Unfortunately this is also going to be another one of a very long post and likely to test the reader’s patience, but there is a misconception about the creation of Pakistan that the matter cannot be dealt satisfactorily in any other way.
The problem is that majority of the younger generation of Pakistan do not know the “raison d’etre” or reason of existence of Pakistan. Mr Ali Mohammed Khan is obviously one such person. Since I was born before the partition and grew up reading ‘Zamindar’ newspaper of Maulana Zafar Ali Khan, who was one of the speakers on the 23rd March session, perhaps I am in a better position to know why Pakistan came into being in the first place.
First lest us agree as to what is implied when we refer to a secular state? As I understand, it means that a "Secular State is officially neutral in the matter of religion". In other words the state does not give preference / precedence nor discriminates her citizens on the basis of religion.
Neutrality does not mean that people are silent people about the religious basis of their convictions. What it requires is that articles of faith, or other substantive conceptions of the good life, do not carry any weight simply because they are matters of faith.
It also needs to be acknowledged that secularism is not and should not pretend to be "neutral" in various important respects. Most obviously, it clearly asserts the values that are widely shared among the otherwise diverse population, such as tolerance, freedom of expression, rule of law and so on. It can also treat different faiths and sects differently depending on how benign or malign they are. Nor does this kind of neutrality mean, in effect, always imposing one set of values on everyone.
Therefore despite whatever her constitution says, in its true sense of the word; India under the BJP and the Hiduvta government is no longer a secular state.
Now let us read the Lahore Resolution. It must be clear that the name “Pakistan” was never mentioned or referred to in the resolution or by any of the speakers.
The Resolution
On March 23, A.K. Fazul Haq, the Chief Minister of Bengal, moved the historical Lahore Resolution. The Resolution consisted of five paragraphs and each paragraph was only one sentence long. Although clumsily worded, it delivered a clear message. The resolution declared:
“While approving and endorsing the action taken by the Council and the Working Committee of the All-India Muslim League, as indicated in their resolutions dated the 27th of August, 17th and 18th of September and 22nd of October, 1939, and 3rd of February 1940, on the constitutional issue, this session of the All-India Muslim League emphatically reiterates that the scheme of Federation embodied in the Government of India Act, 1935 is totally unsuited to, and unworkable in the peculiar conditions of this country and is altogether unacceptable to Muslim India.
It further records its emphatic view that while the declaration dated the 18th of October, 1939, made by the Viceroy on behalf of His Majesty’s Government is reassuring in so far as it declares that the policy and plan on which the Government of India Act, 1935 is based will be reconsidered in consultation with the various parties, interests and communities in India, Muslim India will not be satisfied unless the whole constitutional plan is reconsidered de novo and that no revised plan would be acceptable to the Muslims unless it is framed with their approval and consent.
Resolved that it is the considered view of this session of the All-India Muslim League that no constitutional plan would be workable in this country or acceptable to Muslims unless it is designed on the following basic principle, namely, that geographically contiguous units are demarcated into regions which should be so constituted, with such territorial readjustments as may be necessary, that the areas in which the Muslims are numerically in a majority, as in the North-Western and Eastern Zones of India, should be grouped to constitute ‘Independent States’ in which the constituent units shall be autonomous and sovereign.
That adequate, effective and mandatory safeguards should be specifically provided in the constitution for minorities in these units and in these regions for the protection of their religious, cultural, economic, political, administrative and other rights and interests in consultation with them; and in other parts of India where Mussalmans are in a minority, adequate, effective and mandatory safeguard shall be specially provided in the constitution for them and other minorities for the protection of their religious, cultural, economic, political, administrative and other rights and interests in consultation with them.
This session further authorizes the Working Committee to frame a scheme of constitution in accordance with these basic principles, providing for the assumption finally by the respective regions of all powers such as defence, external affairs, communications, customs and such other matters as may be necessary”.
Besides many others, the Resolution was seconded by Chaudhary Khaliquzzam from UP, Maulana Zafar Ali Khan from Punjab, Sardar Aurangzeb from the N. W. F. P, Sir Abdullah Haroon from Sindh, and Qazi Muhammad Esa from Baluchistan. Those who seconded the resolution, in their speeches declared the occasion as a historic one. The Resolution was eventually passed on the last day of the moot, i.e. March 24.
