Writings Of Hamza Alavi Professor Hamza Alavi is one of the few eminent scholars in the West who have written so extensively on Pakistan. Based on years of research and scholarship, his work reflects a progressive outlook of developments in Pakistan, its society, and its history. Spanning over a period of three decades, his writings deal with social, political, economic, and historical issues. These issues include, among others, social structures of the Pakistani society, ethnicity, problems of developing societies, history of dictatorship in Pakistan and almost parallel development of its reliance on the US.

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/sangat/HAMZA.htm

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Fragments a of Life (An autobiography of Professor Hamza Alavi) Pakistani Women In A Changing Society Pakistan And Islam : Ethnicity And Ideology The Origins And Significance Of The Pakistan-Us Military Alliance Authoritarianism and legitimation of state power in Pakistan Marxism, Ex-Colonial Societies and Strategies of the Left - Notes For friends British Socialism: Long Dead, Now Buried Ironies of History: Contradictions of The Khilafat Movement Authoritarianism and legitimation of state power in Pakistan Colonialism and the Rise of Capitalism - Pakistan, Afghanistan and India Labour Legislation and Trade Unions in India and Pakistan - A review on Amjad

Ali's book The Rise of Religious Fundamentalism in Pakistan

 

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FRAGMANTS OF A LIFEHamza Ali Alavi

Date of Birth: 10 April 1921 --- born at Karachi

A KIND OF C.V. - MY ACADEMIC CAREER

FRAGMANTS OF A LIFE

BOOKS AND PUBLICATIONS

A KIND OF C.V. - MY ACADEMIC CAREER

Visiting Professorial Fellow: Center for Social Theory and Comparative History, at the University of California, Los Angeles, 1989.

I was invited by Prof. Robert Brenner , Director of the Center, to spend a semester with them. I could not resist it. I went in place of my friend Victor Kiernan who was returning to Scotland. I enjoyed my time at UCLA, among friends: Perry Anderson, Michael Mann, Eric Hobsbawm and some others.

Professor of Social sciences GSIS, University of Denver, 1987-88

The Director of the GSIS telephoned me at Manchester and invited me to join the GSIS as Professor---He omitted to tell me that he himself was about to go off to the City University of New York, as Dean. I had just retired from Manchester; US Universities have no compulsory retirement age. He said that he had met me at the University of Dar-es-Salaam in 1975 when I spent a busy week giving interminable seminars. He also knew my work. But I could not recall him. The GSIS turned out to be a mediocre and right wing set-up, full of second rate Saudi and Kuwaiti students whom the staff courted. The place was unbearable. When Bob Brenner called me from LA and invited me I seized the opportunity and resigned from Denver. At my age and beset by ill-health I had no intention, in any case, of going on for long. Being fed up I had already thought of returning to Manchester to do some writing and then to go back to Karachi.

Honorary Associate Fellow Institute of Development Studies at the

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University of Sussex,1971-1994. This was purely a formal appointment.

ReaderDepartment of Sociology, University of Manchester 1977-88

Academic Assessor i.e. referee for promotions etc.

Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology. University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, 1983-85

Lecturer, Department of Politics, University of Leeds, 1972-77

See below for an account of my appointment as Professor in Canada followed by a ban on entry into Canada ! After that I had an offer of a Professorship at the University of Amsterdam. I went to Leeds instead, for reasons explained below.

Visiting Associate ProfessorCenter for S. Asian Studies, Michigan State University, 1971

Research Fellow Inst. of Development Studies, University of Sussex, 1966-71

Member of Editorial Board:

Journal of Contemporary Asia (Quarterly) 1971 to 1985

Journal of Peasant Studies (Quarterly) 1973 ...

FRAGMANTS OF A LIFE

My first academic job was with the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Sussex in 1966 which I joined on a four year contract. While employed by the IDS my wife and I spent 15 months researching in a Punjab village (in 1968-69). My term at the IDS was to expire in 1970. 1 had planned to go back to Pakistan at the end of it, to set up an Institute of Peasant Studies in Pakistan which I had been promised. I informed the Director of the IDS accordingly. My post was advertised and someone appointed. Then came the Pakistan Military action in Bangladesh. I was traumatized. I could not return to Pakistan under the auspices of such a regime. The IDS managed to find funds for a three month extension for me while I tried to sort myself out. I was then invited to go to the Michigan State University as a Visiting Associate Professor and Director of an inter-disciplinary Pakistan Rural Development Research Workshop (which resulted in a book that I co-edited). I spent a few months there.

BANNED FROM CANADA

The day after I arrived at East Lansing (Michigan State University) in May 1971, I was telephoned by friends in the Department of Sociology at Queen's University at Kingston, Ontario. They were about to make an appointment when they learnt through the academic

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grapevine that I was around and available. They invited me to Kingston and put forward my name for the job. I was selected and in due course I got a formal letter from the Vice Chancellor appointing me as Professor. I might add that Khalid Bin Sayeed was not involved in any of this. He is in the Department of Politics and he was abroad on leave until September. He did not know of my appointment until I wrote to him in January.

I applied for the Canadian Landed Immigrant Visa, giving them, as required, a full account of my political activities and affiliations. It took them three months to check that out. In December 1971, they informed me that my application had been approved. We were to go to Canada in July 1972, Surprisingly, in February 1972, my wife and I were summoned by the Canadian High Commission in London and this time we were both interviewed by their top intelligence man about my politics and beliefs. I was then informed that I was banned from entry into Canada. What made them have the second thoughts after they had already checked me out ? I wondered. Had there had been some intervention by someone in the meanwhile ? I am left to guess by whom and why ?

On being told of the ban I notified the Sociology Department and also the Vice-Chancellor of Queens, accordingly. The Vice-Chancellor took up my case and eventually got the ban lifted. But by that time I found the idea of going to Canada quite offensive. Behind a facade of liberalism they had been quite vicious. I was even a bit flattered by the ban for I was in good company. Several of my friends, all distinguished scholars, had also been banned from Canada. One of them was my good friend, Istvan Meszaros, a distinguished Marxist philosopher, a colleague and personal friend of Georg Lukacs. Istvan was banned when he was appointed Professor at York University. Andre Gunder Frank, a friend since 1962 before he became a world-wide celebrity, was banned too. Gabriel Kolko, the distinguished historian of US imperialism, and a fellow member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Contemporary Asia, was also banned. Sadly I have never met him. Who knows how many more ? That is the hypocritical 'liberalism' and 'freedom of thought' of the 'Democratic West' --- empty slogans. McCarthy lives on.

My ban became a 'cause celebre' in Canadian Universities. There were protests. But I was outraged to see that there was not a single word of protest, not even a private word of solidarity, from any of my prospective colleagues at Queens. Only a ringing silence. I was quite disgusted. What kind of people were they with whom I would have to work ? When the ban was eventually lifted I chose not to go there, The salary at Queens was 3 times what I got at Leeds. But that was no attraction. A living wage was enough.

When I went to Montreal for a conference in 1974 some academics from Universite du Quebec a Montreal met me. They told me that when Prime Minister Trudeau visited their University he was questioned about my ban. Trudeau replied that the 'ban' was an administrative mix-up which had been reversed. He told them that it was my decision not to go to Canada after all. That was not his fault, he said. That was hypocritical.

LEEDS

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The alternative to Canada was a Lecturer's job at Leeds which I was happy to take. I had friends there. Justin Grossman and now Ralph Miliband who had joined as Head of the Department of Politics. My wife and I had spent the New Year's eve at Ralph's house in London. I had told him that we were going to Queen's. Little did I know that I would join him at Leeds instead. It so happened that I had applied to Leeds earlier and Justin was able to reactivate my old application when the Canadian job fell through. After due process and interview I was appointed. My friends at Leeds gave me a warm welcome, but said that a Lectureship was all that was on offer. But that was fine with me.

PROFESSORSHIP AT AMSTERDAM

A few weeks before my Leeds interview, I got an offer from Amsterdam that came out of the blue. It was an invitation from the University of Amsterdam to take up Prof. Wertheim's Chair at their 'Sociology - Social Anthropology Center'. Wertheim was retiring. I knew Wertheim, who is a scholar of international standing. To be invited to take over from him was itself quite an honor.

They said that they had considered about 200 applicants and interviewed some, before they decided to invite me. I do not believe for a moment that the applicants did not include persons of great caliber, probably better qualified than myself. But I found that they were interested in having me because of the areas of my work in sociology and social anthropology (which ran parallel to Wertheim's interest) and the fact that I was a South Asian, which fitted in with their ideas of the direction in which they wanted the Center to develop its work. They wanted to move out of the colonial rut, such as their focus on Indonesia, and broaden their work, The last thing they wanted was another Indonesia specialist who was the next strongest candidate after me.

They invited my wife and myself to go to Amsterdam for a week as guests of the Center so that we could see the place and make up our minds. Wertheim met us at the air terminal. He took me to the Center where I met the gathered Appointment Board. We talked for one and an half hour. I realized that they were overwhelmingly for me. I did not know any of them personally, excepting for Prof. Wertheim himself. But they knew my work. Only two of the 15 members of the Appointments Board seemed to be hostile. And one senior Professor was non-committal. He did not yet know me. But we got to know each other during the week and he too came around strongly to support me, as he made clear. He even gave us a dinner party at his home. The job was mine. The appointments procedure for that senior Chair was elaborate. Recommendation from the Appointments Board would go to the Senate for ratification. Then it would go to the Ministry of Education. But I was also assured that once the Appointment Board had made its recommendation, which in this case was overwhelmingly in my favor, the rest of the procedure was a mere formality. The only time in their history, they wrote, when the recommendation of Appointments Board had been referred back was in 1947 when the Board had been evenly divided between the candidates.

After we got back to London my wife expressed her unhappiness at the prospect of going to live in Amsterdam, although she did say that for my sake she would go anywhere.

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What would she do in Amsterdam, she asked. She had stood by me through thick and thin and I did not wish to build my career on the basis of her unhappiness. The job at Leeds would be attractive for us both. The Milibands had been our personal friends for years and my wife was comfortable with them. Miliband, for his part, strongly urged me to take the Amsterdam job. I decided on Leeds. The Amsterdam option was there, in case Leeds turned me down. I was in correspondence with friends in Amsterdam who pressed me to reconsider. It would have been the ultimate irony if I had to take that up, though.

I wrote to Amsterdam withdrawing my candidature. I gave some lame excuses for my decision. They were not only upset---they were astonished. My friends at Amsterdam found it incomprehensible that I would prefer a mere Lectureship at Leeds to the distinguished Chair at Amsterdam. There followed a lot of correspondence and telephone calls. They thought that I had withdrawn because I was unsure of the Amsterdam job and was taking the Leeds job as a 'bird in hand'. They went to great lengths to assure me that the Amsterdam Chair was mine and that I should not worry about it. But I had decided and have never regretted that decision. I got the job at Leeds.

MANCHESTER

I moved to Manchester after five years at Leeds. I had thought that I would never leave Leeds. But my friends in Manchester 'twisted my arm' and persuaded me to go there. Things had changed in Leeds for Millband left for Brandeis University In America. Without him Leeds would not be the same. We had, between the two of us, enjoyed running an M.A. course which attracted excellent students. Without him, it would not be the same. So now Manchester was not a bad idea.

In Manchester we had an excellent team in Sociology of Development with Peter Worsely, Teodor Shanin, Bryan Roberts, Ken Brown and myself. In a national survey we were rated as one of the best University Departments in Britain offering Sociology of Development. We attracted excellent research students. Teodor Shanin and I ran a lively seminar. I enjoyed being at Manchester. My greatest regret is that I did not get good Pakistani students. My only good Pakistani student did a Ph.D. with me at Leeds---an excellent study of industrial workers at Karachi. At Manchester I had two Pakistani students about whom the less said the better. That is not much to show for a lifetime of work. My best students were from Latin America, South East Asia and one from Turkey.

THE SECOND CAREER: POLITICAL ACTIVISM IN LONDON

Before I moved into an academic career in 1966, I spent 10 years in London in political activism, writing, lecturing and giving seminars at Universities. When I first came to London, I joined the LSE for a Ph.D. on Banking in Pakistan, which given my years of first hand involvement in building it up, I could have written blindfolded. But I was sick of that subject. And I was disenchanted by empty academicism. I found myself attending Sociology, social anthropology and political science seminars. I devoured a vast amount of literature. I was full of questions. What had happened to my country ? I studied and wrote. In those days there was nothing much to read about Pakistan, to discover what had

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gone wrong. So one had to study, analyze and write ! I founded and edited Pakistan Today (1957-62) a quarterly journal. Each issue would have a substantial article that I wrote. We would bring out an issue as soon as there was a major development in Pakistan. After the Ayub Coup we came out six times a year. PT had a circulation of several hundred. The peak was about 1500 for our final issue which was wholly devoted to an article entitled The Burden of US Aid. Pakistan Today was sent to East and West Pakistan and clandestinely reproduced there or placed in libraries. The US Aid Issue was reprinted as a booklet by Faiz Ahmad Faiz . It was also reprinted in the US by a New Left journal called New University Thought and as a booklet by the Detroit Radical Education Project (who also reprinted some of my later articles in booklet form). Tariq Ali acknowledged it as a source in his first book. We got letters from sympathisers in Europe and North America. When there was total silence in Pakistan itself, it was a worthwhile thing to do. A lot of my time was invested in it.

I became a political activist. My wife and I joined one or two like minded friends, notably Tassaduq Ahmad from Dacca and his wife. We worked amongst Pakistani students and workers very successfully from 1955 to 1966. We founded a number of organizations designed for activity at different levels. The Pakistan Youth League was a broad liberal to socialist forum. We met fortnightly and about 150 to 200 would turn up. Besides ourselves, speakers included scholars on the Left like Stuart Hall, Tony Benn and Eric Hobsbawm. The Pakistani Socialist Society was a smaller group. At a broader political level, soon after the Ayub Coup, we set up a Committee for the Restoration of Democracy in Pakistan. At an international level we ran a group called The Forum which brought together socialists, from Asia, Africa and Latin America, for a dialogue. It fell apart when Khruschev intervened in the Belgian Congo and our common ground of free and open, non-sectarian, debate with mutual respect, was gone. We were also active organizing Pakistani workers through two Pakistan Welfare Associations, one based in the East End of London (mainly Bengali) and the other in Slough (Punjabi).

I was a founding member of CARD, the Campaign Against Racial Discrimination, a UK-based wide multi-racial Organization of Pakistanis, Indians, West Indians and White British, to join forces to fight the rising tide of racism. Some of us, so-called 'leaders' of black communities in Britain, were invited by Martin Luther King at his London hotel to talk about racism in Britain, when he was on his way to receive his Nobel prize. We met not only Martin Luther King. We also met each other. We realized that there was much to be gained from joining forces against racism In Britain. So we met again and launched CARD. Dr. David Pitt, a West Indian member of the Greater London Council, who was an 'establishment' figure in the Labor Party, was elected Chairman. An Indian Maoist and a white American Trotskyite (both women) were elected Joint Secretaries. At CARD's first national convention I was elected Vice-Chairman. With David, I was a member of the National Council of the British Overseas Socialist Fellowship (Our Chairman was Fenner Brockway).

A decade of political activism was exhilarating. But I could not keep it up for much longer for a number of reasons. There were too many problems, some of them personal. So far we had managed on a small income that my wife had from Tanzania. But that

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could not go on. I needed a job, an academic job, simply to live. I had also to think of making the best use of my time. Our political activities had turned into full time welfare work for immigrants. One would get telephone calls from Indian and Pakistanis friends whenever there was a problem, usually at the airport. One had to intervene. It was more than I could cope with. I could not go on like that. I decided to leave political activism and turn to full time academic work. So in 1966 1 joined the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Sussex.

FARMING IN TANZANIA

I had come to London from Tanzania. I had gone there after resigning from the State Bank of Pakistan. I decided to take to farming ! There was an element of romantic escapism in that. Both my wife and I took it seriously. We spent a several months, at first, on a derelict farm in the Usumbara Mountains. We lived amongst local peasants (so-called 'tribal' people) which was great. But we did not seem to get anywhere when it came to farming. Realizing that it would take an expert to rehabilitate a derelict farm, I took a job on a modern farm near Arusha to learn how to farm. Unfortunately, while I was there I became ill with some peculiar kind of infection and was taken to Tanga where I was operated, unnecessarily as I was later told, by a drunken white surgeon (a character straight out of Hemingway !), After several weeks when my wound from the operation wound not heal, I was advised by a doctor to go to London and to get myself sorted out. I needed two operations and several weeks at the University College Hospital in London to put me together again. That was a time for reflection, which brought me back into the real world. We decided to stay in London. I would find my way into the academic world. But I was full of deep concern about what had happened to Pakistan. I was drawn instead into political activism, of which I have given an account above. I had gone to Tanzania having resigned from the State Bank of Pakistan. So let me say something about that, my first career.

MY FIRST CAREER: STATE BANK OFFICIAL

I had joined the Reserve Bank of India in 1945 as a Research Officer on the recommendation of, indeed at the behest of my supervisor for Ph.D. at the Gokhale Institute at Poona. Prof. D. R. Gadgil had been asked by the Reserve Bank to recommend candidates for their research department. He asked me if I wanted the job. When I told him that my aim in life was to make a career in the academic world he said: 'Young man, you had better learn something about life before you start teaching'. He pointed out that my starting salary in the Reserve Bank would be far higher than that of a University Lecturer. 'You can come back to the academic world at any time on your own terms'. So I joined the Reserve Bank of India in 1945.

When the Partition was announced Governor Deshmukh called me and pointed out that too few Muslims officers had opted for Pakistan, The State Bank of Pakistan would have great problems without trained officers. It is interesting that a Maharashtrian Brahmin was so concerned whether the State Bank of Pakistan would be able to function properly or not. Why should he care? He pointed out that research was a luxury. The State Bank of

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Pakistan would need people who could do practical jobs. He suggested that I should get some training. So I was put on a program of intensive training in the Exchange Control Department.

With the Partition I came home to Karachi. Technically we were to remain under the Reserve Bank of India until July when the State Bank would take over. But as soon as I found myself in a position to do so, in March 1948, I decided to take over, de facto and set up a headquarters for Exchange Control at Karachi which would give us time to build up our Organization well before the D-Day.

Everything was in a state of chaos. We moved from crisis to crisis. Part of the problem was the clerical mentality of many of our senior colleagues (though with one or two brilliant exceptions-- without them we would have been doomed). Most of the senior officers were twice my age. Their style of work and thinking had been shaped by long experience of serving virtually as clerks under White masters. The first concern of these glorified clerks was personal survival. As long as they acted in accordance with their precious manuals no one could hang them. They were petty bureaucrats and lacked the imagination to see what was at stake. They blocked innovation at every stage, which took up a lot of our energy when we tried to get things done. They had neither the will nor the ability to take responsibility. Mercifully, there were one or two brilliant exceptions to them. Thanks to them we survived.

I flourished in that climate of successive crises. Looking back I realize that I had two assets. One was my ignorance. It was a blessing in disguise that I did not know the manuals backwards as my senior colleagues did. Those manuals were, in any case, out of date and had little relevance to our conditions. I realized that given our situation we will have to write our own manuals. I actually did just that in 1950 when I compiled the Exchange Control Manual for the guidance of Banks. Some of us were able to see things from a fresh perspective. Every time that a problem landed on my desk, I would work out a logical solution from first principles and act on it. We were constantly innovating and improving on old, out of date, systems.

The exchange control system was set up in India in 1939 by a man called Cayley, a true colonialist. The system that he built up discriminated blatantly against Indian interests. Cayley had groomed his successor, a Parsee called Jeejeebhai who carried on in the same way. In Pakistan I realized that we would have to change Cayley's system radically, to end discrimination against our own banks and our own people. I had a great time discovering these and making changes. I was able to act with confidence as I enjoyed the full backing of our Ministry of Finance. I had great fun in a game of one-upmanship with Jeejeebhai, for technically I was still under him until July 1948. But I set up our own de facto independent Head Office, in advance of the formal change. Jack Kennan who soon joined us as my boss, backed what I was doing. We went in for innovations that the Reserve Bank of India would, belatedly, copy.

My other asset was sheer naivete. Unlike my petty bureaucratic colleagues, I assumed that my job was to get things done. I had not yet absorbed the bureaucratic ethos of first

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worrying about saving my skin and not acting unless I was covered by rules or sanction from a higher authority. Time was always of the essence. Once I had worked out what needed to be done I would go ahead and do it. I did not particularly worry about 'covering myself' by referring the matter to my superiors. In the situation in which we were at the time of Partition, we could not have survived otherwise. I soon acquired a reputation of being a 'trouble-shooter', a man to cope with crises. I had the confidence and backing of Governor Zahid Hussain and the Ministry of Finance. I could not have carried on like that without that backing. I rose rapidly in the Bank's hierarchy.

By 1952 1 was appointed to the rather senior position of Secretary to the Central Board, i.e. one of five 'Principal Officers' of the Bank, who ranked after the governor and Deputy Governor. The job of Secretary to the Central Board, in those days, involved a lot more than what its name suggests and the work was too much for one person. The post was later bifurcated into two Executive Directorships. The name of Jamil Nishtar, who was one of them, will be familiar to Pakistanis. His was a political appointment. The other Executive Director, Naziruddin Mahmood, was a seasoned and competent banker.

RESIGNATION FROM THE BANK

Political pressures, especially from ministers to get things done for their friends, had always been a problem. I was able to resist them thanks to my boss, a remarkable Englishman named Jack Kennan, who took over as the Controller of Foreign Exchange. He was from the Lloyds Bank in London. I shared an office with him and learnt a lot from him. He was professionally very competent. Moreover, unlike Cayley, he was always prepared to consider what was in Pakistan's best interest rather than that of British Banks or companies. Equally important, he made it clear from the outset, to senior bureaucrats and Ministers, that no favors would be done to anyone. After an unsuccessful attempt or two, Ministers gave up trying to push him around. This was a man I could shelter behind. When Kennan left at the end of his contract, I lost my shield. I had also moved up to more responsible positions and there was no one behind whom I could now shelter. It was not easy.

The situation became quite intolerable for me after I was sent to Dacca in 1951-52, with full powers in East Pakistan. I was based in Dacca but was also responsible for our other office at Chittagong where I would spend one week in every month. I was posted to Dacca on a few hours' notice. After we concluded an agreement with India in 1951, we had to introduce exchange control with India. This raised new and difficult problems and fears. East Pakistan had a very large informal trade with India, in fish and firewood, chicken and eggs, which was handled by enormous numbers of very small people and carried by country craft. The Government was afraid that any ham-fisted bureaucratic interference with that trade could create incalculable and terrible political repercussions. They needed someone who could be relied upon to take quick and sensible decisions on the spot and treat the small fishermen and farmers with understanding,

I had played a role in the negotiations with India. Immediately when they were concluded I had to prepare instructions for the Banks (for which I had contingency drafts already). It

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was a Sunday morning. Governor Zahid Hussain summoned me to his office. Mumtaz Hussain, Joint Secretary Finance, who was responsible for State Bank affairs in the Ministry, was with him. I told them that the circulars were ready and were being printed. The Banks would have them on Monday morning. Everything was under control. Zahid Hussain then told me that in that case I should catch the afternoon plane to Dacca and take up overall charge in East Pakistan. I was sent to Dacca at a few hours' notice. Zahid Hussain and Mumtaz Hussain told me about their worries about East Pakistan, of which I was already aware. Zahid Hussain gave me my marching orders saying that I would have complete responsibility and full powers in East Pakistan. It will be entirely up to you, he said. Mumtaz Hussain was more emphatic. 'Do what you think best. For God's sake do not refer anything to Karachi'. They knew that references to Karachi would mean delay and possibly trouble. It was a heavy burden of power for me to carry. After all I was as yet only in my late twenties, even if only just.

No one had gone before to East Pakistan with such a carte blanche. It was to be expected that I would become the focus of attention. There were many interests who would want to exploit me. I would be courted and flattered. I had to be on my guard. Predictably, soon after I landed In Dacca, Ghulam Faruq, Chairman of the Jute Board, accompanied with his close friend Mirza Ahmad Ispahani (who controlled 30% of the Jute trade) called on me at my office to welcome me to East Pakistan. At first they indulged in predictable flattery. Ghulam Faruq was a powerful member of the bureaucracy, an old ICS man who later became a multi-millionaire industrialist ! As Chairman of the Jute Board, he said to me rather patronizingly: 'Young man, I am sure you know nothing about jute. Look at me. I am a seasoned old official. I have spent my entire career in Bengal. I still do not know anything about jute. Luckily we have amongst us Mr. Ispahani who knows everything there is to know about jute. Jute is in his blood. When I have any problem I consult him. It would be wise for you to do the same'. Ispahani wanted to have the State Bank in his hands, just as he had all other relevant departments of government under his thumb. It was the beginning of a long struggle.

I was soon fighting a quixotic battle against two of the most powerful men in East Pakistan. It is a long story. I survived more by good luck than good sense. I seemed to win every round in our extra-ordinary contest. But it was a very tense period for me. I knew that if I made just one slip, they would have me hanged. Fortunately I had the backing of Governor Zahid Hussain though I do not think he knew just how the cards were stacked. It was all very stressful. For the first time I wondered about resigning from the Bank. My wife in fact suggested it. Not unreasonably she had long complained that I was 'married to the Bank'. Was this all worth it, she asked. While I was still thinking about resigning, I was appointed to the post of Secretary to the Central Board at Karachi, one of five 'Principal Officers'. of the Bank. It was sheer vanity that made me set aside thoughts of resigning. I wanted to hold that post, at least for a while. The promotion had come rather soon, though I was next in line for it. I half suspect that it was manipulated by powerful men to get me out of East Pakistan. I would not put it past them.

My health was deteriorating from overwork. In May 1953 1 was finally allowed to go on leave. We went to Tanzania to spend time with my wife's family. It was there that,

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looking at everything in perspective and encouraged by my wife's brother who was like a father to her, I finally decided to resign from the State Bank. The Bank was astounded by my resignation, for I had given no inkling of it and there was no immediate reason for it. Except perhaps for Governor Zahid Hussain. He had an almost fatherly affection for me. During our travels together we had opportunities to talk freely and from the heart. He knew that I had hankered after an academic life though he never thought that it was anymore a serious option for me. When I resigned he wrote to me a personal letter in which he said: 'I knew that you had inclinations for an academic career but I had formed the impression that having cast your lot in the Bank you did not feel that you could turn back and do something else. As you know I had the greatest regard for you and every confidence that you were destined for a big career in the Bank. You had in fact already reached a senior position in its service and with a large number of years before you, there was indeed no place beyond your reach.' However, Zahid Hussain seemed to have accepted the fact that my decision was final for he added that: 'It has been my innermost wish to do something in the educational field. ... When I do so I shall look forward to association with you which I will value'. Zahid Hussain was a passionate nationalist and could be regarded as an advance representative of Pakistan's nascent bourgeoisie. He was against an unconditional red carpet given to foreign capital and equally he was committed to land reforms. Later when we met In London in 1956 he spoke to me of his plan to set up a research Institute and three associated weekly journals modeled on the London Economist, published simultaneously in English, Urdu and Bengali which, he hoped, would generate in the country an understanding of our problems and generate support for independent national development. He said that he had already secured the needed financial backing for the project. He believed that it would lift political debate in the country to a new and higher level. Sadly he died of heart failure within days of our meeting, during his flight back to Pakistan.

It was the Deputy Governor, however, who was in charge of the Establishment and had to deal with my resignation. He thought differently. He and the Central Board could not understand why I had decided to throw away my exceptional career. Given our careerist values, my decision did not seem to him to be rational, I suspect that the only explanation of my insane action that he could think of was that I had suffered some kind of a breakdown. After all I had worked under unrelenting pressure for 5 years without respite. He therefor got the Central Board to offer me, exceptionally, 9 months leave with full pay. He wrote to me: 'This is not the time to make plans for the future. You have been working very hard and under great pressure. Now is the time to rest a bit. 'You and your wife, have a good time and recover your health. There will be plenty of time to take big decisions after that.' He asked me not to decide about my future until the end of my leave. I was free to return or not to - there were no strings attached. It seems that they were sure that I was bound to go back to the Bank, once I had got back to my senses. No one who was already at the peak of his career at a young age, would do otherwise.

Knowing that I had no wish to return, I felt that it would be unethical just to draw salary for the extra leave. So I wrote to the Bank telling them that as my decision was already final I would not take advantage of their generosity. So ended my first career.

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EDUCATION

School education: My grandfather, a businessman, was a dedicated educationalist. When he died the daily Dawn published a long obituary notice, describing him as 'Sir Syed Ahmad Khan of Sindh'. He was an old Khilafatist who knew and greatly admired Dr. Ansari. He was committed to the education of the urban poor. He wanted his grandson to understand the way in which the urban poor live. I was sent to Municipal Primary Schools in Soldier Bazaar and (for some time) Khadda, where my class mates came from slum areas. It was good social education for a middle class boy. After that in the Karachi Academy High School I was put in the B stream where the bulk of the students again came from very poor backgrounds. I developed a social conscience and became a socialist before I ever heard the word.

University: D.J. Sindh College, Karachi then Wadia College, Poona (B.A., Bombay University), Aligarh Muslim University (M.A.). Then, finally, the Gokhale Institute at Poona for Ph.D. At the Gokhale Institute I worked under Prof. D. R. Gadgil on whose suggestion (at whose behest I should rather say) I joined the Reserve Bank of India, Central Office, at Bombay as Research Officer.

BOOKS AND PUBLICATIONS

Books Edited

South Asia - Sociology of Developing Societies (with John Harriss), Macmillan Press London Monthly Review Press New York, 1989

State and Ideology in the Middle East and Pakistan , (With Fred Halliday) Macmillan Press, London /Monthly Review Press, New York, 1988

Capitalism and Colonial Production (with Doug McEachem et. al.) Croom Helm, London 1983

Introduction to Sociology of the 'Developing Societies' (with Teodor Shanin) Macmillan Press, London/ Monthly Review Press, New York, 1982

Rural Development in Bangladesh and Pakistan (with R. Stevens and P. Bertocci) University of Hawaii Press, Honolulu, 1976

Sections of Books

1. 'The Two Biraderis- Kinship in Rural West Punjab' In T. N. Madan (ed) Muslim Communities of South Asia, (second enlarged edition), New Delhi, 1995

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2. 'The Origin and Significance of the Pak-US Military Alliance' In Satish Kumar (ed) Indian foreign Policy, 1990-91, New Delhi, 1991

3. 'Pakistani Women In a Changing Society' In Hastings Donnan & Pnina Werbner (eds), Economy and Culture in Pakistan, London 1991.

4. 'Authoritarianism and Legitimation of State Power In Pakistan' In Subrata Mitra (ed) The Post-Colonial State in South Asia, (London and New York) 1990

5. 'Formation of the Social Structure of South Asia Under the Impact of Colonialism' in Alavi & Harriss, Sociology of Developing Societies: South Asia, 1989

6. 'Politics of Ethnicity in India and Pakistan' in Alavi & Harriss, Sociology of Developing Societies: South Asia 1989

7. 'Introduction' to Karl Kautsky, The Agrarian Question with Teodor Shanin , Zwan Publications, London & Winchester Mass, 1988

8. 'Capitalism and the Peasantry' in Teodor Shanin (ed) Peasants and Peasant Societies revised edition, Blackwells, Oxford, 1987

9. 'Pakistan and Islam: Ethnicity and Ideology' in Alavi & Halliday (eds) State and Ideology in the Middle East, 1988

10. 'Ethnicity, Muslim Society and Pakistan Ideology' in Anita Weiss (ed) Islamic Reassertion in Pakistan' Syracuse University Press, Syracuse NY 1986

11. The Social origins of Pakistan and Islamic Ideology' in Kalim Bahadur (ed) South Asia in Transition, Patriot Publishers New Delhi, 1986

12. 'India: Transition from Feudalism to Colonial Capitalism' in Alavi et al Capitalism and Colonial Production

13. 'State and Class in Pakistan' in Hassan Gardezi & Jamil Rashid (eds) Pakistan: The Roots of Dictatorship, ZED Press, London 1963

14. 'Colonial and Post-Colonial Societies' 'Populism' 'Marxism and the Third World' in T.B. Bottomore et al (eds) A Dictionary of Marxist Thought Oxford, 1983

15. 'State and Class under Peripheral Capitalism' in Alavi & Shanin (eds), Introduction to Sociology of the 'Developing Societies'

16. 'The Structure of Peripheral Capitalism' in Alavi & Shanin (Des), Introduction to Sociology of the 'Developing' Societies'

17. 'Die Koloniale Transformation in Indien: Ruckschritt Vom Feudalismus Zum Kapitalismus' in Jan-Jeeren Grevemayer (ed) Traditionale Gessellschaften und Europaischer Kolonialismus, Frankfurt 1981

18. 'Indien und Die Koloniale Produktionweisse' in Dieter Senghaas (ed) Kapitalistiche Weltekonomie - Kontroversen uber ihre Ursprung und ihre Entwicklungsdynamik, Frankfurt 1979

19. 'The State In Post-Colonial Societies' in Harry Goulbourne (ed) Politics and the State in the Third World, Macmillan, London 1979

20. 'Kinship in West Punjab Villages' in T.N. Madan (ed) Muslim Societies in South Asia, Vikas Publications, New Delhi 1978

21. 'The Rural Elite and Agricultural Development in Pakistan' in Hamza Alavi, R. Stevens & Peter Bertocci (eds) Rural Development in Bangladesh and Pakistan, University of Hawaii Press, Hawaii, 1976

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22. 'Armee et Bureaucratie Dans la Politique du Pakistan', in A. Abdel Malek (ed) L'Armee Dans La Nation SNED Alger, 1975

23. 'Pakistan' ,In Encyclopedia Britannica, 15th Edition 1974 24. 'Peasants and Revolution' in Joseph Lopreato & L.S. Lewis (eds) Social

Stratification: A Reader, Harper & Row, New York, 1974 25. 'The State in Post-Colonial Societies' In Kathleen Gough & H. Sharma (eds),

Imperialism and Revolution in South Asia, New York 1973 26. 'Peasants and Revolution' in Kathleen Gough & Hari Sharma (eds) Imperialism

and Revolution in South Asia, New York, 1973 27. 'Peasent and Revolution' in A.R. Desai (ed) Rural Sociology in India, 1969

Articles in Journals

1. 'Politics of Ethnicity in Pakistan', Pakistan Progressive, Vol 9 No 1, Summer 1987

2. Material Foundations of Communalism in India' in Pakistan Progressive, vol 9 Nos. 2 &3 Fall 1988

3. Pakistan: Women in a Changing Society' in Economic and Political Weekly, June 25 1988, reprinted in Viewpoint Lahore November 1988

4. 'Structure of Colonial Social Formations' in Economic -and Political Weekly Vol XVI Nos 10-12, ANNUAL NUMBER 1981

5. 'India: Transition from Feudalism to Colonial Capitalism' in Journal of Contemporary Asia Vol 10, No 4, 1980

6. 'India and the Colonial Mode of Production' in o i. Economic and Political Weekly Special Number, August 1975 o ii. Socialist Register 1975, R. Miliband & J. Saville (eds) London 1975

7. 'Rural Bases of Power in South Asia' In Journal of Contemporary Asia Vol 4 No 4, 1974

8. 'Peasant Classes and Primordial Loyalties' In Journal of Peasant Studies Vol 1 No 1 Oct 1973 ( also published as a book in Spanish)

9. 'Elite Farmer Strategy and Regional Disparities in Pakistan' In o i. Pakistan Economist, Feb 1973, o ii. Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. VIII No 13, March 1973

10. 'The State in Post-Colonial Societies' in New Left Review No 74, 1972 11. ''L'Etat Dans les Societes Post-Coloniales'' in Les Temps Modernes, 1972 12. 'Lo Stato Nele Societa Post-Coloniali', Problema del Socialism, 1972 13. 'Kinship In West Punjab Villages' in Contributions to Indian Sociology, NS VI,

1972 14. 'Bangladesh and the Crisis of Pakistan' in

o i. Journal of Contemporary Asia, Vol I No 3, 1971 o ii. Socialist Register 1971, R. Miliband & J. Saville (eds)

15. 'Politics of Dependence - A Village in West Punjab' in South Asian Review, Vol 4 No 2, Jan 1971

16. 'Constitutional Changes and Dynamics of Political Development in Pakistan' in Collected Papers on Post-Independence Constitutional Changes, Institute of Commonwealth Studies, London 1969

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17. 'The Structure of the Agrarian Economy in West Pakistan and Development Strategy' in Pakistan Administrative Staff College Quarterly, 1968

18. 'Army and Bureaucracy in Pakistan' In o i. International Socialist Journal, Vol 3, No 14, 1966 o ii. Revue Internationale du Socialisme, April 1966

19. 'Peasants and Revolution' in o i. Socialist Register 1965, R. Millband & J. Saville (Des) o ii. French: Les temps Modernes, No 306, Jan 1972 (Paysans et

Revolution) o iii. German: 'Theorie der Bauern-revolution, by Plakat Bauernverlag o iv. Spanish: Three translations from Argentina, Columbia and Mexico o v. Arabic and Persian translations. o vi. Book form, published by Radical Education Project, Ann Arbor, Mich.

20. 'Imperialism Old and New' in o i. Socialist Register 1964, R. Miliband & J. Saville (eds) o ii. 'La Nouvel Imperialisme' in Les Temps Modernes 219-220, 1964 o iii. Critica Marxista, No 2, 1965 ( Italian ) o iv. translations in Japanese, Spanish, Portuguese, Arabic and Hebrew.

21. 'Pakistan: The Burden of U.S. Aid' in o New University Thought, Chicago, Autumn 1962 o Pakistan Today, Autumn 1961 o iii. published as a book by j4ew England Free Press, Boston, Mass. o iv. published as a book by Syed and Syed Publishers, Karachi 1965 o v. reprinted in R.I. Rhodes (ed) Imperialism and Underdevelopment 1970

22. 'Race Relations in Britain' in Afro-Asian and World Affairs, 1966 23. 'Pakistanis in Britain' in Sheila Patterson (ed) Immigrants in London 24. 'The Rise of Prejudice', Plebs, Special Issue on Immigration, Dec 1965 25. 'Nationhood and Communal violence in Pakistan' In Journal of Contemporary

Asia, Vol 21, No. 2, 1991.

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The Rise of Religious Fundamentalism in Pakistan

by

Hamza Alavi

Religious fundamentalism has become a powerful and dangerous force in Pakistan, due mainly to the opportunism of successive political leadership that has pandered to it. Militant sectarian religious groups and parties, led by half-educated and bigoted mullahs, many of them armed to the teeth, are holding our civil society and the state to ransom. They threaten the very fabric of Pakistan society.

Threats of disruption from religious parties have escalated in recent decades. They have steadily grown in strength since the time of General Zia. They now claim that they are the true custodians of Pakistan and that it was they, the mullahs, who had fought successfully for Pakistan, to establish a theocratic state for Muslims. Facts contradict such claims. With the exception of Ghulam Ahmad Parvez’s pro-Pakistan Tulu-i-Islam, group, all religious groups and parties, including the Jamiat-i-Ulama-i-Hind, the Majli-i-Ahrar and the Jamaat-i-Islami, had all bitterly opposed the Pakistan Movement and abused its leadership which was secular.

The Muslim League, the Party that led the Pakistan movement, was a party of modern educated Muslim professionals and government job seekers (whom, for the sake of brevity, we may call the ‘salariat’). It had little to do with the outlook of bigoted mullahs. It was free of any millenarian ideological pretences about creating an Islamic state. It was a movement of Muslims rather than a movement of Islam. Behind it was a new class of English educated Muslim professionals and government job seekers that came into being in the 19th century. It got organised politically by the turn of the century, seeking a better deal for themselves vis-à-vis Hindus who were advancing relatively more rapidly in these fields.

When the Muslim League was founded in 1906 at a meeting convened by Nawab Salimullah at Dhaka, the new party was immediately hi-jacked by the Aligarh group led by Nawab Viqar ul-Mulk. Aligarh was at the vanguard of the new Northern Indian Muslim salariat class, the sons of the Muslim Ashraf, who were deeply conscious of the loss of their privileges with the advent of British rule and the relatively more rapid rise of Hindu educated classes. The main base of the Muslim salariat was in UP and Bihar for, at that time, its was relatively weaker in the Muslim majority provinces.

The Muslim League was focused entirely on its secular demands of western educated Muslim professionals and the salariat. Attempts to place the issue of Islamic ideology on the agenda of the Muslim League were both rare and invariably unsuccessful. Arguably,

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the earliest of such attempts was one by Shibli Numani to Islamise the Aligarh syllabus. Shibli was explicitly committed to theocratic values and wanted to shift the emphasis of the Aligarh syllabus away from English and modern sciences, towards Islamic learning and the Arabic language. The response of the Muslim salariat class to that attempt is exemplified by the remarks of Sir Raza Ali, who was a close collaborator of Sir Syed’s immediate successors, Muhsin ul-Mulk and Viqar ul-Mulk. With them, Raza Ali was at the centre of the Aligarh establishment. In an article in the daily Statesman opposing Shibli’s move, he remarked that the idea of reviving Arabic knowledge was, of course, beguiling for Muslims. But he warned that they should not ignore the demands of our times, for the most urgent need of Indian Muslims was to be offered education that would be beneficial in the affairs of this world; education that would help their coming generations to earn their livelihood. Sir Raza Ali spelt out the principal concern of the educated Muslim middle class at the time. Their concern was not about a hypothetical return to original Islam and the creation of an ‘Islamic State’, ruled over by mullahs, that Shibli had dreamt about. Shibli had to leave Aligarh, for it was not the place where his theocratic ideas could flourish.

Among the rare attempts to bring the issue of ‘Islamic Ideology’ on to the agenda of the Muslim League was one that was planned for the Delhi Session of the AIML in April 1943. One Abdul Hameed Kazi (backed by ‘Maulana’ Abdul Sattar Niazi) canvassed support for a resolution, which he intended to table. That would commit the Muslim League to an Islamic ideology and the creation of an Islamic state. But pressure from everyone around him forced Kazi to abandon the idea. The resolution was not even moved. The Pakistan movement remained firmly committed to its secular concerns.

In his keynote speech before the inaugural meeting of Pakistan’s new Constituent Assembly, on 11th August 1947, Mr. Jinnah spelt out the Pakistan Ideology, namely the secular and tolerant vision of the new state. That speech was not a sudden aberration, as some Islamic ideologists, and General Zia’s hacks, were later to allege. It was consistent with what Mr. Jinnah had been saying for decades. The Muslim League had always been committed to a secular society.

Following Mr. Jinnah, his political successor, Liaquat Ali Khan, too reiterated the Muslim League’s secular values. When Liaquat moved the Objectives Resolution in the Constituent Assembly in March 1949 he declared that ‘As I have just said, the people are the real recipients of power. This naturally eliminates any danger of the establishment of a theocracy.’ Despite that clear statement by the mover of the Objectives Resolution, later religious ideologues, notably General Zia and his hacks, have claimed that the Objectives Resolution was a charter for the imposition of the ‘Sharia’ (as they would interpret it) although the word Sharia does not occur anywhere in that Resolution. Their argument is based on some conventional generalities in the Resolution, which said that ‘Muslims shall be enabled to order their lives, in the individual and collective spheres, in accord with the teachings and requirements of Islam as set out in the Holy Quran and the Sunna’. That, did not amount to a charter for the creation of a theocratic, ‘Islamic’ State.

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Liaquat’s position on the Muslim League’s traditional secularism was, however, soon to be reversed. Not so very long after the Objectives Resolution was passed, Liaquat began to change his tune for his political base was threatened by of splits in the Muslim League in the Punjab, which was the power-base of Pakistan’s ruling elite. That was due to factional conflict between Daulatana and Mamdot who left the Muslim League to form a rival Party. Liaquat was now in a panic. He decided to exploit Islamic rhetoric, to hold together his crumbling Party. He began to speak of ‘Islam in Danger’. He also began to equate loyalty to the Muslim League with loyalty to the state. Those who opposed him or his party were denounced as traitors.

There was, however, a second and a much more important reason why Liaquat decided to abandon his secular stance. Powerful regional movements had arisen in East Bengal, Sindh, Baluchistan and the NWFP, whose people felt that they were not being given their due in a Punjabi dominated Pakistan. They demanded regional autonomy and fairer shares of resources. The Centre, which was seen as ‘Punjabi’, was in fact dominated by a cohesive bureaucracy, under Chaudhri Muhammad Ali as Secretary General to the Government. It was the centralised bureaucracy that ruled Pakistan whilst politicians, including Liaquat, went through the motions.

Arguably, it was the challenge to the centre from regional movements which was the more important factor in precipitating Liaquat’s ideological volte-face. Abandoning Mr. Jinnah’s (and his own) firm stand against pandering to the mullahs, Liaquat sought to negate regional demands by issuing calls for ‘unity’ in the name of Pakistan and Islam. We were all Pakistanis and Muslims, it was now argued, and therefore we could not be Bengalis or Sindhis or Baluch.

The bureaucracy, rather than Liaquat, was in effective control, and it was not prepared to make any significant concessions to the mullahs. The mullahs could be given a visible public role, but without any real share in power. For that purpose a Board of Talimaat-i-Islamia, was set up. It provided a few jobs for some senior mullahs, the Ulama. But the Board was to be no more than a façade for the new found religious rhetoric of politicians. It was not to have any real powers. Its function was purely advisory and that too only on matters that were referred to it. When the Board did make some suggestions they were unceremoniously ignored. Nevertheless, the Ulama seemed to be content with the arrangement. They remained quiescent for nearly two decades. Recalcitrant Mullahs, such as Maulana Maududi, found themselves in jail. The mullahs were under control.

That basically peaceful scene was disturbed only temporarily in 1953, when Islamic militants launched Anti-Ahmadi riots in the Punjab an d Martial Law was proclaimed. Although religious zealots of the Majlis-i-Ahrar and the Jamaat-i-Islami led the riots, they were in fact being used by cynical political forces, led by Punjab Chief Minister Mumtaz Daulatana. That was done in the context of US attempts to destabilise the Nazimuddin Government at the centre and to counter the Bengal group of MPs in the matter of the proposed Pakistan-US military Alliance which they opposed. That is a long and complicated story.

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A decade and a half later, religious rhetoric was indulged in by the illegitimate regime of General Yahya Khan, but without conceding any formal role to the mullahs. General Sher Ali, redefined ‘Pakistan Ideology’ as ‘Islamic Ideology’. The Yahya government’s primary concern was to de-legitimise the increasingly powerful Bengali nationalism. Yahya’s Bengali adviser, Prof. G. W. Choudhury, had persuaded him and his coterie of Generals, that East Bengali nationalism was limited to only a handful of intellectuals, who were in the pay of the Indians and that the vast majority of Bengalis had no sympathy with them. That tragically false picture could account for the ferocity and reckless manner in which Yahya tried to suppress the Bengali people in 1971. Would they have embarked on that policy if Yahya had even the slightest inkling of the depth of Bengali feelings ?

The mullahs were quiescent, however, until they were stirred into action by the foolish populist rhetoric of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto who misguidedly decided to exploit religious ideology. Thereby Bhutto sowed the seeds of his own destruction, for the re-activated mullahs became the vanguard of the campaign against him. That set the scene for Gen. Zia’s coup d’etat.

It was under General Zia that narrow and bigoted religiosity became state policy. The General sought the political support of the mullahs for his illegal regime, for he had no other political base. He also sought financial support from the Reagan regime in the US. Both of these objectives, he thought, could be secured through an Islamic Jihad which he proclaimed against the Soviet presence in Afghanistan. The CIA joined took over the task of organising armed religious groups in Afghanistan, in cooperation with Pakistani agencies. When the Russians left Afghanistan, however, the CIA was withdrawn precipitately from the scene, leaving it to Pakistan to deal with the mess that they had created. Foolish Pakistani policies since then, especially under Benazir Bhutto and her successor Nawaz Sharif, got Pakistan even more heavily involved with these once US sponsored ‘terrorist groups’. The present government has done little to turn away from these policies to extricate Pakistan from the mess that was inherited from Zia’s Afghan policy.

When he seized power illegally, Zia badly needed some source of legitimacy for his regime. Being politically bankrupt, he decided to exploit the credulity of Pakistani Muslims by invoking Allah. He claimed to have experienced ilham (a divine revelation) in which, he declared, he was enjoined by the Almighty himself to Islamise Pakistan and to transform it into a fortress of Islam. New ‘Islamic Laws’ were promulgated that were crude and cruel distortions of Islamic teachings, such as his Hudud Ordinance which, for example, had the effect of punishing a rape victim (for fornication) while the perpetrator of the rape went scot-free because of impossible conditions of proof now needed to prove his guilt!

Zia also bequeathed to his successors undemocratic Shariat Courts, that are answerable to no one. They issue binding decisions on the state and on the people, in the name of the Sharia. That role, in the name of Islam, is rejected by the philosophy of Sir Syed Ahmad who pointed out that Islam did not decree the office of a Pope with powers to issue

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binding decrees in the name of the faith. Islam, he said, is a religion of the individual conscience. No person or institution has the right to issue binding fatawa, laying down what Islam is and what it is not. Indeed, no other Muslim country has the equivalent of our Shariat Courts. They were set up by Zia’s illegitimate regime and should be dissolved.

The Shariat Courts are manned by persons who hold rigid religious views. Their most damaging decision so far is an order that requires the abolition of interest, ‘in all its forms’, by 30th June, 2001. This threatens to bring Pakistan’s already very shaky economy to a complete halt. No enemy of Pakistan could have devised a more potent weapon to destroy the country. In arriving at their decision the judges of the Shariat Bench of the Supreme Court set aside the advice of a very large number of scholars who came before it as witnesses, who resisted this interpretation of the Sharia. Instead, the Court appears to have been misled by bogus claims of ‘Islamic Banking’. They seem to be ignorant of how a modern economy functions and do not seem to have understood at all the obvious implications of their decision in a modern day capitalist economy such as that of Pakistan. They appear to be ignorant of the difference between interest in a modern capitalist economy (sood) and usury (riba) in pre-capitalist economies to which Quranic strictures apply. What the Shariat Courts have produced is a time bomb which, if allowed to go off, threatens to blow up Pakistan’s economy.

The present Government seems to be paralysed in the face of the die hard religious lobby which seems to be triumphant about this. It has poor advisers. As soon as the Shariat Appellate Bench of the Supreme Court announced it decision, the minister of Finance, who is an ex-banker declared, without pausing to think, that the Court’s decision would be implemented in full. But, after months of deliberations by several high powered committees, the Government still has no idea whatever of what is to be done. It speaks with two voices. At a recent meeting, the Federal Minister for Religious Affairs declared that the Government has drafted all required laws and regulations, which are ready to be promulgated and that the Government is ready to implement the Shariat Court’s decision in full, and without qualifications. But at the same meeting, the Governor of the State Bank of Pakistan (the country’s central Bank) declared that they do not as yet know how the Shariat Court decision can be implemented. He said that the Government needs more time to work out viable solutions and that it has asked for an extension of time.

The Government does not seem to understand the gravity of this issue. They should know that they cannot allow the economy to collapse. But they also appear to be too intimidated by religious fundamentalists to overturn the Shariat Court’s decree. Meanwhile, the top nine religious parties in the country have declared that they will launch a mass anti-Riba movement, on the lines of the movement that brought down Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, if the Government fails to abolish interest by the date laid down by the Shariat Bench of the Supreme Court, namely the end of June, 2001. They have declared, ominously, that the time has come for a decisive war between Islamic and secular forces in the country !

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A major factor in the present situation is a development since the time of Zia. That is the proliferation of deeni madaris, religious schools, that have spread throughout Pakistan. They receive generous foreign funding, not least from Middle Eastern states like Saudi Arabia. The deeni madaris have little difficulty in recruiting pupils (taliban), who are turned into fanatics, ready to die for what they are taught to believe are sacred causes. A factor that has greatly helped their recruitment is the creation of a huge number of unemployed families, people without a livelihood and without hope, as a consequence of farm mechanisation, especially in the Punjab. Every tractor displaces at least a dozen families of sharecroppers. Hundreds of thousands of them are now without a source of livelihood. In that context, the appearance of the well financed deeni madaris, who take over their children, give them free ‘tuition’, accommodation and food, cannot appear to be anything other than a great blessing. The enthusiastic young taliban, are taught to recite the Quran. They are also indoctrinated, their minds filled with distorted and intolerant ideas about what Islam is and what it prescribes. The taliban are thus turned into fanatics. Most of the ‘deeni’ madaris also give them military training for jihad initially ostensibly against the Soviets and now for the liberation of Kashmir. But already Pakistan itself is experiencing the inevitable heavy fall out from this. The armed groups, many of them with battle-hardened taliban, are in the vanguard of sectarian killings throughout Pakistan, which are on the increase; killings of members of rival sects, Sunnis against the Shi’a, Deobandi Sunnis against Barelvi Sunnis and so on. They have also begun to issue threats against the state itself and the society in Pakistan.

Instead of a viable policy designed to disarm and liquidate such groups, successive regimes in Pakistan have pandered to them. The current military government, unlike the military regime of General Zia, has not indulged much in religious rhetoric, except for the occasional utterances of its Federal Minister for Religious Affairs. Indeed, the Government’s liberal interior minister, General Moinuddin Haider, has given calls, from time to time, about doing something to bring the so-called deeni madaris under some sort of control, reforming their syllabi to introduce some useful, career related, educational input into their activities. For that he has become the bête noir of the religious parties, who have warned the government, firmly, against meddling in their affairs.

The government, for its part, seems to be intimidated by the militant Islamic groups. In December last, for example, one Maulana Muhammad Akram, leader of the Tanzimul Ikhwan, threatened to march on Islamabad with ‘hundreds of thousands’ of his followers, to force the Government to promulgate the Sharia. The Government’s response was to placate him. It despatched the Punjab Home Secretary and the Inspector General of Police to parley with Akram. That was apparently not enough, for it then sent Dr. Mahmood Ghazi, the Federal Minister for Religious Affairs, as reinforcement. After long drawn out talks, Maulana Akram ‘graciously agreed’ to defer his plan to storm the capital. It has been suggested by the media that Maulana Akram has ‘a lot of influence among middle-ranking officers of the army’. If that is so, that must surely be extremely worrying. Could it be that which explains the Government’s apparent paralysis in the face of serious threats from fanatical religious groups? It must know that a do nothing policy will not solve anything. Left to itself, the situation can only get worse.

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Theories of the state, democratic or otherwise, are premised on the state’s monopoly of legitimate force. But here we have a situation where the state’s monopoly of force is undermined by the numerous armed religious groups (who often work in concert) that have agendas of their own. The Government must realise that the more they try to accommodate religious zealots, the stronger and the more intransigent they become. What the situation demands is a firm and well thought out policy to disarm such groups and bring them under control. It is surprising that Pakistan’s professional military does not yet seem to have realised the very serious threat that this situation poses to itself as well as to the State and society as a whole. In the meantime, until something is done, Pakistan will continue to stagger towards an uncertain future, with contradictory state policies.

PAKISTANI WOMEN IN A CHANGING SOCIETYHamza Alavi

The decade of the 1980s has truly been a decade of the women of Pakistan. A powerful women's movement made a dramatic impact on Pakistan's political scene. The concrete achievements of the women's movement in its struggle against policies of General Zia's military regime which were directed against women in the name of Islamisation, have not been inconsiderable. A number of women's organisations in the country came together in this struggle, which included the Women's Action Forum (WAF) which has been the leading and the most effective of these, the Democratic Women's Association, the Sindhiani Tehrik and the Women's Front as well as the All Pakistan Women's Association (APWA) the oldest of these which has been run by wives of senior bureaucrats and politicians and has had a reformist but rather a patronising orientation.

The decade of the 1980s was also a decade of degradation of Pakistani women. The Zia regime, in its search for legitimacy, in the name of Islam, embarked upon a series of measures that were designed to undermine what little existed by way of women's legal rights, educational facilities and career opportunities - as well as the simple right for freedom of movement and protection from molestation by males. That galvanised women of the country into militant action in defence of their rights. The military regime's actions, rhetoric and propaganda created an atmosphere which encouraged bigoted and mischievous individuals to take the 'law' into their own hands and harass women under the pretext of enforcing 'Islamic' norms of dress or, indeed, for simply appearing in public. Such lawlessness was allowed to go on with impunity. Women had to defend themselves not only vis-a-vis the state but also against hostile mischief makers in the society at large. Such attacks still continue. The women have fought back.

These developments must be viewed against the background of quite far-reaching changes in Pakistan society in the four decades since independence, that have affected women's place in it, both in the rural society and the urban It is the latter, the urban society, with which we shall be most concerned here, for this is where the changes challenge most forcefully established social practices and attitudes.

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It must be kept in mind, however, that everywhere, in both the rural as well as the urban society, Pakistan remains a rigidly patriarchal society in which women are treated as chattel, 'given' or 'acquired' through arranged marriages, to spend their lives in the service of a male dominated social system. By and large women are married within biraderis (lineages) and the biraderi organisation provides a framework within which women's lives are ordered. In the case of corporate biraderis the power of the biraderi panchayat (council) derives largely from control over decisions about whom a woman is to marry. It is not only a single patriarch, the head of a nuclear family, but the whole male dominated kinship organisation which has a stake in the subordination of women. (for an account of biraderi organisation cf.Alavi, 1972). No woman, even one with an independent career in a city can set up a home on her own, without the 'saya' (lit: shade or protection) of a male. A divorced woman or a widow must turn to her father or brother, if they will have her. unless she has a grown up son under whose protection she can live. This is a powerful factor of control over women. Furthermore, not altogether infrequently, especially amongst the poorer sections of the society, especially in cities and amongst kammis or 'village servants'. a daughter is 'sold' for money to a prospective husband and likewise, husbands divorce and 'sell' their wives. A woman who is not prepared to accept such a fate has little choice. She is a valued object, a prized chattel.

Demographic statistics provide a measure of the effects of discrimination against women. Pakistan is probably unique in the world in having a lower number of women in its population than men i.e. 906 women for every 1,000 men (Census of Pakistan - 1981) as against a world average of 111 women to every 100 men. In the population segment of 15 to 40 years olds there are 75 per cent more female deaths than male. This is attributed to nutritional anemia that affects most women in the country resulting from discrimination against women in the sharing of food. They are given less and have often to make do with left-overs. Because of the lower resistance of their underfed bodies women are more susceptible to killer diseases; malaria, gastro-enteritis and respiratory diseases, especially tuberculosis. Repeated pregnancies also take a heavy toll by lowering their resistance to disease. In the case of urban lower middle class women their condition is aggravated both physically and psychologically by their incarceration within the four walls of their appallingly confined and insanitary homes. They get little of the sun and fresh air and no recreation at all while their men go about everywhere freely and are not affected therefore quite so much by their poor housing conditions.

When attention is drawn to the subordination and oppression of women in Pakistan and demands made for improvement in their lot, Pakistani ideologues are quick to rebut such charges by painting an idealised picture of the high status of women in Islam. But this is a non sequitur, a specious line of argument that is intended to obscure the real issues, those of the actual conditions to which women in Pakistan are subject. It is against such a background that questions about women in Pakistan society need to be looked at. Changes of a variety of kinds are under way, some improving their condition, others worsening them.

In rural areas, the place of women in society and their role in the division of labour in production differs very widely from region to region and also between different classes.

