Zabt lazim hai magar ghum hai qayamat ka Faraz
I am not going to write anything on the loss I felt on Benazir Bhutto's death. I have never hidden the fact that in Pakistan''s political landscape, I had been a sympathizer, supporter and voter of her since 1997, even in times when people predicted her political career is over. I do not feel like publicly expressing my grief on the loss of hope that I had. However, there are a few issues that need deliberation of us the nation.
I attended a talk by Mr. Adil Najam in Weston last Sunday. One of the most interesting questions raised there was why are we all so shocked and grief stricken at her death? Many possible explanations of the question could be given and to be honest there are a lot of things that contributed to this magnitude of grief and shock - some more, some less.
There, unfortunately, are people (and thank God it is a very small minority in an otherwise very humane society of ours) who hated her to the core and are either indifferent or relieved at her death (And if you think where do such people exist, read Cawosjee in Dawn). I do not need to explain why her supporters are mourning her death and that explains about mourning of a little more than 1/3rd of country.
That leaves us with the rest. There is a small but significant group that still does not agree with her politics but felt shocked and grieved at her death. This grief and shock has its roots in the manner of her killing, the state of affairs we have come to and also the tragedy of Bhutto family. And last but certainly not the least is the grief of a large section of society who once believed in Benazir Bhutto the dream and hope but then gradually distanced themselves from her. There grief is on state of affairs, her murder, and tragedy of Bhuttos. But more importantly the largest chunk of this grief comes from the guilt some where deep inside.
People had great hopes of Benazir Bhutto and she did not deliver on them in her two terms despite the progress made. People never judged her performance in comparison with the performance of her opponents but judged it on the standards we had set for her and this led to more and more disappointment. Any honest assessment will reveal that her record on economic front and infrastructure development is at minimum at par with her opponents. The corruption in her government was way less than the one during many other regimes. And her record on rule of law, freedoms and human rights was the best in our 60 years of national history. But yet we expected a lot more from her - she was Benazir. And in that demand, to me, we became unjust to her. We did not realize the magnitude of challenges she faced and the battles she had to fight for survival of what was left of system, democracy, constitution and pro-poor policies. And in the times when she needed our strength the most, we left her in our quest for some utopian idealism. She held her ground, fighting every inch of her and our way and ultimately died. And her death has jolted our conscience on the cold shoulder we gave her when we were needed the most and this is from where emerges the grief, sorrow and sadness. We accused her of Murtaza Bhutto's murder without realizing she was the biggest victim. We accused her of taking West's line on terrorism and criticized her talk of establishment-extremist nexus till she herself gave her life to make us realize the dangers we face. And more importantly we remained silent and indifferent when we saw her wronged again and again in the name of corruption, in the name of being security risk, and in accusations of working on Western agenda. Something inside is pinching us that we had not been fair to this woman and this has made us cry.
Now before I move on to the last point that I feel like making on this tragedy, let me briefly highlight another issue. Since the creation of our homeland, we have only had 4 popular leaders with appeal across the federation - Fatima Jinnah, H. S. Suharwardi, Z. A. Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto. Is it a mere coincidence that each one of them either died in mysterious circumstances or was killed, one each in four martial laws that we had?
I have talked about Adil Najam's talk the other day. One take home point from that talk was creating the idea and ideal of Benazir Bhutto. I have always believed in Law of Natural Justice and for this reason I believe that ultimately time does create idea and ideal of a persona befitting him/her and things fall in place where they belong. But before that nature gives us a chance to put them in their right place and the nations, societies and individuals who capitalize on this opportunity triumph. We failed to acknowledge the idea of Z.A. Bhutto. It did not do any harm to his idea, for in quarter of a century, time and history created the undisputed idea and ideal of him that is befitting him. We now have our opportunity with the idea and ideal of Benazir Bhutto. We need to create and uphold the idea of Benazir Bhutto and as Mr. Najam rightly pointed out her idea is not limited to her dynastic legacy or party but more so is about a liberal, tolerant, democratic federation and a social welfare state. Take this opportunity and uphold this idea in a befitting tribute to her or else history will do it for her.
We right now are a nation in mourning, sadness, frustration and anger. As Ahmad Faraz once put it
Zabt lazim hai magar ghum hai qayamat ka Faraz
Zalim ab ke bhi na roe ga tu mar jae ga
So cry my countrymen. But cry not in hopelessness or anger but cry in strength. Cry through the vote that you have and make a pledge that you will turn out and vote whenever asked by the homeland. This will sound odd coming out of a PPP supporter like me but vote not on sympathy but on your conviction and on rationale and even more importantly vote not just this time, but for times to come.
Make a pledge that you will come out on street outside your house with a candle in your hand whenever there is another military coup or the government elected is removed through 58-2B or other mandate-robbing technique. Make a pledge that you will reject the forces of hate, violence and bigotry. Make a pledge that you will respect the mandate of majority, not just now, but for times to come - even if it is against your choice. Not only the idea and ideal of Benazir Bhutto demands this but also does our sorrow, anger and frustration. We should feel sorry about ourselves no more.
