The elusive history and politics of Pakistan’s truck art

Pakistan’s ‘truck art’ is now quite a well-known ‘genre’ around the world. For long, it has been an homegrown art-form in South Asia, especially in Pakistan, where the whole idea of decorating trucks (also, lorries and even rickshaws) with complex floral patterns and poetic calligraphy, has evolved in the most radiant and innovative manner.

This indigenous art-form became known to the developed world from the 1970s onwards when European and American tourists took back the photographs they had taken of heavily painted and decorated trucks and buses on the roads and streets of Pakistan.

From the late 1980s, the government of Pakistan and enterprising individuals began to organise truck art exhibitions abroad and by the early 2000s, the genre had established itself as an exciting and vibrant ‘folk art-form’ from Pakistan.

So much has already been written and said about truck art. Yet, very little is ever said about its history.

Though experts around the world have spent a lot of effort in trying to dissect the aesthetical dynamics of this art-form; and on how these dynamics are a reflection of a process which sees Pakistan’s traditional folk imageries become fused with those of modernity, which the drivers come across on the roads, very few have attempted to trace the history of this forthright, yet enigmatic, art-form.

A much restrained version of this art-form was present in the subcontinent in the 1940s.

It first appeared on trucks and lorries driven by Sikh transporters who would paint a portrait of their spiritual Gurus, or those who helped form the Sikh religion.

The portraits were painted with the loudest of colours. Simultaneously, Muslim transporters and drivers began to paint portraits of famous Sufi saints on their trucks and lorries.

By 1947 — the year Pakistan emerged as an independent country — truckers began to add more elements around the portraits of the Sufis, such as whole landscapes, flying horses, peacocks, etc.

In the 1960s, a strand of truck art in Pakistan began to incorporate politics.

Heavily painted portraits of Pakistan’s first military dictator, Ayub Khan, began to emerge on trucks which were mostly owned by transporters from Khan’s home province, the NWFP (present-day Khyber Pakhtunkhwa).

Ayub’s regime was largely secular-nationalist in disposition and his state-backed capitalist policies had triggered rapid industrialisation in the major cities of Pakistan.

Though the transporters too, had benefitted from these policies, their homage to him (on their trucks), had more to do with the fact that he belonged to their province and had encouraged the migration of labour from NWFP to the booming metropolis, Karachi.

In the early 1970s a most interesting phenomenon galvanised the genre of truck art.

Till the late 1960s, trucks were mostly being painted with spiritual and exotic images on the rear of the vehicles.

From the early 1970s, images and calligraphy began to completely engulf the whole body of the vehicle.

This was prompted by the manner in which billboards and hoardings of Pakistani films became louder and more kaleidoscopic in appearance.

In turn, those painting such billboards were inspired by the ‘psychedelic art’ and Pop Art which had begun to mushroom in the west from the late 1960s onward.

So the painters of truck art, mostly stationed in workshops and cheap roadside eateries along Pakistan’s highways, began to incorporate the complex and loud wall-to-wall style adopted by the billboard painters and fused it with the already established flair of the truck art genre.

The first to get painted in this manner were the ‘mini-buses’ of Karachi. A 1975 feature (in the now defunct Urdu newspaper, Aman), quotes a mini-bus driver describing his heavily decorated and painted vehicle as a dhulan (bride). The style was soon adapted on trucks.

In Paradise — a book about the famous but now defunct ‘hippie trail’ which ran from Turkey to Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and all the way to India and Nepal — mentions how a group of European hippies (in 1974) would take LSD and then go bus and truck spotting on the roads of Pakistan! To them it was ‘psychedelic heaven.’

The sudden burst of ceaseless colour and imagery on trucks and buses in the 1970s also had to do with the extroverted nature of the Pakistani society during the populist ZA Bhutto regime (1971-77).

What’s more, Bhutto became the second political figure to begin appearing on trucks — mostly on lorries owned by transporters from the Punjab and interior of the Sindh province.

By the 1970s, non-Pakistani figures also began to appear in truck art. For example, martial arts expert and film star, Bruce Lee, became hugely popular in Pakistan.

He became the first non-Pakistani celebrity to appear on trucks, surrounded by the traditional imagery of truck art, thus creating a most surreal effect.

With the kind of impetus which it had enjoyed in the 1970s, truck art became a lot more complex, elaborate and ubiquitous in the 1980s.

In fact, it also produced its first ever super-star. His name was Kafeel Bhai Ghotki.

Ghotki Taluka is a dusty town in the northern most districts of the Sindh province. The majority of the people settled here are indigenous Sindhis, but the town also boasts of having a sizeable Mohajir (Urdu-speakers), Baloch, Pakhtun and Punjabi settler population.

Just like the overall Ghotki District, Ghotki Taluka too, is largely an industrial town, known for having a number of manufacturing and production plants and factories.

However, in the early and mid-1980s, Ghotki became famous for something that had absolutely nothing to do with factories.

Many Pakistanis began noticing the following text signed behind colourfully painted and decorated trucks and lorries: ‘Kafeel Bhai Ghotki Wally — Right Arm Left Arm Spin Bowler’.

The frequency with which these words began to appear on trucks and lorries on the roads of Pakistan was such that many motorists became curious enough to actually stop and ask truck drivers, who on earth this Kafeel Bhai was (and what the heck was a right arm left arm spin bowler)?

The funny thing is that (initially) many drivers when asked didn’t even know that the mentioned text had been placed at the bottom of the multi-colored images and pictures painted behind their trucks.

When some regional Sindhi newspapers investigated the phenomenon, they discovered that Kafeel Bhai was a young cricket enthusiast and a gifted painter who came from a humble, working-class background in Ghotki.

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, he had fancied himself to be the only bowler in the world who was able to bowl devastating off-spin with his right arm and an equally devastating leg-spin with his left.

He did manage to get a place in a few club sides in Ghotki where he tried to prove his uniqueness on the city’s grubby cricket grounds. Though he actually could bowl from both his arms, the ball would hardly ever turn and he was usually taken to the cleaners by the batsmen.

Blaming his fate as a bowler on the flat pitches of Ghotki, he decided to try his luck on the cricket grounds of Sindh’s sprawling and cosmopolitan capital, Karachi.

In Karachi, he couldn’t even bag a place in a modest club side and he returned to Ghotki heartbroken and convinced that the Pakistan Cricket Board couldn’t understand his unique cricketing abilities.

In Ghotki, Kafeel Bhai began to spend his time hanging out at the small tea stalls and eateries near the petrol stations on the highway that ran past Ghotki.

These stalls and eateries were mostly frequented by truck drivers who were driving their trucks to and from Karachi (in the south) all the way to Peshawar (in the north), carrying industrial goods, wheat, sugarcane, etc.

Though many of these trucks had all kinds of images painted on them, Kafeel Bhai began to spot trucks that didn’t, and offered to paint them. He only asked the drivers to pay for the paints and brushes required for the job.

The drivers loved his work that mostly included painted images of flying falcons, famous Pakistani vocalist, Madam Noor Jehan, horses, and Lady Diana (!); but what they didn’t know was that Kafeel Bhai was signing off his work as ‘Kafeel Bhai Ghotki Wallay – right arm left arm spin bowler’.

Even when (in 1987) some mainstream Urdu weeklies in Karachi began running a feature or two on Kafeel Bhai, and truck, van and lorry drivers now insisted that he put his name/signature line on their vehicles, Kafeel Bhai refused to accept any money for his work. Instead, he’d just ask for some paint, brushes and maybe a cup of tea at one of the tea stalls where he would spend his days and evenings.

By then Kafeel Bhai had already expanded his signature line that now read: ‘Mashoor-e-zamana spin bowler, Kafeel Bhai koh salam’ (Greetings to the world famous spin bowler, Kafeel Bhai).

But what did he do for a living? Nothing. His lunch and dinners were usually paid for by the truck and lorry drivers.

Kafeel Bhai’s ‘fame’ reached a peak in 1992 when a French art magazine published some pictures of his truck art.

A group of French men and women also came to Ghotki for a visit. They offered to take Kafeel Bhai to France where they wanted him to paint over some trucks and public buses in Paris.

Kafeel Bhai agreed, but only on one condition: He will be allowed to put his signature lines(s) on every French truck and bus that he would paint.

His French patrons responded that this they could not guarantee this but he would be paid well. Hearing this, Kafeel Bhai turned down the offer!

Kafeel Bhai had now entered his mid-30s and one fine day simply stopped painting.

After borrowing some money from one of his many fans, he set up a small furniture shop. After the shop began to turn up a small profit, he finally decided to get married.

Then, in the early 2000s, he suddenly sold his shop, packed his bags and moved to Karachi with his wife.

Nobody is quite sure where in Karachi he lives or what he does for a living. Kafeel Bahi just decided to vanish and so did his images and signature lines on trucks.

It may not look it, but truck art has continued to evolve — now more than ever. It continues to incorporate and fuse modern aesthetic elements and imagery with traditional spiritual and folk ones.

Sufi saints, spiritual vagabonds, the flying horse, the eagle, the peacock, the falcon and imagined scenes of paradise (jannat) are painted side-by-side popular political figures, military heroes, famous cricketers, show-biz personalities, F-16 jets and missiles.

