Jinnah had highlighted the egalitarian, the tolerant, the peaceful features of Islam that would be the pillars on which Pakistan would rest. Instead, those who came after him turned his concept on its head, observes S. G. Jilanee
The middle of August marks an occasion of rejoicing both in India and Pakistan. Only the dates differ. Even though both countries became independence almost simultaneously but Pakistan observes the Day on the 14th only to give the impression that it preceded India in achieving independence. India celebrates its independence on 15th August.
For sixty years the two countries have been going through the ritual. The most common sight is the abundance of national flags all round – private homes and public buildings, taxis and rickshaws. Civil and military awards are conferred. Some prisoners are given amnesty. Newspapers bring out supplements. Social organizations organize seminars where scholars and intellectuals, both real and ersatz, try rather to impress the audience by a display of their learning than with any sincere belief in their statements. The trite cliché repeated every year with unabated gusto is an appeal to look back and take a solemn vow to achieve national unity and not repeat the past mistakes in order that the country may prosper. Extra emphasis is laid on ‘solemn’ and ‘unity.’ The name of the country is inserted according to the location of the gatherings. Yet from the next day it is like back to square one, as if all one had seen or heard the day or evening before was just a dream. Nobody seems in any mood to waste their time to the ‘looking back’ exercise. The blasé rich rolling in the oodles they have amassed find it more rewarding instead, to look forward to ‘fresh fields and pastures new.’ They will have no stomach for what a look back would offer: pictures of grinding poverty; babies wailing for want of milk, hungry children crying for a morsel of food and agonizing shrieks of the sick for want of appropriate medical treatment. Jawaharlal Nehru in his first speech after receiving independence called it a ‘tryst with destiny.’ But he certainly did not mean to say that India’s destiny lay in the vast chasm of economic and social inequity that is India. It is a chiaroscuro; skyscrapers side by side with ramshackle shanties often made with cardboard with plastic sheets for roof. The rich throw fabulous wedding parties whose pomp and pizzazz would dwarf the Arabian Nights; where bridegrooms come in brand new BMWs or Porsches. The poor sometimes sell their daughters at a young age, because they would not be financially able to marry them off when they grow up. Dalits are still sacrificed to the monster of caste system, despite a lifetime of effort by Mahatma Gandhi to banish this evil. Visiting Delhi, he would stay in the Sweepers’ (Bhangi) Colony. He ran a journal by the name of Harijan to demonstrate his support for the low caste Hindus. Yet, their leader, Dr. B.R, Ambedkar noticed signs of the drift soon after independence. Accordingly, though he joined the Nehru Cabinet and contributed in drafting India’s constitution, yet he converted to Buddhism with a large number of his followers.
Nehru vowed to make India truly secular. But the Muslim minority remains sidelined and discriminated against. It is a naked betrayal of the solemn pledge of the frontline leaders to bring the fruits of independence to the masses. Pakistan’s situation in this respect is not much different. If Brahmins, Rajputs and Bhumihars slaughter the Dalits in secular India, in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan it is Sunni-Shia, Barelvi-Deobandi. Deprivation and poverty is endemic. There are people who send bottles of choice whiskey with wedding invitations pasted on them, to invitees. Here the lot of the landless labourer is worse than in India. Sixty years on he and his family remain ‘mortgaged’ to the landlord because the country is yet to see meaningful land reforms, abolition of feudalism and agricultural income being taxed like in India and even Bangladesh. If Nehru had vowed to found a secular India, Jinnah had drawn its specific contours and defined it in his 11 August 1947 address to the Constituent Assembly. But, while people swing in a state of mock-rapture as they chant his words like a mantra, their hearts are not with them. That is why the emphasis on ‘freedom’ and repetition of ‘go to’ in his speech sometimes triggers a lurking suspicion as if he had meant to add, "Go to hell for aught I care. I have done myself to death to win Pakistan for you and that is enough for me." He already said once that he had some dud coins in his pocket. He knew the stuff his lieutenants were made of. And he has been proved correct over the years. Jinnah praised Islamic social justice before the world. And the world watches dumbfounded how justice is administered in Pakistan, where powerful landlords often parade the women of their errant kammis naked in broad daylight on the streets, where Mukhtaran Mai is gang-raped publicly.
Jinnah had highlighted the egalitarian, the tolerant, the peaceful features of Islam that would be the pillars on which Pakistan would rest. Instead, those who came after him turned his concept on its head. One group saw Islam as synonymous with amputations, stoning to death and beheading. This class of people would forcibly snatch property and build mosques on it. It would not submit to any law but its own sweet will. If the state sought to enforce the common law and ask it to vacate any encroachment, this group would give battle and call it jihad. Another class would roll Quad-e-Azam’s ‘you are free.’ It was about such ones that Milton said, "License they mean when they cry liberty." It would demand freedom to identify with the "West." Women’s dresses that reveal more than they hide are already chic. Not only the ‘cleavage’ but even large parts of what Somerset Maugham called the ‘mounds of Nebraska’ on either side of it are on display. To follow is the navel button. Among other freedoms on the list are homosexuality, gay rights, same sex marriages, abortion at will, single motherhood and a woman’s right over body to dispose of it as she wishes, -hire, lease or outright sale. Pulled between these two opposite sides the common folk feel literally betrayed. Their hunger remains unsatisfied; their thirst unquenched. Neither the rigours of the Sharia law nor the freedoms of the secularists would provide their needs: jobs, education, home and health care. Was this the Pakistan they had been promised, is what they ask in despair. 
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