A Movement in Religious Nationalism: Jami’at-ul-Ulama-i-Hind
Unknown November 11, 2003
#65 Posted by rsridhar on November 13, 2003 3:19:59 pm
#48 by vertex
``Here`s a radical thought: how about letting the Muslims decide if they want to stay or not! ``
Good idea. Let Mushy the dictator of Pakistan implement this concept in Baluchistan, Sindh and NWFP. But then, Pak does not even have a democracy. why talk of people`s rights? This is like a whore talking about chastity.
Sridhar
``Here`s a radical thought: how about letting the Muslims decide if they want to stay or not! ``
Good idea. Let Mushy the dictator of Pakistan implement this concept in Baluchistan, Sindh and NWFP. But then, Pak does not even have a democracy. why talk of people`s rights? This is like a whore talking about chastity.
Sridhar
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#66 Posted by vertex on November 13, 2003 4:08:47 pm
RationalFailth,
“In order to understand people like Vetex you need to look at the case of South Africa. When power shifted into the hands of the majority blacks, some Africaner whites who had ruthlessly ruled over the blacks rushed to demand a separate nation (Volkstaat). They were arguing that their `interests` will not be protected in a black South Africa ruled by the blacks. “
Before I begin, I want to make it clear that I support the right to self determination, but I am not making the claim that Muslims should give up on India and abandon it. Far from it. Just that it’s THEIR prerogative either way. Now…
Comparing the literal black and white issue of South Africa to the complexities of Muslim and hindu rule during the period of Muslim conquests shows the lack of historical depth these fascist types have.
Let’s not forget that you glossed over the fact that both Hindu and Muslim communities remained disjoint after British rule…where’s the comparison there? The idea was to forge a new Indian nation based, in large part, on these two communities from the territories that were controlled by the British (there was no ‘India’ per sae except this pre-1947). Now we have one community defining itself as de facto Indian, and the other (it seems – please do correct me if I’m wrong) viewed as “alien”. That comes across loud and clear in this article. What’s more, we have some people making demands on these aliens to effectively shed their Muslimness for some fictitious ‘Indian’ identity – ‘emotional’ integration, whatever the hell that means. It’s not enough that as a poltical entity Muslims are willing to work with Hindus, no…Muslims must cease to be Muslims and become Indians. Not just in political arena, but at the social level as well.
This very article proves how Islam is regarded as alien, were we have Muslims asserting themselves in a way that seems genuinely advocating cooperation with Hindus (and I would be the first to condemn the JUH if they in fact had ambitions to harm Hindus), and this is simply rejected as fanatical religious nationalism. In other words, anything to do with Islam is non-Indian – couldn’t possibly have anything to do with India, could it?. On the other hand, we have thinly veiled defense for the RSS types, who openly advocate hostility towards Muslims…and these guys are ‘Indian’ ultra-nationalists who apparently have some sort of legitimate historical basis for their hate – and even more ridiculous is that their views are somehow equivalent to those Muslims who regard themselves as a distinct community within India.
Emotional integration indeed. It seems like this integration is one way, where Muslims must integrate into a Hinduized India and Hindus are free to treat Islam like a foreign presence in their domain, to be tolerated only at a private level. Secularization of politics is one thing, the `secularization` of society is a different one…especially when this ‘secularization’ presumes the legitimacy of one relgio-cultural group in a region over the other.
The fact is, the Muslims talked about in this article supported India, and just because they had the ‘audacity’ to think that somehow they were a distinct community with different needs (which was more true at the time than now), they are somehow less Indian…traitors or usurpers in fact. The fact is these Muslims recognized the Hindu presence on the subcontinent as legitimate, and were willing to work along side them regardless on differences in view on how each should be governed.
The demand for the assimilation of Muslims is nothing more than the old-school politics of dominance that has been in the region for the longest while. It`s interesting that the view of Muslims is that of a people who have by and large created their own problem...so on the one hand we have half-hearted condemnation of the BJP types, but quickly we get stupid comments like (from the writer):
``In fact, they never made any assertive effort to define the role of Islam for relationship of Muslims with the Hindu-majority of India. In the absence of this fair play, their political Islam generated a negative doctrine of Hindutva against the Muslims.``
So even when muslims are targets/victims of hate, they in the end are somehow responsible. Wow...muslims `generated` the vitrolic varient of Hindutva...is their no end to the debauching of history?
“In order to understand people like Vetex you need to look at the case of South Africa. When power shifted into the hands of the majority blacks, some Africaner whites who had ruthlessly ruled over the blacks rushed to demand a separate nation (Volkstaat). They were arguing that their `interests` will not be protected in a black South Africa ruled by the blacks. “
Before I begin, I want to make it clear that I support the right to self determination, but I am not making the claim that Muslims should give up on India and abandon it. Far from it. Just that it’s THEIR prerogative either way. Now…
Comparing the literal black and white issue of South Africa to the complexities of Muslim and hindu rule during the period of Muslim conquests shows the lack of historical depth these fascist types have.
Let’s not forget that you glossed over the fact that both Hindu and Muslim communities remained disjoint after British rule…where’s the comparison there? The idea was to forge a new Indian nation based, in large part, on these two communities from the territories that were controlled by the British (there was no ‘India’ per sae except this pre-1947). Now we have one community defining itself as de facto Indian, and the other (it seems – please do correct me if I’m wrong) viewed as “alien”. That comes across loud and clear in this article. What’s more, we have some people making demands on these aliens to effectively shed their Muslimness for some fictitious ‘Indian’ identity – ‘emotional’ integration, whatever the hell that means. It’s not enough that as a poltical entity Muslims are willing to work with Hindus, no…Muslims must cease to be Muslims and become Indians. Not just in political arena, but at the social level as well.
This very article proves how Islam is regarded as alien, were we have Muslims asserting themselves in a way that seems genuinely advocating cooperation with Hindus (and I would be the first to condemn the JUH if they in fact had ambitions to harm Hindus), and this is simply rejected as fanatical religious nationalism. In other words, anything to do with Islam is non-Indian – couldn’t possibly have anything to do with India, could it?. On the other hand, we have thinly veiled defense for the RSS types, who openly advocate hostility towards Muslims…and these guys are ‘Indian’ ultra-nationalists who apparently have some sort of legitimate historical basis for their hate – and even more ridiculous is that their views are somehow equivalent to those Muslims who regard themselves as a distinct community within India.
Emotional integration indeed. It seems like this integration is one way, where Muslims must integrate into a Hinduized India and Hindus are free to treat Islam like a foreign presence in their domain, to be tolerated only at a private level. Secularization of politics is one thing, the `secularization` of society is a different one…especially when this ‘secularization’ presumes the legitimacy of one relgio-cultural group in a region over the other.
The fact is, the Muslims talked about in this article supported India, and just because they had the ‘audacity’ to think that somehow they were a distinct community with different needs (which was more true at the time than now), they are somehow less Indian…traitors or usurpers in fact. The fact is these Muslims recognized the Hindu presence on the subcontinent as legitimate, and were willing to work along side them regardless on differences in view on how each should be governed.
The demand for the assimilation of Muslims is nothing more than the old-school politics of dominance that has been in the region for the longest while. It`s interesting that the view of Muslims is that of a people who have by and large created their own problem...so on the one hand we have half-hearted condemnation of the BJP types, but quickly we get stupid comments like (from the writer):
``In fact, they never made any assertive effort to define the role of Islam for relationship of Muslims with the Hindu-majority of India. In the absence of this fair play, their political Islam generated a negative doctrine of Hindutva against the Muslims.``
So even when muslims are targets/victims of hate, they in the end are somehow responsible. Wow...muslims `generated` the vitrolic varient of Hindutva...is their no end to the debauching of history?
#67 Posted by vertex on November 13, 2003 4:08:47 pm
rsridhar,
If Pakistan is kept together by the gun or the whims of a few, then I don`t want it to exist.
A nation should be for it`s people, not the other way around. Clue in dude...
#68 Posted by vertex on November 13, 2003 4:08:47 pm
maharana,
”I have tried to show you a contrast where, one bigot is using factual information to further a discriminating ideology and the other furthering a bigoted vision based on an ideology of being different than the rest of humanity by virute of belonging to islam.”
Your attempt at giving credence to the re-workings of history by the hindutva types, and at the same time trivializing of any possible Muslim grievance or concern in a Hindu-dominated India shows your biases. Or are we supposed to deny the fact that the RSS and their likes aren’t tampering with history one bit?
No one is denying the brutality of some Muslim tyrants on the subcontinent, but the RSS is hell bent on portraying the entire Muslim presence as first, foremost, and possibly only an anti “hindu” exercise - to this day. Also, to bring that past up, defunct empires no less, to support contemporary political agendas is stupid. Your attitude is that at least there is some historical basis for their bigotry. That IS to some degree supporting their position. My argument is that history that old is irrelevant for our current relations. Is that really so difficult to see?
“The modern ideology of jewish state is based upon their experience of holocaust in a big way. Which is to defend their interests. And yes holocaust was real. Although the ideology furthered by them today cannot be justified, only understood in terms of their traumatic experience.”
Well so long as you insist that their ideology can no longer be justified, I somewhat agree. We can indeed sympathize with the sufferings of the Jewish people…however not to the extent that we point out that the Palestinians didn’t suffer the same amount, and so by default dismiss the Palestinian cause outright or pretend like they should have no issues and simply bend over and except Israeli domination.
“In the same way, RSS is trying to use the past as a tool to justify defending the interests of Hindu community. I understand their grievance, but do not believe, that anything justifies atrocities to avenge past genocide.”
Genocide?!?! Do you know what the word means? Genocide is a systematic campaign to eliminate a people. No honest reading of the (yes, often brutal) history of Muslim rule on the subcontinent can lead to that conclusion. This is the kind of re-working of history I’m talking about.
“And hence my argument again, ‘What arguments do the mullahs have in a nation where they have ruled and oppressed others to form a group/nation to protect their interests’. “
They, themselves, personally? What arguments are necessary other than current concerns? Historical ones? And who says these sentiments are restricted to mullahs?
”By the same logic, Brahmins, the much maligned community in india, should have demanded a separate nation…”
Let them. I can’t speak for Brahmins…I am not a Brahmin. If they want my support, they have to convince me and I’ll judge (like all of us would) based on a bunch of criteria. If they are suffering, I will gladly help them out in their time of suffering, but I can’t guarantee support for any of their causes. Give them their own state, for all I care...