Source: The elusive history and politics of Pakistan’s truck art
Published in Dawn, August 19, 2016.

The journey of an iconic image

One of the most recognisable (and merchandised) images in the world has been that of the late South American revolutionary, Che Guevara. The image is of his face. He is staring sternly ahead with a pensive look. The look is further enhanced by the presence of an unkempt beard, a light moustache, and an equally unkempt flock of hair, upon which sits a black beret.

According to Michael J. Casey’s book The Legacy of an Image, ever since the late 1960s, this image has been reproduced by revolutionary outfits, political parties, painters, rock bands and advertising agencies at the same frequency as famous Disney characters are reproduced!

Whereas popular Disney or mainstream film characters are created so that they could also be merchandised for additional profit, Che’s image was once just a forgotten photograph taken by a Cuban photographer. What’s more, unlike Mickey Mouse or Iron Man, the image was of an actual man.

As Casey mentions in his book, even though Che’s image still sells big (on various merchandise) in markets across the globe, it is now being consumed by a generation most of whose members are not quite sure who the man is behind the charismatic face.

Casey suggests that the traction of the image has helped it age beyond the ideology it was once directly associated with. Che Guavara was a sensitive young Argentinian, studying to be a doctor when he was smitten by Marxism and an urge to overthrow US-backed dictatorships in South America through guerrilla warfare and revolution.

Che Guevara’s mass-produced image has moved from being a revolutionary icon to a capitalist commodity
In the mid-1950s, he teamed up with Fidel Castro, a robust opponent of Cuban dictator, Batista, and both led a two-year guerrilla war in the jungles of Cuba against Batista’s army. In 1959, Castro’s rebels were able to topple Batista and (on Che’s urging), impose communist rule in Cuba.

Che was a leading member of Castro’s revolutionary regime until in 1965 when he quietly left Cuba to spark similar revolutions elsewhere. He fought alongside communist rebels in Central Africa, and then, in 1967, arrived in Bolivia to launch an insurgency. He was captured by CIA backed by Bolivian forces and executed. Che’s last words were addressed to the soldier who had been sent to execute him. He reportedly told the soldier: “I know you’ve come to kill me. Shoot, coward, you are only going to kill a man.”

The excellent 2010 documentary Chevolution, suggests that the first time the famous Che image appeared in public was in the shape of a large poster pasted on a wall in front of which Castro stood on a podium, speaking to thousands of Cubans, mourning the death of Guevara.

A year later, in 1968, the same image began appearing on posters during violent student uprisings in Europe and the US. By 1969, the image had also made its way on the walls of campuses in Asia and Africa.

But nobody knew who had taken the photograph. Trisha Ziff in her book, Revolutionary & Icon, writes that it was only in 1980 that one was made aware of the fact that the image was part of a series of photographs Alberto Korda, a Cuban photographer had taken in 1960.

Korda was a flamboyant and highly paid fashion photographer in pre-revolutionary Cuba. When revolutionary violence erupted in Cuba, Korda began photographing ordinary Cubans. A photograph that Korda took of a sombre three-year-old girl from a poor family clutching a piece of wood as if it were her doll, made him a supporter of Castro’s movement.

Korda decided to remain in Cuba after the revolution and became Castro’s personal photographer. In March 1960, he took dozens of pictures at a huge rally in which Castro was the main speaker. As Korda’s camera remained largely focused on Castro, at one point it moved to the right of Castro. There stood Che, staring pensively into the crowd.

Korda returned to his studios to develop the photographs. He sent all of them to various publications within and outside Cuba. None of them used the Che photograph.

However, six years later, in 1967, when Che had left Cuba and his whereabouts were unknown, a French monthly published Korda’s photograph. By 1968, the photograph had become an iconic image of resistance.

In 1969, a young Irish artist, Jim Fitzpatrick, gave the image its two-tone look. He simply put his signature at the bottom and did not copyright it. Many decades later, when his version had become the most reproduced design of Korda’s photograph, Fitzpatrick told Trisha Ziff that he did not copyright his design because he was a huge admirer of Che and wanted his image ‘to be reproduced like mad!’

Fitzpatrick’s version was inspired by the Pop Art genre of the period, and till the late 1970s, was largely being used by left-wing political outfits and radical youth. It was also in the 1970s that the Che image began appearing in Pakistan. One begins to notice it being mentioned in magazine articles of the era about how students were putting up Che’s posters in their hostel rooms.

Interestingly, the posters were not being printed in the country. According to a 1973 feature in the now defunct Urdu monthly, Al Fatah, Che posters (based on Fitzpatrick’s design of Korda’s photo) were being brought into Pakistan from Europe and also from Kabul in Afghanistan, and Kolkata, India.

After reaching a peak in popularity in the mid-1970s, the presence of the iconic Che image began to recede from the early 1980s onward – especially when populist leftist ideas began to erode.

It almost vanished when the Cold War began to fold in 1989-90. But the image suddenly bounced back when, in 1992, it was used on the T-shirts and an album cover of the then up-and-coming radical hard rock band, Rage Against the Machine.

I remember watching small stickers of the image beginning to appear on Rickshaws in Karachi in 1993. However, even though the image would once again begin to be used by radical left outfits and regimes (such as by the Hugo Chevaz government in Venezuela in 2000s), it became increasingly commoditised and commercialised.

By the late 1990s, it was being reproduced by cigarette, alcohol and fashion brands, and being put on merchandise such as coffee cups, shirts, ties, even underwear!

Incensed by the way his image had begun to be used, Korda began to sue large commercial brands who were using it. In 2000, Korda successfully sued Smirnoff. An out-of-court settlement saw Korda receiving $50,000 from the company, which he donated to Cuba’s healthcare system. He told reporters, ‘Che would have done the same.’

Korda continued to successfully sue large corporations (under international ‘moral laws’ which are a kind of copyright laws), but could only slow down the apolitical reproduction (for commercial purposes) of his image. He passed away in 2001 but his daughter continued his crusade to keep the iconic image rooted in Che’s ideals.

However, eventually, she had to settle for simply gaining the right to decide on what products the image could be used.

The image continues to be reproduced on a variety of merchandise more than ever now symbolising capitalist cool, more than communist defiance.

Source: The journey of an iconic image
Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine August 21st, 2016

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The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion !

Iqbal's new Muslim man

The Indian National Congress (INC) and the All India Muslim League (AIML) were both greatly weakened by the collapse of the Khilafat Movement and Gandhi’s non-cooperation movement (1919-1923).

Though Muhammad Ali Jinnah had rejected the idea of joining any of the movements (which played out together), he felt deluded by the state of Indian politics in the immediate aftermath of the collapse of both the movements.

He soon flew out to the UK where he decided to stay until his return in the mid-1930s. Much had changed and was changing in the spheres of Muslim politics in India.

The Muslim community was engulfed by a sense of disorientation. The agitation witnessed during the Khliafat Movement had hurled the community out of the paradigm designed for it by progressive educationist Sir Syed Ahmad Khan and deeply politicised the community.

The Khilafat Movement was started by Ulema groups and pan-Islamists after the defeat of Turkey’s Ottoman regime in the First World War. The movement demanded that the British should not allow the dismantling of the Ottoman Caliphate.

Following the disastrous end of the movement, Muslim political leadership was weak and fragmented, scattered between a debilitated and fractured Muslim League, and religious groups who had been radicalised by the commotion.

From this tension emerged a man who would become the second major figure in the evolution of Muslim nationalism in India after Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, and, consequently, that of Pakistani nationalism.


Muhammad Iqbal was a poet and a philosopher of considerable intellectual prowess. Though he had initially supported and then joined the Khilafat Committee (in Lahore), his stay in it was short-lived.

He resigned from the Committee after accusing its leaders of being ‘overtly sentimental’. He then went on to deride the Ottomans for ‘being a shame to the Muslims’.

In fact, he believed that the fall of the Ottoman caliphate in Turkey could be catalytic to the emergence of a renaissance in Islam. He also applauded the takeover of Turkey by Mustafa Kamal — a secular nationalist who abolished the caliphate and declared Turkey to be a modern republic.

On Kamal’s reforms, Iqbal wrote:

"The truth is that among the Muslim nations today, Turkey alone has shaken off its dogmatic slumber and attained self-consciousness…"
Even though, later on in life, Iqbal would begin to alter his views about Kamal’s reforms, for a while he did see the new Turkish republic as a dynamic political and social model of Muslim evolution — the sort which should be emulated by the Muslims of India.

Police parade arrested Muslim peasants in Mopla after their uprising was crushed during the Khilafat Movement.
Police parade arrested Muslim peasants in Mopla after their uprising was crushed during the Khilafat Movement.
Mustafa Kamal speaks to Turks after abolishing the Ottoman Caliphate and declaring Turkey a secular-nationalist republic.
Mustafa Kamal speaks to Turks after abolishing the Ottoman Caliphate and declaring Turkey a secular-nationalist republic.
Iqbal became increasingly aware of the nature of the changes which had swept across India's Muslim community after Sir Syed Ahmad Khan's reformist movement in the late 19th century, and then during and after the eruption and collapse of the Khilafat Movement.

