is not a modus operandi to be taken for granted. It rests on the assumption that the political elites of the communities in multi-ethnic states want to develop such a democratic model of the state and even more crucially, that they sincerely strive for a common state. As I have tried to show with the foregoing examples of countries that uphold (or have upheld) consociationalism, this model for power sharing has no universal and ultimate utilization in different environments. The pattern visible from these examples is that the more a society is divided along ethnic lines, the less the consociational mode has a durable positive effect. Therefore, each country should first and foremost consider, when making political and societal arrangements, the unique characteristics of the state in question. Any implementation that merely replicates another country’s successful experience with a certain model cannot be guaranteed to meet with similar success.

Dear BJK

Again little knowledge is dangerous...

1- Contrary to your claims it was Gandhi who unleashed havoc in the street with his support of the Khilafat Movement which was the first truly violent movement in South Asia... Jinnah on the other hand remained committed to a constitutional way of politics... you don`t even have the courage of actually investigating your ridiculous claims... because you are a Gandhian to the core... and Gandhian means : a lying, bigoted, dishonest crook.

2- It is Gandhi who is falsely propped up as a hero of liberalism and humanity when he was a racist casteist freak. The world is beginning to discover it ... Furthermore... Jinnah Papers in full are available in every library of any major University in the US... and there is a CD out as well. You may go and find it.

3- Jinnah`s record is there... and your claims will never change the facts. Every now and then some Indian will wake up and smell the coffee and there will be a huge debate again ... on Jinnah`s secularism.. on the main page of every Indian newspaper for weeks on end... just like last year ....

4- I quoted Mahatma`s Progeny to show the real facts ... unlike your fudged ones.

5- Why should I say I haven`t read the collected works of Gandhi when I have with a very open mind and found Gandhi to be the exact opposite of what he is propped up to be?
Gandhi was a racist bigot, a woman hater, an abusive husband, a bad father and what is more he was underhanded person who went so far as to bribe people to keep them from speaking the truth.

6- Please note that to date you haven`t produced a single piece of evidence to prove your outrageously idiotic claims. This just shows that you are an insecure person who has now found out the truth about Gandhi ... but is unwilling to accept the facts.



Krishna...

Had Gandhi been alive, he would have been the biggest enemy of Internet and Computers... This just shows how unlucky the man is ... to get corporate sponsorship from Apple and Pepsi... which goes against the very grain of his teachings.

Sadna...

I am glad I`ve educated you. I take your current response to be an indication that you have no more arguments left and so you must pick and choose a critique of a theory. Last I checked atleast four great European Democracies and welfare states including Belgium and Netherlands- all more prosperous and stable than India surely- followed this model. Posting one side of the story - valid as that maybe- doesn`t mean the other side of theory is completely invalid. Ironically ofcourse … from your non-featured article of Wikipedia (it has two kinds featured and nonfeatured) even India is given as an example of a consociationalist state.

Political scientists often argue on theories... but only someone like you personalises (your smileys for example) these isssues... because you are convinced that only your idea of democracy is correct ... those people in Netherlands must be idiots.. for having a workable democratic secular system.

Learn to accept that there may be points of view different from yours.



-YLH

http://www.salon.com/media/1997/11/04media.html


gandhi was no pitchman

---

Apple clicked on the wrong icon for its ``think different`` ad campaign.


BY BILL McKIBBEN | I`m writing this on a Macintosh, which is the only kind of computer I`ve ever owned. But if I ever need another one (and I may not -- I just use it as a glorified typewriter, and so it has oceans more power than I require), I`m going to buy a PC. And all because of an ad.