“So here you have on one hand, muslims whose ancestors have persecuted the rest busy ``taking care of their interests`` today in light of imagined dangers, and the brahimns as the evil doers who should be punished without remorse for their ancestors` actions.”
Oh, let’s just invent arguments, whack down the straw man and call it a day. Nice.
And I love this generic “Muslims whose ancestors have persecuted”….business…hell, according to your reading of history my ancestors WERE persecuted, and converted to escape the living hell the evil doing Muslim hordes made India (from that previously pristine, just, heavenly, unified land)…that’s why I’m Muslim today…no? The RSS an imagined danger….ha ha….you’re a riot. And who the hell brought Brahmins into this?
Yes, Muslim rulers from time to time persecuted Hindus, (and other Muslims along sectarian/poltical lines, but we can’t let history get in the way of a good old fashion victim complex, can we?). But it’s interesting that your opinion of your ‘fellow’ Muslims is that of descendents of persecutors (like that has got anything to do with them, anyway), and not simply as ‘Indians’ …so much for unity.
You then later wrote,
“What you say is true. Unfortunately, in many regions of the world, muslims still would like to separate themselves from the others in the region and form a nation… We`re living in an age where the absolutist tendencies of religions are being brushed aside for the sake of progress and welfare for humanity in general. Unfortunately, some sections of the world population do not wish to give up their discriminating ideologies. “
Oh please. If anything is a bigger ‘discriminating ideology’, then I would say it is nationalism. What’s stopping me from making the same arguments about Hindus and Muslims vis a vis the former British Empire? Nooo…we pesky brownies wanted independence…spare me this human unity crap. You almost seem to be arguing against the concept of a nation altogether. If not, then at least bless us with your wisdom on who should and should not get their own nation.
#69 Posted by rsridhar on November 13, 2003 4:08:47 pm
re: Arun Shourie
I admire Shourie. I believe he is one of the few incorruptible people in Indian politics. That fact in itself should elevate him to a high esteem in many people`s eyes. But, he has more to his credit, many of which i will not repeat here and have been highlighted by Dost Mitterji.
I used to read his columns in a website called www.indiaconnect.com until he became a federal minister and stopped writing in that column (or they stopped publishing his articles). His articles are painstakingly researched. His article on madrassa education in Pakistan appeared in the early 90s even before this became a big issue.
He is a guy to watch out for and has all the potentials for being a P.M.
I don`t think he is anti-Pak or anti-muslim just because he is in BJP. He just goes by his own evaluation of the problems, which are usually backed by facts and research.
Sridhar
I admire Shourie. I believe he is one of the few incorruptible people in Indian politics. That fact in itself should elevate him to a high esteem in many people`s eyes. But, he has more to his credit, many of which i will not repeat here and have been highlighted by Dost Mitterji.
I used to read his columns in a website called www.indiaconnect.com until he became a federal minister and stopped writing in that column (or they stopped publishing his articles). His articles are painstakingly researched. His article on madrassa education in Pakistan appeared in the early 90s even before this became a big issue.
He is a guy to watch out for and has all the potentials for being a P.M.
I don`t think he is anti-Pak or anti-muslim just because he is in BJP. He just goes by his own evaluation of the problems, which are usually backed by facts and research.
Sridhar
#70 Posted by dost_mittar on November 13, 2003 5:14:26 pm
rsridhar:
``He is a guy to watch out for and has all the potentials for being a P.M.``
No, he lacks political instincts. I doubt if he can even get elected to the Parliament (he is in the Rajya Sabha). He would annoy Muslims today, dalits tomorrow and the RSS pracharaks the next day. Politics is the art of compromise, and Arun Shourie is anything but compromising.
``He just goes by his own evaluation of the problems, which are usually backed by facts and research. ``
You are right there! He basically has a problem-solving approach to issues, much like that Governor-wanna-be Bobby Jindal.
``He is a guy to watch out for and has all the potentials for being a P.M.``
No, he lacks political instincts. I doubt if he can even get elected to the Parliament (he is in the Rajya Sabha). He would annoy Muslims today, dalits tomorrow and the RSS pracharaks the next day. Politics is the art of compromise, and Arun Shourie is anything but compromising.
``He just goes by his own evaluation of the problems, which are usually backed by facts and research. ``
You are right there! He basically has a problem-solving approach to issues, much like that Governor-wanna-be Bobby Jindal.
#71 Posted by jang on November 13, 2003 5:40:33 pm
vertex various
arguments posed by vertex are very clear and perfect. and yet most indians (non-muslims) will find them disconcerting. this is because they have a visceral fear of anti-nationals, (however rational) like vertex. the indians know the construct of india as a nation, which gives them a sense of security, identity and hope. vertex is at a higher plane, where, such baby blankets are not needed. so while he disregards the fragile nationalism of indians with cold logic, i wonder if he is aware of the damage he does? does he care? so my guess is, he will shut his opponents, but not win their agreement.
arguments posed by vertex are very clear and perfect. and yet most indians (non-muslims) will find them disconcerting. this is because they have a visceral fear of anti-nationals, (however rational) like vertex. the indians know the construct of india as a nation, which gives them a sense of security, identity and hope. vertex is at a higher plane, where, such baby blankets are not needed. so while he disregards the fragile nationalism of indians with cold logic, i wonder if he is aware of the damage he does? does he care? so my guess is, he will shut his opponents, but not win their agreement.
#72 Posted by gujjubania on November 13, 2003 7:03:20 pm
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#73 Posted by Singh on November 13, 2003 9:13:31 pm
Vertex, ``flood of words, drops of reason`` ...
. Islam will always be viewed as an alien implant in Indian society as long as Islamo-fascist-racist notions of Muslims in India exist. In places where Hindus and Muslims believe in the concept of Secularism i.e. equal respect for all religions (essentially a Hindu concept), Hindus fast with Muslims during Ramzan ( I have done it too; its tough) and Muslims take part in festivals like Ganesh Chaturthi... but in places where Hindu pilgrims are burnt ... in a medieval fashion, please expect medieval reactions.
``vertex is at a higher plane, where, such baby blankets are not needed.`` - gee, an islamo-fascist-racist fan club .... coolll....
. Islam will always be viewed as an alien implant in Indian society as long as Islamo-fascist-racist notions of Muslims in India exist. In places where Hindus and Muslims believe in the concept of Secularism i.e. equal respect for all religions (essentially a Hindu concept), Hindus fast with Muslims during Ramzan ( I have done it too; its tough) and Muslims take part in festivals like Ganesh Chaturthi... but in places where Hindu pilgrims are burnt ... in a medieval fashion, please expect medieval reactions.
``vertex is at a higher plane, where, such baby blankets are not needed.`` - gee, an islamo-fascist-racist fan club .... coolll....
#74 Posted by RationalFaith on November 13, 2003 11:09:47 pm
Vertex
Your arguments have no legs.
I will return after Monday. We can discuss it then.
Your arguments have no legs.
I will return after Monday. We can discuss it then.
#75 Posted by gujjubania on November 13, 2003 11:52:50 pm
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#76 Posted by saminshah on November 14, 2003 12:01:10 am
The Lunatic Mainstream Vs A Slender Fringe
Arun Shourie
``Aap log jis jazbe aur walwalese Jihad karten hain, vo Bharati kutton, muaf kijiye, faujiyon ko apni bandookein uthane ka mauka bhi nahin milta`` -- the passion and fervour with which you wage Jihad does not leave the opportunity for these Bharati dogs, pardon us, these Bharati militarymen to even pick up their rifles. ``Agar aap isi tareh Bharati faujiyon ko makhi macchar ki tareh jahanum ki vaadiyon mein dhakelte rahe, to ankareeb Bharat ka koi bhi kutta muazarat fauji Kashmir ka rukh nahin karega`` -- if you continue to push them into hell in this way, like flies and mosquitoes, no Indian dog, begging you pardon, no Indian militaryman will dare look towards Kashmir. ``Phir aapke paas karne ko kuch nahin rahega`` -- and then nothing will be left for you to do. ``Doosri taraf yeh bhi khadsha hai ki jahanum ke daroga sahib aap se khafa ho jain, ki yeh kya gandagi aur gilazat ke anbaar meri taraf bhijwaye ja rahe ho`` -- on the other hand, there is the apprehension that the daroga of hell may get infuriated at you, and demand, ``What is this filth you are going on dispatching to me ?`` ``Kahin aisa na ho ki in gande keedon, muaf kije phir bhool ho gayi, Bharati faujiyon ka dakhila jahanum mein bhi band kar diya jaye`` -- and it should not come to pass, that the entry of these filthy worms into hell too gets stopped.
...
Daily Excelsior
July 30, 1999
Arun Shourie
``Aap log jis jazbe aur walwalese Jihad karten hain, vo Bharati kutton, muaf kijiye, faujiyon ko apni bandookein uthane ka mauka bhi nahin milta`` -- the passion and fervour with which you wage Jihad does not leave the opportunity for these Bharati dogs, pardon us, these Bharati militarymen to even pick up their rifles. ``Agar aap isi tareh Bharati faujiyon ko makhi macchar ki tareh jahanum ki vaadiyon mein dhakelte rahe, to ankareeb Bharat ka koi bhi kutta muazarat fauji Kashmir ka rukh nahin karega`` -- if you continue to push them into hell in this way, like flies and mosquitoes, no Indian dog, begging you pardon, no Indian militaryman will dare look towards Kashmir. ``Phir aapke paas karne ko kuch nahin rahega`` -- and then nothing will be left for you to do. ``Doosri taraf yeh bhi khadsha hai ki jahanum ke daroga sahib aap se khafa ho jain, ki yeh kya gandagi aur gilazat ke anbaar meri taraf bhijwaye ja rahe ho`` -- on the other hand, there is the apprehension that the daroga of hell may get infuriated at you, and demand, ``What is this filth you are going on dispatching to me ?`` ``Kahin aisa na ho ki in gande keedon, muaf kije phir bhool ho gayi, Bharati faujiyon ka dakhila jahanum mein bhi band kar diya jaye`` -- and it should not come to pass, that the entry of these filthy worms into hell too gets stopped.
...