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And there have been far reaching changes everywhere. To give only two instances, in the Potohar area of North West Punjab, for example. which is a region of fragmented bankrupt farms, massive numbers of men of working age have left the villages for jobs in the army, in factories all over Pakistan and, not least, as migrants, for work in Britain and Western Europe and especially in the Middle East where they are not permitted to bring their families to live with them. This has brought about an extra-ordinary situation in villages of the region, many of which are, as a result, inhabited mainly by old men who are past working age, young children and women. It seems that in these cases women have to carry the main burden of working the land over and above their customary share in the farm economy and their domestic responsibilities.

By contrast, in the rich canal Colony districts of the Punjab. in the wake of the Green Revolution, many women have been withdrawn from the farm economy and confined within purdah. Until these developments in recent decades (with the exception of landlord families) women have always had an active role in agricultural production in weeding, harvesting and threshing of crops, and other operations. It is their duty to cut fodder and to look after farm animals. Accordingly these women enjoy freedom of movement and are not confined behind purdah. A custom that gives them a degree of economic freedom is their exclusive right to pick cotton . This is being undermined by recent changes). For this women are paid in kind. The cotton that they receive in payment is ritually sacrosanct, their privileged property which men cannot lay their hands on. After the cotton harvest it is a common sight to see women walking to town with a bundle of cotton perched on their heads, going shopping, to barter the cotton for something for themselves or, more likely, their children, without having to ask the husband for permission. But after the Green Revolution of the 1970s many well to do peasants, who had prospered, withdrew their womenfolk from the labour force and confined them, to the purdah, secluded and isolated within the four walls of their homes, as a mark of their new higher social status. In the course of research in Punjab villages my wife and I found that far from rejoicing in this partial relief from the burden of work, the women resented this change. Many of them described their new situation to my wife as the equivalent of being locked up in a prison. They had lost the small degree of economic freedom and with it their freedom of movement. When one considers the implications of such a change, one is led to a conceptual distinction between exploitation of a woman's labour and a woman's oppression. While the burden of labour on women has eased, though only slightly, their oppression has increased enormously, a change which the women themselves see as one which has left them feeling greatly deprived.

It is in the urban context that women's contribution to the family economy has changed beyond recognition, as compared to conditions forty years ago. These changes seem to be having a greater impact on lower middle class families than either working class families or upper class ones. A large component of the working class, in Pakistani cities consists of migrant workers from the north of the country whose families have been left behind in their villages. We know too little about the consequences of that fact on the life of single male workers in the city nor about the families left behind in the villages. In the case of workers whose families live with them in the cities, many of the women either do unskilled work in factories or operate in the so-called 'informal economy' or are engaged

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in domestic employment. They often prefer such employment over home-based work, for waged employment pays better. Despite the great increase in their burden of work and their independent contribution to the family budget, judging from evidence brought up in court cases during the last decade, it seems that the women continue, nevertheless, to be subject to patriarchal domination.

By contrast problems of the majority of upper class women are different. They have servants to do their chores and they do not need to (or are not allowed to) take jobs and have careers. Their worries stem from their total dependence on the husband and consequently insecurity for fear of being abandoned by the husband in favour of a second wife. In the absence of the possibility of an independent job or career, compounded by extreme difficulty for women in setting up an independent household without the 'saya', or protection, of a male head of family, their dependence on the husband is total. They are therefore reduced virtually to the status of well fed, well dressed and well ornamented slaves who depend absolutely upon the whim of their husbands. Where the husband ill-treats or abuses them they must put up with it. Because of the difficulty in setting up an independent household even women with careers share this problem.

Amongst the nouveau riche, in particular, a familiar pattern is one of a first 'traditional ' marriage to a woman from the biraderi (lineage), possibly not very well educated or fashionable. This is often followed later in life by a marriage to an attractive socialite, a fitting spouse for the arriviste, a woman well endowed to perform the duties of a sophisticated hostess who can receive and entertain his friends and associates, businessmen and bureaucrats, in style. The first wife is discarded like an old shoe. She dare not insist on a divorce for, generally, she has nowhere to go and virtually no prospects of building a new life in a society that despises a divorced woman who is invariably blamed for the failure of her marriage. She is lucky if she has grown up sons who might make it possible for her to set up an independent home. But in general, given such prospects, upper class women are likely to live out their lives in insecurity and anxiety. How common such situations are, would be difficult to quantify.

Nor is the problem of dependence upon husbands absent in the case of women of the lower middle classes or the working class. However, in their case, as well as in the case of members of upper classes to a lesser degree, pressures from biraderi (lineage) members and elders tend, to some degree, to restrain husbands from abandoning wives, daughters of their kinsmen. In Pakistan, unlike the West, the social life of most people functions within frameworks of extended kinship, and the values and norms of kinship obligations cannot be flouted without penalty, except by the rich and the powerful or those who live in cosmopolitan circles. On the whole one gains the impression that the risk of a woman being abandoned by her husband in favour of a more attractive woman is less common, though by no means absent, in the case of lower middle class husbands, who can less afford two wives and are in any case ground down by the humdrum daily routine of their rather ordinary lives for such fanciful indulgence.

In the case of lower middle class families we can identify a two-fold division. On the one hand there are families whose women are educated, sufficiently at least to hold down a

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'respectable' job. On the other hand there are more traditional families whose women have not received a good education who therefore do not qualify for 'respectable' salaried jobs. In these latter cases women contribute to the family economy by taking in home-based work under a putting out system operated by entrepreneurs who are only too happy to exploit this extremely cheap source of labour. General Zia's Islamisation policies threatened most directly the first category of lower middle class women, triggering off the militant women's movement of the 1980s.

Underlying these developments is the growing crisis of the lower middle class household economy over the last forty years. At the time of independence it was the normal expectation that man was the provider for the family. Joint families were favoured because of economies of scale in the domestic economy. A patriarch and his brothers, with his sons and nephews would all go to work and bring in the income needed to keep the family. Burdened with domestic labour, women of this class were not classified as 'economically active'. It might be said that urban lower middle class women were amongst the most oppressed of women in Pakistan. being confined to the 'purdah and char diwari' or the four walls of their home. In villages even those women who are confined behind the purdah nevertheless have relatively easy access to the company of other women of the village which is very supportive for them. Likewise, in old cities the layout of the mohalla (wards) has provided a similar possibility of social interaction amongst women. But with the explosive expansion of Pakistan's cities such patterns of spatial organisation of society seem to have broken down. In such circumstances urban lower middle class women became virtually prisoners in their diminutive homes for going visiting would entail an elaborate logistic operation reserved for very special occasions.

The continuous inflation in the cost of living in Pakistan over the decades has brought about a situation where a man's wage is no longer sufficient to keep the family. There was therefore a continuous pressure to broaden the base of the family economy. Gradually and steadily, more and more women were forced to find jobs to supplement family incomes. The change is visible and quite striking. Initially only a few occupations were thought to be respectable enough for such women. As the pressure for jobs increased the concept of a 'respectable job' was progressively broadened to take in a wider range of jobs. Initially, apart from high status professional occupations, notably that of a doctor , what better), jobs in the teaching profession, especially in girls' schools and colleges, were considered to be respectable enough. About a third of the doctors and an equal proportion of school teachers were women. Gradually this changed. The mantle of respectability was now to cover also clerical jobs in open plan offices where women could work with men, but in public view. The role of the personal secretary was initially suspect although it was much better paid, because it entailed a close relationship with the boss. But that too has changed. Today one finds women in a wide range of occupations, including laboratory assistants or ticket clerks at railway stations or clerks at post office counters and so on, as well as lawyers, architects, engineers, journalists and broadcasters. Needless to add, the numbers in the latter categories of occupations are extremely small. With more and more women taking up salaried jobs and in keeping with an increasing number of women taking to higher education, new values have emerged. Women now

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desire jobs and careers for their own sake so that an increasing number of wives of well heeled professionals and women from the upper classes take jobs not out of economic necessity but for self-fulfilment.

Education is the key to acceptable and respectable jobs and careers. Lower middle class families would find it degrading to let their women take up jobs as domestic servants or to work on the factory floor (though some are driven to this out of desperation) i.e. jobs for which education is not a pre-requisite. But families who expect their women to take up jobs as teachers or office clerks (or better) tend therefore to put a higher value on women's education than was the case before - though financing the education of sons still takes precedence. There was a time when women's education was thought to be mere indulgence, wasteful of the money spent on it. There is demand for women's education also from professional men who want to marry reasonably educated wives, although not too highly qualified. There is a concept of an 'over-qualified' woman i.e. a woman who has better qualifications than her potential spouse. Such a woman is positively at a disadvantage. Far too many engagements have been broken when the fiancee has done too well at college or university. Where both spouses are professionals or academics, if the wife's career advances more rapidly it becomes a threat to the false pride of the husband. Because of the heavy price a woman has to pay if her marriage breaks down sometimes she holds back to keep her marriage safe. But some marriages do break down on this account.

Given these social changes and the high degree of functionality of women's education for middle class and lower middle class families the threat to women's education that was posed by Islamic fundamentalism and General Zia's so-called 'Islamisation' policies was a threat to the family economy and to the new values and attitudes. These families have therefore tended to subscribe rather to liberal social philosophies or 'modernist' interpretations of Islam. They tend to be sceptical of dogmatic versions of Islam propounded by ignorant and bigoted Mullahs. There is therefore a considerable and growing social base of secularism in Pakistan's political as well as social life, a fact that is reflected in the repeated routs of the Islamic fundamentalist Jamaat-i-Islami in three successive elections in the country namely those of 1985, 1987 (local bodies election) and, again, in 1988.

There are, however, many lower middle class households in Pakistan where women have been given no education that could befit them for 'respectable' salaried jobs. Traditionally they were relegated to the role of 'housewives'. But, gradually and with increasing rapidity new avenues for exploiting the labour of these women have opened up. There are factories with women only work force, notably in the ready made clothing trade, where they can go and work as seamstresses or similar tailoring and finishing jobs, which are woefully underpaid. There is, however, another alternative too whereby the labour of women of this category is exploited without their having to leave their 'char diwari' i.e. the four walls of their home. This is by way of development of a classical form of 'putting out system' whereby orders for the work to be done and the materials that are required are brought to them in their homes and the finished goods are later collected. For their long hours of labour, carried out in the midst of the demands of a variety of domestic chores

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and clamour of a multitude of children, they are paid a mere pittance - much less even than the outrageously low level of wages for women who go to work in factories. But for women who have families to look after there is often no choice.

We can identify two patterns in such cases, although there are no data available that can allow us to quantify their relative importance. One is that when the family patriarch controls the operation. He mediates with entrepreneurs brings home the materials and work orders. delivers the finished goods and, most important of all, pockets the money paid by the entrepreneurs. In effect the women of his household are virtually his slaves. He guards their subordination quite as jealously as any slave owner, deploying ideological weapons against the women by a constant invocation of Islamic values, as interpreted by himself and the Mullahs. On the other hand he builds up images of the 'modern' ordinary working women who take up outside employment as corrupt and un-lslamic, which he contrasts with that of his own enslaved kinswomen who are good and pure, unsullied by the eyes of strange men. Ideologically fundamentalist interpretations of Islam reinforce the authority of the patriarch over his enslaved womenfolk.

There is also another pattern of the putting out system. In this case the entrepreneurs employ women agents who go around houses (especially in katchi bastis or shanty town homes) distributing orders and materials for work and collecting the finished goods. In this case they are said to make payments directly to the female head in the household. In the absence of research one can only speculate whether in this case the balance of power in the household is shifted thereby (even if only partially) in favour of women. In an interesting study of Muslim women 'beedi' (cheap 'cigarettes' made of rolled tobacco leaves) makers in Allahabad, Zarina Bhatty found that as a result of contributing substantially (over 45 per cent) to the household incomes, the women acquired a "greater importance in household decision making process. ... (i.e.) an increased say in spending money" (Bhatty, 1981: 45). It would be hazardous to extend such a conclusion drawn from a study of a community of Muslim rural labourers in India to urban lower middle class families in Pakistan. Clearly there are a number of issues located here which invite systematic investigation.

Home-based women workers, denied the freedom of movement and relative independence of their sisters employed in salaried jobs, rationalise their own predicament in ideological terms, through a self-image of their moral superiority. Frustrated by their increasingly straitened circumstances and lack of freedom, they are easily mobilised by their men against women who go out to word. They are even made to join public demonstrations, suitably enclosed in the chaddar or burqa (the all-enveloping women's overalls that covers them from head to foot). They parrot the complaints of their men that women's employment takes jobs away from men and undercuts their salaries and that, in any case, it is quite shameless and un-Islamic for women to go about the city and work in offices with men. In their own minds as well as in the minds of the men who control their lives, their confinement to their homes offers a gain in respectability.

The life of lower middle class women in salaried employment is subject to rather different kinds of pressures. Her working day starts early, for she must feed her husband

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and children and send them off to school before she herself rushes off to work. Traveling to work is itself quite a battle, given the state of public transport in Pakistan cities, especially Karachi. In order to attract women workers whom they need, many large companies maintain fleets of minibuses to pick up their women employees in the morning and take them home after work. In the case of a woman who is the first to be picked up or the last to be dropped home this can add an hour, or even two, to the long day spent at work. She comes home tired. Whilst her husband relaxes with a cold drink under a fan, she has to rush straight into the kitchen to prepare the family evening meal. And there are umpteen little chores to be attended to, young children to be looked after and the family fed and put to bed. Some chores, such as washing clothes and cleaning the house, are inevitably put off for the weekend which therefore is not time for rest nor for demonstrations in aid of women's rights. Given the race against time only a very few working women can afford the time to go to meetings and demonstrations even though they sympathise solidly with their aims; women who happen to have particularly enlightened and helpful relatives (e.g. a mother-in-law) or a co-operative and politically committed husband (a rare commodity) who is willing to take over some of their chores during their short absence. Only those who are sufficiently well off to have servants to take care of the domestic front can play an active and continuing part in such activities. Mobility is another major obstacle in their way so that only those women can take part in such activities without too much difficulty who have their own cars or who have women friends or close male relatives who can give them a lift (going with unrelated males is unthinkable).

It is because of these difficulties that the vast majority of lower middle class employed women cannot take a regular, not to say an active and leading part in the women's movement. But this does not mean that the vast majority of working women who are not blessed with the advantages which make such activities possible- 'lack consciousness' or that they are unaware of the issues that confront women in Pakistan. One has only got to go and talk to some of them to get a measure of the depth of their feelings and the clarity with which they themselves see the issues. Under these circumstances the activists and the leadership inevitably comes from women of better off families especially those whom can afford servants and cars, mainly professional women in their thirties. But it needs to be emphasised that they, nevertheless, articulate by and large attitudes and demands that affect all working women. These relatively small number of activists are like the tip of a huge iceberg, their inarticulate sisters being submerged, for the time being, in an ocean of work.

The women's movement in Pakistan thus revolves around educated women, both professionals and those who take up salaried jobs. Official propaganda under the long years of the Zia regime tried to discredit the women's movement by caricaturing it as a movement of English-educated, Westernised, upper class women whose heads are filled with foreign imported ideas and who, the propaganda claimed, had no roots amongst true Pakistani women. The fact of the matter is that the vast majority of activists in the women's movement are closer to working women of all classes than either the bureaucrats in government or much of the political leadership or journalists, who all sit in judgement over them. Most of these activists are new to the tasks that they have taken

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upon themselves in organising and leading the movement. In taking up these unfamiliar tasks they have demonstrated quite remarkable qualities of leadership -- not only ingenuity and flexibility but also a noteworthy personal humility. This last quality is reflected in the commitment of WAF members to non-hierarchical organisation.

The Zia regime itself had much to do in creating conditions that precipitated the movement and caused it to break out with much force. Problems that confront women in Pakistan today have been accumulating over several decades. The reason why the women's movement suddenly erupted into action in the 1980s has much to do with the outrageous attacks that were actually undertaken or were contemplated by the Zia regime, in the name of 'Islamisation', a policy that was designed (unsuccessfully) by the regime to gain political legitimacy. These policies were calculated to degrade the place of women in Pakistan society and to erode such legal rights that they did possess, and to put up barriers in the way of women's education and their freedom of movement and to obstruct their access to jobs and professional careers.

Among the new 'Islamic' laws that were enacted by the Zia regime was a change in the law of evidence, enacted in October 1984, purportedly to bring the existing law of evidence in line with prescriptions of Islam. Except in the case of the Hudood Ordinances of 1979 (prescribing 'Islamic' punishments) which laid down their own special rules of evidence for hadd offences, the new law of evidence provided that two male witnesses or in the absence of two male witnesses one male and one female witness would be required to prove a crime. This law as well as other proposed legislation, equated one man to two women. This was so, for example, in the proposed new laws of Qisas and Diyat which provided for financial compensation to be given to the injured party by an accused in lieu of punishment in cases of murder or bodily injury, it being held that in such cases the 'Islamic' remedy lay not in punishment of the offender but in compensation to be paid to the victim or his family. This law was proposed by the Council of Islamic Ideology and passed by the Majlis-e-Shoora (Zia's legislative institutions). The compensation in the case of women was to be fixed at half that for men. Such laws that put the worth of a women at half that of a man, were a powerfully symbolic factor that set the women's movement into action.

Besides these blatantly discriminatory laws that reduced a woman's humanity by half, there were policies undertaken or contemplated by the Zia regime that threatened the life and prospects of working women more directly. Although the militant activities and demonstrations of the women's movement were, in the first instance, directed against the new laws, there were some no less weighty and more directly felt underlying concerns, especially about the future of women's education. In general laws and policies pursued by the Zia regime were directed towards discouraging women from taking an active part in activities outside the home and to limit the scope for their self-expression.

There were proposals, for example, that threatened women's access to higher education. Perhaps the most important of these was the idea of segregating women within 'Women's Universities'. As proposed by Zia's University Grants Commission, the existing three colleges of Home Economics located at Karachi, Lahore and Peshawar were to be

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upgraded to University status. Women were to be given the education that was thought to be appropriate for them, namely to be trained as housewives. They were to be denied a wider education that might prepare them for professional or academic careers or jobs in government, commerce or industry. Obstacles, such as higher required grades, were placed in the way of women seeking admission to science courses in Universities or places in medical colleges.

There was an attack too on women's participation in sports. Pakistani women athletes and the women's hockey team were prevented from participating in international events. Zia's Federal Minister for Sports and Culture explained that women could participate in sporting competitions only before an exclusively female audience or one in which only mehram males and no others males were present ! Reporting this, the press translated the term mehram inaccurately as 'blood relatives'. That is not the case. The category of mehram defines relatives whom a Muslim may not marry. A woman's mehram comprise her siblings, ascendants and siblings of ascendants, descendants and descendants of siblings and, amongst some sects, sisters' husbands. A first cousin, such as father's brother's son is not mehram though a 'blood relative'. As mehram defines an ego centred kindred, which would be differently constituted for each woman, male spectators are effectively ruled out. Women could engage in sports only in purdah ! This ridiculous and meaningless rule illustrates only too well the arbitrary and cavalier manner in which religious symbols were invoked to restrict women's activities.

The issues of higher education and sports, in a society such as that of Pakistan, affect mostly upper class, middle class and lower middle class families. There are other policies of the Zia government that bore down relatively more heavily on the most vulnerable component of Pakistan society namely women of the poor. It must be said that degradation of women in Pakistan is nothing new and is not the result solely of the so-called 'Islamisation ' policies of the Zia dictatorship. But it reached abysmally low levels in the wake of its legislation and policies.

In the name of fighting against 'obscenity' and 'pornography' the Zia government set in motion a mass campaign against women seen in public. An atmosphere was generated in the country in which attacks against women became commonplace, legitimated in the name of religion. Such campaigns against women are led by mullahs, the custodians of ignorance, and by criminals and mischief-makers in general, who all seem to derive a kind of perverted psychic pleasure from molesting women under the pretext of enforcing morality. A spate of directives were issued by the Zia regime ordering female government employees, women teachers and girls at schools and colleges to wear 'Islamic' dress and the chaddar or burqa. As a direct result of such campaigns against women who are depicted as a threat to male virtue, the morality of Pakistani males sunk to new depths. They do not seem to be able to resist the temptation to interfere with and manhandle women, posing as guardians of public virtue. Violence against women has been on the increase behind the cloak of 'Islamisation'. The most obscene examples of such hypocrisy are numerous, widely publicised, incidents where women's noses have been cut off or they have been disrobed and paraded in the nude in public to 'teach them a lesson'. As a result of public outrage aroused by such incidents, the Zia regime

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announced punishments for such actions. But his so-called 'Islamic' regime did little to track down the culprits and punish them. Nor did it engage in any public campaign to denounce such actions and arouse public opinion against those who perpetrate them. Such incidents and attacks on women still continue.

The Zia regime introduced Hudood Ordinances purportedly to lay down 'Islamic' punishments for certain crimes. These were barbaric punishments such as cutting off of hands and stoning to death. There has been some controversy in the country whether these are truly Islamic prescriptions. That, as such, is not a matter that we need to pursue here except to say that even where these were not actually carried out in all cases, they carried a symbolic charge and provided a rallying point to mullahs who demanded their full implementation. Public lashings however, were carried out before vast crowds and TV cameras, quite savagely - members of the crowd urging the 'executioners' to hit 'the bastards' even harder. These were incredibly degrading sights to watch. The law that concerns us here most directly, however, is the Zina (Enforcement of Hudood) Ordinance of February 1979. This Ordinance provided a new basis, as we shall see, for intimidation and terrorisation of women by husbands or male relatives, especially amongst the urban poor, but not amongst them alone. Ironically, the Ordinance has also created a situation in which women victims of rape dare not even complain about the sexual violence done to them for fear of penalties that they themselves invite under this iniquitous law, while the culprits go Scot free because of its extra-ordinary provisions.

The Ordinance provides new weapons to men against women by virtue of making Zina i.e. adultery and fornication, crimes against the state, cognisable offences for which the police can take action. Previously that was not the case, for then adultery was a matter of personal offence against the husband by the male party to adultery and extra-marital sex was not a penal offence at all. Now where a wife leaves her husband, it has become all too easy for the husband to go to the police and file a complaint against her for committing zina whereupon the wife is arrested and jailed. Given police corruption and the interminable length of time that it takes for such cases to be adjudicated by courts of law (often years) the woman is effectively punished without even going through the due process of law. The husband can bail the wife out of jail. But when that happens. she is totally at his mercy. for he would threaten to withdraw bail which would return her to prison. Thus the woman's position is made worse than that of a slave. According to Asma Jahangir, a distinguished Pakistani woman lawyer and Secretary of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan: 'it has now become common for husbands to file complaints of Zina against wives wanting separation. There are hundreds of cases every year where women are arrested for Zina on complaints filed by husbands' (SHE. March 1989: 81). It is likewise in cases of elopement, where a father refuses permission to his daughter to marry the man of her choice. The father brings charges of 'abduction' in such cases and the law presumes zina unless the couple can prove lawful nikah or marriage according to Islam.

The Zina Ordinance has created a 'Catch 22' situation for women victims of rape. This arises from the fact that the ordinance brings both adultery and fornication (zina) on the one hand and rape (zina-bil-jabr) on the other, under a single law in a manner that is

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unsafe. Secondly, the problem arises from the type of admissible evidence that is prescribed under the Ordinance. The offence of rape is defined as sexual intercourse against the will and/or without the consent of the victim or with consent if the consent has been obtained under fear of death or hurt. It also includes under the category of rape sexual intercourse with consent of the victim where the offender knows that the consent is given by the victim because she (or he) believes that she (or he) is validly married to the offender although the offender knows that they are not.

The catch in this law, that affects women victims of rape cruelly, is the specification of the type of evidence that is admissible for hadood or 'Islamic' punishment for zina and zina-bil-jabr which is stoning to death (under certain conditions lesser punishments called tazir would apply). The evidence required is either a confession on the part of the accused (for an unmarried woman pregnancy is self-evident proof) or the testimony of 'at least four Muslim adult male witnesses about whom the Court is satisfied ... that they are truthful persons and abstain from major sins ... (who) give evidence as eye-witnesses of the act of penetration necessary for the offence.' This is a type of evidence that is most unlikely to be found except perhaps in the vast open spaces of the Arabian desert.

In effect, therefore, the offence of rape is unprovable and rapists now go about without fear. Reports of such offences have become widespread. The law excludes the testimony of women, so that evidence of the victim of rape counts for nothing. But if she complains of rape (which she cannot possibly prove, according to this law) she is taken to have admitted to having had sexual intercourse with a man who is not her lawful husband, hence guilty of zina. For this she invites the heavy penalty of this law. A woman has not only no remedy under this iniquitous law for the sexual violence done to her; she herself becomes a victim of the law.

In one way or another, women have been victimised under the Zina Ordinance. Documenting the phenomenal increase, during the 1980s, in the number of women who are languishing in Pakistani prisons as a consequence of this law, Asma Jahangir points out that about 40 per cent of the convicted women whom she interviewed in Multan Jail had been sentenced for the offence of zina. Most of the women whom she interviewed belonged to low income families; out of 37 women 16 had a family income of only Rs. 500 per month (the wage of a single labourer) and no one had a family income of more than Rs. 3000 (the salary of an office clerk). Newspaper reports of victimisation of women under this law are legion. For want of space, we will give only a couple of examples to illustrate the different ways in which women are victimised under it.

The most notorious case is that of Safia Bibi, an 18 year old virtually blind girl, the daughter of a poor peasant, who was employed in the house of the local landlord as domestic help. She was raped by her employer's son and then by the landlord himself. As a result the girl became pregnant. Her illegitimate child is said to have died soon after birth. The girl's father filed a case with the police alleging rape. The Court acquitted the landlord and his son for lack of evidence as required under the zina Ordinance, the evidence of the girl not being admissible and four pious Muslim witnesses to the repeated acts of rape not being available. But by virtue of her accusation the girl herself, being

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unmarried, was found guilty of zina, her pregnancy being proof of it, and she was sentenced to three years in prison, public lashing (15 lashes) and Rs. 1000 fine. In passing this sentence, the Court said that it was being lenient in view of her age and disability ! This case created an uproar and turned out to be an issue on which the Women's Action Forum began campaigning. In the light of public outrage, General Zia himself intervened and got the Federal Shariat Court to take over the case, suo moto. An exceptionally liberal judge quashed the outrageous conviction of the girl on the ground that if in the case of rape the man (or men) were acquitted due to lack of the required evidence, the woman too was to be given the benefit of doubt. But there was no question here of prosecuting the rapists and bringing them to justice.

A rather different type of case illustrates the way in which the law is used by male relatives or husbands to terrorise and control women. A young woman of 25, Shahida, got a divorce from her husband, Khushi Mohammad. The divorce deed was signed by the husband and was attested by a Magistrate. Under the law as it stands, however, the divorcing husband is then required to register the divorce papers with the local council. That he did not do. This was possibly a deliberate omission which was to give him a hold over his ex-wife. Shahida, after spending the prescribed period of ninety six days of waiting (iddat), as prescribed for a divorcee, with her parents, married Mohammed Sarwar. Khushi Mohammed, meanwhile decided that he wanted her back or, in any case, he would not allow her to marry again. So he took the matter to the law, charging her with zina. Although Shahida produced before the Court the attested copy of the divorce document which was signed by Khushi Mohammad and attested by a magistrate, the Court did not consider it to be admissible as it had not been registered with the local Council. The Court decided that the divorce was invalid and therefore that the second marriage illegal. As the two accused, Shahida Parveen and Mohammed Sarwar had 'confessed' to living together as husband and wife, the Court found them guilty, under the convoluted provisions of that extra-ordinary Ordinance, of raping each other ! Accordingly they were both sentenced to stoning to death. Happily, due to campaigning by the women's movement that extreme sentence was eventually commuted- but not all victims of this extraordinary law have been so lucky.

In cases of eloping couples, parents deprived of the money that they would get for marrying off their daughter (bride price is not a normal custom) file a complaint with the police for abduction. Even if the girl has found refuge with the family of the boy or some supportive family, sexual intercourse is presumed in such cases and both the girl and the boy are penalised for zina. It is by no means unusual in such cases, especially if the young couple cannot be found, for the police to arrest the families who are believed to have given them support, as accomplices to zina.

The fact is that all such cases have affected not only the parties directly involved but have intimidated Pakistani women in general, for they dare not leave an oppressive and cruel husband or greedy and grasping parents wishing to sell them, for fear of the consequences for them under this terrible law.

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Sadly, the eleven years of the so-called policy of 'Islamisation' under General Zia, have produced in Pakistan a culture of intolerance. This culture, above all, has persecuted women and subjected them to all kinds of humiliation and ill-treatment, not to speak of inhuman punishment under the Hudood Ordinances, as described above. The Government embarked upon a mass publicity campaign, through all the media, exhorting people to order their lives in accordance with Islam, but as interpreted by Zia and his bigoted mullahs. Far more mischievous was Zia's call to the 'people' to ensure that their 'neighbours' did likewise. This was a charter for the mischief-makers and the bigots who took upon themselves the task of chastising women, total strangers, and molesting them under that excuse. For example, Mumtaz and Shaheed quote an instance, which is by no means unique or isolated, when a woman who entered a bakery in an upper class Lahore neighbourhood, was slapped by a total stranger for not having her head covered ( Mumtaz and Shaheed, 1987: 71). A much publicised and quite horrendous case is that of a congregation leaving a mosque after Friday prayers who found a new born baby on a nearby rubbish dump. The mullah promptly concluded that it was an illegitimate child and, in accordance with the laws of Islam, as he understood them, led the congregation of the pious Muslims in stoning the child to death. Such outrageous conduct was the direct result of incitement by the propaganda of the Zia regime, which has created an atmosphere of bigotry and intolerance.

It was hoped that the democratic Government of Benazir Bhutto would reverse this and, in particular, repeal the Hudood Ordinances (including the Zina Ordinance. But a year after it was put in office the Government has shown no inclination to change the laws. This is in part due to the paralysis of the Government, due to a complex set of political factors which we cannot go into here. Meanwhile the terrible legacy of the Zia regime lives on. Prospects before Pakistani women remain uncertain and threatening.

References CitedAhmad, Shahnaz 1983 'Women's Movement in Pakistan',

Alavi, Hamza 1972

Kinship in West Punjab Villages', Contributions to Indian Sociology, New Series. Vol. VI (for a fuller account see Hamza Alavi, 'The Two Biraderis- Kinship in Rural Punjab' in T. N. Madan (ed) Muslim Societies in South Asia, 2nd edition, New Delhi 1995)

Bhatty, Zarina 1981 The Economic Role and Status of Women in the Beedi Industry in Allahabad, India, ILO, World Employment Programme, Vol 63

Mumtaz, Khawar and Shaheed, Farida

1987 Women of Pakistan

Zed Press, London

various Pakistan Law Digest

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[Back to Hamza Alavi Homepage]

THE ORIGINS AND SIGNIFICANCE OF THE PAKISTAN-US MILITARY ALLIANCEHamza Alavi

Pakistan's disputes and confrontations with India and Afghanistan, especially confrontation with India over Kashmir and the dispute over division of the waters of the Indus basin, were no doubt central to the making of Pakistan's foreign policy immediately after independence. These conflicts have continued in one form or another over the years. It is a common mistake, however to interpret Pakistan's foreign policy too narrowly in the context of its conflicts with its neighbors for that obscures the extent to which Pakistan has in effect been increasingly drawn into the Middle East as from the mid-fifties, not so much in terms of the so-called 'Islamic ideology' but rather in terms of the role that Pakistan was made to assume in Western military strategy for the Middle East. By the early 1950s Pakistan's relationship with the US was set on a new course, culminating in a military alliance.

Objectives of the Military Alliance:

There is a pervasive view that the object and the effect of Pakistan's military alliance with the US was to strengthen it vis-a-vis India. That is how Indian nationalist scholars and politicians have represented that alliance. That is also how Pakistan's rulers themselves have sought to justify it. The rhetoric of US politicians themselves about it was rather different. They suggested that the alliance was to bolster Pakistan as a first line of defense of South Asia against Soviet designs for 'expansionism' in the South Asian region. This was in line with the McCarthyite cold war spirit of the times and legitimated such a military alliance within the US. It seems that the emphasis on this argument was calculated also to allay Indian fears. If the purpose and function of the Pakistan-US military alliance were to strengthen Pakistan vis-a-vis India, a view that is endorsed by critics of the alliance as well as its apologists in Pakistan, ironically it played no part in Pakistan's wars with India, when it was defeated twice in 1965 and again in 1971. In fact the US went to great lengths to reassure India that the alliance held no threats towards India. The US administration took great care to ensure that the military hardware that it supplied to Pakistan in terms of the Alliance, was not to be available to Pakistan for use in its conflicts with India. This paper aims to show that India-centered explanations of the US-Pakistan military alliance obscure its true purpose and significance and the overall dynamics of Pakistan's foreign policy, as a protege of the US.

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Another aspect of the conventional wisdom on Pakistan's relationship with the US is that it is viewed in unilinear terms, suggesting that from the moment of the creation of he new State of Pakistan it's rulers went begging to the US for economic and military aid and assumed the role of a US satellite and that Pakistan has remained so ever since, in a basically unchanging relationship. An influential work of this genre is Venkataramani's 'The American Role in Pakistan' (1984), which incorporates both these aspects of the conventional wisdom about Pakistan's relationship with the US in its argument. In Pakistan especially, it has become an influential work. This is because, on the face of it, it exposes the willing and unchanging subservience of successive Pakistan regimes to the US - which suggests by implication that the US did not have to resort to a great deal of manipulation and pressure to draw Pakistan into its circle of client states. To assume that would obscure the great dramas on the Pakistani political stage that were played out in the mid-fifties in order to secure US objectives. Furthermore, Venkataramani's book carries some degree of credence because much of it is evidently based on exhaustively researched archival material in Washington, which gives it a ring of authority. But, sadly his research is highly selective and partial, grounded in his own particular prejudices. He has no clue about the changing contexts of the US military and strategic interests in the region and, correspondingly, shifts and changes in Pakistan's place in US foreign policy considerations from one period to another.

Venkataramani's work is a typical example of Indian nationalist scholarship on this subject. It reflects an ambivalence between a desire to represent Pakistan's political leadership, from the very inception of the new State, as subservient and a willing instrument of the US, as its favored instruments of its policies in the region. On the one hand, he continually mocks Pakistan's political leaders and rulers, who were desperately in search of military equipment its early years, for debasing themselves before the US, begging fruitlessly from successive unresponsive US administrations to be granted the facility of purchasing of military equipment which were regularly and rudely refused. They are shown therefore to be treated shabbily by the US which chose to ignore them. Then, with some questionable 'nationalist pride', he notes the greater importance that the US attached to India in its regional diplomacy. He writes: "considering India clearly more important in that context (i.e. of US policy of containment of Soviet Union and China. H.A.) the Administration extended an official invitation to the Indian Prime Minister Nehru to visit the United States (whereas they) had indicated no interest in inviting the Prime Minister of Pakistan." (Venkataramani, 1984: 73-74). This is so evidently childish. Why should this be regarded to be such a great 'honor' conferred by a patronizing US on Pandit Nehru and India. The US surely was doing no more than pursuing its own designs for the region. The discrimination that Venkataramani notices in US treatment of Pakistan and India, respectively, ought to have led him into examining more closely US motives and interests in the region rather than into the petty mockery in which he indulges.

That was in 1949. However, quite soon US priorities changed fundamentally, so that even at the risk of antagonizing India, the US drew Pakistan into a military alliance. Why were US priorities in the region now radically altered ? Was it merely because of cleverer Pakistani diplomacy ? And what did the alliance offer to the US ? What did it offer to

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Pakistan ? What new calculations had changed the equation between India and Pakistan in the US regional policy calculations ? Venkataramani does not stop to ponder over these kinds of questions; nor do most scholars, who write about Pakistan's foreign policy in a similar vein. They tend to treat the military alliance between the US and Pakistan, that was forged in the 1950s, as if it was simply an unproblematic extension of an on-going relationship. Some profound changes took place in the strategic military situation in the region in the early 1950s that brought about a crucial shift in the US regional military calculations. It was this that now conferred on Pakistan a new role in US regional military strategy for the Middle East. We cannot begin to understand the reasons for the change in US attitudes from the earlier coldness and distancing from Pakistan to a desire to establish a military alliance with it without taking the major changes that took place in the regional balance of power at the time. This certainly did not come about because of initiatives taken by Pakistanis, as we will soon see, although in later Pakistani (and US) propaganda Ayub Khan was sometimes represented as the author of the alliance. That bogus claim helped to propagate the notion that the alliance was essentially in Pakistan's interests which, at last, the US was willing to support. In truth, the US was left to face a new reality with regard to the balance of power in the region and, above all, the threat to Western oil interests. The event that brought about this sea change in US strategy was the nationalization of Iranian oil by Muhammad Mossadeq in March 1951 that precipitated the crisis of Western power in the Middle East.

A new Western strategy for the 'defense of the Middle East', i.e. the defense of Western oil interests, had to be worked out. Barnds notes that "The idea of a US-Pakistani military relationship first came under serious consideration in Washington in 1951. ... The US Air Force was interested in possible sites for air bases; other military strategists considered the manpower the Pakistani Army might furnish for use elsewhere in Asia". A US-Pakistan agreement about military assistance was reached by mid-1952. But it was not until the installation of the Eisenhower administration in 1953, with the Dulles brothers in charge of the State Department and the CIA, respectively, that things really began to move. This reorientation of the US regional military strategy had little to do with India, except that in making the shift and drawing Pakistan into a military alliance, the US put at risk its good relations with India and had to try as much as possible to limit that damage.

Historical Perspective:

It might be helpful to look at the background to this in historical perspective. Since World War II, after the decline of British and French global colonial dominance, the US emerged as the most potent power on the world scene. As it eventually evolved, Pakistan's relationship with the US became qualitatively different from its relationships with other major countries of the capitalist world for Pakistan has been made subject to a form of indirect colonial rule. The US has exercised a decisive influence, from time to time, on the establishment and survival of regimes in Pakistan and on the choice of ministers and allocations of their portfolios. It must be emphasized that this does not imply the same kind of control as under direct colonial rule. The weight of US power over Pakistan is pervasive. But this is not without its tensions and contradictions, so that

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often the US has to manipulate forces in Pakistan to achieve its purposes and that not always successfully. The most eloquent testimony to Pakistan's relative autonomy, as a post-colonial state, is the long on-going struggle over Pakistan's nuclear program. Despite pressure and sanctions such as suspension of aid and military supplies, the US does not appear to have been able to do much about it.

The story of the US-Pakistan relationship has been an uneven and complex one. The fact is that during the first five years after the Partition, Pakistan was quite insecure in the international arena, in its relationships with the US and Britain as well as the Soviet Union, especially in the context of its bitter confrontation with India. The actual and prospective economic stake in India for US and British capital was far greater than what the backward and smaller economy of Pakistan could possibly offer. For the US and Britain there was no point in jeopardizing Indian goodwill because of any entanglement with Pakistan.

In Britain a Labor Government was in power and the Labor Party leadership had long standing and close ties with the Indian National Congress and its leaders. The British Labor Movement had looked upon the Congress as a force for democracy in South Asia whereas it had always been hostile towards the Pakistan Muslim League, as a communal force. Likewise in the US Democrats were in power. They also had close relationships with leaders of the Indian National Congress and looked upon the Pakistan Muslim League in the same light as did the British Labor Party. Understandably, in that context, Pakistan was suspicious of both. Nor could Pakistani leaders, given their ideological predilections and Soviet leanings towards India, look upon the Soviet Union as an alternative source of support. India was being wooed from all sides, as Pakistani leaders saw the situation, and Pakistan felt isolated, as a political orphan on the world stage. It had little alternative in the first five or six years of its existence therefore but to chart a neutral course in foreign policy.

This may come as a surprise to those who have been conditioned to think of Pakistan as a US satellite from its very inception. Pakistan's foreign policy during the first five years after the Partition was in fact neutral and non-aligned. This was not an ideological choice but a condition that was imposed on Pakistan simple by virtue of the stark reality of her world position. Therefore, despite their mutual hostility, a most striking fact about that period is that Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan stood shoulder to shoulder with Prime Minister Nehru in proclaiming a policy of non-alignment on a number of occasions and issues. This was particularly remarkable in view of Liaquat Ali Khan's personal obsession with the Kashmir issue and his consequent stance of hostile confrontation with India. He visited the US in May 1950 to solicit US aid. Against the background of the cold war, when the Americans took the view that anyone who was not in their camp was in the camp of her enemies, it is noteworthy that Liaquat Ali Khan began his first major speech before the National Press Club in Washington, with the words. (paraphrasing Metternich) that a country has "no eternal friends and no eternal enemies. It has eternal interests". He spelt out what he believed to be Pakistan's 'eternal' interests, with no reference to the cold war. Referring to the US he did not go beyond expressing the hope that Pakistan and the US may "come to a better understanding of each other's point of view", thus clearly

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distancing Pakistan from any question of identification with the US camp or qualifying her own independent position. Needless to add he returned empty handed from that trip.

Pakistan's non-aligned policy under Liaquat Ali Khan is little recognized. This writer noted it in an article on "The Burden of US Aid" in Pakistan Today in 1962. More recently, Barnds, one of the few who have since come to recognize it, writes in explanation that: 'Pakistan had followed a policy of non-alignment, in fact though not in name, since 1947. It did not want to depart too far in international politics from other Muslim states and Arabs had generally shown their opposition to Western defense alignments and organizations. This explanation, attributing Pakistan's non-aligned policy as a gesture towards Arab opinion, seems to be misconceived, considering that we are as yet dealing with the period upto 1951, when the Middle East was still dominated by right wing regimes under British patronage, and the philosophy of Gamal Abdel Nasser and Arab Nationalism had yet to capture the hearts and minds of Arab peoples. Nor was Pakistan's non-alignment a 'policy' i.e. a deliberate and calculated choice. It was no more than an expression, and acceptance, of its isolation on the global stage and lack of trust in Western regimes whom Pakistan's leaders believed to be already committed to India. For India non-alignment, in the context of East-West confrontation, was for different reasons. With its relatively more developed economic base and aspirations for independent planned economic development and, furthermore, its considerable bargaining power as a leading Third World country and regional power, this was a calculated policy from which India has profited greatly through its bilateral dealings with all sides.

A problem that was felt most keenly by Pakistan's leadership in the first years after independence was its military weakness. Pakistan had to create a new army virtually from scratch, a problem that India did not have to face to the same degree. Lord Birdwood (then adviser to the British Conservative party on defense matters and himself son of a Commander-in-Chief of the Army in British India) noted that: " Thus 'class' units Dogras, Mahrattas and Sikhs - could immediately be allotted to India, since they were all composed of Hindu clans. Punjab infantry regiments and all the cavalry contained companies and squadrons of Hindus, Sikhs and Moslems. Even more intricate was the problem of splitting the various Corps and ancillary services ... all services in which Moslems and Hindus had to be separated out and dispatched to new units, new homes and new loyalties." (Birdwood, 1953: 83). This meant that in Pakistan virtually the entire army had to be regrouped and reconstituted into new units and knit together. For a time Pakistan had practically no army in the sense of an effective and organized, not to say well equipped, force.

A major blow for the new Pakistan army was the non-arrival of its due share of military equipment and stores, located mostly in distant places in India, that were allocated to her under the Partition deal. An independent Supreme Court and had been set up under General Auchinleck to deal with the transitional problems of unscrambling the two armies and division of assets between them. A Joint defense Council was also set up to supervise this. Although they were both to function until the end of March 1948 they were prematurely dissolved, on Indian initiative, in November 1947. Birdwood noted that: "It was Pakistan's bitter complaint that although the Defense Council might allocate

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stores and supplies to her army, in fact orders were never translated into action. ... For this reason the Pakistanis viewed the decision to close down the Supreme Command in November with dismay. They had not received their fair share and with the abolition of a central independent authority they saw no prospect of ever doing so." (ibid: 84-85) Even the official army records and documents of the nucleus of the Pakistan Army H.Q. which was formed out of the old GHQ in New Delhi, were left behind. Given these circumstances it is not surprising that organization and equipment of the army was a matter of great urgency for Pakistan.

Pakistan's options were limited. Europe had just emerged from a most devastating war and was preoccupied with the post-war reconstruction of its war torn economies. The only likely source for the equipment that Pakistan urgently needed was the USA. The government of Pakistan lost no time in making a request to the US for supply of arms and equipment for its army, navy and air force and for loans to finance the purchases. But at that time Pakistan was accorded a very low priority in US calculations, for its traditional interests were in the Far East and the Middle East and, insofar as it had any interest in South Asia it was far more interested in cultivating its relationship with India, for Pakistan had little to offer to US capital.

Desperate to equip its armed services, despite repeated rebuffs, Pakistan continued to press its requests to the US for sales of military equipment. But the US refused to lift its arms embargo. In the meantime, Pakistan bought arms, including war surplus material that had survived the Second War, on the open market, wherever available. Pakistan army's historian, Major general Fazal Muqeem Khan lists 15 countries from which Pakistan purchased arms at this time, though, as he adds, 'Not all the army's demands were fully met'. (Khan, 1963:58). Meanwhile British intelligence gathered that Pakistan was negotiating purchase of arms from Czechoslovakia, and informed the Americans. At this time the Pentagon was also speculating about possibilities of securing airbases on Pakistan soil from which it could reach the Soviet Union's soft underbelly. So the US lifted its arms embargo in 1949 and Pakistan was allowed to make moderate purchases - a relaxation of policy that, it hoped, would keep Pakistan happy, stop it from making arms deals with communist countries and generate enough goodwill in Pakistan to keep open prospects of making it a willing collaborator with the US if that came to be needed in the future. This small gesture would not seriously antagonize India. However this was not yet a major shift in US policy.

The regional strategic picture changed dramatically with the nationalization of Iranian oil in March 1951, under the leadership of the Iranian National Front leader Muhammad Musaddeq. Britain and the Western powers were unable to intervene militarily to reverse what the Iranian's had pulled off. Morrison, foreign Secretary in Britain's socialist government denounced the nationalization, refusing to grant the Iranians a right that the British labor government claimed for itself in Britain. A crippling blow for Iran was the withdrawal of British personnel who played key roles in Iranian oil production and the great oil refinery at Abadan closed down by the end of July 1951. Everything possible was done to stop transport and sales abroad of Iranian oil in world markets.

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What this event revealed was a major gap in Western military capacity. Much diplomatic pressure was exerted on the Iranians. Britain took the nationalization issue to the International Court of Justice and the UN Security Council but to no effect. British naval units were dispatched to the Persian Gulf and 3,000 British paratroopers were sent to Cyprus in readiness for possible action in Iran. (Ramazani, 1975: 205-206). But It was clear that these were empty gestures, for Britain was in no position to mobilize sufficient forces to intervene militarily nor did it have available bases from which to mount such an enterprise. In earlier times it would have dispatched troops from India and simply taken over Khuzistan and the refinery at Abadan. But now the old Imperial option of direct military intervention was not available. The British huffed and puffed but could do nothing effective to reverse the oil nationalization.

A lesson that was driven home by this event was that there was a 'power vacuum' in the region, following the independence of India and Pakistan from British rule. The army of British India was not merely an army of occupation. It was also an imperial army that was used to underpin British power beyond India itself. The army was divided into two sections namely the "Internal Security Troops", and the "field Army" which had responsibilities in the wider Imperial system. India was the base from which the British controlled both the Middle East and South East Asia. Now, after independence of India and Pakistan, that base had disappeared. The strategic problems that this was to pose for Britain with regard to its control of the Middle East were not immediately grasped. Olaf Caroe, one-time Governor of the Northwest frontier Province the British India did recognize this problem and urged the Western powers, Britain and the US, to base their Middle East military strategy on Pakistan as the British had done previously on the basis of their presence in British India. (Caroe, 1951). But evidently this warning was not yet heeded or came too late.

Lord Birdwood commented on this major transformation of the strategic equation, which had gone unnoticed so far. He wrote: "If the British Commonwealth was comparatively unaware of the great transition in 1947, the world at large was completely ignorant. ... Attention was confined to such obvious matters as the relations of Pakistan and India, the problem of Kashmir and the operation of the new Indian constitution. The fact that policy over a very large area of the globe, from North Africa to the China Seas had overnight received an entirely fresh orientation escaped notice." (Birdwood, 1953: 173). He continued: "To take but one example, a trail of events which ended in the abandonment of the Persian oil-fields and a refinery worth $300 million, in no small measure derived from the circumstances by which troops from India were no longer available to protect our interests in Khuzistan." (loc cit.)

Birdwood goes on to argue that "The position might be modified if and when Pakistan can provide armed forces for defensive purposes outside her territory" (ibid: loc). This idea was the-foundation of Pakistan's military alliance with the US. American scholars and advisers were also thinking along these lines. In a book on Defense of the Middle East, one of them wrote: "Traditionally, in two world wars, 'allied' defense of the Middle East had been entrusted to British and Commonwealth forces. It was natural that they should again form the backbone of any defense..." (Campbell 1960: 39). One night add at

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this point that while recognizing this problem Campbell expressed skepticism about the role that Pakistan could play in such a defense arrangement.

Formally at least, the US had so far maintained a neutral posture in the Anglo-Iranian dispute, playing the role of the honest broker between the British and the Iranians. But it was greatly concerned by the oil nationalization. As Ramazani sums it up: "The principal considerations underpinning this concern were: (1) that the Anglo-Iranian controversy might lead to the stoppage of the flow of oil to Western European, allies of the United States; (2) that the example of Iranian nationalization might have an adverse effect upon the United States oil interests in the Persian Gulf area; (3) that the British departure from the south would mean diminution of Western influence in the area; and (4) that a breakdown of the Iranian economy in the face of turbulent domestic politics, particularly resulting from increasing Tudeh influence, might drive Iran to a 'Communist coup d'etat." (Ramazani, 1975: 242). He adds that: "but it was during the Eisenhower administration (i.e. two years later. H.A.) that Washington agreed with Eden's thought that 'we should be better occupied looking for alternatives to Musaddeq rather than trying to buy him off'."(ibid: 244-5). It did not take long for the CIA to mount Operation Ajax, that overthrew Mossadeq on l9th August 1953, and restored the Shah to full authority, as an American protege. The CIA has boasted about how easy it was to pull off this coup. Tully writes that it "was necessary to the security of the United States and probably to that of the Western World". He claims, further, that "It was an American operation from beginning to end" (Tully, 1962: 96 - cf also Barnet, 1969, pp 226-7)

A new, US sponsored, military strategy was to be devised for the Middle East, based on military alliances with local client regimes. Pakistan and Turkey were to play key roles in that strategy. For that the Government of Pakistan had to be 'persuaded' to undertake the required role and build up its military strength accordingly. That would involve major increases in Pakistan's military expenditure, which it could ill afford. East Pakistani political leaders in particular, were not at all happy about large increases in expenditures on the military, for little of it would go to East Pakistan. When proposals about the Alliance were mooted Prime Minister Nazimuddin, an East Pakistani, although known to be a very weak man himself, nevertheless, opposed them. In this he reflected East Pakistani feelings about priorities in government Expenditure, being especially concerned about the low level of development in East Pakistan. Given the weight of East Pakistani opinion, understandably the Nazimuddin government was not at all enthusiastic about the Alliance policy. For that project to go forward his government had to be removed.

Nazimuddin had been made Prime Minister in place of Liaquat Ali Khan who was assassinated on 16th October 1951. In the ensuing reshuffle Finance Minister Ghulam Mohammad, a powerful man who had the bureaucracy in his control and who was also a US favorite, took over the key position of Governor General of Pakistan. It was an office which was invested with far reaching constitutional powers and which, under its new incumbent, was no longer to be a formal office as it had been allowed to become with Nazimuddin who had preceded him. From now on Ghulam Mohammad was to play an active and decisive role in running the government and making policy. Three men, all committed to the US alliance, were together in key positions of power, on whom the US

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could rely entirely, namely Ghulam Mohammad as Governor General, Gen. Iskandar Mirza as Defense Secretary and General Ayub Khan as the Commander-in-Chief of the Army. But to put them in full control of the state apparatus the Nazimuddin government had first to be removed.

US agencies, and this 'gang of three' in Pakistan, soon set about the business of establishing a new political regime in Pakistan. To destabilize the Nazimuddin government a variety of agitations, riots and crises were engineered, including widespread anti-Ahmadi riots in the Punjab. But in the event, the ploy that proved to be successful was the manufacture of a 'food crisis' and specter of an 'impending famine'. An opportunity for that was provided by the fact that the wheat crop in West Pakistan for 1951-52 was below average, due to drought, and it was put out that the following crop would also be below normal due to diversion, it was said, of irrigation water from the Pakistani canal system by India, which controls the headworks. This issue of the diversion of canal waters was made a subject of a vigorous press campaign which in turn was used to reinforce the picture of prospects of crop failure and the specter of a famine. Predictably, speculators began to hoard grain and prices began to rise. This price rise in turn seemed to confirm warnings about prospects of a crop failure and famine. In his budget speech in March 1953 the Finance Minister, Chaudhry Muhammad Ali estimated the shortfall in the current year's crop to be no less than one million tons i.e. nearly a quarter of the total average crop. Adding to this alleged shortages of stocks, the overall deficit was estimated at nearly two and a half million tons.

The Nazimuddin government put out desperate appeals, especially to the US, for food aid to avert the 'impending famine'. Canada and Australia responded promptly and sent 160,000 tons of wheat aid i.e. barely 6 per cent of the projected deficit, from the US, who it was hoped would be the main donor, there was no word at all. Unable to secure help from the US, the Nazimuddin government resigned. The price that the US extracted for a promise of food aid was appointment in April 1953 of US protege Mohammad Ali Bogra, an east Pakistani as Prime Minister. But it was Governor General Ghulam Mohammad who was to be in effective charge. Bogra was his puppet. But it was politically useful to have him, an East Pakistani, as the nominal head of the government, as Prime Minister. Ghulam Mohammad not only chose members of Bogra's cabinet but also allotted to them their respective portfolios. Bogra himself was powerless, merely a figurehead.

As soon as the new government was installed in office the US promptly announced an offer of 700,000 tons wheat aid, with an offer of an additional 300,000 tons, if needed. But it took many months for even a fraction of that promised aid to arrive by which time a bumper harvest had been reaped and it was clear that there had never been any question of an impending famine. But the ploy had worked.

It might be added that Mohammad Ali Bogra, sensitive to East Pakistani opinion, as an East Pakistani politician, was also unenthusiastic about the military Alliance and escalation of military expenditure. But he was a prisoner in the hands of Pakistan's 'gang of three'. Barnds writes: "Prime Minister Mohammad Ali was concerned more with political and economic considerations ... (and was) more apprehensive about the effects

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of an open US-Pakistani alliance on public opinion. ... By the fall of 1953, however, Mohammad Ali was resisting the attempts to get US military aid, preferring economic assistance. Arms aid, he feared, not only would be at the expense of economic assistance but would also increase the autonomy and independence of Ayub (C-in-C of the army) and the military in government." (Barnds 1972: 102). But Mohammad Ali Bogra was a powerless Prime Minister, merely a 'front man'. There was nothing he could do to alter the course that Pakistan had now embarked upon under US tutelage.

Client Garrison Strategy:

There followed a series of Treaties and military arrangements to put the new military strategy into effect. One would designate this the 'Client Garrison Strategy', for it was premised on Pakistan undertaking to provide a mercenary army to assist US and its allies in the region, providing troops for military intervention where a Western client regime in the Middle East was threatened from outside or, more to the point, by nationalist or radical movements from within. In return the US was to provide military aid to equip the forces that Pakistan would require for this role. The understanding was that if, for example, the Shah of Iran was threatened by a resurgence of Iranian nationalist, troops from Pakistan and/or Turkey would move in to support their ally the Shah against what would be labeled "Soviet sponsored" or " communist" subversion.

Turkey and Pakistan were to play key roles in that Northern Tier Scheme, enclosing between them Iran and Arab oil producing countries. By the end of 1953 US and Pakistan were engaged in negotiation of the military arrangements. Simultaneously negotiations got underway between Pakistan and Turkey who, on 2nd April 1953, signed a treaty of friendship and cooperation for security. The military assistance agreement between Pakistan and the US was signed in May 1953. "One part of the agreement was the understanding that Pakistan would cooperate in regional defense" (Campbell. 1960: 51) A Turkish-Iraqi pact, for cooperation for mutual security and defense, the Baghdad Pact as it was later to be known, was signed on 24th February 1955. It was open for all states interested in the 'peace and security of the region' to join. Britain joined the Pact in April 1955. Pakistan followed in September 1955 and Iran in October. The Five member Pact was thus complete. The US formally stayed out, although for all practical purposes it had brought it about and had supported it with military aid. But it decided not to join the Baghdad Pact formally because, as Campbell puts it, "the State Department wished to keep whatever chance still remained of working with Saudi Arabia and Egypt; it did not wish to provoke any new Soviet move into the Middle East; it did not wish further to antagonize Israel which had declared its hostility to the Pact; and it did not relish the prospect of a debate in the Senate on ratification which might throw its whole Middle Eastern policy into the arena of domestic politics." (Campbell, 1960: 60) The foundations of the US military strategy for the region had, however, been firmly laid.

Given Pakistan's undertakings vis-a-vis the defense of Western interests in the Middle East, what must be of special interest to us is the manner in which military aid to Pakistan was to be applied, and controlled by the US. Contrary to the deliberately false claims of Pakistan's ruling junta at the time, put out to justify the alliance, that the Alliance and US

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military aid provided protection for Pakistan against India, a view that was also on the face of it, confirmed by Indian reactions to it, the fact is that these facilities were clearly excluded from deployment in Pakistan's defense vis-a-vis India. The US, anxious to allay Indian suspicions and concerns had declared from the highest levels, publicly and formally, that the military aid to Pakistan would not be permitted to be used vis-a-vis India. Thus the US attached a formal 'Understanding' to the SEAT0 Treaty to this effect - the question of a similar rider to the Baghdad Pact did not arise as the US did not formally join it. In fact US precautions went beyond there declarations of that kind and special safeguards were incorporated in the military organization that was created in Pakistan as a result.

Under the US military Assistance Program (MAP) that was set up, Pakistan military forces were divided into two distinct formations, namely the MAP forces and non-MAP forces. US military assistance was earmarked exclusively for units designated as MAP forces, which were deployed in the Western approaches to the country, for intervention in the Middle East in accordance with US requirements. Military aid supplied under the program was not to be used by Non-Map forces , those deployed vis-a-vis India, such as forces on the Kashmir border, the Indian border generally or in East Pakistan. This was strictly supervised by US officials who were stationed right inside the Pakistan Army GHQ in Rawalpindi.