Now let us re-visit the address of the Quaid E Azam MA Jinnah of 11Th august, 1947
“I cannot emphasize it too much. We should begin to work in that spirit and in course of time all these angularities of the majority and minority communities, the Hindu community and the Muslim community, because even as regards Muslims you have Pathans, Punjabis, Shias, Sunnis and so on, and among the Hindus you have Brahmins, Vashnavas, Khatris, also Bengalis, Madrasis and so on, will vanish. Indeed if you ask me, this has been the biggest hindrance in the way of India to attain the freedom and independence and but for this we would have been free people long long ago. No power can hold another nation, and specially a nation of 400 million souls in subjection; nobody could have conquered you, and even if it had happened, nobody could have continued its hold on you for any length of time, but for this. Therefore, we must learn a lesson from this. You are free; you are free to go to your temples, you are free to go to your mosques or to any other place or worship in this State of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion or caste or creed that has nothing to do with the business of the State. As you know, history shows that in England, conditions, some time ago, were much worse than those prevailing in India today. The Roman Catholics and the Protestants persecuted each other. Even now there are some States in existence where there are discriminations made and bars imposed against a particular class. Thank God, we are not starting in those days. We are starting in the days where there is no discrimination, no distinction between one community and another, no discrimination between one caste or creed and another. We are starting with this fundamental principle that we are all citizens and equal citizens of one State. The people of England in course of time had to face the realities of the situation and had to discharge the responsibilities and burdens placed upon them by the government of their country and they went through that fire step by step. Today, you might say with justice that Roman Catholics and Protestants do not exist; what exists now is that every man is a citizen, an equal citizen of Great Britain and they are all members of the Nation.”
It is obvious that Quaid’s concept of Pakistan was very close to what a secular state should be. Primarily because the real motivation behind the creation of Pakistan was that Muslims being only about 25% of the British India, there was a genuine fear that an overwhelming Hindu majority would / could ramrod Hindu cultural values such as a ban slaughtering the cows or a ban on Azaan sometime in the future. Pakistan was never meant to be a “Theocratic” Islamic State such as Saudi Arabia or Iran.
Religious parties on the other hand were against the partition. No mullah or member of the religious parties was involved in drafting or preparation of the Lahore Resolution.
The following is the full list of the 25 original, formally designated members of the Special Working Committee of the All India Muslim League, 1940, which met between 21 and 24 March 1940, and which largely drafted the Lahore Resolution.
·
Quaid e Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah
·
Nawabzada Liaquat Ali Khan
·
Sir Sikandar Hayat Khan
· Sir
Shahnawaz Khan Mamdot
·
Amir Ahmed Khan Raja Sahib of Mahmudabad
· Maulvi
A.K. Fazlul Huq
·
Sir Abdullah Haroon
·
Al-Hajj Sir Khawaja Nazimuddin
·
Amjadi Bano Begum ( Wife of Maulana Mohammed Ali Jauahr)
· Molana
Muhammad Akram Khan
·
Chaudhry Khaliquzzaman
· Nawab
Muhammad Ismail Khan
· Sir
Currimbhoy Ebrahim
·
Ali Muhammad Khan Dehlvi
·
Qazi Muhammad Isa
· Sardar
Aurangzeb Khan
·
Abdul Mateen Chauhdry
·
Ashiq Mohamed Warsi
· Haji
Abdus Sattar Essak Saith
·
S.M. Sharif
· Syed Abdul Rauf Shah
· Mohammad Latif ur Rahman
·
Abdul Rehman Siddiqui
·
Malik Barkat Ali
·
Sadullah Khan Umarzai
Whereas that non-Muslims could also live happily on Quaid’s Pakistan; PTI would like to rid of ‘Secularist’ as well !
This reminds me a song by Munni Begum where one of the verses was:
“Jab bhi Gulistan ko Lahoo ki zaroorat pari, subse pehle to gardan hamari kati. Ab ye kahtey hein hum se ahle chaman, ye chaman hai hamaraa tumhara nahien” meaning whenever the garden needed, our blood was used as fertiliser. Now the residents are claiming that the garden is not ours but theirs alone.
P.S.
Finally, I would like to say that I am a liberal, not a secularist. I would discriminate against non-Muslims but to the extent that positions of President, Prime Minister, Head of the Armed forces, Governors & Chief Ministers of the provinces and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court should be restricted to Muslims only.