Daily Excelsior
July 30, 1999
#77 Posted by saminshah on November 14, 2003 7:46:23 am
The Lunatic Mainstream Vs A Slender Fringe
Arun Shourie
``Aap log jis jazbe aur walwalese Jihad karten hain, vo Bharati kutton, muaf kijiye, faujiyon ko apni bandookein uthane ka mauka bhi nahin milta`` -- the passion and fervour with which you wage Jihad does not leave the opportunity for these Bharati dogs, pardon us, these Bharati militarymen to even pick up their rifles. ``Agar aap isi tareh Bharati faujiyon ko makhi macchar ki tareh jahanum ki vaadiyon mein dhakelte rahe, to ankareeb Bharat ka koi bhi kutta muazarat fauji Kashmir ka rukh nahin karega`` -- if you continue to push them into hell in this way, like flies and mosquitoes, no Indian dog, begging you pardon, no Indian militaryman will dare look towards Kashmir. ``Phir aapke paas karne ko kuch nahin rahega`` -- and then nothing will be left for you to do. ``Doosri taraf yeh bhi khadsha hai ki jahanum ke daroga sahib aap se khafa ho jain, ki yeh kya gandagi aur gilazat ke anbaar meri taraf bhijwaye ja rahe ho`` -- on the other hand, there is the apprehension that the daroga of hell may get infuriated at you, and demand, ``What is this filth you are going on dispatching to me ?`` ``Kahin aisa na ho ki in gande keedon, muaf kije phir bhool ho gayi, Bharati faujiyon ka dakhila jahanum mein bhi band kar diya jaye`` -- and it should not come to pass, that the entry of these filthy worms into hell too gets stopped.
Serious analysis in Khabarein, a leading paper of Lahore, of 10 July, laced with the ``wit`` and ``sarcasm`` that is typical of Pakistan`s Urdu press. The author proceeds to dissect the use of the word ``infiltrators`` by ``Indian beasts, beg your pardon, politicians`` to describe the mujahideen. These beasts were angry with Sonia Gandhi, he explains. She is more beautiful than Indian women, speaks good English, and is going to become the Indian Prime Minister in a short while, he says. Alarmed, the Indian politicians started saying that she was an ``infiltrator`` into the family of Jawaharlal Nehru. That is how the term came into wide use. When India`s crippled and temporary Prime Minister, Vajpayee, found his chair and dhoti slipping, the author explains, he started using this term for the mujahideen. But people know the reality. They know that the real infiltrators into Kashmir are Hindu banias, and Bharati dogs -- the militarymen -- who want to bark and bite like any dog...
Vajpayee comes in most for this kind of ``wit`` -- bar-e-sagheer ke do number shayaron ka dada, the second-rate don of petty poets... And Advani -- neem Pakistani aur adha Hindustani Kaliya... But since the ``Washington declaration`` of July 4, they are left far behind: Clinton is way ahead-- that almi shoharat yafta zani, that internationally notorious rapist, as the analyst of Ausaf refers to him in the issue of 19 July, or more frquently as that Shaitan Clinton, as Clinton the devil.
Indian forces are invariably referred to as Bharati kutte, as Indian dogs, as the darinda-sift Bharati afwaz, as the beast-like Indian forces... India continues to be pictured as a country on the verge of disintegration, as a country in the grip of Hindu banias, who are hell-bent on pursuing Brahmin imperialism.
When the Washington statement came out, at first several English-language papers tried to put a brave face on it. Some even pasted victory and statesmanship on it! The mujahideen have already achieved their objectives, they said: they have internationalized the Kashmir issue, and they have humiliated and demoralized the Indian Army and given it a bloody nose. And now with this declaration, Pakistan comes out looking flexible, in sharp contrast to India whose obduracy, whose ``totally rigid and purblind stand,`` whose ``dogmatism`` are now manifest to all. Nawaz Sharief was sought to be projected as the one who had saved the sub-continent, and therefore the world from a nuclear holocaust.
That phase passed swiftly. By now the refrain in Pakistan`s English press is that the country must do ``serious introspection``. Why did we embark on this adventure in the first place? If we had a clear objective, why did we abandon it so abruptly? If the Pakistan Army and Government had nothing to do with it, why did we start holding daily briefings by spokesmen of Pakistani defence forces? Why did we start projecting and celebrating the victories of the mujahideen as if these were of our forces? Why did we send our diplomats and ministers all over the world to argue their case? As the mujahideen rejected the Washington declaration outright, how come we were able to ensure that they vacated the positions they had conquered? What have our leaders accomplished except the total isolation of Pakistan?
We must as a country think whether we can ever wrest Kashmir out of India`s grip without a total war, analysts in the English press write, and we must seriously assess whether we can wage an all-out war. Can a country so weak economically, can a country so much in debt that it is vulnerable to every tug from the IMF etc, launch and sustain such a war?, the country should ask, they counsel. Whether international media, whether governments the world over are biased against us or not, should we not be worried that our ranking on ``the credibility index`` has fallen as low as our ranking on ``the human development index``?, they asked.
Analyses of this kind are what our papers reproduce, and our secularists are forever hectoring us to take them to be representative of Pakistani opinion. Alas!, they represent just the fringe. And even this fringe has enough who are able to read triumph into the thrashing Pakistan has received. Enough who believe that Pakistan scored a resounding victory and that it is only ``diplomatic sluggishness`` of the Pakistan Foreign Office which squandered it, that it is only Hindu-cunning which enabled India to ``mislead international opinion`` into taking a ``one-sided stand``. Enough who are ready to convince their countrymen that the mujahideen ``have inflicted the worst ever humiliation and casualties on the arrogant Indian armed forces,`` that ``they have done the whole Muslim ummah proud by their spirit of Jihad and that flame will burn undiminished by the vagaris of politics``. Enough who believe that the Clinton-Nawaz meeting ``marks the pinnacle of internationalization of the Kashmir issue ever achieved at any time in the past,`` that the mujahideen ``achieved the pinnacle of glory with an unmatched success in drawing world attention to the cause of freedom in Kashmir``. Enough who declare that Washington has asked India to respect the Line of Control. Enough who seriously argue that there were ``three objectives Pakistan wanted to achieve from the Kargil situation, namely internationalization of the Kashmir problem, attracting attention of the US President and averting full-fledged war with India,`` and that of these ``all have been achieved``. Enough to forecast that to ``assuage the grievously hurt Indian ego,`` Indians would pounce on the withdrawing mujahideen and cause a ``bloodbath``, that India could not but do so as the Government has stoked an unimaginable ``war hysteria`` all across India...
Enough who believe, to use the words of General Javed Nasir, that Kargil was a brilliant idea brilliantly executed, and that it could not succeed only because ``it lacked the will of Allah.`` Enough who don`t just go on parroting self-deluding nonsense. A typical example is the editorial of the Pakistan Observer of July 3: there is a revival of the Khalistan movement, it declares, and for good reason. The Khalistan movement leaders who have been compelled to take refuge in Europe remain concerned about the ``sufferings of the Sikh community``. More important, ``Concern has also been voiced about Hindu military command`s decision to deploy Sikh jawans and officers in the forward positions of Kargil in Kashmir to be the first target of the rot (sic) from across the Line of Control. Press reports indicate growing frustration among members of the Sikh community in the Indian society including the armed forces over the second class citizens` treatment being meted out to them. The revival of the Khalistan movement is, therefore, not only understandable but also justified, for the realisation of their just rights...`` And the outcome is certain: ``History bears testimony to the fact that no amount of suppression and repression can deprive individuals and communities determined to retrieve their rights. Sikhs too are, therefore, bound to be triumphant ultimately, irrespective of the excesses to which they are being subjected by the Hindu majority of India``. [These representative propositions and observations are taken from the issues of Dawn, News, Frontier Post, Pakistan Observer, and Nation from the last week of June and the first half of July.]
It isn`t just that there are enough even among the sensible fringe who believe this kind of nonsense, they urge it in their writings, they build plans on it. But the more important point is that the ones advancing this rubbish constitute the saner lot.
The mainstream is maniacal. Even a fortnight after the Pakistani forces began withdrawing even as the papers of the terrorist organizations themselves were denouncing Nawaz Sharief for selling out to that ``internationally notorious rapist``, speaker after speaker at the rallies was declaring that ``caravans of mujahideen are proceeding to Kargil at this very time.`` Ten days into the withdrawal the analyst of Ausaf is telling his readers. ``The kafirs are being subjugated. Siachin is slipping out of India`s occupation. Siachin and the kafirs are in danger Muslims and Islam are dominating...``` The next day another analyst writes, ``The Hindu bania understands only the language of force``, that, therefore, they must prepare themselves for a decisive war against India, that without such a war the Hindu bania will not withdraw from Kashmir till the day of kayamat. ``One should know that the Hindu understands the language of force. The Kashmiri mujahideen have disabled this cunning and wicked enemy with courage, and it is high time that the heinous mask of so-called democracy and peace should be removed from his face to expose the reality...``
A Jihad-e-Kashmir conference is held in Islamabad on 15 July. Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, head of the Markaz Dawa wal Irshad, the parent organization of the Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, declares that Sharif can go on giving assurances but he cannot make the mujahideen withdraw from Kargil. He announces that they will continue to occupy the positions they hold in Kargil and will devise a new strategy to move further. The Amir of Al Badr Mujahideen, Punjab, Ahmed Hamzah, declares that no one can dare ask them to vacate the heights, and challenges anyone who dares to try and enforce the Clinton-Nawaz agreement. Amir Hamza, the editor of the terrorist organization`s publication, Al Dawa, tells the conference that they do not need a coward for a Prime Minister -- one who does not even know the map of Kashmir. Hafiz Abdus Salam Bhatvi, leader of the Marakaz Dawa wal Irshad, declares that Jihad has become a flashpoint throughout the world, that they have rejected the Washington, Lahore and Tashkent declarations, that they do not recognise the Security Council, and that they will continue the Jihad. That being the case, the map of India is set to shrink, and that of Pakistan is set to expand. Abdul Aziz Alvi, Amir of the Markaz in PoK, declares that the Jihad will continue till Kashmir is liberated, that it will continue till the day of kayamat... Commander Bakht Zamin of Al Badr speaks over the wireless-- so the audience is told -- from Kargil. He announces that they are going to open new fronts soon...
