Daily Times

How unfortunate is the land where gloomy winters give birth to a violent spring? Violence of all hues and colours, ethnic violence, sectarian violence, religious violence and mob violence have all sprouted to ‘entertain’ our depraved souls. The raids, suicide attacks, operations, bombings and lynchings are what we waited for during the long, cold winter. Spring is a harbinger of life but what we see is the dance of death all around. The festivities of spring are conspicuous by their absence from our national menu. How wretched is the land where burnt corpses overshadow the blossoming flowers of spring?
The state is a device, according to the Utilitarian Theory by Jeremy Bentham, to bring greatest happiness for the greatest number of people. However, quite contrary to this theory, we have been content with our miseries. Our journey for the last seven decades can be aptly described in the terms used by Christina Lamb: a nation searching for a state to a state searching for a nation. The unbridgeable ethnic, religious, sectarian and regional fault lines are growing wider with every passing day. The Hobbesian condition of “war of all against all” is the best description of our state. The present dysfunction clearly indicates that something went terribly wrong with the project of statehood and nationhood from scratch. The present sorry state of affairs of the state of Pakistan demand introspection and soul-searching as a nation and society.
The idea of an independent state for the Muslims of India was conceived originally by the leadership of the Muslim League as a solution to the constitutional crises of post-British India. The vagueness about the shape and contours of the independent state during the pre-partition period, was used as a ploy by the leaders of the All India Muslim League to find an audience with a comparatively larger section of Indian Muslims. However, soon after independence, the clergy — hitherto opposed to the idea of a new state — demanded a greater role for religion in state affairs, as religion was used as the raison d’être for the division of British India.
Soon after the demise of Mohammad Ali Jinnah, the political leadership, in search of legitimacy for the new state, opted for religion as the ideological bedrock. The Objectives Resolution, a curious mix of theology and political philosophy, anchored the role of religion in state affairs firmly. The weaving of nationalism around religion was pursued by the civil-military bureaucracy with religious zeal afterwards. The rhetoric of Islamist ideology provided them with justification for the centralisation of powers and the suppressing of voices for regional and provincial autonomy.
Religious nationalism, the animosity towards India and reliance on western aid became the guiding principles of the nascent state. The symbiotic relationship between the state and Islamists further strengthened in the wake of the crisis in East Pakistan. The 1971 debacle exposed the strength of religion as a binding force for a nation with geographical and ethnic schisms. The popular government of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto got the opportunity to provide an alternative and viable model of state and nation building. However, his authoritarian and feudal instincts got the better of him and resulted in another martial law. With the overthrow of the political government, the military regime of General Zia launched a comprehensive campaign in connivance with the Islamists to turn the country into a Sharia-based theocracy. General Zia was not content with a merely ideological state but opted for an outright jihadist state with pan-Islamist designs. From our history to the Constitution, from our criminal code to textbooks, everything was re-tailored in a manner to make Pakistan a fortress of conservative Islam in true letter and spirit.
The heavy dose of religiosity injected by the state in the veins of society for achieving unity through uniformity proved counter-productive. The fissures in society along sectarian, religious and ethnic lines further exacerbated. The nexus between the clergy and military establishment for defending our ideological and geographical frontiers sowed the seeds of the present disaster we find ourselves in.
After 9/11, the jihadists unleashed their violent streak against the state of Pakistan for the alliance of Pakistan with the US against terror. It took us more than one-and-a-half decades to recognise the real enemies of the state. The blame for terrorist acts in the last decade was put on he, she, it, they, them and so on. The present military leadership rose to the occasion and realised that the threats from inside are more serious than those from the outside. The recent actions like Operation Zarb-e-Azb provide sound proof of the resolve of the armed forces to root out every form of terrorism from the country. However, military actions alone may not succeed in achieving durable peace.
We need a lot of scratching beneath the surface to ascertain the factors responsible for our descent into the present chaos. Present state dysfunction is a corollary of ignoring the real concerns of the people and wasting all energies and resources on the rhetoric of Islamist ideology. Unless and until the state is weaned away from its ideological leanings, the attainment of peace and prosperity will remain an elusive dream. Religious nationalism makes the environment conducive for the growth of militancy and religious extremism. Territorial nationalism, based on the Indus Valley civilisation and adjacent areas, will help in building a more sustainable and progressive ideology for the state of Pakistan.
Let us hope that next time around, in the same days of the year, we will be writing something nice about Basant and other festivities that define the spring season.

The author is assistant accountant general, Peshawar