In the backdrop of passage of XVIII Constitution Amendment Act, 2010 and the re-naming of NWFP as Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa, the resultant movement for carving out more provinces from the existing one like Hazara, Seraiki from Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa and Punjab respectively, would lead to opening of the Pandora Box. The rise of sub-nationalities to demand their accommodation in the Federal compact is but inevitable.
It is imperative that instead of Ostrich Like approach, the establishment concedes that this issue of accommodation of sub-nationalities needs to be accepted, opening the dyke and addressed objectively by evolving a consensus, more in administrative dimension then the ethno-political.
At the advent of the twenty-first century, the whole planet convulsed, by unprecedented social, economic and political turmoil. After the fall of the Berlin wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union, humankind has gone through a spate of wars, terrorism, imperialist savagery and reactionary fundamentalism. An epoch of mild reaction, stagnation and ferment has been the hallmark of human society under the crushing domination of monopoly capitalism and a paralytic globalization.
Under this stalemate and a lull in the movement for a relatively long period of time questions such as national chauvinism, racism and ethnic conflict have re surfaced even in the advanced capitalist countries where they were thought to have been resolved long ago.
In the ex-colonial or so-called developing countries, the uncompleted tasks of the national democratic revolution, like the national question, have erupted with a bloody vengeance. These conflicts have resulted in hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of innocent people being killed.
Millions more have been displaced from their homes, women and children have been massacred and yet this terrible suffering continues unabated with no end in sight under the prevalent capitalist system.
Globalization poses several challenges; the “national question” in the 21st century is one of them. The ongoing restructuring of the global political economy by multinational corporations, multilateral trade agreements, and such supra-national institutions as the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the World Trade Organization, raises questions about the history and future of the nation state.
“Globalization” fostered by profit maximizing of multinational corporations, brutally undermines the integrity of nations, cultures, the ecology of the planet, and the human condition of existence. No country – not even the biggest country – can withstand the crushing domination of the world market.
Nevertheless, here we see a striking contradiction. Precisely at this moment in time, when the world market has become the dominant force on the planet, national antagonisms have everywhere acquired a ferocious character and the national question far from abolished everywhere assumes a particularly intense and poisonous character.
Initially the creation of the nation state and the market gave an impetus to the productive forces, science and technology.
However, the rapid growth and production through the industrial revolution gave rise to wars for markets and the phenomenon of colonization. This process gave rise to imperialism and the subjugation of countries and regions where the industrial revolution had not taken place.
The whole pattern of socio-economic development of these countries under the yoke of imperialism was uneven and yet combined as imperialist investment was more advanced in those countries due to their quest for higher rates of profit.
Even after the independence of these countries, mostly in Asia, Africa and Latin America, the domination of imperialism continues specially in those countries where capitalism was toppled by the national liberation movements.
With the passage of time, their character became more passive and reactionary because of globalization and advancements in the mode of production and now the nation state has become one of the fundamental barriers to human development. These corrupt feudal property owners and capitalists ruling these ex-colonial countries are acting as commission agents of the bourgeoisie to exploit the working class under the slogan of nationalism.
In Pakistan, the national question exists in its worst form because Pakistan itself is, perceived by the nationalist and sub-nationalist forces as a failed nation state.
Demand for Pakistan, a separate Muslim Home land it is argued was conceded by the British, because of the partition of the Indian subcontinent, as they and the feudal, feared that a united national liberation would not stop there but would move towards a social transformation that would overthrow landlordism; capitalism and the imperialist strangle hold.
From Imperialist-Capitalist perspective, to avoid a socialist revolution they conspired and split the movement along religio-communal lines that led to the reactionary and traumatic partition of a land that had more than five thousand years of common history, cultural and socio economic existence.
Nationalists in Pakistan have always believed that country was, founded not a nation state, but as a state made up of nationalities. Even the abbreviations, which form the word Pakistan, are cited as a testimony to this fact. This corresponds to its belated character.
On the foundations of extensive agriculture and home industry, commercial capital could not develop fully. Not by transforming production, but broadly by increasing the radius of its operation, the greedy demands of the state and the meagerness of the economic foundation under the ruling class gave rise to the bitterest terms of exploitation. National oppression has been brutal and rough ever since the country came into being.
If we look back at last 60 years, the question arises, what Pakistan as a nation state has achieved so far? More than half a century after independence, the conditions of Pakistan are more miserable than they were at the time of partition. There are countless failures of independence.
The litany of failures includes the inability to have a functional parliamentary system, failure either to sustain economic development or meaningful redistribution of wealth to the impoverished masses.
To cite a few the East Pakistan debacle, the inability to resolve regional and sectarian disputes, the inability to sustain a clear concept and direction to Pakistan’s Nationalism and finally failure to create a modern cohesive nation state.
In the case of Pakistan, the regional assertion based on the ethnic identities came to the fore in more pronounced ways in the 1990s. Ethnic disaffection was simmering in Balochistan and NWFP since the 1970s. Similarly, the Mohajir of Pakistan were emerging as an important ethnic group with the growth of MQM since the 1980s as a major force in Urban centers in Sindh, especially in Karachi and the twin city of Hyderabad. The Sindhi assertion has along been there since 1950s.
