Our Landlord System...Good or Bad?

Feudalism is, by a gigantic margin, the biggest problem in Pakistan. One really has to live in the feudal areas to understand it. Compared to feudals, the maulvi brigade are angels.

Secularism and religionism are the last refuge of the scoundrel. After looting the country, and nearly making Pakistan a failed state, the feudal parties and their crony status-quo loving supporters (many on this site) are now trying to promote these same parties because they are more, ``secular`` or ``liberal`` than others. Is it alright for thieves to rule a country, if they can portray themselves as, ``liberal?``

Go explain the advantages of the PPP and PML to the peasant farmer whose daughter is at the mercy of panchayats set up in areas dominated by, ``forward looking, liberal and politically mainstream`` feudals, whose own daughters study in Harvard.

Winessing mullahism brings one to a certain amount of emoitonal suffocation. It locks one`s right of expression into an odd interpretation of an otherwise great religion. But feudalism is worse. Witnessing it brings one to the point of anger. It may not lock the rich folks` right of expression, but it has locked the remaining 90% of Pakistan in a perpetual state of hell.

After seeing certain mullahs spurt out their miguided interprations of religion, I have felt the desire to shave their hypocritical beards. But after seeing the peasant-filled personal fiefdoms of the clean-shaven English-speaking feudal, I have wanted to kill him. Even if the devil removes the influence of feudal and tribal politicians from Pakistan, it is a positive. There were 19 political parties that (I had mentioned before elections) no one should have voted for, in my opinion. These were the 13 off-shoots of PPP and PML and the six parties in MMA. Unfortunately, these are the exact parties everyone voted for. But given the unfortunate choice of the feudal evils and the mullah evils, the later is a much better option in the long run. Mullahs are easily removable thorugh elections, and what you see is what you get. The slippery, ``liberal feudals`` (what a contradiction in terms) have hoodwinked Pakistan long enough and have proven impossible to remove. I don`t know how anyone can still speak positively about them.

Someone needs to challenge and hang the feudal by his balls. And if the only person who has enough courage to do this in the narrow-minded maulvi, then I support him in this task. The mullah can be removed at a later stage.

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Zubeida Jalal became the first woman in the history of the land of Baluchistan to win a national election. She won from a province which has a 2% literacy rate for women (probably the lowest in the world). She was not representing any party. She won on her own. She won as an independent candidate against the strongest of the Baluchi sardar/feudal parties.

What is even more interesting is that her husband lost from an adjacent constituency. But what is really interesting is that she was pregnant and delivered a baby, exactly two days after the election.

I consider her the anti-Benazir. She is a self-made person from a lower-middle class background, who went on to become a social worker in her village area and a philanthrapist, and then a successful Minister of Education, in the Musharraf cabinet. BB is a feudal, born into wealth and power, who has looted the country.

There is talk of Pakistan having a Baluchi Prime Minister this time around. Frankly speaking, due to the small population and low literacy rate, and sardar culture of Baluchistan, there really aren`t too many good candidates from there. Unless of course, one considers Zubeida.

She has now joined PML(Q). My initial vote for PM goes to Imran Khan, since he is the leader of the party I support. But he will never ally himself with PML(Q), and is waiting for the next elections for his party to score big (he is the only one who won a seat from PTI, this time). And he is from Punjab.

Since Imran Khan is not eligible, my vote for the next Prime Minister of Pakistan goes to Zubeida Jalal. It is about time the Zubeida Jalals and Imran Khans of Pakistan started taking hold of the country`s political leadership.

Agriculture is not the best business to be in for any entrepreuner. In places like Pakistan, Feudalism is a scapegoat mainly because of poor lobbying by this group. The reason is that feudalism creates very few while collar jobs - an absolute necessity for lobbying and image building.
The areas with relatively less feudals or almmost no feudals have not exhibited any socio-economic or political model for others to follow. Bahawalnagar is one district with few if any big land holdings because it was created through planned settlement after water was brought in through canals. Never heard of any great achievement from Bahawalnagar district.
The biggest crop for biggest feudals in southern Punjab and Sindh is cotton. The cotton production in Pakistan has steady improvement over other grain staples. Whether that land is divided or not, it will still be cotton as major cash crop. The grain staples need machination farming, watering at right time and fertilizer than dividing it for the production to go up. Right now, government buys most of their grain from small farmers through commission agents. Pakistan does not have Rice and Wheat kings but many cotton kings. In NWFP, it is wheat, corn and tobacco and some orchards. They are not self sufficient in corn and wheat but produce more tobacco than their use. Since agriculture in NWFP will never be able to provide jobs to majority due to terrain in the north and west, the concept of feudalism does not have any effect beyond electoral politics.
Balochistan is mostly tribal sardars holding arid lands in the name of tribe rather than personal although inheriance laws apply. Get rid of Sardari system and nawabs? Fine, but what is expected to achieve? Pakistan got rid of Nawabs of Swat, Dir and Chitral during Z. A. Bhutto era. I do not know if Swat, Dir and Chitral are a model for meteric rise in any field since then.

