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Democracy in Pakistan a Distant Dream

This reminds me of the book the future of Pakistan. It was a good book but contained a lot of negativity about the future of Pakistan. Ofcourse when the economy is down, terrorists are attacking us Pakistanis everywhere and brutally murdering us, their is no placating America and a list/range of problems afflict us so the reviews are surely going to be negative. Optimism does not make policies it seems.
 
First of all when Indians try to pose as experts on Pakistan, it makes me laugh no end. They write with a typical Indian bias of superiority.

Any country, if it has democracy like Pakistan's, will not want it. Its not that we want Pakistan to be taken over by mullahs or army. We had enough of army too. But this version of democracy is a loot sale only. It does not resolve any of people's problem, in fact it creates more.

People see, at that moment in time, if their problems are being resolved. If their problems are being compounded and the nation is going down, why would they want this kind of 'democracy'?

The only fruit of democracy, Pakistan style, is that people have become more aware and can see that the political parties ruling them are just groups of looters and killers.
The thing about most of these 'democracy' advocates is, they secretly want a piece of that system. If you have a good king, why do you need to change it? Roads get built, hospitals, repaired etc.
Indians got some hope from democracy while political parties didnot do sonething good here in Pakistan……
1-our education system is one of the worst to support thugs and lords to be re elected
2…No medical reforms
3…No land reforms these thugs have almost many villages as their land…
4…no industrial reforms
5…corruption is everywhere
6…they always run away after elections filling their pocket
Well we need something to counter then i.e Judicial process and literate Pakistan
We need some sensible and patriot in politics……
India is the same thing as Pakistan, except minority vs majority politics are used to keep people distracted. What do you think a rich gandhi, has to do with a poor bihari? They are just turned against minorities and Boom!
Unfortunately this is also the future I see unless the government can correct itself.
I have to admit tho, the idea of mobs lynching Feudal is a really nice one, but that chaos that will bring is not worth it.
The Feudal should learn from the cultural revolution in China and give up their powers willingly or people will take them forcibly.
All that happens, in a 'revolution' where people flow in with the mob, instead of being a leader and having a sense of self is you replace a feudal looter/thug with a pendu one.
 
It is better to be a sham democracy, or even a populist democracy than be an efficient totalitarian state.
 
It is better to be a sham democracy, or even a populist democracy than be an efficient totalitarian state.

Really, then why did we have a long line of united kings before we had a divide and rule congress-led british tribute state?

I, see maratha pride has switched from out-right looting of other's temples, (and women) to creating a system to do it for them.

Very 'bramin-like' I '\ / salute' you good, sir.
 
There is no such thing as Democracy in Pakistan, there is only Democrazy in Pakistan run by bunch of goons, culprits, corrupt & incompetent who have no love for Pakistan.
 
There is no such thing as Democracy in Pakistan, there is only Democrazy in Pakistan run by bunch of goons, culprits, corrupt & incompetent who have no love for Pakistan.

Who are still much better then the diktators :coffee: 40,000 dead politicians or diktators?
 
South Asian countries specially Pakistan has civil dictatorship ....running in the family
 
South Asian countries specially Pakistan has civil dictatorship ....running in the family

All over the world there are political dynasties, Pakistan or for that matter India is no different. Civil dictatorship in all its forms is still dependent on public mandate and maintaining that mandate thus far better then Military dictatorship.
 
Democracy does not naturally works in Pakistan due to simple facts

1- Uneducated population
2- Ethnic language barriers in 4 provinces and reluctance to intermarriage

Pakistan needs either a Man like Imran Khan , clean cut welfare state man who can fix things

Or a Dictator like Musharraf, who manage to fix at least the economy and internet in country
 
I think biggest problem in Pakistan is tolerance issue. People ruined their owning just for getting even. That s one of the reason qood brain runaway from Pakistan faster pace ...then ever

All over the world there are political dynasties, Pakistan or for that matter India is no different. Civil dictatorship in all its forms is still dependent on public mandate and maintaining that mandate thus far better then Military dictatorship.
Our leaders are bad dogs, they always bite back to their master who give them food.
 