By the 1920s, a Muslim business class had emerged. Historians such as W.C. Smith suggest that this class began to find many of its avenues (of growth) ‘blocked by the Hindus and the British’ and its members 'could not develop large-scale capital'.

This was one overriding reason why the Muslim business class had supported the Khilafat Movement.

A Muslim middle-class too had emerged, largely from within the paradigm and rules of engagement drawn by Sir Syed Ahmad Khan.

In the early 20th century, the educational progress of the Muslims was quite rapid. Many teachers, lawyers, professors, military officers and bureaucrats were recruited from this class. Most of them were aligned with the politics of the Muslim League.

In the aftermath of the Khilafat Movement, these two classes were feeling extremely vulnerable. As a consequence, some sections of these classes hurried out to support radical Islamic groups which had emerged from the Khilafat Movement; whereas the rest tried to figure out what course Muslim politics would take after the League had been weakened by infighting, and when the hopes of communal harmony and anti-British politics raised by the movement had shattered.

Iqbal would become the intellectual by-product and expression of this turmoil which was whirling within the Muslim community after the Khilafat Movement had buckled.

More than just an expression, he became a (possible) answer.

The iconoclast
Till 1905, Iqbal had been a passionate Indian autonomist. He was a strong proponent of wataniyat or love of the territorial homeland. He often wrote about his despondency over the rising strife between the Hindus and Muslims of India.

By the time the Khilafat Movement had begun to implode, Iqbal was convinced that the Muslims of India required a new expression, one which should emerge from ‘individual autonomy’ and was not chained to the worldview of the religious guardians of Islam.

Many ulema were not amused by this. In response to their criticism, he wrote:

Zahid-e-taang nazar ne mujhe kafir jana,
Aur kafir samajhta hai Mussalman hoon mein

The religious bigot considers me an infidel
and the infidel deems me a Muslim

Iqbal was conscious of the fact that the Muslim community in India was evolving with two competing sets of ideas: one which encouraged the community to embrace western education and political concepts to regenerate itself as a separate cultural community, and one which explained this community as part of a global Muslim community (ummah) striving to cleanse itself and move towards the formation of a pious caliphate.

Iqbal uniquely merged the two tendencies to come up with a complex synthesis which would go a long way in adding a weighty ideological dimension to the Muslim League, and, eventually, become an important building block in the construction of what would become Pakistani nationalism.

Iqbal thought highly of Sir Syed Ahmad Khan. He praised Syed for being the first Muslim (in India) ‘to glimpse the positive character of the age which was coming’.

But in his attempt to create the aforementioned synthesis, Iqbal was somewhat critical of an excessive use of rationalism (in matters of faith) which Syed had championed.

Iqbal explained that this did not mean he (Iqbal) was advocating irrationalism, but that too much rationalism in this context could create cleavages within a larger (but varied) community of people with a shared religious history.

To him, too much rationalism stopped members of the community from enriching themselves through the exchange of differing cultural values.

Though Iqbal was highly appreciative of the fact that Syed’s endeavours had put so many Muslims in schools, colleges and universities, he lamented that these Muslims had submerged themselves too much in (European) values which contradicted those present in their (Indian) culture and religion (Islam).

Iqbal believed that this had uprooted them from the collective history of their own land and community.

In a way, Iqbal was lauding Syed’s reformist spirit and modernist outlook, but at the same time lamenting that those Muslims who had been rescued from religious obscurantism and social stagnation by Syed’s deeds, had thoughtlessly hurled themselves to the other side of the divide which was populated by European political and social ideas, which, to Iqbal, were ‘alien’ to the historical cultural make-up of the Muslims.

Iqbal then turned towards the idea of Muslim nationhood which was opposed to Syed’s reformist, rationalist and modernist propensity.

He agreed that the Muslims of India were part of a larger global Muslim nation (ummah), and that Islam cannot be separated from their everyday lives (as Syed might have suggested).

Nevertheless, Iqbal believed that this idea was being upheld by men who wanted to retain a stagnant and dogmatic status quo.

The new Muslim man
Iqbal maintained that the only way Muslim distinctiveness in India can be realised was through a jolting rejuvenation of Islam and the ‘ethical education of the Muslim masses’.

He wrote that this duty was in the hands of ‘half-educated religionists’ and regressive clerics (mullahs). He wanted this obligation to be snatched away from them and put in the hands of the new Muslim man which he was out to create.

Cobwebs of religious dogma and obscurantism on the one side, and a blind adherence to European ideas and values on the other, had to be done away with.

Doing this would be the new Muslim man — an individual who was morally and politically strengthened by a self-affirmation that inspired collective action.

The self-affirmation was to be gained from self-realisation and/or a firm and clear realisation of one’s inherent ethical and spiritual strengthens buried underneath the weight of ignorance and materialistic distractions.

Iqbal called it khudi — a powerful expression of informed individualism. Khudi was inspired by the study of the ego by German philosophers such as Nietzsche and Hagel, but Iqbal presented it as an attribute which did not lead to selfishness and conceit, but to the spiritual and intellectual blossoming of a human being, and, consequently of the community he was a part of.

The idea first appeared in its matured form in Iqbal’s 1915 book, Asrar-i-Khudi (The Secrets of the Self). In it he asserted that God had created man and blessed him with khudi so that he is fit for the role of being His vicegerent on earth.

To Iqbal, it is this very concept of khudi which when awakened in someone, revolutionises the person and also provides human society with the true essence and meaning of existence.


The new Muslim man was thus unable to agree to or create a sense of nationhood which did not include his community’s cultural distinctiveness. And for a Muslim, this also meant the inclusion of Islam as a polity, and not just a label.

The new Muslim man’s purpose was to discover his khudi by demolishing the torpors of obscurantism, dogmatism and inertia. He was then to inspire khudi in his community, which, in turn, would inspire the community to turn itself into a polity driven by a dynamic, evolving and progressive Islam.

This process will lead to the creation of a powerful nation of forward-looking and motivated Muslims who would be able to convincingly and effectively challenge European colonialism, economic exploitation and western political ideas, which, to Iqbal, had become ‘morally bankrupt’.

Iqbal, though, never shied away from confessing the impact certain European philosophers had on him. What’s more, in dealing with the western idea of parliamentary democracy, Iqbal suggested that it (democracy) was ‘a political ideal in Islam’.

Nevertheless, he lambasted how the west had been practicing it because the system depended more on weight and numbers and sacrificed individualism and talent.

So what was the new Muslim man to do, since he was supposed to also reject the ideas and institutions of kingship, monarchy and clergy?

Iqbal wrote that the self-realised and rejuvenated Muslim polity should elect a national assembly made up of members who were well-versed in both Islamic as well as modern (secular) sciences, laws and philosophies.

Such an assembly will make sure that the spiritual as well as political and economic interests and issues of the polity are advanced and resolved according to the progressive and dynamic spirit of its faith; and a consensus (ijma) is reached which is representative of the whole community which might otherwise have ethnic and sectarian divisions and its members may follow different schools of Islamic jurisprudence.

Iqbal was a thorough idealist, a glorious romantic in the guise of an ideologue and a reformist. His new Muslim man was to be an unprecedented being in the Muslim universe.

This new man was to offer a bold challenge — to the ‘morally bankrupt’ but ubiquitous ideas of the modern western man; to the dogmas and intransigent attitude of the old Islamic man; and even to the ascetic disposition of the Eastern spiritual man (Sufi).

Yet, much of Iqbal’s thinking revolves around abstract concepts and ideas of the human psyche. But he insisted that they were sprouting from physical historical events and currents, especially those related to Muslim history.

And even though his new Muslim man was to be a thoughtful being who had overcome religious dogma and the indoctrination of ‘alien ideas’ to realise his full intellectual and spiritual potential, he was to be an entirely social entity, capable and willing to positively interact with society.

Yet, the process one had to go through to spark his khudi and become the new Muslim man, in essence, is a metaphysical pursuit.

Thus, the new Muslim man, too, is a mystical being, but one who rejects the more established and traditional routes of mysticism and replaces it with one which expresses itself as a more extroverted and even political countenance.

The new Muslim man realises his potential through intellectual introspection, but wasn’t introverted or cut off from society.

To Iqbal, the whole idea of the annihilation of the ego in Sufism was detrimental to the pursuit of discovering khudi.

The ego was vital to the new Muslim man because he had transformed it into becoming a vivacious and constructive force of life, instead of a one-dimensional feature which led to conceit.

Iqbal was a staunch individualist. When he had suddenly dropped out of the Khilafat Movement, he was visited by a leader of the movement who found him relaxing on a sofa and smoking a hookah.

The leader complained: ‘We read your poems and go to jail. But here you are, enjoying a smoke?’

Iqbal casually replied: ‘I am the nation’s qawwal. If the qawaal begins to sway with the crowd and gets lost in a trance, then the qawaali is over.’


So the question is, would the new Muslim man, who too was a radical individualist, change course once he had sparked the creation of a whole community of people driven by khudi? He has to continue to stand out; to not become part of the crowd, even after he had left them swaying.

Such a dichotomy, or, rather, paradox, does not seem to bother Iqbal because to him the realisation of the khudi was an eternal process which one had to continue adding to and evolve.