Jang, Nawa-e-Waqt, Ausaf and other papers carry reports of a massive Sajjad-e-Shahid Conference held at Rawalkot on 17 July. They reproduce the posters: the war will continue till the destruction of India,`` ``Harkat ka ek ek mujahid, Atom Bomb, Atom Bomb.`` Each mujahid of the Harkat is an Atom Bomb, an Atom Bomb, ``Kal Roos bikharte dekha tha, ab India toot-te dekhenge``, We saw Russia disintegrate yesterday, we shall see India breaking up now; ``Ham barq-e-Jihad ke sholon mein America jalte dekhenge,`` we shall see America burn in the lightning of Jihad.. Kargil has become the battlefield of Karbala, the speakers shout. The mujahideen are following the path of the Prophet while Nawaz is following the path of Clinton, they proclaim. If the ruling elites do not give up their ways, they warn, the passions which have been unleashed against India can turn against Pakistan as well. Ten thousand or so are reported to have been present. To a man, woman and child they take a pledge to wage Jihad, they take the pledge of martyrdom. When thousands of children, youth and elderly persons begin taking the pledge of martyrdom, writes Hamid Mir about this event in Ausaf of July 19, efforts to block them are nothing but foolishness...
The Jang of that very day, July 19, reports that the Jihad organizations have decided to form a ``Kashmir Liberation Army to carry forward the Kargil experiment. The KLA will oust the Indian Army from Kashmir through a better organised, better coordinated, better equipped operation, it reports. It will aim at maximum self-reliance like the Kosovo Liberation Army. Affluent Kashmiris living abroad will happily provide the necessary funds. Arms and ammunition requirements will be met by different agencies throughout the world...
And there is the other symptom of paranoia: Pakistan must have more conspiracy-theorists per square inch than most countries in the world. Even the English press, that saner fringe, is studded with them. ``The US silence over the continued atrocities in the Kashmir slaughter house and denial of Kashmiri`s right to self-determination seems to be part of a bigger game,`` writes an analyst in the Frontier Post of 29 June, and asks, ``Who knows that the USA is not waiting for a full-scale war between India and Pakistan so that it could eventually turn Kashmir into another Kosovo for stationing US forces under the banner of NATO?`
``Had not the powers intervened to the disadvantage of the mujahideen, the intelligently planned operations by the Islamic militants and their victories in the Kargil-Drass sector might have catapulted India into an abyss of ignominy and darkness,`` declares the editorial of the Pakistan Times` of July 6. ``It is indeed painful to see the mujahideen`s cause suffering such a massive setback courtesy the malicious thinking of some leading countries of the world. At the heart of the entire situation lies the prejudice of the industrialized world that holds the freedom-fighters, rather the entire Muslim community as fundamentalists identifying them as enemies of modernization, or even civilization...``
The Urdu press is of course more fertile in imagining conspiracies. The Nawa-e-Waqt widens the objectives of the conspiracy. What the USA has done is in furtherance of its ``anti-Islam, anti-Pakistan and anti-China designs,`` it states in its editorial of 26 June...
The Jasarat in its Friday Special of 9 July informs its readers that what has been done is an American conspiracy directed in the first instance to alienate the Pakistan Government and the mujahideen from each other, and then, in the second round, to confront each other. Another article sketches an even more intricate conspiracy. Nawaz and Vajpayee are the tools the USA is using. Its objective is to have Pakistan and India sign the agreement on Kashmir which it wants. For this reason the USA first allowed Nawaz to acquire autocratic powers by neutralizing all other institutions. Vajpayee was floundering. Therefore, the drama of Jayalalitha withdrawing support was staged. That ensured elections. Now withdrawal from Kargil has been forced. This will help Vajpayee win the elections. The two leaders in the saddle, USA will get them to sign the agreement it wants, on the ground that unless that agreement is signed nuclear war will break out...
The Jang of 11 July invents yet another conspiracy. Ever since Pakistan exploded its nuclear bombs, the USA wanted to punish not just Nawaz Sharief but the people of Pakistan. It has settled the score this time with the Nawaz-Clinton talks... The Ausaf of the next day informs its readers that Nawaz Sharief, Benazir Bhutto and other politicians are acting to the plans of Zanjari, the International Organization of Jewish Leaders. The objective of Zanjari is to carve out a new State comprising Ladakh, Gilgit and the Northern Areas of Pakistan. Once formed, it will be headed by the Aga Khan or some puppet nominated by him... By 19 July, the conspiracy has widened to encompass Nawaz Sharief! Ausaf declares that Nawaz Sharief is about to hand over a list of mujahideen fighting in Kashmir to the Indian Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee...
A society saturated with poison against India, a society that is convinced that it had once again won a splendid victory and was cheated out of it, a society that is convinced that the world is conspiring against it, that all its problems flow from this fact, that, therefore, Jihad is the answer...
Can a minuscule fringe hold out against this -- the lunatic mainstream?
Daily Excelsior
July 30, 1999
Arun Shourie
``Aap log jis jazbe aur walwalese Jihad karten hain, vo Bharati kutton, muaf kijiye, faujiyon ko apni bandookein uthane ka mauka bhi nahin milta`` -- the passion and fervour with which you wage Jihad does not leave the opportunity for these Bharati dogs, pardon us, these Bharati militarymen to even pick up their rifles. ``Agar aap isi tareh Bharati faujiyon ko makhi macchar ki tareh jahanum ki vaadiyon mein dhakelte rahe, to ankareeb Bharat ka koi bhi kutta muazarat fauji Kashmir ka rukh nahin karega`` -- if you continue to push them into hell in this way, like flies and mosquitoes, no Indian dog, begging you pardon, no Indian militaryman will dare look towards Kashmir. ``Phir aapke paas karne ko kuch nahin rahega`` -- and then nothing will be left for you to do. ``Doosri taraf yeh bhi khadsha hai ki jahanum ke daroga sahib aap se khafa ho jain, ki yeh kya gandagi aur gilazat ke anbaar meri taraf bhijwaye ja rahe ho`` -- on the other hand, there is the apprehension that the daroga of hell may get infuriated at you, and demand, ``What is this filth you are going on dispatching to me ?`` ``Kahin aisa na ho ki in gande keedon, muaf kije phir bhool ho gayi, Bharati faujiyon ka dakhila jahanum mein bhi band kar diya jaye`` -- and it should not come to pass, that the entry of these filthy worms into hell too gets stopped.
Serious analysis in Khabarein, a leading paper of Lahore, of 10 July, laced with the ``wit`` and ``sarcasm`` that is typical of Pakistan`s Urdu press. The author proceeds to dissect the use of the word ``infiltrators`` by ``Indian beasts, beg your pardon, politicians`` to describe the mujahideen. These beasts were angry with Sonia Gandhi, he explains. She is more beautiful than Indian women, speaks good English, and is going to become the Indian Prime Minister in a short while, he says. Alarmed, the Indian politicians started saying that she was an ``infiltrator`` into the family of Jawaharlal Nehru. That is how the term came into wide use. When India`s crippled and temporary Prime Minister, Vajpayee, found his chair and dhoti slipping, the author explains, he started using this term for the mujahideen. But people know the reality. They know that the real infiltrators into Kashmir are Hindu banias, and Bharati dogs -- the militarymen -- who want to bark and bite like any dog...
Vajpayee comes in most for this kind of ``wit`` -- bar-e-sagheer ke do number shayaron ka dada, the second-rate don of petty poets... And Advani -- neem Pakistani aur adha Hindustani Kaliya... But since the ``Washington declaration`` of July 4, they are left far behind: Clinton is way ahead-- that almi shoharat yafta zani, that internationally notorious rapist, as the analyst of Ausaf refers to him in the issue of 19 July, or more frquently as that Shaitan Clinton, as Clinton the devil.
Indian forces are invariably referred to as Bharati kutte, as Indian dogs, as the darinda-sift Bharati afwaz, as the beast-like Indian forces... India continues to be pictured as a country on the verge of disintegration, as a country in the grip of Hindu banias, who are hell-bent on pursuing Brahmin imperialism.
When the Washington statement came out, at first several English-language papers tried to put a brave face on it. Some even pasted victory and statesmanship on it! The mujahideen have already achieved their objectives, they said: they have internationalized the Kashmir issue, and they have humiliated and demoralized the Indian Army and given it a bloody nose. And now with this declaration, Pakistan comes out looking flexible, in sharp contrast to India whose obduracy, whose ``totally rigid and purblind stand,`` whose ``dogmatism`` are now manifest to all. Nawaz Sharief was sought to be projected as the one who had saved the sub-continent, and therefore the world from a nuclear holocaust.
That phase passed swiftly. By now the refrain in Pakistan`s English press is that the country must do ``serious introspection``. Why did we embark on this adventure in the first place? If we had a clear objective, why did we abandon it so abruptly? If the Pakistan Army and Government had nothing to do with it, why did we start holding daily briefings by spokesmen of Pakistani defence forces? Why did we start projecting and celebrating the victories of the mujahideen as if these were of our forces? Why did we send our diplomats and ministers all over the world to argue their case? As the mujahideen rejected the Washington declaration outright, how come we were able to ensure that they vacated the positions they had conquered? What have our leaders accomplished except the total isolation of Pakistan?
We must as a country think whether we can ever wrest Kashmir out of India`s grip without a total war, analysts in the English press write, and we must seriously assess whether we can wage an all-out war. Can a country so weak economically, can a country so much in debt that it is vulnerable to every tug from the IMF etc, launch and sustain such a war?, the country should ask, they counsel. Whether international media, whether governments the world over are biased against us or not, should we not be worried that our ranking on ``the credibility index`` has fallen as low as our ranking on ``the human development index``?, they asked.
Analyses of this kind are what our papers reproduce, and our secularists are forever hectoring us to take them to be representative of Pakistani opinion. Alas!, they represent just the fringe. And even this fringe has enough who are able to read triumph into the thrashing Pakistan has received. Enough who believe that Pakistan scored a resounding victory and that it is only ``diplomatic sluggishness`` of the Pakistan Foreign Office which squandered it, that it is only Hindu-cunning which enabled India to ``mislead international opinion`` into taking a ``one-sided stand``. Enough who are ready to convince their countrymen that the mujahideen ``have inflicted the worst ever humiliation and casualties on the arrogant Indian armed forces,`` that ``they have done the whole Muslim ummah proud by their spirit of Jihad and that flame will burn undiminished by the vagaris of politics``. Enough who believe that the Clinton-Nawaz meeting ``marks the pinnacle of internationalization of the Kashmir issue ever achieved at any time in the past,`` that the mujahideen ``achieved the pinnacle of glory with an unmatched success in drawing world attention to the cause of freedom in Kashmir``. Enough who declare that Washington has asked India to respect the Line of Control. Enough who seriously argue that there were ``three objectives Pakistan wanted to achieve from the Kargil situation, namely internationalization of the Kashmir problem, attracting attention of the US President and averting full-fledged war with India,`` and that of these ``all have been achieved``. Enough to forecast that to ``assuage the grievously hurt Indian ego,`` Indians would pounce on the withdrawing mujahideen and cause a ``bloodbath``, that India could not but do so as the Government has stoked an unimaginable ``war hysteria`` all across India...
