Respect the Law

The following is my article published in Dawn on October 29, 2010, as Friday Feature, 'Respecting the Law'. Some of the wording might be slightly different from the printed version.

With the birth of Pakistan, the Muslim community of the sub-continent not only created a new country but also a new nation. The first goal of this nation was to achieve a kind of organic unity, and Pakistan itself was the tool for achieving it. Respecting the law was the ideal to be kept in front. Studying the history of Pakistan in this light, one finds many indicators suggesting that the goal was achieved by 1966.

Obviously, this requires us to understand three concepts first. They are (a) organic unity; (b) Pakistan as a tool for achieving it; and (c) the significance of respecting the law in this special context.

The organic unity intended here is based on a portion of Verse 28 of Surah Luqman (Chapter 31 of the Quran). It is translated by Iqbal as, “Your creation and resurrection are like the creation and resurrection of a single soul.” Creation and resurrection are biological concepts, and hence the kind of unity implied in this verse is a biological unity, as if entire humanity was a single organism and individuals were its parts. If such a connection exists between all human beings, then obviously it is moderating the worldly and spiritual power of each individual, whether he or she knows it or not.

Giving us awareness of this connection is the aim of religious thought, according to Iqbal. However, thought alone cannot be sufficient. We need a practical tool as well. Hence, in the preface of The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam (1930), Iqbal wrote, “A living experience of the kind of biological unity, embodied in this verse, requires today a method physiologically less violent [than the methods devised by the past masters] and psychologically more suitable to a concrete type of mind.”

The same year, while presiding over the annual session of the All-India Muslim League at Allahabad, he seemed to be suggesting that the achievement of a Muslim homeland in the region could become, somehow, the new method through which this kind of organic unity would be realized. In his presidential address, after proposing and predicting the birth of a Muslim homeland, he went on to suggest, “One of the profoundest verses in the Holy Quran teaches us that the birth and rebirth of the whole of humanity is like the birth and rebirth of a single individual. Why cannot you who, as a people, can well claim to be the first practical exponent of this superb conception of humanity, live and move and have your being as a single individual?”

Hence, if we could “live and move and have [our] being as a single individual,” we would experience what is meant by the Quran when it says that the creation and resurrection of the humanity is like the creation and resurrection of a single soul (and it seems that neither Iqbal nor Jinnah meant to exclude the non-Muslim citizens of the Muslim homeland, since according to the Quran, this organic unity is a biological fact that moderates the existence of every individual on this planet).

If Pakistan was the tool – “a method psychologically suitable to a concrete type of mind” – for discovering this organic unity, how was this tool going to be used? The most logical answer was, by respecting the law. This was how the homeland had been achieved in the first place, and even against the bitter opposition by powerful and unfair adversaries.

The first twenty years of Pakistan present a curious case study when visited in the light of this ideal. It seems as if the educated elite and the intelligentsia were on one side, often ignoring the significance of the ideal and the implications of the recent history. Apparently, due to the one hundred and fifty years of British domination, much power had been left in the hands of the liberals and those who favored secularism in some form. Quite often they were found to be guilty of abusing that power, for instance when Chief Justice Muhammad Munir, a self-proclaimed believer in secularism, upheld the decision of Governor-General Ghulam Muhammad to abrogate the elected parliament. Conservatives and socialists, perceiving that the just demands of the people were being suppressed, would often invite the masses to agitation and direct action. When the masses chose to ignore such calls, they were accused of lacking in political awareness.

Hence, the unschooled masses of Pakistan seem to be standing on the other side, clearly distinguishable from the reactionary educated elite and the intelligentsia. At least three successive events in the last three years of this period should have vindicated the masses against the widespread accusation of being politically unaware. These were the tremendous unity displayed in supporting Fatima Jinnah against Field Marshall Ayub Khan in the presidential election of 1964, the display of patriotism during the 1965 War and the general outcry against Ayub Khan after the signing of the treaty at Tashkent in 1966.

These are some indicators in terms of the broader current of history only. Understanding and experiencing their deeper meaning requires us to revisit our literature, politics and religious thought with a new approach, which has never been attempted (and unfortunately, our education offers us little preparation for such a task). However, in terms of the general outline of the story of our ideals as a Muslim nation, the year 1966 seemed to be the moment when the ambiance of being a ‘new country’ had ended, and the nation seemed poised for starting a new stage, together.

Rise Above Yourself

The following is my article published in Dawn on October 15, 2010, as Friday Feature, 'For a common destiny'. Some of the wording might be slightly different from the printed version.

The election of 1926 was the first occasion when Muslim masses voted in large numbers according to separate electorate. However, in the assemblies that were inaugurated the next year as a result of this election, no single party had emerged as common leader of the entire Muslim community. It seemed as if there was no new ideal, no commonly agreed goal anymore, and hence no means for a collective effort.