This is also why he was critical of ancient Islamic scholars such as Al-Ghazali (1058-111), and Ibn-i-Taymiyah (1268-1328), who cautioned against the dangers of philosophy (because too much of it might lead one to heretical, even, irreligious thought).

Iqbal wrote that Islam was not opposed to Philosophy because the Holy Quran urged believers to reflect upon God’s creations and to peruse knowledge for the sake of it.

Iqbal did not see Islam and its holy scriptures as a ‘block universe’; instead he saw them as processes of ‘continual actualisation’.

Iqbal and his new Muslim man was to reconcile faith with the realities of the now and the here. Like Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, Iqbal, too, was a steadfast advocate of interpreting the scriptures according to the realities of the day.

To him, the Holy Quran was a dynamic work which could be ‘reconciled to the environment which humanity finds itself’.

He lamented that the quality of Islamic scholarship in the Muslim world was such that it was unable to dynamically, rationally and imaginatively interpret the scriptures according to the realities of modern times.

Iqbal’s ideas were highly complex yet extremely bold and modernistic. And even though these ideas did ruffle feathers in various sections of the conservative ulema community, their (the ulema’s) anger towards him was not as pronounced as it had been against Sir Syed Ahmad Khan.

Dr M Khalid Masud in his essay — Iqbal’s Reconstruction of Ijtihad — noted that Sir Syed had used the word ‘reformation’ to explain his iconoclastic ideas, which made the conservatives believe that he was somewhat changing the doctrines of Islam.

Iqbal on the other hand, consciously used the term ‘reconstruction’ which did not carry the same negative perception (in the minds of the ulema) as the term reformation had.

But both Syed and Iqbal were urging the Muslim community to widen, modernise and evolve Islamic theology.

But whereas Syed was trying to mold and shape the Muslim community as an enlightened cultural entity, Iqbal was doing the same, but also further transforming it into becoming a vibrant polity and political entity.

Though Iqbal’s passion to rejuvenate all aspects of Islam through introspection and study — enough for the concept of khudi to emerge in the Muslim community and turn it into a progressive polity — remained a constant, he wasn’t immune to often change his mind and ideas.

He fell in and out with pan-Islamism; with the secular Turkish republic of Mustafa Kamal; and with modernism and as well as orthodoxy.

Dr Masud wrote that ‘while the conservative Muslim critics find Iqbal departing radically from tradition; Western scholars criticise him for his conservatism.

But his philosophical undertaking was rather weighty. He tried to reconcile and then merge rationalism with religious emotionalism and instinct.


Looking to transform the Muslim community into a distinct polity, Iqbal, unlike Sir Syed, was not repulsed by politics. He was a prominent member of the Muslim League who often contested elections.

In December 1930, while speaking at a party convention in Allahabad, Iqbal finally announced what he expected the Indian Muslim polity to do.

He urged the creation of a separate Muslim state within the Indian British Empire. But even more interesting is how he explained this state ideologically:

"(This state) for India means security and peace resulting from an internal balance of power; (and) for Islam, an opportunity to rid itself of the stamp that Arab imperialism was forced to give it, to mobilise its law, its education, its culture, and to bring them into closer contact with its own spirit and with the spirit of modern times."

This is a remarkable statement which was increasingly downplayed during the post-1970s’ rise of the more myopic narrative of Pakistani nationalism.

The statement clearly suggests that Iqbal saw the Indian Muslim community and polity to lead the way in rejuvenating a stagnating faith according to modern times, and, in the process, neutralise the impact of ‘Arab imperialism’ on it.

Source: Iqbal's new Muslim man
Published in Dawn, August 28th, 2016

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The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion !

The roots of religious radicalism

In his 2011 book Pakistan in Search of Identity, veteran historian Dr. Mubarak Ali wrote that the roots of Muslim religious radicalism in South Asia can be found in what came to be known as the Khilafat Movement (1919-1922).

Eminent scholar and professor of political science, late Khalid bin Sayeed had suggested the same in his 1968 book Pakistan: The Formative Years. The book was recently republished by Oxford University Press. But to Sayeed, the aforementioned movement not only stirred religious passions of the region’s Muslims, but also of the Hindus. Thus, in view of Sayeed’s assertions in this context, one can conclude that the roots of Muslim and Hindu militancy sprouted from the seeds first sown during the Khilafat Movement.

In 1919, when the already depleted Ottoman regime in Turkey was defeated by a British-led alliance during the First World War, the ulema of India who till then had largely remained stationed in their mosques and madressahs poured out to agitate against the possible dismantling of the Ottoman Empire.

Did the Khilafat movement sow the seeds of militancy in the subcontinent?
The resultant ‘Khilafat Movement’, which had begun to ferment during the last years of the First World War, managed to capture the attention and interest of a large number of Indian Muslims.

Pan-Islamists, many of whom were also operating from within the secular-nationalist Indian National Congress (INC), and ulema groups were at the forefront of the movement. The All India Muslim League (AIML), a moderate Muslim-centric party which had emerged in 1906 from progressive educationist and reformer Syed Ahmad Khan’s Muslim Educational Conference, was still struggling to find its feet.

One of its leading members, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, a dispassionate but astute lawyer, advised the League to stay out of the movement. In a letter to INC’s revered figurehead, Mahatma Gandhi, Jinnah wrote that the movement was bound to stir up untapped religious passions of the masses and would be a disaster to the fate of the Hindus and Muslims of India.

Gandhi disagreed. In November 1919, after being approached by some leading members of the Khilafat Committee, he decided to make the INC part of the movement. Both Mubarak Ali and Sayeed maintain that Gandhi did this to bolster the anti-British movement that he was already planning to launch.

On the other hand, a senior member of the Muslim League, Dr Ansari felt that the League was being sidelined and overwhelmed by the rising religious passions of the movement (which also became apparent within the party’s main Muslim urban middle-class constituency). He headed a special party convention in Delhi and invited a group of ulema to the session. This created a rift within the League. Jinnah’s group opposed the movement along with Gandhi’s ‘non-cooperation movement’. It was taking place in concert with the Khilafat Movement.

Jinnah insisted that the result of both the movements would be disastrous and chaotic. INC leader Jawaharlal Nehru later wrote that Jinnah saw the commotion (created by the Khilafat and non-cooperation movements) as ‘mob hysteria.’

The first major event which substantiated Jinnah’s concerns took place in Amritsar in April 1919. Mobs of Hindu, Muslim and Sikh protesters attacked a few banks and killed two British men. The colonial government responded by mercilessly massacring over 350 Indians gathered in a small garden (Jallianwalla Bagh).

The incident seemed to have consolidated Hindu-Muslim unity against the British but Jinnah continued to insist that the movement was bound to bring the two communities into serious conflict. He was ignored and, thus, his group in the League remained aloof throughout the movement.

To appreciate INC’s decision to participate in the movement, the conservative Islamic party the Jamiat Ulema-i-Hind issued a fatwa sanctioning Gandhi’s non-cooporation movement. Pan-Islamists such as Maulana Abul Kalam Azad and Muhammad Ali Jauhar were the most vocal proponents of the movement. Their fiery articles and speeches urged the Muslims to quit their schools, colleges and jobs ‘for the sake of Islam.’ Many did. The INC sectioned the move.

Jinnah was livid. He questioned the wisdom of such a move. ‘What are their replacements?’ He asked. ‘Where else would the students go, if not to schools and colleges?’

Then, Azad and another prominent member of the Khilafat Committee, Maulana Abdul Bari, declared India as darul harb (a house of war). They encouraged Muslims to migrate to Afghanistan which at the time was being ruled by a Muslim ameer. Hundreds of Muslims (mainly from Sindh and former NWFP) sold off their belongings and headed for Afghanistan. Most were robbed on the way, and the rest were turned back by the ameer. They found themselves homeless and jobless when they returned to India.

The anarchic route that the movement had taken and its violent currents further mutated it when, in the Malabar area, Muslim peasants began to attack Hindu landlords. The uprising was followed by bloody communal riots in Malabar and Multan. The riots were brutally crushed and Malabar’s Muslim peasant community never fully recovered from them.

Then, in 1922, a mob of Hindus and Muslims burned alive 21 policemen (all Indian). The incident took place in the Chauri-Chaura area. This is when Gandhi pulled the INC out of the movement.

Finally, the movement suddenly collapsed when Mustafa Kamal, a charismatic secular-nationalist general in Turkey, ousted European forces from much of Turkey and abolished the Ottoman caliphate.

By the end of it all, the INC was weakened; the League was severely fragmented; and thousands of Muslims were out of educational institutions and jobs. Large sections of the Hindu and Muslim communities had been radicalised. This eventually gave birth to militant outfits such as the Majlis-i-Ahrar-i-Islam and the Hindu Shuddhi movement, whose sole purpose was to convert Muslims and Christians to Hinduism. The influence of the Hindu nationalist outfit, the Hindu Mahasabha, also strengthened. The apolitical but deeply ritualistic and conservative Tableeghi Jamaat and, later, the quasi-fascist, Khaksar Movement, also emerged from the fragments of the fallen movement.

Jinnah’s caution and position were vindicated. But the tradition of politics done on the impulse and emotion of the mindless mob had been established in the region.

Source: The roots of religious radicalism
Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, August 28th, 2016

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The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion !

Angry young men from reel to real life

The arrival of James Dean and Marlon Brando in the 1950s in films such as Rebel Without a Cause and The Wild One heralded a new kind of cinematic idol. He was the ‘angry young man’ a brooding type with a propensity to explode into sudden bursts of anger. His character became even more complex by the presence of bottled-up emotional vulnerabilities which he carried as a burden. He was a contradictory character with the good intentions of the conventional hero but (simultaneously) exhibiting an ambiguous ethical disposition.

The character became an immediate draw, especially among the youth who vented their frustrations against the sterile socio-political conformity imposed by the American post-war establishment through him. The cinematic angry young man symbolised the tumultuous underbelly of suburban serenity.

In Bollywood, the cinematic angry young man did not arrive until 1973’s Zanjeer, starring Amitabh Bachchan. His role was of a brooding cop prone to bursts of anger which saw him undermine the system by bypassing the apathy of the bureaucracy and the police, and taking on the villains on his own terms.

Amitabh’s character in Zanjeer was a way for the audience to vent their own resentments, especially against the degenerating law and order situation and the rising political and economic corruption in India in the 1970s.

The new-age angry young man can be seen storming TV talk-shows and political rallies, specially those covered by news channels
And even though Bollywood’s angry young man would continue in this vein across the 1970s and early 1980s, his character in films, no matter how menacing, intense and angry, was always about a conscientious entity up against crooked individuals, never the state itself.

Indian film critic and author Nikhat Kazmi, in her book Ire In The Soul, suggests that even though the worsening political and economic situation in India in the 1970s and the lack of any political leader who clearly articulated the pitfalls of the situation inspired the creation of Bollywood’s angry young man, he might just have been created by the Indian state itself.

In other words, popular ‘angry young man’ films were never about masses of people rising up against state institutions. Instead, the films were about a renegade individual getting rid of the rotten apples who were spoiling a system that was otherwise okay. The system was never blamed. Only individuals were.

So Amitabh’s angry-young-man roles were weaved more as an instrument of collective catharsis, rather than as exemplary cinematic motifs of mass revolution.

By the 1980s, however, Bollywood’s angry young man character started to seem rather irrelevant in India’s shifting sociology, politics and economics.

Strangely, till the late 1970s, heroes in Pakistani cinema remained rather straight-arrowed and conventional, apart from Nadeem’s character in the ‘socialist’ film Har Gaya Insaan (1973).

All this began to change from 1975 onward when, due to the Z.A. Bhutto regime’s haphazard nationalisation policies and his growing autocratic tendencies, the country’s politics and economics began to come under severe stress.

It was, thus, in 1979’s Maula Jat that Pakistani cinema first witnessed the creation of its very own angry young man. He was played by the late Sultan Rahi. Rahi’s character was quite unlike that of Bollywood’s angry-young-man. Whereas Amitabh’s roles in this context were street-smart, brooding and ideologically-charged, Rahi’s role was that of a man steeped in the rugged and earthy myths of honour and revenge in rural Pakistan.

Maula Jat’s theme of an angry young man in a Punjabi village taking on cruel feudal lords and eventually his main nemesis — the cool, calculated psychopath Noori Nath — went down well with audiences to whom these villains symbolised the uncaring and exploitative ‘establishment.’

When hordes of working-class Pakistanis and peasants started venturing into cinemas to watch the film, the Zia dictatorship stepped in and demanded the director re-cut certain scenes of violence from the film.

According to the film’s producer, Sarwar Bhatti, this happened because Gen Zia’s regime — which had by then established a working relationship with various anti-Bhutto members of Punjab’s landed elite — was alarmed by the film’s ‘anti-establishment’ tone.

But by the late 1980s, just as Bollywood’s angry young men had become unintentional self-parodies, so did Rahi’s roles. They became disconnected with the changing political and economic dynamics of a transforming society. Economic liberalism had unleashed an unprecedented streak of consumerism in both India and Pakistan and their film heroes became either sanitised consumer brands, or untouchable and implausible superheroes.

But the new urban middle-class prosperity had an underbelly as well. This time it was the frustrations of a class which had gained economic mobility but felt that its aspirations to achieve political power were being blocked. The manifestation of this particular frustration did not come in the shape of a new version of the angry young man. Rather, it did produce one, just not on the silver screen, but on the political podium!

The new angry young man has emerged on TV talk-shows and in political rallies, specifically those covered by TV news channels. Imran Khan in Pakistan and Arvind Kejriwal in India are prime examples. They are real flesh-and-blood men (though not very young). But as angry political entities brilliantly utilising the media, they are largely scripted characters and acts written by the circumstances of an urban class which wants to vent the political frustrations which betray their economic wellbeing.

Narendra Modi too represents the same. But instead of being cast as the angry young man, he has been scripted (by the same class), as the new Bollywood hero: the superman.

Source: Smokers’ Corner: Angry young men from reel to real life
Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, September 4th, 2016

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The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion !

Smokers’ Corner: The little red book that inspired and killed

A week or so ago, while trying to locate a book in my large but rather chaotically arranged library, my eyes fell upon a dusty red book. It was Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung (aka the Little Red Book).

I had completely forgotten about it, despite the fact that an edition of the book which I possess sold for 13,000 dollars in December 2002, at an auction in New York.

What I have with me is a 1966 edition of the book — a book which went on to become perhaps the most read, quoted and cherished possession of ‘Maoists’ and an assortment of leftists around the world.

The book was a central prop during the tumultuous ‘Cultural Revolution’ in China launched by the country’s senior-most communist leader Mao Tse-tung.

Millions of copies were printed and distributed from 1964 onwards, reaching a peak during the height of the Cultural Revolution, between 1967 and 1973.

This Chinese icon of communist propaganda is implicated in unprecedented chaos but also inspired Qaddafi and Z.A. Bhutto
The Cultural Revolution came to an end in 1976 with Mao’s demise but by then the book had already been translated into over 20 languages in 117 countries.

The book was a consequence of a power tussle in the ruling Communist Party of China (CPC). On the one side of the wrangle were pragmatists who had criticised some of Mao’s sweeping economic policies which had caused famine and mass starvation in China’s countryside. On the other end of the tussle were those who had accused the ‘lingering presence of the bourgeoisie and feudal mindset in the country’ for ‘sabotaging’ Mao’s communist initiatives.

Mao was the main ideologue and architect of China’s 1949 communist revolution. But in 1960 during a large CPC convention he was almost sidelined by the party. However by 1962 he had managed to return to the fore and regain control of the CPC. He launched a purge and ousted hundreds of CPC members who he believed were ‘counter-revolutionaries’. It was during this period that the Little Red Book first appeared.

The book contains hundreds of quotes culled from Mao’s writings, lectures and speeches. These quotes cover various ideological, economic and social issues, commented on by Mao in the framework of how he understood Marxism-Leninism in the context of Chinese culture and polity, and also of the revolution in general.

In 1966 during a session of the CPC supporters of Mao insisted that counter-revolutionaries had infiltrated the party and state institutions. They said that the only way to identify them was through ‘the telescope and microscope of the Mao Tse-tung thought.’

It was decided that a cultural revolution will be launched to completely eradicate the ‘counter-revolutionary mindset’. Soon after, Mao and his supporters willingly allowed large groups of young Chinese students and youth to begin undermining the authority of state institutions and enact an anarchic and fanatical reign of terror in which teachers, professors, doctors, actors, authors, civil servants and sometimes even one’s own parents were beaten up and publicly humiliated by gangs of youth. These young Chinese went around doing this while profusely mouthing quotes from the book.

Millions of Chinese men and women perished in the chaos. All of them were accused of being counter-revolutionaries after being tried in spontaneous ‘peoples courts’ through ‘the telescope and the microscope of the Mao Tse-tung Thought’ (basically the Little Red Book).

China plunged into anarchy. But it was madness engineered from the top of the CPC hierarchy where Mao sat navigating the cleansing of the Chinese society.

Once he was able to use the chaos to oust his possible rivals in the party and drown the memory of his disastrous economic policies, he suddenly brought in the powerful Chinese military and sent thousands of his fanatical followers to the countryside to work on farms. Thus the Cultural Revolution began to lose its intensity from the early 1970s and came to a complete halt when Mao passed away in 1976.

By 1980, leaders damned and ousted by the Cultural Revolution were brought back into the party fold. The Little Red Book that had fuelled the imagination and ambitions of so many revolutionaries in the 1960s and 1970s came to be seen as a lethal instrument of propaganda and after the end of the Cold War, a curious ideological artefact of a bygone age.

In Pakistan, the book had first arrived in 1967. It was translated into Urdu and thousands of copies were distributed by the Chinese embassy between 1968 and 1973.

What I have with me is an English version of the book but which was printed in China in 1966. A late friend of mine, Irfan Malik, had gifted it to me in 1986, when both of us were young Marxist pretenders.

The book belonged to Irfan’s father who bought it in 1966 after a trip to China. Since his father had gone on to become a successful businessman, Irfan believed that the book would look better sitting on my bookshelf!

