Daily Times

I was captivated to know of a document archived in British Library, London, which is a record of a special séance with the spirit of Quaid-e-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah held at 6 pm on March 13, 1955 — eight years after creation of Pakistan and seven years after Quaid’s death. The special séance, where a spiritualist makes a contact with the spirit of a dead, was arranged for by a government officer, Muhammad Ibrahim, who was overtly anxious about the crisis that plagued Pakistan in 1955. He had hired a spiritualist for this session. The document is a handwritten report, which provides for some interesting details that this column can’t afford. God knows how this document reached British Library as a part of ‘Quaid-e-Azam Papers’.

The officer accompanied spiritualist in the séance so he could feed the questions he was most concerned about once the contact with Jinnah’s spirit is secured. After salutations and formal inquiries about Jinnah’s well being, the officer asked, “Sir, as a creator and father of Pakistan, won’t you guide the destiny of the nation now?” Jinnah’s spirit responded: “It’s not for me to guide Pakistan’s destiny anymore, even though I often see flashes of evil pictures about Pakistan.” Much worried, the officer then asked, “Don’t you think there’s a peaceful and prosperous future for Pakistan?” As if untouched, the spirit responded, “I don’t think so. Prosperity of a country depends on the selflessness of people who control its destiny. None at all is eager to be selfless there.”

In the end, the spirit made the most potent declaration, “It’s easier to acquire a country, but extremely difficult to retain it. That’s in a nutshell the present position of Pakistan to gain which rivers of blood flowed.” I am no expert to certify or refute the reality of séance with the spirit of the dead and credibility of information secured through this medium. What I find conspicuously true about this spiritual testimony is how truly it reflected the crisis of our state in 1955, when the country was still without its first constitution, power players among politicians and civil and military bureaucracy squabbling, and smaller provinces weary of a centralised state. Just sixteen years later, this prophetic warning unfortunately proved to be true when we lost eastern wing of the country.

Democracy would have taken root and delivered peace and stability in the country after initial teething problems, had there been no political intrusion and adventurism from the military generals and it was left to the politicians to deal with constitutional and governance challenges

Regrettably, even to this day, those at the helm are still far from being selfless for the sake of peace and prosperity of the nation that its founder had dreamed so dearly. Factional interests and desire for domination among most important institutions such as military establishment, judiciary and the popularly elected executive is so fierce and obvious that it’s not just locals but foreign powers too know of it fully well. Ideally and as the constitution of the country demands, the elected representatives and the civilian executive must reign supreme when it comes to leading and governing the country. However, for paucity of democratic values and character among the politicians and their general inability to rise beyond venal political ambitions was hardly of any help to democracy and civilian supremacy.

Nevertheless, in all probability, democracy would have taken the root and delivered peace and stability in the country after teething problems and stumbling, had there been no political intrusion and adventurism from the military generals and had it been left to the politicians to deal with constitutional and governance challenges. Sadly, every single time the military coup removed the civilian regimes, the judiciary was on the side of military dictators. And it happened with such a frequency ie almost after every other decade, that the corps d’elite of military and judiciary have taken upon themselves to intervene in routine government matters such as foreign policy, economy, and transfer postings of the government officers.

Else, for instance, what can justify in any democratic country that a military dictator tried for a high treason case is allowed to fly out of country on the most flimsy ground of back-pain? Or in which civilised country an order from the prime minister office is out rightly ‘rejected’ by major general so contemptibly over social media? Or what logic could justify executive interventions from higher courts in transfer postings of government officers? In what country regulating bodies such as PEMRA are rendered almost useless by courts liberally issuing stay-orders over routine regulatory actions against violations by TV channels and anchorpersons? As Quaid’s spirit declared, the state institutions and their leadership which undoubtedly control the destiny of this nation could have turned Quaid’s dream into a reality only if they had a sense of selflessness in terms of power sharing, privileges, resources and publicity. The testimony from séance with Quaid’s spirit painfully holds true to this day.

The writer is a sociologist with interest in history and politics. He tweets @ZulfiRao and can be reached at Zulfirao@yahoo.com