All this has to be studied, against the background of the separatism within Pakistan that climaxed in the formation of Bangladesh in 1971.
Historical Background
To examine the ethnicity in Pakistan, we will have to search for its root in the Pakistan movement. It was a movement of a special nature. Led by the Muslim League under leadership of Mohammed Ali Jinnah, the Muslims of British India were fed with the fond hope of an Islamic State as opposed to the secular, democratic ideals of State Advocated by the Indian National Congress, which sought to unify diversities, in Indian sub-continent throughout its length and breadth. The current and ongoing simmer and smoke in post Independence Republic of India.
While the Congress Party organized constructive programs like, women welfare, eradication of illiteracy, addressing the issue of untouchables and decentralizations of power and so on, the leaders of the Pakistan movement, unwaveringly continued to clung to the anti-Congress agenda, as they genuinely believed that INC was putting up a façade of secularism. The apprehension turned in to stark reality of subjugation of Muslim minority in Hindu controlled Establishment in post independence India.
Jinnah had given up demand for Pakistan and accepted the Cabinet Mission Plan of May 1946. He retracted after Nehru misinterpreted the Plan and then gave call to Muslims to observe the ‘Direct Action Day’ on 16 August 1946.
The idea of ‘Islamic State’ overstepped all other secular concerns and after the foundation of the State of Pakistan on August 14, 1947, there was no further impetus to build a nation out of several disparate ethnic groups.
The demand for an Islamic Pakistan was essentially a demand for political empowerment, and was therefore not so religious in intent. As such, ‘Islam’ did not act any more as a binding force, once Pakistan came into existence.
It is of little surprise that the most prominent of India’s Ulema and religious leaders, notably those in the Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Hind (party of Indian Ulema) and Jamaat-e-Islami did not look favorably upon Muslim Communalism and former, instead supported the Congress Party’s notion of United India.
After independence, the positive programmatic policies of the Congress Party were, incorporated into the Indian Constitution as the guidelines of a welfare state. In contrast, the ideological foundation of Pakistan as a unified Muslim, (not in exclusive religious sense but in political sense), nation state, has not yet taken roots in the minds of the people in Pakistan. Instead this very aspiration of people of Pakistan to be a Muslim State in sub-continent has been exploited by Governments and Regimes since early fifties.
The failure of the process of drafting of a constitution for the state of Pakistan revealed the irreconcilable differences among various groups seeking to impose their World-view on the people of Pakistan. This lack of consensus has marked the nature of the Pakistani polity ever since.
Pakistan movement was very strong in Muslim minority provinces, where Muslims feared Hindu domination most. Pakistan, however, was created in the Muslim majority Provinces of northwestern India and Bengal. Ethnic, linguistic and cultural distinctions set them apart.
The socio-cultural outlook of the Muslim populations of the Muslim minority provinces (Bihar, U.P, C.P, and Princely State of Hyderabad) had very little similarity with the Muslims in Sindh, Balochistan, and NWFP and even in Punjab. The Sindhis, Punjabis, Bengalis, Biharis, or Hyderabadis followed different customs. They were, culturally and politically, different people in terms of ethos emanating out of living with their Hindu neighbors than with people of Muslim majority provinces. The founding fathers of Pakistan had hoped, however, that the cementing force of Islam would, remain engraved over the national psyche and continue to maintain the integrity and unity of the country despite the ethnic diversity. They were not off the mark either. Only the cementing force of Islam has kept the national foundation firmly cemented, which keeps us going over the precipice.
After the passing away of both Jinnah and Liaquat, the League virtually became leaderless. The League leadership was heavily Mohajir dominated. Just after independence, out of 27 top posts of the country including P.M, C.M, Governor, Attorney General etc., Mohajir numbered about 18. They were very well educated in comparison to the other ethnic groups.
However, the oligarchic League leadership delayed the formation of the constitution, and remained over-dependent upon the old colonial set-up, which again had its ethnic bias with Mohajir and Punjabis having an upper hand.
Thus Punjabi – Mohajir, combine did not like the idea of Bengali dominated Pakistan, culturally a stronger community in Pakistan and numerically preponderant. The ruling elite, mostly Urdu speaking Mohajir from north India, was completely against the Bengalis. There was a big gap between East the West Pakistanis society in terms of rituals and customs.
Between 1963 and 1967 the percentage of poor – those whose income was below Rs. 300 per month – had declined in both rural and urban areas, from 60.5 % to 59.7 % and from 54.8 % to 25 % respectively. The actual number of the poor in both the areas had risen from 24.46 million to 24.8 million in rural areas, and from 6.78 million to 6.81 million in urban areas. Economic growth favored the industrial sector at the cost of the traditional economy, and it led to growth of the cities at the cost of the rural hinterland and small towns. Punjab and West Pakistan grew at the cost of East Pakistan. Authoritarianism became associated with economic disparity.
Ayub Khan’s (1958-1969) rule especially harbored an ethnic bias. According to Mahbubul Haq, 1968, twenty-two families controlled two thirds of Pakistan’s industrial assets: 80 % of banking and 70 % of insurance, all of them were from West Pakistan.