By the end of 1953 a Pakistani Army Planning Board consisting entirely of military officers, was set up, with US advisers, to consider questions of reorganization of the Pakistan army, its plans and commitments. An American Military Survey Mission arrived in February 1954 and in October of that year a US Military Assistance Advisory Group,(MAAG) was established at the Pakistan Army GHQ at Rawalpindi. The MAAG remained ensconced in the Pakistan army GHQ and wielded great influence, until the US removed them unceremoniously on the outbreak of the first India-Pakistan war in 1965. By these means a direct institutionalized link was established between the Pakistan army and the Pentagon, by-passing the normal inter-governmental channels, the Prime Minister and the Cabinet. In 1956 Mr. Zahid Hussain, the first Governor of the State Bank of Pakistan spoke to the present writer about the very deep concern that was being felt by senior ministers who claimed that the US was dealing directly with the army, outside the normal inter- governmental channels and that they, the Ministers, had no idea of what was going on. US influence on the Pakistan Army was pervasive. Major General Fazal Muqeem Khan, the army historian, has recalled the 'decisive influence on the ideas of the officer corps...the Pakistani commanders and staff ... and army planners', of the new US contacts, of US sponsored training courses and study tours of the US. American training teams and individual American officers were attached to Pakistani units and the GHQ." (Khan, 1963: 159)

The Pakistan army was also being bolstered up and prepared for a role that it was to fulfill within the Pakistan political system, to secure 'stability' of a regime that would have the responsibility of delivering on its obligations under the Alliance. A "Summary Presentation of the (US) Mutual Security Program" published in 1957 stated that: " From a political viewpoint, US military aid has strengthened Pakistan's armed services, the

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greatest single stabilizing force in the country and has encouraged Pakistan to participate in collective defense agreements." (Italics added H.A.). Pakistan's political leadership was marginalised even though Pakistan was not as yet under direct military rule.

Having undertaken obligations on behalf of the US and the Western powers and being recipient of military aid, one assumes that as a result Pakistan was to be a net receiver of resources on that account. But we find a curious result if we look at the balance sheet of military expenditure. We discover that Pakistan was not a net receiver of aid from the US because of the expenditure that Pakistan itself was required to undertake for sustaining military capacity for meeting US and Western regional military needs. The alliance imposed on Pakistan obligations to pay from its own budget local costs of the armed forces that were required to protect US and Western interests in the Middle East, a very strange deal indeed. What the US provided was only hardware but that too was for use only by MAP forces which were maintained exclusively for the benefit of the Alliance. Not only did Pakistan have to bear the cost of establishment and pay of these forces, but in times of financial stringency, it was the MAP forces which were given a prior claim over Pakistan's available resources in its military budget. If cuts had to be made, Pakistan had to cut expenditure on Non- MAP forces i.e. forces that Pakistan maintained for its own defense. According to Col. Jordan substantial cuts which were applied on foreign currency allocations for military purchases abroad in 1960, affected largely Non-MAP forces. (Jordan, 1962) Pakistan was paying heavily for the defense of Western oil interests in the Middle East. This was a curious policy for any free nation to undertake. It can be explained only by the ambitions of powerful Generals that were served by an inflated military.

Naturally the US was delighted with these arrangements. Considering the prospects, the US secretary of the Treasury said before US Senate Hearings: "The military aid, and to what extent it may be continued as I see it, is just a matter of how much cheaper can we do it that way than we can do it another way. That is just a matter of figuring it out overtime. As long as we can save some money doing it, I am for it. As long as we can save some boys, I am for it.'' congressman Vorys, testifying at the House of Representatives hearings on Mutual Security Act, in 1956, said: "Last year it cost $ 5,900 to have an American soldier overseas without a gun in his hand. This program costs the US $ 744 per each man in service with weapons in his hands at places where our Joint Chiefs thinks he ought to be for mutual security." (Italics added, H.A.) It was an incredibly one-sided deal. The benefit to the US was not only a financial one or a question of whether brown lives were more expendable than white. There was also an underlying political calculation. Politically (and internationally) it would evoke very different responses if Pakistani troops were to march into Iran to go to the aid of their ally, the Shah threatened with domestic insurgency than it would be for US troops to march in which would only excite further anti-colonial sentiments and thereby strengthen the national insurgency. Intervention by proxy could be politically wiser.

The 'Client Garrison Strategy' had its critics in the US at the time, notably some influential figures in the State Department. One of the most vocal of these critics, C.B. Marshall, a member of the State Department Policy Planning Staff, who was at one time

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Political Adviser to Pakistan's Prime Minister Suhrawardy, referred to the weakness of Pakistan's political system and its internal instability which would stand in the way of Pakistan actually being able to deliver on its obligations under the Alliance, if and when the time came. The Alliance he insisted would be unworkable. Campbell writes in a similar vein: "Pakistan ... is a nation that has not yet found political stability. ... It cannot be expected to play a major role in the Middle East." (Campbell. 1960: 289)

In the event, this 'Client Garrison Strategy' was indeed to be put to a test at the time of the Kassem coup in Iraq. In the event it failed that test, as demonstrated by its inability to intervene. The idea of intervention was considered at an emergency meeting in Ankara of the Baghdad Pact powers (minus Iraq of course). But intervention was ruled out by a number of factors. One of these was that Pakistan itself was then in the throes of a major political crisis, which was to result in the coup d'etat, only a few months later, in October l958. It was clear that the "'Client Garrison Strategy' did not work and was not workable and the US soon abandoned it. Although the Baghdad Pact was reincarnated in the form of CENTO, life had gone out of it.

The US set about working out a fresh strategy for its Middle East defense in which Pakistan was to have no role. This shift in US policy away from Pakistan was associated with a parallel shift towards India. The crisis of the Indian Second Five Year Plan by 1959 and India's need for US aid, especially food aid, had softened Indian non-alignment although the rhetoric remained. The Sino-Indian war of 1962 was a decisive moment which opened up fresh opportunities for the US to develop ties with India in terms of military aid as well as economic aid. Against that background Pakistan was shunted aside by the US. for it had become a political liability in US dealings with India.

Cut adrift yet again by one more shift in US policy. Pakistan found itself again relatively isolated on the world scene, although not quite as badly as it had been in its first five years. Pakistan's relations with the US worsened. But at this time Pakistan became greatly concerned by the rapid increase in India's military might, following its re- armament program after 1962, in the aftermath of its border war with China. The Pakistani military felt that the balance of military power between the two countries was shifting decisively in India's favor. Ayub Khan made a desperate bid in 1965 for wresting Kashmir from Indian hands by military force, before it was too late. He over-estimated Pakistani military strength vis-a-vis India. But it was also a case of 'now or never'. It was a very rash and ill calculated move which Pakistan was to regret. Annoyed, the US put an embargo on military supplies to Pakistan and cut off aid.

Pakistan's relationship with the US had never been cooler, although Ayub Khan did his best to keep as much US goodwill as he could do. Meanwhile Pakistan built up an increasingly close relationship with China. Along with France. China became the most important supplier of arms to Pakistan in that period. Ayub Khan put a bold face on the new situation and designated the new foreign policy as 'bilateralism'. In the 1970s, under Bhutto, Pakistan made special efforts to cultivate friendship with oil rich Middle Eastern countries, to which Pakistan exported manpower, now a major source of foreign exchange earnings and from whom it also began to receive financial aid. On the other

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hand, Pakistan provided military contingents to Saudi Arabia to underpin the regime there. In that context Pakistan began to exploit Islamic ideology to signify and strengthen its relationships with these countries. The US encouraged the development of these ties. Pakistan also served the US in other ways. In 1969, under Yahya Khan, Pakistan played an intermediary role in the negotiations that eventually led to a resumption of US diplomatic relationship with China.

But it was after 1979 that there was yet another clearly marked shift in US policy for the region in which, once again, Pakistan was to have an important role. There were two, quite different contexts in which this shift took place. That which is the more well known is Pakistan's role in connection with Afghanistan. It allowed the US and Chinese to operate from its territory in supplying arms and aid to the Afghan fundamentalist guerrillas and it also played a direct role itself in organizing and seeking to control the guerrilla operations through the ISI, the Inter- Services Intelligence Agency, the powerful Pakistani military intelligence agency. In return US substantial military aid to Pakistan was resumed by the US.

In the longer term in considering the factors underlying the shift in US policy and its resumption of economic and military aid to Pakistan, it is Pakistan's potential role in the Persian Gulf region, which is far more important for the US and the Western powers. In the wake of the Islamic Revolution in Iran the Western military strategy for the Persian Gulf region that had relied on underpinning the regime of the Shah, was in ruins. Another component of the policy that was evolved in the 1960s aimed to secure a direct US military presence in the region. This was to be through moving the US Seventh Fleet into the Indian ocean, to operate from Singapore to Suez. To support these US naval operations the island of Diego Garcia was seized from Mauritius, with the collusion of the Wilson government in Britain, and handed over to the US, and its few inhabitants deported to Mauritius. Diego Garcia is a horseshoe shaped atoll which can accommodate an entire fleet in safe harbor. It was to be a logistics base for operations of the US navy and Marines in the Indian ocean area. US military capability was to underpin the fragile regimes of the Gulf region. A further component of this new strategic thinking was the role of a Rapid Deployment Force (RDF) which as formed in March 1980. The RDF, needs quick follow up support for which Diego Garcia is too far in relation to the Persian Gulf region. The US had therefore to seek bases and facilities nearer at hand, Pakistan territory, especially the Makran coast is particularly well suited for this.

Existence of US bases on the Makran coast in Baluchistan, on the Persian Gulf, is officially very strongly denied in Pakistan. What is quite intriguing, however, is the existence of a top security military installation on the desolate Persian Gulf coast line in Makran at a point where there are some excellent deep water inlets, a few miles from Gwadur which is 50 miles from the Iranian border, at the far western corner of Baluchistan. No one is allowed to approach it for many miles from either land or sea. So far west such a top secret military installation can have little value for the defense of Pakistan itself. The nature and purpose of this installation must, for the moment, remain a matter for speculation.

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In this changed context 'the Pakistan option' has thus reappeared as a realistic component of the US regional strategy. "The Pakistan option makes a certain amount of sense within the context of America's Islamic-oriented Gulf interests. ... It also complements the US relationship with Turkey, because Turkey and Pakistan both have good relations with Iran." (Kuniholm, 1987: 335) Kuniholm omits possibly the most important aspect of this, namely Pakistan's strategic location on the Persian Gulf. The US military strategy is now in the hands of CENTCOM which covers the Persian Gulf and the Indian ocean area. Lifschultz, a well informed commentator on this subject, gives an excellent account of the new arrangements under CENTCOM. (Lifschultz, 1986) Commenting on Pakistan's new role in it he describes facilities and bases that the US has now available in Pakistan which, as he points out, is now the third largest recipient of US military aid. He quotes the testimony of an American participant at a closed door Congressional hearing in 1985, who is reported to have said that: 'General Kingston and the Central Command hope to draw Pakistan into a network of understandings which has implications for the sub-continent since Pakistan is covered by CENTCOM. ..'. P-3 ASW planes are occasionally using Pakistani airfields and there will be pressure for more access of this type." (ibid:73).

So once again Pakistan-US relations are being grounded in concerns about defense of Western oil interests in the Middle East. This Westward orientation of Pakistan has been facilitated greatly by the liberation of Bangladesh for Pakistan will no longer be inhibited from taking on commitments in the Middle East because of political opposition, as was the case earlier, from East Pakistan. It is unlikely, given the power and might of India, which will always be a matter for consideration by Pakistan's rulers, that Pakistan will cease to be a part of South Asia. Its eastward orientation is dictated by that factor as well as by facts of history. Pakistan will remain an integral part of South Asia not least because of the common linguistic and cultural as well as historical legacy and hopefully, friendly economic ties in the future. But as Pakistan's disputes and conflicts with India are resolved, its gravitation towards the Middle East, politically, militarily and possibly ideologically, may well continue with greater vigor.

[Back to Hamza Alavi Homepage]Published in: Fred Halliday and Hamza Alavi (eds)

State and Ideology in the Middle East and Pakistan , London & New York, 1988

PAKISTAN AND ISLAM : ETHNICITY AND IDEOLOGYby Hamza Alavi

Pakistan and Islam

There is a pervasive belief, held more widely outside Pakistan than in the country itself, that Pakistan like Israel and Iran, is one of three confessional states in the world; that, like Israel, Pakistan's very origin was to fulfil a religious ideal, to create an Islamic state and Islamic society for Muslims of India. Within Pakistan itself that slogan was proclaimed most stridently by the Jamaat-e-Islami, a fundamentalist extreme right wing party, which

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was aided and abetted by politically bankrupt regimes such as that of Gen. Zia which hoped, by exploiting the good name of Islam, to gain some spurious political legitimacy.

Quite apart from the fact that the Jamaat-e-Islami never succeeded in gaining mass public support, a fact that was confirmed by the fact that it was routed totally even in the few seats that it chose to contest in successive elections, its fortunes have languished even further since the sudden death of Gen. Zia, its great benefactor. What much is more to the point in the present context is the time-serving quality of the Jamaat-e-Islami's political ideology and that party's demonstrated capacity to turn it upside down, when circumstances made that more expedient. Before Pakistan was created, the Jamaat-e-Islami's ideological stance was exactly the opposite of what it now claims. Then the Jamaat had vigorously opposed the Pakistan movement and denounced its leadership. Once Pakistan was created it decided to stand on its head and for the nearly half a century since the Partition it has masqueraded as the principal thekedar, the authoritative steward, of the so-called 'Pakistan Ideology' , an undefinable conception which it has used as a weapon with which to berate and beat down every political opponent. But behind that present image lies the truth of the fact that this was an overnight politically opportunistic conversion of faith, So much for consistency and intellectual honesty.

This is but only one of many facets of a cascade of major contradictions that underlie any suggestion that the creation of Pakistan was the result of a struggle by Muslims of India to create an 'Islamic State'. We have to face up to the glaring fact that the Pakistan movement was vigorously opposed by virtually the entire Muslim religious establishment in India. The Jamaat-e-Islami itself was then of little consequence, for before the Partition it was a small and insignificant band of religious zealots. Far more significant was the opposition by the major authoritative Muslim religious bodies in India such as the Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Hind, the principal organisation of Sunni Ulema. It was only on the eve of Independence that Liaquat Ali Khan was able to win over a section of that great body who were to find their new fortunes in the new State of Pakistan. At another level, in terms of popular Islamic religious movements was the fanatical Majlis-i-Ahrar. A powerful populist movement of lower middle class and poor urban Muslims, mainly of the Punjab, the Majlis-i-Ahrar was implacably anti-colonialist and equally hostile to the Pakistan movement whose leaders they denounced as stooges of the British imperialists. After the Partition, Majlis-i-Ahrar ceased to be a political party and degenerated into a tiny extremely bigoted and fanatic religious sect.

This universal opposition of virtually every significant religious group in Undivided India, indeed the entire Muslim religious establishment to the Pakistan movement and the Muslim League cannot be reconciled with any idea of religious origins of Pakistan. This is just one of many paradoxes that anyone who thinks of that the true reason for the creation of Pakistan was to establish a religious 'Islamic state', must unravel.

Our people are ignorant about these facts because there has been a systematic campaign of disinformation over more than four decades. It reached its peak under General Zia. In a recent work, entitled 'The Murder of History in Pakistan'. 1A the distinguished historian, K.K. Aziz has shown how thoroughly distorted is the presentation of our own past

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through the re-writing of history is in Pakistan. The people of Pakistan are entitled to know the truth. The motives of the state authorities in instigating and promoting this project of systematic disinformation need to be examined and understood.

Here we have yet another paradox. The men of power in Pakistan, the bureaucrats, military leaders and politicians generally, all in truth have an essentially secular intellectual make up and few are devout practitioners of their religion. In their hands Islam has been made into just a political slogan, a mask that feel they must wear when facing the public. They mistakenly feel that they need this for the legitimization of power in the eyes of the masses. Because having nothing to offer to the common people by way of improving their material conditions of life and labouring under the illusion that the mass of the people are and unthinking fanatical lot who will be carried away by their insincere slogans, they wrongly believe that they can mobilise their support by resort to religious slogans. The results of successive elections have proved them wrong. But the falsification of Pakistan's history continues, driven by the unthinking political calculations of the state authorities who organise the production and dissemination of distorted propagandist accounts of our history through the commissioning of 'approved' textbooks, controlled by a bureaucratic 'Textbook Board'. Schools and colleges in Pakistan are required to disseminate such falsified accounts of the past to their students. As a consequence of this, after nearly half a century since the Partition, we have generations of Pakistanis who have no idea whatever of the reality of our history. All they know is the fiction that is relayed to them through the state controlled educational system and the media.

What then was Pakistan movement all about, if it was not a religious movement for creating an 'Islamic State' ? The answer, in a nutshell, could be that the Pakistan movement was a movement of Muslims i.e. an ethnic movement, rather than a movement of 'Islam' i.e. a religious movement. Even that formulation needs to be qualified, for the Pakistan movement, paradoxically, failed (until the very eve of the Partition) to draw any substantial support in the Muslim majority provinces which were later to constitute the State of Pakistan. The solid base of support for the Muslim League (for most of its history i.e. until 1946, as well shall examine) lay in the Muslim minority Provinces of India, notably The UP and Bihar. The Muslim League was founded in 1906. It was not Mr. Jinnah who founded it. He was, rather, a leading figure of the Indian National Congress. It was in 1913 that he was invited by the Lucknow based Muslim Leaguers, led by Wazir Hassan, to join them. Their motive in asking him is quite interesting. They asked him because of the enormous standing and prestige that Mr Jinnah had in the Congress with which the League leadership had decided to build closer links. It was later that Mr. Jinnah reassessed the situation and recognised the value of an organised Muslim constituency and a role for himself as their spokesman, though that was for a long time with him still within the Indian National Congress of which he remained an active an influential member.

For nearly four decades the Muslim League failed to make any significant impact in the Muslim majority areas which were dominated by feudal landed magnates (indeed by a coalition of Muslim, Hindu and Sikh landlords). The main political support of the

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Muslim League, it will be argued here, derived mainly from the job-seeking educated urban middle classes and professionals (whom we have designated as the ' salariat', although at one stage the Muslim landed magnates of the UP, fearful of radical politics that were developing within the Congress with its commitment to land reform, decided to back the Muslim League as a political counter to the Congress but without fully understanding where the Muslim League politics would ultimately take them.

In the 1920s, following the Montagu-Chelmsford Reforms, Hindu and Muslim landlords were allied under the 'Agriculturist Party' (similar to the Unionist Party of the Punjab). It was the coming of the Government of India Act, 1935 that changed the political equation and with the parallel radicalisation of the Congress with its commitment to land reform, the landed magnates in the UP looked for other options. They decided to join communal organisations, the Hindu Mahasabha, or the All India Muslim Conference or the Muslim League. Behind the rivalry of the Muslim Conference and the Muslim League lay the rival ambitions of Sir Fazl-i-Hussain, who set up the Muslim Conference, to displace Mr. Jinnah as the legitimate spokesman of the Muslims of India. Though the loyalties of the landed magnates were thus much divided, the Muslim 'salariat' stood solidly with the Muslim League.

How did this organisation of a minority of Muslims of India suddenly become successful in founding a new State ? For an answer to that question we must examine rather closely developments that took place in the later war years, the changing hopes and fears of various classes of people, not least the landed magnates, as the prospects of Independence appeared over the horizon. The year 1946 was the decisive when the destiny of the Muslim League was finally settled. That year was a true turning point. Forces based in the Muslim majority provinces that had so far opposed the Muslim League, suddenly changed their colours and turned completely round. It might appear, on the face of it, that they now chose to follow Mr Jinnah and the Muslim League into Independence. The truth of the matter was the new converts, the feudal lords, did not just join the Muslim league. In reality they took it over. We have to examine the implications of this for the fate of Pakistan that was newly created, its founding father a dying man.

What do we mean when we say that the Pakistan movement was at its weakest in all the Muslim majority provinces of India. Take the situation in the Punjab. There the dominant ruling Party was a secular alliance of landed magnates, Muslims, Hindu and Sikh together, in the shape of the Unionist Party. The Unionist Party was a political alliance of Muslim, Hindu and Sikh landowners. Its founder and famous leader was Sir Fazli Hussain, a Muslim. But Sir Fazli Hussain's right hand man was Sir Chhotu Ram, a great Hindu landowner. The third main figure in that ruling triumvirate Sir Sundar Singh Majithia, the leader of Sikh landed interests.

The Muslim League in the Punjab did have some famous figures associated with it, notably Mohammad Iqbal. These were mainly urban professionals, and members of the 'salariat' (see page 6 ff.), the educated classes that look to access to government jobs for their upward advancement. But, as a group they were merely a handful and weak and ineffective. in the political arena. They were patronised by Sir Fazli Husain who at the

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same time despised them. That Party remained the unchallenged ruling Party in the Punjab until the eve of the Partition, with a only a few defections to the Muslim League; but such defections increased rapidly as the prospects of Independence drew over the horizon. The politically more astute and, in terms of recognition of their class interests, far sighted landlords such as Mumtaz Daulatana and Nawab Mamdot, saw the need to change horses earlier than many others. Ultimately, by that fateful year 1946, most of them accepted the change of tactics to preserve the long term interests of their class by joining the Muslim League and taking over the new state of Pakistan, which was to be the guarantee of their survival as a landlord class which was threatened by the Congress commitment to land reform.

Likewise in Sindh, the provincial government were in the hands of changing coalitions of Muslim and Hindu landlords working together, their social background being much the same that of the Unionists in the Punjab. In the Sarhad (NWFP), there was in fact a Congress Government in power until mass arrests of all Congressmen during the war, which temporarily gave some room for groups of Khan's to play politics for a while, manipulated by the British Governor, Sir George Cunningham. In Bengal, there was a more radical coalition of Muslim and Hindus in power, under the banner of the secular Krishak Proja Party, in which all religious communities stood together. Led by A.K. Fazlul Haq, their main demand that united them was for abolition of Zamindari. Not surprisingly Zamindars of Bengal both Hindu and Muslim, were lined up together against them, even if they belonged to different Parties. These included Nawab Salimullah of Dacca whose name is associated with the founding of the Muslim League. It would be a mistake to read too much into that for soon after its founding conference the leadership of the League passed into the hands of the urban professionals and the salariat, mainly of the UP and Bihar. Of this too more later. Finally, Baluchistan was ruled directly from the centre and the people of Baluchistan had no voice in national struggles.

If we reflect on the fact that the main strength of the movement led by the Muslim League came not from the from the Muslim majority provinces but, instead ,from the Muslim minority provinces of India, notably the UP and Bihar, we are faced with yet another paradox. If we think of the Pakistan Movement as one that was aimed at creating a separate state for the Muslims of India, that could be constructed only out of the Muslim majority provinces of India; but initially at any rate, they gave little support to the movement. What we need to ask what that offer to Muslims of the minority provinces ? Given the fact that the main beneficiaries of the Partition were bound to be Muslims of the Muslim majority provinces what was in it for the people of UP and Bihar who were prepared to sacrifice themselves and their families and their future for it ? What was the motivation that drove them behind a movement that offered so little to those who were bound to be left behind in India. True, a few of them managed to migrate to Pakistan, though under conditions of great hardship and heartbreak, to found a new future and new fortunes. But still India remains a country with the largest Muslim population and the creation of Pakistan the Muslims of UP, Bihar and other Muslim minority provinces of India. The Partition has solved no problems for those who were left behind, the majority of them. What motivated them therefore to back the Pakistan movement far more strongly than the Muslims of Muslim majority provinces.

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If we were to answer this question by saying that their motivation was purely ideological, that they were carried away by a movement of 'Islam' and practical considerations did not matter, at first sight that may sound to be a plausible answer. No doubt those who wish to represent the Pakistan movement as a religious movement, committed to 'Islamic Ideology' (however that may be defined) might seize on such an argument. But if we examine the argument closely, we soon find ourselves bound up with yet more questions and contradictions. Such an explanation would undermined by the fact that the main bases of the Muslim religious establishment that were located precisely in the Muslim minority provinces were implacably hostile to the Pakistan movement and its 'westernised' leadership. On the other hand, the educated Muslim government job-seekers and professionals , the Muslim 'Salariat' (see page 6ff.) who had lined up behind the Muslim League, with very few exceptions, could hardly be said to have been deeply moved by religious motives. They certainly did not allow themselves to be guided in this matter by the Islamic religious establishment. The notion that the Pakistan movement was motivated by 'Islamic ideology' cannot be sustained on the basis of evidence and reason. This points to some issues to which we shall come later, that need to be examined much more carefully than has so far been done.

Some Alternative Theories of the Origin of Pakistan

We have begun by recognising that the Pakistan movement was not motivated by an Islamic ideology, a proposition that we shall examine more fully below. There are other alternative explanations, of the Pakistan movement which too we will examine in the course of our analysis as we proceed. We shall find that most of them too have no more substance than the one that we have mentioned above. At this stage we might see what these alternative explanations are.

After the 'Islamic Ideology' thesis, a second argument, that we may consider is one that has been much favoured by Indian Nationalist historians and which was also the official position of the Communist Party before 1942 (when it changed its mind and decided to support the Pakistan movement) and once again after Independence when the CPI again changed its mind and resumed its original argument, is that the Pakistan movement was a movement of Muslim 'feudal' landlords who were hand in glove with the British colonial rulers. They suggest that the Movement was instigated and fostered by the British who hoped thereby to divide the Indian nationalist movement - Divide and Rule ! As we proceed to examine the facts, we will find that this theory too is misconceived and slurs over many facts and aspects of a complex history.1

There is a third explanation of the Pakistan movement. It was adopted by the Communist Party in 1942 (when it decided to support the Pakistan movement and tried to push for 'Congress-League Unity' via 'Gandhi-Jinnah talks'). This position lasted until Independence when its position was again reversed. This was also the 'Soviet' official view from 1942 onwards and continued through the years unchanged, unlike that of the CPI. This view that the Pakistan movement was a movement of the ( weak ) Muslim national bourgeoisie and therefore a legitimate anti-imperialist movement, deserving of communist support, in line with the stand taken by Lenin at the Second Congress of the

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Communist International in 1921.2 This view was reiterated by Soviet scholars, notably in the widely available work of Yuri Gankovsky and Gordon-Polonskaya on the History of Pakistan.3 They produced names of a few prominent Gujarati Muslims from a business community background who were associated with peripherally the early Muslim League, to support their argument. That view is also mistaken. The predominantly Gujarati Muslim trading communities of India, barring one or two individuals, took little part in the Muslim movement, which was dominated, above all by Muslim professionals and the salariat (see below) of northern India, especially of the UP and Punjab. The Gujaratis were isolated from them linguistically and culturally as well as politically and had no objective class interests of their own that the Muslim movement could then serve. There were a few individuals, especially professionals, drawn from Gujarati business communities, notably Mr. Jinnah himself, a rich and successful lawyer son of a not too successful trader, who did play a part in the Muslim movement. But from this we cannot infer class involvement.

Muslim State and Islamic State

The irony of the argument that Pakistan was founded on religious ideology lies, if we may repeat the point, in the fact that every group and organisation in the Sub-continent of India that was specifically religious, was hostile to Jinnah and the Muslim League and had strongly opposed the Pakistan movement. Fore most amongst them was the Jamiat-ul-Ulema-e-Hind, the leading organisation of the so-called 'Deobandi' Ulema, whom we might categorise as Islamic Traditionalists. A great deal of effort was devoted by the Muslim League leadership to win them over and eventually they succeeded in that, though only partially, on the eve of the Partition, by winning over a section of them led by Maulana Shabbir Ahmad Usmani, who formed the Jamiat-ul-Ulema-e-Islam. Likewise, the Islamic Fundamentalist Jamaat-e-Islami, led by Maulana Maududi, was no less opposed to the Pakistan movement, although since the Partition they have gone to great lengths to conceal or explain away their earlier stance. Again, the Nationalist Muslims who were in the Indian National Congress not only included secular minded figures like Rafi Ahmad Kidwai, but also, and especially, Muslims educated in the classical tradition who were deeply religious such as their leader Abul Kalam Azad who was steeped in Muslim classical and religious learning.

This was in contrast to the modernist education and style of life and aspirations of the Muslim League leadership. A claim that the creation of Pakistan was a fulfilment of millenarian religious aspirations of Indian Muslims would therefore stand in contradiction to the alienation of the principal bearers of the religion of Islam in India from the Pakistan movement and, contrary-wise, the explicit commitment of the leaders of the movement to secular politics. These apparently contradictory aspects of the history of Pakistan are over looked by scholars, mostly foreign, who are mesmerised by the spectre of militant fundamentalist Islam arisen throughout the 'Muslim world'.4 In Pakistan itself history has been systematically rewritten and ideologists of the regimes in power have spared few efforts to present the Pakistan movement as a fundamentalist religious movement.

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A Theory of 'Ethnicity' in Colonised Societies

With an Agrarian Production Base.

My contention is that the Pakistan movement was neither a millenarian ideological movement devoted to the realisation of an Islamic state nor was it a movement of feudal landlords nor yet again a movement of an emergent Muslim national bourgeoisie, although it is true that by 1946 the Muslim League reached an accommodation with the landed magnates who ruled over Sind and Punjab, but on their terms. We shall examine their specific role. It will be argued that central driving force behind the Muslim movement was a class that has a distinct place in colonised societies whose role needs to be recognised more fully and explicitly. I have labelled that class as the 'salariat', the urban educated classes who qualify for employment in the colonial state. With them we may take the new professionals, especially lawyers, journalists and urban intellectuals generally who share many of the problems and aspirations of the salariat.

In a nutshell the argument of this paper is, to repeat, that the Pakistan movement was a movement of Muslims rather than of Islam; a movement in which diverse Muslim ethnic groups from different regions, representing different social strata and interests, were allied in pursuit of quite material objectives. At the centre of that movement was a coalition of the emerging Muslim salariats of different regions of India. That coalition was to break down as soon as Pakistan was created and the Muslim movement had outlived its purpose. Moreover, that temporary and precarious alliance did not include all Muslims of India all the time, for Muslim nationalism was at its weakest in the Muslim majority provinces, having little appeal to the rural classes. Even for those who were drawn into the movement, there was no automatic nor permanent translation of the attribute of Muslim by faith or Muslim by descent, into an enduring conception of an undifferentiated Muslim nation. On the contrary, the central axis of Pakistan's political history has revolved around strident affirmations of regional and linguistic ethnic identities that have refused to be set aside, de-legitimised and dissolved by slogans of Islamic ideology or claims of 'Muslim' nationhood raised on behalf of the dominant ethnic groups.

Comprised of diverse groups, both regionally and socially, the unity of the movement that ultimately resulted in the creation of Pakistan was a precarious one. Jinnah's political genius lay precisely in his ability to orchestrate a loose, volatile and unpredictable coalition of forces. He is generally pictured as a man with a firm and total grip over the groups that he was leading. But that is a myth, made plausible by his powerful and commanding personality. In reality his hold over the various groups was quite tenuous and he had to take them on their own terms. He merely stood at the centre of a political process around which diverse regional groups revolved, over whom he had little control.

By the late 1940s, as Independence, very likely to be inherited by the Indian National Congress, was clearly on the horizon, Jinnah and the All India Muslim League provided the predominantly rural magnates of the Muslim majority provinces (notwithstanding the fact that hitherto they had been united with Hindu and Sikh landlords and organised in

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right-wing 'secular parties, such as the Unionist Party of the Punjab) a convenient voice and hopefully influential voice at the centre of Indian politics, in the dialogue with colonial masters about the fate of independent India, as well as the Indian National Congress their main rival contender. The landed magnates were quite cynically prepared to make use of Jinnah and the All India Muslim League for that purpose. That supported the illusion of a unified Muslim nation in India. But it was a marriage of convenience, for the provincial magnates on whom Jinnah depended for support and his own legitimacy, were not prepared to surrender their local power and autonomy. It was they, rather than the central leadership of the Muslim League, who dictated the terms of their mutual alliance. Nevertheless the idea of a Muslim nation gained temporary currency and Jinnah became the embodiment of that conception. The Pakistan movement, in that sense and to that extent, became a national movement, on the basis of the 'Two Nation Theory' that Jinnah propounded, affirming that Muslims of India were a separate nation from Hindus. Insofar as their politics entailed the establishment of their own state, their objective was the creation of a 'Muslim state', as a nation state; they did not seek an 'Islamic state', as a theocratic conception.

The Muslim Salariat and Muslim Ethnicity

I will argue here that there was one particular social group for whom, more than any other, the conception of Muslim' nationhood (and not religious ideology) was particularly meaningful. That class was the product of the colonial transformation of Indian social structure in the 19th century and it comprised those who had received an education that would equip them for employment in the expanding colonial state apparatus as scribes and functionaries, the men ( for few women were so employed ) whose instrument of production was the pen. For the want of a better term I have referred to them as the salariat. The term 'middle class' is too wide and 'petty bourgeoisie' has connotations, especially in Marxist political discourse, that would not refer to this class.

The 'salariat' is an 'auxiliary class' (a concept that must be distinguished from that of a 'ruling class ) whose class role can be fully understood only in terms of its relation to 'fundamental classes' (from which the 'ruling class' is drawn); i.e. the economically dominant classes viz. the economically dominant metropolitan and indigenous bourgeoisies and the land owning classes on the one hand and, and the subordinate classes, the proletariat and the peasantry on the other. Given a particular configuration of class forces in the state and society members of the salariat attach themselves to 'fundamental classes' by virtue of their own personal 'class origins' or through 'class affiliation' by virtue of its need and willingness to serve an economically dominant class for career considerations regardless of their individual class origins. . An example of such careerism can be seen in the willingness of the Indian and Pakistani salariat to serve anti-national purposes of foreign (metropolitan) bourgeoisies at the cost of the nation that they purport to serve.

The 'salariat' looms large in colonial societies because there the bulk of the population is rural and agricultural. In the absence of a significant number of people clustered around urban industrial activities, and leaving aside a small number of people engaged in petty

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trading or in the relatively tiny sector of export trade and finance, the urban society revolves mainly around functionaries of the state, and the educated look primarily to the Government for employment and advancement. In some contexts it would be useful to distinguish between different levels of the salariat, for its upper echelons, the bureaucratic and military oligarchies, play a role that is qualitatively different from that of its lower level functionaries. The relative weight of upper echelons of the salariat in the political process vis a vis elected political representatives, is the greater the lower the level of development of the society in question. It is very prominent in many societies of Africa, for example, as it is in Pakistan which has been ruled over by a military bureaucratic oligarchy since its inception, with only a temporary interruption during the rule of the Pakistan People's Party for barely five years. It is less so in post-colonial India which has experienced relatively higher levels of economic and political development, though even there it has not failed to make its mark. The salariat not only serves the economically dominant classes in the colonial and the post-colonial state but it also has its own specific interests by virtue of its particular structural location and its powers, privileges and opportunities for corruption as the 'governing class' in the post-colonial state. In the relatively backward post-colonial societies the upper echelons of the salariat, the bureaucracies and the military, come into their own, by virtue of their direct grip over the state apparatus, in the absence of institutional structures of democratic political control. This is a striking feature of the political scene of Pakistan. 5

It was the Indian salariat and professional classes who were at the core of the Indian nationalist movement in its early stages during the late 19th century, demanding a rightful place for Indians in the state apparatus, for 'Indianisation' of the services and the creation of popular institutions of representative government through which they could have a share in the exercise of power, or at least some measure of control over the state in the name of 'self-government'.6 It was only later that the Indian bourgeoisie threw in its weight behind the nationalist movement and Indian nationalism mobilised wider sections of the Indian people.

Jinnah's 'Two Nations' theory expressed the ideology of the weaker Muslim 'salariat' vis-a-vis the dominant high caste Hindu salariat groups. The Muslim salariat was central to the Pakistan movement. However, in a society in which the rural votes predominate and are controlled by landed magnates, the Muslim salariat could make little progress in elections until it reached an accommodation with the rural magnates by the late 1940s. That was a fragile alliance, founded on temporary calculations of mutual interests. In the Punjab there was a wide gulf between the urban Punjabi salariat and the rural magnates. In Sindh there was no ethnic Sindhi Muslim salariat to speak of.

The alliance between the landed magnates of the Punjab and Sindh and the Muslim salariat, such as it was, was effected between its national leader ship, Jinnah and the All India Muslim League, who had something to offer to the regional power holders by way of ensuring that the post-independence government would not be in the hands of the Congress Party but rather a party that was dependent on them which would therefore ensure their own survival as a class.

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In contrast to the character of the alliance between the rural magnates of Punjab and Sindh and the organisation of the Indian salariat, the All India Muslim League, that between the salariats of Bengal and Sindh in the post-Partition regional ethnic movements in Bengal and Sind with the respective rural power-holders, was quite different. In both these cases there was an 'organic alliance' or bond between the respective salariats and the dominant rural classes of these provinces. The ethnic Bengali and Sindhi salariats, respectively, were the sons of well to do peasants and landlords big and small. The interests of these salariats were, through kinship, organically linked with those of the landed classes of the provinces. Such organic ties are often overlooked when questions of class formation and class alignment are considered entirely in the abstract, when classes are thought of as wholly separate segments of the population.

The Muslim salariat was not evenly distributed in size and influence in different parts of India and its future fragmentation was written into the pattern of its uneven development. If we take the numbers of persons of over 20 years of age who were literate in English as an index of their size, we get the following picture:

ENGLISH LITERATES OVER 20 YEARS OF AGE AMONG MUSLIMS AND HINDUS (Census, 1931)

TOTAL POPULATION (IN MILLIONS)

U.P Punjab Bengal Sindh

Total: 48.4 28.5 51.0 3.9

Muslims 7.2 14.9 27.8 2.8

Muslims % (14.8%) (52.4%) (54.5%) (72.8%)

LITERATES IN ENGLISH OF 20 YEARS AND OVER (IN THOUSANDS)

U.P Punjab Bengal Sindh

Total: 266.0 185.0 722.0 34.0

Muslims 49.4 58.8 175.6 4.9

Muslims % (18.6%) (31.7%) (24%) (14.5%)

Source: Census of India, 1931: Compiled from relevant Provincial Volumes. The 1931 Census date are used because the 1941 Census data, the last pre-partition Census, are notoriously unreliable.

We find that as a class the salariat itself, has a propensity to be easily fractured into different ethnic groups which vie with each other for preference and privilege. Such groups are not defined and determined, once for all, by cultural, linguistic, religious or regional criteria. There is, rather, a process of definition and redefinition of ethnic identity on the basis of perceptions of the distribution of privilege and politically viable options, as they are brought into focus from one stage to the next. Thus in Pakistan Muslim ethnic identity, once it had fulfilled its purpose for the salariats of Bengal, Sindh, Sarhad and Baluchistan, have way to the respective regional ethnic identities. The newly affirmed identities are not of course, constituted out of nothing. They draw on deeply

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embedded cultural, linguistic, religious or regionally significant symbols around which they can mobilise popular support, symbols that can generate a powerful political charge.

Muslim ethnicity therefore was only one stage in such a process of ethnic definition and redefinition. It represented a temporary alliance of various regional groups. Its original thrust came from the Muslim salariat of the UP, where it was especially privileged rather than otherwise but where it was fast losing ground. Elsewhere the Muslim salariat was less developed than the Hindu salariat, so that the interests of the Muslim salariats could be considered to be in opposition to those of Hindus.

The Muslim salariat of the Punjab was the largest amongst Muslims, both in terms of its absolute size as well as its larger percentage share of the entire Punjabi salariat (i.e. 31.7%), though even in that Muslim majority Province the Muslim salariat share was lower than that of Hindus. This was the principal grievance that fuelled the Muslim movement there. Later, after the creation of Pakistan, the Punjabi salariat, by virtue of its much greater size and development was to occupy a dominant position in Pakistan society and the state.

The urdu speaking UP salariat was the next largest. In contrast to Punjab, historically its proportionate share of the overall salariat in the UP was greater than the relative numbers of Muslims in the UP population. But their relative position declined sharply in the 19th century. For example their share of jobs in the highest ranks of colonial service which were then open to Indians, declined from 64% in 1857 to about 35% by 1913, which was a dramatic decline.7 The UP Muslims had a deep sense of grievance and insecurity, notwithstanding the fact that they were still a privileged minority for their share of the population was only about 13%. This perceived threat to their (privileged) situation probably explains the fact that the initial and the major thrust of the Muslim movement in India came from the UP.

The Bengali Muslim salariat was the largest in terms of absolute size as compared to Muslims of other provinces, although its share of government jobs was proportionately much smaller than that of Hindus of Bengal; Bengali Muslims were always an underprivileged majority. The Sind figures show how small the Muslim salariat was in that province. These figures in fact give a somewhat inflated picture of the insignificant share of ethnic Sindhi Muslims in salariat positions, as these figures include the considerable numbers of non-Sindhi Muslims who were employed in Sindh.

The conception of a unified 'Muslim Nation" of South Asia did not outlast the day of independence and the creation of Pakistan. The inter-regional coalition of the 'Muslim' salariat broke up in the new state, for a new equation of the distribution of privilege and deprivation between them became visible. The Punjabis ( who were temporarily joined by an elite group from 'Muhajirs', Urdu speaking migrants from India) were preponderant in the bureaucracy and the army and were quickly perceived as the privileged and dominant group whereas the other ethnic salariat groups had less than their fair share of access to education, jobs and power.

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Overnight the 'Muslim' identity, behind which they had all rallied together in the Pakistan movement, was laid aside by the regional groups and new ethnic identities were affirmed - Bengali, Sindhi, Pathan and Baluch. It must be added though that the Pathan position has been a little ambiguous after Zia's military coup d'état, in view of the relatively strong representation of Pathans in the army. Again, we find a replication of the Indian example, for now the slogan of 'Akhand Bharat' was echoed in Pakistan by a new slogan of the indivisibility of the Muslim Nation that was proclaimed on behalf of the dominant Punjabis. A person could not legitimately declare himself or herself to be Bengali or Sindhi or Pathan or Baluch, because he or she was a Muslim, and Islam was a religion of equality and brotherhood and would recognise no divisions amongst the people of the faith. It is in that context that Islamic ideology was first placed at the centre of political debate, only after Pakistan was created, to oppose regional ethnic movements.

After Pakistan was created the slogan of Islam was adopted by the dominant component of the salariat in Pakistan. It was invoked at first only nominally. Insofar as it was included in the vocabulary of political debates in Pakistan during the first 30 years, only a few symbolic concessions were made to men of religion to make the argument look convincing. It was no more than a political argument that was used by the dominant Punjabis against the assertion of the new regional and linguistic ethnic identities of Bengalis, Sindhis, Pathans and Baluch. The ruling bureaucratic-military oligarchy, which has dominated Pakistan since its inception, had no intention, thereby, of allowing mullahs and Islamic ideologues, to encroach on their monopoly of power and privilege.8

It was only after the seizure of power by the Zia regime that Islamic ideology was invoked in a rather more strident manner for a new purpose, namely the legitimation of state power itself for a politically bankrupt regime that lacked legitimate authority. It has had to go much further in affirming, symbolically, its commitments to Islam than any previous regime. But the question of Punjabi dominance ( urdu speaking migrants from India who had shared that position with them gradually fell behind ) has not thereby been displaced by politics of Islamic Ideology for it was recognised by opposition groups that this is only a cover for continued Punjabi domination. Ethnicity and religious ideology therefore remain closely intertwined and the various disaffected regional groups are unimpressed by the dramaturgy of religious fervour.

The Formation of the Structure of Muslim Society in India

In view of the relatively low development of the Muslim salariat in general and its uneven development regionally the question has often been asked why Muslims did not take more to education or to trade or commerce, i.e. to middle class occupations. Was that due to some peculiarities of their religion or culture or was it due, as the displaced erstwhile rulers, to their hostility to colonial rule, that systematically discriminated against them after the unsuccessful War of Independence, the Indian Mutiny, in 1857 ? Speculation along these lines most favoured by Muslim nationalist historians.9 But the question is better inverted and we may well ask why in pre-colonial India the urban middle classes, who were engaged in Government service or trade did not convert to

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Islam. This had much to do with the route through which Islam came into the Indian subcontinent.

There are clear patterns of conversions to Islam by different social strata in different regions, which have been little noticed, let alone explained, although the patterns themselves are not difficult to see. There are two distinct and contrasting patterns, each related to the route by which Islam came to a particular region. One route of the advent of Islam was with the Muslim conquerors - though, this did not mean that Islam was therefore spread by the Sword; quite the contrary. The other route was by the sea, through contact with Arab seafarers and traders who for centuries dominated the Arabian sea. These two routes of the penetration of Islam into India had quite different effects on the class distribution and regional patterns of Islamisation. It is the resulting distribution of Muslims between different communities and regions that has constituted the context in which later ethnic movements, that we are concerned with here, were to arise.

A paradox of the advent of Islam with Muslim rule was that at the heart land of Muslim empires of India, in the Gangetic Plain, conversions to Islam were minimal. On the other hand they were maximal in the two peripheries of the empire, namely the Indus Plain, now Pakistan, and Bengal. We have no answers yet to the question why that was so, though we would suspect that there are social structural explanations to be found. The peripheries were perennially given to heresy against the Brahminical orthodoxy that ruled at the heartland of empire.

Before Islam, Buddhism flourished in the two peripheral regions of the Delhi Empires; the Indus plain and the Ganges Delta. Even after the advent of Islam, it was a dissident version of Islam that took root there rather than the orthodox puritanical version of Islam that was established in the UP, where great seminaries of Muslim religious learning flourished. The Islam of the periphery was influenced instead by sufism and was ruled over by pirs who claimed miraculous powers and made profitable business out of the credulity of their followers. It was also infused with a large dose of syncretism, much condemned by the UP based Ulema. By contrast in the UP influence of pirs and sufism was minimal.

The divergence in patterns of religious belief between the Gangetic Plain and the two peripheries is paralleled in divergence in many other aspects of social life. A study by Marriott, for example, plots the scale of rigidity and fluidity in caste ranking and ritual between different regions of India. He found greater fluidity in these the further West one moved away from the Brahminical heartland of the Gangetic Plain towards Punjab and Sindh. Marriott found such differences also among Hindu communities of these regions.10

My own work in the Punjab shows likewise that there is no social institution operating there that can seriously be treated as caste. Even in the matter of structures of kinship there are differences, for patrilateral-parallel cousin marriage (i.e. preferential marriage to father's brother's daughter or structural equivalent) is the rule in the Indus Plain whereas, as one moves East, to East Punjab and Western UP the so-called 'Muslim' structure of kinship gives way to 'gotra' exogamy practised by Jat, Rajput, Meo (etc.); Muslim peasants. Parallel to the regional differences in religious ideology there were also

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regional differences in social structure, which raises questions about the nature of the connections between the two.

If we consider the pattern of conversion to Islam along another axis, we find that there is a fairly clear class pattern of Islamisation associated with the advent of Muslim rulers. Muslim rule installed expatriate Muslims brought from Arabia, Iran, Turkey and Afghanistan as feudal lords at the foundations of their empires and many Hindu, especially Rajput, chiefs converted to Islam. Their dependant peasants 'converted' likewise. Islam was established thereby as a predominantly rural religion. It made much less headway in towns and cities. The relatively low level of conversions to Islam among urban classes suggests absence of coercion by Muslim rulers, who were quite happy to be served by Hindu officials. In the UP Kashmiri Brahmins and Kayasthas were the two main Hindu castes who have traditionally worked for the state both before and after the colonial conquest. The UP and Punjab diverge from this general rule, for there far more Muslims found themselves in the salariat than elsewhere as descendants of those associated with the courts at Delhi, Agra, Lucknow and Lahore found their way into salaried state service. When Pakistan was created men from Punjab and the UP, where the Muslim salariat was the most developed, dominated the bureaucratic-military oligarchy. Over the years, Punjabis have acquired complete ascendancy in Pakistan.

In contrast to the UP and Punjab, Muslims had little share of urban middle class occupations in Sindh and Bengal or in Baluchistan and the NWFP. In Sindh, under Muslim rule, government service was virtually the exclusive prerogative of Amils, a Hindu community. The number of ethnic Sindhi Muslims in government service was minute. Trade in Sindh was traditionally in the hands of another Hindu community called Bhaibands, though during the latter half of the 19th century there was an influx of Muslim and non-Muslim trading communities mainly from Gujarat (including Kathiawar and Cutch) into Sindh (and Punjab). Bengal was no different, for the size of the Muslim salariat there was small and suffered much from discriminatory colonial policies. Aparna Basu notes that 'In lists of qualified candidates drawn up by the Council of Education in Bengal in the years after 1846, Muslim names are conspicuous by their absence'.11 Politics of Muslims in Bengal were predominantly based on rural classes, especially the struggle of ( mainly Muslim) 'Occupancy Tenants' (de facto landowners), for abolition of Zamindari over-lordship, a cause upheld by the non-communal Krishak Proja Party led by A.K. Fazlul Haq.

Islam that came by the sea, with Arab control of overseas trade, resulted in a rather different class configuration of Muslims. (Our concern in this paper is primarily with Northern India and we will ignore for the moment the logic and patterns of Muslim conversions in southern India). In Gujarat (including Cutch and Kathiawar) on the West coast of India, Muslim conversions were mainly from trading communities, Sunnis such as Memons and Shias such as Bohras and Khojas (Ismailis) and Ithna Asharis. This seems to be closely related to the fact that the bulk of the export trade from northern India went abroad through ports in this region, which were all under Hindu rule. Arabs dominated the trade of the Arabian sea. Substantial trading communities which were engaged in export trade in Gujarat, not surprisingly, converted to Islam. The myths of

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origin of these communities speak of benign and tolerant Hindu rulers who did not discourage this. One can see the functionality of such tolerance and goodwill when rival ports were competing with each other to attract the Arab trade. Contrary to the Northern Indian pattern no Muslim land lords were installed in these areas and there were no dependent peasantry therefore to take to Islam, except to the extent that the pattern was to be modified later when Muslim rule itself was extended southwards and was established in Gujarat. There was a diffusion of the Muslim trading communities of Gujarat over various parts of India, during the second half of the 19th century, when they began to move to the new expanding centres of colonial trade, like Bombay, Karachi and Calcutta and elsewhere. There was a push effect as well as a pull effect, for the development of the railway links between Bombay and Karachi with northern India short-circuited the traditional trade routes to the Gujarat ports and the trading communities there had to look for fresh pastures.

These Muslim trading communities were isolated, with respect to language and culture, from the northern Indian salariat. Moreover, these trading communities set a low value on higher education, which was functional for those aspiring for salariat positions. In terms of their own values they despised salaried employment, however eminent. Their children were expected to join the family business after secondary schooling. They missed out therefore even the politicising effects of university life. Nor were they impelled as a class into the Muslim movement which at that time had little to offer them. Their role in Muslim movements was negligible, except for one or two individuals, notably, of course, Mr. Jinnah himself who, however, had cut himself off very early from the modest background of his family and community in Karachi and assimilated himself, as an extremely successful and very rich lawyer, into cosmopolitan upper class Bombay society.

Much is made by some historians of another exceptional case of Gujarati businessmen, namely that of Sir Adamjee Pirbhai, a Dawoodi Bohra industrialist who owned textile mills and the Matheran railway, amongst his varied interests. As a friend of the Agha Khan, he was made to preside over the conference of the Muslim League at Karachi in 1907, that is when the Muslim League had just been launched by the Muslim 'notables' and was about to be seized by the Muslim salariat who soon pushed the notables aside. Sir Adamjee Pirbhai himself was soon to get embroiled in an anti-clerical movement within his own community for which he was to sacrifice his time and his fortune. He had little interest in or time for the Muslim League. It would be a mistake therefore to read in his momentary and peripheral participation or similar participation of a very few such individuals in the Muslim movement, to imply the class involvement of the Gujarat based Muslim bourgeoisie. There was also a much smaller Punjabi section of the Muslim bourgeoisie which likewise, was peripheral to the Muslim movement.

Islamic and Secular Ideologies of Muslims in India

There is a widespread tendency, in the language of scholars as well as in the rhetoric of politicians, to attribute political and ideological positions to 'Muslims' of India, in an over -generalised way, as if Muslims of different social strata and classes in different regions,

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were equally involved. That is manifestly untrue. There were sharp differences in these respects not only between different classes and strata but also between Muslim majority provinces and Muslim minority provinces.

'MUSLIM' IDEOLOGICAL AND POLITICAL POSITIONS IN BRITISH INDIA

I 'MUSLIM' POSITIONS ('All-India - but main base in Muslim minority areas).

i. Islamic Traditionalism- (I) The Ulema I : 'Deobandis'

ii Islamic Traditionalism- (II) The Ulema II: 'Barelvis' & Pirs

iii. Islamic Fundamentalism_- Maududi and the Jamaat-e-Islami

iv. Jamiat-e-Ahrar Anti-colonial 'nationalist' Muslims-- anti-. Muslim League

v. Islamic Modernism - Sir Syed Ahmad Khan & Iqbal

vi. Secular Muslim Nationalism - exemplified by Jinnah and the Muslim League

II NON-COMMUNAL POSITIONS OF MUSLIMS IN MUSLIM MAJORITY AREAS 4

vii. Secular Provincial Non-communal Transactional Politics:

Landlord Dominated Right Wing Punjab Unionist Party and various landlord political groups in Sind, being the ruling groups/parties in both cases.

viii. Secular Provincial Non-Communal Radical Politics:

The Krishak Proja Party of Bengal, led by A.K. Fazlul Haq, the ruling Party in Bengal; Hindu and Muslim tenants together against Zamindars.

x Secular Non-Communal Nationalist Muslims(in Congress Party)

in Sarhad, the N.W.F.P. the ruling party was the Congress under Ghaffar Khan

It was in the Muslim 'minority' provinces, especially in the UP, rather than those in which Muslims were in a majority, that specifically Muslim political and ideological movements were generated. Until the late 1940s, when Jinnah and the Muslim League managed to form an uneasy alliance with dominant groups in the Muslim majority provinces, their politics were not even Muslim nationalist not to say 'Islamic'. They were, rather non-communal politics of landlord dominated groups and political parties.

We have identified eight 'Muslim' ideological-political positions amongst Muslims in India. In addition to the groups mentioned in the above table, there are also Shias, who are estimated to number about 15% of the population of Pakistan; some estimates are

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considerably greater. No reliable data are available. Shias organised the All-India Shia Conference in 1907 to rival Sunni organisations. But, given the fact that leading Shias of the UP were active in the Muslim League instead, the Shia Conference did not make any headway. Since the 1980s, under General Zia, some extremist Shia organisations have surfaced, that parallel extremist Sunni organisations. These are complex and contradictory reactions to the Government's campaign for Islamisation. Shia organisations have been influenced by the dramatic impact of the Iranian revolution, and they are demanding imposition in the country of 'Fiqh-e-Ja'faria', the Shia legal code, rather than a Sunni code. This is obviously a quite extra-ordinary and unrealistic demand which expresses Shia fears of being forced to accept Sunni legislation. The main current of Shia opinion in the country however seems to favour the notion of a secular state.

Contrary-wise there have been equally strident demands that Pakistan be declared a Sunni Hanafi republic and the Hanafi 'fiqh', or legal code, be made the law of the land, that all other sects be declared minorities and be reduced to second class citizenship. This has led to a great deal of sectarian violence. These developments are the inevitable logical extensions of the claim made by the Zia regime that Islamic Law be imposed in Pakistan. The question is: Which Islamic Law ?' Each sect expects that its own particular version be acknowledged and imposed on the rest. Rather than promote any conception of 'Islamic Unity' this is a powerful recipe for disunity and inter-sectarian strife.

There have been numerous other Muslim political movements during the colonial period, such as Khaksars and Ahrars. The latter were extremely hostile to the Pakistan movement. We can also distinguish several sectarian divisions among Sunni Hanafis some of whom are, from time to time, at war with each other. Of these I have listed only three main sectarian categories, namely the i) the 'traditionalist Deobandi Ulema', ii) the 'traditionalist Barelvi Ulema' and iii) the Islamic Fundamentalist Jamaat-e-Islami, whose beliefs and creeds are quite incompatible with each other. (see below) We may also mention two others namely the Ahl-i-Hadith who deny the validity of the four medieval schools of Islam and insist on a literal application of the Quran and Hadith and the Ahl-i-Quran who go even further in demanding absolute reliance only on the Quran, casting some doubt on the reliability of the Hadith which was transmitted through fallible human channels and therefore precarious. Each declares the others to be 'kafirs' or infidels. Summing up evidence taken from all major religious groups a high level judicial Committee of Inquiry (into sectarian riots in 1953), which was headed by the country's two most eminent judges, concluded as follows: 'The net result of all this is that neither shias nor sunnis, nor Deobandis nor Ahl-i-Hadith nor Barelvis are Muslims and any change from one view to the other must be accompanied in an Islamic State with the penalty of death, if the State is in the hands of the party which considers the others to be kafirs.12

Traditionalist Islam: The Ulema -'Deobandi' and Barelvi

The 'Ulema' (plural of alim, a man of - religious - learning) is a grandiose term, which is often used quite loosely, as for example in the results of a survey recently published by the Government of Pakistan which finds the vast majority of them to be barely literate.

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To be properly classified amongst the 'Ulema' a person would have been educated at a religious seminary and would have gone through the 'Dars-e-Nizami' a syllabus that was laid down in medieval India and has hardly changed. Generally, they have little knowledge of the world that they live in, nor even perhaps of the world of Islam except for myths and legends. They inhabit little temples of their own uncomprehending and enclosed minds in which they intone slogans, petrified words and dogmas. Affairs of state and society are, generally, beyond their narrowed vision. There are only a few amongst them who have had the benefit of some tolerable education and who, in their own ways, try to follow current affairs.

The Ulema of the Sunni Hanafi Mazhab, as mentioned above are themselves divided into warring groups of whom the two main are popularly known as the 'Deobandis' ( after the great seminary at Deoband ) and 'Barelvis', after the town of Bareilly in the UP, which was the seat of their mentor Maulana Ahmad Raza Khan Barelvi. Deobandis and Barelvis differ in many respects, by virtue of their different doctrinal positions, the different classes (and regions) amongst whom they have influence and their different political stances. The hallmark of Deobandi Ulema in the late 19th and early 20th centuries was their unremitting anti-colonialism. Barelvis Ulema and Pirs, unlike the Deobandis, were not involved in anti-colonial ideology and struggle. On the contrary, most of them, with few exceptions, supported the colonial regime and, were in turn, favoured by it.

The 'Deobandi' Ulema

It took the Deobandi Ulema many decades of British rule before they began to show their eventual deep resentment against it. One should add, parenthetically, that the label Deobandi is not wholly appropriate here, except for brevity, for the eponymous Dar-ul-Uloom at Deoband was not founded until 1867. Very few of these worthies played a part in the Wahhabi movement of the early 19th century which was led by men of the sword, the last defenders of Indian feudalism, rather than the dispensers of law. Be that as it may the belated hostility of these Ulema to British rule was derived from changes that were being brought about during the middle decades of the 19th century by the colonial state, that directly impinged upon their lives and livelihood.

There were three contexts in which the changes impinged upon them. Firstly, in pre-colonial India Muslim Ulema and Hindu Pandits played a central role in the judicial system and held lucrative and influential positions. That continued in the early years of colonial rule. But soon a new legal system was being established to meet new needs of the expanding colonial capitalist economy. The old feudal dispensations were no longer appropriate. Along with the new laws and new types of courts to adjudicate them, a new class of English educated lawyers and judges took over from the Ulema and they were pushed out of their influential high status and lucrative jobs. Secondly, the Ulema were also being pushed out of the educational system. That process was a bit more slow, though that was not because the colonial regime spared any efforts to speed it up. Indian clerks were needed who would be educated along lines that would prepare them for service in the apparatus of colonial government. The traditional schools run by Ulemas (and Hindu Pandits), with their emphasis on classical learning, Arabic, Persian and

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Sanskrit, were no longer suited to that purpose. They were replaced by new Anglo-vernacular schools, with the active sponsor ship and support from the colonial state. The hostility of the Ulema to the colonial regime no doubt owed much to these bread and butter questions, although it was expressed and legitimised in terms of moral out rage. A third factor underlying the anti-colonialism of the Ulema was the plight of Indian weavers, the Julahas, who were their most fervent followers. Indian weavers, once the most prosperous of the Indian artisan classes, were devastated by the colonial impact and consequent destruction of Indian textile manufacturing. Julahas, were therefore amongst the most embittered opponents of colonialism. They became extremely bigoted and developed an uncompromising attitude towards the West. The Ulema's outlook reflected that also.