ZafarA:

in that sense countries do go somewhere. some double their poverty rate in ten years for example- technically they are still going somewhere.

Junaid,

Not only that your writing style is pathetic, even the content reeks of your ignorence. Studies world wide have documented that small land holders are the most efficient land users in highly populated countries like pakistan. A small holder cannot afford to keep the land fallow, he tries to get three crops, interspersed with fruit trees and vegetables, all his family takes part in agriculture even though it soesnot get inro the statistcs as wage earners. Large land lords resort to share cropping where half the out put goes to the land owner reducing the incentive for the farmer to increase productivity. It is well known that the economic progress of korea was underlined by the land reforms introduced by japanes during their occupation of korea.

It is well documented the increase in income and productivity after land reforms in kerala. Increased rural income can come about only after land reform because the rural wages will remain always depressed due to the abundant labour. Land reforms followed by provisioning of rural credit is the only hope for pakistan. Junaids assertions that creation of landlords increased may have initially increased the farm output because the land lords would have used improved inputs and also it was a periond of intruduction of high yielding varieties of crops, but I am certain that subsequent improvements in land productivity would have been negligible.

If I remeber correctly pakistan is a net food garin importer today. It is articles like this coming from half baked information is the tragedy of pakistan. You must be the rural ro,mair of chowk. You should be a good fertilizer in the slopes of kashmir, go become a jihadist.

Prem:


the feudal bashing is largely symbolic as most people aren`t moved into activity trying to bring about land reforms.

there are other avenues. you are correct. if there is availability of resources for the private sector to set up industrial ventures. since those are consumed for unproductive purposes like kashmir and diseased with an establishment (faujiz and babus) concerned about perks and pieces of the pie and privilages, that goes to hinder progress along those avenues.

this all is the result of a military dominated view of how a country is to be run.

consistent economic growth is difficult in absence of investment and lack of credit available (even nationalized banks have only so much).

but if the view of private business owners is anything to go by, stability and having institutionalized standards to follow would go a long way. this again is hindered by those who wield power.

For the uninitiated and curious, this is what the a typical Pakistani Urdu newspaper reads like. No coherence, no theme, just off the hip mumbo jumbo. Chowk is on life support and this time I am serious.

later
-sac

Dear Interlocutors,

Your learned opinion is required at a thread I started at Chowk unplugged in Civic Center folder.


Thanks.

I skimmed through this article and I think author has never been to a rural area in his life. Nevertheless, this article may serve as an impetus for a debate.

Pakistani intellectuals need to think honestly to solve this problem. Blanket denunciations of feudals serve no purpose.

No doubt, feudals have significant material power. But material power does not survive by itself. Ultimately, it is a society`s intellectual environment which either sustains or transforms its existing power structure.

In Pakistan, feudals do not create that intellectual environment. So, simple analysis tells us that the problem is deeper, or lies somewhere else.

From my casual observation, I see the macro situation in Pakistan as follows (a highly eccentric, layman`s view, which may have nothing to do with reality):

There are three main ``power groups`` in Pakistan. As an Indian, I see them as the three Brahmin castes of Pakistan,-each automatically assuming that they have the right to rule over others.

1. The feudals (traditional local landowners) in areas such as Sindh and Balochistan, 2. The military-mullah group, sustaining and legitimating each other by a combination of violence and religious emotionalism, and 3. the mohajirs (my bhai bandhu) whose cultural heritage has been declared to be the cultural heritage of Pakistan.

The military can not bring about serious reforms since it itself covets Pakistani land. So long as the generals and brigadiers can get land, the military has little incentive to make any large changes.

That leaves discussions of land reforms primarily in the hands of two parties with completely different interests - the original holders of land in areas like Sindh and Balochistan, and the mohajirs who currently don`t have land, and unlike the military, can not easily snatch it from current landholders.

Given the radically different social positions of these two groups, their mutual dialogue consists mainly of promoting their self interests under the garb of ``the national interests of Pakistan.`` This kind of dialogue can hardly be compelling.