This hatred and the sense of discrimination against the Bengalis culminated in the bifurcation of Pakistan in December 1971. It was the first direct manifestation of the anguish of major ethnic groups against the dominant ethnic groups, i.e., Punjabi, Sindhi, Pathan, Mohajir and Baloch, apart from many small groups like Saraiki, Hindko, Zikri, Ahmadiya etc.
The rise of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and the PPP to power in 1971 presented Pakistan with another opportunity to define national identity in secular socio-economic terms.
However, he miserably failed to embrace democratic norms, thus shaking the foundations of newly established Parliamentary democracy and federalism in Pakistan. Bhutto could not tolerate his PPP’s electoral debacle in 1970 elections in Provinces of Balochistan, NWFP and to meddle with the ethnic politics of these states.
The ruling political elites in Pakistan have always sought to use the ideology of Pakistani nation against the demands of different nationalities as well as ethnic groups for greater provincial autonomy. The elite’s self-serving temptation to take any demand for autonomy as a mischievous conspiracy to divide and disintegrate Pakistan has had adverse effects and led to assertion of many regional identities.
One may say elite in Pakistan has always tried to monopolize patriotism, as it has been the most convenient vehicle for their protectionist and self serving objective and to maintain the status quo.
The Case of Baloch and Pathan Assertion
Balochistan is the largest province of Pakistan constituting 43 % of the total population. Even the name would suggest that, the province is named, after the principal ethnic community. The Baloch, in Balochistan, make up less than half of the population of the province.
In fact, Baloch, population residing in Karachi and elsewhere in Pakistan and abroad, outnumber the Baloch population living in Balochistan itself. The Baloch are, divided into several tribes, clans and organized on the lines of traditional, semi-feudal Sardari System.
Z.A. Bhutto motivated by desire to dominate Balochistan and NWFP, dismissed the elected provincial government in Balochistan in February 1973 and the NWFP government resigned in sympathy/protest against dismissal of the Balochistan Government.
Initially Z.A. Bhutto played the Sardars against each other for his own interest and finally in 1976 he declared the system abolished. Subsequently, Baloch leader Ghaus Bakhsh Bizenjo gave the theory of four nationalities. Consequently, abolished the Sardari System abolished and arrested the Baloch and Pushtoon nationalist leaders put on trial before the special Hyderabad tribunal.
These measures, particularly the dismissal of Balochistan government, were seen in Balochistan and NWFP, as an assault on the autonomy of the provinces. The resistance in Balochistan soon developed into a civil war. Bhutto ordered the armed forces to suppress the Baloch dissidents.
The war against Baloch lasted almost from 1973 to 1977 and many Baloch were forced to flee Afghanistan. The war resulted in the killing of 5300 Baloch and death of 3300 soldiers. The Shah of Iran also came to the help of Bhutto in suppressing the Baloch nationalities, as he was afraid that the contagion might spread to Iranian Baloch too.
Again, in October 1992, ethnic tempers ran high and clashes took place between the Baloch and second largest ethnic group, the Pathans in Balochistan, when 12 new wards were included in the Quetta Municipal Corporation.
Pathans dubbed the decisions as faulty because according to them it was meant to outnumber Pathan councilors against Baloch to ensure the election of a Baloch mayor.
After the Chaggi nuclear tests by Pakistan in May 1998, some Baloch student’s hijacked one PIA plane to register their disapproval and draw international attention to the prevailing sense of discrimination in Pakistan against Baloch people and Balochistan. The Afghan crisis in early 1980s also triggered ethnic tension between the Pathans and the Baloch.
Pashtoon Nationalism:
The idea of an independent Pakhtunistan is very old. The origins of this idea lie in the nostalgic association of the Pathans with the empire of Ahmed Shah Abdali, a Pathan, who gained control over the entire area from Persia to Delhi during the late 18th century.
This empire did not last long. However, the event of this empire lingers in the popular memory and this has provided the legacy for those advocating Pakhtunistan. Apart from this the major ethnic group in Afghanistan, the Pathans are willing to support any movement for autonomy for Pathans in Pakistan.
Continued negligence of NWFP by central leadership in Islamabad gives further legitimacy to the movement for ethnic assertion, which might assume disintegrative proportion. The gradual decline of Pathan representation in administration and especially security agencies has created lot of resentment among the Pathans.
In 1968 Pathans were almost 40 % of the top military elite, thus getting the bigger share than the Punjabis (35-4%) do. Ayub Khan was himself a Pathan. For sometime, the large presence of Pathans in the state apparatus made it difficult for the advocates of autonomous or independent Pakhtunistan to convince the younger educated middle classes to believe that other ethnic group was ruling them.
However, later on the steps taken by the central administration contributed to their fear of gradual marginalization in the hands of the Punjabis. The massive influx of Afghan refugees into Balochistan and NWFP in the wake of the first Afghan war revived the Pakistani fears of on eventual revival of the Baloch and Pathan separatism in the 1980s.
This in fact disturbed the ethnic equation in Balochistan leading to Baloch assertion for they were being ‘minorities’ (outnumbered by Pathans). Similarly, in NWFP, the huge Pathan-refugee population added to the confidence of the Pathans for renewed assertion. During this period, regional parties were welcomed into alliance with mainstream national parties and such coalition succeeded in blunting the edge of ethnic assertion effectively for sometime until irreconcilable differences tore them apart leading to ethnic assertion by the regional parties again.