All these factors bound the Ulema to the Indian nationalist cause. They never argued for the setting up of an 'Islamic' state nor a Muslim state. Quite the contrary. They called upon Muslims to join hands with their Hindu brothers in the patriotic cause against foreign rule. To rationalise that position they put forward a theory that constituted an essentially secular public philosophy. They separated the domain of faith, as a private domain, from the public domain of politics and government. This was formulated quite explicitly by Maulana Hasan Ahmad Madani of Deoband who argued that:-

(i) faith was universal and could not be contained within national boundaries but

(ii) that nationality was a matter of geography and Muslims were bound to the nation of their birth by obligations of loyalty along with their non-Muslim fellow citizens.

Hindus, Muslims and members of other communities would live together in harmony in independent India which, although not 'dar-ul-Islam', as it would be under Muslim rule was, nevertheless, 'dar-ul-aman', the land of peace, where Muslims would be guaranteed freedom to practice their faith, where it would be the duty of Muslims to live as loyal and law abiding citizens. It was the duty of the Muslim in India to fight with a sense of dedication for the freedom and independence of his country quite as much as he was obliged to fight for the liberty of his conscience and the sanctity of his faith. The political philosophy of the Ulema was a peculiar amalgam of pan-Islamic ideas and Indian nationalist ideas which were fused in their anti-imperialism.13

That contradictory amalgam of ideas came together in the Khilafat Movement (1919-23) in the aftermath of the First World War, which was the climactic moment in the political struggles of the Deobandi Ulema. The aim of the movement, was to resist the removal of the Ottoman Caliph from his high office. It was a bizarre movement of religious obscurantism that unleashed rabid and atavistic passions among Indian Muslims. It ran counter to the aspirations of Turkish and Arab nationalism. It was strongly disapproved by Jinnah. But, ironically, it was backed by Gandhi, leader of secular Indian Nationalism! The movement promised to isolate the Muslim salariat leadership from Muslim masses by arousing their fanatical passions behind a hopeless and anachronistic cause. In 1919, under the leadership of Deoband and in the wake of the Khilafat movement, the Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Hind was formed as the political organisation of the Deobandi Ulema. It was

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during that movement, that they made their biggest, though somewhat brief, impact on the Indian political scene. But they left behind a bitter legacy of narrow communalism especially amongst some sections of the Muslim urban subordinate classes. In the late 1940s the Muslim League made great efforts to win over the Ulema to the Pakistan cause. They eventually succeeded in November 1945, when Pakistan was already in prospect, in winning over a breakaway group from the Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Hind to form the Jamiat-e-Ulema-Islam which has established itself as a political party in Pakistan.

Barelvi Ulema and Pirs

In contrast to the Deobandi Ulema, Barelvis profess a more populist Islam, more infused with superstition, and also syncretism, that make up the religious beliefs of the peasantry. Barelvi version of Islam emphasises belief in miracles and powers of saints and Pirs, worship at shrines and the dispensing of amulets and charms, which are all condemned by Deobandis as un-Islamic. Deobandis and Barelvis detest each other and much sectarian conflict consists of fights between the two Pirs or Sufi shaikhs, play an important part in the religious life of the peasantry. Barelvi Islam is closely tied to devotion to pirs and belief in their powers of intercession (wasilah), whereas Deobandis emphasise personal redemption by rigorous performance of religious ritual and avoidance of sin. However, in the course of extended research in Punjab villages I found that the peasant makes a clear distinction between the powers of the spirit of dead Pirs and those of living Pirs. He goes to shrines of dead Pirs and prays for his intercession for a variety of purposes. He believes that the spirit of the dead Pir can hear him so that he communicates with him directly and has no need for intermediaries. He may show some deference but not too much reverence for the Sajjada Nashins, the guardians of the shrines, who are usually descendants of the dead saint. The Sajjada Nashins are credited by scholars to have spiritual powers. But the peasant himself does not seem to recognise that. Propositions in the literature about powers of the Sajjada Nashins over the peasant,14

not least in the political arena, are a complete myth which cannot survive close scrutiny in the light of observation of what actually goes on. Where Sajjada Nashins do play a role in local level politics, as they often do, they do so by virtue of their rather more material powers as landowners rather than some spiritual hold that they are presumed to have over the peasants.

Living Pirs fall into two categories. Firstly there are Pirs as petty practitioners, dealers in miracles and magic, at a price. They provide amulets or anointed oil to protect the peasant from evil or specific remedies which he buys from them. Such Pirs can make barren wombs fertile, or ease the pain of incurable disease and so on. They take their lucrative business seriously and avoid getting involved in politics for, given the factional division of local level politics, they would run the risk of losing half their clientele if they were to get politically involved. During my extended period of fieldwork in Punjab villages I came across only one solitary case where such a Pir did intervene in politics, due to some exceptional circumstances. He declared that as a man of God politics was not a matter that he would care to get involved in. But he was also able to invoke some high moral principles to explain why on that particular occasion he was compelled to do so. In the event his intervention was totally unsuccessful. Everyone (including the Pir himself)

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could see who, in the event, were those that disobeyed him. The dissident group, in explaining their behaviour to me, made a distinction between the spiritual domain in which the Pir had powers and the worldly domain in which he did not, so that they were not obliged to follow the Pir's call in a matter which should not concern him.

Secondly there are Pirs of an altogether different kind who operate on a a much higher level. Their relationship with peasants is not a direct one based on 'spiritual powers' but is rather a mediated one through landlords and local faction leaders who control the peasantry politically. Such Pirs have mureeds or disciples, who take an oath of allegiance (bai'a, or, in Punjabi bait) to the Pir. At the core of such Pir's coterie of mureeds are powerful landlords, village level faction leaders, and not least government officials, who together constitute a free masonry exchanging patronage and favours, which is tightly organised and controlled by the Pir. They operate with great effect in the political arena, as well as in the dispensing of government favours, through control and distribution of patronage and favours. Their mutual bonds are expressed in the language of kinship and the mureeds consider each other pirbhais, or pir-brothers. The Pir himself, being at the centre of such a structure of 'generalised reciprocity' wields great power. But that is not direct power over the peasantry and it has little to do with religious beliefs of the peasantry. It is a myth to suppose that such Pirs, by virtue of charismatic power, have political authority over the peasants in general, although where their landlords are mureeds. Pirs may indirectly control peasant followers in the political arena. In most cases such Pirs are big and powerful landowners in their own rights and control their own peasants. Political recruitment of peasants by such Pirs therefore takes place on the basis of distinctly non-spiritual powers.15

Deobandi and Barelvi Ulema in Pakistan

Historically, Deobandis have tended to be mainly urban and from middle and upper strata of society whereas Barelvi influence has been mainly in rural areas, with a populist appeal. This has changed somewhat in recent decades, for Barelvi influence has extended to towns and cities, amongst the lumpen-proletariat (peasants in cities) and an insecure urban petty bourgeoisie. Traditionally Barelvi influence has been weaker in the UP (with the exception perhaps of the peasantry of south-western UP ) than in the Punjab and to some degree in Sind. On the other hand the main base of Deobandis was in the UP especially among urban Muslims. In Pakistan they make up a large proportion of Muhajirs, refugees from India. As an unmerited legacy of the Wahhabi movement they are also well entrenched amongst Pathans of the Sarhad (the NWFP) and northern (Pushtun) districts of Baluchistan. That influence now extends, to a certain degree, to Pathan workers and lumpen-proletariat in Pakistan's cities, especially in Karachi; these are their storm troopers in sectarian riots against Shias and Barelvis.

In Pakistan both Deobandis and Barelvis have organised themselves as political parties, the former as the Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Islam ( JUI ) founded in November 1945 and the latter as the Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Pakistan (JUP ) which was founded in 1948. The political influence of each is much more limited than their sectarian following. In Pakistan's first General election - in 1970 the JUI won only seven seats (out of a total of 138 for West

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Pakistan) Not surprisingly six of these were from Sarhad and one from a Pushtun constituency of Baluchistan. The JUP too won seven seats, all from West Pakistan, of which four were from Punjab and three from Sindh, one of them being from the city of Karachi.16 In both cases the rural seats were won not so much on the strength of religious commitment to the Party concerned but rather because the JUI candidates were allied to influential tribal leaders whereas in the case of the JUP they relied on powerful landlords and Pirs.

Before we leave the Ulema, we must take note of their respective positions on a doctrinal point of Deobandis and Barelvis on the one hand and Islamic Fundamentalists and Islamic Modernists on the other; and further certain crucial differences between the two latter. These doctrinal positions are pivotal to the terms in which the political debate between them is articulated. That debate centres around the concept of ijtihad which we may translate as 'interpretative development of doctrine in keeping with the spirit of Islam', on issues that cannot be decided by a manifest and direct applicability of injunctions of the Quran or the Hadith, or a solution offered by other prescribed rules. Ijtihad is the final remedy and for those who would admit to the possibility of Ijtihad, there are recognised methods by which it may be accomplished. The Traditionalist (Sunni) Ulema do not accept that it is possible to perform ijtihad; as they would put it, 'the gates of Ijtihad are closed'. For the 'traditionalists' Islamic doctrines, as formulated and codified by the 9th century AD, in the form of the teachings of the four orthodox Sunni schools which comprise their received tradition and doctrine is complete and final. For them it is fixed for eternity. Instead of Ijtihad they rely on taqlid, unwavering and unadulterated application of the received doctrine. The Islamic Modernists and Islamic Fundamentalists, on the other hand, each reject this Traditionalist view of the immutability and rigidity of the doctrine of the faith, that admits only the principle of taqlid, or doctrinal conformity. Instead, they insist on both the possibility as well as the necessity of ijtihad, to revivify Islam in keeping with new questions and issues that arise with constantly changing conditions in the world. Their different political positions turn, however, on their different solutions to the question of how ijtihad may be properly carried out, the 'fundamentalist' solution being an authoritarian one whereas the 'Modernist' tradition finds justification for the democratic political process in the search for Ijtihad.

Religious Reform Movements in India:

Background to Islamic Modernism

The colonial restructuring of India's political system shifted the centre of gravity of status and influence in Indian society from the landed gentry to the emerging salariat, members of the colonial bureaucratised state. This newly emerging class had different needs and outlook from those of pre-colonial upper classes. They began to develop a new life style and new ways and these found expression in new ideas. There was a 'Hindu Renaissance' which was followed, after an interval of a few decades by a 'Muslim Renaissance'. This time lag is usually explained by an assumption about 'Muslim backwardness' which is attributed to a variety of factors. A more plausible explanation for this time lag may lie in

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the fact that in places where the colonial transformation first got under way, namely the initial nodal points of colonial rule in Bengal, Bombay and Madras, the Muslim component of the new salariat was negligible in size and the new ideological perspectives were opened up by Hindu thinkers, who were the leading elements of that new class. It was much later that these changes reached the UP, the heartland of the Muslim salariat. There Muslims were far from 'backward'. Quite the contrary is true. While the proportion of Muslims in the population of the UP was quite small, nevertheless Muslims held the lion's share of salariat positions, especially in their higher echelons. Not surprisingly it was therefore in the UP that 'Muslim Renaissance' soon got under way, with the colonial transformation of the state apparatus there.

The Hindu Renaissance in India began with the Brahmo Samaj movement in the 1830s in Bengal, under the intellectual leadership of Raja Ram Mohan Roy. There were parallel movements in the other two major centres of colonialism in India, namely the Vedic Samaj in Madras and the Prarthna Samaj in Bombay. Some social anthropologists have misconceived the nature and purport of this movement and speak of it as 'an intellectual nativistic revival' and say, as Maloney does, that 'Ram Mohan Roy tried to recover and rationalise the spiritual essence of Hinduism'.17 Such a view fails completely to understand the rather more positive and forward looking rather than nostalgic concerns of these movements. They attempted to articulate quite new ideas though in the idiom of the established religion.

An opposite kind of misconception about these movements, far more common, is that these movements simply packaged ideas imported from Europe in locally made boxes; that these are examples of mere reflection of Western ideas, a borrowing and mechanical transmission from one culture to another. Such a view seems plausible, for liberal ideas were in ascendancy in the colonial metropolis, though it would be difficult to accuse British colonial officials of being the bearers of liberal ideas which they did not consider suited to India. The diffusionist theory of transmission of Western ideas to the colonised society fails to account for the fact that the ideas that were locally produced by intellectuals of the 'Hindu Renaissance' and the 'Muslim Renaissance' in India bore clearly the stamp of India's colonial situation and the peculiar character of its social structure. Their 'liberalism' (at least formally) was not that of an ideology of free and equal individuals, nor of laissez faire, which were the slogans of triumphant capitalism in England. It would be much more accurate to describe these new ideas as rationalism rather than liberalism. Nor were these ideas a crude import from the West, a popular but rather misguided and superficial notion that is current amongst scholars. These new ideas represented an authentic ideology of a new indigenous class, the salariat, and had its own quite specific contours. David Kopf, a perceptive scholar, referring to these movements of ideas, writes: 'Such radical notions as secularism, humanism and rationalism had to be reinterpreted to fit the Indian situation'. He points out that the new Indian classes produced a new ideology to suit their own circumstances and needs. These movements repudiated tyrannies of religious orthodoxy from sources within their own tradition.18

Islamic Modernism:

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Sir Syed Ahmad Khan and Mohammad Iqbal

The 'Hindu Renaissance', as I pointed out above, was followed by 'Muslim Renaissance' which was pre-figured by writers and poets such as Mirza Ghalib and, later, articulated most clearly and force fully by Sir Syed Ahmad Khan in his prolific writings. Sir Syed Ahmad was pioneer and most certainly the outstanding and most influential figure of the 'Muslim Renaissance'. Sir Syed Ahmad was also a very effective practical organiser, as well as a theoretician and major intellectual figure. His role and mission in life was to facilitate the induction of upper class UP Muslims into the colonial salariat. For that it was necessary to encourage them to move out of the traditional system of education (dominated and controlled by traditionalist and backward looking ulemas). Sir Syed Ahmad urged Muslims to take instead to English and Western education that would qualify them for jobs in the colonial salariat. He also preached the beneficent character of colonial rule and the absurdity of opposing it. His own personal life reflects the transition, of a member of the old UP aristocracy to the new salariat. He was from an noble family with long connections with Moghul Imperial rule, now less prosperous. He joined the service of the East India Company, against the wishes of his family, and rose to be a 'munsif', or sub-judge, which at the time, was about as high a position in the colonial state apparatus as an Indian could aspire to. He soon became a pioneer of a new rationalist public philosophy, but one which was expressed in the idiom of Islam. Nevertheless he was much reviled and attacked by the Ulema. Embroidered tales of his persecution by bigots have become a part of the mythology of the Muslim salariat.

It is not too surprising that Sir Syed Ahmad, the father of Islamic Modernism was directly influenced by Raja Ram Mohan Roy the father of Hindu Renaissance. As an impressionable young man Sir Syed Ahmad met Roy, who was on a visit to the Moghul court in 1831. He gave much prominence to an account of Roy's visit in his book Sirat-e-Faridiyah. A leading scholar on the life and work of Sir Syed Ahmad is of the opinion that 'The personality and work of Ram Mohan Roy were a formative influence in Sayyid Ahmad Khan's life'. 19 It is no accident that parallel religious reform movements arose in different parts of India, amongst both Hindus and Muslims, during mid-19th century. Likewise there were other parallels such as a Buddhist religious reform movement in Sri Lanka. They all reflected similar changes in society, notably, the emergence of the colonial new salariat. It might be illuminating to think of these Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists etc. who were involved in these new movements, as merely different ethnic components of a single class, the salariat; and therefore the respective Hindu and Muslim Reform movements as different strands of a single intellectual movement that was sweeping across India in the 19th century, expressing rationalist ideologies and a commitment to a scientific outlook of the newly emerging Hindu and Muslim salariats, even when they were expressed in their respective religious idioms.

Sir Syed Ahmad's political philosophy, as appropriate to the concerns of the emerging Muslim salariat in the UP, was cast in Muslim ethnic terms (rather than 'communal', which is a pejorative term). He was striving for numerical equality of Muslim representation in the services to that of Hindus, although in the UP Muslims were only about 13 % of the population. He argued that Muslims, as a community, were entitled to

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an equal share because for they made up for their lack of overall numbers by their preponderance amongst the upper classes. That view did not entail hostility towards Hindus as such, nor was it a question of religion. The issue was that of equating the two communities, irrespective of their relative size and demanding an equal share for each. This was nicely expressed in his much quoted statement that India was a bride adorned by Hindus and Muslims who were her two beautiful eyes. The bride would be disfigured if the two eyes were not equal. It is evident that in all this Sir Syed Ahmad Khan was not equally interested in the fate of all Muslims; his concern was primarily about the fate of the class from which he himself sprang, the ashraf, or the upper class, Muslims.

Sir Syed Ahmad did not argue for a restoration of Muslim political power over India, much less an Islamic state. Nor did he want independence or democracy. His hopes were pinned on an indefinite continuation of British colonial rule for that, in his eyes, was the only impartial guarantee of protection of Muslim interests which lay in their securing numerical equality with Hindus within the Indian salariat. He was very suspicious of the Indian National Congress, and feared that independence and democracy would mean that Hindus would overwhelm the small numbers of ashraf Muslims, Muslims of the upper classes, who would then have no one to protect them. It is clear from this that Sir Syed Ahmad's political horizons were defined by the boundaries of the UP and he did not extend the logic of his argument to Muslim majority provinces where his argument could be inverted.

Education was the sovereign remedy for reversing the decline of the UP upper class Muslim society. The main thrust of Sir Syed Ahmad's writing and indefatigable organisational activity, therefore lay in the pursuit of modern education for Muslims. He founded the Muhammadan Anglo-Oriental College at Aligarh in 1877 which later became the famous Aligarh Muslim University, which was to become the heart of Muslim Nationalism in India. In other parts of India too Muslim modernists, like Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, were preoccupied with the task of promotion of the new education. There were powerful educational movements everywhere which worked with missionary zeal to set up modern educational institutions for Muslims.

Sir Syed Ahmad had to fight the bigoted Ulema at all levels, not least on their own ground of theology. His writings on religion were prolific and reflected a high level of scholarship. Without going into details of particular controversies one particular issue can be singled out. That was the burden of the received and congealed orthodoxy, the immutable Traditions of the Four Sunni schools, in the name of which the Ulema fought him. His counter-attack was simplicity itself, the wielding of Occam's Razor. He wiped the slate clean of the hide-bound traditions of the four schools as handed down by the Ulema over ten centuries, by declaring that they had become cluttered with accretions of bid'at (or 'innovations'), in other words misconceptions and misinterpretations.20 The only alternative was to go back to the source, the Quran and the Hadith of the Prophet. By that bold stroke he swept orthodoxy out of the way and gave himself freedom to write on the cleaned slate a new message of a rationalist social philosophy that sought legitimation by invoking the fundamental sources of Islam.

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Sir Syed Ahmad's work opened the way for a liberal re-interpretation of Islamic political philosophy by Mohammad Iqbal. Iqbal attacked the dogma of the Traditionalist Ulema that the received doctrine was immutable. He passionately attacked the Ulema's commitment to the principle of taqlid, or doctrinal conformity, which he argued had ossified Islam and made it remote from realities of the contemporary world. That was the root cause of the present decline of Muslims. To revitalise Muslim society, ijtihad had to be reinstated.21 That could be done through ijma, or consensus of the community of the faithful, which he considered to be 'The third source of Mohammed an Law (after the Quran and Hadith of the Prophet. H.A.) ...which is in my opinion perhaps the most important legal notion in Islam'.22 He argued further that 'The transfer of (the power of performing) ijtihad from individual representatives of schools to a legislative assembly ... is the only possible form ijma can take in modern times'.23 Iqbal was quite as hostile to the decadent and obscurantist views of the Ulema as they were to his. Referring to provisions of the Persian constitution of 1906 he repudiated as 'dangerous' the idea of giving powers to the Ulema to supervise legislative activity. 'The only effective remedy for the possibilities of erroneous interpretations is to reform the present system of legal education" he added.24 By that formula of securing ijma through a legislative body, he legitimised in Islamic terms the liberal principle of representative self-government, the system that the political leadership of the professionals and the salariat (though not necessarily its bureaucratic and military components) best understood and wanted to have.

Islamic Fundamentalism: The Jamaat-e-Islami

The Islamic Traditionalism of the Ulema and Islamic Modernism of Sir Syed and Mohammad Iqbal as I have suggested, were each associated with problems and wishes of certain social classes (of Muslims) during the 19th century, whose concerns and aspirations they articulated and expressed. The social roots of the new Islamic Fundamentalism of the Jamaat-e-Islami that was a most insignificant group of Muslim intellectuals at the time of The Partition, but which has gained much notoriety since then, cannot be quite so clearly identified. It originated entirely as an ideological movement and its appeal was initially limited to a small number of dedicated followers whom it offered a dream of an utopian future. It drew to itself a small band of idealists in search of a better society. Many of them were quickly disenchanted and left the Party, often joining left-wing groups and organisations. Their numbers and weight in that party have dwindled steadily. The Jamaat was soon to get generous support from powerful vested interests for whom it began to serve a political purpose. That changed its character radically.

The Jamaat-e-Islami was founded in 1941 by Maulana Maududi, a scholar-journalist with a classical education. Maududi was an opponent of Muslim Nationalism and the Pakistan movement. But when Pakistan was created he found it prudent to migrate to Pakistan. With that his political philosophy went through a radical transformation. Maududi's opposition to the Pakistan movement was on the ground that the true vocation of an Islamic militant was a proselytising one, that Islam was a universal religion that knew of no national boundaries. After the creation of Pakistan Maududi revised the conception of

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his mission and that of the rationale of the Pakistan movement. He now argued that the sole object of the creation of Pakistan was to establish an Islamic State and that it was his Party alone which possessed a true understanding of Islam and commitment to bring that about.

To build an Islamic state the existing state must first be captured and brought under the control of those who, by Maududi's definition, were the only true bearers of militant and authentic Islam, namely himself and his Party. Unlike the Ulema, control of the state apparatus was therefore his first priority. His conception of the ideal Islamic State was a strongly centralised one, run on authoritarian lines, with the help of a strong and effective and dedicated army, under the authority of the Commander of the Faithful. Democracy was despised, for it gave power to the ignorant and those whose commitment, and understanding, of the faith could be doubtful. The onus lay therefore on his Party and on himself as its Guide and Leader, to take Muslim society forward to its true destiny. The Constitution of his Party illustrates this authoritarian philosophy for it demands unquestioning and total obedience from members of the Party to its Amir, its Supreme Head, namely himself. His ideas, justifying dictatorship in the name of Islam have, not surprisingly, found much favour with some sections of Pakistan's authoritarian military rulers.

The Jamaat is not a mass Party but one with selected cadre members. Because of its shallow roots in society, the Jamaat has been quite ineffective as a political Party. The full extent of its isolation from popular support was brought home recently to the Jamaat as well as its surprised opponents, by its debacle in the controlled elections staged by the Zia regime in January 1985, for conditions for its electoral success could not have been made more favourable. All opposition Parties were under a ban and their leaders and local activists were in prison or in exile. The field was therefore clear for the Jamaat to make a clean sweep of it. But it was routed completely. The electorate voted negatively, against Jamaat candidates and for non-entities.

The Jamaat's electoral bankruptcy ought not to lead anyone into under estimating its power and influence in today's Pakistan, which are derived primarily from its symbiotic relationship with the ruling regime. It tends to function as a pressure group rather than a political Party and uses its influence with government agencies and power to blackmail and terrorise individuals to achieve its objectives. During the rule of General Zia particularly, the Jamaat acquired a firm grip over the Universities and the entire educational system, its prime objective. It as also acquired a powerful influence on the government owned and control led broadcasting media. Its tentacles extended everywhere so that its opponents lived in fear. The Party, in turn, enjoys enormous capacity of patronage and thereby attracts support from all kinds of opportunists and careerists, which further reinforces its influence within the apparatus of the Government and the army quite apart from its influence directly at the top.

After the Partition the Jamaat attracted a new following among urdu speaking refugees from India, the muhajirs, who felt insecure and bitter about India, because of their suffering in the course of their enforced migration. They responded readily to the

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chauvinistic rhetoric of the Jamaat. But, over the years, this support has been withering away. In part this is because muhajirs who have settled in the interior of Sindh have developed linkages with the Sindhi community, being traders and professionals who serve Sindhi peasants and landlords. They have become the 'New Sindhis', and sympathise with the Sindhi movement which has got under way quite powerfully in recent years. They dislike the anti-democratic support by the Jamaat of the repression let loose by the military regime against Sindhi nationalism. Even in big cities, like Karachi, where muhajir support for Sindhis is much less, there are elements within the Jamaat, like Prof. Ghafoor Ahmad of Karachi and Jan Mohammad Abbasi, who are critical of their Party's support of the martial law regime because that has been losing the Jamaat popular support.

The leadership of the Jamaat has passed into non-ideologist hands, although exploitation of their ideology remains their principal political weapon. The Party bosses seem to feel that its diminishing support from its meagre popular base, mostly amongst the Muhajirs is of less consequence than the support that it is deriving from powerful classes in Pakistan for whom its value lies in its ability to bludgeon radical and left-wing groups, very often quite literally so. The Party receives generous donations from big businessmen and landlords and is believed to be a recipient of generous donations from the Americans and from potentates in the Middle East. But an excess of money and, for that matter, influence, has also brought problems for the Party. New vested interests have grown up in the Party bureaucracy and the old ideological wing of the Party, in decline, resents that. There is a considerable tension (to say the least) between the ideologists in the Party, mainly Karachi based, and those whose political ambitions lie in what they can get from the military regime. This latter consists mainly of the Punjab based, so-called 'pragmatic' wing of the Jamaat, led by Mian Tufail Mohammed, the Amir of the Jamaat and successor of Maududi. However, to retrieve its standing amongst the people the Party has begun to voice carefully measured criticism of the military regime, to distance itself from it. There is also a third element in the Party namely armed thugs, an element that was reinforced by the repatriation from East Pakistan of members of Al-Badar and As-Shams, its fascist paramilitary organisations, after the liberation of Bangladesh. They go about beating up opponents and breaking up meetings. These elements are associated with, especially, the Islami-Jamiat-e-Tulaba, the student organisation of the Jamaat, that maintains an armed presence on University campuses.

To end our account of the Jamaat-e-Islami, we must return to the central doctrinal issue of ijtihad, or interpretative development of doctrine, around which the political debate about Islamic State has turned. As it was pointed out above, the Jamaat stands for ijtihad, contrary to the position of the Traditionalist Ulema. But at the same time The Jamaat-e-Islami derides the method proposed by the Modernist Iqbal for realising Ijtihad under contemporary conditions, through processes of representative democracy, which is represented as the only possible source of Ijma modern conditions. Maududi contends against this that this could not lead to a reliable interpretation of Islam, for the voters may not be Muslim and even if they are, they may not have a 'true understanding' of Islam, such as only Maududi and his followers are blessed with. Iqbal's exhortation to educate

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the people was no solution either. Scholarship was no guarantee, for even the Ulema were misled and ignorant.

The logic of that argument, leads Maududi to an authoritarian solution, for by his lights there is only one true and reliable interpretation of Islam and Maududi and his Jamaat are the custodians of that true knowledge. They are a gifted and select elite, and amongst them only its great leader, knows what Islam is.

'According to Maududi', writes K.K. Aziz:

'there is always a person (Mizaj Shanas-i Rasool) who alone is competent to decide what the Holy Prophet would have done in a given situation if he were alive. ... He left no doubt in the minds of his followers that he was the only candidate for this supreme pontifical office. And his chief lieutenant, Maulana Islahi declared before the Punjab Disturbances Inquiry Committee that he wholeheartedly and unreservedly accepted Maududi as the Mizaj Shanas-i Rasool'.25

As far as the Jamaat claims and ideology are concerned, there can be no objective or logical criteria by which their validity can be settled. They can be accepted only as an act of faith, by a religious conversion in effect, to the Maududi sect, which may therefore be properly regarded to be yet another sect of Islam which, like every sect, claims to be the only true one.

Paradoxically Maududi's elitism itself militates against a principle which would be regarded as a central tenet of Islam, namely that ijtihad by ijma, the consensus of the community, has precedence over ijtihad by the alim, the man of religious learning, because an individual, however learned he may be, is fallible, but Allah in his divine mercy would not allow his community collectively to go in error. This has always been recognised as the principle of democracy in Islam. Maududi's argument contradicts that. The Jamaat-e-Islami ideology while insisting on ijtihad, in effect rejects the fundamental notion of ijma, and offers little more than a personal charter of authority to the head of the Jamaat-e-Islami to lay down the law in the name of Islam.

It must be said that by virtue of re-interpretation of Islam by Ulema of the 8th and 9th centuries AD, to suit the needs of the feudal Abbasid empire, the concept of ijma was itself narrowed down to that of a consensus between 'qualified' scholars, which took away the power from the community that the Prophet Mohammad's Islam had conferred on it. They abolished the right of the community to be represented in the state. Even today such a notion is peddled in Pakistan by the ignorant and to a degree state subsidised Ulema. Nevertheless, even this narrowed conception contradicts Maududi's claim. This is quite apart from the impossibility of 'consensus of scholars' in a world in which there are sharp and vicious sectarian differences so that those with differing persuasions call each other kafirs, as recorded by the Report of the Court of Inquiry, a high judicial body, that reported in 1954 on sectarian violence that took place in 1953, referred to in footnote no. 12 above. So on doctrinal grounds we can see that there are contradictions underlying every position. There is no way of resolving it except by either imposing one sectarian

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position over all the others or by accepting a secular conception of the political process and the state so that every individual, whatever his or her religious persuasion may be, would be free to participate in the democratic process, following his or her own private faith and conscience, to shape policies of the state. We will refrain from pursuing this arcane and insoluble debate any further for it cannot be resolved by logic.

Secular Muslim Nationalism - Jinnah

Most of the salariat in fact, implicitly or explicitly, espoused a secular conception of

being part of a Muslim nation. Jinnah their spokesman, was always quite explicit about it and on this issue he put his position quite unambiguously. In recent years there has been a systematic attempt by Pakistan's captive media to misrepresent Jinnah on this point and they are trying hard to build up an image of the Father of the Nation as a religious bigot. The reality was very different. Jinnah was a member of cosmopolitan Bombay society, a close colleague and friend of Sir Pheroze Shah Mehta, a Parsi Indian nationalist and, along with M.K. Gandhi, a protégé and close friend of G.K. Gokhale, the great Indian liberal leader. Jinnah began as an active member of the Congress Party. He was not among the founders of the League. Ironically the basis of that growing unity was destroyed by a decision to pander to Muslim bigotry not by the League but by the Congress, much to the disgust and resentment of the League leadership. That was by virtue of Gandhi's decision to back fanatical Muslim Ulema in launching the Khilafat movement, (1919-23). If there had been any intention to drive a wedge between the secular minded Muslim salariat and the Muslim masses and to shift leadership in the direction of the obscurantist Ulema, the Congress could not have taken up a more potent issue.

It is true that it was Muslim notables, so-called 'feudals', who presided over the birth of the Muslim League in December 1906 at Dacca. This has misled too many historians about the character of the Muslim League. The fact of the matter is that the Muslim League, soon after its initiation by Muslim notables, was taken over by the Muslim salariat. At the initial meeting at Dacca two leading lights of Aligarh, Mohsin-ul Mulk and Viqar-ul Mulk were appointed as joint secretaries and two-fifths of the Provisional Committee were from the UP. These were as yet 'men of property and influence' although quite committed to the salariat cause. Later, by 1910, the leadership and control of the Muslim League passed into the hands of men from a relatively more modest background who have been described as 'men of progressive tendencies', under the leadership of Wazir Hassan and others like him, who were based at Lucknow. They pushed the Muslim League in a new direction and sought co-operation with the larger Indian nationalist movement and the Congress, provided Muslim salariat rights were protected.

Jinnah himself was to be brought into the Muslim League by these elements three years later. It would be a mistake to think that the Muslim League was dominated and controlled by the so-called feudals' during the four decades after its inception. That is the nub of a complicated story, of which a most perceptive account will be found in Robinson's excellent study of the early Muslim Movement in the UP.26 Naturally, like all

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great political and social movements there are many different strands that are interwoven in the tapestry of Muslim history in India during the 19th and 20th centuries. But its leitmotif was engraved on the map of Indian politics by the aspirations and anxieties of the Muslim salariat, the force behind Muslim nationalism.

A number of factors contributed to a new turn in the development of Muslim politics in India by the first decade of this century. The Muslim salariat was by now detached from its total reliance on the goodwill and patronage of the colonial regime. It turned towards its own self-reliant political organisation for which it looked to Muslim professionals to provide political leadership. That was prompted above all by the prospective constitutional changes that offered an opportunity and need for representation in the state apparatus. It is not an accident that Muslim salariat's political organisation took shape in that decade. Nawab Salimullah Khan's initiative and invitation to Dacca had merely provided an opportunity and an occasion for that.

The Muslim salariat had begun to crystallise its political identity. Its key objectives were, again, defined by the narrow perspectives of the privileged UP Muslim salariat, not least its sharply deteriorating position relative to Hindus. Its demands corresponded to the problems of a beleaguered group in a Muslim minority province. They do not make too much sense when viewed in the context of Muslim majority provinces. Their central demand was for separate electorate for Muslims so that they may not be outvoted by the overwhelming Hindu majority in the UP. Robinson sums up developments in the first decade of the century as follows: 'By 1909 a Muslim identity was firmly established in Indian politics ... (by virtue of ) the creation of a Muslim political organisation ... (and) the winning of separate Muslim electorate. ... The creation of a protected share of power for Muslims ... stimulated the further development of Muslim politics.' 27 Jinnah who was brought into the Muslim League in 1913 reassessed the situation and recognised a role for himself as a spokesman for Muslims in the Nationalist movement on the strength of their independent organisation in the Muslim League. Robinson comments 'He brought to the League leadership important connections with all India Congress circles and the distinction of having been a close friend of Gokhale.' 28

Jinnah eventually began to get disillusioned with the Congress Party, from the 1920s not because he was a Muslim communalist but quite the reverse. It was the Congress, rather, which embarked on a course that encouraged Muslim fanaticism under the leadership of the Ulema, by instigating and backing the Khilafat movement. Jinnah was quite outraged by this. No greater disservice could have been done to the cause of inter-communal harmony in India. Nothing that the Muslim League ever did or wanted to do could have done more to excite Muslim communalist passions and to evoke corresponding responses from Hindus.

Increasingly Jinnah was disenchanted with the leadership of the Indian National Congress. The failure to reach an accommodation with the Congress after the 1937 elections finally forced him to reconsider his strategy. So far the Muslim League's influence was limited to the salariat; hence its ineffectiveness in elections in a society in which landlords controlled the mainly rural vote. Jinnah decided now to secure Muslim

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landlord support at any price and he soon set about making deals with those of them who were in power in Muslim majority Provinces, persuading them to accept the Muslim League label, even if it was to be only nominally. In return he gave them carte blanche, and in effect surrendered the local Muslim League organisations to them. Jinnah's objective in this was to secure at least the formal position of the Muslim League as the nominally 'ruling Party' in Muslim majority provinces. That would legitimise his claim that the Muslim League was the sole and legitimate spokesman of Muslims of India.

Jinnah looked upon the landed magnates, the political bosses of the Muslim majority provinces, with contempt and dislike quite as much as they in turn showed little inclination to allow him and the central Muslim League leader ship to encroach on their domains of power. In Punjab the Jinnah-Sikandar Pact of 1936 was the first of these one-sided arrangements between the Unionist Party and the Muslim League. The Unionist Party was an alliance of Muslim, Hindu and Sikh landowners. In return for Muslim Unionists' nominal allegiance to the League it delivered the Punjab League into the hands of the Unionists leader, Sir Sikandar Hayat. The political cleavage in the Punjab was urban-rural and the rural magnates had always shown contempt for the urban salariat, which was the Muslim League's mainstay. The Unionist Party, especially earlier under Sir Fazl-i-Husain, was determined to keep Punjab politics 'non-communal'. Fazl-i-Husain's closest and most trusted associate was Sir Chhotu Ram, a Hindu. Although he was prepared to patronise members of the Muslim salariat, Sir Fazl-i-Husain and his associates had no intention of letting the urbanites, on whom they looked down with some disdain, encroach on their power. Iqbal complained of Sir Fazl-i-Husain's anti-urban bias in a speech in 1935 and his associate Malik Barkat Ali did so too; both urban stalwarts of the Muslim League.29 Later Iqbal was to protest repeatedly to Jinnah about his pact with Sir Sikandar Hayat, Sir Fazl-i-Husain's successor. In a series of letters in October and November 1937, Iqbal complained to Jinnah that 'Sir Sikandar wants nothing less than complete control of the League and the Provincial Parliamentary Board.30 Jinnah maintained a prudent silence over the matter and did not reply to Iqbal's repeated letters. Having handed over the League to Sir Sikandar Hayat Khan and the Unionists, there was little that he could have said.

In Sind the story was no different, for there the local base of the Muslim salariat was narrower than that in the Punjab. In Sind its size was minute. The urban leadership of the Muslim League, mainly in Karachi, was mainly ethnic non-Sindhi. The rural based ethnic Sindhi leadership was divided into warring factions led by Ghulam Hussain Hidayatullah and G.M. Syed. In terms of its social composition Hidayatullah's faction was a replica of the Punjab Unionist Party. Jinnah decided to put his bets on the Hidayatullah faction which was the more powerful; but it was evidently an unpalatable decision. Jinnah confided his views about his Party colleagues to Sir Hugh Dow, Governor of Sind (which itself is an extra-ordinary reflection on Jinnah's relationship with the servitors of Empire ). Dow, in a Secret letter to Wavell, the Viceroy, reporting on political developments, wrote:-

'Jinnah made a prolonged stay in Karachi ... and held prolonged conferences with the "leaders". .... Jinnah dislikes them all ( he once told me that he could buy the lot of them

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for 5 lakhs of rupees to which I replied that I could do it much cheaper) and has been mainly concerned that the League ticket should go to the man who was most likely to be returned, his previous and subsequent loyalty to the League being a minor consideration." 31

All that Jinnah was looking for was pinning the Muslim League label on the Provincial governments and little more.

It is not difficult to see the short term calculations of this strategy for Jinnah, for it legitimised his All-India position and strengthened his bargaining position. The reason for the decision of the Provincial magnates for accepting the Muslim League label is less obvious. It was not the vote pulling power of the Muslim League, for it was the landed magnates them selves who controlled the mainly rural vote. What the League offered to the landed magnates of Punjab and Sind is best understood only if we consider the fundamental shift in the long term political prospects that began to be visible to the landed magnates whose eyes were so far focused too narrowly on the provincial scene. With independence in sight, they had to look beyond their Provincial horizons and some of them could see the writing on the wall earlier than others. It was clear that it was only a matter of time before the colonial rule would end. With the departure of their colonial patrons they were faced with the prospects of the rule of the Congress Party, with its commitments to land reform. If they were to preserve their class position, the only viable option for them was a government at the centre of the Muslim League rather than the Congress. If that was to mean Pakistan, so be it. Whatever form it took it would guarantee their own survival for the Muslim League was wholly dependent on them. It is they who would wield power in any autonomous regional grouping of Muslim majority provinces that would ensue. It was not a question of ideology but clearly understood class interest that lined them up behind the Muslim League. They were unimpressed by Muslim League politics until the imminence of independence. Only at that juncture did they decide to jump on to the Muslim League bandwagon and, in fact, took it over.

When the Pakistan slogan was raised Jinnah's opponents continually complained that he was refusing to specify precisely what Pakistan was actually to be. As a seasoned negotiator evidently Jinnah did not lay all his cards prematurely on the table. But it was not difficult to see that what he was aiming for was a grouping of Muslim majority provinces enjoying a degree of regional autonomy, possibly within an overall Indian Federal Union rather than the Partition of India, especially if that was to entail carving up of Punjab and Bengal. That he was quite happy to accept Pakistan as a regional grouping within an Indian federal union is testified by his ready acceptance of the three-tier Cabinet Mission Plan which offered just that in April 1946. It was the Congress who rejected it. Such a solution, resulting in a weak centre, would have undermined a major objective of the Congress and the Indian bourgeoisie namely to embark on planned development of free India; in retrospect one may well conclude that India's progress in planned industrial has justified that strategic decision. For the Muslim League, the logic of the federal union solution was particularly important for Muslims of the UP and Muslim minority Provinces, for that would have established a link between them and those in power in Muslim majority regions within the federal union. The 'reciprocal

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hostages' theory was premised on the idea that the fate of non-Muslims in the Muslim majority zone would be a guarantee for their own protection in the other zone in which they were in a minority. The issue revolved around the fate of communities. Pakistan, in whatever form, was not to be a theocratic state.

Jinnah had consistently opposed theocratic ideas and influences and never minced his words about his commitment to a secular state. Speaking to students of Aligarh Muslim University, the heart of the Muslim salariat, in February 1938, he declared:

'What the League has done is to set you free from the reactionary elements of Muslims and to create the opinion that those who play their selfish game are traitors. It has certainly freed you from that undesirable element of Maulvis and Maulanas' (a derogatory reference to the Ulema).32

Jinnah re-iterated, time and again, that Pakistan would be 'without any distinction of caste, creed or sect.' Aisha Jalal, in her excellent study of Jinnah's political role, records at least two occasions on which Jinnah successfully resisted attempts to commit the Muslim League to an 'Islamic Ideology'.33 Jinnah's memorable inaugural address to the Pakistan Constituent Assembly on 11th August 1947 was a clarion call for the establishment of Pakistan as a secular state. From the principal forum of the new state he declared:

'You may belong to any religion or caste or creed - that has nothing to do with the business of the state ... We are starting with this fundamental principle, that we are all citizens of one state. ... I think we should keep that in front of us as our idea and you will find that in the course of time Hindus will cease to be Hindus and Muslims will cease to be Muslims, not in the religious sense because that is the personal faith of each individual but in the political sense, as citizens of the state'. 34

There could be no clearer statement of the secular principle as the basis of Pakistan. The true heirs in today's Pakistan of what the Pakistan ideology really was, are the secularists. They include practising Muslims, who, nevertheless, reject and repudiate the idea of exploitation of Islamic ideology in pursuit of political ends.

If Islamic Modernism was the initial ideology of the emerging Muslim salariat, it has long ceased to be a live intellectual movement and has been marginalised. It exists in small and peripheral groupings such as the Tulu-e Islam group which was led by Ghulam Ahmad Parvaiz. Many of the basic ideas of Islamic Modernism, have passed into conventional wisdom. Insofar as they still have currency, they are accommodated within secular political attitudes. It may help to put things into perspective if we quote from an account by Rosenthal, a renowned Islamic scholar, of his investigations in Pakistan, even though his report is quite old.

Rosenthal summed up his impressions of attitudes that he encountered in Pakistan with the words:

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'On balance, I should say that among the academic youth there is a minority in favour of an Islamic state in substance not just in name. The Majority are divided in their allegiance to Islam from personal faith to indifference and outright rejection, as being out of date and dividing men instead of unifying and leading them to a world state'.35

More recently this issue has been dealt with sensitively and perceptively by Sibte Hassan in his influential urdu book Naveed-e-Fikr, which has been translated into English with the title: 'The Struggle for Ideas in Pakistan', where he arrives at similar conclusions.36

Islamic Rhetoric in Pakistan

Muslim ethnicity had outlived its original purpose when Pakistan was created, for the 'Muslim' salariat, no longer stood in opposition to Hindus. Instead a new dominant ethnic group identified itself, the ruling Punjabis. In turn, other sections of the once Muslim salariat now redefined their ethnic identities, as Bengalis, Sindhis, Pathans and Baluch, who were under-privileged in the new state. They demanded fairer shares for themselves. They had left Muslim ethnicity behind in the pre-Partition world. Now the regional question was to be at the centre of politics in Pakistan, ill-concealed by the rhetoric of Islamic ideology that was deployed against them, to deny the legitimacy of their newly affirmed separate regional and cultural identities.

There was a fresh process of accounting of regional privilege and deprivation. Although there were 41.9 million East Pakistanis, as against only 33.7 million West Pakistanis (1951 census), shares in public appointments bore no comparison to that, not even remotely. In 1948 East Pakistanis numbered only 11 % of the members of the CSP, the Civil Service of Pakistan, the elite cadre that stood at the head of the bureaucracy and controlled it and thereby the State, in Pakistan.(The CSP was later abolished by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto). East Pakistani share in the army was even worse, for only 1.5 % of army officers were East Pakistani. Bengali Muslims owned no more than 3.5 % of the assets of all private Muslim firms.37 A wave of political militancy swept through the whole of East Pakistan. The Bengali language movement erupted with dramatic force in February 1952 when, for a few days, the writ of the Government ceased to run in that Province. Every Bengali government employee went on strike. That movement, significantly, started on the Dacca University Campus. The Bengali Language movement repudiated the ruling Muslim League's claim to represent the people of East Pakistan. In the 1954 Provincial elections the ruling Muslim League Party won no more than 10 seats out of a total of 309, notwithstanding repression of opposition parties and the fact that many of the elected candidates were in prison at the time. The opposition United Front, that articulated Bengali nationalism, swept the elections. Sindhis, Pathans and Baluch movements were soon to develop likewise.

At first in Pakistan the secular tradition of Jinnah was maintained. In March 1949, moving the 'Objectives Resolution' in the Constituent Assembly, Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan declared: 'The people are the real recipients of power. This naturally eliminates any danger of the establishment of a theocracy.' 38 Choudhury, editor of Constitutional Documents of Pakistan, a champion of Islamic ideology, complained that 'The Ulema

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were also not happy with the first draft constitution as it contained very little, if at all any, provisions as to the Islamic character of the proposed constitution" 39

As soon as the regional protest against Punjabi rule began to get under way, the ideological tune changed. Suddenly Islam and the notion of Islamic brotherhood became the order of the day. It was unpatriotic on the part of Bengalis, Sindhis, Pathans and Baluch to make demands in terms of their regional ethnic identities because all Pakistanis were brothers in Islam. The constitutional proposals were quickly redrafted. Choudhury happily reported that 'The Second Draft Constitution (Choudhry's over-enthusiastic title for the Report of the Basic Principles Committee, 1952) was noted for elaborate provisions relating to the Islamic character of the proposed Constitution. The most noble feature of the Islamic provision was a board of ulema which would examine if any law was repugnant to Quran and Sunnah'.40

All that this 'noble feature' added up to was a smoke-screen, for it went little beyond setting up a Board of Talimat-i-Islamia (In other words: Board of Islamic Learning) which formally had some advisory functions but, in the event was to exist only on paper, for the bureaucratic-military oligarchy (with the Punjabi salariat in saddle) which dominated Pakistan, had no intention of giving the mullahs a share in power. The only concrete result of all this, after years of rhetorical Islamisation was a decision to change the name of the Republic to 'The Islamic Republic of Pakistan' and, further, a provision was inserted in the Constitution that the President of the Republic shall be a Muslim. But these were mere symbolic gestures. The ruling oligarchy was in no mood to make any real concessions of substance to the Islamic ideologists. But, for the moment, for the mullahs, evidently concerned far more with some little material benefits than fundamental principles of the State, all this was quite enough to keep them occupied in the business of generating rhetorical steam on behalf of the dominant Punjabis who made it plain that the 'Islamic Pakistan' would not tolerate any regional movements for autonomy or equality.

The secular mood of the country was dramatically demonstrated by the rout of 'Islam Loving' Parties in the first national election of Pakistan in 1970. The secular Awami League, predominantly Bengali, which had no influence in West Pakistan, swept the board in East Pakistan, winning every seat but one; that one seat for the Chittagong Hill Tracts being uncontested to allow its tribal leader to be elected there. In West Pakistan the Pakistan People's Party, with its secular slogan of "Roti, Kapra aur Makan" (i.e. Bread, cloth and shelter ) got a landslide victory in Sind and Punjab (giving it an overwhelming majority in West Pakistan as a whole) and The 'left-wing' National Awami Party made a very good showing in NWFP and Baluchistan. The Islamic Parties came nowhere.

The Bengali movement was eventually to lead to the liberation of Bangladesh. It was the Bengali salariat which spearheaded that movement, although it had deep roots in the countryside. In a predominantly rural country (the urban population in 1960 being only about 5%) most members of the Bengali salariat were sons of well to do peasants and the landed gentry. The Awami League which spoke most volubly for the East Bengali

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salariat, therefor and got solid support from the rural power base. The same was to happen later with the powerful Sindhi movement that erupted with force in the late 1980s.

The ideology of Sindhi nationalism too is explicitly secular. Like the East Bengalis, the small Sindhi salariat is also backed by the entire Sindhi rural population, for they too are the sons of Sindhi peasants and landlords, big and small. The grievances of the Sindhi salariat are, however, compounded by those of all other ethnic-Sindhi classes who feel discriminated against and disaffected. Sindhi landlords and peasants are concerned about the question of equitable sharing of waters of the Indus river system between Sindh and Punjab, of which the Sindhis feel they get less than their due share. Dispossessed Sindhi sharecroppers thrown out of their traditional source of livelihood by farm mechanisation and driven to the cities to look for work, find that the Sindhi urban society, of Karachi, Hyderabad, Sukkur and the major industrial cities of Sindh, has become non-Sindhi. They are therefore strangers in their own cities and are denied working class jobs which are monopolised by immigrants from Sarhad and the Punjab and the locally entrenched Muhajirs. There is therefore an accumulation of grievances of all classes of the Sindhi people. The Sindhi movement has therefore erupted with great force in the 1980s, drawing together all sections of the ethnic Sindhi people, for it is not confined to the Sindhi salariat. But despite this solid support in the country, the Sindhi movement has failed so far to realise much. Some of its weakness derives from the fact that it has failed to build a united front with the predominantly non-Sindhi working class in Sindh. This has made it relatively ineffective despite its strength in the rural areas.

With the assumption of power by the Zia regime another factor has come into play, namely the legitimacy of power (or, more accurately, its total lack of legitimacy ). Afraid to face a free electorate and having no mandate to govern, the General turned to Allah. In that he was forced to go much beyond the outworn old Islamic rhetoric of previous days. He had to show to a cynical public, who had heard it all before, that he actually means business. But there was not much that he could do in practice. Being in charge of running a peripheral capitalist economy, heavily dependent financially on the US, he could not conjure out of nowhere an Islamic economy, following examples of medieval economic practices. Running a peripheral capitalist economy imposes its own rules and logic and its own imperatives that cannot be disregarded. So Zia drew the line clearly between symbolic gestures that he could make and fundamental restructuring of society that he could not. The Banking system and financial institutions continued to oil the wheels of commerce and industry in the country. In the Act setting up Shariat Courts, under the Constitution ( Amendment ) Order 1980, issued by Presidential decree, to 'Islamise' Pakistan's laws, everything connected with the working of the economy was explicitly excluded from the jurisdiction of these Courts, under subsection (c) of section 203 A. As we shall see his successors were more stupid and ignored this golden rule which Zia never announced publicly but nevertheless carefully followed namely that he must not mess about with the economy, whatever Islamic rhetoric he may employ to bolster up his illegitimate regime.

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All that was left to the Zia regime to do, in the name of Islamisation, was to undertake cosmetic measures, although the word 'cosmetic' is an outrageous word to describe barbaric punishments that were prescribed under the Hudud Ordinances which were promulgated by him in the name of introducing an Islamic legal system. The regime has also launched a systematic attack, both symbolically and practically, on the status and privileges of women in Pakistan society. That in turn sparked off a women's movement which generated a force that was unknown in Pakistan's history. The only measure of the Zia regime that could properly be called cosmetic was described as 'interest free banking', the regime's pride and joy in its record of 'Islamic achievements.' Banks, instead of charging interest to customers, now had to 'buy' their customers' goods which otherwise would have been hypothecated to the bank against the loan. Simultaneously the Bank would 'resell' the same goods to the customer, at a higher price. The mark up between the 'purchase' and 'sale' prices was designated as the 'profit' of the Bank that it would receive in lieu of interest ! This was, one might say, Islamisation by semantic jugglery, for what in effect was interest continued to rule under its new designation: 'profit'. This is just cheap petty deception of the public, that left the essentials unchanged.

The Zia regime seemed to have reached a dead end by the mid-eighties. Its strident rhetoric about the Islamic basis of the Pakistan ideology had failed to give it the basis of legitimacy that it had so desperately sought. Unhappily for that regime, its problems were compounded because its rhetoric had the effect of raising hopes of some naive ideologists and Islamic fundamentalists, which it was in no position to fulfil. Its bigoted supporters began to get disillusioned and even began to voice criticism of the regime that has so far protected and patronised them and which they had so faithfully supported. Zia realised that he had to change tack.

[Back to Hamza Alavi Homepage]Notes and References

1A See K.K. Aziz, The Murder of History in Pakistan, Vanguard, Lahore 1993 1 See Ram Gopal, Indian Muslims, (London, 1959), Ch XI, for an Indian

nationalist view and R. Palme Dutt, (India Today, Bombay, 1970) pp 456-9 and D.N. Pritt 'India' in Labour Monthly, XXIV April 1942 for the Communist view (Mark I).This view was reiterated by R. Palme Dutt, 'India and Pakistan', in Labour Monthly, XXVIII March 1946.

2 G. Adhikari, Pakistan and Indian National Unity,(Bombay, 1943) and also R. Palme Dutt, 'Notes of the Month', Labour Monthly, XXIV Sept 1942 for the Communist view (Mark II).

3 Yuri Gankovsky and L.R. Gordon-Polonskaya, A History of Pakistan, (Lahore, n.d.)

4 e.g. Edward Mortimer, Faith and Power: The Politics of Islam, (London, 1982) 5 H. A. Alavi, 'The Army and the Bureaucracy in Pakistan Politics', paper

presented at the Centre d'Étude des Mouvements Sociaux, at C.N.R.S., Paris in 1965. An extended version of this paper written in 1967 was widely distributed in mimeographed form during the 1960s and was published in French translation under the title 'Armée et Bureaucratie dans la Politique du Pakistan' in Anouar

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Abdel Malek (ed) L'Armée Dans La Nation, Alger, 1975. See also: H.A. Alavi, 'The State in Post-Colonial Societies' in New Left Review No.74, July-August 1972, reprinted in Kathleen Gough & H. Sharma (eds.) Imperialism and Revolution in South Asia,(New York, 1973), and in H Goulbourne, Politics and the State in the Third World, (London, 1979).

6 B.T. McCully, English Education and the Origins of Indian Nationalism, (Williamsburg, 1940) and Aparna Basu, The Growth of Education and Political Development in India 1897-1920, (Delhi, 1974)

7 Francis Robinson, Separatism Among Indian Muslims: The Politics of the UP Muslims 1860-1923, (Cambridge, 1974), p 46

8 For an analysis of the role of the bureaucratic-military oligarchy in the state of Pakistan see Hamza Alavi, 'Class and State in Pakistan' in H.N.Gardezi and J. Rashid (eds.) Pakistan: The Roots of Dictatorship: The Political Economy of a Praetorian State, (London, 1983). Within the bureaucratic-military oligarchy, the military emerged as the senior partner by the 1970s and the coherence of the once tightly knit bureaucracy, which was controlled by the elite CSP cadres, was destroyed by Bhutto's 'Administrative Reforms'; all the same, the Punjabi salariat continues to dominate both the military as well as the civil bureaucracy.

9 Abdul Hamid, Muslim Separatism in India, (Lahore, 1967) 10 McKim Marriott, Caste Ranking and Community Structure in Five Regions of

India and Pakistan, (Poona, 1960). 11 Aparna Basu, op.cit. p 151 12 Report of the Court of Inquiry...into the Punjab Disturbances, 1953 (Munir

Report) Government of West Pakistan Press, (Lahore, 1954), p. 219 13 Zia-ul-Hassan Faruqi, The Deoband School and the Demand for Pakistan,

(London, 1963); Barbara Metcalf, Islamic Revival in British India: Deoband 1860-1900, (Princeton, 1982), passim.

14 David Gilmartin, 'Religious Leadership and the Pakistan Movement in the Punjab' in Modern Asian Studies, Vol. 13, No 3, 1979; Barbara Metcalf (ed.) Moral Conduct and Authority, London 1984, articles by David Gilmartin and Richard Eaton.

15 For an account of political factions in the Punjab, dominated by landlords and Pirs, see Hamza Alavi, 'Politics of Dependence: A Village in West Punjab', South Asian Review Vol. 4 No. 4, January 1971

16 Iftikhar Ahmad, Pakistan General Elections 1970, Lahore 1976 17 Clarence Maloney, Peoples of South Asia, (New York, 1974), p 506 18 David Kopf, The Brahmo Samaj and the Shaping of the Modern Indian Mind,

(Princeton, 1979) 19 Christian W. Troll, Sayyid Ahmad Khan: A Reinterpretation of Muslim

Theology, (Karachi, 1979), p 18 and footnote No.75 20 Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, Rah-e-Sunnat dar Radd-e-Bid'at, Tasanif-e-Ahmadiya

Vol. I, (Aligarh, 1883) 21 Mohammad Iqbal, The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam, reprinted,

(Lahore, 1958) 22 ibid. p. 173 23 ibid. p. 174

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24 ibid. p. 175-176 25 K. K. Aziz, Party Politics in Pakistan 1947-58, (Islamabad, 1976), pp 143-4 26 Francis Robinson, op cit. passim 27 ibid. pp 173-175 28 ibid. p 252 29 Azim Husain, Fazl-i-Husain: A Political Biography,(Bombay, 1946), pp 315-

316 30 Mohammad Iqbal, Letters of Iqbal to Jinnah, Lahore 1963, pp 28-32 31 Dow to Wavell 20th September 1945, Fortnightly Reports - Sind, L/P&J/5-261,

(Jan-Dec, 1945), India Office Records 32 Jamil-ud-Din Ahmad (ed.) Speeches and Writings of Mr. Jinnah, Vol. I,

(Lahore, 6th edition, 1960), p. 43 33 Aisha Jalal, The Sole Spokesman: Jinnah, Muslim League and the Demand for

Pakistan, (Cambridge, 1985), pp 95-96 34 G.W. Choudhury (ed.) Documents and Speeches on the Constitution of

Pakistan, (Dacca, 1967), pp 21-22 35 E.I.J. Rosenthal, Islam and the Modern National State, (Cambridge, 1965), p

245 36 S. Sibte Hassan, Naveed-e-Fikr, (urdu) (Karachi, 1983) 37 Rounaq Jehan, Pakistan: A Failure in National Integration, (London, 1972), pp

25-27 38 G.W. Choudhury, op.cit. p 25 39 ibid. p 30 40 ibid. p 31

Authoritarianism and legitimation of state power in PakistanHamza Alavi

On 29 May 1988, while Prime Minister Mohammad Khan Junejo, having just returned from an official tour of the Far Fast and China, was in the middle of a press conference at Islamabad airport the proceedings were rudely brought to a halt for the gathered journalists were peremptorily summoned to appear before General Zia. The General announced to the astonished newsmen that he had just dismissed his Prime Minister. A puzzled and unsuspecting Mr. Junejo was thus unceremoniously returned to the political obscurity whence he had come. Zia also dissolved the National Assembly, which was elected in February 1985 under rules dictated by himself, on a 'non-party basis' , to provide a semblance of representative government as a legitimating cover for military dictatorship. These were only the opening shots in the political high drama that began to unfold following Zia's mid-air assassination, and the installation of Benazir Bhutto as Prime Minister after the elections of November 1988, the situation in Pakistan is still problematic, fraught with uncertainty and pregnant with possibilities.