Enough who believe, to use the words of General Javed Nasir, that Kargil was a brilliant idea brilliantly executed, and that it could not succeed only because ``it lacked the will of Allah.`` Enough who don`t just go on parroting self-deluding nonsense. A typical example is the editorial of the Pakistan Observer of July 3: there is a revival of the Khalistan movement, it declares, and for good reason. The Khalistan movement leaders who have been compelled to take refuge in Europe remain concerned about the ``sufferings of the Sikh community``. More important, ``Concern has also been voiced about Hindu military command`s decision to deploy Sikh jawans and officers in the forward positions of Kargil in Kashmir to be the first target of the rot (sic) from across the Line of Control. Press reports indicate growing frustration among members of the Sikh community in the Indian society including the armed forces over the second class citizens` treatment being meted out to them. The revival of the Khalistan movement is, therefore, not only understandable but also justified, for the realisation of their just rights...`` And the outcome is certain: ``History bears testimony to the fact that no amount of suppression and repression can deprive individuals and communities determined to retrieve their rights. Sikhs too are, therefore, bound to be triumphant ultimately, irrespective of the excesses to which they are being subjected by the Hindu majority of India``. [These representative propositions and observations are taken from the issues of Dawn, News, Frontier Post, Pakistan Observer, and Nation from the last week of June and the first half of July.]
It isn`t just that there are enough even among the sensible fringe who believe this kind of nonsense, they urge it in their writings, they build plans on it. But the more important point is that the ones advancing this rubbish constitute the saner lot.
The mainstream is maniacal. Even a fortnight after the Pakistani forces began withdrawing even as the papers of the terrorist organizations themselves were denouncing Nawaz Sharief for selling out to that ``internationally notorious rapist``, speaker after speaker at the rallies was declaring that ``caravans of mujahideen are proceeding to Kargil at this very time.`` Ten days into the withdrawal the analyst of Ausaf is telling his readers. ``The kafirs are being subjugated. Siachin is slipping out of India`s occupation. Siachin and the kafirs are in danger Muslims and Islam are dominating...``` The next day another analyst writes, ``The Hindu bania understands only the language of force``, that, therefore, they must prepare themselves for a decisive war against India, that without such a war the Hindu bania will not withdraw from Kashmir till the day of kayamat. ``One should know that the Hindu understands the language of force. The Kashmiri mujahideen have disabled this cunning and wicked enemy with courage, and it is high time that the heinous mask of so-called democracy and peace should be removed from his face to expose the reality...``
A Jihad-e-Kashmir conference is held in Islamabad on 15 July. Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, head of the Markaz Dawa wal Irshad, the parent organization of the Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, declares that Sharif can go on giving assurances but he cannot make the mujahideen withdraw from Kargil. He announces that they will continue to occupy the positions they hold in Kargil and will devise a new strategy to move further. The Amir of Al Badr Mujahideen, Punjab, Ahmed Hamzah, declares that no one can dare ask them to vacate the heights, and challenges anyone who dares to try and enforce the Clinton-Nawaz agreement. Amir Hamza, the editor of the terrorist organization`s publication, Al Dawa, tells the conference that they do not need a coward for a Prime Minister -- one who does not even know the map of Kashmir. Hafiz Abdus Salam Bhatvi, leader of the Marakaz Dawa wal Irshad, declares that Jihad has become a flashpoint throughout the world, that they have rejected the Washington, Lahore and Tashkent declarations, that they do not recognise the Security Council, and that they will continue the Jihad. That being the case, the map of India is set to shrink, and that of Pakistan is set to expand. Abdul Aziz Alvi, Amir of the Markaz in PoK, declares that the Jihad will continue till Kashmir is liberated, that it will continue till the day of kayamat... Commander Bakht Zamin of Al Badr speaks over the wireless-- so the audience is told -- from Kargil. He announces that they are going to open new fronts soon...
Jang, Nawa-e-Waqt, Ausaf and other papers carry reports of a massive Sajjad-e-Shahid Conference held at Rawalkot on 17 July. They reproduce the posters: the war will continue till the destruction of India,`` ``Harkat ka ek ek mujahid, Atom Bomb, Atom Bomb.`` Each mujahid of the Harkat is an Atom Bomb, an Atom Bomb, ``Kal Roos bikharte dekha tha, ab India toot-te dekhenge``, We saw Russia disintegrate yesterday, we shall see India breaking up now; ``Ham barq-e-Jihad ke sholon mein America jalte dekhenge,`` we shall see America burn in the lightning of Jihad.. Kargil has become the battlefield of Karbala, the speakers shout. The mujahideen are following the path of the Prophet while Nawaz is following the path of Clinton, they proclaim. If the ruling elites do not give up their ways, they warn, the passions which have been unleashed against India can turn against Pakistan as well. Ten thousand or so are reported to have been present. To a man, woman and child they take a pledge to wage Jihad, they take the pledge of martyrdom. When thousands of children, youth and elderly persons begin taking the pledge of martyrdom, writes Hamid Mir about this event in Ausaf of July 19, efforts to block them are nothing but foolishness...
The Jang of that very day, July 19, reports that the Jihad organizations have decided to form a ``Kashmir Liberation Army to carry forward the Kargil experiment. The KLA will oust the Indian Army from Kashmir through a better organised, better coordinated, better equipped operation, it reports. It will aim at maximum self-reliance like the Kosovo Liberation Army. Affluent Kashmiris living abroad will happily provide the necessary funds. Arms and ammunition requirements will be met by different agencies throughout the world...
And there is the other symptom of paranoia: Pakistan must have more conspiracy-theorists per square inch than most countries in the world. Even the English press, that saner fringe, is studded with them. ``The US silence over the continued atrocities in the Kashmir slaughter house and denial of Kashmiri`s right to self-determination seems to be part of a bigger game,`` writes an analyst in the Frontier Post of 29 June, and asks, ``Who knows that the USA is not waiting for a full-scale war between India and Pakistan so that it could eventually turn Kashmir into another Kosovo for stationing US forces under the banner of NATO?`
``Had not the powers intervened to the disadvantage of the mujahideen, the intelligently planned operations by the Islamic militants and their victories in the Kargil-Drass sector might have catapulted India into an abyss of ignominy and darkness,`` declares the editorial of the Pakistan Times` of July 6. ``It is indeed painful to see the mujahideen`s cause suffering such a massive setback courtesy the malicious thinking of some leading countries of the world. At the heart of the entire situation lies the prejudice of the industrialized world that holds the freedom-fighters, rather the entire Muslim community as fundamentalists identifying them as enemies of modernization, or even civilization...``
The Urdu press is of course more fertile in imagining conspiracies. The Nawa-e-Waqt widens the objectives of the conspiracy. What the USA has done is in furtherance of its ``anti-Islam, anti-Pakistan and anti-China designs,`` it states in its editorial of 26 June...
The Jasarat in its Friday Special of 9 July informs its readers that what has been done is an American conspiracy directed in the first instance to alienate the Pakistan Government and the mujahideen from each other, and then, in the second round, to confront each other. Another article sketches an even more intricate conspiracy. Nawaz and Vajpayee are the tools the USA is using. Its objective is to have Pakistan and India sign the agreement on Kashmir which it wants. For this reason the USA first allowed Nawaz to acquire autocratic powers by neutralizing all other institutions. Vajpayee was floundering. Therefore, the drama of Jayalalitha withdrawing support was staged. That ensured elections. Now withdrawal from Kargil has been forced. This will help Vajpayee win the elections. The two leaders in the saddle, USA will get them to sign the agreement it wants, on the ground that unless that agreement is signed nuclear war will break out...
The Jang of 11 July invents yet another conspiracy. Ever since Pakistan exploded its nuclear bombs, the USA wanted to punish not just Nawaz Sharief but the people of Pakistan. It has settled the score this time with the Nawaz-Clinton talks... The Ausaf of the next day informs its readers that Nawaz Sharief, Benazir Bhutto and other politicians are acting to the plans of Zanjari, the International Organization of Jewish Leaders. The objective of Zanjari is to carve out a new State comprising Ladakh, Gilgit and the Northern Areas of Pakistan. Once formed, it will be headed by the Aga Khan or some puppet nominated by him... By 19 July, the conspiracy has widened to encompass Nawaz Sharief! Ausaf declares that Nawaz Sharief is about to hand over a list of mujahideen fighting in Kashmir to the Indian Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee...
A society saturated with poison against India, a society that is convinced that it had once again won a splendid victory and was cheated out of it, a society that is convinced that the world is conspiring against it, that all its problems flow from this fact, that, therefore, Jihad is the answer...
Can a minuscule fringe hold out against this -- the lunatic mainstream?
Daily Excelsior
July 30, 1999
#78 Posted by saminshah on November 14, 2003 7:46:23 am
What Propels Them? What Blinds Them?
Arun Shourie
``India has massacred 60,000 Kashmiris, but the people of Kashmir will never rest till they have won freedom;`` ``India has deployed 700,000 soldiers in the Valley, and yet the Kashmiri mujahideen are inflicting heavy losses on them every day;`` ``How laughable it is that India has packed the Kargil sector with 40,000 troops, and just a handful of mujahidin are able to inflict humiliation upon humiliation on them;`` Indian infrastructure has collapsed to such an extent that even those Indian casualties which were ``lucky enough to be evacuated by air, had to wait for three days for a bed in Srinagar hospitals`` -- such ``facts`` are repeated ad nauseum in Pakistani papers. Sixty thousand Kashmiris killed by India? Seven hundred thousand troops in Kashmir? Forty thousand troops in Kargil? Soldiers waiting for three days to get a hospital bed? We tend to dismiss such assertions as the usual lies -- friends who run one of our most conscientious news services about happenings in our neighbourhood, Public Opinion Trends, are so inured to these concoctions that they excise them from their reports! In fact, the concoctions deserve attention.
