Daily Times

It’s been almost three months since Nawaz Sharif was ousted through a questionable verdict by Supreme Court. Many in Pakistan and abroad believe it was actually part of the scheme from the Pakistani establishment. Although it’s just over ten weeks since Sharif’s removal, a small time to witness the usual defections from among his party men, yet going by Pakistani standards, it’s no less than exceptional scene. At other times in similar situations since 1990s defections from parties, be it PPP or PML-N, always followed in quick sequence. That the party has basically stuck together, and has re-won the vacated National Assembly seat of Sharif, gives an impression that political dynamics of Punjab has changed, which is the power base of PML-N.

Historically, Punjab’s masses and leaders are not known for confronting neither invaders nor local forces and institutions of great ferocity as we have seen since the days of Turkic Delhi Sultanate in 13th century to Mughals, and the British. After independence of Pakistan too, the leaders of this region had seldom firmly stood against usurpers of power i.e. military generals. In past only exception was Sikhs who could dare fight against Mughals and Afghans, which led to the rise of Ranjit Singh, and then against the British invaders who eventually succeeded in colonising the region. That’s perhaps why we didn’t see since Delhi Sultanate days a single governor of Punjab, who racially belonged to the local stock, until well into the middle of eighteenth century just before the province came under the British in 19th century.

Punjab’s masses and leaders are not known for confronting invaders, local forces or any institutions of great ferocity. This has been seen since the days of the Turkic Delhi Sultanate, the Mughals, the British and after independence of Pakistan as well. The leaders of this region have seldom stood against usurpers of power

Glimpses from political history of the region under British Raj and later after independence of Pakistan might substantiate this acquired characteristic of the region, which revolves around survival and not confrontation. Around the first quarter of 19th century, while all of the prominent landed aristocracy of Punjab such as the forebears of Tiwnas, Awans, and others fought on the side of Mughals against Sikh insurgency, by the mid of that century when Mughal empire was virtually crumbling and a rather wishful Sepoy Mutiny 1857 provided some impetus to fight for restoring Mughal empire- except for a few negligible number, the majority of Punjab’s Muslim landed aristocracy provided soldiers and fought on the side of the British against mutineers.

Later in early half of the 20th century with the arrival of parliamentary politics and local rule in provincial governments in India, we see how so many of Punjabi Muslim members of Unionist party or Indian National Congress defected following September 1939 when the Viceroy Lord Linlithgow declared World War-II against Soviets and their allies. Congress refused to accept the declaration on Indians’ part without consulting their representatives i.e. Congress and later resigned from all provincial governments. As Soviet Union publicly hailed Congress stance, this further antagonised the British who, already suspicious, now saw Congress siding with the Soviets; hence jailed virtually the whole of Congress leadership.

Jinnah took advantage and called upon Indian Muslims to support the British in WW-II. Punjab’s Muslims provided the largest chunk i.e. 380,000 new recruits for this war. In exchange, Jinnah had a set of assurances from the British for Muslims in post-war constitutional framework of India. As Jinnah’s heightened say in the affairs of British India was evident to all during the war years with Congress leaders in jails and sidelined, Unionist party and Congress saw massive defections of their Punjabi Muslim members. By the time elections of 1946 held, key families, in the past and their scions such as Iftikhar Mamdot, Shoukat Hayat, Feroz Khan Noon, Mumtaz Daultana from Unionist party, Mian Iftikharuddin from Congress and many others switched to Muslim League. With just one seat in 1937, Muslim League became the largest single party in Punjab’s elections in 1946. Once formidable in Punjab, Unionist party virtually disappeared.

Likewise, following independence, we have seen so frequently leaders from Punjab toeing the line of military dictators instead of putting up a joint opposition. Erstwhile Republican Party, Convention League, and more recently Q-League are examples of this lack of steadfastness with some principled cause.

So if history is any measure to help forecast near future, then it will take a little more while before we could see defections and breakaways from PML-N in coming months as soon as the establishment and institutions under it increase their pressure on the party members from traditional laded aristocracy to fall in line. However, as societies also evolve in surreptitious manner we may hope that with likes of Ahsan Iqbal, Shahid Khaqan, Khawaja Asif, Khawaja Saad and many others whose families had been pro-establishment but they aren’t, perhaps to a greater extent the Punjab is readying to assert people’s right to rule themselves democratically.

The writer is a sociologist with interest in history and politics of Pakistan. He tweets @Zulfirao1 and is accessible at Zulfiroa@yahoo.com

Published in Daily Times, October 26^th 2017.