Really, then why did we have a long line of united kings before we had a divide and rule congress-led british tribute state?

I, see maratha pride has switched from out-right looting of other's temples, (and women) to creating a system to do it for them.

Very 'bramin-like' I '\ / salute' you good, sir.

Brother,go read some Maratha History..

Shivaji Maharaj never ever killed innocents or raped women ( like mughals,ghaznavis did).. and did not touch Mosques,churches and their holy scriptures ( for more info. read Maratha raid on Surat)

Though I agree that later maratha sardars/subeidars were arrogant.

and second.. yes kingdoms were united under a King..

but those were feudal ages.. now we are a modern and a civilized nation..

and yes, in a democracy.. everybody gets a chance to be a rascal.. not only the members of a particular family/families

Basically, Indians and Pakistanis have same Feudal blood in them..

but major difference in two democracies came in 50s and 60s... when, in India.. Nehru and Acharya Vinoba Bhave put all their political and social clout to erase Zamindari off the face of India...

Vinoba Bhave organized Bhoodan ( lit. Land Distribution/Donation Movement).. and distributed huge tracts of lands owned by zamindars to poor landless labours(mostly dalits)..

else India would also have suffered from the Zamindari virus which would have eaten our democracy

Cheers !
 
Democracy does not naturally works in Pakistan due to simple facts

1- Uneducated population
2- Ethnic language barriers in 4 provinces and reluctance to intermarriage

Pakistan needs either a Man like Imran Khan , clean cut welfare state man who can fix things

Or a Dictator like Musharraf, who manage to fix at least the economy and internet in country

Bull$hit.

Democracy has worked in India with the exact same problem of Uneducated population, Ethic language barriers and religious differences despite the fact that all of it was 10 times worse than Pakistan.
 
It is great to see the first ever elected government complete its five years team. We congratulate the people of Pakistan on this great achievement. Pakistan is a still a young country and going through growing pains. It is natural to see younger Pakistanis distrust the political process and reject this concept but with consecutive democratic governments who have to be answerable to its electorates they will see stability and prosperity. Democracy is based on human rights with freedom and equality for all and that is what that founder of Pakistan, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, has envisioned about Pakistan. People who say that Pakistan is shifting towards Islamization fail to realize that Pakistan’s constitution is based on the Quran and it has been so from its inception. We totally believe that Pakistan and its people have a bright future.


Abdul Quddus
DET-United States Central Command
U.S. Central Command
 
Democracy in Pakistan a Distant Dream

In the just-completed tenure of an elected civilian government in Pakistan some well-meaning analysts have come to discern the seeds of democracy in the country. Their argument goes that it is for the first time that a civilian government has managed to complete its full tenure surviving a long tradition of the powerful Pakistan Army’s intrigues (for a coup) and a new trend of judicial over-activism. The government to be formed after the forthcoming parliamentary elections in May 2013 would therefore automatically feel far more confident to strengthen democracy.

One, however, finds that democracy continues to be a distant dream in Pakistan. The government that completed its tenure recently was democratic only in form. Like all its predecessors, it miserably failed to promote what a democratic state is supposed to first and foremost, namely, foster the multi-faceted development of all its citizens.

It is well documented that during its five years in office Pakistani citizens have continued to be denied their basic freedoms. There has been little improvement in the life of the minorities -- Hindus, Sikhs, Christians, the Baha’is, Buddhists, Zoroastrians, Ahmadis, Shias and Mohajirs, that is, both non-Muslims and non-Sunni Muslims. Pertinently, one of the most disastrous consequences of the continuing denial of freedoms to the minorities is that most of those affected have either resorted to exodus or religious conversion to skip their ordeal. This has altered Pakistan’s religious demography beyond recognition. According to authentic studies, in undivided British India, non-Muslims formed more than a quarter of the population in territories that later became Pakistan. On partition, they came to account for about 14 per cent of Pakistan’s population, albeit concentrated mainly in East Bengal. Today, in a population of 17,56,46,000, Sunni Muslims constitute 77 per cent and Shias 20 per cent. Non-Muslims -- Hindus, Christians and others -- are three per cent. Hindus constitute about 1.6 percent of the total population.

