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Three articles from Dawn.

com Pakistan
http://www.dawn.com/news/1128832

Exit stage left: the


movement against
Ayub Khan
From InpaperMagazine Published Aug 31, 2014 06:21am

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any people who, as young men and women, took part in the
widespread protest movement against the military rule of Ayub
Khan in the late 1960s suggest that Ayub relinquished power
after he was told what some of the protesters had started to call him. In 1968
at the height of the movement against him, young protesters in Karachi and
Lahore began describing him as a dog (Ayub Khan Kutta!). This was a time
when politicians and rulers in Pakistan hardly ever used any derogatory
language against their opponents, so Ayub was supposedly shocked when he
heard that some of his children (the term he used to describe his subjects),
had called him a dog.
Ayub had come to power in 1958 on the back of a popular military coup
(Pakistans first), and had enjoyed a significant run of admiration from a
majority of Pakistanis in the first four years of his dictatorship.
Vowing to make Pakistan a powerful and influential military-industrial
state, Ayub encouraged and facilitated an unprecedented growth in the
process of industrialisation in the country. He also initiated the
introduction of technical innovations in agriculture and brought Pakistan
closer to the United States, thus benefitting from the military and financial
aid that came with the enhanced relationship.
By 1961 the Ayub regime had largely restored the countrys economy
that had begun to weaken from the mid-1950s onwards, mainly due to the
political chaos that prevailed in the country, as various factions of
Pakistans first ruling party, the Muslim League, indulged in constant
infighting and intrigues, and were unable to address the growing
disenchantment and cynicism exhibited towards politicians by those who
were kept out from the political process dominated by the countrys
political-bureaucratic elite.
Ayub was at the height of his power and popularity when he decided to
lift Martial Law in 1962 and restore at least a semblance of political activity
by the parties that had been banned in 1958. He became the president and
handpicked an assembly through a complex electoral system that he called
Basic Democracy. After discarding the 1956 Constitution, his assembly
passed a brand new constitution that enshrined Ayubs idea of Jinnahs
Pakistan. It revolved around the construction of a strong militaryindustrial state, propped-up by state-backed capitalism, free enterprise,
agricultural reforms and a progressive interpretation of Islam that was
compatible with science, technology and modernity.
Ayub detested politicians, from both the left as well as the right. His
regime came down hard on left-wing parties and then went on to also ban
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parties such as the Jamat-i-Islami ( JI) though the ban was overturned
by the courts. Leftists accused him of encouraging crony capitalism, the
exploitation of workers and the suppression of the rights and ethnicnationalism of the Bengalis (in East Pakistan), Sindhis, the Baloch and the
Pakhtun, and of dislodging the Urdu-speaking (the Mohajirs) from
important state and government institutions that they had helped build
after Pakistans creation in 1947. The religious right denounced him of
being overtly secular and undermining Pakistans Islamic culture and
traditions. Ayub easily glided through the many periodical protests that
took place against him after 1962 and then won a second term as president
in a controversial presidential race in 1965.
Buoyed by his victory and his status as a benevolent dictator, Ayub
then made an uncharacteristic mistake by allowing himself to be convinced
by the hawks in his cabinet (led by his young foreign minister, Zulfikar Ali
Bhutto), to crown his economic and political achievements with a military
triumph against India.
India had suffered a humiliating defeat at the hands of the Chinese
army in 1962 and Bhutto and his supporters in the cabinet were convinced
that the Pakistan army would be able to crush the weakened Indian armed
forces.
Though the Pakistani armed forces made rapid gains in the initial
period of the 1965 war, the conflict soon turned into a stalemate. Ayub
settled for a ceasefire, apparently sending Bhutto into a rage. Ayub eased
out Bhutto from the government but the damage was done. The war had
drained the countrys resources and the economy began to slide.
Ayubs opponents accused him of losing the war on the negotiation
table. Bhutto went on to form the PPP, and along with the already
established left-wing groups, such as the National Awami Party (NAP) and
the National Students Federation (NSF), he became the most prominent
face of left-wing opposition in West Pakistan.
In East Pakistan, Shiekh Mujeebur Rehmans Awami League (AL),
upped the ante against the regime and accused it of leaving East Pakistan
open to an Indian attack during the 1965 war.
As the Bengali nationalist movement led by AL and by various
militant/Maoist Bengali nationalist groups in East Pakistan gathered pace,
in West Pakistan, Ayub was suddenly faced by a spontaneous students
movement when in October 1968, a large contingent from the NSF gatecrashed a ceremony being held by the government at Lahores Fortress
Stadium (to celebrate the governments Decade of Progress).
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The students began to chant anti-Ayub slogans and clashed with the
police. They accused the regime of enriching a handful of cronies and letting
everyone else suffer unemployment and economic hardship. Then in
November 1968, police opened fire on a left-wing student rally in
Rawalpindi, killing three protesters.
In response, students formed a Students Action Committee and
announced that students across Pakistan would begin a concentrated
protest movement against the regime.
As the students began their campaign (with most of the student groups
demanding a socialist system and parliamentary democracy), Bhuttos PPP
joined the fray along with NAP and their entry brought with it the
participation in the movement of the radical trade and labour unions that
were associated with these parties.
By late 1968 the movement had spread beyond Karachi, Lahore,
Rawalpindi and Peshawar and reached the smaller cities and towns of
Punjab and Sindh. Meanwhile in East Pakistan, AL and other Bengali
nationalist groups began to demand complete provincial autonomy for East
Pakistan.
Schools, colleges and universities stopped functioning; workers went on
strike and closed down a number of factories, and white-collar
professionals refused to attend office, further crippling an already
deteriorating political and economic order.
After failing to quell the protests (through police action and wide-scale
arrests), Ayub invited opposition parties to hold a dialogue with the
government. But the PPP and NAP boycotted the negotiations that were
largely attended by religious parties and some moderate right-wing parties.
However, Mujeebs AL did participate, but the talks ultimately broke down.
By early 1969 the movement had also been joined by peasant
committees and organisations in the countrys rural areas. In March 1969 a
group of senior military men advised Ayub to step down, fearing the
eruption of a full-scale civil war in East Pakistan and political and social
anarchy in the countrys west wing.
A weakened and tired Ayub finally decided to throw-in the towel and
resigned, handing over power to General Yahya Khan who immediately
imposed the countrys second martial law.
He promised to hold the countrys first general election based on adult
franchise and to relinquish power after introducing parliamentary
democracy in Pakistan. With this announcement, the movement came to a
halt.
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Elections were held in 1970. In East Pakistan the AL won 98 per cent of
the allotted national and provincial assembly seats, whereas in West
Pakistan, the PPP swept the polls in the regions two largest provinces,
Punjab and Sindh. NAP performed well in the former NWFP and
Balochistan. Most of the status quo parties (such as the many Muslim
League factions) and most religious outfits (except Jamiat Ulema Islam)
were decimated.
However, a three-way deadlock between AL, PPP and the Yahya regime
(over a power-sharing formula) regime triggered a crisis that finally saw the
feared eruption of a civil war in East Pakistan and then Indias entry into
the conflict.
After that disastrous conflict, a group of military officers (most of them
Bhutto sympathisers), forced Yahya to resign and then invited Bhutto and
his party to form the countrys first parliamentary government.
Ayub, who had gone into seclusion, died in 1974.
Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, August 31, 2014