Thus, after the 1988 elections the Awami National Party (ANP) having considerable Pathan following, made an alliance with the PPP and in 1990 formed a coalition government with the Islamic Jumhoori Ittehad (IJI), and again with PML-N in 1997. This alliance broke down when the government of Nawaz Sharif refused to rename the NWFP as Pakthunkhwa.
This marked apparently the return of the strategy of ethnic mobilization by the ANP. Begum Nasim Wali (the wife of Wali Khan) declared in an interview “I want an identity. I want the name to change so that Pathans may be identified on the map of Pakistan”. She emphasized that Pakthunkhwa was “the 300 year old name of this area: the name used by Ahmed Shah Abdali who said he forgot everything including the throne of Delhi but not Pakthunkhwa”. ANP is also against the Kalabagh Dam project whose royalties the Pathans say is bound to go in Punjabi pockets.
The Mohajir
Another serious ethnic tension, going on in Sindh, particularly Karachi, is the one between the Sindhi and the Mohajir. The Mohajir are the people who migrated to Pakistan mainly from Gangestic belt of India, in 1947. The Mohajir were not only in politics but also dominant in administration in Pakistan during the initial years. Out of 101 Muslim members of the Indian Civil Service, 95 opted for Pakistan, among who only one third were Punjabis. The Mohajir represented only 3.5 % of the population, in the early years while they occupied 21 % of Civil Services post”.
Since the inception, the Mohajir shared a dominant position with the Punjabis, who because of their former status of the martial race in British India represented 80 % of the armed forces. The reign of Ayub Khan saw the balance tilting in favor of Punjabi-Pathan axis. The Mohajirs were no longer in position, albeit purges from civil services of top Mohajir Bureaucrats, to exert as much influence as they did not vote for Ayub in the 1964 Presidential election.
Z. A. Bhutto’s PPP came to power in 1971. The Sindh saw it as the empowerment of Sindhi nationalism. At the same time, Mohajir saw Bhutto as Anti-Mohajir. Bhutto made Sindhi compulsory in School by passing the Sindhi language bill. It forced bureaucrats to use Sindhi as an official language. Mohajir protested against this and another purge of Mohajir Bureaucrats. Bhutto introduced a quota system under which 1.4 % of the posts in central administration were given to rural Sindh (Sindhi hinterland) through the 1973 constitution. This affected the Mohajir preponderance in the Civil Service of the Province. I
In 1973, Mohajir constituted 33.5% of the posts in civil administration, when they only represented 8% of the total population. The rural Sindh occupied 2.7% of the posts in the junior grade and 4.3% of the posts in the officer grade. In the army, they represented only 2.2% and their presence has remained more or less the same since then. Zia, on the one hand supported Mohajir for countering the PPP in its stronghold, on the other favored Sindhi nationalism, and facilitated the Punjabi penetration in Sindh.
Mohajir ethnic consciousness found expression first in 1978 in the form of student activism, but subsequently, it consolidated into a political party – the Mohajir Qoumi Movement (MQM) in 1984.
Soon after its appearance the MQM swept into power in the urban centers of Sindh, taking over the Mayorship of Karachi and Hyderabad in 1987.
This led to confrontation and the Province became the battleground for violence and armed conflict”. Army launched operation clean up in 1992 to clean Sindh of dacoits and anti-social elements. During the operation, MQM activists were harassed and fake-encounters occurred.
Army also engineered split within MQM and the split away group was known as MQM – Haqiqi faction, which acts as an arm of the security agencies of the Pakistani State. The main MQM party was then known as MQM – Altaf Hussain faction. The leader of MQM – (A), Altaf Hussain, lives in exile, in London.
During the last decade, encounters between the two MQM faction and as well as between MQM – (A) and the Police and security forces took ten of thousands of lives in Karachi, which continued unabated and 1995 witnessed a full-blown insurgency by MQM.
Situation obtained in a city, which generated one-third GDP, had been termed by the New York Times as one of the violent cities of the World. It has had negative impact on the economic scenario, which remained under tremendous pressure after the Chaggi explosions due to international economic sanctions.
The Karachi crisis is mainly between the Sindhi and the Mohajir but there is strong presence of other ethnic groups too, particularly the Pathans, largest concentration of Pushtoons out side of Khyber-Pakhtoonkhwa. In April 1998, a Mohajir boy’s love marriage with a Pathan girl triggered a new brand of ethnic clash resulting in many deaths.
However, in the last decade, particularly since 2002, when the Musharraf Regime opted for a policy of inclusive politics, the MQM has under gone qualitative and quantitative changes and has become a political force to be reckoned with at par with ANP. MQM is in power corridors for that duration and has consolidated its presence in the political power equation in Pakistan.
MQM still feels uncomfortable with its relations with the establishment and does not give go ahead to return to Pakistan to its Quaid Mr. Altaf Hussain with many of his colleagues, ending self-imposed exile in UK.
SINDHI NATIONALISM
Roots of nationalism in Sindh
To understand Sindh’s nationalistic mass psyche, we need to explore the past and unfold the process of its development.
