What is the face of Gen. Zia-ul-Haq's Pakistan?

There is no wine, there are not many women on the streets, and the song of Pakistan is blowing in the wind. At Lahore airport, a custom's official lingers over a passenger's bottle of whisky. "And what," he says, "is this?" Drawing the bottle carefully out of its carton, he turns it over in his hand. The passenger looks uncomfortable and protests: he is Indian not Pakistani. After a stern passport check, the officer offers apologies and explains: "You see, you spoke Urdu just like us." But his eyes continue to hover over the elusive liquor.It is not just the common language that can cause occasional misunderstandings. Beneath the overwhelming warmth, the spontaneous generosity and the sentimental attachment, the itinerant Indian in Pakistan can sometimes sense a distinct chill. Hostility might perhaps be too harsh an expression. It is rather a compound of insecurity and ignorance that continues to plague the Pakistani consciousness in its attitude to India and Indians.Thirty years after the great divide, an Indian's first impressions of Pakistan are predictably bitter-sweet, the result of three intense decades of love and hate. Hurtling down an Islamabad highway, at 80 mph, the car's driver, born in Aligarh, asks with genuine concern whether Muslims are still persecuted in India. "And you mean," he questions incredulously, "Hindus and Muslims marry each other?"Children's Chant: In a small village, enthusiastic children chase a group of Indian journalists. "Hindu, Hindu, that's a Hindu," goes up the chant. They have never seen a Hindu before; the curiosity is natural. But a few days later in Karachi, a Pakistani reporter inviting an Indian reporter into his home during the afternoon siesta is insistent on waking his wife and daughter. Somewhat embarrassed, he explains that they have never met an Indian before.In Lahore, a young journalist on The Pakistan Times minces no words in satisfying some reciprocal curiosity on the part of an Indian. "Basically we hate you. Deep down, every Pakistani sees every Indian as an oppressor, an aggressor. Your physical size and superiority is a constant threat. Your technological development is a permanent danger. You could swallow us up in one gulp. After Bangladesh no Pakistani can afford to lose sight of that fact."Two Horns: A young actor in the same city confirms the impression, "We were literally brought up to believe that a Sikh was somebody who had two horns." He offers a standard children's textbook as proof: the illustration of a Hindu is that of a semi-clad Brahmin, head shaven, feet dirty. The stereotype figure is portrayed as someone rabidly anti-Muslim, basically a scheming and crafty villain.But the curiosity is genuine, particularly amongst Pakistanis born in their own country after Partition. The Kashmir question, brought up repeatedly, appears to them an insoluble issue, intangible, unattainable, and something relegated to the mists of history. Talk of common culture, common history, and a common heritage are likely to be dismissed after a while as common cliches. As in all love-hate stories, there is a strong note of emotional estrangement. The queues of visa applicants outside the cramped offices of the Indian embassy in Islambad grow longer each day. Old women in burkhas, young men in crumpled suits, and some who have waited for days. Most of them have travelled from Hyderabad, Karachi and Sind.The Queue: Many have waited with their small bedrolls for several nights in the queue. "Last night there was a hailstorm," says 26-year-old Mushtaq Ali, "and we were still sleeping outside the Embassy. Is there no way out? Can't you tell Vajpayee sahib?" It can take from two to six months to get a visa to India. The Indian embassy clears about 200 applications a day, but the staff is small and the procedure tortuously long.On a human level, the problem of free access to either country for the people on both sides is one of the most painful realizations in Pakistan for any Indian. Everywhere there are stories of families separated, old bonds severed, communications disrupted. For the pre-Partition generation, the memories survive. "How is my old friend Air Marshal O. P. Mehra?" asks Air Marshal Asghar Khan, now chairman of the Tehrik-e-Istaqlal party in Rawalpindi. "How is St. Stephen's College?" asks General Zia-ul-Haq, chief martial law administrator, over a cup of tea in Islamabad. "How is Number Six, Windsor Place?" asks someone in Karachi. "We lived in that house for years and years." "And how," asks a middle-aged kababiya in Peshawar, "are the steps of Jama Masjid in Old Delhi?" Kababs: He sits behind a mammoth iron plate, deftly turning over steaming chhapli kababs, across the Sunehri Masjid in Peshawar. For 15 years he produced the same kababs on the steps of Jama Masjid. Now there seems little chance of returning to his old haunt. "You see," he tells visitors from India, "you can come here, a hockey team can go from here. Despite the troubles, the rich can travel. Nobody asks the poor."Thirty years of alienation, and