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What they never


tell us about
Ayub Khan's regime
Murtaza Haider Dawn.com, Updated Nov 05, 2016 12:53pm
133 Comments

akistanis are a forgiving lot. They are even more forgiving of the
dead. Civil and military dictators, fascists, hate-spewing clerics, and
vigilantes end up with disciples, and at times, even with a shrine.
Military dictators are slightly more fortunate. An army of repute defenders,
in uniform and civvies, continues singing the praise of the golden era when
the General Sahib once ruled. They reminisce about the days when honey
and milk flowed in ravines and open drains, and when the economic growth
rivalled that of South Korea or some other Asian tiger or cat.
October 27 marked the 58th anniversary of the Martial Law imposed
by General Ayub Khan. Given that we have the advantage of hindsight, we
can revisit the 'golden days' to test the veracity of the claims of bounty and
harmony that are usually retailed, yet seldom verified.
Political leaders of all stripes and tenor must envy the good repute
General Ayub Khan continues to enjoy almost 50 years after he reluctantly
relinquished power. The popular discourse about the Ayub era (1958
1969) is that of economic growth, prosperity, and the growing stature of
Pakistan on the world stage. However, the economic realities of the time are
much less glamorous, if not dismal.
An objective review of General Ayub Khans policies and actions
suggests that his primary motive was to sustain and prolong his rule as his
regime sowed the seed, and generously watered the plant, for Bangladesh's
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separation that came years later. He empowered the religious


fundamentalists as he sought their support against Fatima Jinnah.
The economic growth, which many cite as his singular achievement,
promoted the income inequalities resulting in the rise of the 20 influential
families who controlled the nation's resources and amassed ill-gotten
wealth, leaving the rest poor, hungry, and resentful.

