Daily Times

Desire for change is a worldwide norm. That its intensity increases during election campaigns is due to the charged environment becoming, though momentarily, aggressive. In Pakistan, change means revolution, and revolution means a military takeover. Pakistan has so far seen three major ‘revolutions’. How much destruction our three revolutions caused, to know about this is the key to the question why the fourth revolution would never be welcome — in a united Pakistan.

General Ayub Khan’s revolution came when the elections of 1959 were about to be held. The reason behind it was that the continuity of the political system would have damaged the Anglo-Saxons’s regional interests, and our civil-military bureaucracy’s absolute control over Pakistan’s economy, because the elections would have led to the victory of Bengalis, Sindhis, Baloch and Pakhtun, who were not interested in a big army and confrontation with India, Afghanistan and the USSR.

Before the elections of 1970, the most popular thinking prevailing in West Pakistan linked the turbulence in East Pakistan to the influence of the Hindu academicians on the minds of the Bengali politicians. The proponents of this thinking were the civil-military bureaucracy, the West Pakistani wealthy classes, Punjabi and Urdu speaking intelligentsia, Jamaat-e-Islami and the Muslim League. This thinking would present a picture of East Pakistan wherein Bengalis loved West Pakistanis due to the Islamic bond; and for ending the turbulence, it would suggest strengthening of the Islamic bond and using muscle against the defiant Bengali politicians. A different thought also existed but it was considered as unpatriotic. The nationalists, pro-USSR leftists and liberal democrats were its proponents. This thought suggested that the political problems of entire Pakistan could be solved only by strengthening democratic institutions and by giving financial and political autonomy to the provinces.

The turbulence after the elections turned into a rebellion because the military government did not transfer power to the Bengalis. Muscle was used to quell the rebellion but the Bengalis ultimately won more than the financial autonomy: freedom from West Pakistan. Subsequently, the Pakistani army came under severe public criticism due to its surrender before the Indian army at Dhaka. Realising that laying the blame on India would not work — because the elections had clearly showed that the Bengalis had voted for their political and economic rights and not for the Islamic bond — the state-funded propagandists came up with the reason that it was the class struggle of Bengalis, and not the military defeat and ethnicity-based exploitation that divided Pakistan.

The truth is that Ayub’s revolution had turned 80 percent Bengalis and 40 percent West Pakistanis into paupers, and whatever he had done had helped evolve a state-funded unorganised economy only. Such economies do not create classes; they create mafias and paupers. It is a natural outcome of military rule. Since generals do not have the support of the masses, they introduce and promote corruption, strengthen the rich individuals and create mafias to protect their rule. The generals — Zia and Musharraf — did the same and more. They promoted social, ethnic and religious militancy inside and outside Pakistan.

Pakistan is facing constant turbulence due to the three ‘revolutions’ of generals and bureaucrats. Today, when elections are only four months away, the ‘revolutionaries’ are again in action. Some of them, whose leaders are Hamid Gul and Hafiz Saeed, are advocating a Taliban-type revolution. Some — whose voices are Lal Khan and Ayaz Amir — want a Marxist revolution. The others — the moderates such as Dr Qadri — are not clear even on what to bring about — revolution or reforms. The question is, do the cries for revolution or reforms really represent the feelings of the miserable masses?

The answer the concerned Pakistanis know is that democracy has delivered, and it will continue to deliver. The 70 percent budgetary allocation to the provinces is a revolution in itself. Saving Pakistan from certain default, hoisting the Pakistan flag again in Swat, tackling the after-effects of two terrible floods, participating bravely in the war against terrorism and strengthening the democratic procedures are some more feats of the democratic government.

Agreed that today the influential Baloch leaders are up in arms against the state, but they are not unwise; they will be satisfied with an enhanced autonomous status for Balochistan. The democratic government has given autonomy to the provinces, but in the case of Balochistan, the kind of measures taken in the past that are bound to turn the Baloch into a minority in their own land must be undone.

As far as militancy is concerned, there is no solution to it other than the one that ties the hands of those state and non-state actors who support militants. The thought of a section of our security establishment and rightists that the presence of the Taliban in Afghanistan is the only way to have and maintain influence in Afghanistan is fatal. The good thing that has so far happened to Pakistan in this regard is that its democratic government and a section of the security establishment are committed to eliminating militancy in Pakistan, and they are committed to stopping militancy from re-entering Afghanistan and elsewhere too.

As far as the economic miseries are concerned, they are due to the expansion of an unorganised economy, Pakistan’s extremist religious image, militancy, abnormal growth of population, shortage of resources, knowledge and skills, greed, absence of commitment, and culture of ensuring self-centric and institutional aggrandisement through corruption and other criminal means. For this all those who matter — be they bureaucrats, generals, politicians or undisciplined rich — are responsible. Again, is there any way other than democracy to set things right?

The cries for revolution or reforms do represent the feelings of the miserable masses, but people want things to change through democratic means and this is what Dr Qadri’s sit-in ultimately showed. A Marxist revolution is a good solution, but neither the US nor our big army nor our radicalised society will accept that. A Taliban-type revolution too is a solution, but for that let us first learn how to live in a graveyard of creativity. A ‘Pakistani Spring’, Islamic democracy desired by the Anglo-Saxons is yet another solution. Let no one remain under the illusion that the control of a moral revolution brought by the moderates will remain in the hands of the moderates. Today its leader is Dr Qadri; given our radicalised society and militarised establishment, tomorrow its leader could be a Pakistani Osama bin Laden or a Pakistani Mullah Omar.

The proponents of the revolutions in Pakistan are inadvertently paving the way for a fourth revolution of generals. Let no one remain under one more illusion that the fourth revolution can survive. The earlier revolutions survived because in the past Sindh, Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, despite facing awful exploitation, did not want separation from Pakistan. Today, leave alone another revolution, the situation in these provinces will become worse than the one that we faced in East Pakistan if the coming elections are even delayed. The fourth revolution will not survive even for a month, and nor will Pakistan. A military takeover always means the same — a tragedy for the nation.

Dr Qadri’s storm that touched Islamabad did not turn into a revolution or a Pakistani Spring. He frustrated all: the revolutionaries, the Pakistani Spring-seeking Anglo-Saxons and the anarchists. And the same thing was done by all political forces including the ones from Punjab, who openly sided with the proponents of rational thinking by declaring that it is only democracy that could deliver. However, the storm should not be taken lightly. The agreement between Dr Qadri and the government on the selection procedures of candidates for the coming elections must be implemented. We need dedicated and selfless democratic leaders to take charge and to work day and night to make Pakistan a militancy-free, discrimination-free, conflict-free, corruption-free and, hence, turbulence-free country.

The writer is a freelance columnist