Re: Should Pakistan be more diverse like India?
Lessons to be learned from India?
Key differences in ideology, leadership may explain why Indians succeed where Pakistanis often fail
Nov 15, 2007 04:30 AM
Sonya Fatah
SPECIAL TO THE STAR
LAHORE, Pakistan–Why has India thrived as a democracy for nearly six decades, while neighbouring Pakistan has been plagued by chronic military coups since British India was partitioned in 1947?
Sharp differences in political leadership, ideology and social institutions help explain why India has largely succeeded where Pakistan has perennially failed.
The intensely secular and staunchly democratic Jawaharlal Nehru led India for the first 17 years of its existence, arguably the most difficult period in the country’s history. There were others too – men like Sardar Vallabhai Patel who cut across caste and class lines and formed the core of India’s leadership.
By contrast, Pakistan lost its founding father, the secular-minded Mohammad Ali Jinnah, within a mere 13 months of its existence. Its first prime minister, Liaquat Ali Khan, was assassinated in October 1951.
“Pakistan died with Jinnah,” says Ardeshir Cowasjee, 81, a newspaper columnist who has spent much of his life pressing for the rule of law in Pakistan.
Into the breach stepped a succession of military men.
Gen. Mohammad Ayub Khan took the country’s reins in 1958 and stayed in charge for 11 years. After a turbulent decade following Jinnah’s death, people welcomed Khan, who gave the country much-needed stability.
Close on Khan’s heels came Gen. Yahya Khan, whose four-year stint oversaw the country’s disastrous 1971 war that ended with the loss of East Pakistan and the birth of Bangladesh.
After a rare few years of democratic rule, Gen. Mohammad Zia ul-Haq staged a coup and began a U.S.-backed 11-year reign marked by the Islamization of the country that haunts Pakistan till today.
In his recent hefty book on India’s contemporary history, India After Gandhi, historian Ramachandra Guha wonders “what would (Jinnah and Liaquat Ali) have done if they had enjoyed power as long as Nehru, and if they had had the kind of supporting cast that he did?”
India’s leaders propelled the country forward through radical land reform, particularly in the states of Punjab and Haryana. Those reforms broke the traditional grip of landlords who had massive holdings and ran political fiefdoms, exploiting low-caste groups.
It wasn’t a success everywhere. In India’s Bihar state, for instance, the government’s failure to implement reforms gave steam to the often-violent Naxalite rebel movement. Despite that, India’s diversity has thrown up leaders from outside the elites, even in Bihar state, demonstrating that in India politicians can represent the disenfranchised.
Pakistan’s story is very different.
Although reforms were attempted during two different governments, they were never implemented. Most of Pakistan’s political class, including Oxford-educated Benazir Bhutto, represents its feudal aristocracy – large families in possession of thousands of hectares of land, who run their estates as absentee landlords.
In this nation of 160 million, it is hard to think of an influential leader who has risen from Pakistan’s largely poor masses.
Instead, there remains a brittle alliance between the military, industrialists, Islamists and feudals.
India’s other advantage was the former colonial administrative machine that bound the nation through a unified civil structure.
“The Indian Administrative Service had all the paraphernalia that goes with government – administration, tax collection, law and order,” says retired Brig. Rao Abid Hamid, who now works at the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan.
“It allowed for a healthy transition.”
Across the border, Pakistan didn’t have enough qualified officers to outfit its civil service. It had lost its Hindu and Sikh elite, who had previously staffed the bureaucracy.
“The only functioning, healthy institution in Pakistan was the army and that was misused.”
That tradition of misuse continues in Pakistan today.
President Gen. Pervez Musharraf is flexing his military muscle to prevent popular political parties from campaigning, demonstrating or organizing themselves.
In India, the independent election commission has pushed hard to ensure elections are free and fair.
When India’s Uttar Pradesh held its election recently, the commission sent in 72,000 paramilitary troops to prevent political gangs from disrupting the polling process for the state’s 190 million people.
Not surprisingly, Indians cherish their ability to vote their leaders into or out of power.
“India has got into the habit of democracy,” said Khushwant Singh, 92, one of India’s best-known authors and political analysts.
“We were lucky to have prime ministers who were committed to democracy … Today, we have politicians who are second-rate people but they are at least honest by the constitution.”
Sonya Fatah is a freelance journalist based in South Asia.