For one thing they are part of a world-view, they are part of an Ideology. Everything Pakistan does about Kashmir -- stoking terrorism, sending army regulars, spreading fabrications at every international gathering -- it pictures to itself as jihad, as a religious undertaking, indeed as an Allah-ordained duty. Concocting lies then becomes a device for discharging that duty. ``War is stratagem,`` the Prophet has said, ``War is deceit.`` [Sahih Muslim, Volume III, pp. 945, 990-91; Sahih al-Bukhari, Volume IV, pp. 166-67; Sunan Abu Dawud, Volume II, p. 728] Thus one may lie, one may kill the enemy while he is asleep, one may kill him by tricking him. [For instance, Sahih al-Bukhari, Volume IV, pp. 164-65, 167-68.] That is one problem: for the man or force weaned on jihad, the concoctions are an intrinsic part of the struggle he is waging, for him the fact that the war he is waging is Allah-ordained is a complete justification for cruelty, for lies and the rest; on our side, we don`t just shut our eyes to the concoctions that result from it, we shut our eyes even more tightly to the Ideology of which they are but the result.
There is an immediate, practical result also. These sorts of ``facts`` and assertions are repeated so often that by now they have sunk into the subconscious of the average Pakistani. He actually believes that India has massacred sixty thousand Kashmiris, he actually believes that Kashmir is aflame, that Kashmiris are dying to merge into Pakistan, that it is just a matter of months and they will be able to do so. From this it is but a step to conclude that all that is necessary is to give one more push, to launch one more offensive, and the Kashmiris will rise, the place will go up in flames, India will be broken, the job will be done.
The believer, having internalised the concoction, just can`t see why the world doesn`t believe what he is putting out. As we have seen, Pakistani papers had themselves been reporting -- with evident self-congratulation -- that soldiers of the Pakistan Army have wrested posts from the Indian Army, that they have occupied a village in... As international opinion turned against Pakistan for that very reason, suddenly, as if a switch had been turned, references to the Pakistan Army ceased, and the victories were ascribed to the valiant mujahidin. Within days, references to these mythical mujahidin too were replaced -- now it was the ``Kashmiri freedom fighters`` who were inflicting the ``humiliating defeats`` on the Indian Army. One feature of course is that these switches come naturally -- as the war is a jihad in the cause of Allah, whichever thesis will serve The Great Cause is the one which must be pushed. The other is that the believer is just not able to see why the world does not swallow his fabrication.
As everything is a matter of belief in Allah, to question the ``fact`` which has been put out, to doubt a scenario -- the sheikhchili`s scenario in which one favourable twist leads to another devastating turn -- becomes blasphemy, it becomes proof that one lacks faith, it is betrayal. Thus, not to believe that Indians have massacred sixty thousand Kashmiris, to doubt that Kashmir is on the brink of breaking away from India, not to believe that Kashmiris are pining to join Pakistan is to be unpatriotic, it is to lack faith in the fundamental notion that, as they all believe in Islam, all Muslims constitute one, seamless ummah. As a consequence, while not even the allies and props of Pakistan are buying its assertions today, self-delusion remains a duty!
The insurgency which Pakistan had orchestrated in Kashmir is dead: to cite a single index, while the number of tourists in the Valley had fallen to just 600 in 1996, this year they are running close to 250,000. Recruitment of locals has evaporated. But in the Pakistani press the insurgency is at the point of overturning the Indian State! A fundamental change has taken place in the area, writes a commentator in The News of 3 June. `` ...Freedom fighters in Kashmir have attained self-sufficiency in weapons and have developed indigenous techniques of fighting which have become a way of life for them,`` he writes. ``They fight under the cover of darkness, under the protection of mountains and in their own area which they know very well. They move in the area like wild goats and can reach anywhere without any difficulty. They return to their homes and hearths in the morning after accomplishing their task and join their family on the jobs which are needed to be done to earn livelihood.`` ``Two weeks of fighting in the Kargil sector have established the following facts,`` the analyst continues. ``That the indigenous insurrection movement in Kashmir is so strong and so well-armed that India can no longer hold it in check. It is also no longer possible for India to cross the international boundary and so the fighting will remain confined to Kashmir where India has always been the loser...``
``On the diplomatic front the Indians are playing on the back-foot,`` writes an analyst in The News of 4 June. ``....The Kargil operation [of India], aimed at killing the Kashmir issue, will have helped to chisel away at the paralysed and hardened Kashmir position of the international players [an acknowledgment there!]. And the Kashmiris living under Indian control know that. Much like the Intifada which proved to be a potent stimulus for the Palestinians under Israeli occupation, India`s Kargil fiasco will renew the Kashmiri resolve to fight on. Psychologically, the fact that a mere 400 - 600 mujahidin have bogged down the world`s third largest army for a few months, irrespective of the final outcome [another acknowledgment there!], will be a major morale booster for the Kashmiris of Kashmir.`` The diplomatic isolation of Pakistan is for all to see, but the analyst remarks, ``Nawaz Sharief meanwhile, ably supported on foreign policy issues by his Information Minister and Foreign Office, has pursued a near-faultless India policy. He has mixed peace offers with commitment to his country`s defence and projected nuclear strength with gentleness. He is indeed South Asia`s strong man of peace....`` Remember, The News is the paper which was till recently the special target of the attentions of Nawaz Sharief and his Information Minister!
Belief makes one not just blind, it makes one reckless. The Taliban in the madrasas are of course fed Quranic stories of the ``wars`` of Badr etc. But they are not the only ones. The regular soldier and officer of the Pakistani Army has them drilled into him just as deep. And the lesson from these stories which is stuffed into him is not some particular stratagem to be followed in a siege or an assault, say; the lesson he internalises is that Allah shall always come to the aid of believers, that the side of Allah shall prevail. So all one has to do is leap.
One of the things that strikes one in reading books from Pakistan, the analyses in their newspapers, judgments of their courts is the singular absence of subtlety, of shades. The analyses are gross: the categories are basic, the conclusions predictable. This is not the result merely of mental habits or capacities. Ideology makes grossness inevitable. Everything is either black or white, everyone is either a co-religionist or one who will some day deceive one, every engagement is going to turn out one way -- capitalism is certain to collapse, it is on the verge of collapsing, Allah is bound to come to the assistance of believers, His cause is bound to prevail...
There is another consequence -- Pakistani newspapers are replete with instances of it. The belief having been drilled into him that he is doing Allah`s Will -- or, as in Marxism-Leninism, of History -- the believer just cannot believe that the fault may lie with him. As the war he is waging has been ordained by Allah, the one who is opposing him must, by definition, be doing so for some perverse reason, for some ulterior purpose. Pakistanis have been genuinely surprised at Washington`s statements disapproving their crossing the Line of Control. They just cannot see that Pakistan might be in the wrong. Their analysts hint that the USA is tilting towards India because it is drooling at the prospect of India`s large market! Commenting on a statement of the American Secretary of State, The Nation of June 6 remarks ruefully, ``India being the bigger market for trade does not mean that the world should give up its moral values on political issues``! By the 8th, the paper is hinting at some even deeper mystery! Repeating the new fabrications on the Line of Control, the paper remarks in an editorial, ``If despite India`s strange illogicality, the US State Department chooses to buy the Indian accusations and discounts the Pakistani version of the incident, there has to be more to it than a fair assessment of the situation``!
The Indians cannot be fighting Pakistani troops because they have occupied Indian territory. They are doing so for some other, unworthy, deplorable reasons. Vajpayee is facing an election, and launching a war against Pakistan has been his party`s traditional way of gathering votes! ``The BJP government has collapsed despite its `popular` nuclear policy,`` observes Najam Sethi`s The Friday Times of 4-10 June in its editorial, ``but it still clings to the old political tricks to garner votes. It is also hostage to an aggressive policy in Kashmir. If it lets up, the Congress will pillory it by adopting a more hawkish stance. India`s politicians have therefore hog-tied themselves by their devotion to this vote-getting gimmick...`` ``They [the Indian politicians] have made de-escalation more difficult all round,`` it continues -- Pakistani troops cross the Line of Control, our forces, by fighting back, make de-escalation difficult! ``The Congress government committed the `popular` folly of sending troops to Siachin. But no later government has dared to withdraw troops from it...`` So long as Pakistani troops were occupying Siachin it was far-sightedness, it became folly when Indians occupied it! And daring would consist in vacating Siachin for the Pakistani Army, not in holding it!
In this analysis the BJP government is strong enough to push its ``old tricks to garner votes``. In other analyses, the reason is the opposite! Writing in The Nation of 28 May, an analyst tells his readers that an Interim, weak government is in office in Delhi, and that ``hawks in the Indian military establishment are ruling the roost,`` and that this is what accounts for the scale of the response, the air-strikes and the rest!
But such objective factors -- ``old political tricks to garner votes`` and the like -- are never enough for a believer. He must detect something deep, some fundamental perversity in the one who is being so obdurate as not to fall at the believer`s feet. Predictably, therefore, that staple of Pakistani papers has returned: ``Hindu cunning``! And this time, just as predictably, Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee is the epitome of it. ``Mr Vajpayee has proved more two-faced than his predecessor,`` notes The Friday Times. ``Vajpayee -- the man who showed statesmanship by describing his visit to Minar Pakistan as `the defining moment in history` -- has only appeared at the bar of history as a clumsy pygmy,`` The News of 30 May tells its readers. ``A short-sighted and pathetically parochial politician whose instincts for political survival are both reactionary and jingoistic. His passion for the cheap thrill coupled with the BJP`s desire to regain a foothold in contemporary Indian politics have resulted in airstrikes on Kashmiri freedom fighters...``
It isn`t just information from which Ideology insulates one. Ideology insulates one from experience just as much. When the believer succeeds, he is confirmed in the belief that the Ideology has driven into him -- that Allah is with him. But the Ideology has also driven another notion into him -- a notion that protects the Ideology from an adverse outcome, but by the same token disables the believer from learning. When they are defeated, the faithful have been taught to conclude, Allah is just testing their faith: Allah has put defeat in their path, they have been taught, to ascertain whether at such a time they lose faith in Allah`s promise. Do they abandon their faith in Allah?, Allah wants to see. Do they blame Him rather than themselves?, Allah wants to make sure.