A Chief Martial Law Administrator is born


General Ayub's dramatic ascent to power in 1958 came after a decade of
political turmoil. From 1947 to 1958, Pakistan was governed by four heads
of state and seven prime ministers. The political jostling for power
incapacitated the then president, General Iskander Mirza, who suspended
the parliament and appointed a new cabinet with General Ayub Khan as
the new prime minister. However, within days, Ayub Khan turned the
tables on General Mirza forcing him into a pensioned exile in London.
General Ayub Khan declared himself the president of Pakistan on
October 27 while he simultaneously held the office of the Chief Martial Law
Administrator. In the General's words:
"Major General Iskander Mirza, lately President of Pakistan, has
relinquished his office of President and has handed over all powers to me.
Therefore, I have this night assumed the office of President and have taken upon
myself the exercise of the said powers and all other powers appertaining thereto."

Too illiterate to vote,


but literate enough to create a homeland
From the time he assumed control, General Ayub resented the public
and the democratic process. For him, the public was too illiterate and poor
to be trusted with adult franchise. So he created an electorate ("basic
democracy") of a few thousand of whom 95% elected the General as their
leader. That the same illiterate and poor people of Pakistan were wise
enough to have voted earlier with their hearts, minds, and feet to create a
new country that elevated the same General to the office of the army chief
was not sufficient for them to have earned the General's trust for adult
franchise.
General Ayub Khan held the politicians squarely responsible for the
"chaotic internal situation" and accused them of being willing to barter the
country "for personal gains". He was keen to imprison leading politicians in
East and West Pakistan. The military dictators that came after him have
held a similar contempt for politicians.
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The economics of inequality


Shahid Javed Burki, a former World Bank economist, rightly identified
the fundamental disconnect between the public and the Ayub Junta that
celebrated 10-years of being in power by highlighting GDP growth and
other inflated macroeconomic indicators. The general public, however,
cared less of the aggregate statistics as they struggled without much success
against price inflation and spatial income disparities. Burki points out that
the so-called economic growth was rooted in income inequality, which
worsened over time between regions and among people with the growth in
the macroeconomy.
The result was evident: half of the industrial wealth accrued to
Chinioties in Punjab and the immigrant Memons, Bohras, and Khojas. At
the same time, General Ayub opened the door to foreign experts who were
ignorant of, and alien to, the political economy of Pakistan. Yet they came
armed with policies that might have worked elsewhere but were ill-suited
for Pakistan's challenges.
General Ayub's economic prowess need not be discounted entirely. His
penchant for central planning is evident in the second five-year plan. The
inflow of foreign capital, at twice the rate of that of India, sparked growth
in industries that supported consumer goods.
One must also review what drove the growth and what industrial
sectors blossomed as a result. A close look at what transpired reveals that
there was nothing organic about the growth. It was primarily driven by
foreign aid, the same way General Musharraf 's rule was buttressed by
American aid after 9/11. By December 1961, foreign aid was more than
twice the size of foreign loans. With the second five-year plan in 1964,
foreign aid was responsible for 40% of the total investment. And that's not
all. Foreign aid covered 66% of the cost of imports. One must give credit
where it's due, and it's mainly foreign aid.

Read next: Religious orthodoxy during Ayub regime


Despite the foreign investment as aid and credit, and the aggressive
public works programme pursued by the regime to generate new jobs,
unemployment persisted, and even worsened during the second five year
plan from 5.5 million man-years in 1960-1 to 5.8 million man-years in 19645 in East Pakistan. The regime allocated twice as much for atomic energy
than it did for technical training.

