In the aftermath of Independence, there were many contested visions of nationhood and alternative frameworks for its realisation. Yet, the first decade of Jawaharlal Nehru's government stands in contrast to developments in neighbouring Pakistan. In 1947 India went on to consolidate itself as a democracy; the Constituent Assembly adopted a constitution which came into force on January 26, 1950. On the other hand, it took nine years for the Pakistan Constituent Assembly to agree to a constitution that satisfied the requirements of being Islamic, federal and a parliamentary democracy. Still, no national elections were held under the 1956 constitution. Two years later, Pakistan fell prey to military rule.So, what explains the differences in the experiences of India and Pakistan? I believe the striking contrast between the two countries, as also between the military rulers in West Pakistan and the Awami League leaders in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh), was the charisma, popular appeal and moral authority ofindividual Congress leaders and the widespread legitimacy they enjoyed among different sections of society.
The man who probably made the greatest difference of all was Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. Although assassinated by a Hindu fanatic just when the country had tasted the fruits of freedom, his legacy lived on in the hearts and the minds of the people who he had served with singular dedication. Similarly, Nehru, the natural successor of the Mahatma, was better placed and more suited to cope with the changes ushered in by Independence and the upheaval caused by the Partition. He, more than anybody else among his contemporaries, was able to keep the fissiparous tendencies in check.
Mohammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan, was cast in a different mould. He was out of place in the Gandhian-led movements and out of tune with Nehru's socialist rhetoric. He was a constitutionalist par excellence, who relished debating finer points of law and legal processes. He was comfortable in the Home Rule Leagues andthe cosy chambers of the Central Legislative Assembly where he performed with his characteristic elan.
Jinnah enjoyed the trapping of power but was seemingly ill-equipped, at least until the late-1930s, to lead the masses from the front. He aired his aversion to the mixing up of religion in politics during the Khilafat movement in the early 1920s, but his real problem was to make sense of Gandhi's political strategies. One would have thought that the two men, who shared a Gujarati background and were educated in British legal schools, would have understood each other better and created spaces for acting in unison on certain matters. But in reality they were far removed from each other long before their acerbic exchanges started in the late-1930s.
Sure enough, Jinnah was not a devout Muslim or a religious bigot waving his flag to tease and torment the "nationalists". Yet he, more than the religious-fundamentalist groups, expounded the idea of a civilisational unity among Muslims and counterpoised itagainst other pluralist and eclectic religious and cultural traditions. His reading and interpretation of India's history was based on false premises, but that was not being challenged, except by Gandhi, Nehru and Azad, with any degree of intellectual rigour in the early 1940s. What was being questioned by Jinnah and the colonial government was the very idea of an Indian nation being foisted on different "nationalities". For Jinnah, the "two-nation" theory was grounded in the historical experiences of two mutually contradictory entities engaged in carving out of their own destinies. The creation of Pakistan was, according to him, the only way out for the Muslims.
It was easy to split people and divide territory, but the more challenging task was to create a nation out of highly disparate and unevenly developed communities in Pakistan. It was easy to project Islam as the cementing bond at the height of the Pakistan movement, but the real task at hand was to mediate between conflicting interests andcontending identities that surfaced soon after the birth of Pakistan. Indeed, what was urgently required was the laying down of certain ground rules for building a state system divorced from the rhetoric of the mullahs.
Sadly, the rulers of Pakistan had no intellectual resources to draw upon, no cadres to translate their nebulous plans into action. The ailing founder of the new nation had neither the time nor the intellectual reserves to define his long-term agenda. He led a powerful mobilisation campaign but made no attempt to deepen his popular support on the strength of a clear-cut economic programme.
Given the historical role of individual Congress and Muslim League leaders in their respective spheres and the contrasting legacies of the two parties, Pakistan would have probably plotted a predictable course with or without Jinnah and his party. Its fate or destiny was not, however, predetermined. Nor was its survival as a national entity at stake. The more pressing issue was the readiness of the rulingclasses to negotiate the terms of a contract without those groups who had migrated to their newly-discovered homeland in search of better opportunities. No serious endeavours were made to do so.
The powerful landlords in Sind and Punjab, having aided Jinnah to realise the dream of a Muslim homeland, showed no inclination to share power with the competing elites or agree to the redistribution of land. There was no Nehru or his socialist comrades to push through land reforms. Similarly, the nascent bourgeoisie, drawn mainly from the migrant entrepreneurs belonging to the ethnic minorities, had no interest in democracy. Rather, it relied on the authoritarian state structure to expand and consolidate its position. The idea of an Islamic state, consummated years later during the inglorious regime of Zia-ul-Haq, was thoughtlessly pursued after the creation of Pakistan. The contestation between the modernist and the traditionalist world-views imposed severe strains on a nation that was still trying to traverse arough terrain after the untimely death of its founder.
As the Indian Republic enters its 48th year, there are important lessons to be drawn from our own experiences and from the trajectory plotted by the military and political establishment in Pakistan over the last fifty years.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