The book was initially inspired by History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, a propaganda textbook that was widely published and distributed in the Soviet Union in the 1940s. It was largely based on the thoughts and theories of Soviet communist dictator, Joseph Stalin. It was also translated into Chinese and a copy of it had landed in the hands of Mao while he was leading communist forces in pre-Revolution China. Though the publication of the book was halted after Stalin’s death in 1953, it was kept in circulation in China by Mao.

The Little Red Book in turn inspired Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi to author his Green Book in 1975 in which he presented his theories on Islam and Socialism. Just as the Red Book had become compulsory reading in China (till 1976), Qaddafi’s book became compulsory reading in Libya. In fact it remained so till the fall of his regime in 2011.

In 1974 the PPP published Quotations of Chairman Bhutto, a book containing quotes of Z.A. Bhutto on democracy, socialism and Pakistani nationalism. I have this book too but I don’t think it would fetch 13,000 dollars today.

A colleague of mine advised me to put my copy of the Red Book for sale on eBay. I told him I found that to be a rather distasteful idea. But only until he emailed me a picture of a portrait of Mao nonchalantly hanging inside a McDonald’s restaurant in Beijing. Oh, well, in that case …

Source: The little red book that inspired and killed
Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, September 11th, 2016

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The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion !

History of the Pakistani passport

The Pakistani passport has been a mirror of the persistent existentialist tussle in the country itself. The evolution of its look and contents have reflected (or, rather, have been made to reflect), what Pakistan as a polity and a nation stands for.

The country came into being in August 1947, mainly through the efforts of a sharp lawyer and Muslim modernist, Muhammad Ali Jinnah. Jinnah explained the new country as a modern Muslim-majority state where 'Muslim culture' would dominate the society but the state itself would have nothing to do with matters of faith. According to the founder, religion was an individual's private matter.

Jinnah passed away just a year after Pakistan's creation. And ever since his death, the country's state, various governments, and the moderate, liberal, and conservative intelligentsia have been locked in continuous battle over the question of the country's raison d'être and ideological composition.

According to moderates and liberals, Jinnah envisioned Pakistan as a project to conceive and initiate an entirely modernistic, flexible and pluralistic strand of Islam, which could then go on to inspire the rest of the Muslim world.

On the other hand, conservative and religious intelligentsia insists that Pakistan was created as a jumping pad to launch a theological state. They maintain that this was to be done through legislation from above and evangelical activity from below, which would then shape a 'unique' Islamic state for the Muslim Ummah.

This battle has raged on and it becomes even starker when it is played out in the corridors of the state.

The initiatives have gone to and fro between the liberal/moderate narrative and the conservative one. The evolution and trajectory of this battle can also be traced in the transformation of the Pakistani passport.

Issued in late 1947, the cover of Pakistan’s first passport is largely beige in colour and only partially green.

It has 'Pakistan Passport' written in three languages: English, Bengali, and Urdu.

It has two Pakistan flags, one symbolising the country's western wing (West Pakistan) and the other its eastern wing (East Pakistan). Inside, there is just the holder's name, address, profession, photo, and marital status.

Pakistanis did not require pre-arrival visas and could get visas-on-arrival in any country they wished to travel, including India

By 1954, the colour green had ousted the beige. The two flags were still there, but the holder's name now appeared on the cover.

Due to tensions between the state and the Bengali majority of East Pakistan, the government had introduced the One Unit scheme, which treated the ethnically diverse West Pakistan as a single province and the Bengali-dominated East Pakistan as the other province.

Consequently, West Pakistani passports (like the one in the picture) had 'Pakistan Passport' written only in English and Urdu, whereas East Pakistani passports had the same written in English and Bengali.

This was soon changed, but the rest of the contents remained the same: holder's name, photo, address, profession, and marital status.

Pakistanis could still get on-arrival-visas in most countries, except Israel, the Soviet Union and Afghanistan – countries that Pakistan had developed strained relations with. However, India and Pakistan were still issuing on-arrival-visas to one another despite the fact that both had gone to war in 1948.

The dark green passport lasted till 1960. In 1956, when the Constituent Assembly authored and passed the country's first constitution, it declared Pakistan an Islamic Republic.

It was also decided that the term 'Islamic Republic of Pakistan' was to appear on Pakistani passports by 1958. However, this never happened because in 1958, the country's powerful president, Iskander Mirza, and its army chief, Ayub Khan, imposed martial law for the first time in Pakistani history.

Mirza suspended the constitution, terming it “the peddling of Islam for political gains.” Within the first 20 days of the coup, Ayub ousted Mirza as well and became president in 1959. He changed the name of the country to the Republic of Pakistan.

The first passport issued by the Ayub regime was in 1960. It was light green in colour, symbolising the regime's modernist and moderate view of Islam. It just had 'Pakistan Passport' written on it in English and Urdu. The flags were removed and so was the Bengali translation (which had reappeared in the late 1950s). The contents inside remained the same.

Pakistanis could receive on-arrival-visas in all countries, except the Soviet Union, communist countries in eastern Europe, and Israel. Afghanistan had begun to give on-arrival visas.

The only communist country that gave on-arrival visas to Pakistanis was China. India and Pakistan still had on-arrival-visa policies between them.

In 1967, the colour of the passport was changed back to dark green.

The Ayub regime had begun to face harsh criticism from opponents, especially after the 1965 Pakistan-India war had ended in stalemate and the once-booming economy had begun to retract.

Trouble began to brew on the country's streets and campuses, and Bengali nationalists in East Pakistan became more hostile. The passport turned dark green again and, once more, the words 'Pakistan Passport' began appearing in Bengali. The inside contents remained the same.

Pakistanis still enjoyed on-arrival-visa facilities in all the countries, except in communist countries, barring China. However, from 1965 onward, India and Pakistan abolished their long-standing on-arrival-visa policies.

In 1974, the passport became bluish green in colour and the Bengali text disappeared.

This was due to the fact that in December 1971, East Pakistan had broken away to become Bangladesh.

Pakistani passports continued to use Bengali text till the country finally recognised Bangladesh in 1974.
When Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's left-leaning and populist Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) came to power in 1973, it authored and passed the country's third constitution. Even though the new constitution changed the country's name back to Islamic Republic of Pakistan, the new name did not appear on the passport.

The contents inside changed a bit though. Apart from having the holder's name, address, profession, and marital status, a section was added to note the colour of the holder's eyes.

From 1970 onward, the U.S. ended its policy of giving on-arrival-visas to Pakistanis, but the Soviet Union and communist countries began to relax their visa policies towards Pakistan somewhat. Nevertheless, Pakistanis were still able to enjoy on-arrival-visas in most countries.

In 1974, the passport also came with the disclaimer that Pakistanis could not use the passport to travel to Israel and South Africa, which was under the apartheid regime at the time.

In 1979, the passport was more or less the same, but the Urdu words 'Pakistan passport' were shifted on top and the English ones pushed down.

In July 1977, a reactionary military coup pulled off by General Zia ul Haq had toppled the Bhutto regime, but the name Islamic Republic of Pakistan had yet to appear on the passports. The contents inside remained the same as they were in 1974.

However, the revived on-arrival-visa policies between Pakistan and Afghanistan were abolished again, mainly due to the communist revolution in Afghanistan in 1978 and the Soviet invasion of that country in 1979.

Barring the communist countries (except for China) and the U.S., Pakistanis could still get on-arrival-visas in most countries.

n 1984, major changes were made to the Pakistani passport.

Zia was still at the helm and had accelerated his so-called Islamisation project. The country's official name, though changed to Islamic Republic of Pakistan in 1973, only appeared on the passports for the first time in 1984.

What's more, the word 'Passport' appeared not only in English and Urdu, but also in Arabic!

There were two reasons for this.

Firstly, more and more Pakistanis were going to oil-rich Gulf countries for work. Secondly, Arab cultural and theological influence had been allowed by the regime to seep inside the country’s institutions.

The contents of the new passport inside now had an additional section in which the holder had to declare their faith. Also, they had to sign a declaration that they were not members of the Ahmadiyya community in order to receive the passport. Though the community had been ousted from the fold of Islam by a National Assembly Bill in 1974, a new ordinance in 1984 introduced further restrictions on the community.

In 1983, UK and other major European countries stopped providing on-arrival-visas to Pakistanis. Pakistanis could also not get Afghan visas (and vice-versa), but the visa policies between India and Pakistan were greatly relaxed.

Pakistanis still could not get visas for the Soviet Union and other communist countries easily, but China continued to provide on-arrival-visas.

Soon, the Gulf states changed their policies as well and Pakistanis were required to have pre-arrival visas for the UAE, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia. Libya had already stopped providing on-arrival-visas to Pakistanis in 1980.

In the early 1990s, a few years after the end of the Zia dictatorship, the passport changed again.

The green became slightly lighter in colour, and the English words 'Islamic Republic of Pakistan' were once again pushed up and the Urdu ones pushed down.

The Arabic text were removed, but the section noting the holder's faith remained and so did the declaration denouncing the Ahmadiyya community.

This version of the passport has remained as is till this day, even though the Pervez Musharraf regime (1999-2008) attempted to replace the words 'Islamic Republic of Pakistan' with the old 'Republic of Pakistan'. But the attempt failed due to protests by religious parties.