So, instead of promoting constitutional changes in land ownership-which are unlikely to happen any time soon- other avenues must be found. Could, for instance, a consistently higher economic growth rate make issues of land-owership moot over time? What could be done to promote consistent economic growth? What should be done to promote social mobility? How can a widespread scientific and progressive spirit be cultivated so that people develop sources of thought, power, and influence other than the old perennials - religion, violence, and land?

These challenges are all about creating a specific intellectual environment. And intellectual environment, unless I am quite mistaken, is created primarily by the military-mullah combine, and my brother mohajirs.

Ultimately, then, the responsibilty for effecting changes being sought lies with these two groups of power players. Will they do the hard work needed to make the change? Or, will they continue to look for easy short cuts aimed merely at strengthening their own positions?

Rozaibaji

Thank you for your insights. Countries always go SOMEWHERE - I was wondering, truth be told, that since Pakistan`s focus was not going to be land reform, the growing population might not tend to urbanise and provide the basis for greater industrialisation - meaning if there is a work force, eventually SOME industry finds it profitable to use it (albeit at wages which may not be the best) - in the long run, surely that will be good? Anyway, regards and best wishes (to both you and Pakistan).

temporal:

lay off him temporal. if everyone could write fabulous poetic pieces in ten minutes, then your poems would no longer stand out.

ZafarA:

for all intents and purposes, because the tightly knit exitence of armed forces with the feudals and other members of establishment (ie the agricultural department itself), there can be no re-distribution of land.

the establishment was shaken with the devolution plan initiated by musharaf. but it turned out to be a farce. the ties amongst the thieves (army, landlords and establishment) are too strong to break as all parties have deep interest in keeping things the same.

the industrial sector in pakistan has been given heavely tax breaks and incentives to develop but it has not been able to advance much.

if we try to find out why, it`s not very difficult. on the one hand, few would be willing to invest in country with an unstable political atmosphere that constantly goes to the brink of war. because of the high level of debt, there is no money left to dole out toward industrial loans. compared to the level of financing avaibale say in the sixties, there is very little today. so no matter how many tax breaks are given, as long as the creditors can`t find confidence, there will be no significant investment.

the faujis continue to live off of the budget which forces the government to take out loans from the banks which should ideally go toward the private sector in activities which even if they fail are a thousand times more productive than a wasted soldier and a retarded general.
kashmir is an albatross the fauji fuks have placed on the neck of people. nawaz sharif was right, the indians were right. trade first, kashmir later.

to sum up your query, pakistan can go no where.

unless of course, that is if they be so kind, America signs a free trade pact and awards pakistan the most favored nation status getting rid of all quotas and signing off a few more billion dollars of debt.

Hmmm. OK, the landlords are wicked folk - but where does all this lead to?

I`d be interested in hearing some opinions of where Pakistan can or should go from this stage.

Some things which seem relevant to me include:

1 Enclosures
2 Industrial Revolution
3 The relative contributions of primary, secondary and tertiary (??) production to GDP in different countries (ie poor ones and rich ones)
4 Food security and Zimbabwe`s current situation.
5 ``City air smells of freedom``

Am I barking up the wrong tree(s)?

Regards

(T-ji, pleeeeease don`t trash my spelling/grammar - I`m doing the best that I can.)

ummm.. t ji, does it really matter if there are spelling errors if the content has substance to it? u could have also pointed out the errors without the caustic tone..

Ana

feudal system has only been beneficial for the rulers. and currently it benefits the Armed Forces of Pakistan.

It`s really very simple. There are plenty of proposals out there to get rid of the feudal system. Distribute land amongst separate folks with no land area exceeding 100 acres and MAKE sure that the current feudals don`t end up buying it back by signing contracts with the separate individual folks. The problem with all prior land reforms had been that the land was distributed to within family members and even if it was distributed to those outside, the feudals would buy the land back after a while. (the proposal i heard from a member of agricultural dept)

But the worst feudals today are the Armed forces of Pakistan with their schemes of federally funding brazend lands for irrigation and then handing it out FREE to retarded Fauji fuks. ie 40,000 acres irrigated in cholistan in the name of helping the poor there only to be given to those in stinky khaki suits.

like nothing else about faujiz makes sense, neither does this. provincial harmony doesn`t inccrease when a punjabi brigadier is getting fat off the land given to him in Sindh.

ps) the panchayat system i think is older than feudalism whose foundations were placed by the armed forces of Britain and taken over by the armed forces of Pakistan. the latter embraced feudalism in many forms including having their officers married within families of the Brutus` of Pakistan like chaudhary shujaat and pervez illahi. the brits could not have done as good a job of obtaining and getting self serving opportunists to join in bed.

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