This Ideology-induced deafness is compounded in the case of Pakistan by the essentially authoritarian nature of both -- its society as well as polity. In free, democratic societies there is incessant self-examination. In authoritarian societies pasting blame on The Other becomes nature. The defeat in Vietnam caused an enormous amount of introspection in America: it led, among other things, to new strategic thinking, to new technologies. The rout in Bangladesh caused none in Pakistan. We see the same sequence today. Indian forces are rolling back the Pakistanis in Kargil. Internationally Pakistan stands isolated as never before. But Pakistani press is singing hosannas: the success of the mujahideen in holding the Indian Army at bay has inspired the freedom fighters of Kashmir, they sing to themselves, the uprising against India will now reach new heights; the Kashmir issue has been ``irretrievably internationalized,`` they exult; the world now realizes that Kashmir can be the nuclear flash-point, they declare to their own satisfaction.
These features hold for Pakistanis in general, immersed as they are in, committed as they are to an Ideology, Islam. Each of them is compounded ten-fold in the case of the officer and soldier of the Pakistan Army. Stephen Cohen has noted how the ``Sandhurst`` and ``American`` generations of their officers have passed, how the officer-class consists increasingly of persons from the lower middle class and peasant stock. In the country at large these classes are among the ones which have been swept up most by Islamic rhetoric: and, what with the continuing collapse of educational institutions, at an accelerating pace. The success which the Army has achieved through the Taliban in Afghanistan also buttresses the notion that ``the time of Islam has returned``.
There are other factors too. The more intense Islamic rhetoric has become, the more cut-off from outside influences and opinions Pakistan has become, the Army even more so than other sections: almost the only thing which has kept an aperture open to the rest of the world is Pakistan`s technological backwardness -- because of this backwardness, it has had to continue relying on other countries for technical upgradation, and hence some contrary ideas must still be sneaking in. But it is a tiny aperture: the countries from whom it secures the weapons are also ones whose life and ways its Ideology teaches it to hate and reject.
Not only is the Army, like other sections of Pakistani society, insulated from the world, it is insulated from those other sections within Pakistan too. The Army is overwhelmingly Punjabi. Within that one province, its recruits are overwhelmingly from a small clutch of five or six districts.
Furthermore, that the Army has such an over-weaning, predominant status in Pakistani society and governance impels a certain deafness: few dare question what it says and does, all the greater reason for the Army to conclude that what it is thinking is valid. And there is another twist. The Pakistani Army has great power, overwhelming power vis a vis other sections of society, but not esteem. That went -- first with the way it lost Pakistan in 1971, and then with the mess that the Army made of the country during the years it had absolute sway, the Zia years. Since then, while the success in Afghanistan has restored its esteem somewhat, this is counter-balanced with the reputation for corruption, the reputation for being involved in the drug-trade etc. which have got stuck to it.
To the faith of the believer, therefore, has been added a compulsion -- to prove itself again.
Each of these factors applies to organizations like the ISI twenty-fold. And to the terrorist organizations the ISI etc. have spawned -- a hundred-fold.
In a word, Kargil is but the latest of what Pakistan will continue to inflict on us. Defeating each such venture with demonstrative harshness is as much a part of the peace-process as pursuing every opening like Lahore.
The Afternoon Despatch & Courier
June 25, 1999
Arun Shourie
``India has massacred 60,000 Kashmiris, but the people of Kashmir will never rest till they have won freedom;`` ``India has deployed 700,000 soldiers in the Valley, and yet the Kashmiri mujahideen are inflicting heavy losses on them every day;`` ``How laughable it is that India has packed the Kargil sector with 40,000 troops, and just a handful of mujahidin are able to inflict humiliation upon humiliation on them;`` Indian infrastructure has collapsed to such an extent that even those Indian casualties which were ``lucky enough to be evacuated by air, had to wait for three days for a bed in Srinagar hospitals`` -- such ``facts`` are repeated ad nauseum in Pakistani papers. Sixty thousand Kashmiris killed by India? Seven hundred thousand troops in Kashmir? Forty thousand troops in Kargil? Soldiers waiting for three days to get a hospital bed? We tend to dismiss such assertions as the usual lies -- friends who run one of our most conscientious news services about happenings in our neighbourhood, Public Opinion Trends, are so inured to these concoctions that they excise them from their reports! In fact, the concoctions deserve attention.
For one thing they are part of a world-view, they are part of an Ideology. Everything Pakistan does about Kashmir -- stoking terrorism, sending army regulars, spreading fabrications at every international gathering -- it pictures to itself as jihad, as a religious undertaking, indeed as an Allah-ordained duty. Concocting lies then becomes a device for discharging that duty. ``War is stratagem,`` the Prophet has said, ``War is deceit.`` [Sahih Muslim, Volume III, pp. 945, 990-91; Sahih al-Bukhari, Volume IV, pp. 166-67; Sunan Abu Dawud, Volume II, p. 728] Thus one may lie, one may kill the enemy while he is asleep, one may kill him by tricking him. [For instance, Sahih al-Bukhari, Volume IV, pp. 164-65, 167-68.] That is one problem: for the man or force weaned on jihad, the concoctions are an intrinsic part of the struggle he is waging, for him the fact that the war he is waging is Allah-ordained is a complete justification for cruelty, for lies and the rest; on our side, we don`t just shut our eyes to the concoctions that result from it, we shut our eyes even more tightly to the Ideology of which they are but the result.
There is an immediate, practical result also. These sorts of ``facts`` and assertions are repeated so often that by now they have sunk into the subconscious of the average Pakistani. He actually believes that India has massacred sixty thousand Kashmiris, he actually believes that Kashmir is aflame, that Kashmiris are dying to merge into Pakistan, that it is just a matter of months and they will be able to do so. From this it is but a step to conclude that all that is necessary is to give one more push, to launch one more offensive, and the Kashmiris will rise, the place will go up in flames, India will be broken, the job will be done.
The believer, having internalised the concoction, just can`t see why the world doesn`t believe what he is putting out. As we have seen, Pakistani papers had themselves been reporting -- with evident self-congratulation -- that soldiers of the Pakistan Army have wrested posts from the Indian Army, that they have occupied a village in... As international opinion turned against Pakistan for that very reason, suddenly, as if a switch had been turned, references to the Pakistan Army ceased, and the victories were ascribed to the valiant mujahidin. Within days, references to these mythical mujahidin too were replaced -- now it was the ``Kashmiri freedom fighters`` who were inflicting the ``humiliating defeats`` on the Indian Army. One feature of course is that these switches come naturally -- as the war is a jihad in the cause of Allah, whichever thesis will serve The Great Cause is the one which must be pushed. The other is that the believer is just not able to see why the world does not swallow his fabrication.
As everything is a matter of belief in Allah, to question the ``fact`` which has been put out, to doubt a scenario -- the sheikhchili`s scenario in which one favourable twist leads to another devastating turn -- becomes blasphemy, it becomes proof that one lacks faith, it is betrayal. Thus, not to believe that Indians have massacred sixty thousand Kashmiris, to doubt that Kashmir is on the brink of breaking away from India, not to believe that Kashmiris are pining to join Pakistan is to be unpatriotic, it is to lack faith in the fundamental notion that, as they all believe in Islam, all Muslims constitute one, seamless ummah. As a consequence, while not even the allies and props of Pakistan are buying its assertions today, self-delusion remains a duty!
The insurgency which Pakistan had orchestrated in Kashmir is dead: to cite a single index, while the number of tourists in the Valley had fallen to just 600 in 1996, this year they are running close to 250,000. Recruitment of locals has evaporated. But in the Pakistani press the insurgency is at the point of overturning the Indian State! A fundamental change has taken place in the area, writes a commentator in The News of 3 June. `` ...Freedom fighters in Kashmir have attained self-sufficiency in weapons and have developed indigenous techniques of fighting which have become a way of life for them,`` he writes. ``They fight under the cover of darkness, under the protection of mountains and in their own area which they know very well. They move in the area like wild goats and can reach anywhere without any difficulty. They return to their homes and hearths in the morning after accomplishing their task and join their family on the jobs which are needed to be done to earn livelihood.`` ``Two weeks of fighting in the Kargil sector have established the following facts,`` the analyst continues. ``That the indigenous insurrection movement in Kashmir is so strong and so well-armed that India can no longer hold it in check. It is also no longer possible for India to cross the international boundary and so the fighting will remain confined to Kashmir where India has always been the loser...``
``On the diplomatic front the Indians are playing on the back-foot,`` writes an analyst in The News of 4 June. ``....The Kargil operation [of India], aimed at killing the Kashmir issue, will have helped to chisel away at the paralysed and hardened Kashmir position of the international players [an acknowledgment there!]. And the Kashmiris living under Indian control know that. Much like the Intifada which proved to be a potent stimulus for the Palestinians under Israeli occupation, India`s Kargil fiasco will renew the Kashmiri resolve to fight on. Psychologically, the fact that a mere 400 - 600 mujahidin have bogged down the world`s third largest army for a few months, irrespective of the final outcome [another acknowledgment there!], will be a major morale booster for the Kashmiris of Kashmir.`` The diplomatic isolation of Pakistan is for all to see, but the analyst remarks, ``Nawaz Sharief meanwhile, ably supported on foreign policy issues by his Information Minister and Foreign Office, has pursued a near-faultless India policy. He has mixed peace offers with commitment to his country`s defence and projected nuclear strength with gentleness. He is indeed South Asia`s strong man of peace....`` Remember, The News is the paper which was till recently the special target of the attentions of Nawaz Sharief and his Information Minister!
Belief makes one not just blind, it makes one reckless. The Taliban in the madrasas are of course fed Quranic stories of the ``wars`` of Badr etc. But they are not the only ones. The regular soldier and officer of the Pakistani Army has them drilled into him just as deep. And the lesson from these stories which is stuffed into him is not some particular stratagem to be followed in a siege or an assault, say; the lesson he internalises is that Allah shall always come to the aid of believers, that the side of Allah shall prevail. So all one has to do is leap.