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What about the rapid industrialisation undertook by the Ayub regime


using foreign aid? As soon as the industries started generating revenue, the
regime disposed of them to private investors.
During 1964-65, the loans and advances by the government to the
private sector were twice the size of the direct investments by the industry.
However, profit-making units that should have been set up by the
industry in the first place should have not been handed over to the
industrialists as an unearned reward.
Those who defend General Ayub Khans reign also hold false memories
of peace and harmony. Do such claims withstand empirical scrutiny?
Raunaq Jahangir, quoted by Burki, demonstrated that violence, especially
in Bangladesh (East Pakistan), increased tremendously during the Ayub
era.
If there was peace and tranquility in the sixties, why did the unrest in
1968-69 reach such a feverish pitch? It was not the economic growth, but
the increasing concentration of wealth and power in the hands of a few that
irked the have-nots and fuelled violence. A critical report by none other
than Dr Mehboobul Haq, the then Deputy Chairman of the Planning
Commission, revealed that a coterie of just 20 families controlled twothirds of the industry and three-fourth of the banking.
Pakistan's poet laureate, Habib Jalib, could not ignore the injustice. His
poetry galvanised the public as he recited poems at gatherings where tensof-thousands heard him denounce the 20 nouveau riche, who became even
richer at the cost of keeping millions poor.
Jalib wrote:
Biis gharanay hein abaad /
Or karorron hein nashaad /
Sadar Ayub Zindabad.

General Ayubs global fan base


There was no shortage of the high-profile admirers. From de Gaulle of
France to President Johnson of the United States, Western leaders were
singing praise for the economic growth in Pakistan. Even Robert
McNamara, the then World Bank president, proclaimed that Pakistan
under General Ayub was one of the greatest successes of development in the
world. However, experts were quick to point out that de Gaulle, Johnson,
McNamara and others focused solely on growth and ignored the
distribution of wealth resulting in income inequalities that sowed the seeds
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of discontent, violence, and ultimately caused the splitting of East and West
Pakistan.

The Bangladesh debacle


An oft-cited criticism of the former Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto
(197177) is that he engineered Bangladesh's succession to avoid sharing
with, or worse losing power to, the demographically dominant East
Pakistan. However, it was General Ayub's years of preferred treatment of
West Pakistan that irked East Pakistanis, who couldn't ignore the sustained
rebukes when General Ayub placed three of the largest legacy projects, i.e.,
the construction of the new capital (Islamabad) and the two large hydel
projects (Mangla and Tarbela) in West Pakistan. Furthermore, General
Ayub never kept a confidante from East Pakistan as all the Kings men
belonged to West Pakistan.

The government of best intentions and worst implementation


Land reforms were one of the cornerstones of General Ayub's sociopolitical reengineering that restricted the maximum size of land holdings
to encourage a more equitable distribution of land and resources among the
landless peasantry. The land reforms, however, achieved little in limiting
the size of land holdings and limiting the political clout of the landed gentry.
Instead, power and wealth concentrated further in the hands of the
notorious 20 families.
The Ayub regime decided to limit land holdings to 500 acres of
cultivated land, 1,000 acres of dry land, and 150 acres of orchards. Over
6,000 landowners exceeded the newly defined ceilings, owning 7.5 million
acres of land. The landowners though outsmarted the regime by
transferring the land in advance to relatives so that ownership remained
with the landed gentry. Thus, not much land was transferred to landless
peasants.

Ayub Khan and Islam


Unlike General Ziaul Haq (1977-1988), who spent 11 years of his
dictatorial rule to revert Pakistan back to a 7th-century medieval utopia,
General Ayub was more of a modernist who was wary of the attempts to
convert Pakistan into a desert kingdom of a bygone era.
While addressing a seminary he articulated his views:
This I consider a great disservice to Islam, that such a noble religion should
be represented as inimical to progress In fact, it is great injustice to both life
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and religion to impose on twentieth century man the condition that he must go
back several centuries in order to prove his bonafides as a true Muslim.
General Ayub's most significant and long lasting contribution is the
promulgation of Muslim Family Laws Ordinance in 1961 that empowered
women, especially in the matters of marriage and divorce.
Though the commission that drafted the recommendations was
constituted in 1954, the Ayub regime took steps to implement the laws
empowering women. Before the family laws were enacted, neither
marriages or divorces were required to be registered with the state. This
created severe hardships for divorced women, some of whom eventually
remarried. Their former husbands could, and some even did out of malice,
accuse them of adultery since the women lacked proof of divorce from the
first husband.
The new laws also required men who desired a second wife to seek
formal consent from the first wife. In summary, the acts and ordinances
introduced by the Ayub regime discouraged polygyny, protected the rights
of wives and granted the rights of inheritance to grandchildren.