I was leafing through some magazine at the library when the back cover caught my eye: Mahatma Gandhi, cross-legged in front of his loom, wire-rim glasses perched down his nose, wearing only a loincloth that he had doubtless made himself. And in one corner, the Apple logo and the words ``Think Different.``

Despite its wounded grammar, this ad is not very difficult to decode. Gandhi has great power as an icon (in the archaic meaning of the word). One look at him and you think, ``simplicity,`` ``calm,`` ``rebellion without violence.`` The associations come as quickly and as powerfully as they do in an ad with, say, Pamela Anderson Lee, where you immediately think, ``sex on a beach.`` And for Apple, of course, it`s important to endow its box of chips with those associations. Fairly or not, Apple has long since lost the battle for ``efficiency,`` which is the chief virtue of the data age. It`s stuck defending a few niche markets -- design, education, certain kinds of media -- where rebellion remains a nostalgic touchstone. So Gandhi makes a certain kind of mercenary sense.

But Gandhi is different. While it is ignoble to use Albert Einstein (another of Apple`s icons) as a pitchman, it is not perhaps immoral in quite the same way. Einstein was more or less a part of his century; his magnificent mind did not take him outside the flow of recent history.

Gandhi really is different, far more different than the copywriter seems to have understood.

He was the eruption in this century, and in some ways this millennium, of a venerable idea, an idea that stretches back at least to the Buddha -- the idea that by leaving yourself behind you find yourself, that by renunciation you conquer. So it is bizarre to use him to sell products. When he died, all his belongings -- toothbrush, Bhagavad Gita, loincloth -- fit inside a couple of shoe boxes.

But that`s not the real degradation. Were Apple merely selling computers it would only be grubby to use Gandhi`s picture. Instead, of course, they`re trying to sell each of us an image of ourselves. Which is precisely what Gandhi spent his life trying to help people strip away. In the fight for Indian independence (against the biggest brand name of his era, the British Empire), he succeeded in helping a nation shrug off its own internalized sense of subjugation, its own sense that Britishness, like Appleness, was superior. And he did it without trying to substitute the usual nationalist passions.

He went well beyond that, too -- his battle against the caste system was in reality a battle against even more insidious self-labeling, against identities ingrained in the unconscious of an entire subcontinent. And though he was a devout man, he even tried to fight against the religious brands -- his prayers each night came not just from the Hindu scriptures, but from the Gospels, from the Koran. He was assassinated by a fanatic Hindu precisely for his lack of brand loyalty.

Gandhi believed there was something sacred and lovely at the center of people, and that to get to it each of us needed to cut through the various lusts and fears of everyday life. That was hard enough to do in village India; how much harder in our time and place, when we live amid a hurricane of messages and symbols all designed to overlay our own identity. Gandhi, in other words, was the chief spokesman against the consumer mentality since Christ -- against the idea that the ownership of a particular kind of computer might free you, make you more creative or rebellious or attractive.

Trying to sell a Macintosh with Gandhi`s image is every bit as ironic as selling cigarettes with a picture of healthy, sexy young bodies. (Or as ironic as the Land Rover ad some years ago that said: ``Celebrate Thoreau`s Birthday. Drive Through a Pond.``)

Eknath Easwaran, the California meditation teacher whose book ``Gandhi the Man`` is the simplest, and therefore loveliest, of the many Gandhi biographies, describes seeing Gandhi meditate during the evening prayer service in the last years of his life. The text that evening was from the second chapter of the Gita. As the sonorous verses were read, you could see him completely absorbed, his mind growing calm and still. His concentration was so complete that it was no longer the second chapter you were listening to, it was the second chapter you were seeing, witnessing for yourself the transformation it describes:


They are forever free who have broken
Out of the ego-cage I and mine
To be united with the Lord of Love.
This is the supreme state. Attain thou this
And pass from death to immortality.

On the other hand, you could have 1.6 Gb, a 10xCD-ROM, 128 MB RAM and a smug dose of superiority.
SALON | Nov. 4, 1997

Bill McKibben is a Methodist Sunday School teacher in upstate New York and the author of ``The End of Nature.`` Simon and Schuster will publish his new book, ``Maybe One: A Personal and Environmental Argument for Single Child Families,`` next spring.