One of the things that strikes one in reading books from Pakistan, the analyses in their newspapers, judgments of their courts is the singular absence of subtlety, of shades. The analyses are gross: the categories are basic, the conclusions predictable. This is not the result merely of mental habits or capacities. Ideology makes grossness inevitable. Everything is either black or white, everyone is either a co-religionist or one who will some day deceive one, every engagement is going to turn out one way -- capitalism is certain to collapse, it is on the verge of collapsing, Allah is bound to come to the assistance of believers, His cause is bound to prevail...
There is another consequence -- Pakistani newspapers are replete with instances of it. The belief having been drilled into him that he is doing Allah`s Will -- or, as in Marxism-Leninism, of History -- the believer just cannot believe that the fault may lie with him. As the war he is waging has been ordained by Allah, the one who is opposing him must, by definition, be doing so for some perverse reason, for some ulterior purpose. Pakistanis have been genuinely surprised at Washington`s statements disapproving their crossing the Line of Control. They just cannot see that Pakistan might be in the wrong. Their analysts hint that the USA is tilting towards India because it is drooling at the prospect of India`s large market! Commenting on a statement of the American Secretary of State, The Nation of June 6 remarks ruefully, ``India being the bigger market for trade does not mean that the world should give up its moral values on political issues``! By the 8th, the paper is hinting at some even deeper mystery! Repeating the new fabrications on the Line of Control, the paper remarks in an editorial, ``If despite India`s strange illogicality, the US State Department chooses to buy the Indian accusations and discounts the Pakistani version of the incident, there has to be more to it than a fair assessment of the situation``!
The Indians cannot be fighting Pakistani troops because they have occupied Indian territory. They are doing so for some other, unworthy, deplorable reasons. Vajpayee is facing an election, and launching a war against Pakistan has been his party`s traditional way of gathering votes! ``The BJP government has collapsed despite its `popular` nuclear policy,`` observes Najam Sethi`s The Friday Times of 4-10 June in its editorial, ``but it still clings to the old political tricks to garner votes. It is also hostage to an aggressive policy in Kashmir. If it lets up, the Congress will pillory it by adopting a more hawkish stance. India`s politicians have therefore hog-tied themselves by their devotion to this vote-getting gimmick...`` ``They [the Indian politicians] have made de-escalation more difficult all round,`` it continues -- Pakistani troops cross the Line of Control, our forces, by fighting back, make de-escalation difficult! ``The Congress government committed the `popular` folly of sending troops to Siachin. But no later government has dared to withdraw troops from it...`` So long as Pakistani troops were occupying Siachin it was far-sightedness, it became folly when Indians occupied it! And daring would consist in vacating Siachin for the Pakistani Army, not in holding it!
In this analysis the BJP government is strong enough to push its ``old tricks to garner votes``. In other analyses, the reason is the opposite! Writing in The Nation of 28 May, an analyst tells his readers that an Interim, weak government is in office in Delhi, and that ``hawks in the Indian military establishment are ruling the roost,`` and that this is what accounts for the scale of the response, the air-strikes and the rest!
But such objective factors -- ``old political tricks to garner votes`` and the like -- are never enough for a believer. He must detect something deep, some fundamental perversity in the one who is being so obdurate as not to fall at the believer`s feet. Predictably, therefore, that staple of Pakistani papers has returned: ``Hindu cunning``! And this time, just as predictably, Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee is the epitome of it. ``Mr Vajpayee has proved more two-faced than his predecessor,`` notes The Friday Times. ``Vajpayee -- the man who showed statesmanship by describing his visit to Minar Pakistan as `the defining moment in history` -- has only appeared at the bar of history as a clumsy pygmy,`` The News of 30 May tells its readers. ``A short-sighted and pathetically parochial politician whose instincts for political survival are both reactionary and jingoistic. His passion for the cheap thrill coupled with the BJP`s desire to regain a foothold in contemporary Indian politics have resulted in airstrikes on Kashmiri freedom fighters...``
It isn`t just information from which Ideology insulates one. Ideology insulates one from experience just as much. When the believer succeeds, he is confirmed in the belief that the Ideology has driven into him -- that Allah is with him. But the Ideology has also driven another notion into him -- a notion that protects the Ideology from an adverse outcome, but by the same token disables the believer from learning. When they are defeated, the faithful have been taught to conclude, Allah is just testing their faith: Allah has put defeat in their path, they have been taught, to ascertain whether at such a time they lose faith in Allah`s promise. Do they abandon their faith in Allah?, Allah wants to see. Do they blame Him rather than themselves?, Allah wants to make sure.
This Ideology-induced deafness is compounded in the case of Pakistan by the essentially authoritarian nature of both -- its society as well as polity. In free, democratic societies there is incessant self-examination. In authoritarian societies pasting blame on The Other becomes nature. The defeat in Vietnam caused an enormous amount of introspection in America: it led, among other things, to new strategic thinking, to new technologies. The rout in Bangladesh caused none in Pakistan. We see the same sequence today. Indian forces are rolling back the Pakistanis in Kargil. Internationally Pakistan stands isolated as never before. But Pakistani press is singing hosannas: the success of the mujahideen in holding the Indian Army at bay has inspired the freedom fighters of Kashmir, they sing to themselves, the uprising against India will now reach new heights; the Kashmir issue has been ``irretrievably internationalized,`` they exult; the world now realizes that Kashmir can be the nuclear flash-point, they declare to their own satisfaction.
These features hold for Pakistanis in general, immersed as they are in, committed as they are to an Ideology, Islam. Each of them is compounded ten-fold in the case of the officer and soldier of the Pakistan Army. Stephen Cohen has noted how the ``Sandhurst`` and ``American`` generations of their officers have passed, how the officer-class consists increasingly of persons from the lower middle class and peasant stock. In the country at large these classes are among the ones which have been swept up most by Islamic rhetoric: and, what with the continuing collapse of educational institutions, at an accelerating pace. The success which the Army has achieved through the Taliban in Afghanistan also buttresses the notion that ``the time of Islam has returned``.
There are other factors too. The more intense Islamic rhetoric has become, the more cut-off from outside influences and opinions Pakistan has become, the Army even more so than other sections: almost the only thing which has kept an aperture open to the rest of the world is Pakistan`s technological backwardness -- because of this backwardness, it has had to continue relying on other countries for technical upgradation, and hence some contrary ideas must still be sneaking in. But it is a tiny aperture: the countries from whom it secures the weapons are also ones whose life and ways its Ideology teaches it to hate and reject.
Not only is the Army, like other sections of Pakistani society, insulated from the world, it is insulated from those other sections within Pakistan too. The Army is overwhelmingly Punjabi. Within that one province, its recruits are overwhelmingly from a small clutch of five or six districts.
Furthermore, that the Army has such an over-weaning, predominant status in Pakistani society and governance impels a certain deafness: few dare question what it says and does, all the greater reason for the Army to conclude that what it is thinking is valid. And there is another twist. The Pakistani Army has great power, overwhelming power vis a vis other sections of society, but not esteem. That went -- first with the way it lost Pakistan in 1971, and then with the mess that the Army made of the country during the years it had absolute sway, the Zia years. Since then, while the success in Afghanistan has restored its esteem somewhat, this is counter-balanced with the reputation for corruption, the reputation for being involved in the drug-trade etc. which have got stuck to it.
To the faith of the believer, therefore, has been added a compulsion -- to prove itself again.
Each of these factors applies to organizations like the ISI twenty-fold. And to the terrorist organizations the ISI etc. have spawned -- a hundred-fold.
In a word, Kargil is but the latest of what Pakistan will continue to inflict on us. Defeating each such venture with demonstrative harshness is as much a part of the peace-process as pursuing every opening like Lahore.
The Afternoon Despatch & Courier
June 25, 1999
#79 Posted by MantoLives on November 14, 2003 10:39:31 am
This is another angle on the muddled politics of partition... Jamiat-e-ulema-Hind were the worst opponents of Mohammed Ali Jinnah and the Muslim League... calling him a kafir secularist.. Despite all their fanaticism and hatred for non-muslims they were allied with the Congress against the League and Jinnah who they viewed as Kemalists trying to westernise muslims. Sadly Organizations like Jamiat-e-ulema-Hind and Majlis-e-Ahrar were preferred by Azad and Nehru in 1937 .... while they failed to come to an arrangement with the Muslim League which comprised of those who had been ex-congress and later proved it self to be a true voice of the Muslims.
I feel that what the all India leadership failed to understand was the clash between Muslim League and JUH represented a clash within muslims of modernity vs orthodoxy... and by supporting orthodoxy and dumping Jinnah and his ilk, the Congressmen made a mistake of humongous proportions, as is now apparent in history.
-YLH
#80 Posted by MantoLives on November 14, 2003 10:53:17 am
Dear Dost Mittar,
RE: Sir Syed
Sir Syed Ahmed Khan was very disappointed after the Urdu-Hindi issue, and came up with the two nation theory. While he didn`t advocate a separate country, he did advocate a nation status for the Muslims so that they would be considered equals of Hindus... he was one of the original people to come up with the idea of a separate Muslim political body .. as did all Indian Muslim modernists of the time like Syed Ameer Ali.
As for admissions... as far as I know .. Aligarh was a Muslim institution catering to the needs of only Muslims who Sir Syed feared had been left behind the Hindus in terms of Modern education and Western sciences... it would not make sense not to restrict admissions from his point of view. Also it is important to note that Sir Syed Ahmed Khan played an important part in keeping influential Muslims out of the Congress in those earlier years... It was not until the young blood amongst Muslims like M A Jinnah and Mazharulhaq returned from England that there was some influx of Muslims into the Congress...
-YLH
RE: Sir Syed
Sir Syed Ahmed Khan was very disappointed after the Urdu-Hindi issue, and came up with the two nation theory. While he didn`t advocate a separate country, he did advocate a nation status for the Muslims so that they would be considered equals of Hindus... he was one of the original people to come up with the idea of a separate Muslim political body .. as did all Indian Muslim modernists of the time like Syed Ameer Ali.
As for admissions... as far as I know .. Aligarh was a Muslim institution catering to the needs of only Muslims who Sir Syed feared had been left behind the Hindus in terms of Modern education and Western sciences... it would not make sense not to restrict admissions from his point of view. Also it is important to note that Sir Syed Ahmed Khan played an important part in keeping influential Muslims out of the Congress in those earlier years... It was not until the young blood amongst Muslims like M A Jinnah and Mazharulhaq returned from England that there was some influx of Muslims into the Congress...
-YLH
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