A nation at war with itself
WITH the start of the New Year 2022 the third decade of the millennium has begun and the media is full of predictions about the future.
Whatever the future has in store for the country one thing is crystal clear. Pakistan is a country suffering from self-inflicted wounds or better still a country at war with itself. Even today the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel is not visible.
The long awaited healing process is yet to start. The deadly poison of hate, fanaticism and bigotry is all pervasive. Civic rights have been trampled upon, human values have been debased and, above all, basic human rights have been placed on the back burner.
The nation is bleeding from countless wounds that are self-inflicted and we cannot blame any external force for our own wrong doings.
We have managed to drag the nation into the dark ages with tall claims of progress and building a modern progressive society.
Pakistani society today in the seventy fifth year of independence is divided along ethnic and sectarian lines with the monster of political polarization eating away its vital innards.
Our political leaders are incapable of civil dialogue and the followers of these leaders do not believe in tolerance and the freedom of speech and thought. The cancerous malignancy of intolerance is killing the very basic form of a civilized society.
Pakistan as a constitutional nation state today exists in an unnatural form or rather an unsustainable existence.
It appears as if the glue that is holding the nation together is not sticking. The respect for law and statecraft has dwindled to dangerous levels.
Base tribal instincts based on laws of sectarian nature and ethnicity have taken over. The stench of a rotting carcass is pervasive and all over. The vultures are circling overhead to move in for the final onslaught.
Incidences of religious intolerance and sectarian violence have increased to frightening levels and the nation has been bruised and battered by the actions of its own citizens and stalwarts bent upon imposing their religious and political agenda on others.
During the last two decades or so we have witnessed the frightening escalation of instability, insecurity and religious extremism while desperately fighting the global war on terrorism.
The nation has paid a huge price in this war. The economic, political, cultural and psychological impact has wounded the country almost fatally.
All this has happened due to the crusade launched by our own monsters, by the Frankenstein of religious terror created by our own leaders and institutions.
Spin doctors of some political parties and national institutions are very fond of spinning tales of hidden hands and mysterious conspirators responsible for all the ills in our society but the fact of the matter is that this country is bleeding profusely from millions of self-inflicted wounds.
In terms of human lives Pakistan has paid a heavy price with the sacrifice of over 75000 human beings at the altar of religious fanaticism and bigotry and the economic and social cost just cannot be calculated.
One great impact of this religion-based terror is that the religious militant organizations are now hand in glove with the criminal mafias thus increasing the crime rates to frightening levels all across the country. Sectarian violence and targeted killings have become the everyday tools of the religious mafia.
Our present leaders are more interested in policing the nation to ensure that religious values are promoted and our educational institutions and the media are subjected to a heavy dose of religious injunctions while human values are neglected totally or placed on the back burner.
The classic examples are the implementation of the Single National Curriculum and the establishment of the Rehmatul-lil-Aalameen Authority under the direct patronage of the Prime Minister.
In a recent dialogue with Muslim scholars all the emphasis was on religious injunctions and how to make a better Muslim society to establish a new Riasat-i-Madina and the need for better human values and civic rights was not even talked about.
The present Government is bent upon taking this country back to the dark ages. Every effort is being made to curb the basic and fundamental right of freedom of speech and thought.
A new state organization by the name of Pakistan Media Development Authority has been launched. This is nothing but a very crude attempt to regulate the print, electronic and digital media and to impose a strict censorship in the name of regulating the media.
This new initiative of the ruling clique amounts to one step forward and two steps backwards and another dagger in the body politics of the country another self-inflicted bleeding wound. An authority to control films, electronic and print media in the private and public domain is a rather ugly scheme to end all independent thinking and to bring the media under the thumb of the government.
Democracy requires that the media and internet regulators should not be in any way subjected to the desires and whims of the rulers. This Authority is another self-inflicted wound.
—The writer is Professor of History, based in Islamabad.