``consociationalism``
Consociationalism is a form of government involving group representation by elites

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consociationalist
``Consociationalism focuses on diverging identities such as ethnicity instead of integrating identities such as class, institutionalizing and entrenching the former. Furthermore, it relies on rival co-operation, which is inherently unstable. It focuses on intra-state relations and neglects relations with other states. It assumes that each group is cohesive and has strong leadership. Although the minority can block decisions, this requires 100% agreement. Rights are given to communities rather than individuals, leading to over-representation of some individuals in society and under-representation of others. Grand coalitions are unlikely to happen due to the dynamics of ethnic competition.

Each group seeks more power for itself. Consociationalists are criticized for focusing too much on the set up of institutions and not enough on transitional issues which go beyond such institutions. Finally, it is claimed that consociational institutions promote sectarianism and entrench existing identities.``


It basically means a form of government where society is divided into pre-defined segments which have autonomy wrt and isolation from each other and governance is by mutual accomodation at only the elite or leadership level. In the historical context of the subcontinent it means religion-based nationalism or two nation theory ie Indians should have agreed that their religion is the primary element of their citizenship and primary political identity. Hindus and Muslims should have been autonomous segments totally isolated from each other except at the leadership level. Only Muslims vote for Muslims, Muslims vote for only Muslims, only Hindus vote for Hindus and Hindus vote only for Hindus.

In other words in consociationalism Muslims would have said `I am a Muslim first then an Indian, and Hindus would have said `I am a Hindu first and then an Indian`. The Lucknow Pact was a consociational arrangement and would have lead to this culmination after independence. Adherence to consociationalism would have forced Hindu elite to sink their majority and effectively disenfranchise the Hindu masses because the Muslim elite demanded that as the price of accomodation. Damn that Gandhi for spoiling the party!

Paul Brass says (`Ethnicity and Nationalism` - Ethnic Conflict in Multiethnic Societies)

``
..consociationalism is by definition elitist and postpones democratization of multiethnic societies. Lijphart is explicit that the principle of `segmental isolation`, which is central to consociationalism, `entails a strengthening of the political inertness of the non-elite public and of their deferential attitudes to the segmental leaders.` Just how elitist and conservative it is should be clear from the fact that Lijphart even point to the Southern blockage of civil rights in the US for decades as a consociational arrangement.
...

..it is ridiculous to propose that the party system reflect the communal cleavages of the society when the party system may be the only mode of intercommunal communication available. The reinforcement of segmented autonomy by eliminating all political means of non-elite intercommunal communication and the creation instead of monoethnic political parties whose leaders have to agree not to press any extreme claims on behalf of their group clearly must lead to a self-sustaining system that can last only as long as the mass public remains political inert and deferential.
...

`First, political accomodation in democratic societies is an art not a system, and one that has to be pursued persistently in the face of changing circumstances. Consociationalism is a device for freezing existing divisions and conflicts and reducing the art of political accomodation to formulas that can work only as long as processes of social, economic and political change do not upset them.

Second, if one is concerned with group rights and not with maintenance of existing states, the recognition of group rights does not require consociational democracy. It only requires that the cultural rights of groups not be infringed and that those groups which wish to act as groups can do so in such matters, for example, as having government schools in which the language and culture of the group can be taught. On the other hand, consociational democracy inevitably violates the rights of some groups and the rights of individuals. It violates the rights of those groups in being and those that may develop in future whose existence is not recognised by the state. It also certainly fails to provide protection to and may lead to the oppression of individuals who wish not to be identified with or wish to free themselves form identification with particular cultural group.
...
..the real trade-offs are between competition with possibility of ethnic conflict and consociationalism with the likelihood of domination of some ethnic groups and individuals by others or of the mass of the people by an elite and with the longterm likelihood of a violent breakdown. For example, consociationalism practised between the North and South in the US for nearly a hundred years involved the oppression of blacks by whites and the retardation of the political and economic emancipation of the black people for the same period. It terminated only in the 1950s and the 1960s, leaving in its wake the violent conflicts associated with race relations in the US for the next two decades.
...
...In some circumustances, it is simply futile to propose consociational solutions. In others, it is itself a form of repression. One thing, however, is certain. When well-entrenched ethnic elites see that their interests will be better served by dividing up state patronage proportionally, they do not require advice from political scientists to seize the opportunity.