Zia's action highlighted the dilemmas and contradictions that have bedeviled successive regimes in Pakistan. The thread that runs centrally through the history of Pakistan is a

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tension between the locus of power and legitimation of power. The argument of this chapter is that state power in Pakistan has been concentrated in the hands of a military bureaucratic oligarchy, a tightly knit coterie of mainly (but not exclusively) Punjabi officials who have remained in command of the state apparatus in Pakistan from its inception. That oligarchy has had, on the whole unsuccessfully, to devise ways to legitimate its rule. The rise of the ethnic movement and ethnic politics have been only one factor in the challenges to the military- bureaucratic oligarchy. There has been a broader concern for restoration of democracy in the country, a movement that has not excluded Punjabis, the dominant ethnic group.

In the process neither the place of the military-bureaucratic oligarchy in the state nor the forms of state institutions have remained unchanged, nor has the balance between the two components of the 'oligarchy', the military and the bureaucracy, remained unaltered. But movements for the restoration of democracy in Pakistan have made no effective dents in the power of the oligarchy, despite occasional ritualistic elections, for two reasons: first, because of the formalistic and narrowly legitimate constitutionalism of Pakistan's political leadership, which has failed to address itself to the question of generating effective countervailing power, especially by way of organizing the working masses of the country, including the peasantry, with which to confront oligarchic domination. Second, because the main base of party politics in Pakistan has rested on landlord-dominated factions, uncommitted to the spirit of democracy and all too easily patronized and manipulated by those in control of the state apparatus; their basic class interests are fully guaranteed by the state, for the dominant bureaucrats and military officers have substantial landholding interest in their own right. Thus this class, as a class, is directly entrenched in the structure of state power. Apart from the lure of office , it has little to attract it to the democratic process. Conversely, changes in forms of state power and its institutions, including resort to the electoral process. have been forced on the dominant military-bureaucratic oligarchy by its consistent failure to construct a stable basis for the legitimation of state power. Coercion alone has not been sufficient to maintain its hold on it but, nevertheless, its search for legitimacy has been elusive.

There was an apparent exception to this, namely the rise to power of Mr. Bhutto and the PPP in 1972. Unlike previous political leaders who held office, Mr. Bhutto enjoyed both legitimacy and power. He was conscious of the role of the military-bureaucratic oligarchy. which he set about to rescind, breaking the power of the bureaucracy through his administrative reforms. However, the military was already prostrate in the aftermath of the debacle in Bangladesh, for it had lost all credibility and capacity to take over state power. The initiative had decisively passed into the hands of Mr. Bhutto. Sadly, he failed, because of his own illusions of grandeur and petty mentality given to humiliate and even destroy individuals who had fallen from his favor, regardless of their importance even for his own party and, more importantly, for the democratic political base which must be strong to bring the military -bureaucratic oligarchy under firm political control. Indeed, he created condition that gave the oligarchy, under Zia, an opportunity to return to power.

Classes and social forces in Pakistani society: US presence in Pakistan

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The story of Pakistan's relationship with the United Stated has been an uneven and complex one. It would not be true to say, as it often is, that immediately after independence Pakistan became a satellite of the United States. On the contrary, during the first five years after Partition Pakistan was, by and large, ignored by both the United States and Britain. This has to be seen in the context of Pakistan's bitter confrontation at the time with India. The economic stake in India for US and British capital was far greater than that which the backward and smaller economy of Pakistan could possibly have offered. There was to be no question, therefore, of jeopardizing Indian goodwill through involvement in Pakistan. Understandably, in this context, Pakistan was suspicious of both the United States and Britain. The Soviet position was no different. As a consequence Pakistan was isolated on the world stage.

During this early period Pakistan undertook measures that reflected not its dependency on foreign capital but the contrary. These measures, inimical to foreign capital, especially in the field of banking, were initiated mostly by the State Bank of Pakistan, led by Governor Zahid Hussain, who responded readily to proposals that might favor the indigenous bourgeoisie which had yet to be set on its feet. It was surprising to discover how much could in fact be accomplished in this area and undoubtedly this success had much do with Pakistan's international isolation at the time.

The most important of these measures. to give only one example, confined foreign banks to port towns on the plea that their proper role was to deal with foreign trade; Dacca and Narayanganj, centers of the jute export trade, were defined its 'port towns' for this purpose. Existing inland branches of foreign banks, of which there were very few, were allowed to continue but no new one were permitted, That measure reserved banking as a protected held for the expansion of indigenous banks and was responsible for their rapid expansion thereafter.1 The country's banking system passed virtually exclusively into domestic hands. Certainly at this stage one can not say that Pakistan was a mere satellite of Western powers and US capital. This was soon to change.

Foreign investments in Pakistan were initially limited to British investments in trade and extractive industries. From January 1948 to September 1952 over 87 percent of foreign investment in Pakistan was British and less than 405 percent came from the United Sates.2 ( US Department of Commerce 1954). In the four years from 1957 to 1960 the share of Britain in foreign investments in Pakistan (including reinvestment of local earnings) was lower but still the major source, at 67 percent whereas the US share rose to 10 per cent. 3 Later foreign investments, especially US investments, expanded. in new fields such as fertilizer production, pharmaceuticals, oil and natural gas. A major economic stake of US capital in Pakistan has been in sales of military equipment. The United States has had a large stake in the militarization of Pakistan. Parallel with this, from the mid-1950s, Pakistan grew increasingly dependent on US aid and was consequently drawn into a dependency relationship with the United States and the principal representatives of internationalized capital in the world today, the World Bank and the IMF.

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With the intensification of Pakistan's economic dependence the United States has been able to intervene decisively in Pakistan's internal affairs, even to dictate the choice of ministers and allocation of major portfolios in the Government from time to time. It was in the period after 1952-3 that Pakistan passed under the tutelage of the United States. 'The earlier indifference of The United States and western powers towards Pakistan changed overnight after the nationalization of Iranian oil in March 1951 by the National Front government in Iran, led by Mohammad Mossadeq. Immediately the regional strategic priorities for the western powers changed decisively. Their economic interests in India were far less important than their control of Middle East oil.4

A direct consequence of this involvement was militarization of Pakistan society. Military expenditures increased phenomenally and the army establishment was inflated. As will be discussed below, the army was not yet ready to play an independent role in the political arena. But it had already begun to cast its shadow over the country " 5 The Pakistan army was also being bolstered up and prepared for a role that it was to fulfill in the Pakistan political system. A 'Summary Presentation of the (US) Mutual Security Program' published in 1957 stated that: 'From a political viewpoint, US military aid has strengthened Pakistan's armed services, the greatest single stabilizing force in the country and has encouraged Pakistan to participate in collective defense agreements'. 6

Even after the abandonment by the United States of relying on a military alliance with Pakistan (and other countries) for the defense of its interests in the Middle East, the inflated and reinforced Pakistan army retained its dominant position in the country and continued to pre-empt a major share of public expenditure. Pakistan , having lost its role in US regional 'defense' policy and therefore marginalized by the United States, accommodated itself to the new reality by proclaiming a' bilateral ' foreign policy - later redesignated 'non-alignment'. The US having suspended armed aid and, after the 1965 war with India, even sales of military supplies, Pakistan cultivated ties with China and France as its principal suppliers of military equipment, but it continued in its attempts to win back US favor. In 1969-70 it played an important role as a go-between in U S opening towards China, which was one reason why the United States did not restrain the Pakistan military in its brutal action in Bangladesh; US military sales and aid were not resumed until Reagan dollars began to flow once again after the 1978 revolution in Afghanistan and, more decisively, the Soviet intervention in that country in December 1979 when Pakistan soil was used as a base for American and Chinese intervention by proxy in Afghanistan. Pakistan, with its strategic location on the Persian Gulf, also acquired a new importance in US policy for the region. Pakistan has so far tried hard to maintain good relations with the Iranian regime and is a potential intermediary for the United States in its dealings with that country.

There are several reasons why the United States might be expected to continue to take a close interest in Pakistan's internal affairs. First, the United States is deeply committed to fighting the drug traffic through Pakistan, its concern heightened by its lack of confidence in the ability or the will of Pakistan authorities to deal with it. It has established its own organization in the country to monitor this and track down offenders. There have been many occasions on which it has had to pressurize the Zia regime to apprehend offenders

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because senior officials, including military officers, involved in the traffic were unpunished. Second, there is also the US concern about Pakistan's developing nuclear capability, now perhaps a cause for greater worry after announcements in February 1989 by the army chief that Pakistan is producing surface-to-surface and surface-to air missiles. But third, and potentially most important of all, there is the US interest in the use that it can make of Pakistan for its strategy in the Persian Gulf.

Landlords:

Landlords are the most powerful indigenous class in Pakistan. Electoral politics being highly biased towards rural areas, landlords predominate in the political leadership. Members of the bureaucracy and the army also come from this class. Where staff officers of the army or senior bureaucrats do not already have large landholdings in their own right, they soon acquire them through a policy of allotment of newly irrigated lands to them at giveaway prices. By virtue of that class status of bureaucrats and military officers, the big landlord lobby is directly and deeply entrenched in the Pakistani state.

One example of the effectiveness of landlord power in Pakistan is the persistent failure of World Bank- and IMF-backed proposals to tax agricultural incomes, despite the bankruptcy of the Pakistan treasury and its very narrow tax base and the pressure from these bodies to remedy this. On the contrary, landlords are not only free from income tax; they also enjoy large subsidies on their inputs and high guaranteed price support for wheat. Landlord power is also reflected in the failure to implement land reforms, despite the rhetoric of some governments. Ayub Khan's land reform of 1959 had little effect, for no more than 2.4 per cent of the cultivated area was due to be surrendered as a result in a country of massive concentration of landownership.7 According to one estimate in 1970, 5 per cent of rural households in Pakistan owned about 70 per cent of the land.8 Again, despite his rhetoric, the 'Land Reforms' of Mr. Bhutto (himself a substantial landowner), amounted to nothing. In the words of a leading authority on the land question in Pakistan: 'The 1972 land reforms did not make even a dent in the concentration of land in the Indus Basin.9

What Pakistan did achieve, on the strength of landlord power, was a land reform in reverse in 1953-54, which must be unique in Third World history. In fact, this land redistribution from the poor to the rich is little known, even in Pakistan, except in villages, among landlords and the peasants themselves who know it only too well. It is recorded in obscure documents and Six-Monthly Reports to be found in Government archives. With the mass movement in 1947 of millions of refugees in each direction across the border with India, as an emergency measure land of the outgoing refugees was distributed among incoming refugees on the basis of one acre per head for every family. Incoming landlords, however, were additionally given a cash stipend, but they complained of having left behind vast acreages of land in India for which they had not received an equal amount of land in Pakistan, whereas peasants who were landless in India had been given land. That was unjust. The government decided to redistribute the refugee land on the basis of claimed previous ownership in India, subject to a nominal maximum of 1,000 acres of unirrigated land and 500 acres of irrigated land. Small

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refugee peasants were turned off the land that they had been given and the land was redistributed in accordance with landlord justice.10 With the dispossession of small-holders there was a concomitant increase in the number of landless laborers in the country.

Politically landlords are the most effectively organized class in the country, unlike the bourgeoisie or the subordinate classes; landlord-led factions dominate the rural vote.11 Ironically the Muslim League was weak in provinces in which Muslims were in a majority, areas that now comprise Pakistan. I have argued elsewhere that the Pakistan movement was the movement of the Muslim salariat in India, the educated mainly lower middle classes whose main avenue for livelihood and upward mobility was to secure salaried in jobs in the colonial and the post-colonial state apparatus. The main strength of the Muslim salariat in India was in provinces where they were in a minority. After the debacle of the 1937 elections Jinnah was painfully aware of the necessity of winning the support of the Muslim landlord leadership of Muslim majority provinces in order to legitimate the claim of the Muslim League to be the sole legitimate representative of Muslims of India. The landlords were preoccupied with provincial politics within the framework of overall British rule in India, which they did not care to challenge. It was not until 1945-46 when prospects of independence loomed over the horizon, that Muslim landlords of Punjab and Sindh, fearful of the Congress threat of land reforms in free India, lined up behind the Pakistan Muslim League to preserve their class existence. In the process it was not the Muslim League that took over the landlords but, rather, the landlords who took over the Muslim League.12 Ever since. landlords have dominated all effective political parties in the country, including the Pakistan People's Party, notwithstanding its populist rhetoric.

The indigenous bourgeoisie:

At the time of Partition the territories that came to comprise Pakistan had few industries; those engaged in commerce and trade were mostly Hindus who were driven from the country There were, however, some Muslim communities, mainly Gujarati-speaking traders, i.e. Memons, Bohras, Ismaili Khojas and Ithna Ashari Khojas, who had migrated from Gujarat, Kutch and Kathiawar from the middle of the nineteenth century to the prospering new colonial cities all over South Asia and beyond, in the wake of the rise of colonial trade as well as expanding business prospects in new colonial administrative and military centers. After Partition a large number of members of these communities migrated to Pakistan from India, East Africa and South East Asia. Alongside the Gujarati business communities there were a few Punjabis, notably Chiniotis who had also immigrated all over India and had prospered, especially in handling exports of hides and skins, which Hindu merchants would not handle. Finally there were merchants of Punjabi origin from Delhi. who are organized in association of their own. The Gujaratis were the predominant element among these, until recent years,

The mainly Gujarati-speaking business communities in Pakistan had no political representation as such. They were left at the mercy of the bureaucracy. They were represented collectively through Chambers of Commerce and the influential Pakistan

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Federation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry in which, until the 1980s, they held a dominating position. Given the political isolation and weakness of the trading communities in Pakistan, it is quite remarkable to see how the state authorities in the country set about the task of turning them into an industrial bourgeoisie. The Government embarked on a desperate drive for industrialization, because they believed that without industries Pakistan would not be economically viable. (We have no space to discuss the origins and basis of this belief.). This was a major factor in the drive for industrialization which the dominant bureaucracy embarked upon, and their committed support for industrialists, although this class had little or no weight in state power. A wide range of policies and programmes were taken in hand to promote industrialization.

By the mid-1950s industrial investment grew rapidly and parallel with that growth was a rapid concentration of ownership, with the rise of the proverbial 'twenty-two families' who were estimated, by the mid 1960s, to own about 65 percent of industrial capital and about 80 per cent of financial assets in the country. The scene changed in the early 1970s. 'The industrial bourgeoisie was demoralized both by a high level of working class militancy, initially encouraged by Bhutto (but later repressed brutally), and Bhutto's nationalization measures, compounded by what they thought to be the sheer unpredictability of Mr. Bhutto. In the Zia period, again, they found that they could not cope with the arbitrary rule of the military. There was a sharp drop in new investment and many of them turned to trade or shifted their interests abroad.

During the 1980s, a major shift took place in the composition of the business communities for during the Zia period a new group appeared on the scene and has begun to dominate it. These are 'Punjabi' families; not simply ethnic Punjabi, but rather relatives of senior Punjabi military officers and bureaucrats whose personal high-level connections in the state apparatus mean that they can negotiate minefields of bureaucratic obstacles with comparative ease. The older business communities feel very badly done by. Their disgruntled feelings were expressed in the 1978 Report of the Karachi Chamber of commerce where they complained that Zia's 'denationalization's' had benefited only three business families from the North. By the 1980s, control of the prestigious Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry, which is based at Karachi, passed into Punjabi hands, the crowning symbol of the new Punjabi ascendancy.

Mandi merchants:

A special mention is needed of the influential and well organized 'mundi' merchant who operate in 'mundis', or produce markets, in District and Sub-District towns, and who have a multiple -class positions. They are dealers in produce, are fairly substantial landowners and also in many cases own agro-industries such as cotton ginneries, wheat flour mills and/or rice mills. Before Partition such trade was handled by Hindus. The vacuum left by Hindu traders was filled by Muslim landowners, owners of perhaps, between 300 to 800 acres, especially in the Punjab, who took over their trading function.13 Of course, this triple overlap is not universal, for we may have a combination of landownership and trading or that of landownership and agro-industry, but all of them tend to have close mutual links.

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The common affairs of mandi merchants are managed by a committee at each mandi. 'Horizontal linkages' between them, both locally and nationally, tend to be close; they also have 'vertical linkages' by virtue of their regular dealings with clients in the area, which gives them an exceptionally powerful network of close contacts. They have a significant role in political affairs and played a significant part in financing and organizing the supposedly 'spontaneous mass movement' against Mr. Bhutto, which prepared the ground for Zia's military takeover. To alienate Mr. Bhutto from his crucial landowning class base he was lured by certain senior bureaucrats (who were later richly rewarded by Zia) into nationalization of agro-industries, namely cotton ginneries, wheat flour miles and rice Mills14. Predictably mandi merchants and landlords reacted with anger. In the 1988 elections, still resentful of Mr. Bhutto's measures. they aligned with the opposition Islamic Democratic Alliance (IDA) against Benazir Bhutto in the Punjab. This factor, however, should not be overestimated, for some of the support of the IDA was mobilized by the Inter-Services Intelligence, the ISI (which was a state within a state, but has recently been re-organized with some of its political functions transferred to other agencies) as well as the IDA's landlord base.

Mullahs and pirs:

There is a pervasive myth that 'mullahs' or, more grandiosely, the ulema, i.e. learned religious scholars, on the one hand and on the other, pirs or 'sufi mashaikh', i.e. 'saints' who are believed to have powers of intercession with Allah or 'sajjada nashins' , heirs of great saints of the past and keepers of their shrines, have a powerful hold over an ignorant peasantry and thereby have great weight in electoral politics. Such myths are the stuff of stereotypes that urban intellectuals have of the peasantry of whom they have no direct knowledge. Sadly these ideas, relayed by such urban intellectuals, are given currency by Western scholars who take their opinions at face value, and there are too many scholarly tomes that give them a stamp of authority. In the course of extensive fieldwork in Punjab villages over a period of fifteen months reality was found to be quite different, a matter that I do not have the space to discuss fully here.15 Suffice to say that the village 'imam' occupies a very lowly status and has to subscribe to one landlord-dominated village faction or its rival. In rare cases, some of them manage to declare themselves to be men of Allah and stay neutral --- but in so doing disqualify themselves from political intervention. The position of small local pirs in villages is similar, although there are many pirs who are substantial landlords in their own right. In their case it is mainly their power as landlords rather than their 'spiritual powers' that underlies their capacity to act in the political arena. Some such pirs have been prominent in Pakistan politics, aligning with one or another political party.

In urban areas the roles of mullahs and pirs work rather differently. The former tend to be organized in Madressahs, or religious schools, and tend to operate as networks (affiliated to particular Madressahs) through mosques in the city. These mullahs succeed at times in mobilizing their congregations and leading crowds in street demonstrations and riots, but by and large their role has been manifested in sectarian riots. It might be pointed out that, uniquely in South Asia, Sunnis are divided into two mutually hostile traditions, a division that cuts across the classification of Sunni Muslims into the four major schools. The two

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South Asian tradition are the 'Deobandi' tradition, named after the great religious seminary at Deoband near Delhi, and the Barelvi tradition named after the town of Bareilly in Uttar Pradesh in India, the home of a major figure in that tradition. Most communal riots are between these two or between Deobandis and Shias, Barelvis being more tolerant towards Shias. Each of these Sunni groups have organized themselves as political parties. The Deobandis are organized as the Jamiat-e-Ulema-Islam, whose strength, such as it is, is localized in certain pockets of the Sarhad and Balochistan and, especially, in Karachi which has a very large Pushtoon population. Barelvis are organized as Jamiat -a-Ulema -Pakistan, whose influence is confined to pockets in Sindh and Punjab. The electoral performance of both is negligible. Finally, mention must be made of the highly organized and well financed fundamentalist Jamaat-i-Islami, which was given much encouragement by the Zia regime. The limitation of its electoral base can be judged from the fact that it was routed in three successive elections in 1985, the local bodies election of 1987 (both under Zia, who gave the Party much support) and again in 1988. While one would not discount entirely the influence of these various religious groups in the narrowly religious, cultural and ideological spheres, especially among some sections of the urban lower middle classes and traders, contrary to the conventional wisdom they have proved to be inconsequential as a political force.

The salariat:

There is a class, it could be argued, that has a special significance in colonial societies where the production base is primarily agricultural. They are those with formal educational credentials that entitle them to salaried jobs in the colonial state apparatus and who dominate the urban society there16. In India a new education policy was shaped to produce functionaries for the colonial state and the colonial legal system. We have labeled this new class the salariat which, itself, is divided into two strata, viz. the bureaucracy at the top which wields power and the ordinary scribes below them. In Marxist terminology, the salariat is an auxiliary class, whose class role in society can be fully understood only with reference to fundamental classes to which it relates. Nevertheless it looms large in colonized and post-colonial societies and dominates their urban life and political debate. It might be flattering to call them the 'intelligentsia', although members of the intelligentsia too, namely academics, writers, journalists, etc., identify with this class. The term 'middle class' is too wide and 'petit bourgeoisie' inappropriate, for in Marxist terminology the latter hits a specific meaning referring to small traders and petty commodity producers.

In Pakistan this class is at the center of ethnic and regional politics. The salariat of underprivileged regions of Pakistan (led by students, prospective members of the salariat) articulate their grievances and demands vis-a-vis , Punjabis who predominate in the Civil Service and the military17. The predominantly Punjabi military and bureaucracy tend to be hostile to such ethnic movements, whereas the regional political leadership, excepting that of the Punjab, responds positively to such demands. However, the Pakistan People's Party, ambitious to secure power at national level and fearful of losing support in the Punjab, the largest province, has always declared itself as a 'national party' and distanced itself from regionalist movements. Nevertheless, given the prominent place of leaders of

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Sindhi origin in the party, in the 1988 elections Sindhi nationalists preferred to vote for the PPP, i.e. for a party that had real prospects of getting into power at the center. They hoped that in spite of the PPP distancing itself from Sindhi nationalism it would not ignore their legitimate demands, and voted for the PPP rather than for Sindhi nationalist candidates who they knew had no prospects of getting into power and fulfilling their promises. In the case of Balochistan, however, voting was along ethnic lines as also in the case of Urdu-speaking Muhajirs, who constitute the majority of the urban population of Sindh and who voted solidly for the Muhajir Quami Mahaz (MQM), which has emerged as the third largest party in the country. It was able to negotiate as a party with the PPP leadership in power for their collective demands, and later the MOM decided to conjoin with the opposition. Violent ethnic conflict between Muhajirs and Sindhis is one of the toughest problems that confronts the Benazir Bhutto government, and which it has been quite powerless to resolve.18

The Bureaucracy:

There has been a myth, shared by many writers, that during its first eleven years Pakistan was ruled by a democratic leadership, namely Mr. Jinnah and his successors, under a system of representative government and that political power lay in the hands of politicians. It has been argued that it was only after the Ayub coup d'etat of 1958 that the politicians were swept aside. It was not until the mid 1960s' that the central role of the bureaucracy in the state of Pakistan came to be widely recognized. Even here there were differences in perception. Khalid bin Sayeed ( 1960). placing the role of the civil service at the center of his analysis, regarded them as instruments of 'central' domination over the regions, thus begging questions about the equation of power at the center. He wrote:

"Today in the government of Pakistan the civil servants often play an even more powerful role than that of their imperial predecessors. Their ascent to power has been both steady and dramatic, Under the dominating personality of Quaide Azam and his successor Liaqat Ali Khan, the civil servants effectively controlled the entire administration in the provinces and the politicians there were kept in power subject to their willingness to obey Central Government directives".19

Taking a different view, I argued, as early as 1958, that the bureaucracy in Pakistan was in power at the center from the moment of inception of the new state, a view that I amplified a year later.20 Later this interpretation was to pass into general currency. The bureaucracy was not, as Sayeed, suggests, merely the instrument of the two political leaders with whom he identifies the central government. It was the military-bureaucratic oligarchy that controlled the central government. Initially the army was a junior partner in that; its power and influence increased through the 1950s. But the regime of General Zia was the first truly military regime in Pakistan.

Bureaucrats in Pakistan have operated, with rare exceptions, in the manner in which they were brought up under the colonial regime. Officers of Indian origin were generally limited to lower ranking roles where they did not need to do much more than carry out policies that were laid down by the superior white officers. They were not much involved

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in considering fundamental issues of state policy and formulating strategies. This mentality has persisted, to a large degree, in the post-colonial situation and has been a stultifying influence on the making of state policy. C. B. Marshall, a member of the US State Department Policy Planning Staff with long experience in Pakistan, had this to say about them:

"Some civil servants have considerable proficiency in administrative routines. Most of them incline to regard these as the sum total of government. As men of routine rather than audacity and imagination, they tend to have small conception of growth and change and would be beyond their depth in providing the rationale of a revolution. (Marshall is referring here to Mirza and Ayub Khan's self-proclaimed 'revolution' of 1958) or staking out an imaginative course of national development." (Marshall 1959)21

The military

In 1947 the Pakistan army was weak and disorganized. Initially the Commanders-in-Chief were British officers, General Messervy followed by General Gracey. In 1951 General Ayub Khan was appointed as the first Pakistani Commander-in-Chief, superseding several more senior generals. He was a personal friend and protégé of the wily and powerful General Iskander Mirza, Secretary of the Ministry of Defense, who was later to become the President of Pakistan. Although Mirza enjoyed a military title, having been trained at Sandhurst with Ayub Khan, he was a bureaucrat, having served as member of the elite Indian Political Service under colonial rule. Prime Minister Liaqat Ali Khan was the Defense Minister but he left Defense Ministry affairs to Mirza. Thus, Ayub Khan's Private Secretary wrote:

"The Defense portfolio had always been held by the Prime Minister himself who, being the leader of the ruling political party, had mostly been busy in consolidating his Party position or in attending to the ever increasing parliamentary wranglings.... (He) never found time to attend to the real problems of the Defense Ministry. (Ahmad 1960) "22

Mirza's choice of Ayub Khan was astute and was not merely that of promoting his old friend. He had chosen a man on whom he could rely to be loyal and subservient to himself not only because Ayub Khan had a weak personality and was personally dependent on him, but also because having been promoted over the heads of a number of more senior and disgruntled generals, Ayub's position in the army itself was somewhat shaky, making him even more dependent on Mirza's backing. Thus, in the early years, the bureaucracy had secured its grip over the army.

During-the 1950s; with US military aid and expansion of the military and its newly forged (direct) links with the Pentagon and the US establishment, the army was greatly strengthened and began to have much weight in the nation's affairs. Parallel with this Ayub Khan's ambitions grew, but as yet the military did not play an independent political role. It would be a mistake, however, to think that the Pakistan military is an

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undifferentiated entity. Rampant involvement in corruption, especially under the Zia regime when army officers could move over into lucrative civilian appointments, sapped its morale and discipline. True professional soldiers were appalled to see this sorry state of the armed forces and in recent months there seems to be a process under way to rectify this to some extent, to restore professionalism in the army.

The most sinister element of the military establishment is the Inter-Services Intelligence Unit, ISI, which earned the reputation of being virtually a parallel government. It was initially encouraged by Mr. Bhutto himself, but truly flourished under Zia, with an estimated staff of 10,000. It is reputed to be one of the most influential military and internal security machines in the Third World. It was headed by a CIA-trained general' who has been moved from the position since the PPP government came into office. The ISI was not limited to military counter-intelligence, its proper function. It acquired a considerable presence in Pakistan politics and the tentacles of the political wing of the ISI reached far and wide. There have been moves recently to divest the ISI of some of its internal political functions, which have been transferred to other agencies, and to scale down its size.

Workers and peasants:

In considering the balance of forces in Pakistan society, we need to take account of the fact that, unlike India, workers and peasants in Pakistan are relatively unorganized and there are no effective parties of the Left to lead them. Trade unions are still in their infancy and are enmeshed in day to day operations with bureaucratic institutions and procedures, such as the Labor Department and Labor Tribunals, inherited from the colonial regime. Sadly, many trade union leaders are corrupted by the management. It was only in the 1970s that powerful militant trade unions began to emerge, but, for reasons too lengthy to consider here, this vitality was soon dissipated. Similarly there has been no effective peasant organization, either, although there are several small organizations that describe themselves as the Pakistan peasant movement.

The judiciary and the doctrine of 'necessity':

In the absence of mass Organization of workers and peasants there is no thrust from below to bolster the democratic process in Pakistan, to generate countervailing power vis-a-vis that of the repressive state apparatus. Political leaders are unable to mobilize mass resistance when institutions of representative government are subverted and overthrown by the military-bureaucratic oligarchy. The approach of the political leadership to the problem has been narrowly legalistic. Ironically, even here, the law itself has betrayed them. Each time democratically established constitutions have been overthrown usurpers of power have had no difficulty in having their authority ratified, ex post facto, by the Courts involving a dubious principle of necessity: this argues that the safety of the state is the supreme law and therefore when constitutional government is overthrown, the usurping authority must be recognized to allow the state to continue to function to avoid anarchy. That is of course not the case, for the proper option is to restore the lawful

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government that was overthrown. In espousing the doctrine of necessity the Pakistan judiciary has lent its authority to usurpers of power rather than defend the rule of law.23

There is a paradox in the way this legal principle has operated in practice, for it is unavailable to democratically elected governments which feel bound by the Constitution that they inherit from dictatorial regimes, in the name of the 'rule of law', while those who overthrow constitutionally established governments have had little difficulty in having their self arrogated rule ratified by the Courts. Constitutionally elected governments, by virtue of their narrow legalistic basis, have felt themselves bound by inherited 'constitutions', which after all were designed by dictators to perpetuate their powers. This is the case with the Government of Benazir Bhutto, which is hampered by an illegal 'Constitution', inherited from General Zia. which was imposed by decree and later legitimized by his 'Assembly' elected in 1985, in the form of the Eighth Amendment to the 1973 Constitution. This 'amendment' is a major obstacle in the way of the PPP government that was elected in 1988 and one that it has little power to remove. Meanwhile President Ghulam lshaq Khan, Zia's nominee and heir, who has not been exposed to a popular verdict and likewise an unrepresentative 'Senate', blocks the way to effective democracy.

Ascendancy of the bureaucracy:

State power in Pakistan as suggested above, was from the outset firmly in the grip of the bureaucracy, the political leadership being made to play a secondary role, the military as yet being disorganized and weak. In examining this a brief comparison with India may be helpful. If we look for reasons for divergences between the trajectories of political developments in India and Pakistan, there are three factors which appear to be particularly significant. These differences are, first, the character of the leading political parties in each country, the style and nature of the struggle for independence that they pursued, the social bases in which they were respectively embedded and finally the weight and effectiveness of the respective political leadership. Second. the choice of Lord Mountbatten and that of Mr. Jinnah, respectively, as the first Governors General of the two countries can be seen in retrospect to have been factors of considerable significance, both in view of the obvious differences in their political positions as well as in the light of Mr. Jinnah's fatal illness at a critical time, which prevented him from playing an active part in Pakistan's affairs as he might otherwise have done. Third, and linked to the second factor, is the creation of the office of the Secretary General to the Government of Pakistan, created on the plea that it was necessary to enable the new state to deal with unprecedented problems and to assist Mr. Jinnah. These changes made it possible for the bureaucracy to usurp powers invested in Mr. Jinnah and to act in his name.

As for the first point, both the Indian National Congress and the Pakistan Muslim League began as parties of the 'westernized' educated middle classes, the salariat, that was brought into existence by exigencies of colonial rule. The Congress party, however, went through a long process of evolution. drawing in the support and participation of other classes. The highly developed Indian national bourgeoisie, discriminated against by the colonial state, was amongst the first to throw its weight behind the Congress and the

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independence movement and ever since it has been entrenched in the Congress Party. Furthermore, through its long history of mass struggle, notably since the civil disobedience movement starting from the 1920s under the leadership of Gandhi, the Congress Party struck deep roots in Indian society, both urban and rural. In the process it established links with local level leadership that was active in local Self-government and the rural gentry, deemed the rural 'vote banks'.24 The Congress leadership thus became deeply entrenched in all classes of Indian society. Its leadership was very broad, not being limited to one or two or even a few national figures, and was well established nation-wide. There were also other well organized political parties in India as well as a strong working class movement and a peasant movement with a proud history. These factors provided a strong basis for Indian democracy.

In contrast to India, the Pakistan leadership achieved independence almost by default, as a by-product of the Indian mass struggle for national independence. The Muslim League had always distanced it self from mass struggles. It was preoccupied with formally disputing the credentials of the Indian National Congress to speak for Indian Muslims and persuading the British authorities that the League alone represented them and indeed that Mr. Jinnah was their 'Sole Spokesman'.25 Jinnah preferred dialogues with British Viceroys and Governors rather than mass struggles, The Muslim League debacle of the 1937 elections left it defeated in every Muslim majority province (even in Assam, where a nominally Muslim League government took office mainly with the help of European planters, the League had won only nine seats, as against thirty-five won by the Congress party). Mr. Jinnah had no inclination to try to mobilize popular forces to strengthen the League position. Painfully aware of the need to legitimate his claim to be the sole spokesman for Muslim India, the person with whom the colonial authorities should negotiate as the exclusive representative of Indian Muslims, Mr. Jinnah was faced with the paradox of the League's failure in every Muslim majority province. All Jinnah needed was legitimation of his claim rather than actual power in the provinces. On that basis he decided to make deals with powerful landowners of the Muslim majority provinces who controlled the rural vote and the Provincial Assemblies and Governments. Given his limited objective, he was prepared to hand over the Muslim League in the respective Provinces to the provincial magnates, in return for their nominal acceptance of the Muslim League label for their governments. That was sufficient for Mr. Jinnah for it would, nominally at least, ratify his claim vis-a-vis the center to be the sole spokesman of Muslims in India.

Members of the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan, drawn from that background, who had been elected indirectly by provincial Assemblies which themselves were elected before Partition on a limited franchise and whose party was now in complete disarray, were only too aware of their own vulnerable position and isolation from a popular electoral base. Afraid of facing the electorate they continued to postpone (until 1956) the framing of a new Constitution, which would have to be followed by elections. The existing provisional Constitution, the Government of India Act 1935, as adapted, facilitated bureaucratic control over the political leadership. The weak politicians were only too willing in the circumstances to submit to the dictation of bureaucrats with whom they were badly compromised due to their bribery and corruption.

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Notes:

1 This was done by amendment of the pre-Partition Banking Control (Restriction of Branches) Act, abolishing exemption for foreign banks from the purview of the Act and then by virtue of a declaration by the State Bank of the criteria for granting permission to banks to open branches, which said that no permission would be given by it to foreign banks to open branches in places other than port towns, as defined.

2 US Department of Commerce (1954), p. 5. 3 State Bank of Pakistan (n.d.), p. 17. 4 See Alavi, The Origins and Significance of the Pakistan-US Military Alliance

(1990). 5 Mr. Zahid Hussain, former Governor of the State Bank of Pakistan and later

Chairman of the Pakistan Planning Commission, expressed to me his grave concern, because the Pentagon was dealing directly and secretively with the Pakistan army with out consultation with the government of Pakistan and its foreign ministry, and that the government was uninformed of what was happening, and therefore extremely anxious about it.

6 Alavi and Khusro (1962). 7 Alavi (1976), pp. 334-5. 8 ibid., p. 337 9 Khan (1981). f 10 Alavi (1976). p. 334. 11 For an account of how landlord power is organized at the village level see Alavi

(1971), See also Alavi (1974) 12 For an account of this we Alavi (1987). pp. 97-103. 13 In my survey of 1968-9 this was found to be the range of landownership of

mandi merchants in Sahiwal District and it was generally agreed by them that this would be the typical range of landownership of mandi merchants all over the Canal Colony Districts of the Punjab, In Sindh the picture seems to be different as many Urdu-speaking Muhajirs, refugees from India have filled this niche where Hindu merchants have left - in some districts of Sindh Hindu traders continue to operate.

14 My interview at Sahiwal in December 1979 with Rana Hanif Mohammad (himself a landowner) who was Finance Minister in Mr. Bhutto's government at the time. He named two very senior officials who lured Mr. Bhutto into taking this step and evidently who were later well rewarded for that by Zia. Rana Haif said that these officials had worked out the nationalization measure in full detail in secret without knowledge of the ministers. Mr. Bhutto was able to announce them, therefore, as a fait accompli. Rana Hanif said that a meeting of the Cabinet was convened, Mr. Bhutto presented a packet of papers dealing with the nationalization decree, and announced to his surprised Cabinet colleagues that he had that day nationalized the agro-based industries.

15 See Alavi (1987). 16 Alavi (1989b). 17 Alavi (1989a).

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18 Alavi (1989c). 19 Bin Sayeed (1960). 20 Alavi (1958, 1959). 21 Marshall (1959), p. 255. 22 Ahmad (1960). 23 Wolf-Phillips (n.d.). 24 Bailey ( 1963), p. 109. 25 See Jalal's excellent study (1985). 26 See Bin Sayeed (1960), pp. 241ff. 27 Wolpert (1984), p. 360- 28 Constituent Assembly (Legislature)of Pakistan (1948), P. 239. 29 Wolpert (1984). 30 Gerth and Wright Mills (1948), p. 232. 31 Constituent Assembly of Pakistan (1956). 32 Braibanti (1959). 33 Report of the Court of Inquiry ... into the Punjab Disturbances of 1953

(popularly known as The 'Munir Report'). 34 See Alavi (1990). 35 See Alavi (1963). 36 Pakistan Today, Summer 1958, London. 37 Marshall (1959). 38 ibid., p 250. 39 1 was given an opportunity to read this fascinating letter. 40 See Alavi(1987). 41 Financial Times, I February 1989, London. 42 Jang (Urdu). 10 March 1989, London. 43 Bhutto (1989), p 263ff. 44 Financial Times, 19 November 1988, London. 45 Guardian, 18 November 1988, London. 46 Guardian, 15 November 1988, London. 47 Financial Times, 8 November 1988, London, 48 Economist, 3 December 1988, London. 49 Independent, I December 1988. London; Jang, (Urdu), 2 December 1998. 50 Economist, 3 December 1988. 51 Financial Times, 5 December 1998, London. 52 Independent, 6 February and 15 February 1989, London.

References:

Ahmad, Colonel Mohammed (1960). My Chief (Karachi: Longman Green). Alavi, Hamza (1958), 'Conditions of political advance in Pakistan', Pakistan

Today, Summer. Alavi, Hamza (1959), 'Democracy and the Generals', Pakistan -Today. Summer. Alavi, Hamza (1963), 'US aid to Pakistan: an evaluation', Economic Weekly,

Special no., July.

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Alavi, Hamza (1971), 'Politics of dependence: a village in West Punjab', South Asian Review, 4(2).

Alavi, Hamza (1972), 'The state in post-colonial societies: Pakistan and Bangladesh', New Left Review, 74.

Alavi, Hamza (1974), 'Rural bases of power in south Asia', Journal of Contemporary Asia, 4(4).

Alavi, Hamza (1976),'Rural elite and agricultural development in Pakistan', in Stevens, R. D., Hamza Alavi and Peter Bertocci (eds), Rural Development in Pakistan and Bangladesh (Hawaii: University of Hawaii Press). Alavi, Hamza (1980), Journal of Contemporary Asia, 10(4).

Alavi, Hamza (I 981).'The structure of colonial social formations', Economic and Political Weekly, XVI, nos 10-12,

Alavi, Hamza (1982), 'State and class under Peripheral capitalism'. in Alavi, Hamza and Teodor Shanin (eds). Introduction to the Sociology of Developing Societies (London: Macmillan and New York: Monthly Review Press). Alavi, . Hamza (1983a).'State and class in Pakistan', in Gardezi, Hassan and Jamil Rashid (eds), Pakistan: The roots of dictatorship (London ZED Press).

Alavi, Hamza (1983b),'India: transition from feudalism to colonial capitalism', in Alavi, Hamza, Doug McEachern et al., Capitalism and Colonial Production (London: Croom Helm),

Alavi, Hamza (1987), 'Pakistan and Islam: ethnicity and ideology', in Halliday, Fred and Hamza Alavi (eds), State and Ideology in the Middle East and Pakistan

(London: Macmillan and New York; Monthly Review Press). Alavi, Hamza (1989a), 'Politics of ethnicity in India and Pakistan', in Alavi,

Hamza and John Harriss (eds), Sociology of Developing Societies: South Asia (London: Macmillan and New York: Monthly Review Press).

Alavi, Hamza (1989b),'Formation of the social structure of South Asia under the impact of colonial rule'. in Alavi, Hamza and John Harriss (eds), Sociology of Developing Societies: South Asia (London: Macmillan and New York: Monthly Review Press).

Alavi. Hamza (1989c),'Nationhood and the nationalities in Pakistan', Economic and Political Weekly, 8 July.

Alavi, Hamza (1990), 'The origins and significance of the Pakistan -US military alliance', in Kumar, Satish (ed.), Yearbook on India's Foreign Policy (New Delhi: Sage Publications).

Alavi. Hamza and Amir Khusro (1962), 'Pakistan: The burden of US aid'. New University Thought, 2(4), 31 (reprinted from Pakistan Today, New Series no. 1.1961).

Bailey, F. G. (1963), Politics and Social Change: Orissa in 1959 (Berkeley: University of California Press).

Bhutto, Benazir (1989), Daughter of the East (New York: Simon and Schuster). Bin Sayeed, Khalid (1960), Pakistan: The formative phase (Karachi, Pakistan

Publishing House), Braibanti, Ralph (1959),'The civil service of Pakistan', South Atlantic

Quarterly,VIII. 2. Constituent Assembly (Legislature) of Pakistan (1948), Debates, 5 March, 1 (7).

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Constituent Assembly (Legislature) of Pakistan (1956), Debates, 9 February 1 (68).

Evans, Peter, Dietrich Rueshmeyer and Theda Skocpol (eds) (1985), Bringing the State Back In (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).

Jalal, Ayesha (1985), The Sole Spokesman: Jinnah, the Muslim League and the demand for Pakistan (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press).

Khan, Major General Fazal Muqeem (1963), Story of the Pakistan Army (Karachi: Oxford University Press), p. 155.

Khan. Mahmood Hassan (1981), Underdevelopment and Agrarian Structure in Pakistan (Boulder: Westview Press).

Marshall. C. B, (1959),'Reflections on a revolution in Pakistan', Foreign Affairs, 37(2). 255.

Payer, Cheryl (19'14), The Debt Trap: The IMF and the Third World(Harmonds worth: Penguin).

Payer, Cheryl (1982), The World Bank: A critical analysis (New York: Monthly Review Press).

Report of the Court of Inquiry ... into the Punjab Disturbances of 1953 (1954) (Lahore: Superintendent of Government Printing, popularly known as the 'Munir' Report).

State Bank of Pakistan (n.d.c. 1983), Foreign Liabilities and Assets in Pakistan and Foreign Investment in Pakistan 1957-60 (Karachi: State Bank of Pakistan). P. 17.

Sunday Times (1989), 26 February- US Department of Commerce (1954), Investment in Pakistan (Washington: US

Department of Commerce). Wolf-Philips, Leslie (n.d., c. 1983). Constitutional Legitimacy: A study of the

doctrine of necessity (London: Third World Foundation Monographs). Wolpert, Stanley (1994), Jinnah of Pakistan (New York and Oxford: Oxford

University Press).

Marxism, Ex-Colonial Societies

and

Strategies of the Left

Hamza Alavi Extract from a letter to a friend

Sunday, 16th February 1997

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Dear *****,

Since you have mentioned Marxist literature, I am prompted to take up with you some theoretical issues that we all need to think about. They are questions about class formation and class alignments (i.e. 'Mode of Production') in ex-colonised societies such as Pakistan. These questions need to be addressed before we can be clear about political strategies.

'Mode of Production' is an awful and intimidating term. Its meaning is pretty straight forward, as I hope will soon become clear as you read on. Instead of the words 'Mode of Production', I would prefer to label that concept 'Social Organisation Of Production' (or nizam-é-pedawari). That phrase perhaps indicates more directly what it is about. It defines class formation, class alignments and class contradictions in a society and therefore has a direct bearing on clarifying the material basis of political strategies. I will set out an overview of Marxist thought that may be helpful.

We need to clarify these issues to be able to assess what went wrong with CPI strategies, and the 'thinking' of the Pakistan Left, or, for that matter, the validity of formulae imposed upon us, such as Soviet conceptions of 'National Democratic Revolution' and so on. We have given little thought to that. I remember discussing large questions in this area, about policies and strategies, in all seriousness with Banné Bhai (Sajjad Zaheer) in 1948-50 who sought my advice (!) when I was as yet immature and foolish enough to take myself seriously. Looking back, I realise that neither of us in fact had much of a clue about the major issues that we were talking about. I am astonished by our naiveté. Since then I have been able to give much thought to these matters. What I have written below should stimulate fresh thought amongst our friends. After all it is our people who must be able to solve our own problems. The coming generation has to be encouraged to think for itself, critically. We cannot look for solutions from outside. The Left in South Asia does not as yet have much of a tradition of independent thought. We have always looked to Soviet or Chinese oracles whom we have treated as the ultimate repositories of political wisdom, only to discover that their intellectuals are often more ignorant than ourselves and their bureaucrats have agendas different from our own.

Social Organisation of Production

No serious independent theoretical effort has yet been devoted to the analysis of the structural effects of colonialism on colonised societies. We shall consider some literature in this field presently. The CPI (and all other CPs) have been brought up on Soviet formulae. These were legitimated with reference to certain propositions formulated by Lenin in his 'Theses on the National and Colonial Questions' presented at the Second Congress of the Communist International in 1920. We need to look closely into the significance of that instead of taking Stalinist formulae at face value.

The key issue that I would emphasise is that of differences between the social structures and class configurations of 1) advanced capitalist, imperialist, countries of Europe and 2) of Russia, a rather different case, examined by Lenin, and 3) those of colonised societies.

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We need to identify the specificity of the case of colonised societies, in other words 'Modes of Production' of colonised societies. Analyses of 'Modes of Production' sounds rather like a scholastic pre-occupation, just an esoteric 'academic' pursuit to be left to mere intellectuals. As we shall see these are issues that we all need to understand and they are pretty straightforward. They are central to our perspectives on our history, our social structure and our political practice.

I have explored these questions with reference to our own society (India and Pakistan), being aware of certain untenable political positions of the CPI, who failed to develop an independent revolutionary analysis in the light of Indian realities. Instead, it tied itself to Stalinist dogma about the leading role of the so-called 'Progressive National Bourgeoisie in the National Democratic Stage of Revolution', with its corollary of unwavering support to the so-called 'Progressive National Bourgeoisie' as represented by the Indian National Congress. With incantation of that Soviet dogma, the CPI ended up supporting the Congress (Indira Gandhi in 1975) to a point of self-destruction. Such formulae were used opportunistically, at the behest of the Soviet leadership to whom CPs everywhere were beholden. Sadly that has lead to disaster everywhere and the virtual demise of the CPI. Its political perspectives was obscured by false theoretical ideas imposed upon it by the Russian state. We need to examine the roots of such ideas.

Let me set out my broad argument and show how the theoretical ground lies. We can identify three classical 'Modes of Production', as summarised below. Listing them together in a sequence like this clarifies their historical and social structural specificity. We can see that they are each historically contextual. Historical materialism does not justify universalised propositions, regardless of historical context. This must lead us to an examination of our own historical specificity as once colonised societies.

Marx's Model - England

It is now widely recognised by many distinguished Marxists that Marx's theoretical model, as in Capital, is based on the social realities of England. It was a society in which capitalism was fully developed, feudalism was dissolved (subsumed under capitalist landed property, as Marx said) and, as he assumed not altogether accurately, the small peasantry had been eliminated (by the enclosure movement). Marx posited, thus, a direct and unmediated confrontation between the capitalist and the proletariat, the central contradiction of CMP. A proletarian revolution was on the cards.

Karl Kautsky and the Western European Model

In Western Europe while capitalism was dominant and feudalism transformed into capitalist farming by the erstwhile Junkers, small peasant production was not eliminated; it proliferated. There was a need to go beyond Marx's 'English Model'; the context was different. That analysis was provided by Karl Kautsky in his celebrated work called 'The Agrarian Question' . There were a large number of small peasants in those countries and

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Kautsky offers a brilliant analysis of how small peasant production was subsumed under capital, without the separation of the producer from the means of production.

I got to read Kautsky's work some years ago when Michael Kidron (Pluto Press) asked me to write an 'Introduction' for the first ever English translation of 'The Agrarian Question'. For me it was a revelation. You will find a summary of Kautsky's argument as well as an account of the circumstances in which the book came to be written and then quickly disowned by the author himself, in my Introduction to that volume, to which my good friend Teodor Shanin also contributed. Kautsky, who was anti-peasant, five years later publicly disowned his own work.

Lenin, on the other hand, was greatly impressed by Kautsky's analysis. We find a reference to it in his Preface to 'The Development of Capitalism in Russia', where he regretted that he did not see Kautsky's work until his own work had already been set in type-too late for revisions. Lenin repeatedly praised that work. Sadly Kautsky's work, which is so relevant and important for us from countries with large peasant populations, is relatively unknown to our intellectuals.

Lenin and the Russian Model

Russia was not like England or Western Europe. Lenin realised that one could not simply extrapolate from Marx's 'English model' to draw conclusions for the political strategy of the Russian Revolution. He offered instead a 'model' based on the realities of Russian society. He spelt it out in 'Development of Capitalism in Russia' and elsewhere. It was a 'model' of a society in which feudalism was dominant, not capitalism as in the West. Capitalism was just developing in Russia. Lenin, therefore, concluded that the central structural contradiction in Russian society was that between the feudal and the capitalist modes of production i.e. between the dominant classes located in those two Modes of Production, the Feudals and the Capitalists. An anti-feudal, bourgeois- democratic Revolution was therefore on the agenda. In assigning that historical role to the Russian bourgeoisie, Lenin was following his teacher Plekhanov.

Lenin was soon to go beyond Plekhanov. A fascinating aspect of Lenin's work is the way in which he readily modified and developed his ideas in the light of Russian realities. He transcended the 'Mechanistic Marxism' of his teacher Plekhanov, especially after 1905. Even when sometimes we find him still paying lip service to Plekhanov, his writings bear his own distinctive mark. We should not therefore treat all of Lenin's writing on a par, without recognising the steady development of his ideas, so that later formulations superseded older ones. We need to differentiate early Lenin's Plekhanovist writings and his later works that bear the unmistakable stamp of his own revolutionary experience and his creative thought.

In his 'Philosophical Notebooks', Lenin dates his emancipation from Plekhanov as from 1914. At that time he spent 9 months in systematic study of Aristotle, Hegel and Feuerbach. In his 'Philosophical Notebooks' he writes that only after he had read Hegel

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did he really understand Marx. He had left behind Plekhanov's mechanistic Marxism, uninformed by dialectical logic.

My reading suggests that there was not such a sudden transformation in Lenin's ideas, in 1914, merely after reading Hegel. It seems more likely that it was the moment when he became self-aware of the distance that he had already travelled, away from mechanistic Marxism of Plekhanov and Kautsky. If we look at his work closely, we find that he had already begun to transcend Plekhanov much earlier. I had understood that Lenin's ideas began to change radically after 1907. My friend Teodor Shanin, who has read Lenin's untranslated Russian texts, tells me that it was already from 1905 that we can see a clear departure in Lenin's ideas.

If we consider his 1905 work 'Two Tactics of Russian Social Democracy ' we can indeed see incipient 'Leninism' breaking through the Plekhanovist mould. While apparently upholding the Plekhanovist orthodoxy that Russia was in the 'stage' of a Bourgeois Democratic Revolution, Lenin nevertheless insists that it was the historic mission of the Proletariat and not the Russian bourgeoisie to carry through the Bourgeois Democratic Revolution, an idea that was clearly subversive of Plekhanovism ! The mind boggles. What kind of 'Bourgeois Revolution' would a proletariat carry out ? While Lenin stuck to Plekhanovist form of words he was advocating a proletarian revolutionary strategy. Plekhanov and the Mensheviks, instead, stood for a collaborationist strategy, like that of the CPI and Cps everywhere under the influence of Stalin, in accepting the leading role of the Bourgeoisie as in Kerensky's 'February Revolution'. Plekhanov and the Mensheviks bitterly opposed the October Revolution. Lenin argued to the contrary, despite his lip service to Plekhanov inasmuch as he spoke of a Bourgeois Democratic 'stage' of revolution, while advocating a proletarian revolution.

Some Marxists go to great lengths to justify the form of words chosen by Lenin. They bend over backwards to find some aspects of the 1917 Proletarian Revolution that they might characterise as an aspect of a Bourgeois Revolution e.g. with reference to the peasantry. I find such worship of Lenin's every word to be rather pathetic. The plain fact is that verbally Lenin often kept repeating Plekhanovist orthodoxy while in reality he was advocating a very different practice, in effect rejecting Plekhanov's class collaborationist strategy ? As we know, Lenin's political break with Mensheviks came quite early.

Colonised Societies: Lenin's (and Western Marxists') Blind Spot

While Lenin recognised the structural specificity of Russian society and differentiated it from that of England and Western Europe, he failed to ask himself the same sort of questions about the structural specificity of colonised societies. Russia was not a colonised society. Lenin failed to see that just as it would be a mistake to extrapolate to Russia ideas relevant to advanced capitalist societies of Western Europe, so also it would be equally wrong to extend the Russian model to colonised societies without asking questions about their structural specificity. He was not justified in extending his 'model'

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of Russia to colonised societies without taking into account the way in which colonialism had transformed their social structure in certain ways. Instead of asking himself such questions Lenin assumed, unjustifiably that the trajectory of colonised societies, which he called 'Countries of the Orient', would be no different from that of Russia. Lenin's blind spot is at the root of some of our problems today.

Lenin did little to study the structures and the histories of colonised societies. That lacunae in his thinking is revealed in his tract on 'Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism', where, if anywhere, we might expect him to fill the gap in Euro-centred Marxist analyses. In that work Lenin is concerned with the issue of inter-imperialist rivalry and the effect of imperialism on the metropolitan societies. Imperialism was for him the Highest Stage of Capitalism -monopoly capitalism in the West. We look in vain in Lenin's writings for any insights into the manner in which metropolitan capital had transformed colonised societies in quite specific ways. His underlying assumption was that in colonised societies too pre-capitalist social structures were being confronted by capitalism in ways no different from what we could see in Russia. That was a big mistake, based on ignorance of what was actually going on in colonial societies.

We find the same blind spot about the structure of colonial societies in the work and preoccupations of Western Marxists. You may know of the famous Dobb-Sweezy debate on the 'Transition from Feudalism to Capitalism' (edited by Rodney Hilton). It is amazing that not one these great Marxists of the Western World felt any need to refer to the role of colonialism in the development of Western capitalism. This is taken up in my paper: 'The Formation of the Social Structure of South Asia under the impact of Colonialism' where we see how the colonial link contributed to the Industrial Revolution in Britain. Western Marxists tend to place the issue of colonised societies into a separate compartment, a matter only for specialist concern.

Lenin on the National and Colonial Question

The crucial text, which is at the root of our present misguided perspectives, is one in which Lenin reverted to a Plekhanovist perspective on revolutionary struggle in colonised societies. That was his 'Thesis on the National and Colonial Question' which he presented at the Second Congress of the Comintern in 1920. This deserves careful examination, for it has been the basis of CPI dogma, leading to class collaboration. Here Lenin turned his back on the notion of the leading role of the proletariat, which he had advocated for the Russian Revolution (as far back as 1905). Now he came forward with a Plekhanovist thesis for colonised societies, namely that the National Bourgeoisie in colonised societies were playing a revolutionary role and it was their historic mission to lead the struggle towards a National Bourgeois Democratic Revolution. The task of the Communist International, 'The Party of the (World) Proletariat, was to support such Bourgeois led struggles. It was a class collaborationist formulae. The entire history of the CPI has been caught up in that. How did that come about.

For an indispensable documentary account of that debate on the National and Colonial Question, see 'Marxism and Asia' edited by H. Carére d'Encausse and Stuart Schram. It is

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an indispensable documentary record, more detailed on this subject and more valuable for us than the Comintern Documents edited by Jane Degras.

In that debate M. N. Roy opposed Lenin, declaring that communists should have no truck with the colonial bourgeoisie which was vacillating and collaborationist with the Imperial power. He argued instead that Communists should lead the proletariat into a revolutionary and decisive break with imperialism. In 1920 the proletariat barely existed in the colonies and there was hardly any proletarian organisation, Roy's position was, in that context, purely formal. Not surprisingly Roy's argument provoked a taunt from Lenin. Where is your proletariat ! Where is your party of the proletariat ! Be that as it may, Lenin's Draft Thesis too was one-sided. There was a compromise (about which we find little mention in CP literature which reproduce only the final and agreed text). Lenin had to concede quite a few points to Roy and other critics. One concession that he made was most unfortunate. A distinction was posited between 'reactionary' bourgeoisies and 'progressive' bourgeoisies, communists being required to support the latter.

That distinction between 'reactionary' and 'progressive' bourgeoisies was not founded on any basic principles. It was merely a verbal sop to Roy's objections. There were no criteria by which the two bourgeoisies could be distinguished. These are mere descriptive categories, not theoretical concepts. Bourgeoisies could be put into one or the other category, arbitrarily. Stalin found it very easy to manipulate and misuse these categories. He and his heirs could label as 'progressive' those with whom they could do business. In later Soviet formulations this became even more blatant-for any State that had good relations with the Soviets qualified for the label 'Progressive', regardless of whether it was a military junta or whatever its class character. Ethiopia is a case in point.

But to return to 1920, we must ask ourselves what made Lenin make a theoretical somersault and take to a Plekhanovist formulae on the subject of the 'National and Colonial Question' and exhort communists to support bourgeois leadership, advocating 'tailism'. To understand that we must recall the specific context of that debate. It was taking place at a time when the USSR was facing a combined counter-revolutionary attack from all the major capitalist powers in the world, the Wars of Intervention. But at that time also there were bourgeois-led anti-colonial struggles going on in countries of Asia around the Southern frontiers of the Soviet Union, from Turkey to China. It is not surprising that Lenin welcomed them.

In the light of the exigencies of the moment, all kinds of dubious characters were promoted to the rank of leaders of the 'Progressive National Bourgeoisie'. Thus Col. Reza Shah, the Persian military adventurer and dictator was elevated to the rank of a leader of a mythical 'Persian National Bourgeoisie'. So also Kemal Attatürk who, whatever his credentials, can hardly be called a leader of a Turkish National Bourgeoisie that did not yet exist. Countries around the flank of the Soviet Union, namely Turkey, Iran, India and China (with Indonesia being thrown in for good measure) mattered to Lenin, because they were all of strategic value in military terms. Why should Lenin and the Comintern not try to get them on their side. That was justified enough. Unfortunately it turned out that this conjunctural recommendation valid for the moment was turned into a basic

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theoretical principle, that has misled us ever since. Hence from Meerut jail Dangé wrote his famous document in which he assured the Indian National Bourgeoisie that communists could not but be sincere in their support for the Indian National Congress, for they could not have their own proletarian revolution until after the National Bourgeoisie had completed the anti-colonial national democratic revolution. That has remained the CPI dogma ever since, one which ultimately destroyed it. Lenin left us a terrible legacy.