On the same topic: A secular man?


Despite his belief and the desire to modernise the society, General Ayub
was quick to give into religious orthodoxy as long as the policy about-turns
prolonged his control over power. Sarfraz Husain Ansari documented the
policy flip-flops as the General reinstated the restrictive clauses of the
Objective Resolution in 1963, which had been expunged from the
Constitution earlier. Furthermore, while the 1962 Constitution used
Pakistan as the official name, the General yielded to the religious forces
and changed the country's name to Islamic Republic of Pakistan in
December 1963.
Finally, the Advisory Council of Islamic Ideology, which does not miss
an opportunity to embarrass Pakistanis by its archaic, and frequently
misogynist, interpretations of Islam, is also a gift from General Ayub that
keeps on giving.

Ab raaj karey gi khalq-i-khuda


Regardless of how efficient a military regime becomes, in the end, the
protagonist has to surrender to the political process in the theatre of
governance. General Ayub was no exception. Despite his misgivings about
politicians and the political process, he joined a political party, the
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Conventional Muslim League, a version of which has always been available


to Pakistan's military rulers as they struggle to transition out of the uniform.
General Ayub knew that joining the political party was no win for him.
He explained the reason he acceded to a party was because he had failed to
play this game in accordance with my rules and so I have to play in accordance
with their rules and the rules demand that I belong to somebody, otherwise
who is going to belong to me. So it is simple. It is an admission of defeat on my
part anyway.
One wonders if Generals Zia and Musharraf, who followed in General
Ayub's footsteps, ever knew or understood his words.
At the end of the day, the right to rule belongs to the people, and it
reverts to them regardless, for eternal victory belongs to them, and not to
civilian or military dictators.
If it were not for his health issues, would General Ayub still consider
abdicating voluntarily? In January 1968, he caught a viral infection
followed by pneumonia that developed into a pulmonary embolism.
By the fall of 1968, his health deteriorated even more.
At the same time, the opposition by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto gained
strength. On February 21, 1969, General Ayub threw in the towel declaring
he would not seek re-election in 1970. By March, General Yahya Khan took
control as the Chief Martial Law Administrator.
On the same theme: Objectives Resolution: the root of religious
orthodoxy
The repeated failed experiments of military rule in Pakistan make it
abundantly clear that unlike other developing countries in the Middle East
and in Southeast Asia where military dictators have enjoyed tremendous
longevity, Pakistanis love independence and will not tolerate for long
attempts to curb their political freedoms.
At the very onset of General Ayub's Martial Law, Justice M. R. Kiyani,
the then Chief Justice of the West Pakistan High Court, articulated the very
aspirations of freedom and independence of the people as he addressed the
Bar Association in Karachi:
"There are quite a few thousand men who'd rather have the
freedom of speech than a new pair of clothes and it is these who
form a nation, not the office hunters, the license hunters, even
the tillers of soil and drawers of water."
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Just two days later, the Chief Justice was forced to tender an apology for
offending army officers.
Pakistan, despite its struggles with rule of law, violence, and crumbling
infrastructure, is stronger today because no one can dare force a Chief
Justice to apologise for upholding the Constitution and the principles of
democracy.