Sindhi nationalism can be divided into pre-partition and post-partition waves. The pre-partition wave consisted of early resistance period (1842-1900), transitional period (1900-1930) and Hur War II period (1930-1943), whereas, the post-partition nationalism consisted of cultural nationalism (1947-1970), transitional nationalism (1970-1980), resistance period (1980-1987), degeneration (1988-2000) and revival period (ongoing).
In the mid-nineteenth century, the Talpur Emirs’ kingdom was divided into three administrative regions. The major one was ruled from Hyderabad, while the others from Khairpur and Mirpurkhas. Their armies joined forces in a last desperate stand against the British invasion at Miani in March 1843. That battle proved to be the Talpurs’ waterloo. Ten thousand Sindhi combatants were slaughtered.
The invasion was aimed at using Sindh as a launching pad in the first Anglo-Afghan war. After this occupation, a series of liberation wars in Sindh dominated the next decades, commencing with the first post-invasion uprising of Ranas in Tharparkar, a southeastern desert district under Karan Singh on April 15, 1859 in which hundreds of fighters lost their lives.
The insurgency went on for six months, and finally, routed the British forces. The last commander of rebels, Rooplo Kolhi, was hanged publicly in the Nagarparkar town.
In 1857, Sher Mohammed Khan of Mirpurkhas gave the British a good fight and was blown from cannon-mouth at Rambagh in Karachi. Darya Khan Jakhrani, another resistance fighter, was expelled to Aden.
After Napier’s departure in 1850, Sindh was attached to the Bombay Presidency, with Sir Bartle Frere as its first Commissioner. There was no infrastructure in Sindh at that time. Frere in 1850-1859 changed the face of Sindh. In 1853, he gave Sindh its first English school, in 1858 the Sindh Railways started work on the Karachi-Hyderabad railway track, irrigation was developed and Sukkur Barrage planned. In the era of British occupation, Sindh transformed from a medieval to modern society.
Rabindranath Tagore once described Hyderabad as “the most fashionable city in India”. Shikarpur became the banker of Central Asia. And after Russian revolution, it became the banker of south India.
The fight against the British rule was not yet over. The Hur Jama’at under Pir Pagara Syed Mardan Shah waged guerilla warfare against British Indian Army in 1890. This liberation war is known as Hur guerilla warfare-I, which went on the whole decade. Hundreds of fighters took part in the warfare; however, three of them, Bachu Badshah, Peeru Vazir and Gulu caught public eye.
This was followed by the Hur guerilla warfare-II, which erupted in early 1941. About 25,000 sq kms area was the battleground between the guerillas and British forces. To counter this, some 35,000 troops of Baloch and Punjab regiments were deployed in Sindh, while thousands from Frontier Force, Air Force, Parachute Force and Sindh Rifle Police were also provided to the Anti-Hur Command. The Heavy artillery was also used. The martial law was imposed on Sindh to arrest the drift in to chaos.
By changing its entire class composition, the partition changed the face of socio-political course in Sindh. Hindus formed middle and urban class in the Sindh society. In 1947, they migrated to India and left a vacuum of middle and urbanized class. Peasant and feudal lords were the remaining classes forming post-partition Sindhi society.
Immediately after the creation of Pakistan in 1947, the Sindh government invited the central government of Pakistan to establish its capital in Karachi. This offer was accepted gladly. After becoming the capital, Karachi was separated from Sindh and handed over to the central government. This separation took place on July 23, 1948 under the orders of Mr Jinnah. The Sindh Assembly passed a resolution against this decision and the Sindhi public opinion turned against it. The separation of Karachi caused financial, cultural, educational and linguistic setback to Sindh.
On October 14, 1954, the centre introduced One Unit scheme in order to confront the numerical majority of East Pakistan and the One Unit that came to be known as West Pakistan in October 1955.
Under this plan, Sindh, Balochistan, Pakhtunkhawa (the NWFP) and the Punjab, which had been distinct cultural and geographic entities for centuries, were merged into so-called West Pakistan, which could then claim parity with East Pakistan.
In 1970s, Prime Minister Bhutto started to transform Sindh society by developing its middle class. The emerging middle class began becoming foundation stone of the nationalist movement in Sindh.
Almost all major nationalist parties were founded in this era. After Bhutto was executed, Sindh took to resistance against the military. Hundreds of civilians as well as armed personnel were killed.
If we analyze the situation in that period, we will find that MRD in Sindh was more a nationalistic reaction against the military than simply a movement for democracy. In 1990s, the middle class in Sindh inclined to be accommodative as the PPP was twice in power. Consequently, nationalist tendencies in Sindhi society became relatively milder. Contrary to this, during Musharraf era, the picture has entirely changed.
Sindhi nationalism, as articulated by Sindhi Nationalist Intellectuals, is an expression of the impasses the masses in Sindh face under the oppressive feudal-capitalist regime that dominates the whole of Pakistan.
The policy of Pakistani governments has primarily been instrumental in the rise of nationalist movements. Ethno-regional identification roughly corresponds with provincial domiciles, but the fit is imperfect owing to the effects of partition and internal migration.