(end quote of Paul Brass)

#613 by Mantolives

Ummah yaar,

When did I EVER claim to be a genuine writer? Leave that designation for people who contribute here – it is sufficient being a genuine human being – which the charlatan sour-puss vamp Jinnah was not – and being dead, shall never ever be! (Thanks for putting the original piece. (Note: I never cited the original piece because there was no need – everyone here has read that already.))

And ummah yaar, your response #613 is a study in the typical Pakistani liberal baloney mentioned in that writeup.

1 – You heartily put this one down when it simply mirrors the flip side of its inspiring article! And anybody can see how your blinkers allow you to call my write-up “long and inane things” when in fact it takes chunk of words straight from the inspiring piece!

2 – Your defense of Jinnah – saying that not being military he lacked the power of Attaturk is equally dishonest. Jinnah had no trouble unleashing the demons and filling the streets with blood when he wanted to. He never used his (perhaps considerable) lawyerly oratorical skills positively – he never tried to bring people together – hedging his bets (correctly, as it turned out) – that it was easier to fool a segment of people for a longer duration than ALL the people even for a short time. So the guy was a heel! (At least this write-up is not making reference to his sex life (especially when he was thirteen years old, a simple fact that has been ignored in the original, as well as you in some of your deluge of interacts – in the usual dishonest style of the great Pakistani liberals).)

3 – {…facts…} The writeup describes the FACTS of Pakistan – Jinnah’s connection is referred only as the source of its troubles. Since there is no “Collected Works of Mohammed Ali Jinnah” out there – one can not go back and start pulling from the CD to make any particular “case” – a task made considerably easier in Gandhi’s case.

The indictment of Jinnah is not based on the murky facts of what he said here and there – the indictment of Jinnah is based on simple facts of what he DID! He tore a people apart, he caused a bloodbath, and he never expressed regret for what he unleashed on that mass of humanity. The hypocrisy of Pakistani liberals becomes stark because of their absolute denial of such simple facts!

The point of this write-up is that if one traces it back – the Jinnah-driven liberalism, the maulana-powered jihad machine, and the khaki-driven funded terrorists all get their inspiration from one simple sentence:

“Being a Muslim makes me different – and puts me on a pedestal higher than that where other human beings stand!”

Go ahead and deny that statement – the Pakistani liberal cowards always do!

4 – {Jinnah is in main hero to the civil society, human rights activists/lawyers, writers, the intellectuals and people fighting for the supremacy of the constitution.} He is being propped up as such – and this represents a false erection! He never accepted that Muslims as individuals were the same as Hindus as individuals! And nor do the current feuding parties in Pakistan!

5 – {V S Naipaul} who cares what Naipaul said – I never read him! But unlike the dishonest Pakistani liberals, who claim to have read Gandhi while denying the fact that there never was any reading done with an open mind – simply a pathetic attempt to build a case against him (and you are not the only one!) – I openly admit my not reading him!

6 – {unable to accept …point of view} Look who is talking – but I have learned to trim expectations in case of Pakistani liberals!

The Mahatma’s Progeny
Farzana Versey
April 4, 2002





“Let the minorities understand that their real safety lies in the goodwill of the majority.” (Words of wisdom at the recently-concluded RSS executive council meeting)

Haven’t we had enough of this goodwill baloney? Who in friggin hell do they think they are? The prime minister of India can declare that he would prefer to die rather than have the VHP utter his name while going on a rampage in the Orissa Assembly, but he has no problems sending a party man to consecrate a piece of stone at Ayodhya despite Supreme Court orders to the contrary and after the recent bloodshed that took place. Anyone else would have resigned. Banned those parties. But political incest brooks no such logic. And the outside forces today are seen as those who are inside. Let us not fool ourselves. The battle-lines have already been drawn if only we care to look beyond the smokescreen.

The saffron brigade is emulating Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi’s patronising attitude towards the minorities and the lower castes. The fact that these segments still have little power after 54 years of Independence shows that he was a failure. Not because he was a peacenik but because he legitimised the Hindutva agenda. As Albert Camus said, “All modern revolutions have ended in a reinforcement of the power of the state.”