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Objectives Resolution:
the root of religious
orthodoxy
Published Jun 20, 2010 12:00am
The rising tide of bigotry of orthodoxy in the context of traditionalist
Islam and religious militancy are closely related, and they owe their
origin directly to the policies which have been pursued by the so-called
westernised Muslims in Pakistan. Madressah of course is where orthodoxy
begins. And the sectarian propaganda has been spread through the pulpit
and by pamphleteering in the country. The religious leaders by themselves
however could not have created the present state of affairs in Pakistan.
It is a sequence of historical events which cannot be neatly established
in a chain of cause and effect but nevertheless has created a cumulative
impact of such a force as to have threatened the very raison d'etre of the
country. Significant turning points are the Objectives Resolution, the
campaign of militant religious leaders against Ayub Khan regime, and
massive compromises made by Z.A. Bhutto with the religious leaders. Then
of course the country went through eleven years of rule by General Ziaul
Haq, and post-Ziaul Haq period is still alive and well, including the 18th
Amendment. Many parts of this story are familiar to the informed reader,
but it needs to be re-told to refresh our perspective. In this article, I propose
to confine my discussion to the Objectives Resolution leaving the other
subjects for a later opportunity.
On the eve of the establishment of Pakistan, the founder of Pakistan and
President of the new Constituent Assembly, Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad
Ali Jinnah, offered his vision for the new country where the citizens might
belong to any caste, creed or religion, but it would have nothing to do with
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the business of the state. . . because that was the personal faith of each
individual. . . . The question whether it was a clear call for the establishment
of a secular state is difficult to answer (he had tolerated Islamic slogans
during the Pakistan movement). But putting together several speeches and
statements he made in the course of the next few months, it seems that he
anticipated Pakistan to be a Muslim state based on principles of Islamic
justice, a state that could not commit itself to the mode of any major sect.
Raja of Mahmudabad, who was a member of the Muslim League working
committee and a long-time family friend, in his autobiography, also suggests
that Jinnah's concept for Pakistan was of a Muslim state where no sectarian
group was dominant over others.
Within six months after Jinnah's death, Liaquat Ali Khan who had been
a loyal lieutenant in his high command introduced the Objectives
Resolution to lay the foundation for a constitution for the country. The
opening sentence of the Resolution confirms the limits for the state as
prescribed by God who has sovereignty over the entire universe. It declares
that by His authority delegated to the State of Pakistan through its people
Muslims shall be enabled to order their lives in accordance with Islam, and
that adequate provisions shall be made for the minorities to profess and
practise their religion freely. It also affirms the principles of democracy,
freedom, equality and social justice.
Obviously the thrust of the Objectives Resolution contradicts the
vision of Jinnah as mentioned above. The question is whether it was Jinnah's
vision or Liaquat Ali Khan's image about future Pakistan which represented
the true aspirations of Pakistanis of that generation. The developments that
followed the Resolution would be important to establish the context in this
regard. For this purpose, we can focus on the main highlights of the period
from 1950 when Basic Principles Committee (BPC) started the task of
constitution-making to 1956 when the first constitution was enforced.
A part of the answer is easily available. If Pakistan according to the
Resolution was a religious expression (to borrow the phrase from Lawrence
Ziring), then the members of the Constituent Assembly should have
started to ponder over the process by which this expression was to be
actually realised. The main business which occupied the attention of the
members, however, was on issues such as joint versus separate electoral
system, or how to establish weight system in voting to correct the
demographic imbalance between East and West Pakistan. A political
impasse had completely engulfed the Assembly and the crisis of
constitution-making came to an end mercifully with the dissolution of the
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Assembly in October 1954 albeit by a different power play by the top


leadership.
But another development took place in the meantime that cast a deep
shadow on the matter, known as the anti-Ahmaddiya riots which took place
in Lahore in 1953. The Ahmadis also referred to as Qadianis and Mirzais
are followers of what all mainstream Muslims consider as an apostate. A
political group from the pre-partition times, Majlis-i-Ahrar was openly
suggesting that the Ahmadis should be declared as kafirs, a view widely
shared by all religious leaders. A shooting of an Ahmadi in Quetta triggered
disturbances across the country and turned into serious riots in Lahore. A
court of inquiry was established with Justices Muhammad Munir and M.R.
Kayani to enquire into these Punjab disturbances. The Munir Report as it
is known is a sobering document, and is quite relevant in the context of the
present culture of intolerance prevailing in Pakistan.
The Munir Report clearly underlines the fact that it was Liaquat Ali
Khan's image that prevailed. On the question of Islamic state, for example,
the court read out excerpts from Jinnah's vision about Pakistan and asked
the religious leaders attending the enquiry about their views about it. They
unanimously said that first, they did not agree with this vision and secondly,
that it had been made obsolete by the Objectives Resolution. But the Report
also publicised further that the religious leaders were not only unfit to run
a modern state but 'the world was presented with a sorry spectacle of
Muslim divines no two of whom agreed on the definition of a Muslim, and
yet were practically unanimous that all who disagreed should be put to
death' (W.C. Smith, Islam in Modern History).
Dr. I.H. Qureshi, who was the chief author of the Objectives Resolution
was a well known academic historian. On the question of place of nonMuslims in an Islamic state there was a growing literature available which
must have been familiar to him. For example, Professor Hamidullah of
Osmania University, Hyderabad, Deccan, had written a comprehensive
article on the Charter of Madina (Dunya ka sub say pahla tahriri dastoor
world's first written code) in which a code of equal rights of citizenship
between Muslims and Jews had been prepared by the Holy Prophet. It is
safe to assume that this document was familiar to I.H. Qureshi. It is a puzzle
that the top leadership of the Muslim League consisted of men who were
familiar with Jinnah's position about equality of citizenship and they
ignored it. As Dr. Qureshi himself observed, there was no pressure for this
action; the Resolution was quickly prepared and passed 'in a snap' at a
meeting of the Muslim League Party.
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In any case, the Basic Principles Committee of the Constituent