This, however, did not last very long. In 1928, Congress demanded through Nehru Report that separate electorates should be abolished. Apparently, it was impossible for an Indian nationalist to understand what a separate electorate meant to a Muslim.

Unity of matter and spirit as a philosophical concept may be incomprehensible by ordinary persons but the activities of the Aligarh Movement and its offshoots in the past sixty years had been sufficient for showing even the most unschooled Muslim how literature, politics, religion and education were interconnected as far as the Muslim community of the region was concerned. Separate electorate appeared to be a tool for formalizing this unity of ideals and reality. Hence when Nehru Report questioned the separate electorates in 1928, Muslim leaders who disagreed on everything else suddenly agreed to disagree with the Hindu majority on this issue.

Against this backdrop, Allama Iqbal, who was also a successful candidate of the election of 1926, presided over the annual session of the All-India Muslim League held in Allahabad on December 30-31, 1930. There, he proposed a new goal. It was “a consolidated North-West Indian Muslim state”, which appeared to him to be “the final destiny of the Muslims at least of the North-West India.”

Thus, Pakistan became the next goal to be achieved (and Iqbal left open the possibility of it being “within the British Empire, or without the British Empire”). Separate electorates then became the tool through which the new goal, Pakistan, was to be achieved.

The ideal to be pursued whilst in quest for Pakistan was “selflessness”, which Iqbal had been preaching at least since 1906. It was embodied in verses that had become proverbial to at least two successive generations, such as the famous line from a 1912 poem, “An individual is sustained by its bonding with the nation and is nothing on one’s own, just as the wave exists in the river and is nothing on its own.”

فرد قائم ربط ملت سے ہے تنہا کچھ نہیں
موج ہے دریا میں اور بیرون دریا کچھ نہیں

As explained in his longer poems and his lectures, selflessness (or bekhudi) was an experience through which an individual could annihilate his or her individual ego (khudi) and arrive at the next level, which was the collective ego, thus acquiring a greater wisdom inaccessible to the individual ego alone.

Iqbal’s conception of a collective ego did not mean that one should cease to have personal opinions, or renounce the freedom of thought and expression. Selflessness was not an act of the mind but an act of love, through the heart. It could only be induced through highly entertaining literature (as Iqbal did in his own times) and could never be imposed through repressive legislation (in fact the suppression of individual liberties could become a hindrance, since it curtails selflessness by enhancing mistrust).

This emphasis on transcending the individual ego was timely, since the elections of 1926 had presented a highly egotistical picture of the community. “Things in India are not what they appear to be,” he said in the Allahabad Address. “The meaning of this, however, will dawn upon you only when you have achieved a real collective ego to look at them.”

Selflessness, or rising above oneself, became the new ideal as the demand for Pakistan gained momentum under the leadership of Jinnah, “the Great Leader”, whom his followers came to see as the incarnation of their ideal in flesh and blood. How the new state came into being is a story that belongs to political history. What ought to be noted here is that the goal was achieved through the election of 1945-46 when an overwhelming majority of Muslims voted for Pakistan, especially in provinces where they were in a minority and were not going to be included in the proposed state.

Pakistan could not have come into being without their support but voting for Pakistan meant invoking the almost inevitable wrath of the future rulers of India. They voted, and they paid the price with their blood and tears. Recorded history of the human race may not offer another instance when such a large number of people made a common decision that required such high degree of selflessness.

Iqbal had said in the Allahabad Address, “Rise above sectional interests and private ambitions, and learn to determine the value of your individual and collective action, however directed on material ends, in the light of the ideal which you are supposed to represent.” The Muslim masses of India could not have followed his words more diligently.

Think Long-Term

The following is a revised version of my article published as Friday Feature in Dawn today.

The birth of All-India Muslim League on December 31, 1906 in Dacca was the biggest consensus ever achieved in the history of Islam. It brought together diverse sects of Muslims under one banner. Twenty years earlier, Muslims of the sub-continent had set their goal to become “a real nation” rather than “a nation only in name”, and that goal was now achieved. Hence the stage that had started in the modern history of the community in 1887 came to an end.

The League offered a new goal. It was to win separate electorate for Muslims in the sub-continent. Since they were a minority in the region, their newly realized nationhood could only be preserved if they were represented as an organic unity in the legislatures (the idea had been originally presented by Syed Mahmood, son of Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, in 1896).

This became the explicitly stated goal of the League, which described itself as the means through which this goal was going to be achieved. Hence a second stage could be said to have started in 1907 and completed in 1926 when separate electorates were effectively achieved and exercised (as described below in more detail).

However, it may be helpful to remember that membership of assemblies at that time was through nomination. General elections had not yet been introduced in the sub-continent (and were not conceded until 1919). Hence separate electorate was not something that concerned a citizen in daily life. If still the ordinary people became interested in it then obviously they were thinking long-term.