And Gandhi was well aware of this. He talked about swadeshi and traditionalism; we are gasping for breath in a global village. He talked of Ram Rajya, which is what is sought to be ushered in. When he used non-violence as a “weapon” there was a method in the madness. It was a gimmick, for the freedom struggle was most certainly not bloodless. An ideal state in hollow times is like a pitcher of water in an empty well. It can satisfy only one person’s thirst. So Gandhism probably did the Mahatma a world of good.

Gandhi as half-naked fakir is just what the Hindutva parties would need to market themselves. If only the Congress had not claimed copyright over him….if only one of their men had not assassinated him…if only he had not become an international hero for the wrong reasons…

But they need not worry. Deep down he can still be their icon. They have mastered his sulking technique. His fasts achieved nothing except more murder and mayhem. So a mahant in the 21st century can try to emotionally blackmail the government threatening to take his life if his wishes, instead of those of the judiciary in a democracy, are not fulfilled. Ashok Singhal uses the same strategy of an indefinite hunger strike (lasting two days!) demanding security for Ram sevaks in Ayodhya. A bunch of goons, who had recently gone on a killing spree, are sought to be given security. Can’t they protect themselves? If Lord Ram is coming in their dreams, surely he might be of some help?

And will they listen to the voice of reason? No. But neither did Gandhi. When there was talk of an honourable settlement between the Hindus and Muslims almost a decade before Partition, he had stated, “I wish I could do something but I am utterly helpless. My faith in unity is as bright as ever; only I see no daylight but impenetrable darkness and in such distress I cry out to god for light.”

No wonder the international community loves him. He was snake charmer, sadhu, and magician – everything that they were looking for by way of Oriental exotica. I have heard people say they do not mind Gandhi’s Ram Rajya but not the one of the saffron parties. What is the difference? His grandson Rajmohan Gandhi in ‘Eight Lives: A study of the Hindu-Muslim encounter’ has quoted the Mahatma as saying, “My own experience but confirms the opinion that the Mussalman as a rule is a bully, and the Hindu a coward.”

One of the reasons the Mahatma is coming under closer examination is not because it sounds sensational but because he let us down. We cannot ignore this. Some years ago I had reported from Bhangi Colony (yes, it is still called that and the tokenism of the word ‘harijan’ has remained just that) and a resident had said, “Everyone goes on about Bapu, Bapu, wearing Gandhi caps. They say, wear khadi. Do you know how expensive khadi is?” As Sarojini Naidu once said, it is very expensive to keep Bapu in poverty.

But the idol had to be propped up. And he was smart enough to write a ‘frank’ account of his flaws in ‘My Experiments with Truth’ before anyone else showed him his feet of clay. As someone has rightly said, sacrificers are not the ones to be pitied; our sympathies must be with those who they sacrifice.

If Gandhi has been deified, then so has his assassin, Nathuram Godse. Today we have a handful of people celebrating the man, reading out his will at memorial services, and a full-fledged fan club that was orchestrated by his brother.

This gives it an underground operation legitimacy, somewhat like what happened during the freedom struggle. What we ought to know is whether Godse was possessed of a desire to further a cause, wreak vengeance or merely ensure his 15 minutes of fame.

He is extremely important to modern-day politics simply because he exposes the underworld face of it. He was poised between two aspects of it – the lowly hitman and the ideologue dada. His initiation into the major league depended entirely on how big his target was. If his anger was against the appeasement of a community, then why did he not merely kill a few Muslims? Because that would have not made him a loyal soldier, a man who would do or die.

Just look at how the RSS and its acolytes operate and see how they are like underworld/terrorist outfits. There are the compulsory disciplinary drills, the initiation ceremony where you have to prove your loyalty and capability, the strict hierarchy, blind belief in an ideology based necessarily on the theory that you are being wronged by the System, and the submergence of the individual self, a very Gandhian trait.