Sindh, the southern most province of the state possesses one of the most varied demographical set-ups in Pakistan. There is a very fragile ethnic balance between Sindhis and non-Sindhis. After partition many of the immigrants from U.P., CP & Berar, Gujarat and Mumbai, besides other parts of India moved mainly to Karachi, but also to Hyderabad, Sukkur and other cities of Sindh.
This massive influx of Mohajir from India and other nationalities from with in Pakistan, resulted in a greater control of people from this transmigration over the economy, jobs and posts in the state apparatus. Although this phenomenon had a greater impact on urban Sindh, the deprivation was felt acute in rural Sindh, especially amongst the Sindhi middle classes. The acquisition of State and other lands by Punjabi settlers further aggravated this feeling of national deprivation amongst the Sindhi populace. There are several other factors, which fuelled these sentiments.
It is not just that after sixty years the Pakistani nation still longs to be forged by the ruling classes and the state, but even in Sindh whose ruling classes had opted for Pakistan at a crucial historical juncture, the migrants from India and elsewhere could not be harmoniously integrated. These ethnic, national and racial prejudices went on getting worse and exploded in bloody conflicts in the 1980s and 1990s.
In addition, huge numbers of people from other provinces of Pakistan migrated to Karachi because it is the biggest industrial city of Pakistan and was the capital before Islamabad. With each passing day, it is becoming increasingly contentious as to who is a “pure” Sindhi, Pushtoon is or Baloch, as the boundaries between these groups are constantly in flux because of demographic changes.
In addition, although it is difficult to decide whom “pure” Sindhi is, distinction between the classes is exposed to an unusual extent in every part of Sindh. As Lenin said, “there are two nations in every modern nation. There are two national cultures in every national culture.” We in Pakistan it seems, have deliberately been deprived of live these two cultures in conjunction as sub-cultures or indigenous culture has always been sacrificed at the altar of so-called National Culture.
The military-bureaucratic elite pursued certain policies, which on the one hand failed to integrate the people into one ideological community, on the other generated, and fed the ethno-national tendencies in Sindh, Balochistan, Khyber-Pakhtoonkhwa (NWFP) and former East Pakistan. Especially the policies pursued during the Ayub era (1958-1969) and reincarnated in the Zia era (1977-1988) and not the least in Musharraf era.
Both the Jeay-Sindh and Baloch movements, which had very little support at the time of the formation of Pakistan in 1947, have significantly emerged on the Pakistani political scene in the contemporary period 1971-87.
At the heart of nationalist sentiments in Pakistan is the perception (may not be reality as common Punjabi is also in the yoke of feudals) by non-Punjabis that the Punjabi nationality dominates the economy, politics, society and the state. There is considerable evidence to support this perception.
First, Punjabis constitute a majority of the population, approximately 60%; second, they dominate the civilian bureaucracy and the military; third, the Punjab is by far the wealthiest and most developed province in the state. Moreover, this perception is fuelled by governmental policies designed to assuage such perceptions.
A provincial autonomy movement emerged in Sindh as early as 1917 against the administrative arrangements of the British who had linked Sindh to the Bombay presidency. The movement led by the traditional landed elite of Sindh took on a national character. The word “Sindhu desh” was first time used during this movement.
Sindh became very closely identified with the idea of Pakistan. The Sindh assembly was the first Indian legislature to pass the resolution in favor of Pakistan. G. M. Syed, an influential Sindhi property owner and one of the important leaders to the forefront of the provincial autonomy movement joined the Muslim League in 1938 and presented the Pakistan resolution in the Sindh Assembly. Only a few months later he considered the Pakistan movement as an “irrational emotionalism” and wanted an “independent Sind”.
G. M. Syed, can rightly be considered the founder of Sindhi nationalism. He formed the Sindh Progressive Party in 1947 and demanded provincial autonomy within a socialist framework. In 1953, he formed the Sindh Awami Mahaz. G. M. Syed himself a middle-sized property owner represented the grievances of that class as well.
The educated middle classes had their own grievances. They did not find any place in two key institutions, the army and civil administration. The ingeniousness of tyranny was that those who were talking about National independence were among the corrupt feudal lords and tribal leaders.
Although there was still an old, distorted feudal system in their regions, where millions of people were on the verge of extinction, the Jeay Sindh movement got support only from the traditional landed elite and educated middle class.
The Jeay Sindh leaders developed covert contacts with high officials of the Indian government, sought and still seek assistance in their activities. The movement during that phase remained at the cultural level and could not translate its support at the political level, mainly because of the emergence of the Pakistan Peoples Party led by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto.
Himself a property owner and a charismatic young leader, he appealed to the same Sindhi constituencies and exploited the same regional issues with considerable success. The People’s Party successfully played a dual role as the champion of Sindhi grievances at the provincial level in Sindh and the spokesperson of the oppressed at the national level.
Because of the slogan of “Roti, (Bread) Kapra (clothing) and Makan” (shelter), the PPP became a broad based, peoples party in Pakistan. As Lenin pointed out, “the National Question is fundamentally a question of bread.”
There have been several movements in Sindh over the last 60 years but there are three very significant mass upsurges that shook the echelons of power in Islamabad. These are the movements of 1968-69, 1983 and to some extent that of 1986. All these movements had different intensities, character, orientation and motivations.