Assembly produced three draft constitutions, first in 1950 under Liaquat
Ali Khan as the prime minister, and the other two in 1953 and 1954. The
first draft suggested inclusion of Objectives Resolution as a Directive Principle of
State Policy, subject to the provision that this would not prejudice the
incorporation of fundamental rights in the constitution at the proper place.
In the second draft, under Khawaja Nazimuddin as prime minister the
Resolution became a preamble to the constitution, and was kept in that place for
third draft as well. Also a procedure was incorporated emphasising the
repugnancy clause (i.e. all laws should be in line with teachings of Islam) and
declaring Pakistan as an Islamic Republic, not an Islamic state. The business of
the second Constituent Assembly came to an end with 1956 constitution,
which kept a balance between the secular and the religious.
When the Objectives Resolution was introduced, the country was
known as Pakistan, not Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Its structure was
republican and in line with the Indian Independence Act 1947. This
structure is still western and democratic, and distinction between Muslims
and minorities is out of tune with it. Pakistan has not succeeded in
reconciling these two conflicting objectives. In this sense, the religious
leaders have a consistent position. Their concept of Islamic state leaves the
decision-making to a few 'pious' citizens to rule by 'consensus' according to Abul
A'la Maudoodi. And for the rest, Khuda knows best. Or, is it Allah, for
orthodox Sunnis!
izzud-din.pal@videotron.ca

Smokers Corner:
Ayubs republic
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Nadeem F. Paracha Updated Apr 10, 2016 09:45am


The state of Pakistan, especially one of its sturdiest institutions, the
military, is trying to rapidly alter its ideological make-up. The move (mainly
orchestrated by the military high command under Gen Raheel Sharif), is
seeking a gradual departure from the mindset which drove and defined the
countrys military establishment for over three decades.
Ever since the late 1970s, a concentrated effort was made by the
dictatorship of Gen Zia (1977-88), to change the supposed Anglicised
nature of the armed forces and transform it into becoming an Islamic one.
And even though religious symbolism in times of war was often used by
the institution in the past, under Gen Zia, such symbolism became a
mainstay, along with the state-backed proliferation of devout ritualism
within the forces, achieved through allowing the wholesale entry of both
political as well as apolitical evangelical outfits inside the barracks.
Studying Gen Ayubs regime might have some tips for the military
establishment as it attempts to revamp the countrys ideological narrative
This was a pragmatic move as much as it was an ideological one. Soviet
forces had entered Afghanistan, and Pakistan had become the launch pad
for a number of Afghan guerrilla groups, aided by the US and Saudi Arabia,
and facilitated by the Zia regime.
According to a reclusive Brigadier-General, S.K. Malik, who became a
spectral ideologue behind much of what emerged within the armed forces
during the Zia regime, every citizen in an Islamic republic should think like a
holy warrior, and that war inspired by faith should be turned into a national
policy.
Malik wrote this in Religious Concept of War, a book he authored in 1979.
It became a necessary read for officers.
The militarys character was successfully transformed, and it was this
transformation which was perceived to have made the institution stronger
and more influential in the region. This largely misappropriated perception
encouraged its continuation, despite the fact that it clearly began to struggle
in finding relevance in a world where the Cold War had ended, and the
Soviet Union had collapsed.
Its relevance then completely eroded in the post-9/11 world. Whats
more, the aforementioned perception had created a collective ego which
soon began to challenge its own architects. The architects settled for
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holding the perception as is, but the ego now wanted it to evolve further.
This egos desire to do so now meant a war not only against the infidels, but
against the state and society as well.
So what the Pakistan military establishment under Gen Raheel is now
attempting to do is to construct a brand new narrative which could replace the
one that has failed to find relevance in the post-9/11 scenario, and has, in fact,
become a major thorn in the side of the Pakistani state and polity.
This again is a pragmatic move, and it should be. But it will require some
ideology as well, especially in a country whose polity has been heavily
indoctrinated in understanding Pakistan as an ideological state.
Part of the answer to this may lie in an interesting period of Pakistans
history. That period constitutes the Ayub Khan regime (1958-69). Much
can be learned from it about what to do and what not to, in the context of
what the military is now attempting to achieve.
Ayub Khan imposed Pakistans first Martial Law in 1958 with the
backing of an all-powerful president, Iskandar Mirza. Mirza and Ayub
blamed rising corruption, a spiraling economy, and political chaos as
reasons for the Martial Law. Both then went on to describe the 1956
Constitution as the selling of religion for political gains.
The Constitution had renamed the country, Islamic Republic of
Pakistan. Mirza and Ayub changed it to just Pakistan. Both were of the view
that Pakistan was created as a modern Muslim-majority state by
Mohammad Ali Jinnah and not a theological one.
Mirza was ousted by Ayub just 20 days after the coup, and Ayub became
the president in 1959. Ayubs coup was a popular one. This gave him the
leeway to aggressively deflect (through policy) all he thought could be
detrimental to a young country.
He was allergic to leftists (who he believed were anarchic and disruptive
expressions of progressive thought); and religious outfits repulsed him (who
he accused of being ill-informed about Islam, backward and archaic). In a
1960 speech, he claimed: Pakistan was not achieved to create a priest-ridden
culture but it was created to evolve an enlightened society
He then continued: In fact, it is a great injustice to both life and religion
to impose on 20th century man the condition that he must go back several
centuries in order to prove his credentials as a true Muslim
In Political & Social Transformation, Dr Anita M. Weiss writes that
Ayub believed in a synthesis of modernist and traditionalist interpretations
of Islam in order to make it compatible with changing modes of time. In a
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1985 essay, renowned Islamic researcher and scholar, late Dr Fazal Rehman
Malik, wrote that during the first phase of the Ayub regime (1958-65), there
was an important development as the era pushed the confused and
ambiguous attitudes of the earlier official Modernists towards a clarity
making Islamic Modernism different from the fundamentalist
conservatives (sic) . . .
Ayubs policies based on his understanding of Islamic Modernism
were seen as secular and Westernised by the religious parties, especially
when he banned polygamy and the 1962 Constitution renamed the country,
Republic of Pakistan. In 1964, he banned the Jamaat-i-Islami ( JI). But
Ayubs popularity was such that he remained unmoved, even though,
eventually he had to alter his radical family planning policies; again redefine
the country as an Islamic Republic; and when the Supreme Court
overturned the ban on JI.
In his essay on the Ayub era, Dr S.H. Ansari, states that from 1965
onward, Ayubs regime began to change complexion. This undermined his
project of Muslim modernity which, had it continued, might just have
moulded a somewhat different future for the country.
Ansari gives three reasons for the projects rollback. First, to get reelected as president in 1965, Ayub allowed his information ministry to coopt certain ulema who asked to negatively highlight the gender of his
opponent, Fatima Jinnah. Secondly, after the 1965 war with India ended in
a stalemate, it negatively impacted the countrys economy. Ayub began to
lose popularity and increasingly began to use religious rhetoric.
Muslim modernists began to abandon him, while the countrys polity,
now suffering from a stressed economy, began moving left (PPP, National
Awami Party, Awami League); or right towards religious outfits. Thirdly, by
the time he resigned in early 1969, many of Ayubs desperate ministers had
begun mending fences with religious outfits (to negate leftist opponents).
But all this could not save Ayubs fall. A floundering economy and an
attempt to repackage and repaint his stumbling regime with more pious
colours only ended up providing his erstwhile opponents the space to make
a re-entry into mainstream politics.
This is also the same ploy Z.A. Bhutto would attempt during the tail end
of his populist regime in 1977, only to also fall and set the stage for the likes
of Zia and whatever followed his regime and legacy.

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Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, April 10th, 2016

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