Something that, ironically, L.K.Advani seemingly possesses too. Why does he avoid the spotlight? Is it only political expediency that makes him promote a Vajpayee? No. By coming across as the kingmaker, he can be seen as the Ram who took to ‘banwaas’ with an Ayodhya awaiting him forever. That is the strategy -- to make the country breathlessly anticipate the great saviour, and teasers about his hard line against the soft one of Vajpayee are sent out to titillate the cadres. One can almost hear the stentorian reprimand. The whispering gallery. And then the denouement by the avuncular patriarch – we are all one.

There are very many reasons provided for his reluctance to take to centre-stage. One of them is his undoubted insecurity. He cannot take the responsibility for crucial decisions. He resigned after the demolition of the Babri Masjid. And he wasn’t merely being honorable; he was afraid.

And while he is in this survivor-in-the-forest mode, the people go through an ‘agni pariksha’. Yes, the country is his Sita, the one he stands by but who will be put through a test to prove his point. L.K. Advani is a trustworthy man because there is a whole machinery that helps others keep the faith. So, he may go to bless a niece marrying a Muslim and get by with a few half-truths; his daughter-in-law may file a case against him saying that he was threatening her with dire consequences if she did not agree to divorce her husband and he can stay out of the rubble. He has his sidekicks, but they are called loyal soldiers of the party. He promotes certain favoured people and instead of a coterie it is seen as a cohesive unit. And that is the point: he can do anything and yet he will be called upright, uncompromising, unspoilt. In some ways he is; if you don’t plant trees you don’t get mud on your hands.

He has no charisma, therefore he would make for a very unlikely Gandhi, but look closely and there is the familiar austerity camouflaging a smooth shrewdness. He would not need a PR guy to point out his USP, for his presence is enough to convey what he stands for.

Like Gandhi, he is the statesman without a state. Today, the man who represents all that India is supposed to want is perhaps more rootless than many. From Karachi to ‘kar seva’ has been a long journey. Which is why he clings to his RSS/Jana Sangh background; it makes him feel a part of the action. In some ways he is like a new convert – he tries too hard. And that effort comes across as sincerity which, as Oscar Wilde said, is the greatest vice of the fanatic.

Identity gets based entirely on how others view you. It is a ghettoisation of collective souls, and only one will be picked by destiny to seal a deal or somebody’s fate.

This is why I feel Godse was a mere pawn. He did not constitute a think tank; he used gut sense. He was paranoid; he had to ensure that his lowly status would not impede his path to glory. Godse rode on the back of a cultural regression, mimicking a renaissance to become a figure in national politics.

Assassins and icons become heroes because they have simulated the System. The anathema and anachronism get transformed into Authority. The lines are bound to get blurred. For instance, Gandhi had admitted to making love to his wife while his father was dying in another room; Godse visited a brothel before he killed the Mahatma. And Gandhi’s call to Ram as his last words have become the Hindutva coinage. And they are done in the name of the people. As Don Marquis said, “Pity the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.”

Such voices ought to be heard not as an expression of freedom but of bondage. We are only as free as our chains let us be.

Salim Bhai,

Brilliant rendering of facts... which has caused Sadna a lot of heartburn.


Sadna,

1- What your allegations amount to is at most that Muslim League played British and Congress against each other to extract maximum mileage. The collaboration allegation does not quite lie.

2- The issue here was your claim about Bengalis. My point was that Bengalis wanted the same consociationalist solution as per six points that was embodied in the Lahore resolution. The point is not whether you think Lahore resolution fit the bill or not or whether it would give the ethnic minorities in Pakistan what they want or not according to you... but that this is what the Bengalis wanted (Lahore Resolution as basis) and this is what Baluchis, Sindhis, and NWFP people want.

3- Your 75-25 majority argument does not quite meet the arithmetic... As we worked out the numbers ... Pakistan Unit and Hindustan Unit parity would mean at most 35% representation for Muslims (recall that Jinnah quote you quote where he talks of Muslim majority but ``not 3 to 1``... that would realistically mean 30% non-Muslims at least) you do the arithmetic... both under this statement and under the Cabinet Mission Plan.

4- Now go back and read my comments about 594 again. It seems that the only dishonest person here is you and worst still... you know it.