The most forceful was the 1968-69 movement, which created a revolutionary situation not only in Sindh but also all over Pakistan. Although there were some connotations of nationalist revulsion against the state, this movement had an overwhelming class basis and a socialist character.
It was the only time, which the vast masses of urban and rural Sindh were united, in a class struggle and overcame the national, ethnic, religious, linguistic and other prejudices.
In urban Sindh, the workers took over large sections of industry and the economy and in rural Sindh, there was a massive peasant revolt where the toilers besieged the Sindhi, Punjabi and other landed estates and the feudal aristocracy was forced to flee.
However, after 1971 when the first PPP government left the revolutionary path and took a reformist direction this movement ebbed and the class unity was again diverted along national and ethnic lines.
The PPP government’s reforms instead of solving the national question further sharpened the contradictions. The abolition of the more shameful national limitations established a formal equality of citizens regardless of their nationality, but this revealed more sharply the unequal position of the nationalities.
The quota system and Sindhi language in schools introduced by the Sindh provincial government of Mumtaz Ali Bhutto, did not improve the plight of Sindhi masses but it only increased the national and ethnic hatred amongst the various nationalities, especially in urban Sindh.
In reality, it gave a basis to the narrow nationalist petty “leaders” of the Pushtoon, Mohajir, Punjab and other communities in Karachi and other urban centers of Sindh.
The overthrow of the Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto government (1977) and his assassination (1979) by the vicious military dictatorship of General Zia-ul-Haq gave a new impetus to the nationalist movement in Sindh. The symbolism was that Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto belonged to Sindh.
Zia was the son of a Mullah who had migrated from Eastern (Indian) Punjab and was American-trained at Fort Bragg. His atrocities, his make up and his background were enough to provoke massive hatred from the masses in Sindh.
Zia’s repression of the Sindh was no less than the brutalities of British colonialists inflicted upon the mass of the subcontinent and other colonies. All this unleashed a glorious movement of the Sindhi masses against the military dictatorship. Although this movement had significant nationalist overtones, fundamentally it was linked to the general class resentment against this regime.
The movement failed because the regime was able to foster ethnic and nationalist discord especially in urban Sindh and in other main cities and provinces of Pakistan. In Karachi, the Pakistani state devised the instrument of the MQM, the Punjabi Pushtoon Ittehad, Islamic fundamentalists and other reactionary outfits to break the momentum of struggle that was developing along class lines.
Still the movement raged on. In such circumstances whenever national antagonisms coincided with class contradictions, they became especially hot. According to the official figures 1263 innocent people were slaughtered by the army in interior Sindh while thousands more were injured. There are heroic episodes of resistance that have now become legends in Sindhi folklore.
This movement could have still been victorious had the leaders of the so-called MRD (Movement for Restoration of Democracy) and the PPP not refused to give it a program of revolutionary class struggle.
Only on this basis could urban, rural and intra-provincial unity have been achieved. However, the MRD leaders were perhaps as much terrified of a revolutionary change as the regime was.
In 1986, the movement in Sindh was actually the last nail in Zia’s coffin. However, the Benazir government and the “democratic phase” that was ushered in had so deeply compromised itself that no real change been even talked about.
These regimes of formal democracy, with freedom of press, assembly, made the oppressed nationalities only the more painfully aware to what extent they were deprived of the most elementary means of cultural development, their own schools, their own courts, their own officials.
Reference to a democracy and future development only further irritated them. These so-called democratic regimes under the yoke of imperialism, and in the clutches of the army and the state, could not and did not solve any task of the democratic revolution. Thus, the national question in Sindh became more complicated, traumatic and convulsive.
The policy of the Zia regime to promote non-party politics had disastrous consequences for national politics in general and provincial politics in particular. In its zeal to weaken the PPP in the Sindh, the regime sought to appease Sindhi nationalism, which only served to give a partisan image to the state structure, which in turn provoked Mohajir nationalism.
The formation of APMSO in 1978 and MQM in 1984 and its patronization by Zia regime, was a conspiracy on the part of State to promote ethnic, linguistic and racial divisions amongst the working classes, especially in Karachi, the hub of the Pakistani proletariat. During the Zia ul Haq’s regime, the policy was one of divide and rule.
The Jeay Sindh adopted a strategy of partial cooperation and partial confrontation with the martial law regime. Its leadership maintained contacts with high functionaries of the Zia regime and did not refrain from obtaining personal and other favors, which the regime was willing to grant because of its own objective of weakening the PPP in Sindh.
These kinds of nationalists, who are either already rich capitalists or aspire to becoming such, do not raise the national question because they desire the common man to achieve freedom or a prosperous Sindh; rather they wish to squeeze the blood of their own people by filling the space which would be left vacant by other capitalists.
All the “solutions” they present to the people can only bring more misery and deprivation to the masses. These kinds of movements are founded on an unscientific basis and ultimately have always dragged people into wars and chaos with catastrophic consequences.
If Sindh should achieve “freedom” through the same phenomenon as in Bangladesh it may well get freedom from non-Sindhi capitalists, but the Sindhis will be all the more cruelly exploited by Sindhi capitalists and property owners.
These nationalists do not want freedom from poverty, misery, unemployment; they just want freedom to establish control over their own market where they could extract a huge surplus by squeezing the last drop of the workers’ blood.