Stalin and his heirs found here a theoretical weapon to justify their opportunist inter-state alliances (for a discussion of inter-state relations see my notes on 'Socialist States and Socialist Movements, enclosed). He used that formulae to impose collaborationist policies on CPs everywhere. Time and again the CPI has resurrected Lenin's 1920 'Theses' to justify its class collaborationist and opportunistic alliance with Governments of the Indian National Congress. Chou En-Lai, likewise, did the same by commending Ayub Khan to Pakistani pro-Chinese Left when he visited Pakistan (in 1959 ?). This false dogma has to be exorcised.

The Structure of Colonial Social Formations

So, we come to the crucial question for us. How do we delineate structures of colonised societies. We will see that they do not correspond to any of the three 'models' of non-colonised societies that we have looked at above, namely 1) Marx's 'model' based on England 2) Kautsky's 'model' based on Western Europe and 3) Lenin's 'model' based on Russia. We need therefore a fourth, a theoretical formulation of the structural specificity of colonial social formations.

This has not been looked into by properly as yet. CP intellectuals have remained trapped in Stalin's formulations and have not been able to go beyond that. Amongst Trotskyite intellectuals, we can look at the work of Ernest Mandel, one of the most well known of them. We find again that he too has done little to look at colonial history and colonial society. That is, indeed, a general complaint that we have of all Western Marxists. Mandel's work is no less Euro-centered. In his two volume work on 'Marxist Economic Theory' he does not go beyond Lenin and Rosa Luxemburg, reiterating the latter's thesis about capitalist expansion into colonies being a basic tendency of capitalism. Mandel speaks of imperialism being an obstacle to the industrialisation of the Third World. This too is familiar stuff. But where does that leave us ? In Mandel's other major work on 'Late Capitalism' he relies heavily on the ideas of Andre Gunder Frank, about which I will have something to say below. They do not get to grips with the basic issue of class formation and class alignments following colonisation.

I feel that this is a crucial area for us to examine. In 1975 I published an article on 'India and the 'Colonial Mode of Production' in Socialist Register 1975. At the time there was little response. Perhaps too many people have invented too many different 'modes of production. I could understand a certain degree of scepticism. Yet another 'mode'.

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I followed that up in 1979 with a study of the colonial transformation of India-'India: Transition from Feudalism to Colonial Capitalism'. That evoked a very positive response. It was translated and published in German. In Australia, a conference was based around that paper at the University of Adelaide. The papers, edited by Doug. McEachern were published under the title 'Capitalism and Colonial Production'. That volume includes several valuable papers. My name appears first on the front cover merely by virtue of alphabetical priority and you may find that the book is probably catalogued under my name.

Following that historical study I published an article in EPW called 'The Structure of Colonial Social Formations' (a copy is enclosed). 'Colonial Capitalism', I have argued, has specific structural properties which I have delineated in that article. It was reprinted in a book edited by Utsa Patnaik. We need also to elaborate its political corollaries. I am afraid I have not got down to that as yet. But they are obvious. But the CPI hegemony on South Asian Left intellectuals is perhaps too strong for the issues that I have raised to be properly discussed. Perhaps I should have written it in impenetrable prose for the New Left Review for people to sit up and take notice.

My papers are only an initial attempt to identify some issues. There are many unanswered questions in my work which I hope friends will take up. For example we might ask how far and in what way is this colonial 'model' affected by inter-nationalisation of capital and, the emergence of Multi-National Capital. How do we fit into our analysis the rise of the so-called 'Tiger Economies' of the Pacific Rim. Such questions, I am sure, will (and must) be pursued.

I have referred above to my very old friend, Andre Gunder Frank (whose work took Left intellectuals by storm in the late 1960s and 1970s) in connection with Mandel's work. Being fed up with CP collaborationism in Latin America, Frank attacked the CP theoretical positions, but on rather dubious theoretical bases. Frank's confused arguments made him easily vulnerable to an attack by Ernesto Laclau, in an article (published in NLR). What Laclau in fact did was to restore the CP orthodoxy. Moreover, he has built his argument on a gross misrepresentation of Peruvian history and social structure. I once thought of writing a refutation, but never got around to it. Laclau's article was universally, and mistakenly, acclaimed and accepted by Western scholars as a definitive work. My own analysis contradicts the Laclau view. So, not surprisingly I begin my analysis in my article on 'The Structure of Colonial Social Formations' with a critique of Laclau.

Soviet Union and China as Fonts of Wisdom

The founding of the Communist International introduced a notion that there was but a single, unified, World Communist Movement. (see Fernando Claudin's 'The Communist Movement' for this). The notion of a single World Communist Movement was allowed Stalin to impose a given 'line' on Communist parties everywhere, regardless of their particular circumstances. Inevitably that led to disasters, which were always blamed by Stalin on 'mistakes' of local leaders. Despite that Mao and the CCP succeeded for they

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were able to by-pass Stalin. But the Chinese too, in their turn, were to take over Stalin's mantle. Rival Communist parties in the Third World rallied behind Moscow or Peking as the seats of their infallible oracles whose guidance they would accept. That has undermined independent indigenous thought in our countries. We will not get very far until we see the flowering of our own ideas. I am sure that a time for that will come, as new generations come on the scene, free from dogmas of the past. As for the issue of the role of the Soviet or the Chinese state in relations to our movements, I have discussed that in an unpublished paper of which too I enclose a copy, namely 'Socialist States and Socialist Movements'.

The Colonial Mode of Production and 'Feudalism'

The issue of feudalism is a most important political issue for us Pakistanis. I find that my analysis is incomplete and therefore misleading in that respect. I would correct that now. I have argued that it was metropolitan capital that carried out the historic task of dissolving pre-capitalist social formations in the colonies and establishing colonial capitalism. I have therefore suggested that feudalism was dissolved by British colonialism. That is not quite correct. I have based that argument in the light of only one criterion namely that of free and unfree labour. But, as I shall show below, there is a second criterion too, that completely alters the picture.

When Marx recognised that in Britain feudalism had given way to capitalist landed property, he nevertheless made a distinction between the great land owners as the 'Governing Class' whereas the Bourgeoisie were the 'Ruling Class'. The erstwhile feudals played a leading role in British Government but they were subject to the structural imperative of British capitalism. That was not quite the case in colonial India. Indeed great landlords were valued by the colonial rulers as their allies and therefore protected and privileged. In India feudalism was to be abolished only after independence by a powerful national bourgeoisie represented by the Congress. In Pakistan landed magnates are a dominant force in the State. The feudals inherited the new state of Pakistan at the time of the Partition whereas our bourgeoisie, such as it is, is extremely weak. Dissolution of feudalism in Pakistan is our primary and most immediate task.

The error in my analysis stems from the fact that I have take account of only one of two criteria that distinguish capitalism from feudalism, namely that of free and unfree labour. We come to very different conclusions when we consider also the other criterion namely that of 'Simple Reproduction' under feudalism versus 'Expanded Reproduction of Capital' under capitalism. (for an explanation of these concepts see Capital Vol. I, Part VII-chapter XXIII ff.). Under 'Simple Reproduction' the surplus that is extracted is mainly consumed whereas under 'Expanded Reproduction of Capital' of capitalism, the surplus is mainly ploughed back into capital accumulation.

I would indeed go a step further and conceptualise what I would call 'The Simple Reproduction Trap' that keeps landowners in the grip of 'Simple Reproduction'. It arises from the fact that in the case of industrial capitalism, with capital accumulation the number of production units in industries are extended or multiplied, thus providing an

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outlet for accumulated capital. In agriculture, on the other hand, the basic input is land. It cannot be multiplied like industrial production units. The available land is relatively fixed for the landlord class as a whole, extended marginally by irrigation schemes. Other inputs like farm mechanisation etc. are marginal. Land is the determining factor. Capital accumulation cannot take place in agriculture in the same way as in industry. The landlord class is necessarily a parasitic class, 'trapped' in the circuit of 'Simple Reproduction', consuming the bulk of the surplus. The landowner remains necessarily parasitical.

In India a powerful industrial bourgeoisie managed to subordinate the landlords. Their political problem now stems from the rise of 'Rich Peasants' who have demands of their own. In Pakistan that is not the case. Parasitical landlords are at the centre of our political system. Great land magnates dominate the electoral process. There may be room for mere scholastic arguments whether in strict scientific terms we can still call our landed magnates a 'feudal class'. But that would be an argument about names and labels rather than substance. We have to recognise that they are not 'capitalists' in the same sense as industrial capitalists.

British Socialism:Long Dead, Now Buried

Hamza Alavi

British Election Results

The landslide election victory of the Labour Party, renamed New labour by Blair, and the defeat of the Tories, were not entirely unpredictable. But the scale of the Labour's victory was above expectations. New Labour won 419 seats as against 165 seats of the Conservatives and 46 of the Liberal-Democrats. In the British 'first past the post' electoral system, the number of seats won by rival parties are not in the same proportion as the votes cast. The Tories polled no less than 73% of the votes secured by New Labour but won only 39% of the New Labour seats. The Tories won no seats at all in Scotland and Wales, although they got 18% and 20% of the votes, respectively, in those two regions.

The 1997 election victory, and the rise of what Blair insists on calling 'New Labour', to contrast it from what he disparagingly calls 'Old Labour', marks a very dramatic shift in orientation of the British Labour Party. It has moved away decisively from any commitments to socialism or, for that matter, the working people. Business magnates have displaced Trade Union leaders in the affairs of the Party. But it might be said that this consolidation of a very right wing Party leadership, is the end of a cumulative process that has been taking shape over many decades.

Roots of the Rightwing in the Labour Party

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The movement of the British Labour Party away from socialism, that Blair's 'New Labour' represents, has appeared on the political stage in a dramatic way. But the fact is that the rightwards shift of the Labour Party leadership is rooted in its long history. What has happened today is the end of a long cumulative process, which was shaped by reaction to Stalinism in the inter-war period and the ideological climate of the Cold War that followed.

The Labour Party originated as The Labour Representation Group' (LRG) which emerged in 1900 as a coalition of a number of liberal and left-wing groups, that brought together the near-Marxist 'Social Democratic Federation', Keir Hardie's 'Independent Labour Party' and, much further to the right, the 'Fabian Society'. These political organisations were born out of working class struggles. Trade Unions were an integral part of that movement. But Ramsay MacDonald, who was the first Secretary of the LRG, espoused a paternalistic attitude towards working people and rejected concepts of 'class' and 'class struggle'. He rejected any commitment to socialism. In Blair's New Labour, MacDonald's ideological legacy has at last borne fruit.

During World War I, LRG member, Arthur Henderson was made a Minister in the wartime coalition government. His job was to exhort workers to enlist for the killing fields of that bloody war, in the name of patriotic duty. That was a time when Lenin was calling for all working class leaders to resist that Imperialist War. In 1923 Ramsay MacDonald formed a minority Government with Liberal support but was defeated in the following year. In 1929 he formed his second ministry that lasted until 1931. There was nothing 'socialist' in MacDonald's governments. It was powerless in the face of British Capitalism. In the words of A.J.P. Taylor, MacDonald was in office but not in power!

Attlee and Socialism

In 1945 the Labour Party won a landslide victory that is comparable to the New Labour victory in 1997. In 1945 the Labour Party, led by Clement Attlee, won 393 seats with a clear majority of 146 seats over all the other Parties taken together. The experience of the Attlee Government left an indelible mark on modern Britain by creating the Welfare State. That was thought to be a high water mark of socialism in Britain. The mythology surrounding that claim needs to be examined.

Attlee was a product of Christchurch College, Oxford, the home of Alice in Wonderland. His 'Rightwing Labour' background was shaped when he joined the Fabian Society in 1907 at a formative time in his life. His negative outlook on colonialism was, likewise, shaped by his experience as a Member of the notorious 'Simon Commission', which was appointed to examine the question of a future Constitution for India. The Commission was universally condemned and boycotted by almost every shade of Indian political opinion, including the Indian Liberals as well as the Indian National Congress and the Muslim League. That experience put its stamp on Attlee's colonialist outlook. Later he served as Deputy Prime Minister in Churchill's Wartime Government. That too was a formative influence in its own way. Attlee's political background was never very radical.

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But he was the architect of the Welfare State in Britain! Was that a fruition of the Party's socialist commitments? Let us look at it a bit closely.

Welfare Socialism?

By 1945, the ideological impact of the war against fascism, on the minds and aspirations of ordinary British workers, was quite far-reaching. Declarations of politicians during the war had held out prospects of a better future after the war. Glossy images of the Soviet Union, that were projected through the media and films during the war, opened up in the minds of ordinary working people the idea of a better society that they could strive for. Memories of the great depression of the Thirties were still fresh in their minds. No less important at the time was a fear that prevailed amongst the ruling classes about the possibility of a communist revolution in Western Europe, which has been documented so well by Isaac Deutscher. If Britain itself was not ripe for revolution, the fear of unrest was very real. It was against such a background that Attlee's 1945 Labour Government set about laying the foundations of the Welfare State in Britain. One would not wish, even for a moment, to diminish the value of what the Welfare State provided or the importance of that achievement, nor ignore the sustained efforts of the Tories in the Thatcher years to erode it (but not to overturn it). But it must be clear that it was not socialism.

The intellectual roots of the Welfare State do not lie in socialist ideology. The idea was first mooted by none other than Winston Churchill himself, who, in 1942, commissioned a Report by W. H. Beveridge, on 'Social Insurance and Allied Services'. That Report was to be the blueprint of the Welfare State. Beveridge followed it up with his report on 'Full Employment in a Free Society', in 1944. He was a Liberal Member of Parliament in 1944-45 and was elevated to the peerage in 1946. Beveridge was not a socialist and all this had nothing to do with socialist concerns of the British Labour Party. Today, looking around Europe, we can see the Welfare State firmly in place everywhere, as a necessary component of contemporary capitalism. In Germany it was installed under the aegis of right wing governments of the Christian Democrats. That said to offers a far more comprehensive and generous example of the Welfare State than the British original. The Welfare State is therefore by no means hostile to modern capitalism. Nor is it socialism, however desirable it might be.

The Attlee government also nationalised the Bank of England, the coal industry, electricity, railways, inland waterways, docks and harbours, and a large chunk of road transport. This was statism, not socialism. Statism was built into the ideology and the constitution (clause 4) of the Labour Party, which Blair has rescinded. The Tories under Thatcher embarked on a wholesale privatisation of the nationalised enterprises, which poured great wealth into the pockets of private investors. That also helped the cash-flow position of the Tory governments, for the receipts from nationalisation helped them to fund mounting current account deficits, to reduce Public Sector Borrowing Requirements (PSBR) and also to free resources to cut income tax on the rich. Blair and his colleagues, having taken Conservative policies on board, are committed to further privatisation. But

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there is not much left to privatise. Blair's New Labour has speculated on the possibility of privatising Air Traffic Control!

Labour's Colonial Policy

1. Potsdam and Vietnam

For those of us who are from the colonised world, it is important to examine the role of the Labour Party towards colonial rule. The sad fact is that its 'socialism' did not extend to the idea of decolonisation. The Attlee government worked not only to reinforce Britain's own colonial rule but also that of Britain's ally, France. Vietnam is a blatant case of this. Deals were made by Stalin with Attlee, Churchill and Truman at the Potsdam Conference that had little to do with principles. Between them, they allocated territories and respective spheres of influence over the world! The Conference took place between 17th July to 2nd August 1945. The Labour Government was elected while the Conference was still in progress and Attlee was able to join Churchill and Truman in the horse-trading that took place there. The Potsdam agreement of the Western leaders with Stalin included a commitment to restore French rule in Vietnam (Indo-China), although Stalin and the others were fully aware at the time that the Viet Minh, under the leadership of Ho Chi Minh, had already liberated their country from the Japanese. Stalin's betrayal of the Vietnamese could not have been more cynical. Attlee, Churchill and Truman were the principal authors of that disgraceful conspiracy with Stalin to restore French colonial rule over a people who had successful fought against the Japanese and liberated themselves. The Vietnamese had therefore to fight for their freedom once again, this time against the French. They were soon to prove that no colonialist power could keep them down.

When the Japanese over-ran Viet Nam (Indo-China) its French Administrators stayed at their posts, operating under Japanese orders, nominally under the collaborationist Vichy government. In September 1940 Adm. Jean Decoux, the Vichy recognised Governor General of Indo-China, formally signed an agreement that legitimised Japanese occupation of the country and placed the French Administration under Japanese military authority. Towards the end of the War, in March 1945, the Japanese became concerned that the French bureaucracy might switch its allegiance to the Free French. Therefore they installed in their place a puppet government under Bao Dai, who was the last French appointed 'Emperor' of Indo-China. Bao Dai formally proclaimed the 'independence' of his country, with the Japanese forces behind him. In the meantime the Viet Minh had become a formidable anti-Japanese resistance force, their liberation army spread throughout the countryside. They soon liberated their country from the Japanese. The French were nowhere to be seen. In August 1945, the Viet Minh formally took over power in liberated Viet Nam.

When the Attlee, Churchill and Truman deal with Stalin was struck at Postdam, to restore liberated Viet Nam to French rule, French forces were as yet unavailable to do the job. Attlee therefore undertook to provide British forces to expel the Viet Minh government and prepare the ground for his fellow colonialists, the French, to take over. The Potsdam deal was that British forces would suppress the Viet Minh in the South and Kuomintang

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forces from China would do the same from the North. Accordingly British forces, under General Sir Douglas Gracey, arrived in Viet Nam on 12 Sept 1945. Later, they were joined by a token force of French soldiers. After several weeks of fighting they succeeded in driving out the Viet Minh Government from the capital. French Government in Viet Nam was formally installed. But they could control only the cities and the main highways. The Viet Minh, who had retreated into the countryside, carried on guerrilla struggle, for the freedom of their country.

The Viet Minh continued their armed guerrilla struggle until they finally defeated the French, decisively, at the historic battle of Dien Bien Phu in May 1954. It was a dramatic victory that reverberated throughout Europe. The Viet Minh had finally liberated their country. Sadly the Vietnamese people were soon to be faced with the devastation inflicted on their small country by the massive US aggression that was to be let loose against them. In Britain rank and file members of the Labour Party campaigned on behalf of the Vietnamese, for an end to the American aggression. But the unswerving sympathies of the leadership of the Labour Party remained with the Americans. In any case it was the Attlee Government that had started the ball rolling for the restoration of colonial rule in Viet Nam. Its 'socialism' did not extend to the right of colonised people to independence and freedom.

2. Malaya

In Malaya, which used to be a lucrative British colony before the war, the pattern was a little different. On the day after Pearl Harbour was attacked on December 7, 1941, on December 8 Japanese forces poured into Malaya. Within a week the Japanese victory was complete. The British just ran away from the country without a fight. Malaya was ethnically divided between Malays who were predominantly rural and the Chinese who predominated in the urban society and tended to be more radical. There were also Indian labourers and few professionals. The Japanese inducted Malays to fill the administrative jobs vacated by British bureaucrats. On the other hand they persecuted the Chinese. The seeds of ethnic conflict between the Malays and the Chinese were firmly planted. Many fled into the jungle and joined the Communist-organised the 'Malayan People's Anti-Japanese Army' (MPAJA) whose leadership was mainly Chinese, although the MPAJA was by no means exclusively so. It was the MPAJA who fought the new invaders and finally liberated the country from Japanese occupation. No British were in sight.

After the Japanese were gone, Attlee's Labour Government, instead of recognising the hard won Malayan independence, decided to re-impose colonial rule there. British forces were despatched to Malaya to take over. The MPAJA were pursued and persecuted. Their armed resistance was to continue for many years. The MPAJA fought from their bases in the jungle. Faced with the Malayan resistance movement, the Attlee Government declared a 'State of Emergency', suspending all civil rights. That cleared the ground for total military repression in the country. John Strachey, who was Attlee's Defence Minister and author of many books on 'Socialism', presided over the suppression of the Malayan people. Nevertheless, the popular base of Malayan Resistance was strong enough to enable the MPAJA to continue the struggle for many years. Their forces were

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still resisting stubbornly when, in 1951, the Labour Government was defeated. The unfinished job in Malaya was taken over by the Tories. The Malayan operation was entrusted to General Sir Gerald Templar who was a cunning as well as a ruthless General. His success owed much to his decision to follow the Japanese precedent in dividing the Malayan resistance along ethnic lines, winning over the backward rural Malays and concentrating his fire against the Chinese who provided most of the leadership of the Resistance. Ethnic conflict is far too often a valuable weapon that ruling classes exploit.

3. India and Pakistan

It is often said that decolonisation in India was brought about peacefully because of ideological, 'socialist', commitments of the Labour Party. That is a myth, a blatant lie. We shall look at the circumstances in which the post war Labour Government was forced to move towards the Independence of India and Pakistan. But first we might consider a prior event, namely the sending of the unproductive Cripps Mission to India in 1942. Japan had struck like lightening against British and French colonial possessions in South East Asia. The sheer speed and the extent of the Japanese victories rang alarm bells in New Delhi and London. Would India be the next to fall? The Japanese had cut their way through the dense jungles of Northern Burma and were entrenched in Kohima and Imphal, across India's eastern borders. That immediate danger galvanised the British Government into action. Its principal object was to find ways to induce the Indian nationalist leadership to throw their weight behind the War against fascism and to impress upon them the threat posed by Japan. The British were ready to make some political concessions if necessary.

In February 1942 Churchill's War Cabinet set up an 'Emergency India Committee' under Deputy Prime Minister Attlee, his India expert! The India Committee included, several conservatives, Sir Stafford Cripps, a senior member of the Labour Party, and Attlee's friend, Sir John Simon of the ill-fated 'Simon Commission'. In the following month the India Committee despatched the Cripps Mission to negotiate with the political leadership in India, to get them to back the war effort. The Congress Party offered to do so, but only if an Indian 'National Government' was set up. It was a condition that the British refused to concede. The Cripps Mission only succeeded in deepening mutual suspicion. The struggle for national independence led by the Indian National Congress and the Muslim League continued.

The decisive moment that sealed the fate of British colonial rule in India and transformed the fortunes of Indian nationalists, was a Mutiny of the Royal Indian Navy in February 1946. It is a forgotten chapter in Indian history for neither British nor Indian nationalist historians have written much about it. The fact is that it was a crucial turning point in Indian history. Its importance in precipitating the developments that followed it, can hardly be overestimated. The Mutiny occurred when Attlee had been Prime Minister for a year. But until that moment he had made no moves whatever to negotiate with Indian nationalist leaders. It was not until his government's hands were forced by a crisis of military power of the first order, that was precipitated by the historic Indian Naval Mutiny, that Attlee decided to move. He was left it with no other option but to make a deal with Indian nationalists.

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The Naval Mutiny came as a total surprise to everyone. It was a remarkably well-organised and meticulously planned operation. At a precise moment, as arranged, the mutineers struck simultaneously in every ship of the Royal Indian Navy, before their officers could be alerted. The strike was initiated in Castle Barracks in Bombay, which was the HQ of the Royal Indian Navy. I was then an official of the Reserve Bank of India, which was just across the road from Castle Barracks. From an upper story window of the Reserve Bank we could look down into Castle Barracks. We watched with excitement as the mutineers broke down the door of an armoury and handed weapons to their comrades. It was an unforgettable sight. Some units of the Punjab Regiment were then sent to storm the Castle Barracks and take it. But the Punjabi soldiers, who came to the scene, refused to attack their erstwhile comrades in arms who had fought besides them in the recent War. That second mutiny of the army put a seal on the situation. A profound crisis of military power had been precipitated.

There were spontaneous worker's strikes in Bombay and other cities. But the Communist Party of India, under the leadership of P.C. Joshi did nothing to seize the initiative to launch a nation-wide struggle. Kusum Nair, whom I met at the Michigan State University in 1971, told me that the Naval Mutiny was planned in minute detail in her Bombay home. She was a member of the Congress Socialist Party and her husband a naval officer. Be that as it may, the roots of the Mutiny lay much deeper, and its significance was much wider. The country was like a tinderbox, seething with discontent. There was a danger of a conflagration that could set the whole country ablaze.

The Government of India was faced with a most profound crisis of power. If other units of the Indian Army were to mutiny also, the consequences would be incalculable. To forestall such a possibility, all Indian units of the army were immediately disarmed and confined to barracks. That left only a very small number of war-weary British units in place. That small force was not nearly large enough to rely on to keep India in bondage in that inflammable situation. What made things worse for the Government was the low morale of British troops. After the long years of war, now that war with Japan had ended and they had nothing to do in the unbearable heat of India, British soldiers could not wait to return home. There was a great deal of unrest among them. There was at least one mutiny, in the Royal Air Force at Karachi that we know about. I would be most surprised if there had not also been other similar incidents elsewhere in India, of unrest or probably even mutiny. The basis of British military power in India had been shaken to the core. The colonial government could no longer rely on its armed forces, whether Indian or British. The moment of reckoning had arrived for British Imperial rule in India. It was not the socialist convictions of the ruling Labour Party that brought about the end of colonial rule. The Attlee Government's hands were forced by its inability to continue with colonial rule in India because of a crisis of military power.

The highly fraught and utterly unpredictable situation quickly persuaded the Attlee Government that a deal had to be struck with Indian leaders. The Indian political leadership, for their part, was no less worried about the unpredictable consequences that might follow. The profound crisis of power that affected the entire military machine on which colonial rule rested, was not a kind of crisis that was likely to resolve itself as other

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crises had done before. The situation for the colonial government in India was rarely quite so grave.

The first task before the Government of India was to get the mutineers to lay down their arms. The Government had realised that it was beyond its own powers to get the mutineers to do so. For the mutineers, equally, there was a problem, for they could do little more unless there was a parallel mass uprising in India, which did not occur. Needless to add, neither the British nor our national leaders wanted to see such an eventuality. The Government was easily able therefore to persuade the leaders of the Congress Party and the Muslim League to come to their help. They were to appeal to the mutineers to call off their action. Nehru declined to have anything to do with it. It was therefore left to Sardar Patel for the Congress Party and Mr Jinnah for the Muslim League, to broadcast an appeal to the naval mutineers on All India Radio. They commended their patriotic gesture but told them that, having done so, it was their patriotic duty to end their mutiny at once and leave the matter in the hands of their responsible national leaders. Without a nation-wide political movement to take their action further forward, the only option for the mutineers was to respond to that appeal. So they surrendered. They were given a promise by the leaders that there would be no victimisation. But victimisation there was, especially of officers who had joined the mutiny.

Attlee soon got a 'Cabinet Mission' ready to go to India to make a deal with the Indian leaders. Mountbatten was to follow. We were on our way to our Independence, which was wrung belatedly from the unwilling hands of the British Labour Government. India and Pakistan owe their independence not to their non-existent socialist conscience but to the bravery of the naval mutineers.

Labour Party and the Cold War

A profound mark was left on the ideology of the British Labour Party by decades of the Cold War, especially by the rise of McCarthyism in the 1950s and the witch-hunts that followed it. It rose like a storm in the US and became a force from which the Western World as whole could not remain immune. It was no less monstrous than Stalinism. Fear engendered by global McCarthyism distorted and undermined the meaning and purpose of socialism in Britain. Labour Party leaders and activists would now bend over backwards to demonstrate that they were not crypto-communists. They were always looking over their shoulders. They would make sure that they did not support any idea or policy which, in any way, could be interpreted as being 'communist'.

Within Britain itself, the Communist Party was virtually irrelevant and the issue of 'Reds under the Bed' was long dead. But it was different when it came to the Third World. Labour Party hypocrisy was particularly evident when it came to the question of military dictatorships. When we campaigned against Ayub Khan's military dictatorship, the first question that I was invariably asked in Labour Party circles was if the opposition to Ayub Khan was not really communist-inspired! We had pretty close contacts at the highest levels in the Labour Party in the 1960s. It was disgusting that while pretending to be

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socialists, they were, nevertheless, prepared to support a military dictatorship because the Americans supported it. American propaganda in support of their protégé Ayub Khan was that opposition to that military government was communist inspired. One quickly realised that all the rhetoric of the Labour Party about its commitment to democracy was sheer humbug when they had so little hesitation in backing one of the first military dictatorships in the Third World.

Socialists and Trade Unionists in the Labour Party

There were of course individuals and groups in the Labour Party who were committed to socialism. But the ideology of many in the Party who thought that they believed in socialism, was not socialism but statism. Their objective was 'nationalisation' under a centralised state, 'to seize the commanding heights of the economy' as it was put. That objective was enshrined in the famous Clause 4 of the Labour Party, which was one of the first items in the Party constitution that was thrown overboard by the onslaught from Blair and his co-conspirators. Nevertheless, there were indeed many still in the Labour Party who did believe in socialism. They joined the Party with few illusions about its leadership. But they hoped that one day they would be able to take the Party over and march on to socialism. That idea was called 'entryism'. It was the idea that the Party could be 'captured' from within. Most of these were Party members and activists at the local level. Few left leaning persons made it to Parliament, not to say the Cabinet. MPs like the irrepressible Dennis Skinner or mavericks like Tony Benn, are ineffective exceptions. Ken Livingstone, another senior left leaning MP, who was the leader of the Greater London Council for many years before it was abolished by Thatcher, has also been sidelined, notwithstanding the fact that he made Blairite noises during the election campaign.

Left-wing activists have been useful for the Party. One might even say that they were indispensable. It was they who, without any payment, trudged round from door to door, canvassing for Party candidates, distributing leaflets and doing all they could to mobilise support for the Party. There was not much joy for them in serving the rightwing leadership of the Labour Party in this way. But they were kept going by the hope that one day their turn would come. They would be in command of the Party. Thus the Labour Party came to be a coalition, in which leftwing activists provided the grass roots cadres, who mobilised electoral support behind the reactionary leadership, which always remained in effective control of the Party at the Centre. When local Constituency Labour Parties became too leftwing and assertive, they were dissolved by diktat of the Centre.

Trade unions used to be at the heart of the labour movement. They provided much needed Party funds. But, it is arguable that in a very real sense they had become a necessary institutional component of modern capitalism, mediating relationships between capital and labour. Large companies would be at a loss without effective trade unions. It is through trade union leadership that they make deals and conduct orderly relationships with their workforce. The worst situation for them is that of 'unofficial strikes', strikes that are out of the control of 'responsible' trade union leadership. Employers have found it difficult to handle such situations. So over the years, most 'progressive' employers

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cultivated a cosy relationship with the trade union leadership. Trade union leaders, for their part, often take pride in being 'responsible' leaders. They have looked for rewards from the capitalist state by way of 'honours', such as Knighthoods and Life Peerages.

Trade unions have had a special role in the organisation of the Labour Party with special voting rights. But, despite their useful functional role in the running of modern capitalism and the fact that by and large (since the 1960s) the leadership of the Unions was largely right-wing, the British media had always demonised trade union leaders. This in turn became a hang-up for the rightwing of the Labour Party, of which Blair is the ultimate incarnation. They have striven to distance themselves from the Unions and to erode their links with the Party. Even in Blair's rhetoric, while he goes out of his way to emphasise how leaders of big business are happy with him, he pointedly avoids any references to the Unions. He has appointed a succession of leaders of big business to senior government positions. But, until now (six weeks since the election) no trade union official has been appointed to a government post. The unions are out in the cold.

During the Thatcher era many of the traditional trade union rights, which had been won over a century of struggle, were abolished. Soon after the election, a delegation of six senior trade Union leaders, led by John Monks, the General Secretary of the TUC, sought to meet Blair to discuss the question of legislation to restore to the Unions recognition rights which they had lost under Thatcher. Blair declined even to see them! Instead, as reported by the Guardian, 'They slipped quietly into the Trade and Industry Department, to meet Margaret Beckett, of the Board of Trade. She listened to them but made no promises'. That was a calculated and very public rebuff, intended to convince business magnates that Blair's New Labour was a truly 'reformed' Party that they could trust. Following that infructuous meeting, 'Union joy at Labour's victory turn(ed) to doubt. … What, if anything at all, would Blair deliver?' The fact of the matter is that by the time the trade unionists were even allowed finally able to meet Beckett, the Blair government's legislative programme had been set in stone for the next 18 months. The trade union recognition Bill that the Unions had long sought had no place in it. The Blair team has been going out of its way to establish its anti-union credentials!

Beginnings of 'New Labour'-The Right Turn !

With such diverse elements in the Party, there was a perpetual ongoing struggle within it. The main confrontation was between left-wing activists of Constituency Labour Parties (CLPs) and the well-entrenched right wing leadership in command of the Party's central apparatus. Confrontations between them come up regularly at Annual Party Conferences. Proceedings of Labour Party Conferences tended to be dominated by radicals and leftwing delegates because of their numbers. In recent years the Party Constitution was changed to minimise that danger. But in any case, when radical resolutions were passed, such as those for Nuclear Disarmament, the Party Leadership adopted the doctrine that Conference resolutions were not binding on them. The Annual Party Conferences therefore became little more than annual opportunities for the radical Party activists to let off steam.

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Despite their repeated defeats, illusions of the Left in the Labour Party wishfully persisted. They failed to get even a token representation in the leadership-except for Tony Benn who was Minister for Energy in the Wilson Government. His is a strange case, for he has ended up as the bette noir of the establishment media. One of the most dramatic moments in its recent Labour Party history was when Tony Benn stood for election for Deputy Leadership of the Party. He challenged the right winger Dennis Healey who had served as Foreign Secretary and Chancellor of the Exchequer in the Wilson Government. He was Deputy Leader of the Party and was standing for re-election. The Left lined up behind Benn's candidature against Healey. At this point the pseudo-Left leader, Neil Kinnock played a crucial role in defeating Tony Benn by declaring that it was perfidious on Benn's part to stand as a candidate in the election, because Party unity required that Healey should be 'elected' unopposed! Benn's supporters asked 'What were democratic elections in the Party for?' But 'left-leaning' Kinnock succeeded by his ploy in disrupting the unity of the Left and undermining Benn's candidature. Kinnock secured Healey's re-election as Deputy Leader. By his betrayal of the Left, and of democratic principles, Kinnock's made sure that his own career in the Party was made. He promptly became a darling of the right and was, in due course, elected as Party leader.

That was the moment when the foundations of New Labour were laid, the basis on which the Blair, Brown and Mandelson team, the 'gang of three', were able to build. From that time on, there began a systematic process of restructuring the Party that would place barriers in the way of activists in local Constituency Labour Parties (CLPs), isolating what was left of the Left in the Party and also cutting down the influence of the Unions. In a few years the Party Constitution was changed beyond recognition.

During the 1980s British Trade Unions suffered a sharp decline in their fortunes. When Thatcher came to power, in 1979, Trade Union membership was 12.1 million. By 1996 it had declined to 7million. Trade unions were tied down in the straitjacket of new Thatcherite restrictive laws and they lost many of their legal privileges, which had been won through a century of struggle. True, the Unions were already, by and large, under the control of right wing leaders. But now they were totally debilitated. During the Thatcher era their power was smashed in two ways. Mass unemployment made the working class docile and less inclined towards the Unions and militancy, for the fear of dismissal was powerful. We can recall that it was during the Macmillan era (1957-63) of full-employment that British Trade Unions were at the peak of their power in the post-war era. The second factor (which was possible precisely because of the weakening of Trade Union power) was their systematic emasculation by Thatcher's anti-Union legislation (which Blair is committed not to repeal). The Unions, therefore, are now a shadow of what they once were.

New Labour has continued with Thatcherite policies concerning trade unions. The position of Trade Unions within the Labour Party was also eroded by changes in the Party constitution. That has brought about a substantial curtailment of the role and voting power of the Unions in Party affairs. Blair has bent over backwards to demonstrate to the business magnates, whom he as been wooing, that the Unions have little power or influence in his Party. Union leaders have been studiously bypassed in Blair's

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appointments, for which he has sought people exclusively from a big business background.

Left wing ideological influence was always far greater in Constituency Labour Parties (CLPs). A big campaign was launched denouncing radical CLP activists, who were declared to be unrepresentative of the rank and file. To minimise their influence in the Party, new procedures were introduced. A concept of 'Direct Democracy' by postal voting by rank and file members was introduced. Members of the Party, like everyone else in society, were always subject to the powerful influence of the media. But when they went to local Party meetings to vote, they had an opportunity to hear issues debated. They could arrive at an informed view. The postal voting system cut out the mediation of discussions at Party meetings with like-minded comrades. They were isolated from contact with CLP activists and their informative and educative influence.

The third element in the structure of the Labour Party, besides the trade unions and the CLPs is, of course, the PLP, the Parliamentary Labour Party, made up of all Labour MPs. The power of Blair's New Labour is entrenched here. The National Executive of the Party has over-riding powers over the selection and de-selection of parliamentary candidates. By virtue of constitutional changes, parallel with curtailment of the powers of the Unions and the CLPs, the power of the PLP has been greatly enhanced. The Parliamentary Labour Party, composed of MPs, is overwhelmingly right-wing-there are only a few who could claim some kind of left-wing credentials. The huge new intake of 1997 has greatly increased Blairite influence in the PLP. Blairites have been inducted in large numbers as Ministers, both as Cabinet Members and as junior ministers outside the Cabinet. The Prime Minister's powers of patronage and thereby influence over the Parliamentary Labour Party are very extensive.

The transformation of the Labour Party had already begun before Blair. The balance of power had already changed when Blair got elected as leader of the Party. But Blair made a most dramatic impact at a Party Conference when he threw over-board key parts of the Labour Party constitutional commitments to statism and social welfare. Soon Blair was to denounce, contemptuously, what he labelled as Old Labour. Blair, Brown and Mandelson, the gang of three, coined the name New Labour, to underline the fact that they had nothing to do with the Labour Party as it had been before them. Their mission, quite clearly, is to manage British capitalism more efficiently than the Tories have been able to do. 'New Conservatives' rather than 'New Labour' would be the most appropriate name for the Party that they have created.

The New Conservatives ?

What is quite remarkable now is the extent to which Blair, Brown and Mandelson, the creators and the creatures of New Labour, have taken on board policies and projects of the discredited and defeated Tories! The Tories complain that they have stolen their policies! The only issue on which they differ from the Tories is New Labour's more positive approach to Europe, which is what multi-national capital badly wants. The Tory anti-Europeans, who were mainly responsible for the defeat of the divided Tory Party, are

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too deeply entrenched in the Party to allow it to adopt a positive and pragmatic approach to Europe. Leaving aside the issue of Europe, on which the Tories are caught up in petty bourgeois nationalism, everything else that they have stood for has been inherited by New Labour.

The creators of New Labour set about assiduously to woo leaders of big business a long time ago. Blair even made a pilgrimage to Australia to kow tow before Rupert Murdoch, the global newspaper magnate who gave them the full backing of his powerful media empire. The apparatus of what Noam Chomsky calls the 'Manufacture of Consent' was in place. Media support played no small part in the New Labour's election victory. At home the Blair team cultivated its contacts with the business world quite assiduously. Left-wing colleagues and trade union leaders missed the significance of this entirely, for they initially put it down to mere electioneering. It is only after the first few weeks after the elections that they came to realise that Blair was dead serious in his pro-Business rhetoric.

New labour is therefore best thought of as the New Conservatives. Where it differs from the defeated Conservative Party is in the dynamism and drive that New Labour has injected in its project to regenerate British Capitalism. The Tories, by contrast, are not only a deeply divided and demoralised Party, with no sense of direction and purpose. They are paralysed by deep-rooted internal dissension. Judging from the way in which the battle for succession to John major is shaping up, it does not appear that they will ever emerge as a viable Party again. Moreover, the Tories are also an ageing and decrepit Party. The average age of its members is 64! Unless they can regenerate Party membership quite radically (which looks unlikely) they run the risk of vanishing altogether. That was the fate of the old Liberal Party of Gladstone and Lloyd George, which disappeared after World War I. The Conservative Party today has ceased to be an efficient instrument for managing the capitalist state in Britain and, given its present disarray, it seems to be destined for the dustbin of history. Blair's New Labour has inherited its mantle.

Future of British Capitalism

New Labour has come on the scene at a critical moment for British capitalism. Under extreme right wing nationalist pressure, John Major's government moved away from positions that could serve British capitalism well. The legacy of the Thatcherite revolution of the 1980s has dominated the fanatic ideology of the Tory Party. A large part of the Tory Party, equally, is wedded no less fanatically to petty bourgeois nationalism which has stood in the way of the Party being free to pursue British interests effectively in the European Common Market. New Labour, by contrast, is free from ideological constraints and is pragmatic in its policies. The Conservatives have ill-served the needs of British industry. In the name of the supremacy market forces, Margaret Thatcher instituted policies, which might have been favourable to the trading and financial interests. But those policies devastated British industry. Thatcherism fostered a short-term outlook and a get rich quick mentality. It discouraged long term investment. Large swathes of British industry were destroyed. Over the years there was a systematic 'de-

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industrialisation' of Britain. During the 1980s the British people could watch the death of British industry on the TV, as factory after factory closed down and the equipment was sold for scrap.

De-industrialisation of Britain is one of the most remarkable achievements of Thatcherism in Britain. Industrialists felt betrayed. It was quite a remarkable sight to see the Chairman of the CBI (Confederation of British Industries) declare at their conference that the time had come for 'a bare knuckle fight' with the Thatcher Government. Thatcherism was destroying them and they had to fight back. It is difficult to imagine the depth of feeling of that senior member of the British Industrial establishment, who was driven to use such language. The CBI kept up its pressure though it was not effective enough. Now Brown and Blair have lined up behind the CBI and given it new heart.

As against the CBI, there is the Institute of Directors, which represents mainly trading and financial interests. They were enthusiastically behind Thatcher. Her policies of privatisation for example put vast assets into their grasping hands. One should add that the policy of privatisation also put huge amounts of liquid assets into the hands of the Government. That allowed them to lower the Public Sector Borrowing Requirements (PSBR) and reduce direct taxes on the rich. It must be said though that the 'tax cutting' rhetoric of the Conservatives has concealed a huge regressive shift in the burden of tax. They increased in indirect taxes (that bear more heavily on lower income groups) that more than made up for what they gave away by reductions in direct taxes, that benefited the rich more. In the conditions created by Thatcher there were quick profits to be made on the stock market. Banks and financial institutions made a killing. A decade and more of Tory government has widened the gulf between the rich and the poor in Britain. With the decline of British industry, unemployment has risen and Britain has plummeted down to the bottom of the European prosperity league.

British capital now wants conditions created for its regeneration. Blair has promised it that. An excited spokesman of the CBI (The Confederation of British Industries) who was commenting on BBC TV on the election results, as they came through, could not restrain his joy when the results indicated a landslide victory for New Labour. He did emphasise though that the New Labour government would have its work cut out, after the decades of neglect. The infrastructure of the British economy had to be revived and rebuilt. He put great emphasis on education and technical training. The Thatcher-John Major years of cutting down government expenditure, has resulted in serious erosion of the social and economic infrastructure, including schools, technical colleges and universities. Rates of literacy and numeracy are bad and the stock of trained personnel available in Britain is alarmingly low. The lack of skilled manpower is a major obstacle in the way of British industrial expansion. Tony Blair had already announced education as his first priority.

The CBI man on the TV was worried about was Blair's electioneering promise that New Labour would not increase taxes. He has given those on higher incomes special assurance. That, the CBI man said, was a mistake. Extra money is badly needed for the renewal of Britain. It was not a question of how much tax we have to pay, he said, but a question of what the money is spent on. The decision of New Labour to remain within the

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constraints of Tory fiscal policies might well turn out to be the rock on which the Blair Government flounders. It is quite contradictory on the part of New Labour to declare that more funds will be available for cash starved schools and hospitals and so on, while promising at the same time that they will keep within the Tory spending limits and not increase taxes. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Gordon Brown, has modelled his style on Tory orthodoxy and promises to be tight fisted. But the ruined educational system in Britain, the cash starved National Health Service and much else that needs repair will not be renewed without more cash. Moreover, the Blair-Brown team do not seem to realise that the Tories were able to make do with low taxes because of huge sums of money that were coming into their treasury through privatisation of publicly owned enterprises. New Labour does not have that option.

It is quite remarkable to see the extent to which Blair and his cohort have identified with the policies of the defeated Tories! On virtually every issue, they not only adopted the existing rightwing Tory policies but in many cases they have even out-bid them in pushing to the Right! The only issue on which they have a relatively different stance is their relative greater (but not unqualified) commitment to Europe.

Old and New Labour

There is a solitary survivor of Old Labour in the Blair-Brown outfit. He is John Prescott, the Deputy Prime Minister. His partnership was indispensable in the early days to enable Blair to carry the rank and file of the Party with him. Prescott was in good standing with the Unions and Constituency Party activists. Now that Blair finds himself in an unchallengeable position of power, he has much less need of Prescott, though it is probably too early for him to get rid of him altogether. Blair has sidelined him effectively. Prescott has been put in charge of the Ministries of Transport and the Environment. That should keep him busy.

Prescott's Tory predecessor, Michael Heseltine, who was John Major's Deputy Prime Minister, had no departmental responsibilities. He had an office inside 10 Downing Street itself, so that he might be close to the Prime Minister, liasing with him constantly on a full range of policies, taking an active part in the making of government policy. By contrast, John Prescott has been given an office half a mile away, to be buried under his departmental responsibilities, isolating him from any prospect of day to day involvement with the making of overall policy; well out of harm's way. He does not even have a place in the key '9 O'clock Committee' with which Blair meets routinely every weekday (at 9 am).

In place of Prescott, Blair has installed within 10 Downing Street Peter Mandelson as 'Minister Without Portfolio'. Mandelson is ideologically and personally very close to Blair. They are of one mind. Mandelson, though a relatively junior figure in the Party, has emerged as L'Eminence Grise, of New Labour. For all practical purposes he, not Prescott, functions as Deputy Prime Minister. According to the Guardian Mandelson 'could be more influential and potentially more powerful than many senior Ministers'. Ensconced inside Downing Street, constantly at Blair's side, he will facilitate Blair's

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penchant for centralising policy making and implementation. Blair is able to use Mandelson to intervene in the affairs of any Ministry (undermining the Minster's authority and autonomy) as Blair chooses. For that he has established institutional machinery in the form of the 9 O'Clocj Committee', as we shall see below.. That suits Blair's authoritarian predisposition.

Blair's Boardroom Blitz !

Having left the working class and trade union leaders far behind him, Blair and Brown have been busy 'recruiting some of the brightest stars of the business world', to take over senior government positions. The first such appointment was that of Sir David Simon, the controversial Chairman of BP who has been made 'Minister for Trade and Competitiveness in Europe'. He is to act as Blair's supremo in Europe. Simon, a multi-millionaire, will draw no salary. He is believed to have received a most generous 'golden handshake' from BP to enable him to turn to 'public duty'. He has been rewarded by elevation to the Peerage. The list of people like Simon, senior men from the world of business who are appointed to key Government positions, is growing day by day. Martin Taylor, Chief Executive of Barclays Bank, has been appointed to head a task force that will examine the tax and social security benefits system. Alan Sugar, self-made multi-millionaire and embodiment of Thatcherite values, is another. New names turn up every day. One more 'catch' is Peter Jarvis, Chief Executive of the Whitbread group, who earns a salary of a mere £600,000 a year, who will head the Government's 'Low Pay Unit! One man who is tipped as a possible successor to the present Governor of the Bank of England is an old and close personal friend of Blair and Brown. Gavin Davies is a multi-millionaire and an associate of a big firm of stockbrokers. Davies recently spent a mere £3 million on a cliff top holiday home in Devon. Blair and Brown admire him greatly. Davies's wife, Sue Nye, holds an important position in Brown's Treasury team. Davies himself was one of a group of men who were nicknamed 'The Wise Men' who served on a panel of advisers to Ken Clark, the Tory Chancellor of the Exchequer. Commenting on Davies, The Guardian said 'He travels light, ideologically'. The same could be said of Blair and Brown. According to the newspapers 'Blair's search for more business names on the Government team is set to continue.' Blair and Brown's boardroom blitz has stuck in the union leaders' craw, who are very sore at having been left out in the cold.

One of the first major acts of Blair and Brown and a dramatic one at that, was the grant of autonomy to the Bank of England in setting interest rates. Until now interest rate policy was the exclusive prerogative of the Government, even though the Governor of the Bank of England was consulted. But it was the Chancellor who had the authority to decide. Now the New Labour government has abrogated these powers and has left it entirely up to the Bank of England to manage interest rates. A Committee of 9 senior members of the Bank, under the Chairmanship of the Governor will meet monthly to review the position and make changes in the Bank Rate on its own discretion, without involving the government or even referring to it. This, Brown has said is to 'remove politics from financial policy making'! For the Governor of the Bank of England this generous offering was turned just a little bit sour by the arrogant and discourteous manner in which he was told of the change. He had not been consulted in advance nor even been given an advance

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indication of what was in the offing. Called to a meeting with Brown at 9 am one Monday morning Eddie George, the Governor, 'was both shocked and delighted' to be told about it.

This step, in handing over the power over determining interest rates to the City of London's financial hierarchy, is a major retrograde step. This was totally unexpected. It was never brought up even for discussion at any time before, let alone getting Party approval for it or being put into the Party's Election Manifesto nor was it tabled as a statement in Parliament. There is no Party or Parliamentary sanction for it. Blair has treated both with disdain. It is a step of unprecedented magnitude, but taken entirely by Blair and Brown, of their own bat. They have given up a most potent instrument of monetary policy, into the unfettered hands of the financial hierarchy of the City of London. A great step for British Socialism indeed, but sadly a huge step backwards!

The autonomy that has been granted to the Bank of England to manage interest rates, without reference to the Government, has already brought serious problems to the forefront. In the name of restraining inflationary pressures, the Bank of England has recently raised interest rates. That has been done at a most inopportune time for the Governments aim of reviving industry and boosting employment. It has put up the cost of raising capital and therefore it is a new disincentive for industrial investment. Moreover, it has had a most undesirable effect on the foreign exchanges by creating upward pressures for an already over-valued pound. This has made British exports more expensive in foreign markets and greatly cheapened imports into Britain, competing more effectively with local industry. In all these ways, the Bank of England decision has been taken in total disregard of the difficult task of regenerating British industry, which is the most important task before the new Government. But Blair's Government has already thrown away that most potent instrument of economic policy.

Autocratic Blair

Finally, one must add a word about Blair's autocratic and authoritarian style. He has contempt for his party, which, for him, is no more than an instrument necessary for his rise to power. He expects his colleagues to grovel before him. As he greeted the new contingent of Labour MPs for the first time, he told them 'We are the servants of the people'. In Blair's self-centred eyes, he himself embodies 'the people'. 'Blair Lays Down the Law to his MPs' said the Times headline, accurately summing up that meeting. If anything the 'landslide' victory has made Blair's authoritarianism worse.

Blair has institutionalised his personal control over the Party and the Government. Normally, Ministers who are responsible for different Departments bring their proposals before the Cabinet where the policies are negotiated with colleagues, presided over by the Prime Minister who naturally does have a special weight in the process but cannot just dictate unilaterally without taking account of his colleagues. Blair has found a way to by-pass this. He has set up a special team of five 'Special Advisers' (nicknamed the 'New Mandarins') who are based in his office at 10 Downing Street and work under his trusted lieutenant Peter Mandelson. All policy initiatives, press briefings etc from every Ministry

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have to be submitted to this '9 O'clock Committee' to be vetted and cleared, as a matter of routine. Blair meets with the Committee at 9 am every weekday. That is Blair's central power house, that enables him to direct, from day to day, the ongoing work of every Ministry on every important issue. The decisions already having been settled through the 9 O'clock Committee, the Cabinet itself is left with very little do but to rubber stamp decisions that are already made with Blair's authority.

Even Blair's friends in the Board Rooms have begun to show disquiet because of his arrogant and supercilious manner. He and Brown seem to take some childish delight in springing surprises on everyone, without consultation or discussion. They ruffled some feathers when they set up a new body that is to oversee and regulate all financial institutions. It was an overdue step that in itself is not unwelcome to the City, in the light of numerous scandals in recent years. The new body will take over some of powers of the Bank of England in supervising Banks. In taking that step Blair and Brown neither consulted nor even informed the Governor of the Bank of England whose role was most directly affected. He knew about it only when the announcement was made. The Governor and the entire City of London establishment are quite appalled at Blair and Brown's persistent cavalier conduct. Lord Alexander, Chief of Natwest Bank and doyen of the City financial hierarchy, fired a shot across the bows in a politely worded but quite plain speech, a warning to Blair and Brown that they must learn the etiquette of public office and check their arrogance. The ruling elite of the city reminded them that they are, after all servants of the 'people' who rule the world of British capitalism!

[Back to Hamza Alavi Homepage]

Ironies of History:

Contradictions of The Khilafat Movement

By Hamza Alavi

The 'Khilafat' Movement of 1919-24, is probably quite unique inasmuch as it has been glorified with one voice by Islamic ideologists, Indian nationalists and communists alike and along with them by Western scholars, as an anti-colonial movement of Muslims of India, premised on the hostility of the British to the Turkish Sultan, their venerated Caliph.1 Little attempt has been made to examine the premises on which the movement was founded, the rhetoric of its leaders being taken at face value. On closer examination we find extra-ordinary paradoxes and contradictions behind that rhetoric.

As for the 'achievements' of that Movement, its lasting legacy is the legitimised place that it gave the Muslim clergy at the centre of the modern political arena, armed with a political organisation in the form of the Jamiat-e-Ulama-e-Hind (and its successors after the Partition) which the clergy have used to intervene actively in both the political as well

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as the ideological sphere. Never before in Indian Muslim history was the clergy ever accorded such a place in political life.

The Khilafat Movement also introduced the religious idiom in the politics of Indian Muslims. Contrary to some misconceptions (and misrepresentations) it was not the Muslim League, the bearer of Muslim Nationalism in India, that introduced religious ideology in the politics of Indian Muslims. Muslim Nationalism was a movement of Muslims and not a movement of Islam. It was an ethnic movement of disaffected Muslim professionals and the government-job-seeking educated Indian Muslim middle class, mainly those of UP and Bihar and urban Punjab. Their objectives were modest, for they demanded not much more than fair quotas in jobs for Muslims and certain safeguards for their interests. Muslim Nationalism in India was a secular rather than a religious movement. Nor was it, in its origins, a Hindu hating movement as is sometimes made out. To the contrary, by virtue of the Lucknow Pact of 1916 it had already moved decisively towards a common platform with the broader Indian National Movement and unity with the Congress Party. The Khilafat Movement intervened in that context in a way that decisively killed the politics of the Lucknow Pact. The intervention of the Khilafat Movement in Indian Muslim politics has had a considerable retrogressive ideological influence on the modern Indian Muslim mind that reverberates still in Muslim thinking and their politics in present day India and Pakistan. For that alone, it deserves to be reviewed and re-evaluated.

The Khilafatist Claims

The arguments of the Indian Khilafatists were based on the claims that:

1) The Ottoman Caliph was the 'Universal Caliph' to whom all Muslims, everywhere in the world, owed allegiance;

2) That there was an ongoing war between the World of Christianity and the World of Islam, which, inter alia, caused loss of territories of the Ottoman Empire in Europe, a loss that Indian Muslims felt obliged to mourn;

3) That Britain in particular, was an enemy of the Ottoman Caliph; that after World War I Britain held the Caliph captive in Istanbul. They demanded that the person and the office of the Caliph be protected and preserved and his sovereignty, including that over Ottoman Arab colonies and the Muslim Holy places, be respected and preserved.

A dispassionate examination of the relevant facts show that these claims were all quite dubious. In this short paper we can review these matters only quite briefly.

Origins of the Ottoman Caliphate

The acquisition of the status of Caliph by Ottoman Sultans is a disputed matter. When, in the modern era, they decided to describe themselves as Caliphs, they claimed that the Caliphate had been transferred three and a half centuries earlier to the Ottoman Sultan

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Selim I by al-Mutawakkil, a descendent of the Abbasids of Baghdad, who was living in exile in Egypt as a pensioner of the Mamluk ruler Baybars, who was defeated in 1517 by Selim. Baybars, the most distinguished of the Mamluk rulers was originally a Turkoman slave. He had picked up al-Mutawakkil's father, an uncle of last Abbasid Caliph, and installed him in Cairo with great pomp as, what scholars have labelled, a 'pseudo-Caliph' 2 who carried the name but none of the authority of that office. Baybar's object in installing him in Cairo was thereby to confer honour and legitimacy on his crown and give his court an air of primacy in Muslim eyes. 3 Al-Mutawakkil succeeded his father in that role. He claimed to be the legitimate bearer of the (late) Abbasid Caliphate, although he was a man without a country and without any authority. He had, at best, only a symbolic value for Baybars, in view of his connections with the Abbasid dynasty. On his return to Istanbul Selim carried the hapless al-Mutawakkil with him, to deny a potential future Mamluk any shred of legitimacy.

The claim that the Caliphate was transferred by al-Mutawakkil to Selim is considered by historians to be quite dubious. 4 It has been argued that al-Mutawakkil was in no position to pass on the Caliphate to anyone, for he did not have it himself, having neither a country nor any power or authority. What appears to the present writer to be a more telling argument against the veracity of that story is that neither Selim nor any of his descendants for nearly three and half centuries, called themselves Caliphs ! There was no Ottoman Caliphate for all those centuries. The title that the Ottoman Sultans took pride in using was that of Ghazi.

It had, however, become a common practice among medieval Muslims rulers to be addressed as Caliph, but only informally so, along with other honorific titles, on ceremonial occasions. In Turkey such a practice also grew, imperceptibly and gradually. The title of Caliph came to be added to the many honorific titles attached to the Ottoman Sultan. But, formally and officially, the title of Caliph was not used by the Ottomans until 1774, or over 250 years after Selim's famous victory over the Mamluks. In that year formal use of the title of Caliph for an Ottoman Sultan came about purely by coincidence. During negotiations with the victorious Russians of the Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca, the Russian negotiators described their Empress, Catherine the Great, as 'the Head of the entire Christian Orthodox Church', thus laying a theoretical claim to the loyalties of Christian subjects of the Ottomans. Not to be out done, a quick-witted negotiator of the Sultan named his master as the Caliph of all Muslims, thus laying a counter claim, to the loyalties of Muslim subjects of the Russian Empress. There was no more to it than that.

After that episode, despite the informal use of the title of Caliph, the Ottomans still did not yet claim that they were legitimate Caliphs and religious heads of all Muslims. That was to come much later. That was encouraged not least by the British who were staunch allies and patrons of the Ottomans, with an eye to the Muslims of India whom they hoped to be able to influence through the Caliph. Lewis writes: 'Under Abdul Aziz (1861-76) the doctrine was advanced for the first time that the Ottoman Sultan was not only the head of the Ottoman Empire but also the Caliph of all Muslims and the heir, in a sense not previously accepted, of the Caliphs of early times.' 5

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Legitimacy of Ottoman Caliphs

It was only by the late 19th century, that the Ottoman Sultans decided to lay claim to the Universal Caliphate. For that to be credible, they needed to establish an acceptable source of legitimacy in the eyes of the world. For that purpose, Turkish propaganda, (which was greatly to influence Urdu journalism and Indian Muslim thought) dredged up the mythical story of transfer of the Caliphate to Selim, by al-Mutawakkil in 1517. It was necessary to take resort to that mythical origin of the Ottoman Caliphate which, it was hoped, would reinforce their claim for legitimacy of their Caliphate. If they could show that it had been formally transferred to them by a member of the House of Abbas who was supposed to be the custodian-in-exile of the Abbasid Caliphate and held that legacy until he could transfer it to a Muslim Sultan who possessed secular power that could do justice to that awesome office, their claim, they hoped, would thereby be unchallengeable. The Ottomans resurrected al-Mutawakkil from the grave to prove their Caliphal credentials.