After 9/11, and the rise of religious militancy in Pakistan, more and more countries stopped providing on-arrival-visa facilities to Pakistanis. Pakistanis now require a pre-arrival visa for China as well.

Today, only 29 countries provide on-arrival-visas to Pakistanis, most of whom are in Africa.
According to a 2016 Henley and Partners Visa Restrictions Report, the Pakistani passport's value has been rapidly diminishing in the last two decades and it is now one of the least valuable passports in the world.

As in 2016, Pakistani embassies in some European countries have begun to provide, to dual-nationals only, Pakistani passports that have 'Pakistan' written on them in English and the words 'Islamic Republic of Pakistan' in Urdu only. This cover might gradually be adopted for passports held by all Pakistanis in the future.

Source: History of the Pakistani passport
Published in Dawn, September 16th, 2016

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The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion !

Smokers’ Corner: A case of identity

Mughal emporer Akbar has been treated with disdain by quite a few ‘official’ historians in Pakistan. Yet another great Mughal king, Aurangzeb is seen as an exemplary prototype Pakistani sovereign. Akbar is scorned at for bringing Islam into disrepute by adopting an overtly pluralistic disposition. Some of his detractors also go as far as accusing him of being a heretic.

However Aurangzeb the last major Mughal monarch of India is praised for dismantling the ‘deviances’ introduced by his great-grandfather Akbar. But was Akbar really a heretic? Or Aurangzeb, a radiant symbol of piety?

Dr. Mubarak Ali believes that Muslim monarchs in India — who were ruling over a region which had a Hindu majority — were always more pragmatic than pious. But nationalist historian I.H. Qureshi went to great lengths to explain why (in the context of Pakistan) Akbar could never be praised in the same breath as Aurangzeb.

In a 1962 book of his, Qureshi wrote that Akbar’s inclusive policies were detrimental to the process of early Muslim nationalism. Qureshi suggested that even though Aurungzeb somewhat corrected the course of evolution of early Muslim nationhood, it was too late. The empire collapsed after the arrival of the British and due to the gradual strengthening of the Hindus, a process which Qureshi believes began during Akbar’s reign.

People project their own contemporary obsession on historical figures
No concrete evidence has ever surfaced which can substantiate that, indeed, an idea of Muslim nationhood was evolving in India between the 13th and 18th centuries. On the contrary, Muslim rulers explained themselves according to their ethnic lineages and languages and also recruited men from among their own regional and linguistic communities.

One group of invaders was distrustful of the other on the basis of differing ethnic backgrounds and origins. Dynasties were established when one set of Muslim conquerors overwhelmed and overthrew another group of imperial Muslims.

Even during Akbar’s reign, Persian-speaking Muslim migrants and high-bred Hindu Rajputs were preferred over local Muslim converts.

Claiming that some prototype version of Muslim nationhood was developing during the height of Muslim rule in India is nothing more than a fanciful historical concoction.

There was little or no concept of Muslim nationhood in India before the 19th century. Muslims were a diverse lot divided by race, class and ethnicity. In fact these divisions were actively encouraged by the Muslim rulers for various racial and political reasons.

Islam only appeared as a battle cry during Muslim invasions but after the invaders had settled down to rule this region, they did so through sheer pragmatism.

Aurangzeb’s inclination to lean on faith was more of a reaction. In his bid to come into power and replace his ailing father Shah Jehan, Aurangzeb’s chief opponent was his elder brother Dara Shikoh.

Dara was deeply impressed by the policies and spiritual disposition of his great-grandfather Akbar. More of a scholar than a warrior, Dara studied Muslim and Hindu scriptures and was an ardent follower of Sufism.

Dara had managed to gather support and popularity from common Muslims and Hindus in and around the seat of power in Delhi. So when he was defeated by Aurangzeb, and captured, he was immediately executed after a group of clerics declared Dara an apostate.

An interesting latter-day manifestation of the whole conflict between Aurangzeb and Dara has been the manner in which it has become part of the on-going debate on what constitutes Pakistani nationhood.

For example, till this day Dara is championed by those who see Pakistani nationalism as something whose original intent was pluralistic. A 2014 play called Dara, authored by a leading Pakistani playwright Shahid Nadeem, suggested that the conflict between the two brothers bore the hallmarks of the same sectarian and sub-sectarian conflicts found in Pakistan today.

Aurangzeb on the other end is hailed as a hero by those who claim that Pakistani nationalism is a by-product of Muslim nationhood which began to develop in South Asia after the 8th century invasion of Muhammad Bin Qasim.

They believe that this nationhood’s roots are more prominent in the lands and cultures of the Muslims who galloped in from Arabia and Central Asia.

Though Aurangzeb ruled for almost 50 years, after his death in 1707 the once powerful Mughal Empire began to crumble, suffering from the social and political inertia which had begun to develop during his regime.

However today in Pakistan, the pro-Aurangzeb narrative seems to be somewhat floundering. During the fourth year of Gen Zia’s dictatorship in 1981, I was a 9th grade student at a school in Karachi. The mentioned narrative was starting to peak, fully sanctioned by the dictatorship.

One of the annual plays at my school that year was to be about Mughal rule in India. Though none of my more talented classmates had managed to bag roles of Mughal kings up to Aurangzeb, the producers of the play were still struggling to find boys for the roles of Aurangzeb, Dara Shikoh and for another one of Shah Jehan’s sons Murad.

Almost all the interested boys from my class auditioned for Aurangzeb’s role. No one was interested in playing Dara. The boy who managed to get the role of Aurangzeb was the proudest fellow on that day.

Thirty-three years later in 2014, the same guy, who had retained his interest in acting, appeared in front of the producers of Shahid Nadeem’s play Dara. No, not to play Aurangzeb, but Dara Shikoh. When he failed to win the role, he was advised to try for some other role in the play, maybe even that of Aurangzeb.

He refused. He told the producers: ‘I am best suited to play Dara, because I personally identify with him …’

Source: A case of identity
Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, September 18th, 2016

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The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion !

Smokers’ Corner: Cherry-picking Iqbal, splitting Jinnah: the Pakistani nationalist conundrum

This was one of the most daunting questions facing the founders of Pakistan: how was Muslim nationalism, which had given birth to a separate country, to be transformed into a more focused idea encompassing this country’s identity?

Muslim nationalism in India had become a multi-dimensional entity. The one emerging from the writings of Sir Syed Ahmad Khan had explained the Muslims of the region as a separate cultural community which had been shaped by 500-year-old Muslim political supremacy in India. To him this community was to enter the future as an enlightened entity, regenerated through modern education and a rational reinterpretation of its faith.

Khan’s ideas in this context played a leading role in the formation of Muslim modernism in India and which, in turn, inspired the creation of the All India Muslim League (AIML). This modernism was further evolved by the likes of Muhammad Iqbal who tried to fuse it with the currents emerging from the other dimension of Muslim nationalism in the region.

This other dimension was one which understood the Muslims of India as being part of the larger global Muslim community (ummah). According to this version, Muslims (India’s largest minority group) would be able to thrive more as a polity in a united India. That’s why this version opposed the creation of a separate Muslim-majority state. The opponents of such a state warned that such a state would disperse the Muslims of the region.

Iqbal tried to reconcile the modernism of Jinnah’s vision of Muslim nationalism with the pan-Islamism of its more conservative strand. Now Pakistanis have undone his work
The Muslim opponents of this state also had pan-Islamist tendencies. So, rather ironically, the more intransigent and ‘fundamentalist’ components of India’s Muslim nationalism were propagating a united India, whereas this nationalism’s more modernist components were demanding a separate Muslim-majority country.

Iqbal rather creatively attempted to resolve this by trying to reconcile the modernity of one dimension with the radical conservatism of the other.

Iqbal’s merger of the two opposing strands of Muslim nationalism was first worked into a political narrative by the AIML — especially when the party had started to become more populist in tone and action. For example, on the one hand, the party banked heavily on Iqbal’s pleas to ‘modernise faith’, but at the same time drew inspiration from the more traditionalist strands of Iqbal’s reconciliation when it had to attract the votes of the masses in the more rural areas.

During the all-important election of 1946, the AIML in Punjab’s urban areas explained the creation of Pakistan as the formation of a modern Muslim-majority country where the Muslims will be able to rapidly advance culturally, politically and economically and so would the other minorities of India, even those Hindu segments who were being repressed by the dominant castes.

In the rural areas of the same province, however, the League turned towards the pro-League ulema who took the rightward route in Iqbal’s reconciliation and explained Pakistan as an Islamic entity.

The modernist and radical conservative currents in the two versions of Muslim nationalism in India, reconciled by Iqbal to become a merged narrative, had emerged with force during the League’s election campaign in the Punjab. But soon after the creation of Pakistan in 1947, this fusion would not be taken as a whole, but would be split between the modernists and the conservatives with both claiming to be expressing Iqbal’s vision.

In 1946, while talking to British journalist, Doon Campbell, Jinnah stated that Pakistan was not to be a theocracy but a modern, democratic state. At the same time, a slogan, ‘What does Pakistan mean? It means, there is no God but God,’ was ringing in some towns of the Punjab.