three major wars, have taken their toll. Despite the alternating periods of aggression and affection-and usually both feelings have run high simultaneously-the psychological insecurity facing the two countries is the outcome of both resumption and indifference."Everybody in New Delhi thinks he is an expert on Pakistan. The fact is, that barely a handful understand what is going on here," admits the Indian Ambassador in Islamabad, K. S. Bajpai. Beyond the psychological barrier, and the cautiously changing physical one, are the personal pre-occupations of both countries. Politically, India has sought and, luckily, learnt to survive within a democratic framework. In Pakistan, the struggle has been much harder at all levels. In its 30 years of independence, the search for a viable democratic government is more frenzied today than ever before.Bhutto Cult: Politics to the people of Pakistan is second nature. Whatever the degree of repression practised by governments past and present, political talk dies hard. So, for that matter, does political opinion. There are few voices, at any rate, that resort to any. ambiguous expression. And from the outset, the visitor can take his choice. The choices, admittedly, are few. And very often, the choice begins and ends, with the country's best-known politician, and premier of seven years, who now languishes in a Lahore jail: Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.With Bhutto in jail, his wife Nusrat and daughter Benazir have emerged as stalwarts of the Pakistan People's Party (PPP): they lead agitations, they are detained, placed under house arrest, released and re-arrested. On December 18, 1977, Begum Bhutto lead an agitation at the Gadaffi Stadium in Lahore during the Pakistan vs MCC cricket match, was badly injured, hospitalized, and later detained by the police. On her release, she emerged triumphant with the halo of martyrdom. The Bhutto cult is not easily extinguished, particularly in the Punjab and in parts of Sind, where he still has massive support, mainly amongst the peasantry and working class. And the transition of his Begum from an elegant Bombay-born socialite of Iranian stock to a firebrand rebel is a phenomenon not unknown on the subcontinent.Dissent: The PPP might be oppressed but, despite a few sparks of dissent from leaders like Maulana Kausar Niazi and Ghulam Mustafa Jatoi, it is unified in the name of Bhutto. It is unlikely to crack up for the simple reason that all possible defectors are not only well aware that Bhutto behind bars is a more prized commodity than Bhutto freed, but also that once they leave the bandwagon they will probably never stand a chance of being re-elected.Precariously positioned against the PPP is the hastily put together Pakistan National Alliance (PNA), a mixed bag of eight parties constituted before the March elections last year and led by religious leaders such as Pir Pagaro of the Muslim League and Maulana Mufti Mahmoud of the Jamait-i-Islami. Khan Abdul Wali Khan, the recently released leader from the North West Frontier Province, has also thrown his lol with the PNA. His National Democratic Party (NDP) is in fact the old National Awami Party (NAP) under a new banner, with the core support in the NWFP and Baluchistan. But what has lately reduced Wali Khan's credibility is his open support for General Zia's military regime. The blossoming relationship between the General and Wali Khan might be one of convenience but it has only pitched public opinion against them both.Split: The PNA as it stands, is splitting under its own weight. In less than a year, the effort of sustaining itself, has strained it to the extreme. The party today is a picture of disagreement and dissent and spells little else than disenchantment for the people.Straddling this pathetic scene of confusion stands the chief martial law administrator himself. The short, stocky General Zia-ul-Haq's face shines with soldierly sincerity when he insists that he is a bird of passage. Opinions on the subject, as on everything political in Pakistan, are broadly split into two: There are the believers and the non-believers. Can the 54-year-old General's claim be taken at face? Does he intend to call elections? Will a democratic government be restored in Pakistan? Will there be a compromise between him and the PPP? Or between him and sections of the PNA?Motivations: These are hypothetical questions. Nothing is predictable in politics, less so in Pakistani politics of the moment. But in the end, General Zia holds the key. And more worthwhile it may be to consider his personality and political motivations. Again, there are broadly two schools of thought of the kind of man General Zia is. Many believe that he is a simple, innocent man of principle, a victim of circumstance, who was forced to assume power to arrest a bloody civil war. Since men, he has steadily been cornered and the only course open to him is to wipe the name of Bhutto and the PPP from the face of Pakistan.Others more cynically contend that the choice is between Bhutto's neck and Zia's neck. Either must go, or