The predicament of Pakistani citizens can be attributed to the politics of Islamist radicalization in the country. Over the years a notorious Deobandi Sunni stream of the puritanical Wahabi-Salafi order, equipped with a distorted version of Islam, has expanded its social base in the country. In order to capture or retain political power, politicians of all hues as well as the ambitious Army have sought to cultivate or keep in good humour this Islamist social base by accommodating its agenda at the cost of the interests of all other segments of Pakistani society.

In 1956 General Ayub Khan had the constitution of Pakistan declared an “Islamic Republic.” In 1959 he circulated a paper defending the theoretical necessity of an “Islamic Ideology in Pakistan. He had a new course , ‘Islamiyat’ added to the school curriculum, according to which Pakistan was not but the culmination of a ‘dream’ that originated in AD 712, when the first Arab armies landed on the coast of Sind under Muhammad bin Qasim.”

His successor General Yahya Khan promised that the armed forces would be the guardian of Pakistan’s ideological frontiers. In the 1970s Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto encouraged the concept of pan-Islamism leading to a close linkage between Pakistan’s radical Deobandis and the Saudi Wahhabis. Bhutto gave Pakistan a constitution declaring Islam as the State religion. In September 1972 he had Christian schools and colleges nationalized. His 1973 constitution had the offices of President and Prime Minister reserved for Muslims, making minorities second class citizens. And Bhutto passed a resolution in 1974 declaring Ahmadis as non-Muslims.

General Zia ul Haq aligned himself with the Jamaat-e-Islami and started Islamizing Pakistan in general and its army in particular. He introduced additional legislation for discrimination against religious minorities in military service, education and the civilian bureaucracy. General Zia also encouraged the madrassas run by Deobandi groups like the Jamaat-e-Islami and other such groups to start indoctrinating the youth. In 1979 the military regime replaced the existing penal codes with the Hudood Ordinance to implement the Islamic Shari’a law discriminatory to women and non-Muslims.

Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto created the Taliban in the 1990s. She protected al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden. In 1996 she directed her Director General of Military Operations General Pervez Musharraf to rehabilitate bin Laden (who had then been expelled from Sudan) in the Pak-Afghan border area.

In 1998 her successor Nawaz Sharief directed Federal Information Minister Mushahid Hussain Saeed to call on Lashkar-e-Taiba chief Hafiz Saeed (Ahl al-Hadith orientation) at his headquarters in Muridke. During his second tenure as Prime Minister, Sharief repeatedly evaded US pressure to allow its special forces to mount an operation from Pakistani territory into Kandahar to kill or capture bin Laden.

The civilian government which has just completed its term conformed to the same pattern of behaviour. In order to cultivate the social base of the Islamists, it also preferred to be seen as backing their agenda here and there. For instance, then Prime Minister Gilani said on January 12, 2012 that there would be no amendment to the country’s anti-blasphemy laws. His Railway Minister Ghulam Mohammed Bilfour of the so-called moderate Awami National Party, headed by the grandson of the ‘Frontier Gandhi’ Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, announced that he would pay $100,000 to anyone who killed the California-based Egyptian Copt (the native Christians of Egypt) who posted his blasphemous film ‘Innocence of Muslims’ on YouTube.

Given all this, it is unlikely that the liberal, democratic forces -- including in the media, academia and legal fraternity – will be able to assert themselves in the upcoming parliamentary elections and contribute to altering the present pattern of Pakistan’s leadership behaviour.
Democracy in Pakistan a Distant Dream | Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses

I think if Imran Khan comes, Democracy will be restored in Pakistan...
 
I think if Imran Khan comes, Democracy will be restored in Pakistan...

No way dude. As long as extremists and fundamentalists are there,you cannot expect democracy in any nation.
 

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