According to Tahir Wasti in his 2009 book The Application of Islamic Criminal Law this slogan was coined in 1945 by a minor poet, Malik Ghulam Nabi, in Sialkot. But whereas Jinnah and most of the League’s leadership had admired Iqbal’s attempt to reconcile political and social modernity through reinterpretations of the scriptures, men such as Ghulam Nabi and the pro-League ulema had responded more to that side of Iqbal’s writings that had celebrated Islam as a rallying impulse that needed to be expressed passionately.

Furthermore, even those clerics and ulema who were against the AIML’s idea of creating a separate country but who eventually migrated to this country, began to point at Iqbal when they began to demand the ‘Islamisation’ of Pakistan.

Jinnah was not an ideologue. He was a sharp politician and an articulate lawyer. Though there is now enough evidence to suggest that he was envisioning Pakistan as a modern Muslim-majority country where the culture would be Muslim, but the state was to remain detached from the matters of the faith, he was also conscious of the thin line which separated the idea of a modern Muslim-majority state from that of an emerging theocracy – especially in a region where a Muslim minority had suddenly become a ruling majority.

Writing in the Frontier Post in 1991, author Ahmad Bashir wrote that during a Muslim League convention in Karachi in 1947, a man in the audience suddenly got up and interrupted Jinnah’s address, shouting Ghulam Nabi’s slogan. Jinnah immediately shot back: “Sit down. Neither I, nor my working committee, nor the council of the Muslim League has ever passed such a resolution where I had committed this to the people of Pakistan. You might have done so to catch a few votes.”

Jinnah passed away in 1948, just a year after the birth of Pakistan. He did not leave behind a systematically conceived ideological model of what Pakistan was to be. There were just his speeches and interviews, but which he had delivered and given as a politician and a rather pragmatic one to boot. His political disposition was that of a level-headed and dispassionate parliamentarian and constitutionalist who had begun to appreciate Muslim nationalism as a progressive idea to mobilise and carry the Indian Muslim community into the modern age and towards political sovereignty.

But even though hugely admired by the new country’s citizens and intelligentsia, Jinnah’s speeches did not seem to figure much when the state of Pakistan first began to formulate the whole idea of Pakistani nationalism. Instead, both the modernists as well as the traditionalists cherry-picked their way across Iqbal’s writings. So much so that even when Jinnah did begin to get more space in the whole nationalist debate, he had been turned into an ideologue, split between the modernists and the conservatives. There was no Iqbal any more to reconcile the two.

Source: Smokers’ Corner
Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, September 25th, 2016

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The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion !

The rise and fall of ‘General Glasnost’

Gen Raheel Sharif has become perhaps the most popular military chief in Pakistan. What’s interesting is that his status in this respect has risen parallel to a popularly elected government headed by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s PML-N.

Theoretically such an arrangement is beneficial for a country now fighting a complex battle against certain ogres that were allowed to mutate and become an existential threat to the state and polity of Pakistan.

Gen Raheel is credited for adding a more determined and decisive dimension to this battle which the state and society have fought for over a decade but without much direction. The enemy was smart to exploit this and that’s why up until December 2014, various shades of military, civilian and religious elements were navel-gazing about the issues of terrorism and extremism as suicide bombers and assassins were causing unabashed mayhem.

Messiahs often arrive from the military as panaceas but their end is often inglorious
If we minus the initial popularity enjoyed by men such as Field Marshal Ayub Khan and Gen Pervez Musharraf out of the equation, then, certainly, Gen Sharif stands out as the most highly regarded military chief in the country. The admiration for Ayub and Musharraf largely rode on their somewhat popular coups, but this popularity had completely eroded by the time both were forced to resign. Moralising soldiers had become amoral politicians.

But Gen Sharif is not quite an anomaly, as such. Some 28 years ago another military chief had rapidly risen during a democratic set-up. For a while his fame rivalled the likes of popular civilian politicos such as Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto. Then it just collapsed in the rudest of manners. The general’s name was Mirza Aslam Baig.

Gen Baig’s emergence was rather extraordinary. He had been made the vice chief of army staff (VCOAS) in 1987 by Gen Ziaul Haq’s handpicked PM, Muhammad Khan Junejo — despite the fact that Gen Zia was not happy about the appointment. Author and columnist Zahid Hussain wrote in 1991 (for Newsline) that Gen Baig’s ideas about the end game in Afghanistan and democracy in Pakistan clashed with those held by Gen Zia. However, before Junejo was chucked out by Gen Zia, he exercised his prime ministerial prerogative to elevate Gen Baig’s rank and position.

In August 1988, Gen Baig became the military chief after Gen Zia was killed in a plane crash. Many suspected sabotage. Gen Baig too was supposed to be on that plane but backed out at the last minute. Some critics still maintain that Gen Baig knew what would happen.

However, the truth is that it was Gen Zia who had advised Gen Baig to travel on another plane. Gen Baig suggested the same. And so did one of Gen Zia’s closest confidants, Gen K.M. Arif, in his 2001 book Khaki Shadows.

Military expert and author H G. Kiessling, in his most recent book Faith, Unity, Discipline, writes that Gen Baig was encouraged by some officers to take-over the reins of the government after Gen Zia’s demise. But Gen Baig believed that “the era of dictatorships was over” and the time was ripe for a return to democracy.

In a 2005 interview, Gen Baig claimed that he had suggested the same to Gen Zia in 1985 only to be told (by Gen Zia), “Baig, do you want a noose around my neck?” Gen Baig began being dubbed as ‘General Glasnost’. Glasnost is a Russian word meaning openness and was made famous by the reformist Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev.

Chairman of the Senate, Ghulam Ishaq Khan — a wily and aged bureaucrat — was made interim president and elections were announced. But Junejo went to the Supreme Court with a plea that his government which was dismissed by Gen Zia should be restored. Kiessing writes that the court had “pro-Zia judges” at the helm.

Fearing a sweep in the elections by Benazir Bhutto’s PPP, the judges were likely to rule in favour of Junejo. Gen Baig sent the Minister of Justice, Wasim Sajjad, to them with a message that their verdict in favour of Junejo would be highly displeasing to him. Almost overnight, the judges changed their minds and ruled against restoring Junejo.

Gen Baig was conscious of the fact that his actions had irked many ‘Ziaist’ officers in the military. Kiessing claims that to strike a balance, he went along with a proposal of constructing an electoral alliance of conservative and religious parties. The alliance was named the Islami Jamhoori Ittehad (IJI). The idea was floated by the then chief of the ISI, Hamid Gul, who warned Gen Baig that a sweeping election win by the PPP would be detrimental to the causes dear to the military.

Speaking to the Herald in 2001, Gen Baig said that he went along with Gul’s plan because otherwise the military would not have allowed Benazir to come to power. PPP won (but could not sweep) the 1988 election and Benazir became PM.

Relations between Gen Baig and the new PM were initially cordial, until the latter decided to chuck out the controversial Gul from the ISI and replace him with a non-serving general, S.R. Kallue.

Gen Baig was more than happy to see Gul go, believing he had become ‘too political’ as an ISI chief. But Gen Baig advised the PM not to pick a non-serving military man to head the ISI. He sent Benazir his own list of men to choose from. The young PM, however, stuck to her decision.

Benazir’s government was dismissed by Ishaq Khan in 1990. She told Voice of America that Gen Baig too was involved in engineering her ouster, but only after “Ishaq and some members of the agencies had convinced him that I wanted to replace him as COAS.”

Kiessing is of the view that Gen Baig had hoped to cooperate with Benazir but his overtures were rebuffed by the inexperienced PM.

The IJI finally managed to win the next election and Nawaz became PM. In 1991, Gen Baig’s reputation evolved from being a pro-democracy and ‘open’ general to becoming a populist hero of sorts when he aired his displeasure against sending Pakistani troops to join an ‘international force’ set up by the US to oust Iraqi forces from Kuwait. In a statement, Gen Baig warned that Iraq would become “another Vietnam for the Americans.”

PM Nawaz was highly displeased by the remarks of his COAS, especially when posters and banners praising Gen Baig began to appear during large pro-Saddam rallies in Pakistan. Nawaz did not extend Gen Baig’s tenure and he retired.

But exulted by his new-found hero status, Gen Baig plunged into politics and joined a strong PML faction, the PML-Chattha. Though this faction allied with the PPP during the 1993 election, Gen Baig was determined to use his popularity to unite and lead all PML factions.

But this was not to be. In 1994, a banker, Younus Habib, suddenly emerged to confess that “money was the motivating force for political intrigue, especially against the first PPP government.”

Habib added that he had used fraudulent transactions to the tune of 5.6 billion rupees (from public administration money) to pay off various politicians and officers. Gen Baig’s name also came up when Habib alluded that the orders had come from high up.

Gen Baig vehemently denied ever receiving the money, even though Habib also claimed that the general disbursed money to the people he wanted to get elected during the 1990 election. Some believe Habib was activated by Gen Baig’s detractors in the agencies, while others suggest it was the second Benazir government which facilitated Habib’s confessions.

Gen Baig tried to reconstruct his reputation, but the scandal refused to go away. His image began to rapidly erode and his political career came to a grinding halt. He is still entangled in the case which undid his speedy rise and hastened his equally rapid fall.

Source: The rise and fall of ‘General Glasnost’
Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, October 2nd, 2016

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The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion !