AGAINST ALL REASON, INDIA CONTINUES TO REMAIN PAKISTAN’S REASON FOR EXISTENCE.
IF PROOF WAS ever needed that the two-nation theory is a load of horse manure, one can only point to Pakistan.Because 70 years after it was formed on the basis of that theory, Pakistan still suffers from a massive identity crisis which constantly undermines and erodes its very existence as a nation.
For a long time after 1947, the only identity Pakistanis had was “non-Indian”. To that end, Pakistan aggressively disavowed and disowned huge chunks of its South Asian heritage, and even tried to pretend that Pakistanis were closer to Arabs. Or Persians. When all that failed, it became a nation built on lies.
Let’s start with the Qaid-e-Azam, or Great Leader. The man who demanded, and got, Pakistan in 1947, as a land for Muslims, the Land of the Pure. Yet the Baba-e-Qaum, or father of the nation, as he is also fondly known, was known to relish his evening scotch (and some reports say he even enjoyed the occasional pork sausage), and is famous for his supposedly secular outlook.
“You are free. You are free to go to your temples, you are free to go to your mosques or to any other place of worship in this state of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion or caste or creed — that has nothing to do with the business of the state,” Mohammad Ali Jinnah declared in his oft-quoted address to the Constituent Assembly on 11 August 1947, three days before the official birth of Pakistan. Reports suggest that the hardliners in the nation ensured that the official version of his speech in the next day’s papers glossed over his “tolerant, inclusive and secular” remarks.
The question obviously arises that if he was indeed secular, why on earth did he want a separate Muslim nation in the first place? But we’ll let that pass.
This story is from the September 2017 edition of Swarajya Mag.
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This story is from the September 2017 edition of Swarajya Mag.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
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