that the General will be forced to seek a compromise with the PPP, having tried abortively other alliances.Tyranny: Whether or not Zia can be believed, he does not fail to make his own design clear on every public occasion. "People must go to the polls frequently and freely," he emphasized adding that before elections are held, he will insist on redistributing the constitutional authority centralized by Bhutto. "So that," he explains, his walrus moustache bristling, "the prime minister cannot became a bloody dictator."There is little to doubt Bhutto's tactics of tyranny. And the evidence available even on the surface speaks volumes. Though the charge for conspiracy in a murder case remains unproved, as do the other major charges of high-level corruption, victimization and misuse of government funds, stories of Bhutto's misdeeds are rampant in every corner of the country.Beneath glittering chandeliers, dinner table talk in an affluent home in Karachi turns to Bhutto. Like hothouse orchids, richly gilded women bring up his amorous caprices, and retail stories about his alleged third wife, Husna, who was the power behind the throne. Their husbands, scions of Pakistan's top 22 families, have other tales to tell. "There is no one that can refute the fact that he (Bhutto) was going out of his mind. The kind of corruption, immorality and atrocities practised by him make Indira Gandhi appear like Snow White." New Class: Another gentleman in a natty three-piece suit takes up the chorus: "Bhutto created a whole class of the new rich through political favours, through permits and bribes and unspeakable dishonesty.""It was a new power elite, guarded by his personal armed force, the federal security force of 50,000. He committed the most heinous crimes on anybody who opposed him. There were innumerable cases of torture, women were raped, sexual assualts were committed on children of dissenting officials or bureaucrats. Till 1970-71, the cost of living here was half of that in India. In three years he ruined this country's economy. He completely destroyed discipline, he paralysed our growth rate." "And what about his personal indulgences?" interrupted another guest. "He would only drink his own brand of Scotch-Royal Salute. Only drink Vichy water imported from France. Only drive in the latest model of Mercedes flown in especially. That was the kind of man he was."Corrupt: In a small office in Lahore, Mian Mahmoud Kasuri, former attorney general of Pakistan and one-time law minister in Bhutto's cabinet repeats the same sentiments. "We have not known a more corrupt and more despicable regime than Bhutto's. He transformed the administration into a private mafia of his own. There is far more press freedom today than there was in his time. All civil liberties and constitutional rights were suspended, there were no human freedoms. It was a period of inescapable darkness. I was arrested three times on such ridiculous charges as theft, beating up a government official in this very room, and disrupting law and order."Bhutto horror stories, very much in circulation, run parallel to the resurgence of the Bhutto myth. To an outsider, it might appear a contradiction in terms, but any dispassionate local viewer, will present it in logical progression. Mazhar Ali Khan, editor of the Lahore weekly, Viewpoint, and father of the Left youth leader, Tariq Ali, explained: "Bhutto's charisma is matchless. By and large the working class continue to support him because they benefited in his regime. At the cost of all other economics, Bhutto skilfully manipulated mass loyalty. I have never before seen in Lahore the kind of crowds who gave him a rousing reception on his release from jail last year. There is, in fact, no doubt that if elections were called in the near future, Bhutto and the PPP would win, probably with a large majority."Bhutto's Return: A major factor that heralds the return of Bhutto is the apparent dissatisfaction of the people with General Zia's government. More than the General, the people are convinced that his military regime cannot but be 'interim'. Besides, law and order situation yet remains to be controlled, there is no appreciable fall in prices, and the General's recent alignment with' sections of the PNA is viewed with growing mistrust. Above all, Zia can hardly compete with the artful rabble-rousing techniques of Bhutto. In Pakistan's cities today, his image, in everyday conversation even lacks the lustre of the late Ayub Khan.Published By: AtMigration Published On: Apr 21, 2015 12:12 IST--- ENDS ---

Download App

Get 37% off on an annual Print +Digital subscription of India Today Magazine

What is the face of Gen. Zia-ul-Haq's Pakistan?

What is the face of Gen. Zia-ul-Haq's Pakistan? INDIA TODAY correspondent Sunil Sethi recently spent two weeks in the country during the Indian Foreign Minister's visit, travelling from Karachi to Khyber, and through the cities of Lahore, Islamabad and Peshwar.

PUBLICATIONS

TELEVISION

EVENTS

RADIO

GAMING

USEFUL LINKS

PRINTING

WELFARE

DISTRIBUTION

SYNDICATIONS

WEBSITES

EDUCATION