Hence pursuing separate electorate also meant embracing a new ideal, “Think Long-Term”. This did not mean that all details ought to be laid out in advance, since the future generations were likely to discover new ideals of their own. Therefore, commitment should not be to any particular ideology but to the society itself. A generation should pick a goal that everybody considers most important for conserving the common ideals. Things should be readjusted according to this goal but it should be remembered that tomorrow would be another day: the future always exists as an open possibility.

This approach can be best illustrated through a statement of Muhammad Ali Jauhar about the birth of the League itself. Jauhar said (ironically while presiding over an annual session of the Congress) that the birth of the League was a result of the MAO College founded at Aligarh nearly thirty years earlier in 1877 (“In obedience, as it were, to a law of nature,” he said. “Once more after nearly thirty years after the foundation of the College, there came into being a political institution of the Muslims.”)

Interestingly, the founder of the Aligarh College, Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, had advised his followers to stay away from politics. Yet, his arch-disciple Jauhar not only named him as the major catalyst for the birth of a political party but also regarded him as the pioneer of Muslim political activity in the sub-continent.

This is often very difficult to be understood by scholars steeped in the Western academic paradigm but from the perspective of “long-term thinking” as practiced by Syed and Jauhar, our real identity is not defined by our specific opinions. It consists of our ideals, goals and the means we leave behind for achieving goals. Superficially, Jauhar and his colleagues seemed to be the antithesis of Syed but in terms of ideals and goals they were continuing the initiative started by him. Hence Jauhar addressed him ecstatically in a famous poem, “You are the one who taught us all this rubble-rousing. If we are the height of it, you were its genesis.” (Sikhaya thha tumhi nay hum ko yeh shore-o-shaghab sara/ Jo is ki inteha hum hain toe is ki ibtida tum ho).

It seems that the demand for separate electorate fired the imagination of the common people in such a manner that the ideal, “Think Long-Term” sunk into the hearts too. Tendency of seeing beyond immediate environment seemed to increase as the demand for separate electorate gained momentum. This could be judged from the way the community responded to the affairs of far-off places like Balkan, Tripoli and Gallipoli. After their Hindu compatriots conceded separate electorate by signing the Lucknow Pact in 1916, Muslims of the sub-continent went to the extent of joining them in the Non-Cooperation Movement of the early 1920s. They even went ahead to boycott Election 1922 on behest of Indian nationalists, although direct voting had been introduced for the first time on that occasion and the voting was to be done through separate electorate.

Think long-term, because you are part of a bigger picture, which is alive and breathing. This much was understood instinctively by a Muslim – especially the unschooled one, whose consciousness was less tainted by foreign education.

It was an ideal that could be epitomized and conveyed, not less effectively than the poetry of Allama Iqbal and the heart-to-heart journalism of Muhammad Ali Jauhar and Zafar Ali Khan, by even a balled written by a little-known poet and sung in the streets in the days of Khilafat Movement, “Bolien Amman Muhammad Ali ki/ Jaan beta khilafat pay day doe” (“Said the Mother of Muhammad Ali: O Son, lay down your life for the Caliphate”). Think long-term because you are part of a bigger picture.

By pursuing the ideal of long-term thinking, the community finally achieved its stated goal. Election 1926 witnessed a historic turnout. Non-Cooperation Movement was long over. Masses thronged to polling stations and cast their votes through separate electorates. The League had served its purpose. It was time to discover the next ideal and set a new goal.

Seek Consensus

The following is my article published as "Friday Feature" in Dawn, September 17, 2010.

THEY were 67, and represented the largest Muslim community in any one country. They had come to Aligarh from all over British India, and included knights and nawabs as well as primary school teachers and ordinary people.

Since 150 chairs were laid out in the Stretchy Hall of Mohammedan Anglo-Oriental College, some 70 students also got invited for filling the vacant seats. The issue, in the words of their host, Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, was this: “Although we are called a nation, we are unaware of each other’s circumstances, as if we were different peoples.”

The participants wanted to realise a Muslim nationhood. To this end they agreed to hold annual gatherings where the community could reach consensus on matters of national importance. The organisation holding these sessions, each year in a different city, was to be called Mohammedan Educational Congress (later changed to Conference). It came into being on December 27, 1886.

This event may qualify as the starting point for the present phase in the history of the development of Muslim thought in the subcontinent. Although the idea of consensus was rooted in the Quranic instruction that believers should consult each other when deciding important matters, no Muslim community after 7th century CE had been able to make its own consensus the final arbiter, since monarchs had come to hold sway after the Pious Caliphate of the early period. Hence the resolution of 1886 was the beginning of a new chapter, not only in India but across the world of Islam. It read:

"In view of an overall decline in education among Muslims, and with a mind that efforts should be made for progress in all forms of education through a national consensus and by taking national initiatives, it is desirable that a session called Mohammedan Educational Congress, comprising people from several districts, should be held every year for deliberating on such matters. This session shall not be held at a fixed place but held each year at a place whose residents are willing to make arrangements for it.”

The rationale behind founding such an organisation was, in the words of Sir Syed, “that we should meet and convey to each other our ideas regarding education and progress of the nation. Whatever mistake there might be in our thinking should get corrected through the opinions of others.”

Hence the idea of rejuvenating Muslim thought in regard to education, a Quranic injunction no less than one that urged the faithful to consult amongst themselves on matters of public good, was different from ‘consensus’ as viewed in a western democracy, in which a contender remains a contender, and the winner’s view prevails over all others. It was also different from the socialist agenda that emerged later, where public opinion would be overruled by a preconceived ideology. Thus, consultation amongst the faithful, as inspired by Islam, treads its own course. Sir Syed’s Education Conference was a potent example of that immutable aspect of applying Islam as a guide in practical affairs by a group of individuals who felt responsible towards the Muslim nation, the millat, as Sir Syed called it.

The ideal then, as perceived by the founders of the Conference, was that an election, poll or any other forum of public debate and representation ought to be an opportunity for learning from others rather than proving oneself to be right. Since a human being has a soul, a heart and a mind and therefore the ability to reason for his own good, seeking consensus of the community – including the unschooled and the uninitiated – could shape new ideals to overrule any pre-existing thought or ideology.

There were three significant implications inherent in the resolution that was passed that day: (a) quest for an ideal; (b) identification of the tool through which it should be pursued; and (c) the commitment to work towards achieving the identified goal. The ideal was that in all matters of collective life, action would be taken through consensus. The tool was the annual Conference itself, and the goal to be achieved was to become a nation that was willing to act for the common good.

Over the next twenty years, the Conference took its message across India. Thousands would gather at the annual session and become inspired by the new ideal through poetry, lectures and debates. A significant goal post was achieved in the 20th annual session on December 31, 1906, when All-India Muslim League was founded at Dhaka as a representative voice of the millat.

The party united diverse Muslim sects under one banner. Sunnis were in a majority but by consensus they chose the leader of the Shia Ismaili community, Sir Sultan Mohammad Shah, Aga Khan III, to lead them. This was the most aspiring consensus in the history of Islam of at least the last 1000 years. India’s Muslims had done what Muslims elsewhere had failed to do repeatedly since the death of Umar bin Abdul Aziz in the early 8th century. It truly transformed the community into a nation that would henceforth act as a whole for realising its aspirations.

Thus the ideal born in 1886 was realised, and the goal achieved, in 1906. It was time to shape the next ideal, and set a new goal in the saga of critical Muslim thought in the subcontinent.

Quran-Burning: Conflicting News Items

Conflicting news are coming about the Quran-burning event. The story changed even as I was writing this post, and since I don’t know what twists are yet to come, I am posting the thing the way I wrote it (just now), along with link to the news page where updates can be found.

Pastor Terry Jones, who had called for burning the Quran on September 11, has cancelled the event “because the leader of a much-opposed plan to build an Islamic Center near ground zero has agreed to move its location”, according to an item from Associated Press, posted on Yahoo! News just a while ago. “The agreement couldn't be immediately confirmed,” AP adds. There are glitches.

GLITCH 1: According to the news item (still being updated as I write this), “Jones said Imam Muhammad Musri of the Islamic Society of Central Florida told him that officials would guarantee that the mosque would be moved.” The “mosque” refers to Park 51 (the so-called “ground zero mosque”), which is being led by a certain Imam Feisal Abdur Rauf. Did he authorize Musri of Florida to make any such promise? (See next).

GLITCH 2: "I asked him three times, and I have witnesses," Jones said, referring to Imam Musri of Florida. "If it's not moved, then I think Islam is a very poor example of religion. I think that would be very pitiful. I do not expect that." What if Rauf has not been consulted and Musri has made a promise on his own? (Since President Obama has already called the whole act of Jones a “stunt”, we wonder if this announcement about a deal is yet another stunt staged by Jones after he failed to gather support for his call to burn the copies of Quran: see next).

GLITCH 3: According to news report, Imam Musri “thanked Jones and his church members ‘for making the decision today to defuse the situation and bring to a positive end, etc”. Even if this deal turns out to be real, the saddest thing is destruction is being equated here with construction. Somebody wants to build a community center. Jones responds by threatening to burn copies of the Quran. This is blackmail and coercion, and not “a positive end” of anything (See next).

GLITCH 4: This came just as I was writing this post: “The imam and developer behind a plan to build an Islamic center near ground zero are denying reports that there is a deal to move the facility.” This is the latest update. So, was it just another "stunt" of Mr. Jones after all?

Note: Photograph is from Associated Press.