Indian Muslims were divided into at least two groups on the issue of recognition of the legitimacy of the Ottoman Caliphate, though its is remarkable that neither side questioned the validity of the story that it had been passed on to Selim by al-Mutawakkil. Those who subscribed to the Barelvi tradition refused to accept the legitimacy of the Ottoman claim on an issue of principle and not by questioning the truth of the story of the supposed transfer of the Caliphate by al-Mutawakkil. Barelvis did not disbelieve the story itself. Given years of Turkish propaganda about it in the Urdu press, they took it for granted, like other Indian Muslims. The Barelvi objection was that the Caliphate could be held only by someone descended from the Quraysh clan. The Ottomans were not of Quraysh descent. They did not, therefore, satisfy an indispensable condition for Caliphate. In taking that view they were in accord with an authoritative and established tradition in classical Islam. Eminent scholars such as Imam al-Ghazali and al-Mawardi had expressed the view that only a descendent of the Quraysh could be Caliph. 6 In the light of the Barelvi rejection, and in order to rally Indian Muslims behind the Ottoman Caliph, Maulana Abdul Bari of Firangi Mahal issued a fatwa in February 1919 laying down inter alia that Quraysh descent was not a necessary condition for Caliphate. Lined up against Bari were such major figures in Islamic learning as Imam al-Ghazali and al-Mawardi. His ex cathedra judgement was rejected not only by the Barelvis but also by influential groups of 'Deobandi' Ulama. Minault records the fact that several senior Ulama refused to sign the fatwa. Amongst those who signed, says Minault, the Ulama of Deoband, Punjab and Bengal were conspicuous by their absence.7

The Barelvi principled position on this issue has been totally ignored by scholars although, arguably, they are the majority of Indian Muslims. Barelvis had a following not only in towns but also, and especially, amongst the vast majority of the rural population. A key difference between Barelvi beliefs and those of the so-called 'Deobandi Tradition' (the 'tradition' itself is much older than the eponymous Dar-Ul-Ulum at Deoband) is that Barelvi's believe in intercession between ordinary humans and Divine Grace which is accessed through the intervention of an ascending, linked and unbroken chain of holy personages, pirs, reaching out ultimately to Prophet Mohammad, who intercede on their

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behalf with Allah.8 It is a more superstitious but also a more tolerant tradition of Indian Islam. The views of the Barelvi tradition of South Asian Islam are, by and large, ignored by scholars. Sanyal's pioneering study is an exceptional and excellent new beginning. 9

The Unexamined Concept of Khalifa

Abul Kalam Azad, the principal theoretician of the 'Indian Khilafat Movement' summed up the fundamental ideological point of departure of the Movement, quite succinctly, in the following statement: 10

'It is an Islamic Shar'i law that in every age Muslims must have one [ék] Khalifa and Imam.11 By Khalifa we mean such an independent Muslim king or ruler of government and country who possesses full powers to protect Muslims and the territory that they inhabit 12 and to promulgate and enforce Shar'i laws and is powerful enough to confront the enemies of Islam.'

The Sultan of Turkey, it was held by the Indian Khilafatists, was such a Muslim ruler and Caliph and it was to him that Muslims of India should pay allegiance.

It is quite extra-ordinary that in the voluminous literature on the Indian Khilafat Movement this 'basic religious premise' of the Movement , as stated by Azad and others, is taken for granted and has not been subjected to critical examination. No proper evaluation of the Khilafat Movement is possible without an analysis in depth of the initial premises of the Movement.

To begin with, there is a basic contradiction between the Ottoman claim that the Caliphate was transferred to them, via Sultan Selim, by al-Mutawakkil, which the Indian Khilafatists took as the Ottoman's charter, and the conditions for a legitimate Caliphate that are outlined by Azad. Those conditions render the Ottoman claim to Caliphate flawed from the start. By virtue of the conditions as set out by Azad, al-Mutawakkil was not a legitimate custodian of the Caliphate. He was neither a Muslim king or ruler of any country nor was he independent, being a pensioner of Baybars, the Mamluk ruler. In the circumstances the question of his possessing the power to enforce Shar'i laws of course does not arise. al-Mutawakkil was in no position to transfer the Caliphate to the Ottomans, not being a valid Caliph himself. He had nothing to give. This objection to the validity of the Ottoman Caliphate is quite separate from that put forward by the Barelvis. Azad's rhetoric, typically for him, is bound up in contradictions.

Meaning of the word ' Khalifa'

It is important to be clear at the outset about the meaning of the word Khalifa and the way in which that word was later transformed linguistically by Umayyad Monarchs to legitimise their rule, having seized power by military force. The word Khalifa is derived from the Arabic root khalafa which means 'to follow' or 'to come after'. It means a 'successor' in the sequential sense, not in the sense of inheritance of properties or qualities. When Prophet Mohammad died, Hazrat Abu Bakr was elected to succeed him.

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He was consequently called 'Khalifat al-Rasool Allah' or the successor of the Messenger of Allah. In its true meaning (successor) the word Khalifa does not indicate any kind of office or status such as that of a ruler, the sense in which it came to be used later. Khalifa meaning 'successor' could be used meaningfully only with reference to a specified 'predecessor'. Hazrat Abu Bakr was Khalifa only with reference to his predecessor, al-Rasool Allah.

The head of the Muslim Umma, Hazrat Umar, who succeeded Hazrat Abu Bakr could have been called Khalifat al-Khalif al-Rasool Allah, or the 'Successor to the Successor to the Messenger of Allah. With every succession thereafter one more 'Khalifat al…' would have had to be inserted before such a title of the previous one. That would have been quite absurd. The question of using the word Khalifa for those who came after Hazrat Abu Bakr simply did not arise. Instead, Hazrat Abu Bakr's successors, Hazrat Umar, Hazrat Uthman and Hazrat Ali, the three successive elected heads of the Umma were each designated by the title 'Amir al-Mu'minin' or the Commander of the Faithful.

When the Umayyad Dynasty was set up in Damascus, its legitimacy was disputed and fought over. Unlike the elected headship of the umma, here was a seizure of power by military force. For that reason Maulana Maududi (1903-1979) has called the rise of the Umayyad dynasty a 'counter-revolution against Islam' (Inquilab-e-ma'koos) and a reversion to Jahiliya or the age of ignorance that is said to have preceded the advent of Islam 13. The Umayyad rulers having become monarchs through military force, looked for a legitimating symbol to sanctify their regime. For that they chose the word Khalifa. They hoped thereby to attach to themselves the legitimacy that was associated with the title of Mohammad's successor, Hazrat Abu Bakr. In so doing they changed the meaning of the word. The word Khalifa was no longer to mean 'successor' to a specified predecessor. It was now to mean monarch or ruler.

A new word had been invented. Although it was spelt and pronounced in exactly the same way as the original word Khalifa that meant 'successor' the same utterance, in its sound and spelling, was now to have a new and totally unrelated meaning. It was a neologism, unconnected etymologically or semantically, with the original word Khalifa the successor. The new word was to mean monarch or ruler. Sir Syed Ahmad commented on that, saying: 'The term Khalifa was abandoned by Hazrat Umar when he was elected to succeed Hazrat Abu Bakr. Instead, of that he adopted the title of Amir al-Mu'minin [Commander of the Faithful]. … That title was used until the time of Hazrat Ali and for a time even after him. … After that and after the time of Imam Hussain, the people who had taken over power [viz. the Umayyads) arrogated to themselves the title of Khalifa 14

because they thought that the title of Khalifa was more exalted (muqaddas) than that of Commander of the Faithful. 15

The word Khalifa, having been misused by Umayyad Monarchs as their title, to sanctify their monarchy, would have lost its force if it were not applied also to the four successors of Prophet Mohammad. But there was a general recognition of the obvious fact that the Umayyads were not in the same class as the latter. Therefore Hazrat Abu Bakr and his three successors were re-designated as 'Khulafa-e-Rashidun' 16, or 'The Rightly Guided

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Caliphs'. If any religious significance attached to the first four, it was made clear that it did not apply to the later 'Khulafa', starting with the Umayyads.

Under the Umayyads the word Khalifa was not yet impregnated with any religious connotations. For them the word was to be only a symbol of legitimacy of their rule-a variant of the 'divine right of kings' as propounded in medieval Europe. It was only in later centuries that claims about religious significance of the title of 'Khalifa' or Caliph were to be made. That was during the period of decay and decline of the late Abbasid Caliphate, when the Caliph was reduced to being a mere puppet in the hands of military commanders or regional princes. These true holders of power needed to generate an ideology that would remove the Caliph from the centre of secular state power, as the ruler, and relegate him to the sidelines, as a nominal head of the state whose essential functions were supposed to lie in the religious sphere-where in practice, he had nothing of any significance to do.

God's Caliph

In the Sunni tradition the religious domain is the domain of the Imam. But unlike the Pope, the Imam does not have any religious authority. Islam, as it is often said, does not recognise any priesthood or a Pope. It is a religion of the individual conscience. Imams are therefore essentially guides, persons who by virtue of personal and religious perfection and excellence in scholarship come to be recognised as Imam. No one appoints Imams. In contradiction to that earlier usage, in the decadence of the late Abbasid period, a (nominal) religious significance began to be attached to the Caliph. Increasingly the practice grew of conflating the concepts of Khalifa and Imam. It is this later corrupted tradition that Azad follows in his words quoted above.

There was also an escalation in religious attributes that were attached to the Caliph. The Caliph was even called Khalifat Allah, or 'Gods Caliph' or 'successor' ! Azad in fact takes the phrase Khalifat Allah as his point of departure when expounding the meaning of the word Khalifa. The concept of Khalifat Allah (God's Caliph), which Azad uses freely when expounding the concept of the Caliphate was been strongly denounced by classical Islamic scholars in works of which Azad could hardly have been ignorant of. Al-Mawardi, condemning the use of the term Khalifat Allah wrote in his classic work Al-Ahkam as-Sultaniya that: 'We disagree that he can also be called Khalifat Allah … The consensus of the Ulama has prohibited this and condemned any one who says it as a fajir (i.e. a sinner or liar) because there can be a Khalifa (successor) only of such a person who has disappeared or who has died. Allah can neither disappear nor can he die.' 17 Goldziher writes: 'When the Umayyads used this pretentious title (Khalifat Allah) it was merely intended to convey the unlimited power of the ruler. Under the later Abbasids the title was filled with theocratic content. …The Ottoman Sultans were … thought to have special claim for adopting these titles of the old Caliphs just as the name Khalifat Allah was transferred to them'. 18 When Azad, in the corrupted late Abbasid tradition, begins his exposition of the concept of Khalifa with the discredited notion of Khalifat Allah, 19 he follows the most backward and reactionary traditions in Islam.

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Sir Syed Ahmad Khan's position on this issue is emphatically the opposite. He is quite clear in distinguishing Khilafat, the secular domain and Imamat the religious domain. He reiterated this, saying that 'After the death of the Prophet of Islam, Hazrat Abu Bakr was appointed … Khalifat al-Rasool Allah … (But) he had no religious authority (dini ikhtiarat). He repeatedly emphasised that the Caliph was not like a Roman Catholic Pope. Hazrat Abu Bakr, he pointed out, was simply the administrative head of the community of Muslims. 20 Shaban, a contemporary scholar, says exactly the same thing. He wrote: 'Mohammad could have no true successor, since no other man could ever have the same divine sanction … Therefore Abu Bakr had no religious authority … He was in no sense a grand combination of Pope and Holy Roman Emperor'. 21

Under the late Abbasids when 'The Caliph had little left except the capital and even there his authority was shadowy' 22 there was an escalation in his religious attributes. The Caliph being divorced from effective control over state power was presented to the people as a religious rather than a secular figure. The Caliphs were increasingly referred to as Imams. Goldziher notes that : 'Under the later Abbasids the title was filled with theocratic content. … (They, the Caliphs) claimed to be Representatives of God's rule on earth and even as "God's shadow on earth". Their ideologues taught that the Caliph is the God's shadow on earth; all those who are troubled find refuge in it (zillu'Ilahi fi'l-ardi ya'wi ilayhi kullu malhafun). … These pompous theocratic titles … must have appeared to contemporaries the emptier the less of real power corresponded to them … The Ottoman Sultans, as the protagonists of Islam, were thought to have a special claim for adopting these titles of the old Caliphs, just as the name of Khalifat Allah, or Gods Caliph, was transferred to them.' 23 The Ottoman propaganda machine played a large part in spreading the notion of the Caliph's supposed religious role, which by implication provided a basis for the Caliph's claim to the loyalty of Muslims everywhere, including India. The Indian clergy in particular welcomed this because as self-appointed guardians of Islam in India this enhanced their place in Indian society and Indian Muslim politics as mediators between the Caliph and 'his people'.

It was not long before 'Muslim' intellectuals and scholars began to come forward with 'authoritative' texts, inventing, emphasising and exaggerating the supposed 'religious' role of the Caliph as Imam. Gone was the notion of an elected secular head of state as it was under the Khulafa-e-Rashidun, the first four 'Rightly Guided Caliphs'. The notions about the supposed religious role of the Caliph were in contradiction to the distinction made in original Islam between the head of the state who was a secular figure (an office that remained secular even when it was redesignated Khalifa by Umayyads rulers) and that of Imam, a religious guide who dwelt in the domain of faith. In the decadence of later days, the two concepts were often collapsed one into the other so that, as we have seen from the above quotation from Azad, the words Caliph and Imam were uttered in the same breath (as Azad does when referring to the Ottoman Sultan) as if there was no distinction between the two.

The Universal Caliphate

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Azad's speeches suggest that there could be only one Caliph in every age. One would have to close one's eyes to much of Muslim history to accept Azad's arbitrary condition at face value. The fact is that over many centuries there has been a plurality of rival Caliphates and not just one that embraced the entire Muslim world. Several Caliphates have coexisted at the same time. The most notable of these, contemporary with the Abbasid Caliphate in Baghdad, were the Umayyad Caliphate in Spain and the Fatimid Caliphate in Egypt. Besides these three best known rival Caliphates, there were numerous independent Muslim kingdoms whose heads claimed the title of Caliph. Bosworth's comprehensive survey offers an account of no less than 82 such Islamic 'Caliphates' ! 24

Notwithstanding that fact of a long history of Islam, the Ottoman's propagandised the notion of a single 'Universal Caliph' for the whole Islamic world as a basic component of Islamic polities. That was the basis on which they laid claim to the loyalties of Indian Muslims. The idea is pure fiction of course. And yet, that is the assumption on which the Khilafat Movement was premised.

Azad claimed that it was an Islamic Shar'i law that in every age Muslims must have 'one' (ek) Khalifa and Imam, the Universal Caliph. He does not indicate the source of that shar'i law where that is laid down, or the basis on which he makes that statement, for he has none. He was accustomed to making large and extravagant claims without any fou

FOOTNOTES 1 Minault's study of the Khilafat Movement (1982) is, arguably, the best available

account. But she too subscribes broadly to the general consensus which the present study questions.

2 e.g. Arnold, 1924: 94 3 Hitti, 1960: 676 4 Hitti, 1960: 676-677 5 Lewis,1961: 121 6 Ghazali, 1964, page iv; al-Mawardi,1960, chapter I, Section 1. 7 A list of those who signed it, and senior Ulama who did not, can be found in

Minault 1982: 80. 8 for some brief comments on this, see Alavi, 1988: 84 ff. 9 Sanyal's pioneering study (1996-forthcoming) is a welcome exception. The

Barelvi tradition is itself an old and time honoured one. It was not created by Ahmad Reza Khan, who was its most able and articulate guide at the turn of the century.

10 Quoted by Abbasi (1986: 15) from Azad's Presidential Address before the Bengal Provincial Khilafat Conference on 28 February 1920, taken presumably from the records of the Zamindar, a campaigning paper behind the Khilafat Movement, of which Abbasi was deputy Editor. He was an important figure in the Movement and, as such, a close colleague and friend of Azad. This passage cannot be found in the version of that Address in 'Khutbaat-e-Azad' edited by Shorish Kashmiri (Azad, 1944). Abbasi is the more reliable source and would have the full text of the speech in his files. This important Address is, rather

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oddly, omitted in its entirety from Khutbaat-e-Azad as edited by Malik Ram (Azad, 1974).

11 In conflating the titles of Khalifa (Caliph) and Imam, Azad follows a discredited ideological position that dates back to the late Abbasid period when attributes of Imam were ascribed to Caliphs, imputing to them a religious role.

12 This condition was not satisfied in the case of India where the Ottoman Sultan did not rule.

13 Maududi, 1961: 38 14 Sir Syed Ahmad Khan writes: 'apné taeen Khalifa ké lafz sé apné aap ko ta'bir

kiya' 15 Syed Ahmad Khan, 1962b:165-166 16 Khulafa is plural of Khalifa 17 Al-Mawardi, 1960 : 69-70 18 Goldziher, 1971: 67-68 19 Azad, Khutabaat-e-Azad, Lahore 1944 : 192. 20 Syed Ahmad Khan 1962: 165 21 Shaban, 1980:19 22 Hitti, 1960: 465. See also Arnold, 1924: 57 23 Goldziher, 1971: 67-68. The notion of Khalifat Allah (Gods Caliph) is

discussed below. 24 Bosworth, 1967 25 Azad's mother was an Arab lady from Makkah. 26 Stojanovic, 1939: 2 27 Gewehr, 1967: 28 28 Shukla, 1973: 123 29 Alavi, 1988: 68 ff 30 Abdus Salaam Khurshied's slim volume (Khurshied, n.d.) is very informative

about the history of Urdu journalism, more so than Sabri's massive three volumes (Sabri, 1953)

31 quoted by Minault 1982: 51 32 Feroz Ahmad, 1993: 35. Feroz Ahmad, the distinguished historian of modern

Turkey, must not be confused with Feroze Ahmad, the Pakistani Marxist and Sindhi nationalist scholar.

33 Feroz Ahmad, 1993 :40 34 Agha Khan, 1954: 163 35 Agha Khan, 1954: 163 36 Agha Khan, 1954: 164 37 Lewis, 1961: 233 38 Agha Khan, 1954: 165 39 Aksin, 1976: 229. I am indebted to Dr. Hakki Rizatepé for his generous help

with translation of Aksin's Turkish text. 40 Mohammad Ali's Presidential speech at the Indian National Congress at

Cocanada on 26 Dec. 1923 in: Mohammad Ali, 1944: 299 41 Aksin, 1976 : 93. 42 Aksin, 1976 : 168 43 Lewis, 1961 : 235

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44 Abbasi, 1986: 210 and Lewis, 1961: 246 Whether the Sheikh-ul-Islam's fatwa was in favour of the Caliph or against him, depended on who was in power and wielded the stick.

45 Lewis, 1961: 242 46 Attatürk, 1963: 5. This 740 pages long speech was delivered over a period of 6

days in October 1927 before Deputies and representatives of the Republican Party. One must admire Kemal's stamina in delivering it and the audience's patience in sitting through it.

47 Atatürk, 1963: 8 One can see Kemal's anger and contempt for the Caliph in long passages in the speech.

48 The glossary that accompanies the published text of the '6 day speech' defines 'Padishah' as 'The ruler or sovereign of the Ottomans, (the) Sultan'. It is significant that Kemal used that hyphenated title, separating the secular and the religious domains.

49 Atatürk, 1963:7 . Nor could the Indian Khilafatists comprehend that. 50 Atatürk, 1963:10 51 Atatürk, 1963: 11 52 Feroz Ahmad, 1993: 48 53 Abbasi, 1986: 199 ff. 54 Abbasi, 1986 :208 55 Home Poll. 588, 23.1.1920, 2-14, NAI.

Colonialism and the Rise of Capitalism

Hamza Alavi

It is quite extra-ordinary to see how, over 45 years ago, leading ‘Western’ Marxists managed to get through an entire debate on ‘The Transition From Feudalism to Capitalism’ (Hilton, 1976) without once mentioning the colonial context of the rise of British industrial capitalism. As we shall try to demonstrate, the imperial nexus played a crucial role in it. Capitalism was a global phenomenon from the outset, not only by way of trade but also by way of extraction of resources from the colonies that underpinned capital accumulation in the metropolis. So it continues today. That blind spot in Marxist historiography, which fails to locate the colonial relationship at the centre of capitalist development in the metropolis is also responsible for a missing dimension in Marxist political practice. The fate of the working class in the advanced capitalist countries is, more than ever, linked inextricably with that of the working people of the so-called Third World. But Western labour movements have done little to integrate their struggles with those of the workers of the Third World.

Colin Barker’s review article in the inaugural issue of Historical Materialism (1997), despite its brilliance and comprehensiveness, is not free from that general oversight. Barker writes with clarity and what he has to say stands very well on its own ground regardless of the merits or otherwise of Ellen Wood’s books that he has reviewed. One would endorse most of what Barker has to say, subject to this one caveat about the absence of the colonial dimension in his comprehensive statement. Wood’s own

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contribution to the inaugural issue of Historical Materialism is, by contrast, very disappointing. I will take her article, however, as a useful point of departure for a discussion of issues that need to be raised. Much of the problem with Wood’s article, it must be said, stems from her methodological decision to take the concept of ‘the market’ as the organising focus of her discussion, even when she criticises others for the way in which they have used it. As against them, she argues that ‘the capitalist market (does not) represent an opportunity ¼ (but rather) an imperative’. But nowhere does she explain what she means by the ‘imperative of the market’.

The market is, of course, an essential component of the mechanism of capitalism. But, except in pseudo-Marxist works, such as those of Immanuel Wallerstein (1974), the market does not define the structure of capitalism. What is specific and central to the capitalist mode of production (in agricultural capitalism as well as industrial) is the separation of the producer from the means of production. As Marx himself put it, ‘This separation of labour from the conditions of labour is the precondition of capitalist production.’ (Marx, 1969:78)

Wood is led away from that key definition in Marx’s thinking. Instead she mistakenly posits the existence of ‘two different narratives’ in Marx. The first of these she attributes to the German Ideology and The Communist Manifesto. In that ‘conventional model’, (as she puts it), history is a succession of stages in the division of labour, with a transhistorical (sic) process of technological progress and the leading role assigned to burgher classes who seem to bring about capitalism just by being liberated from feudal chains’. This rendering of Marx’s ideas is unrecognisable. (Wood, 1997: 10; emphasis added). The second ‘narrative’ in Marx, she writes, is to be found in the Grundrisse and Capital. That, she writes, ‘has more to do with changing property relations’. We can take this notion of ‘changing property relations’ as a euphemism (that obscures rather than clarifies) for the separation of the producer from the means of production. Further on Wood writes: ‘What Marx is trying to explain is the accumulation of wealth’ (ibid:13) Wood must know that there is a fundamental conceptual difference between the idea of accumulation of ‘wealth’ (which could include such ‘wealth’ as palaces or jewels etc. which are unproductive) and that of the ‘accumulation of capital’ that provides a basis of ever rising circuits of production. Accumulation of capital refers to the conversion of surplus value into productive capital, which sets in train a process of reproduction on a progressively increasing scale. It was the accumulation of capital that Marx’s work was all about. One should not have to point out such elementary distinctions to someone whose work has been celebrated so generously in Historical Materialism.

Nor can we say that Marx has two different ‘narratives’, as Wood puts it, namely in his early and later works. That is an old misconception going back to the 1960s when ‘Early Marx’ was ‘discovered’. Marx is quite consistent in his analysis of capitalism. As in his later works, his statements in the Manifesto too speak of the separation of the producer from the means of production, that creates two antagonistic classes namely free labour and the capitalist owner of the means of production. With the rise of capitalism, he points out, society as a whole is split into two great classes directly facing each other: the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. It is no different in Marx’s other early work that Wood

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mentions, namely The German Ideology. There also he points out that ‘The bourgeoisie itself ¼ finally absorbs all earlier possessing classes (while it develops the majority of the earlier non-possessing classes, and a part of the earlier possessing class, into a new class, the proletariat). (Marx, 1960:48) These early works set out the same ideas that were developed as a central theme in Marx’s later works. Whatever Althusserian Marxism, or in this case Wood, might have to say, there is no epistemological break between the early and later Marx on this fundamental issue. There is a consistency in the development of this idea.

In searching, with Wood, for a ‘cause’ of the origin of capitalism, we run the risk of a positivist conception of ‘causes’ of social change. It would be far more profitable to look at the historical process of the rise of capitalism and the structural transformations that are inextricably linked with it. We can distinguish several strands of that wide-ranging historical process. As far as the impact of capital on agriculture is concerned, Wood fastens on only one of several aspects of capitalism and agriculture. She focuses on the work of Robert Brenner, where he looks at the development of capitalist farming, employing free labour and investment of capital. It is by no means clear that Brenner himself takes that development as the sole aspect of changes in agriculture, as Wood seems to present the case. Against that heavy focus on agriculture we need also to remind ourselves that it is in the rise of industrial capitalism that we find the main engine of capitalist development.

Changes in agriculture complemented that. These were of three kinds, of which the above-mentioned is one. In the context of the rise of industrial capitalism, in Britain and elsewhere, Marx himself emphasised rather more another aspect of change in agriculture. That was the enclosure movement that Wood brushes aside, carried away by her criticism of Anderson. Given the greater relative profitability of wool production at the time, peasants were thrown off the land which was converted to grazing to raise sheep. Enclosures brought about large-scale eviction of the peasantry from the land. That generated a vast reserve army of labour, the dispossessed farm workers. Thereby they became available for employment as industrial labourers in the rapid expansion of capitalist industrial production. The enclosure movement was therefore particularly significant because of its role in making available a large reserve army of labour.

We may at this point also take note of a third aspect of the impact of capital on peasant production, that happens to be little known in the English speaking world. It is the subsumption of small peasant production under capital without the separation of the producer from the means of production, which was a dominant feature of the continental rural landscape. That was analysed by Kautsky in his work ‘The Agrarian Question’. (Kautsky,1988). It is a very important work, which was highly praised by Lenin whereas its reactionary author, Kautsky himself, disowned it not long after its publication. (cf. ‘The Introduction’ to the English translation of Kautsky’s ‘The Agrarian Question’, Kautsky, 1988)

Modes of Production

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The concept of mode of production is central to Marxist analysis. But Marx does not offer a concise and precise definition of it. It is embedded in the analysis that he offers in Capital and he leaves it to us to extract it. In recent years several Marxists have dealt with the concept. We do not have the space here to review and comment on them. I will instead outline below the concepts of feudal and capitalist modes of production, as we might derive them from Marx’s Capital and, additionally, propose a concept of a Colonial Mode of Production that, I would suggest, is needed to capture the structural specificity of colonial capitalism. (Alavi: 1981). A mode of production, it must be emphasised, is determined simultaneously at several levels, as a complex unity. There is all too often a tendency to reduce the complex and dialectical unity of the concept of mode of production to a narrow definition of ‘relations of production’ that focuses on particular forms of relationships between the labouring direct producer, and the class that exploits his/her labour power. The concept of mode of production entails determinations as follows:

FMP CMP Col. MP

Unfree Labour, rendered not necessarily in the form of labour services but taking a variety of possible forms.

Free Labour, (1) ‘free’ from possession of means of production and also (2) juridically free, to sell labour power to the capitalist

- as in CMP -

Extra-economic coercion in the extraction of the surplus

Extraction of surplus value through the economic process of ‘free’ sale of labour power

- as in CMP -

Fusion of economic and political power at the point of production, in a localised structure of power. (The case of the ‘Absolutist State’ is discussed below).

Formal separation of economic and political power and the emergence of a bourgeois state and its laws.

The creation of a colonial state, as instrument of metropolitan capital.

Mainly self-sufficient village/ manorial economy supplemented by simple commodity circulation and

Generalised Commodity Production, with balanced production of capital goods (Dept. I) and consumer

Circuit of lopsided Generalised Commodity Production is completed via metropolis with production

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petty commodity production; portion of the surplus goes into trade. Feudalism is compatible with global commerce. But there is no Generalised Commodity Production and labour itself is not yet a commodity.

goods (Dept II), the two sectors bearing a relationship as discussed by Marx in Capital Vol. II. Labour power itself is a commodity, freely traded in the labour market.

of raw materials etc. for export; manufactured goods, including capital goods being mainly imported. No development of Dept I, i.e. capital goods production).

Simple Reproduction – the surplus is mainly consumed by the exploiting classes, so that the economy basically reproduces itself at the existing technological level

Extended Reproduction of capital, with the surplus contributing to capital accumulation and rising productivity.

Extended Reproduction of Capital is realised via the metropolis, colonial exploitation contributing to capital accumulation in the metropolis.

In the debate on ‘The Transition from Feudalism to Capitalism’, referred to above, we see a general failure to grasp the concept of ‘Mode of Production’ as a complex unity of determinations at the various levels as shown above. The debate began with Sweezy’s review of Dobb’s ‘Studies in the Development of Capitalism’ (Dobb, 1954). Dobb defines feudalism, but partially, as the ‘obligation laid on the producer by force and independently of his own volition, to fulfil certain economic demands of the overlord’. (Dobb, 1954: 35). He thereby emphasises the first three of our structural conditions as set out above. Sweezy, on the other hand, writes that under feudalism ‘markets are, for the most part local and that long distance trade, while not necessarily absent, plays no determining role in the purposes and methods of production. The crucial feature of feudalism is that it entails production for use.’ (Sweezy in Hill, 1971:35—emphasis in the original). Thus Sweezy emphasises, again one-sidedly and in a distorted way, the fourth structural condition of the feudal mode of production as we have outlined it above.

Under feudalism the direct producer (the peasant) is left with a bare subsistence share of commodities which he consumes. But some of the surplus extracted by the landlord finds its way to the market, to raise money to purchase a variety of (luxury) goods and services that he needs. Feudalism is therefore associated with a considerable amount of trade, contrary to the arguments of Wallerstein, and others who equate trade with capitalism. A telling argument against them is the rise of the so-called ‘Second Serfdom’ in Poland and Eastern Europe that was triggered off precisely by the rise of the Baltic grain trade that made it profitable for landlords to bring about legal enserfment of the peasantry in the course of the late 15th and early 16th centuries. Poland became the granary of Europe but on the economic foundations of feudalism.

Capitalism and Trade

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History does not come in neat bundles nor is it the case that a new mode of production eliminates the old one instantly as it appears on the scene. Typically, a new mode of production already begins to develop within a society in which an old mode of production is dominant. Two modes of production ‘coexist’, in mutual contradiction, for a time, until the forces associated with the new and rising mode of production complete the destruction of the old. That was Lenin’s conclusion as he analysed the ‘The Development of Capitalism in Russia. That process of interaction and struggle between class forces is obscured in what Wood describes as one of the two ‘narratives’ in Marx’s work which, she says, ‘is very much like the conventional model (?) where history is a succession of stages in the division of labour with a transhistorical (?) process of technological progress …’. (Wood, 1997:10). She adds, uncertainly, that ‘In fact capitalism already exists in feudalism, in a way.’ That is conceptual confusion. Capitalism does not exist within feudalism. It comes into existence in opposition to it. What we have is a situation in which nascent and developing capitalism is present in a social formation in which feudalism is dominant, the challenging forces of capitalism being antagonistic to the dominant forces of feudalism.

Much confusion derives from inability to locate trade in different modes of production. Feudalism does not rule out trade, even on a considerable scale. For those, like Wallerstein, who argue that the rise of commerce is a solvent of feudalism, there can be no better refutation than the example of the ‘Second Serfdom’ in Poland, as Engels called it. That came about at the beginning of the 16th century. The ‘Second Serfdom’ was triggered off by the rise of the Baltic grain trade. To take advantage of rising grain prices brought about by the great expansion in grain trade, the Polish nobility discontinued the system of cash rents. They decided to extract the surplus in the form of labour services so that they could take over the surplus in the form of produce and market it themselves. By the end of the 15th century and in the first two decades of the 16th century the Polish State promulgated a series of laws that legally enserfed the peasantry. They were thus subjected to the direct coercive power of the landlords. Far from dissolving feudalism the Baltic grain trade in effect gave rise to feudal social relations of production in Poland. There was no Absolutist State there for both the State, the peasantry and the merchant class were all weak as against the power of the nobles.

The rise of commerce does not therefore mean the dissolution of feudalism. Nor does the market define a mode of production. Trade is ancillary to modes of production, feudal or capitalist. Marx writes ‘No matter what the basis on which products are produced ¼ whether the basis of the primitive community, of slave production, of small peasant and petty bourgeois, or the capitalist basis, the character of products as commodities is not altered. ¼ Merchant’s capital promotes only the movement ¼ of these commodities, which are the preconditions of its own existence.’ (Marx, 1971: Capital Vol. III, 325) But Marx also adds that ‘The extent to which products enter trade and go through the merchants’ hands depends on the mode of production and reaches its maximum in the ultimate development of capitalist production.’ (loc. cit.)

The Absolutist State

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The idea that trade is virtually capitalism, has led to much confusion. Engels too, amongst others, was misled by that. He took the view that the ‘Absolutist State’ in England, under the Tudor Monarchy, represented some kind of a balance and ‘coexistence’ of contending modes of production. He confused the growth of long distance trade with the rise of capitalism. Engels’ explanation of the absolutist state begins with the proposition that the state ‘as a rule, is the state of the most powerful, economically dominant class, which, through the medium of the state, becomes also the politically dominant class.’ But, then he adds, ‘By way of exception, however, periods occur in which the warring classes balance each other so nearly that the state power, as ostensible mediator, acquires, for the moment, a certain degree of independence of both. Such was the absolute monarchy of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, which held the balance between the nobility and the class of burghers ¼ ’ (Marx and Engels, 1983: 328). Engels’ notion of holding a balance between antagonistic classes is unclear for there was no structural contradiction or antagonism between the feudal lords and the merchants in the sense that the development of the one is premised on the dissolution of the other. They were both located in the same (i.e. feudal) mode of production even if there were particular issues on which their needs differed. It might be helpful if we look more closely at what actually happened.

The Tudor ‘Absolute State’ in England was founded after the decisive victory of Henry VII at Bosworth Field in 1485, against the previously dominant feudal faction headed by King Richard III. Until that time, there was no centralised and institutionalised English state. Rival warring factions of feudal barons, with retinues of armed men, dominated the countryside. The king was the one who headed the dominant faction of rural magnates who backed him with their private armies. If the king’s faction lost he was beheaded and a rival contender to kingship was put in place. The landed magnates exercised arbitrary power over the lands that they controlled. One of the consequences of that was that internal trade was hazardous, at the mercy of their arbitrary demands as trade passed through territories they dominated. The success of Henry Tudor brought about a fundamental change in this by creating a centralised structure of power that enabled him to rise above all feudal factions so that he was not beholden to any one of them

This was at a time when there was a global expansion of commerce. The mercantile bourgeoisie was vastly enriched. It was also beset with problems. The existing political system did not provide the conditions that were needed for their full development. Internally, within England, they wanted conditions that would allow unimpeded flow of trade. Externally, they needed a powerful naval force and a merchant navy that would allow them to meet the challenges of their continental rivals. For the mercantile bourgeoisie it was imperative that a form of state power be established that would limit the power of feudal magnates to their local arenas. They also wanted the state to build up naval power needed for their predominance on the high seas. To achieve that they financed Henry Tudor and his full time professional army for which the ill-organised levies raised by the feudal magnates were no match.

The professional, permanent, army of Henry VII guaranteed his supremacy. After his decisive victory, he proceeded to disband the private armies of the Baronial aristocracy,

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the powerful local magnates. Stripped of their military power, the Barons were, however, given a compensatory niche in society and the state. They became courtiers who decorated the court in London and peddled influence. Until the establishment of the Tudor Absolutist State, for all practical purposes, the capital was where the king was at any particular time. Now London was to be the capital as it had never been before. Thomas Cromwell and Cardinal Wolsey played key roles in setting up a London based bureaucracy. The power of the baronial aristocracy was localised and subdued.

The ‘King’s Highway’, that linked all parts of England, was made sacrosanct. It was protected from arbitrary interference and exactions of the local lords. Trade was now safe and free from their depredations. England was now a unified national market. As for the ambitions of the commercial bourgeoisie with regard to overseas trade, large resources were invested in building Britain’s naval power until it stood supreme. In all these ways, the English commercial bourgeoisie greatly improved its position.

This was not yet a bourgeois revolution. The commercial bourgeoisie operated within the framework of a feudal mode of production. The social relations of production were not altered by the emergence of the Absolutist State. Trade, by itself, did not constitute a capitalist mode of production. The direct producer was still unfree and subject to the local sovereignties of the rural magnates. What had changed was that the power of the feudal lords was now confined mainly to the local arena. Landlords continued to exercise the power of life and death over the peasantry. As Justices of the Peace they sat in judgement over the locals. Their local power was even reinforced. As Christopher Hill pointed out, ‘when the government no longer feared the political power of the aristocracy, it enforced the peers’ social privileges with savage penalties.’ (Hill, 1971: 48). According to him ‘The 16th century offered great opportunities to landowners and farmers’ and that ‘there was a massive redistribution of income in favour of the landed class ¼ ’ (ibid. 65) Rural production was still based on unfree labour. The defining conditions of a feudal mode of production remained in place.

Commercial and landed magnates co-existed, each within their own domain of activity. The Absolutist State catered for both of these powerful classes. That was possible because their interests were not structurally antagonistic, in the sense that the development of the one was predicated on the dissolution of the other. That was not the case. Production was still based on unfree labour and, in the main, it was the surplus extracted by landlords that entered trade. Mercantilism was not yet capitalism.

The Colonial Dimension

The impact of capital on colonised societies did not generate, as Marx had expected, a capitalist mode of production there. But neither did that leave the pre-capitalist structures in the colonies unchanged. The structures of colonial social formations took a specific shape, as we shall see from the example of India. The resulting structure was neither the unchanged pre-colonial one nor was it identical with that of metropolitan capitalism. It is properly designated as, I have suggested, a colonial mode of production. (cf. Alavi 1980, Alavi 1982 and Alavi 1989 for more details.)

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The pillage and exploitation of the Americas and the West Indies, and that of Africa by virtue of the slave trade, and, not least, the discovery by Europeans of the sea route to India and the Far East, led to a very rapid growth in world trade by the sixteenth century. In this the crucial role of India and the Far East in generating the dynamics of British industrial capitalism and underpinning capital accumulation in Britain, is almost wholly overlooked. That role was vital. The multiplication of pre-capitalist long distance trade was the context in which Britain impacted on India and elsewhere. In that a key role was played by great monopolistic chartered trading corporations, that emerged in England in the 16th and 17th centuries, such as the Baltic Company, the Levant Company etc. The greatest of these was the East India Company, which was to conquer and rule over India. It received its Royal Charter in the year 1600.

India had a flourishing foreign trade, mainly in textiles, with the Far East, Africa and the Middle East through which it connected with Europe, long before the advent of the Europeans in India. That trade was mostly in fine cotton and silk textiles. It was carried in Indian as well as Arab ships—and camels and mules. Indian rulers welcomed the advent of European trading nations, notably the East India Company, which added greatly to that trade. Initially the relationship between them was that between equals. Mughal rulers and their local governors gave needed facilities to the Company to allow it to set up ‘factories’ for the conduct of its trade.

Europe’s discovery of the sea route to India at the end of the 15th century inaugurated a new era for India’s traditional exports of textiles. Ships could now carry vast quantities of goods to Europe far more cheaply than overland routes. Indian textile exports to Britain and Europe grew by leaps and bounds during the 17th and 18th century. That was a time of prosperity for India, though much of the new wealth passed into the hands of Indian ruling elites and contributed little either to capital accumulation or the general well being of the people. By the same token India’s manufacture (to distinguish it, as Marx did, from British machinofacture after the industrial revolution) in textile production, showed a remarkable vitality. It expanded rapidly to meet the phenomenal rise in export demand put upon it by sudden expansion of overseas trade with Europe.

In his classic work on the ‘History of the Cotton Manufactures in Great Britain’ Baines (1966— first published in 1835) makes the point that medieval Indian society had already developed manufacturing skills equal to the best that Europe had to offer at the time. The East India Company handled a mounting volume of Indian textile exports to Britain and Europe. In return, Europe had little to offer to India by way of exchange. Hence in spite of Mercantilist ideology that militated against the export of bullion, 75% of the Indian trade was paid for in gold and silver, which unfortunately had the effect of sterilising Indian gains from the trade, for bullion did not provide productive capital. India built glorious monuments like the Taj Mahal but did not embark on broad-based and cumulative economic growth.

It is important to recognise the global character of the colonial enterprise from the outset. The financing of Indo-European trade with gold and silver and precious stones was made possible by another colonial link of Europe namely the Iberian conquest and exploitation

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of Latin America that brought about a steady flow of precious metals into Europe. That pattern of exports to Europe of Indian manufactures against payment in precious metals was the reverse of the classical pattern of colonial trade, that was to be brought into being not until the second half of the 19th century. For the time being India was an exporter of fine textiles examples of which (such as fine Dacca muslin) are exhibited in the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. That was an age of growing trade and prosperity, even though Indian profits from the trade were to be frozen into grand monuments and the Indian custom to accumulate jewellery.

India and Britain: The First Phase

The first phase of the India’s relationship with Europe was one of mutual trade and prosperity. Until the East India Company began to establish a monopoly for itself in Indian trade, pushing out European rivals, notably the French, followed by conquest, that first phase from 1600 to 1757 was not really an unequal ‘colonial’ relationship. The East India Company had a large vested interest in promoting the export of cotton textiles and silks from India which soon began to militate against British industrial interests. Political agitation in Britain began to demand curtailment in the trading privileges of the East India Company and an end to imports of Indian textiles.

The Indian society of the 17th century, except for its military and especially naval weakness, was fully equal, in the arts of manufacture and agriculture and culture, to the Europeans at the time. Contrary to the stereotype of the medieval Indian society as a stagnant rural backwater we find evidence of a high degree of urbanisation. Habib speaks of ‘multitudes of artisans, peons and servants found in the towns … in 120 big cities and 3200 townships (in the second half of the 16th century)’ He adds that ‘Agra and Fatehpur Sikri (twin cities) were each held to be larger than London. Delhi was held to be as populous as Paris, then the biggest city in Europe’. (Habib,1963: 75-76 )

A high proportion of the Indian urban population was employed in industrial crafts. The manufacturing industry was geared not only to the luxury consumption of the aristocracy and the more modest needs of the population in general but also a rapidly growing volume of exports. Naqvi points out that since the 17th century there was a ‘wide growth of cities and towns as centres of cotton manufactures’. (Naqvi, 1968:142). Indian medieval society, far from being stagnant and inert, as depicted in Western academic stereotypes, was very responsive to the new stimulus of booming textile exports to Britain and Europe and also to China (to finance purchases by the British of Chinese silks). China did not produce cotton textiles which being absorbent, unlike linen, wool and silk, were greatly favoured. Despite the ingenuity of the Chinese in the arts of manufacture and the fact that cotton could easily be grown in China, Baines found it curious that it ‘should have remained without cotton manufactures until the end of the thirteenth century, when it had flourished among their Indian neighbours for probably three thousand years.’

The rapid export-led growth of Indian textile production was brought about by new weavers entering the trade rather than by changes in technology. New entrants needed

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funds for working capital and to buy the necessary equipment. A system of cash advances, called dadni loans, developed whereby prospective buyers of cloth would advance the money, in return for which, in a sellers market, the lender/buyer would pre-empt delivery of the finished goods from the weaver. Some scholars have mistakenly taken that system of dadni loans to be analogous to the English ‘putting out system’ which was a precursor of the industrial revolution in England. (e.g. Habib, 1969:67-68). Habib and other Indian scholars have argued that India was itself on the threshold of an industrial capitalist revolution that was thwarted by the impact of colonial rule. (cf. Bipan Chandra et. al., 1969 and Habib, 1969) That seems to be a mistaken view.

There is an important difference between the Indian system of dadni loans and the English putting out system. In the case of dadni loans, the weaver was given the loan by the prospective buyer of his product which thereby bound him to deliver the finished goods to that buyer. But, given the money, the weaver was left to his own devices to procure his raw materials and work on them. The buyer-moneylender, the dadni-merchant, did not handle the raw materials or equipment and was not involved in the process of production in any way. By contrast, in the ‘putting out system’ the entrepreneur took the raw materials round to the weavers, from door to door, and collected the finished cloth. He soon realised that instead of going from door to door, he could simplify his task by bringing all his weavers under one roof. That gave rise to the factory system which, in turn, led to mechanisation and a transition to the Industrial Revolution. That dynamic was absent given the financial organisation of production in India.

After its conquests in India, after 1757, the East India Company, operating through its agents called goomasthas, transformed the system of dadni loans in a manner that was designed to subordinate the weaver totally to the Company’s agents. Their object was to pre-empt the weaver’s services at low prices, as against other competitors, including other European operators who were thus elbowed out. The Company developed a practice of forcing advances on unwilling weavers. A historian writes that before domination by the Company ‘They (the weavers) used to manufacture their goods freely and without oppression, restrictions, limitations and prohibitions. There was no attempt to restrict their goods to the one market of the East India Company.’ (Sinha, 1961: 159). Then it all changed.

The Second Phase: Conquest, Plunder and Unrequited Exports

The second phase of India’s relationship with Britain and the East India Company, opened with the beginning of the conquest of India in 1757. The main interest of the East India Company was still to maximise the export of Indian textiles to Britain and Europe. To that was now added the direct extraction of surplus from the Indian countryside in the form of land revenue and other taxes and impositions. Conquest and plunder joined hands with trade. In the collection of land revenue, the paternalism of Indian feudalism was replaced with the unmitigated avarice and greed of the faceless officials of the Company.

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Taxes and Land Revenue became a major source of surplus extraction for the E.I. Company. Under the regime of the Company land revenue was collected with a rapacity and ruthlessness that was unprecedented. Initially the Company installed an Indian stooge as the Nawab of Bengal. Dutt writes that ‘When Mir Jafar was first made Nawab, after the battle of Plassey in 1757, the British officers and troops received (from him) a bonus of £1,238,575 out of which Clive himself had taken £31,500, besides a rich jagir in Bengal.’ R. C. Dutt lists the large sums that were extracted by the Company and its officials on each occasion when when successors to Mir Jaffer were appointed (in quick succession). He adds that ‘Besides these sums received in presents, amounting within eight years to £ 2,169, 665, further sums were claimed and obtained as restitution within this period, amounting to £3,770,883. (Dutt, 1956:32-33). These are astronomical sums which today would be counted in trillions.

After 1765 the East India Company removed its nominee the Nawab of Bengal and took over the government in its own hands. Now under the Company’s rule revenue impositions began to escalate regardless of the peasant’s ability to pay. ‘In the final year of the administration of the last Indian ruler of Bengal in 1764-5 the land revenue realised was £817,000. In the first year of the Company’s administration in 1765-6 the land revenue realised in Bengal was £1,818,000. When Lord Cornwallis fixed the Permanent Settlement in 1793, he fixed it at £3,400,000’. (R. Palme Dutt, 1970:106) Land Revenue was not only hugely increased. The inflexibility of the Company’s exactions contrasted with the customary flexibility under Indian feudal dispensation through good years and bad. The peasant was totally pauperised. The peasants being robbed of every penny had to part with all their customary reserves of food grains. Famines became endemic, the worst being the great Bengal famine of 1770. A Report of the Calcutta Council of the East India Company to its Directors in London said ‘Above one third of the inhabitants perished in the once plentiful province of Purneah and in other parts the misery is equal’. (quoted by Dutt, 1956: 51-2)

Once the East India Company acquired a large local source of funds in the form of land revenue, it was no longer necessary for Britain to pay for India’s textile exports in bullion and precious stones as it had so far done. It could now buy Indian textiles from the wealth that it extracted from Indians. Textiles for exports were bought from the huge amounts of land revenue that now accrued to the Company and its employees. It was now to be a one-sided flow of unrequited exports from India to Britain. It was to be spoken of by Indian nationalists as the ‘Economic Drain’ from India.

Given its new found power, there was a qualitative change in the basis on which the Company’s agents now dealt with the weavers, which was unrestrained. The erstwhile dadni merchants, who were independent money lenders cum traders, were now pushed out by goomasthas or agents of the East India Company who sought direct control over the weavers. As Bolt, a contemporary British business visitor, put it ‘the weavers were obliged to work ‘against their will at whatever prices are arbitrarily imposed on them.’ (quoted by R. C. Dutt, 1956:25-6) When the weavers resisted, a practice of direct physical coercion was introduced. ‘The Company’s servants assembled the principal weavers and placed guard over them until they entered into agreements to supply only the

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Company. When a weaver accepted an advance he seldom got out of his liability. A peon was placed over him (with a cane) to quicken his deliveries. … Whole weaving population of villages were thus held in subjection to the Company’s factories. … The control under which the weaver population was held was not only a matter of practice but it was legalised by Regulations.’ (Dutt, 1956: 264-5). Dutt, a liberal, said bitterly that this was a far cry from laissez faire!

The Third Phase: India and the Industrial Revolution

The East India Company had a major vested interest in the preservation and expansion of exports of Indian textiles. It obtained Indian textiles for resale in the Far East as well as Europe, where they fetched a profit of three times their cost. But there were rising pressures in England against that trade and for protection and promotion of the cotton textile industry in Britain.

It was not until the middle of the seventeenth century that a cotton textile industry emerged in England. It is generally held that it was the development of the Manchester textile industry that triggered off the Industrial Revolution in England. As Landes pointed out, the ‘threshold’ of the industrial revolution in England was first crossed in cotton manufacture’. (Landes, 1970:82) It is little realised that the prior destruction of the Indian cotton textile industry was a necessary pre-condition for progress of the British Industry. It is a myth that is universally believed by economic historians (Marx among them) that it was the mechanisation of English textile production that killed the Indian textile industry. That was not so. Active steps had to be taken by the British government to suppress the flourishing Indian textile industry. The East India Company had a large interest in the continuation of Indian textile exports that conflicted with those of the rising British bourgeoisie and, especially, the British textile interests. Under pressure from them, the Company’s profitable trading monopoly was ended in 1813 and in 1833 it was required to stop its commercial operations altogether. It then became exclusively an organ of colonial government.

Under pressure from British textile interests and despite ideological commitment to laissez faire, a 10% import duty was imposed in Britain in 1685, against Indian textiles. In 1690 that duty was doubled. In 1619 a law was passed that ‘absolutely prohibited the wear and use of Indian silks and calicoes, painted, stained or dyed in India, under the penalty of £5 for each offence on each wearer and of £20 on the seller’ (Krishna, 1924:263). By the time that the East India Company began its conquest of India, from 1757, the British import duty on Indian textiles went up by another 50%. When the Industrial Revolution got underway the cheapness of mechanised production was not yet enough to drive out Indian textiles which were of finer quality. More than half a century since the Industrial Revolution in Britain had got under way, the Indian textile industry, far from being crushed by British mechanised production, was still undiminished in its competitive power. To enable the British textile industry to survive, the protective duty against Indian textiles was raised once again in 1813 to a massive 85%.

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Historian H. H. Wilson wrote at the time that ‘It is also a melancholy instance of the wrong done to India by the country on which she has become dependent.’ Referring to the massive increases in protective duties against Indian textiles, he adds ‘Had not such prohibitory duties and decrees existed the mills of Paisley and Manchester would have been stopped in their outset and could scarcely have been set in motion even by the power of steam. They were created by the sacrifice of Indian manufacture. Had India been independent, she would have retaliated. …This act of self-defence was not permitted her.’ (Wilson:385) Such tear shedding was not unconnected with the interests of the East India Company in the Indian textile export trade which were hurt by British protectionism. James Mill (also an employee of the Company) declared that this ‘furnishes one of the most remarkable instances upon record of the power of interest to extinguish all sense of justice and even of shame’ (quoted by Dutt, 1956: 30)

India’s strength vis-a-vis Manchester seemed to lie mainly in its ability to produce fine yarn. Much effort was directed in Britain to improve spinning machinery. Crompton’s mule, developed in the 1780s, went some way to improve spinning technology. But as it yet could not match Indian quality. Indian textile industry was not easy to finish off. Contrary to the conventional wisdom (shared universally by Marxist and non-Marxist historians alike) that it was machine production in England that killed the Indian textile industry, we can identify three factors that combined to bring about its steady decline. All three related to the choking off of demand for Indian textiles. First of all, as pointed out above, Britain imposed heavy protective duties and administrative measures to keep Indian textiles out of the British market. The second factor, no less important, was that this coincided with the period of the Napoleonic Wars. The British imposed cordon sanitaire around Europe closed off the European market for Indian textiles entirely. Its importance can be gauged from the fact that in 1789 85% of the calicoes imported into Britain were re-exported to Europe and 60 % of muslins were re-exported. (Baines,1966:330) Simultaneously with the closing of the British and European markets, there was also a collapse in internal demand for textiles in India. In pre-colonial India, taxes collected from the peasant supported a large urban population, including the ruling elite. When, after the British conquest, these taxes were appropriated by the East Indian Company and used to pay for the export of Indian textiles, the Indian urban classes were suddenly dispossessed. There was a massive de-urbanisation. For example, according to Charles Trevelyan, the population of Dacca, the ‘Manchester of India’, dropped from 150,000 to 30,000.(quoted by Palme Dutt, 1970:120) The weavers were driven out of the towns, to seek a livelihood in villages. The Urban elite and middle classes, the consumers, were gone too. The internal demand for Indian textiles collapsed almost simultaneously with the closure of its outlets abroad.

Despite all this, the Indian handloom textile industry was surprisingly resilient. It took a long time to kill the Indian handloom textile industry. It is not until well into the 19th century that we see its decline. In 1815 the total value of of Indian cotton goods exported to Britain amounted to £1.3 million in value. As a result of British protectionism, by 1832, the best part of a century after the Industrial Revolution had begun in Britain, it fell to a mere £100,000. British cotton textile exports to India, on the other hand, were a mere £26,000 in value in 1815, several decades after the Industrial revolution had got under

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way. It was not until 1832 that the figure went up to £400,000 and by 1850 India was the market for one quarter of the total British textile exports to the world. (R.P. Dutt, 1970: 119) India began to import coarse textiles from England but continued to export fine textiles in return. Initially it was the Indian textiles that exceeded those received from England. The balance in the value of that trade did not equalise until 1830 when India finally became a net importer of textiles. The Indian handloom textile industry survived the early blows and its eventual decline was a post-1850 phenomenon. (Twomey, 1983:41)

India’s ‘Aid’ for the Industrial Revolution in Britain

In modern day terminology we can recognise British industrial development as an ‘import substitution’ development, but with one difference. The ‘import substitution’ strategy, was advocated for Third World industrial development in the 1950s by Raoul Prebish and the UN-ECLA. It proved to be a failure. Its main deficiency was that the strategy was restricted to light industries and not to production of capital goods. In Britain, on the other hand its ‘import substitution strategy’ during the Industrial Revolution, entailed a balanced and reciprocally stimulating development of both the consumer’s goods sector (Marx’s Dept II) and also the capital goods producing sector (Dept. I). It is that reciprocity and mutual stimulation and reinforcement that gave it a self-sustaining character. (cf. Marx, Capital Vol. II for a discussion of the dynamics of the relationship between Dept I and Dept II)

That dynamic growth of British industry was made possible by a large and sustained inflow of resources extracted from India and, indeed, colonised societies everywhere. In the mid-1960s, Eric Williams argued his thesis of a colonial ‘Triangular Trade’ that, he claimed, financed the Industrial Revolution in Britain. (Williams, 1975) He pointed out that Britain sold textiles to Africa and used the proceeds to capture slaves who were sold at great profit in the West Indies. With that money Britain brought sugar for Britain. He estimated the profits from that triangular trade to amount to £14,000 in 1739 increasing to £303,000 by 1759. That wealth, he argued, made the industrial revolution possible. Economic historians have treated the Williams’ thesis with derision. (e.g. Crouzet, 1972:7-8). They have, however, failed to see the real argument that underlies Williams’ thesis, for the flow of wealth into England was not limited to that arising from what Williams calls the Triangular Trade. There was a huge flow of resources into Britain from the colonial enterprise all over the world. If then we look at the figures of the flow of wealth from India alone, the argument no longer appears to be derisory.

In a paper that I wrote in 1979, I made a very conservative estimate of the annual net flow of resources from India to England, at the time of the Industrial Revolution, of about £2 million per year. (Alavi, 1980 and 1982) That figure compares with estimates made (e.g.) by Marshall of some £3 million before 1757 and an average of £5 million between 1757 and 1784. (Marshall, 1976: 256). Other estimates are equally large. We can compare these estimates of the annual flow of resources from India to Britain, during the critical period of the Industrial revolution, to estimates of annual industrial capital formation in Britain at the time. Crouzet, for example, estimates gross capital formation

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in the British economy at a grand total of £9.4 million in 1770 and £16 million in 1790-93. Of that grand total investment in machinery was £ 0.8 million in 1770 and £2 million in 1790-93 and additional investment in stocks were £ 1.5 million and £ 2 million respectively. (Crouzet 1972:33) If we compare these figures of the amount of resources that went into industrial capital formation in Britain, even my own much lower estimate of the flow of resources from India to Britain of £ 2 million annually is no longer derisory—and other, better informed, estimates are twice that figure. The flow of resources from India underpinned capital formation in British industry to a very large degree. To that we must add the tribute extracted by Britain from the rest of the colonial world. It can be said that indeed the bulk of capital formation in British industry during the Industrial revolution was paid for by the colonial tribute. The surplus arising in the colonies was accumulated not at home but in the metropolis.

Shaping of the Colonial Economy

It is noteworthy that it was not until the late 19th century that the relationship between India and Britain conformed to the classic colonial pattern of export of raw materials from the colony and imports of manufactured products. Indeed the initial trading activities of the East India Company, concentrating on export of Indian manufactured textiles, was virtually the reverse of the familiar colonial pattern. The classic pattern of the colonial economy, as we know it today, namely that of colonised India as an exporter of raw materials and importer of manufactured goods from England did not take shape until the second half of the 19th century. The American Civil War and the Manchester cotton famine that followed it, played a large part in that change. There was a new urgency in developing canal irrigation for cotton cultivation. Cropping patterns in agriculture were changed to suit the needs of the colonial economy. British capital began to be invested in India mainly in plantations and extractive industries, railways and harbours.

In the rural areas of India, the old pattern of Indian feudalism was replaced by a new system, with a class of landed magnates who were made subordinate to the colonial regime and became also its principal allies in India. Space does not permit us to examine the process by which the colonial regime transformed the structure of the rural society in India, beginning with the ‘Permanent Settlement’ imposed by Lord Cornwallis in 1793 in Bengal. The main impact of that and successive changes was the elimination of the petty sovereignties of chieftains and zamindars or landlords. Indeed, one might say that landlords were turned into landowners. The localised structure of power which is characteristic of feudalism was dissolved, The power of landowners was subsumed under the colonial state into which they were integrated. The resultant structure of the rural society had features that were specific to it. However, the local power of landowners, though subordinate to the colonial state was, to a degree, reinforced and integrated into the power structure of the colonial state. It was a conscious and express policy of the colonial regime to take the landlord class as its principal local allies. It was that ‘alliance’ between the colonial state and the Indian landlord class that made possible the sustained colonial rule and exploitation of India, which in turn underpinned the development in the metropolis itself. A colonial mode of production was established in India.