I attended a talk by Mr. Adil Najam in Weston last Sunday. One of the most interesting questions raised there was why are we all so shocked and grief stricken at her death? Many possible explanations of the question could be given and to be honest there are a lot of things that contributed to this magnitude of grief and shock - some more, some less.
There, unfortunately, are people (and thank God it is a very small minority in an otherwise very humane society of ours) who hated her to the core and are either indifferent or relieved at her death (And if you think where do such people exist, read Cawosjee in Dawn). I do not need to explain why her supporters are mourning her death and that explains about mourning of a little more than 1/3rd of country.
That leaves us with the rest. There is a small but significant group that still does not agree with her politics but felt shocked and grieved at her death. This grief and shock has its roots in the manner of her killing, the state of affairs we have come to and also the tragedy of Bhutto family. And last but certainly not the least is the grief of a large section of society who once believed in Benazir Bhutto the dream and hope but then gradually distanced themselves from her. There grief is on state of affairs, her murder, and tragedy of Bhuttos. But more importantly the largest chunk of this grief comes from the guilt some where deep inside.
People had great hopes of Benazir Bhutto and she did not deliver on them in her two terms despite the progress made. People never judged her performance in comparison with the performance of her opponents but judged it on the standards we had set for her and this led to more and more disappointment. Any honest assessment will reveal that her record on economic front and infrastructure development is at minimum at par with her opponents. The corruption in her government was way less than the one during many other regimes. And her record on rule of law, freedoms and human rights was the best in our 60 years of national history. But yet we expected a lot more from her - she was Benazir. And in that demand, to me, we became unjust to her. We did not realize the magnitude of challenges she faced and the battles she had to fight for survival of what was left of system, democracy, constitution and pro-poor policies. And in the times when she needed our strength the most, we left her in our quest for some utopian idealism. She held her ground, fighting every inch of her and our way and ultimately died. And her death has jolted our conscience on the cold shoulder we gave her when we were needed the most and this is from where emerges the grief, sorrow and sadness. We accused her of Murtaza Bhutto's murder without realizing she was the biggest victim. We accused her of taking West's line on terrorism and criticized her talk of establishment-extremist nexus till she herself gave her life to make us realize the dangers we face. And more importantly we remained silent and indifferent when we saw her wronged again and again in the name of corruption, in the name of being security risk, and in accusations of working on Western agenda. Something inside is pinching us that we had not been fair to this woman and this has made us cry.
Now before I move on to the last point that I feel like making on this tragedy, let me briefly highlight another issue. Since the creation of our homeland, we have only had 4 popular leaders with appeal across the federation - Fatima Jinnah, H. S. Suharwardi, Z. A. Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto. Is it a mere coincidence that each one of them either died in mysterious circumstances or was killed, one each in four martial laws that we had?
I have talked about Adil Najam's talk the other day. One take home point from that talk was creating the idea and ideal of Benazir Bhutto. I have always believed in Law of Natural Justice and for this reason I believe that ultimately time does create idea and ideal of a persona befitting him/her and things fall in place where they belong. But before that nature gives us a chance to put them in their right place and the nations, societies and individuals who capitalize on this opportunity triumph. We failed to acknowledge the idea of Z.A. Bhutto. It did not do any harm to his idea, for in quarter of a century, time and history created the undisputed idea and ideal of him that is befitting him. We now have our opportunity with the idea and ideal of Benazir Bhutto. We need to create and uphold the idea of Benazir Bhutto and as Mr. Najam rightly pointed out her idea is not limited to her dynastic legacy or party but more so is about a liberal, tolerant, democratic federation and a social welfare state. Take this opportunity and uphold this idea in a befitting tribute to her or else history will do it for her.
We right now are a nation in mourning, sadness, frustration and anger. As Ahmad Faraz once put it
Zabt lazim hai magar ghum hai qayamat ka Faraz
Zalim ab ke bhi na roe ga tu mar jae ga
So cry my countrymen. But cry not in hopelessness or anger but cry in strength. Cry through the vote that you have and make a pledge that you will turn out and vote whenever asked by the homeland. This will sound odd coming out of a PPP supporter like me but vote not on sympathy but on your conviction and on rationale and even more importantly vote not just this time, but for times to come.
Make a pledge that you will come out on street outside your house with a candle in your hand whenever there is another military coup or the government elected is removed through 58-2B or other mandate-robbing technique. Make a pledge that you will reject the forces of hate, violence and bigotry. Make a pledge that you will respect the mandate of majority, not just now, but for times to come - even if it is against your choice. Not only the idea and ideal of Benazir Bhutto demands this but also does our sorrow, anger and frustration. We should feel sorry about ourselves no more.
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