We got this land of pures with certain motives behind inter alia to ensure better future for the millions of Muslims in socio-economic areas. A band of our founding leaders led by Muhammad Ali Jinnah embarked on a journey for a separate Muslim state in India. In the first instance, they put-in a formal demand to the then government of India in the shape of resolution of March 23, 1940. Then, in their follow up action, they convinced the Indian Muslims that the state so demanded would be a social welfare state —- a state where there would be no starvation, no injustice and no discrimination for its citizens. What a dream more charming than this could be had for the Muslims? Thus, they overwhelmingly supported the demand. The leadership provided by Jinnah, who for the same reason was given the title of Quaid-i-Azam meaning the great leader, was charismatic enough to convert such support of the Muslims into a mass-movement for the desired Muslim state which was accordingly launched. This movement gained momentum with every passing day and within a few years reached a stage where both the leadership of Indian National Congress and the Indian government who, by then, were stern opponents of partition of India on religious or ethnic basis, had to bow before the Muslims’ stressing demand. And, eventually, Pakistan came into being on 14th August, 1947.
Yes, we got emancipated and that too in a manner we wanted to. Consequently, we took our destiny in our own hands and thus were free in decisions whatever were expedient for making our future better. And that was necessary for justifying our separatism move vis-a-vis the India’s founding leaders’ strenuous efforts to spoil the same. But unfortunately this didn’t happen and the long span of seventy six years fell short for such decisions on part of our ruling elites and, in turn, have still been waiting for our future to get better. The reasons are not too difficult to comprehend and even a lay man has become in the know of while watching the political circus over the past one decade or so. Primarily, we have a lasting political turmoil since infancy of this land. Right from the assassination of Liaquat Ali Khan in 1951, there has been a persistent cold war between the establishment and the political ruling elites. Simultaneously, the political forces too have been at loggerheads with each other and no maturity has ever been seen on their part. Liaquat Ali Khan’s assassination was followed by the worst type of political chaos and anarchy in the nascent state. The gravity of the situation could be assessed from the fact that a short span of mere seven years witnessed six prime ministers brought and sacked in succession. This ultimately resulted in enforcement of first martial law in the country. Then, situation of similar nature in 1969, 1977 and 1999 evoked three more military coups. Thus, a total of thirty two years of our life have been under the exclusive military despotism. In 1988, 1990, 1993 and 1996, the political governments were done away with but without having completed their respective tenures. It is pertinent to mention that such a situation is bound to give rise to political instability and, in turn, to economic instability.
Then, the malady of corruption, that has been in practice in our society, has converted this social evil into corruption culture. Thus, mega corruption and money laundering scandals involving thousands of billions of rupees come to fore and that is almost routine. Our institutions, on the other hand, are not strong enough to take any punitive action against such VVlP branded culprits. And, the last, but not the least, reason is that the successive political governments, by implying political prejudice, discontinue or slow down the pace of execution on, the economic projects whatever launched by the preceding governments and obviously a major setback is caused to the economy. And the CPEC is a glaring example worth quoting. In certain cases, they also lack competence enough to handle, in befitting manner, whatever economic or political crisis the land plunges in. The Instances, though are far and few between, yet the 2018-2022’s incumbent government is recent one. All these are what are responsible for bad governance in the land. Consequently, the poor economy that we persistently have translates into vicious poverty cycle the victims to which are none but the poor masses. Our institutions too are in tatters and thus not delivering to the public. There are a lot of loopholes in our judicial system that causes extraordinary delays in delivering justice to the general masses who have to wait patiently for years for a single ‘peeshi’ in their cases. This apparently creates a deep sense of deprivation among the masses. Wajid Khan, a dumb youngster from Swat, who is denied clerical job against disables’ quota, moves high court where he waits for four long years for relief which, if granted, would have enabled a disabled fellow to get employed at the cost of none else. But unfortunately he fails to get and, meanwhile, turns overage and thus loses the employment opportunity for ever. Disability and financial constraints don’t allow him to seek remedy beyond and thus is made bound to become burden on the society. Rizwana (14), a housemaid with a judge is tortured to an extent that she gets hospitalised in critical condition. Her case is the banner headline on the social and electronic media. She and Wajid are classic examples of social injustice in our society and like them thousands more are there in this land.The threadbare discussion culminates into a simple opinion that in the long journey of seventy six years we haven’t yet been able to convert our dream for better future into reality, nor the track we are going on leads towards that very objective. We however need not to desperate and should instead deliberate on how to make this land what it was in the mind of our founding leaders while launching the journey towards independence. Rare voices are raised by certain political circles for concluding charter of economy. Hence, it is high time to have serious deliberations on it. The new political government as and when gets launched will have to take initiative in this context.
—The writer is contributing columnist, based in Swat.
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