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Reference Cited

Alavi, Hamza 1980 ‘India: Transition from Feudalism to Colonial Capitalism’ in Journal of Contemporary Asia, Vol. 10, No. 4, 1980,

Alavi, Hamza 1981 ‘Structure of Colonial Social Formations’ in Economic and Political Weekly, XVI-10-12, (Annual Number) 1981

Alavi, Hamza, Doug McEachern et al

1982 ‘India, the Transition to Colonial Capitalism’ (reprint of Alavi 1980) in Hamza Alavi, Doug. McEachern et al ‘Capitalism and Colonial Production’ London, 1982

Alavi, Hamza 1989 ‘Formation of the Social Structure of South Asia Under the Impact of Colonialism’ in Hamza Alavi and John Harriss (eds) Sociology of Developing Societies — SOUTH ASIA’, London and New York

Baines, Edward 1966 History of the Cotton Manufactures in Britain (1835)

Chandra, Bipan et.al. 1969 The Indian Economy in the 19th Century — A Symposium, Indian Economic and Social History Association, Delhi

Crouzet, F. 1972 Capital Formation in the Industrial Revolution, London

Deane, Phyllis 1965 The First Industrial Revolution, London

Deane, Phyllis and Cole 1967 British Economic Growth — 1688—1959, London

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Dobb, Maurice 1954 Studies in the Development of Capitalism, London

Dutt, Romesh C. 1956 The Economic History of India, Vol. I – Under Early British Rule, London

Dutt, Rajani Palme 1970 India Today, Calcutta

Habib, Irfan 1963 The Agrarian System of Mughal India, London

Habib, Irfan 1969 ‘Potentialities of Capitalist Development in Mughal India’ in Journal of Economic History, XXIX

Hill, Christopher 1971 Reformation to Industrial Revolution, Harmondsworth

Hilton, Rodney 1976 The Transition from Feudalism to Capitalism, London

Kautsky, Karl 1988 The Agrarian Question, Zwan Publications, London

Krishna, Bal 1924 Commercial Relations Between India and England, 1601-1757, London

Lenin, V.I. 1956 The Development of Capitalism in Russia, FLPH, Moscow

Marshall, P.J. 1976 East India Fortunes, London

Marx, Karl 1960 The German Ideology, New York,

Marx, Karl 1969 Theories of Surplus Value, Vol. I, London

Marx, Karl 1971 Capital, Vol. III, Moscow

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Marx, Karl, 1976 Capital, Vol. I, Penguin Books, Harmondsworth

Marx, Karl and Engels, F.

1983 Selected Works (in three volumes), Volume III, Moscow

Naqvi, Hameeda 1968 Urban Centres and Industries in Upper India 1556-1803

Sinha, N. K. 1961 The Economic History of Bengal, vol. I, Calcutta

Twomey, M.J. 1883 ‘Employment in Nineteenth Century Indian Textiles’ in Explorations in Economic History, Vol. 20

Wallerstein, Immanuel 1974 ‘Rise and Future Demise of the World Capitalist System’ Comparative Studies in Society and History, 16: 4, 1974

Williams, Eric 1975 Capitalism and Slavery , London

Wilson, H. H. -- History of British India, Vol. I

Wood, Ellen Meiksins 1997 ’The Non-History of Capitalism’ in Historical Materialism, No. 1,

Copyright and Translation Rights Reserved by Hamza Alavi – 14 Feb 2002 For publication in: MIDDLE EAST REPORT -- March 2002 - – WWW.merip.org

Pakistan, Afghanistan and Indiaby

Hamza Alavi

Pakistan has been passing through extremely difficult times. It was bullied into supporting America’s Afghan war, which was costly for it. That was followed by a dangerous military confrontation with India, threatening a war that neither side wants. South Asians, who are committed to values of secular democracy, are faced with a paradox. A military ruler in Pakistan has declared a war against Islamic fundamentalism

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and is, apparently, pursuing secular values. By contrast, the once proudly secular India has been taken over by extreme Hindu fundamentalists. It was through the ballot box that they were brought into power. They have threatened war against Pakistan. Secularism and democracy are at odds with each other.

Pakistan and Afghanistan

Islamic fundamentalism was fostered in the country in the 1980s by Pakistan’s military dictator, General Zia-ul Haq, who was recruited by Reagan to work with the CIA to mobilise Afghan warlords to fight the Russians in the name of Islamic jihad. A jihadi culture was actively promoted in Pakistan and Afghanistan with the help of US and Saudi money. Islamic jihadi groups, in both counties, were armed with sophisticated weapons (including e.g. Stinger SAM missiles) and trained by the CIA. US and Pakistan backed Afghan warlords, who had helped to drive the Soviets out of Afghanistan, now began to tear that country apart. Against that background the Afghan Taliban were helped into power by their Pakistani and US patrons.

Oil, Afghanistan and the Taliban

The interests of UNOCAL, a US oil company, have been at the heart of America’s Afghan policy. UNOCAL wants to lay oil and gas pipelines from Central Asia through Afghanistan to the Pakistan coast, by-passing Iran. But warlord-dominated Afghanistan was too insecure for it to proceed with its huge investments. Pakistan’s Benazir Bhutto government was mobilised to take matters in hand. In 1994 Pakistan helped to organise the Taliban’s rise to power. The US government too supported the Taliban, who had made much of their dislike of Iran and their determination to cut down poppy and drug production which had flourished under the warlords. Once the Taliban were installed in power, the US was happy to leave matters in the hands of Pakistan and UNOCAL, and it adopted a policy of masterly inactivity.

By late 1997 world opinion was outraged by news of the extremely oppressive policies of the Taliban, especially with regard to women. US feminist groups mounted pressure against both UNOCAL and the Clinton administration, demanding a change in policy towards the Taliban. The women’s vote was crucial for Bill Clinton in the 1996 elections and he could not ignore women’s groups. The Taliban invited reprisals from the US also for providing a base for Bin Laden, who had declared war against the US and the Saudis and was held responsible for the bombing of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in August 1998. Ironically, it took the petty Monica Lewinsky affair, when Clinton needed a dramatic alternative focus for public attention, to precipitate a hurried, ill-planned and ineffective cruise missile attack on Afghan territory in August 1998, launched from American warships in the Persian Gulf. At that point UNOCAL felt that it had to pull out of Afghanistan, at least formally and for the time being.

UNOCAL and the US continued ‘backroom contacts’ with the Taliban. Three years later the Americans revisited the scene. Top secret contacts between the Bush administration and the Taliban, in February 2001, were reported by two retired French Intelligence

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Officers (Daily Telegraph, London, November, 20, 2001) who wrote that ‘The Bush Administration was ‘willing to accept the Taliban regime despite charges of sponsoring terrorism’. The US, they reported, considered the Taliban as a ‘source of stability in Central Asia’. But, given the notorious intransigence of the Taliban, the talks did not proceed smoothly. Bush warned the Taliban: ‘Either you accept our offer of a carpet of gold or we bury you under a carpet of bombs!’ He kept his promise.

The terrible and outrageous attacks of September Eleven, finally provided the Americans with an opportunity to get rid of the Taliban and install in their place a new government with whom they hoped they could do business. It appears, however, that the transitional government that was cobbled together at Bonn, made up of hostile rival warlords who came together temporarily under Karzai, himself a weak US nominee, is unlikely to offer a basis for the stable future that the US and UNOCAL are looking for in the new Afghanistan. Warlords are already back in action in the countryside, defiant of the central authority.

Secularism vs. Islamic Fundamentalism in Pakistan

There was little of Islamic fundamentalism in Pakistan until the regime of the military dictator General Zia, who, with Saudi and CIA help, set about promoting Islamic fundamentalism with fanatic zeal. A chain of Deeni Madaris (religious schools) soon proliferated throughout Pakistan. Given generous funding, the madaris recruited sons of pauperised peasants offering them free board and lodging and ‘religious education’. Their ‘education’ was designed to turn them into religious zealots. Some madaris also gave military training to their pupils, providing foot-soldiers for the Afghan Taliban, as well as for militant jihadi groups in Pakistan. The brainwashed minds of the pupils (taliban) of the madaris were filled with utopian dreams about an ‘Islamic’ society that they would create, in which there will be plenty and no one will be left in want. They were highly motivated to fight for their beliefs. Most leaders of the Afghan Taliban were products of Pakistani (Deobandi i.e. Wahhabi) deeni madaris. They kept close links with their Pakistani mentors, notably the leaders of the two factions of the Pakistani Jamiat-e-Ulama-e-Islam.

More than 70 percent of the larger deeni madaris (with more than 40 pupils) belonged to the puritanical ‘Deobandi’ (Wahhabi) tradition. The Saudis funded them generously to foster anti-Shi’a and anti-Irani ideology. The Iranians responded in kind. But the number of Shi’a madaris numbered less than 4 per cent. The deeni madaris provided recruits for extremist sectarian groups of which most were heavily armed. Pakistan soon became an arena in which Middle Eastern ‘Muslim’ powers played out their rivalry by proxy. Sectarian violence reached a scale that Pakistan had never known before. The fabric of Pakistan’s civil society was being torn apart.

Religious leaders acquired new ambitions. They began to assert that Pakistan was created to establish an Islamic state and it was they, therefore, who had the right to run the state of Pakistan. Post-Zia civilian governments (alternatively under the Pakistan Peoples Party and the Muslim League) continued to promote fundamentalist Islamic ideology, through

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schools (textbooks being rewritten), Universities and the media. Most Pakistanis soon came to believe that it must be true that Pakistan was created to establish an Islamic state. The fact, however, is that the Pakistan movement had secular foundations. The All India Muslim League was not a religious movement at all. It was a party of Western educated professionals and the ‘salariat’ i.e. those who aspired to get government jobs. They successfully resisted attempts by mullahs to gain influence in their Party.

Jinnah, the founding father of Pakistan, spelt out the secular creed of the Pakistan movement, and his vision of the new state in his inaugural address to Pakistan’s Constituent Assembly. Speaking against the background of the long history of Hindu-Muslim conflict in India before independence, he said that in Pakistan ‘Hindus will cease to be Hindus and Muslims will cease to be Muslims, not in the religious sense, for that is the personal faith of each individual, but in the political sense, as citizens of the State’. Pakistan was to be a secular state. It was not until the 1980s, under the regime of General Zia-ul Haq, that an extreme form of ‘Islamic’ ideology was espoused and propagated by the state and ‘secularism’ was equated with apostasy.

Musharraf’s ‘Secularism’ ?

Armed jihadi groups who were patronised by the ‘democratic’ regime of Nawaz Shareef, dominated Pakistan’s civil society, when the 1998 army coup that brought General Musharraf into power, took place. Thanks to policies of General Zia, Islamic ideology permeated some sections of the army too. However, the dominant ideology in the army is a legacy from British colonial rule. The colonial rulers promoted an ideology of professionalism among Indian officers of the British Indian army, to insulate them from the appeal of nationalist movements. That ideology entailed a belief in the moral superiority of the ‘professional’ army officer over ‘self-seeking politicians’ who exploited the illiterate masses. That ideology included a notion of ‘military honour’ and loyalty to one’s regiment. The ideology of professionalism, with its contempt for politicians, has remained the dominant ideology of the Pakistan military officers corps. This was only partly changed when Gen. Zia made a big effort to promote Islamic ideology instead. The ‘professionals’, however, remained dominant.

In 1995 an army coup, to dislodge the professionals, was attempted by Islamic ideological fanatics, led by one Major General Abbasi. Their aim was to Islamise the army and Pakistan. The coup attempt failed. But it was a major shock to the professionals. That failed coup ‘reinforce[d] the senior commanders’ concern with professional development’ (S. Cohen, ‘The Pakistan Army’, 1998, p. 171) In the aftermath of that coup attempt many Islamist officers were weeded out. But many, especially in senior positions, still remained. Musharraf and the ‘professionals’ were faced with difficulty in contending with powerful Generals who are committed to Islamic ideology.

In opposing religious fundamentalist tendencies in the army and society, Musharraf has invoked the secular values of Jinnah. But Musharraf himself does not appear to be driven by any ideology. He is a ‘professional’, a pragmatic and flexible man, who believes in the

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armed forces, as the sole repository of legitimate force in society and, indeed, the custodian of the nation. As a pragmatic man, he has had no difficulty in abandoning one policy, supporting another, if that promises to be more profitable. It was easy for a pragmatist to turn around and climb the bandwagon of Bush’s war against terrorism. His earlier support for the Taliban, let it be said, was not on grounds of Islamic ideology. The fact is that the capture of Kabul by the Taliban, which in effect was a victory for Pakistan forces behind them, was the first ever victory of the Pakistan army in the field. Musharraf’s took pride, as a professional, in that victory. But soon it was clear to him that the Afghan Taliban was the wrong horse to back and he quickly and easily made the switch to back the War Against Terrorism.

Soon after taking power Musharraf indicated the direction in which he wanted to go, by declaring that Kemal Atatürk, the great ‘Muslim’ secular soldier, was his personal hero! He made an unsuccessful move to modify Pakistan’s notorious blasphemy law, a legacy from Gen. Zia, which was being misused to persecute innocent people, especially Christians. That move was a challenge to Islamists still in the army. There was a loud and angry outcry. If that had been merely an outcry from the public, Musharraf might not have cared. But resistance from within the army was another matter. The ‘professionals’ had not yet consolidated their influence in the army, which Musharraf was later able to do. Meanwhile, he had to retreat. Although he is now quite firmly in power, it speaks much for the still lingering ideological influence from the Zia days, that Musharraf has thought fit to declare that he will not make any attempt to repeal or modify any of the unjust and oppressive laws that were promulgated by Gen. Zia, in the name of ‘Islam’ which are still in force. It will take a long time to obliterate the Zia legacy of Islamic fundamentalism from the minds of the Pakistani public and, especially, the army.

The power of heavily armed jihadi groups was a matter of great concern to the ‘professionals’ in the military establishment for reasons other than that of Islamic ideology. The heavily armed Islamist groups were rival nodes of power vis-à-vis the army. This was anathema for the professionals like Musharraf. This was an issue of a challenge to the army’s monopoly of legitimate force in society. Jihadi groups, with their highly sophisticated weapons were a threat to the army itself.

In the summer of 2001 armed Islamist groups went on a sectarian killing spree throughout the country. There were targeted killings of Shi’a professionals, doctors (68 in Karachi alone), engineers, civil servants and teachers. It was not only the Shi’a who were killed. The Chief of the relatively moderate Sunni Tehrik in Karachi was killed by rival Deobandis (Wahhabis). Shi’a groups also retaliated, killing Sunnis. Iranian diplomats were assassinated by the Wahhabis. The victims of killings by religious zealots numbered hundreds. Government officials, including some senior police officers were among those killed. Judges were unwilling to try cases of sectarian killings (as well as blasphemy cases) out of fear. One senior judge was assassinated in his office by gunmen because he had found a sectarian killer guilty of murder.

It was alleged (cf. Newsline June 2001) that intelligence agencies were involved in the sectarian murders. Support for sectarian killers from within the state machinery was a

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challenge to the army professionals. This was a major contradiction at the heart of state power. Musharraf and his team were in contention with those who sympathised with the religious extremists. That contradiction had another dimension too. Although the professionals were in charge at the centre, religious ideologists were able to manipulate the corrupt and inefficient state apparatus in the localities where it mattered. Many activists of religious extremist groups were common criminals who had close ties with local police and military officers. (Newsline, September 2001). The writ of the state ran very thin. The professionals had a difficult task ahead of them.

Soon Musharraf began to regain the initiative. The universal horror at the killings gave him an opening. He convened a meeting of the Ulama (at a ‘National Seerat Conference’) in June 2001, and roundly condemned them for their narrow and dogmatic conception of Islam. He asked them if Islam was about sectarian killings ! He warned them that they were not above the law. It was a hard hitting speech. He could not have said as much a year earlier. He was now more confident. That warning to religious leaders was followed by the banning (on 14th August) of two of the most notorious sectarian terrorist groups, the Sunni Lashkar-e-Jhanghvi and the Shi’a Sipah-e-Muhammad. But it was only after Bush declared his global ‘War on Terrorism’, that Musharraf knew that he could now depend upon the US to back him (for until then the US had been hostile to him), He was therefore able to deal decisively with the army officers who were involved with or supported religious zealots.

Many in Pakistan believe that Musharraf began to act against religious extremist groups only at the behest of Americans, after Bush had declared war on terrorism. That is manifestly not the case. Musharraf’s crackdown on armed religious extremist groups began not after September Eleven but well before that. However, we must also recognise that he was able to act decisively against Islamists in the army only after September, when he could count on US backing for his moves against the fundamentalists. In the new situation, with American backing, Musharraf was able to remove or sideline powerful Generals who had ‘Islamist’ leanings or involvement. To give one example, amongst the several senior Generals who were compulsorily retired, was the very ambitious and powerful Lt. Gen. Mahmud Ahmad, Director General of the notorious ISI. His grip on power is illustrated by the fact that in the year 2000 Mahmud was able to prevent Musharraf’s projected visit to Afghanistan where he had intended to persuade Mullah Omar to yield on the Osama bin Laden issue. Instead of that, Mahmud chose to go himself and gave the green light to the Afghan Taliban, instead of exerting pressure on them.

In opposition to the fundamentalists’ slogan of Islamic jihad (e.g. in Kashmir or Afghanistan) Musharraf has raised the counter slogan of ‘Pakistan First’. That has caught on. To justify disarming or banning armed religious fundamentalist groups he has declared that the ‘Writ of the State Must be Restored’. By that he has clearly meant the writ of the army. For the time being the professionals have got the upper hand. But main job has yet to begin. The effects of ideological conditioning spanning over two decades, both within the army and in civil society cannot be erased overnight. Moreover, it is not just a question of personal beliefs. Thanks to the legacy of Gen. Zia, fundamentalist

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Islamists are well entrenched in the bureaucracy, the judiciary and the educational system, at all levels. Clearing the system of such well entrenched elements is a major problem that has not yet been even addressed.

The problem is not only one of personnel and their beliefs. There is an even more urgent problem of doing away with Shariat Courts, that were created by Gen. Zia, to enforce ideologically informed laws, rules and policies, pandering to extremely narrow fundamentalist interpretations of Islam. Judges of Shariat Courts have virtually legislative powers, in the name of Islam, but they are answerable to no one. For example one of the decisions of the Shariat Bench of the Supreme Court which has banned interest in all its formers. If implemented that would bring the economy to a standstill. All that the government has found courage to do is to buy time instead of putting an end to such lunacy. What the Government needs to do is to abolish the Shariat Courts, which are undemocratic. They encroach on the powers of democratic legislatures. All such issues have yet to be properly debated and the government has yet to take a firm and principled stand on this.

 

The main job of re-education and, one would add, institutional restructuring, has yet to get underway. Lt. Gen. (rtd.) Talat Masood (Dawn, January 26) reflected concerns about it amongst the professionals of the military when he pointed out that ideological ‘reforming and recasting will not be easy. … and is likely to be met with resistance from disaffected groups, even from some elements within the establishment (meaning the army H.A.) itself.’ Instead of boldly moving forward, Musharraf has already started backtracking. We find new words in his vocabulary such as ‘ultra-liberals’ to whom he will not give way. After their recent set-backs, this must come as music to the ears of Islamic fundamentalists.

A cultural revolution is called for. Musharraf has said that he wants to transform Pakistan into a ‘modern, moderate Muslim state’. If Musharraf and the military believe that a progressive and vibrant society can be created purely by orders from above, they will be sadly mistaken. What is needed is free and open public debate and freedom of speech and expression that might allow creative and courageous thought to flourish. For over half a century, since independence, a culture of conformity and censorship has been enforced. Old habits die had. There is an ingrained fear of new ideas, not least among those who rule over the academic world and the media and the police (vis-à-vis public meetings). The most determined opponents of any break from what they (rightly or wrongly) believe to be the officially approved dogma of the day, are the petty tyrants who preside over our universities. They are not people who will encourage and promote new and challenging ideas. What Pakistan needs is an intellectual environment that will breed new and creative thought. There are already some signs of this. But we have a long way to go. Moreover, this will not flourish in a political vacuum. Nor will it be painless, achieved without a struggle.

Kashmir

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The Kashmir issue has been the main obstacle in the way of better relations between Pakistan and India. It is time that both countries recognised that the future of Kashmir is for the Kashmiris to decide. Since the beginning of the Kashmir intafada in 1989 there has been a growing realisation of that in Pakistan. People of Pakistan support the cause of self-determination of the Kashmiris very passionately. No Pakistani government can abandon that cause. Musharraf too has affirmed that commitment, while condemning the way in which jihadi groups have gone about their activities in Kashmir. He has made a distinction between ‘terrorism’ and national liberation struggles against an occupying power, justifying and supporting the struggle of the Kashmiri people. But at the same time, he has categorically rejected any role for Pakistan based jihadi groups in Kashmir. In 1989, when the Kashmiri intifada began, the then army chief, General Aslam Beg set up the ISI’s Kashmir Cell which controlled and co-ordinated the activities of jihadi groups. Musharraf has closed it down. In criticising the role of Pakistan based jihadi groups in Kashmir, he has said that they were trying to impose their own Taliban version of extremist Islam on the Kashmiris, which was alienating them. Secondly, he has accepted, realistically, that there is no military solution for the Kashmir issue. It has to be a political struggle. What Pakistan must do, he says, is to give all political and diplomatic support to the struggle for self-determination of the Kashmiri people and to try and secure international mediation and enforcement of UN resolutions on Kashmir. A. G. Bhatt, Chairman of the APHC, the 23 member All Parties Hurriyat Conference of Kashmir, has welcomed that declaration, saying that the time had come for the political process to take over.

India’s Threat of War

By mid-December 2002, Pakistan was faced with India’s threat of war, as a response to a jihadi terrorist attack on the Indian Parliament on December 13. The Indians instantly blamed Pakistan’s ISI and two Pakistani jihadi groups, namely Jaish-e-Muhammad and Lashkar-e-Taiba for the attack. As it happens, not long after that leaders and activists of these two jihadi groups were arrested in Pakistan. It was (unconvincingly) claimed that this was unconnected with the New Delhi attack. That attack is the last thing that the Musharraf government could have wanted. Pakistan had nothing to gain and much to lose by staging such a drama.

The scale of Indian troop mobilisation at the Pakistan border has been unprecedented. Washington Times (January 14) quoted US Intelligence sources saying that ’90 per cent of India’s military forces is now deployed (vis-à-vis Pakistan).’ India has a far bigger and better equipped army and much larger nuclear capacity than Pakistan. Its economy is much larger and stronger than that of the virtually bankrupt Pakistan. A war between the two nuclear South Asian countries would be a most terrible disaster all round. Pakistan has few illusions about the ultimate outcome of such a conflict. Musharraf has been appealing for talks and for the return of troops on both side of the border to peacetime positions. Analysts have stressed that a war would not be a walk-over for India either. Whatever may the final outcome be, the Pakistan army has a capacity to inflict heavy and unacceptable damage in return. The last thing that either India or Pakistan should want is a war, whose repercussions for both countries would be devastating. For this writer, who

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has spent the best part of his life promoting friendship between India and Pakistan, the way in which the present Hindu religious extremist BJP government of India has dismissed every approach made by the Musharraf government (and by an anxious US) for a peaceful settlement, is extremely sad – and very worrying.

Immediately after the jihadi attack on the Indian Parliament, Musharraf condemned it unreservedly. He offered to the Indian Government that Pakistan would be willing to take part in joint investigations to identify the culprits and bring them to book. That offer was turned down by India. Pakistan then asked the Indians, at least, to provide it with evidence that might enable it to act against those who were involved. That offer too was dismissed. Instead, the Indian government demanded that about 20 persons whom it named in a list (consisting largely of Indian nationals) should be deported to India. Musharraf said that Pakistan had not given asylum to any Indian subjects. As for any Pakistanis in the list, no Pakistani national would be handed over to another country. If action against any one was called for, that would be done in Pakistan, under law.

India should feel reassured by the measures taken by the Musharraf government against Pakistan based jihadi groups, some of whom were active in Kashmir. Musharraf spelt out in detail, his government’s policy about religious fundamentalist and jihadi groups, in a keynote speech of January 12. Five Islamist and jihadi groups were banned. There were large scale arrests of religious fundamentalist leaders and activists, which were estimated at the time to number more than 2000. Arms of all jihadi groups were ordered to be confiscated. That policy was generously acclaimed by leaders of India’s main opposition party, the Congress Party and its two Communist Parties. But the response from the ruling BJP party, predictably, was cool, once again repeating the overworked mantra that they wanted ‘action, not words’. It took a three day visit of the US Secretary of State, Colin Powell who tried to persuade the Indians to ‘get real’ and soften their line. At a joint press conference with him, India’s Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh expressed his appreciation of Musharraf’s January 12 speech and said that India was ready to cooperate with Pakistan in the fight against terrorism. But the very next day Interior Minister Advani was back in form. While acknowledging that Musharraf’s speech was important, he repeated that ‘Mere speech is not enough’. Indian troops would not withdraw until Pakistan handed over to India those whom he had named.

For his part Musharraf, referring to his own far reaching actions against religious extremist groups, declared that ‘We will not allow anyone to sit on judgment (on us) … Whatever measures we are taking for eliminating terrorism and religious extremism are aimed at reforming our own society and not to appease anyone’. He was also conciliatory. ‘We need patience’, he said, ‘You have to realise that they are a 20 party alliance and often speak with different voices. It takes them time to arrive at an agreed position.’ He speculated, however, that the military confrontation might not end until after the February elections. But, he added, ‘There will be no war’.

The present confrontation between India and Pakistan has occurred in very different conditions from the past. In recent years, extremist ideology has overtaken India’s once proud secularism. A fundamentalist Hindutva ideology, which is both anti-Christian as

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well as anti-Muslim, has gripped that country. Atrocities have been committed against both those minorities by fanatics, with impunity. Many in Pakistan feel that the Indian Prime Minister, Vajpayee, is not himself a war-monger. But he is under great pressure from his senior colleagues, especially Lal Krishna Advani, the extreme Hindu fundamentalist Minister of Interior, and George Fernandes, the ultra chauvinistic Minister of Defence. There is also much political pressure from Hindu fundamentalists in the country to ‘teach Pakistan a lesson’. It is being suggested that Advani has adopted an ultra hard-line position because he is making a bid to succeed the aging and ailing Prime Minister Vajpayee. If that is his ambition, he should know that given his extreme fundamentalist views, he unlikely to be able to hold together a fractious alliance of 20 parties.

The hard line of India’s ruling BJP in the current military standoff with Pakistan, is being attributed to the forthcoming elections (due in late February) in UP, India’s largest state. It is said that its results may decide the future of the ruling BJP party not only in that state but also in the country. Small wonder then that the government has pulled out all stops, including the dangerous military confrontation with Pakistan. But, over and above local and transitory factors, there is one new long term factor that is shaping India’s global policies. That is its ambition to be recognised as a world power. As the largest economic and military regional power, India now has ambitions to extend further its power and influence in Asia, especially in the Middle East (for which it is promoting a new alliance with Israel !) and South East Asia. It has made a bid for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council, for which Bush and Britain’s Blair have announced their support. America too wants India to play a key role in its strategy for the Middle East and South East Asia and, not least, its policy to contain China.

In pursuit of its global ambitions India has been developing close ties with Israel, especially in the field of military cooperation. Israel is to provide highly sophisticated military technology to India. In pursuit of these new ties, in November 2001 alone, three official Israeli delegations visited India, namely a Parliamentary delegation, a Ministry of Foreign Affairs delegation and, crucially, a high level Ministry of Defence delegation. These were followed by a three day visit in January of Shimon Peres, the Israeli foreign minister, to New Delhi. Israel is to provide state of the art weapon systems and military technology to India. That includes the supply to India of the Phalcon airborne early warning system, which in the past the US had refused to allow Israel to supply to third countries. India already has a massive military superiority over all its neighbours. That raises the question what such huge investment in highly sophisticated military technology is for. The declaration by Defence Minister George Fernandes, at the time of India’s nuclear test in May 1998, may be a clue. He said that India’s nuclear bombs and delivery systems are intended for deployment against China !

Military and Democracy in Pakistan

In Pakistan the military has exercised power, de facto, even when civilian governments have been in office. Successive ‘democratic’ leaders have depended on the army’s support and approval to stay in office. The military has had a pervasive influence on the

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shaping of state policies. That was in effect acknowledged by Lt. General (rtd.) Talat Masood who has spoken of a ‘monumental failure of our past domestic and foreign policies in which, ironically, the military has had a crucial role to play.’ (DAWN, Jan 26, 2002). The army’s unshakeable grip over power was revealed when (the ultra right wing) Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif made a bid to end the autonomy of the army by attempting to dismiss Musharraf and putting his own nominee in his place. He was promptly removed by the coup, which was an institutional coup by the army to preserve its autonomy. Nawaz Shareef was much favoured by the US. That did not save him from being ousted. The US, angrily led international pressures on Pakistan to restore democracy. That Musharraf and the army has to promise to do.

The Supreme Court of Pakistan, which had initially legitimated Musharraf’s coup has, following extension of its first deadline, now laid down that the army should restore parliamentary government by October 2002. Musharraf has agreed to do so. It is too early at the moment of writing, to see in what precise form that will be done. The fact that Musharraf has appointed himself President of Pakistan (for ‘at least five years’) is not a good beginning. The constitution too has to be reinstated but we do not know in what shape will that be done.

Elections have been promised, though the army has unconcealed contempt for politicians. Religious parties will not be a threat, for they will be nowhere in the picture. In the past they have not been able to take more that 2 per cent of the vote and they are unlikely to do better. The two main political parties will not present much of a challenge either. The Muslim League has been successfully fragmented and its rival, the Pakistan People’s Party, is demoralised with its leader in exile. There is a political vacuum in the country. There are few signs that it will be filled soon. One of Musharraf’s Ministers has given up his Ministerial post to set up a new political party. Indications are that the new system will have two components, one of them rather lame. One part of the new system is likely to be based on local bodies, for which elections were held last year. That part of the set-up would be on the lines of Gen. Ayub Khan’s much discredited ‘Basic Democracies’ which were ideally suited to control and manipulation by the bureaucracy. The other component would be a moth-eaten national assembly, without significant powers, which would be held up for international acclaim, as an exemplar of army democracy. We have to wait and see how that goes.

Labour Legislation and Trade Unions in India and Pakistan

By Ali Amjad (Oxford University Press, Karachi, 2001)

This rather slim volume on ‘Labour Legislation and Trade Unions in India and Pakistan’ is, more or less, a summary of labour laws in Pakistan, with a brief account of some of its historical background. Ali Amjad is a well known labour-lawyer-cum-trade-union-leader of Karachi. In this book, he offers a summary of labour legislation which is wholly uncritical. Amjad does not make any attempt to examine the consequences of the web of legislation and the institutional network within which the process of collective bargaining in Pakistan is entrapped. One of the consequences of this legal and institutional

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framework is the creation of middlemen, a class of labour-lawyers, who pose as labour leaders but whose interests do not entirely coincide with those of the workers themselves. Ali Amjad carefully avoids any reference to that central issue.

Labour legislation and the relevant institutions, such as the Government’s Labour Departments, Labour Tribunals and Labour Courts, impose major constraints on the process of ‘collective bargaining’, which therefore is not free. The imposed need to cope with such laws and institutions, affects, inter alia, the kind of the so-called trade unions who can operate from the system. By virtue of that they carve out careers for themselves as collective bargaining agents, the middlemen between the workers and the legal system that stands above them. Labour leadership is thus forced out of the hands of the workers themselves. They are forced by the system into the hands of professional labour-lawyers, who pose as trade union leaders, but whose interests do not always coincide with those of the workers. Collective bargaining is laced into the ‘safe’ hands of these labour-lawyers-cum-trade-unionists, who after all are professional middle men, entrepreneurs who make a living out of opportunities provided to them by our complicated and extensive labour legislation.

This is not to say that there are no dedicated trade unionists leaders who are fully committed to service in the cause of workers. Such leaders make great sacrifices in serving that cause. There are many truly dedicated souls, who have resolutely soldiered on in the service of the workers and made very great sacrifices indeed. They deserve to be honoured. But such dedicated men are at a great disadvantage, for not all of them are trained lawyers and experts in labour law, though many of them, surprisingly, are. Our web of labour laws put a premium on legal expertise. Workers are forced to hand over their affairs to professional labour-lawyers-cum-trade-unionists without whom they can get nowhere.

We tend to take at face value the idea that our labour-lawyers-cum-trade-unionists, of whom there are many, are true representatives of the working class. Such professional leaders have a vested interest in the exiting system. They have therefore no interest in criticism of the legal system in which their own livelihoods are embedded. We cannot expect them to voice demands for a reform of our present most undemocratic labour laws and institutions which bring the authority of the state to bear on what should be free collective bargaining directly between workers and their employers. Ali Amjad voices no such concerns.

The web of labour legislation and legal and quasi-legal institutions into which labour relations are forced as a consequence of the Government’s labour policy, limit the freedom of collective bargaining for our working class. Workers in other countries, such as those in Europe, enjoy far greater freedom. The state in such democratic societies does not have any role in the process of collective bargaining, except to exempt trade unionists from liability for damages, in case employers want to sue them. To come up to democratic standards, our own restrictive regulations will have to be done away with.

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Amjad, being a labour lawyer himself, does not touch upon this central issue at all. Instead he celebrates some of the worst anti-labour examples of labour legislation, such as Air Marshal Nur Khan’s 1969 law about the appointment of officially recognised ‘Collective Bargaining Agent’ which was imposed under the Martial Law regime of Yahya Khan. Many trade union activists condemn this law. Instead of that Amjad is full of praise for it. He describes Air Marshal Nur Khan’s ‘Statement of Labour Policy’ and the new industrial disputes legislation, as a ‘surprisingly radical document’ ! The legal category of a ‘Collective Bargaining Agent’, which was established by Nur Khan, is a charter for the class of labour-lawyers-cum-trade-unionists, the middlemen, who earn a livelihood by mediating in the process of collective bargaining. It keeps out activists who come up from the shop floor. Many trade union activists, whom I have spoken to, have condemned this law and given me examples of how that vitiates the worker’s interests.

By virtue of the legislative and institutional framework set up by colonial and post-colonial governments, shop floor workers are kept safely in the background in processes of collective bargaining. Not surprisingly, the class of labour-lawyers-cum-trade union-leaders do not voice demands for the elimination of legal impediments and the whole paraphernalia of laws that obstruct the free operation of collective bargaining between workers and their employers. The fate of the workers is, instead, forced into the hands of the professionals, the lawyers-cum-trade-union-leaders, whose interests do not always coincide with those of the workers. This is a matter to which little thought has been given. A work of substance in this field that comes to mind is the unpublished but well known (in academic circles) Ph.D. thesis of Dr. Zafar Shaheed, which was researched and written under my guidance at the University of Leeds in England about 25 years ago. Shaheed is now an official of the ILO at Geneva.

Shaheed’s study was based on field research in factories in the SITE area in Karachi, at a time when there was a powerful (but sadly short-lived) upsurge in the labour movement during the opening years of the regime of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. Shaheed’s study is quite different in style and scope from Amjad’s bare summary of laws. Saheed’s work has by no means lost its value because of the passage of time, although there is urgent need for a similar study now. Shaheed’s work throws much light on both the internal shop-floor leadership of the workers as well as on the impact of labour legislation and institutions, (such as the Government Labour Department, Labour Courts and Labour tribunals) in much more detail than in Amjad’s brief summary. It is a great pity that Shaheed’s study remains unpublished, though scholars in Europe and North America do have access to it, by virtue of their library system, and they have quoted from it in their writings. Our own scholars unfortunately do not enjoy such advantages.

As an uncritical summary of labour laws, Amjad’s book is far more limited in scope. It is a lawyer’s perspective, though it is unlikely to be of much use to lawyers also, because of its brevity ! There is little attempt in Amjad’s work to illuminate the effects of labour legislation on the leadership of the working class and their freedom to engage in collective bargaining. He does, however, offer a brief account of the historical evolution of the legal and institutional framework within which employer–employee relations, and government mediation, are played out in our country. There are many such well known

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studies which have been carried out in India, whose legal heritage is identical to that of ours. They would be of great help to anyone in Pakistan engaged in a similar work.

Amjad touches on the well known fact that the colonial labour policy in India was driven by the concerns of the Lancashire based British textile industry, which had begun to face stiff competition from the burgeoning Indian cotton textile industry by the late 19th century. Lancashire industrialists, and British trade unionists also, complained that this was because of over-exploitation of Indian labour and their extremely low wages. They demanded that the colonial government should remedy the situation by helping to improve wages for Indian workers. Because of pressure from British textile interests, a paternalistic colonial labour policy emerged, which was ostensibly designed to improve wages and working conditions of Indian labour.

In response to demands from the powerful Lancashire textile interests the colonial government passed the ‘Factories Act of 1881’, to ameliorate some of the worst aspects of the conditions of Indian labour. Amjad quotes Indian historians who pointed out that the 1881 Act was violently attacked by leaders of the Indian national Congress who alleged that this Act was passed despite the ‘complete absence of any complaint or demand of the workers themselves who were willing to work for long hours quite voluntarily’ !

The colonial government’s paternalism, however, did not mean that Indian workers were to be free to organise and seek an improvement in their conditions by means of their own organised shop floor strength. Attempts to organises shop floor power met with Government repression. Not surprisingly the colonial rulers feared the emergence of the independent organised strength of the Indian worker that might threaten it have in the political sphere. Therefore, they developed instead an elaborate legal framework and institutions through to implement their policy of paternalism-cum-repression. Furthermore, state paternalism created a framework of ‘Tripartite’ institutions, with the colonial government in the saddle, as a referee between industrialists and workers. An elaborate framework of labour laws was created, including Provincial Labour Departments, Labour Courts and Labour Tribunals, which forced the leadership of the workers into the hands of a class of comfortable lawyers who presented less of a threat to the alien government than genuine shop floor leaders of workers. Genuine leaders of the workers were persecuted.

Because labour relations were enmeshed within an elaborate legal and institutional framework, workers have had little option but to hand over the leadership of trade unions to lawyers, for few amongst them had the expertise that was needed to deal with the complex legal framework that had been created. Those who selflessly take up the task of serving the workers and who have also acquired a working knowledge of the legal procedures are a dedicated few. In general, the main object and the consequence of the elaborate network of labour legislation has been to keep militant shop floor organisers out of the game. That, indeed, was the intention of the colonial and also the post-colonial governments. The professional labour-lawyers-cum-trade-union-leaders were in effect allies of the government, insofar as they performed a useful function as far as the

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Government and employers were concerned. They were in a sense, each other’s allies. thus allies. Amjad, himself a labour-lawyer-cum-trade-unionist, understandably does not point out these aspects of labour legislation that are contrary to the interests of workers themselves. It is left to the people at large to protest against this undemocratic legal framework and demand their abolition.

Throughout the colonial world, the relationship between capital and labour has been presided over by the colonial state, and later the post-colonial state, to ensure that labour is kept under control. A tripartite structure, involving the State, the employers and labour (as represented by the middlemen) evolved. It has been widely used as a frame within which worker-employer relationships are contained. At the international level colonial capitalist interests set up the ILO as an organisation through which they might propagate and impose their purpose, namely to protect industrialised countries from the competition from poor colonised societies where labour is cheap, as a reflection of their poverty. The workers wages and working conditions were to be improved, within limits, without encouraging any trade union militancy there. After all colonial capital was itself a major employer and its interests were to be protected.

Amjad does not consider the great change that has come about as a result of internationalisation of capital (dominated by North American and European capital) followed by internationalisation of production, by virtue of which low technology labour intensive processes of production are transferred to the so-called ‘Third World’ where wages are low. Globalisation, so-called, is thus a manifestation of the global domination of multinational capital. Following internationalisation of capital and the internationalisation of production, globalised multinational capital, has set up enterprises in the ‘Third World’. Metropolitan capital no longer supports the policy of paternalism towards workers, a policy that had once imposed limits on super-exploitation of industrial labour in the ‘Third World’. Organisations like the ILO are thus becoming redundant for the purposes of today’s globalised multi-national capital. It seems, therefore, that the ILO is being sidelined. It appears to have a bleak future before it, though it may continue to exist by virtue of the law of inertia of International Organisations which, once created, continue to exist, even if there is no role for them anymore. Amjad does not touch upon such major changes that affect labour.

In saying all this, it must be emphasised that even in British India colonial labour policy was by no means always paternalistic. There were regional differences, labour being a provincial subject. For example, British capital dominated Jute industries in Calcutta and tea plantations in Bengal and Assam. There was, therefore, much less ‘paternalism’ in Bengal Presidency labour legislation where labour laws were. More repressive. Amjad takes note of this briefly, recognising differences between Bombay and Bengal legislation.

After the Partition, Pakistan inherited the framework of the Bombay Presidency labour laws. But that was soon to change. Paternalism in labour policy disappeared with independence. The influence of British textile interests, for example, was no longer a factor. The elaborate legal framework within which relations between workers and

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employers had to operate was adopted enthusiastically by our own ruling bureaucracy in Pakistan. Through the tripartite structures that they inherited the ruling bureaucracy was quite happy with the tradition of active state intervention in this area. That was, of course, also in the interests of both local and foreign capital in Pakistan. There is no more room for paternalism in Pakistan.

We find hardly any discussion of such issues in Amjad’s account. His book does not have even a whiff of challenge to the established order. It reads more or less like a plain summary of the legal framework, which it is. He has little to say about the effects of the legislation on the worker. An exception perhaps is Amjad’s enthusiastic welcome for the 1969 Labour policy of Air Marshal Nur Khan, during the Yahya regime. We might recall that this policy, by virtue of its key concept of ‘Collective Bargaining Agent’, offered a charter for the professional lawyer-cum-trade-union-leaders, who by and large qualified as the officially recognised ‘Collective Bargaining Agents’. ‘Unofficial unions’, based on shop-floor initiatives of workers, and led by labour activists, were ruled out. If by chance any such Union got a majority vote, the law enabled the authorities to drag them into endless litigation that bankrupts them.

Amjad’s book, taken as a whole, fails to touch on problems that underlie our iniquitous system of labour legislation. We need a more penetrating and critical study of the subject. What is needed is a group of competent persons from amongst genuine leaders of the workers and legal experts to examine our system of labour laws and institutions in order to generate proposals for their reform or abolition. We can also hope that the democratic movement in Pakistan will demand democratisation of our labour laws along with the democratisation of our political system.

The Rise of Religious Fundamentalism in Pakistan

by

Hamza Alavi

Religious fundamentalism has become a powerful and dangerous force in Pakistan, due mainly to the opportunism of successive political leadership that has pandered to it. Militant sectarian religious groups and parties, led by half-educated and bigoted mullahs, many of them armed to the teeth, are holding our civil society and the state to ransom. They threaten the very fabric of Pakistan society.

Threats of disruption from religious parties have escalated in recent decades. They have steadily grown in strength since the time of General Zia. They now claim that they are the true custodians of Pakistan and that it was they, the mullahs, who had fought successfully for Pakistan, to establish a theocratic state for Muslims. Facts contradict such claims. With the exception of Ghulam Ahmad Parvez’s pro-Pakistan Tulu-i-Islam, group, all religious groups and parties, including the Jamiat-i-Ulama-i-Hind, the Majli-i-Ahrar and the Jamaat-i-Islami, had all bitterly opposed the Pakistan Movement and abused its leadership which was secular.

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The Muslim League, the Party that led the Pakistan movement, was a party of modern educated Muslim professionals and government job seekers (whom, for the sake of brevity, we may call the ‘salariat’). It had little to do with the outlook of bigoted mullahs. It was free of any millenarian ideological pretences about creating an Islamic state. It was a movement of Muslims rather than a movement of Islam. Behind it was a new class of English educated Muslim professionals and government job seekers that came into being in the 19th century. It got organised politically by the turn of the century, seeking a better deal for themselves vis-à-vis Hindus who were advancing relatively more rapidly in these fields.

When the Muslim League was founded in 1906 at a meeting convened by Nawab Salimullah at Dhaka, the new party was immediately hi-jacked by the Aligarh group led by Nawab Viqar ul-Mulk. Aligarh was at the vanguard of the new Northern Indian Muslim salariat class, the sons of the Muslim Ashraf, who were deeply conscious of the loss of their privileges with the advent of British rule and the relatively more rapid rise of Hindu educated classes. The main base of the Muslim salariat was in UP and Bihar for, at that time, its was relatively weaker in the Muslim majority provinces.

The Muslim League was focused entirely on its secular demands of western educated Muslim professionals and the salariat. Attempts to place the issue of Islamic ideology on the agenda of the Muslim League were both rare and invariably unsuccessful. Arguably, the earliest of such attempts was one by Shibli Numani to Islamise the Aligarh syllabus. Shibli was explicitly committed to theocratic values and wanted to shift the emphasis of the Aligarh syllabus away from English and modern sciences, towards Islamic learning and the Arabic language. The response of the Muslim salariat class to that attempt is exemplified by the remarks of Sir Raza Ali, who was a close collaborator of Sir Syed’s immediate successors, Muhsin ul-Mulk and Viqar ul-Mulk. With them, Raza Ali was at the centre of the Aligarh establishment. In an article in the daily Statesman opposing Shibli’s move, he remarked that the idea of reviving Arabic knowledge was, of course, beguiling for Muslims. But he warned that they should not ignore the demands of our times, for the most urgent need of Indian Muslims was to be offered education that would be beneficial in the affairs of this world; education that would help their coming generations to earn their livelihood. Sir Raza Ali spelt out the principal concern of the educated Muslim middle class at the time. Their concern was not about a hypothetical return to original Islam and the creation of an ‘Islamic State’, ruled over by mullahs, that Shibli had dreamt about. Shibli had to leave Aligarh, for it was not the place where his theocratic ideas could flourish.

Among the rare attempts to bring the issue of ‘Islamic Ideology’ on to the agenda of the Muslim League was one that was planned for the Delhi Session of the AIML in April 1943. One Abdul Hameed Kazi (backed by ‘Maulana’ Abdul Sattar Niazi) canvassed support for a resolution, which he intended to table. That would commit the Muslim League to an Islamic ideology and the creation of an Islamic state. But pressure from everyone around him forced Kazi to abandon the idea. The resolution was not even moved. The Pakistan movement remained firmly committed to its secular concerns.

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In his keynote speech before the inaugural meeting of Pakistan’s new Constituent Assembly, on 11th August 1947, Mr. Jinnah spelt out the Pakistan Ideology, namely the secular and tolerant vision of the new state. That speech was not a sudden aberration, as some Islamic ideologists, and General Zia’s hacks, were later to allege. It was consistent with what Mr. Jinnah had been saying for decades. The Muslim League had always been committed to a secular society.

Following Mr. Jinnah, his political successor, Liaquat Ali Khan, too reiterated the Muslim League’s secular values. When Liaquat moved the Objectives Resolution in the Constituent Assembly in March 1949 he declared that ‘As I have just said, the people are the real recipients of power. This naturally eliminates any danger of the establishment of a theocracy.’ Despite that clear statement by the mover of the Objectives Resolution, later religious ideologues, notably General Zia and his hacks, have claimed that the Objectives Resolution was a charter for the imposition of the ‘Sharia’ (as they would interpret it) although the word Sharia does not occur anywhere in that Resolution. Their argument is based on some conventional generalities in the Resolution, which said that ‘Muslims shall be enabled to order their lives, in the individual and collective spheres, in accord with the teachings and requirements of Islam as set out in the Holy Quran and the Sunna’. That, did not amount to a charter for the creation of a theocratic, ‘Islamic’ State.

Liaquat’s position on the Muslim League’s traditional secularism was, however, soon to be reversed. Not so very long after the Objectives Resolution was passed, Liaquat began to change his tune for his political base was threatened by of splits in the Muslim League in the Punjab, which was the power-base of Pakistan’s ruling elite. That was due to factional conflict between Daulatana and Mamdot who left the Muslim League to form a rival Party. Liaquat was now in a panic. He decided to exploit Islamic rhetoric, to hold together his crumbling Party. He began to speak of ‘Islam in Danger’. He also began to equate loyalty to the Muslim League with loyalty to the state. Those who opposed him or his party were denounced as traitors.

There was, however, a second and a much more important reason why Liaquat decided to abandon his secular stance. Powerful regional movements had arisen in East Bengal, Sindh, Baluchistan and the NWFP, whose people felt that they were not being given their due in a Punjabi dominated Pakistan. They demanded regional autonomy and fairer shares of resources. The Centre, which was seen as ‘Punjabi’, was in fact dominated by a cohesive bureaucracy, under Chaudhri Muhammad Ali as Secretary General to the Government. It was the centralised bureaucracy that ruled Pakistan whilst politicians, including Liaquat, went through the motions.

Arguably, it was the challenge to the centre from regional movements which was the more important factor in precipitating Liaquat’s ideological volte-face. Abandoning Mr. Jinnah’s (and his own) firm stand against pandering to the mullahs, Liaquat sought to negate regional demands by issuing calls for ‘unity’ in the name of Pakistan and Islam. We were all Pakistanis and Muslims, it was now argued, and therefore we could not be Bengalis or Sindhis or Baluch.

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The bureaucracy, rather than Liaquat, was in effective control, and it was not prepared to make any significant concessions to the mullahs. The mullahs could be given a visible public role, but without any real share in power. For that purpose a Board of Talimaat-i-Islamia, was set up. It provided a few jobs for some senior mullahs, the Ulama. But the Board was to be no more than a façade for the new found religious rhetoric of politicians. It was not to have any real powers. Its function was purely advisory and that too only on matters that were referred to it. When the Board did make some suggestions they were unceremoniously ignored. Nevertheless, the Ulama seemed to be content with the arrangement. They remained quiescent for nearly two decades. Recalcitrant Mullahs, such as Maulana Maududi, found themselves in jail. The mullahs were under control.

That basically peaceful scene was disturbed only temporarily in 1953, when Islamic militants launched Anti-Ahmadi riots in the Punjab an d Martial Law was proclaimed. Although religious zealots of the Majlis-i-Ahrar and the Jamaat-i-Islami led the riots, they were in fact being used by cynical political forces, led by Punjab Chief Minister Mumtaz Daulatana. That was done in the context of US attempts to destabilise the Nazimuddin Government at the centre and to counter the Bengal group of MPs in the matter of the proposed Pakistan-US military Alliance which they opposed. That is a long and complicated story.

A decade and a half later, religious rhetoric was indulged in by the illegitimate regime of General Yahya Khan, but without conceding any formal role to the mullahs. General Sher Ali, redefined ‘Pakistan Ideology’ as ‘Islamic Ideology’. The Yahya government’s primary concern was to de-legitimise the increasingly powerful Bengali nationalism. Yahya’s Bengali adviser, Prof. G. W. Choudhury, had persuaded him and his coterie of Generals, that East Bengali nationalism was limited to only a handful of intellectuals, who were in the pay of the Indians and that the vast majority of Bengalis had no sympathy with them. That tragically false picture could account for the ferocity and reckless manner in which Yahya tried to suppress the Bengali people in 1971. Would they have embarked on that policy if Yahya had even the slightest inkling of the depth of Bengali feelings ?

The mullahs were quiescent, however, until they were stirred into action by the foolish populist rhetoric of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto who misguidedly decided to exploit religious ideology. Thereby Bhutto sowed the seeds of his own destruction, for the re-activated mullahs became the vanguard of the campaign against him. That set the scene for Gen. Zia’s coup d’etat.

It was under General Zia that narrow and bigoted religiosity became state policy. The General sought the political support of the mullahs for his illegal regime, for he had no other political base. He also sought financial support from the Reagan regime in the US. Both of these objectives, he thought, could be secured through an Islamic Jihad which he proclaimed against the Soviet presence in Afghanistan. The CIA joined took over the task of organising armed religious groups in Afghanistan, in cooperation with Pakistani agencies. When the Russians left Afghanistan, however, the CIA was withdrawn precipitately from the scene, leaving it to Pakistan to deal with the mess that they had

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created. Foolish Pakistani policies since then, especially under Benazir Bhutto and her successor Nawaz Sharif, got Pakistan even more heavily involved with these once US sponsored ‘terrorist groups’. The present government has done little to turn away from these policies to extricate Pakistan from the mess that was inherited from Zia’s Afghan policy.

When he seized power illegally, Zia badly needed some source of legitimacy for his regime. Being politically bankrupt, he decided to exploit the credulity of Pakistani Muslims by invoking Allah. He claimed to have experienced ilham (a divine revelation) in which, he declared, he was enjoined by the Almighty himself to Islamise Pakistan and to transform it into a fortress of Islam. New ‘Islamic Laws’ were promulgated that were crude and cruel distortions of Islamic teachings, such as his Hudud Ordinance which, for example, had the effect of punishing a rape victim (for fornication) while the perpetrator of the rape went scot-free because of impossible conditions of proof now needed to prove his guilt!

Zia also bequeathed to his successors undemocratic Shariat Courts, that are answerable to no one. They issue binding decisions on the state and on the people, in the name of the Sharia. That role, in the name of Islam, is rejected by the philosophy of Sir Syed Ahmad who pointed out that Islam did not decree the office of a Pope with powers to issue binding decrees in the name of the faith. Islam, he said, is a religion of the individual conscience. No person or institution has the right to issue binding fatawa, laying down what Islam is and what it is not. Indeed, no other Muslim country has the equivalent of our Shariat Courts. They were set up by Zia’s illegitimate regime and should be dissolved.

The Shariat Courts are manned by persons who hold rigid religious views. Their most damaging decision so far is an order that requires the abolition of interest, ‘in all its forms’, by 30th June, 2001. This threatens to bring Pakistan’s already very shaky economy to a complete halt. No enemy of Pakistan could have devised a more potent weapon to destroy the country. In arriving at their decision the judges of the Shariat Bench of the Supreme Court set aside the advice of a very large number of scholars who came before it as witnesses, who resisted this interpretation of the Sharia. Instead, the Court appears to have been misled by bogus claims of ‘Islamic Banking’. They seem to be ignorant of how a modern economy functions and do not seem to have understood at all the obvious implications of their decision in a modern day capitalist economy such as that of Pakistan. They appear to be ignorant of the difference between interest in a modern capitalist economy (sood) and usury (riba) in pre-capitalist economies to which Quranic strictures apply. What the Shariat Courts have produced is a time bomb which, if allowed to go off, threatens to blow up Pakistan’s economy.

The present Government seems to be paralysed in the face of the die hard religious lobby which seems to be triumphant about this. It has poor advisers. As soon as the Shariat Appellate Bench of the Supreme Court announced it decision, the minister of Finance, who is an ex-banker declared, without pausing to think, that the Court’s decision would be implemented in full. But, after months of deliberations by several high powered

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committees, the Government still has no idea whatever of what is to be done. It speaks with two voices. At a recent meeting, the Federal Minister for Religious Affairs declared that the Government has drafted all required laws and regulations, which are ready to be promulgated and that the Government is ready to implement the Shariat Court’s decision in full, and without qualifications. But at the same meeting, the Governor of the State Bank of Pakistan (the country’s central Bank) declared that they do not as yet know how the Shariat Court decision can be implemented. He said that the Government needs more time to work out viable solutions and that it has asked for an extension of time.

The Government does not seem to understand the gravity of this issue. They should know that they cannot allow the economy to collapse. But they also appear to be too intimidated by religious fundamentalists to overturn the Shariat Court’s decree. Meanwhile, the top nine religious parties in the country have declared that they will launch a mass anti-Riba movement, on the lines of the movement that brought down Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, if the Government fails to abolish interest by the date laid down by the Shariat Bench of the Supreme Court, namely the end of June, 2001. They have declared, ominously, that the time has come for a decisive war between Islamic and secular forces in the country !

A major factor in the present situation is a development since the time of Zia. That is the proliferation of deeni madaris, religious schools, that have spread throughout Pakistan. They receive generous foreign funding, not least from Middle Eastern states like Saudi Arabia. The deeni madaris have little difficulty in recruiting pupils (taliban), who are turned into fanatics, ready to die for what they are taught to believe are sacred causes. A factor that has greatly helped their recruitment is the creation of a huge number of unemployed families, people without a livelihood and without hope, as a consequence of farm mechanisation, especially in the Punjab. Every tractor displaces at least a dozen families of sharecroppers. Hundreds of thousands of them are now without a source of livelihood. In that context, the appearance of the well financed deeni madaris, who take over their children, give them free ‘tuition’, accommodation and food, cannot appear to be anything other than a great blessing. The enthusiastic young taliban, are taught to recite the Quran. They are also indoctrinated, their minds filled with distorted and intolerant ideas about what Islam is and what it prescribes. The taliban are thus turned into fanatics. Most of the ‘deeni’ madaris also give them military training for jihad initially ostensibly against the Soviets and now for the liberation of Kashmir. But already Pakistan itself is experiencing the inevitable heavy fall out from this. The armed groups, many of them with battle-hardened taliban, are in the vanguard of sectarian killings throughout Pakistan, which are on the increase; killings of members of rival sects, Sunnis against the Shi’a, Deobandi Sunnis against Barelvi Sunnis and so on. They have also begun to issue threats against the state itself and the society in Pakistan.

Instead of a viable policy designed to disarm and liquidate such groups, successive regimes in Pakistan have pandered to them. The current military government, unlike the military regime of General Zia, has not indulged much in religious rhetoric, except for the occasional utterances of its Federal Minister for Religious Affairs. Indeed, the Government’s liberal interior minister, General Moinuddin Haider, has given calls, from

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time to time, about doing something to bring the so-called deeni madaris under some sort of control, reforming their syllabi to introduce some useful, career related, educational input into their activities. For that he has become the bête noir of the religious parties, who have warned the government, firmly, against meddling in their affairs.

The government, for its part, seems to be intimidated by the militant Islamic groups. In December last, for example, one Maulana Muhammad Akram, leader of the Tanzimul Ikhwan, threatened to march on Islamabad with ‘hundreds of thousands’ of his followers, to force the Government to promulgate the Sharia. The Government’s response was to placate him. It despatched the Punjab Home Secretary and the Inspector General of Police to parley with Akram. That was apparently not enough, for it then sent Dr. Mahmood Ghazi, the Federal Minister for Religious Affairs, as reinforcement. After long drawn out talks, Maulana Akram ‘graciously agreed’ to defer his plan to storm the capital. It has been suggested by the media that Maulana Akram has ‘a lot of influence among middle-ranking officers of the army’. If that is so, that must surely be extremely worrying. Could it be that which explains the Government’s apparent paralysis in the face of serious threats from fanatical religious groups? It must know that a do nothing policy will not solve anything. Left to itself, the situation can only get worse.

Theories of the state, democratic or otherwise, are premised on the state’s monopoly of legitimate force. But here we have a situation where the state’s monopoly of force is undermined by the numerous armed religious groups (who often work in concert) that have agendas of their own. The Government must realise that the more they try to accommodate religious zealots, the stronger and the more intransigent they become. What the situation demands is a firm and well thought out policy to disarm such groups and bring them under control. It is surprising that Pakistan’s professional military does not yet seem to have realised the very serious threat that this situation poses to itself as well as to the State and society as a whole. In the meantime, until something is done, Pakistan will continue to stagger towards an uncertain future, with contradictory state policies.

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