There are many other small ethnic groups in the country and many linguistic groups as well. Various smaller linguistic groups often complain that they are not receiving proper treatment from the center.
Among the above-mentioned linguistic groups, Saraiki-speaking people have proclaimed their independent ethnic identity within Punjab. They have demanded that Punjab should be bifurcated and Sarikistan Province be constituted.
As far as fulfillment of regional aspiration is concerned, after the secession of Bangladesh, Punjab has emerged as the focal point of the unity and integrity as well as the cause of regional assertion. Punjab became economically very strong after the successful culmination of ‘green revolution’ in 1960s. Generally, Ayub Khan is credited with bringing about a ‘Green Revolution’ in late 1960s. Pakistan had a surplus of wheat production in 1967 due to introduction of ‘maxi-pak’.
Pakistan is a multi-ethnic and multi-lingual country. There are also so many ethnic, linguistic and racial groups in India. However, the problems of ethno-linguistic assertion have been successfully managed through the mechanism available for resolution of such tensions within the Indian constitutional framework. Unlike India, the leaders of Pakistan could not evolve a healthy democratic culture.
The party responsible for formation of Pakistan was not sufficiently democratized to lead Pakistan to a truly representative form of democracy. The conflicting forces of unity and diversity could not be balanced due to prevalence of acute ethnic and linguistic variations and lack of mutual interdependence of national and regional sub-systems.
The frequent outbreak of federal provincial and inter-provincial crisis such as the one-unit act, the Pakhtoon-Baluch struggle for maximum autonomy and the Sindh-Urdu controversy in Sindh continues to disturb the federal equilibrium. In the process the ruling elites, in a bid to keep the union intact tend to gravitate more and more towards centralization.
When Z. A. Bhutto took over as the first elected Prime Minister of the country in 1971, there was some hope for he had made his intentions very clear on the issue of founding and strengthening a federal structure under which, regional aspirations could be effectively managed? He came out with the 1973 constitution. However, within one year of passage of 1973 constitution, he himself violated the very ethos enshrined in the constitution.
Zia used his full tenure (1977-1988) to destabilize the society, by pitting one against the other. He used Islam not as a cementing force to unite the whole society but to give semblance of legitimacy to regime.
The restoration of democracy in 1988 raised some hope in this direction. However, rampant corruption, growing fundamentalism, sectarian violence, etc., dampened the prospects of good, efficient and federalized governance. Bureaucracy, which is very important in any system, saw itself as the ultimate arbiter of Pakistan’s fate and soon linked itself with the army.
The military bureaucratic collaboration proved lethal to the development of other institutions. The legislative branch remained sapless; the judiciary withered and the press stultified. Successive Prime Minister depended on the support of the Army to maintain public order. According to the Article 6 of 1973 Constitution, army rule could not be imposed, but it has been imposed successfully, first in July 1977 and recently in 12 October 1999.
The assertion of regional identities can be attributed to the shrinking resources too. Economy is in doldrums in Pakistan. Apart from gross mismanagement by the ruling elite – the army – bureaucracy- property owner troika – has taken its toll.
Economic growth has faltered and is now incapable of keeping pace with Pakistan’s annual population growth rate of nearly 3%, from about 6% in the 1980s. Current military budget consumes roughly 40% of the gross national product. Much of the government spending goes on interest payment. After all this, the government does not have sufficient amount to meet with people’s aspiration. The chief interest of the elite in this situation has been to maintain status quo.
All this has had its effects on the regional aspirations. The formation of political outfits like PONAM (Pakistan’s Oppressed Nations Movement), which vows to fight for the rights of the oppressed nationalities in Pakistan, shows the way non-Punjabi ethnic and national identities are trying to assert themselves in the national political scene.
It is easy to brush them aside as nominal parties without having any constituency or support base. However, the sense of frustration that is simmering within may very well erupt posing grave challenges to national integration in Pakistan.
The nationalist movements in Sindh and Balochistan are somehow inter-related. If there is a resistance in Balochistan, the morale of the nationalist movement in Sindh becomes high.
Therefore, what is going on at present in Balochistan has influenced Sindh, given that the Musharaf government’s policies have escalated the sense of deprivation in Sindh. Besides, the murder of Benazir has further aired the flame of separatism in Sindh, which is spreading day by day.
Elite groups dominate Pakistan’s political system. In addition, it faces the dilemma of chronic military rule. Most political parties in Pakistan have not worked well, although not for want of trying. Literally hundreds of political parties have existed during Pakistan’s brief history. In Pakistan, politics has been a struggle between competing kinship groups, for scarce resources and for prestige and honor, therefore loyalty to such parties is generated not by ideological allegiance to a program, but rather to individuals within the party.
Understanding the character of this state structure is the key to the understanding of the rise and decline of national movements in Pakistan.
In these circumstances, a new dialogue between the federating units and the centre, comprised of State Institutions called “Establishment” has become essential to create a new point of agreement between the provinces and the federation regarding political contract in the federal structure of the country. The practical way forward would be engagement of all political entities in Pakistan Be it regional, provincial or National and opt for accommodation and integration of their points of views and ethos to weave the national fabric of our great country Pakistan.
