The Duel Read online

  The British authorities, stung by the growth of support for this organization, were determined it should be “nipped in the bud.” This led to the notorious massacre in the Qissa Khwani (Storytellers) bazaar in 1930, when a thousand or so Redshirts who had gathered to welcome Congress leaders were informed that the authorities had refused to let the leaders enter the province. The Congress held a mass meeting and called for an immediate boycott of British-owned shops. The governor ordered the arrest of Ghaffar Khan and others under Section 144, a legal clause in the public-order ordinance prohibiting the assembly of more than four people in public spaces, a law still much used in South Asia. The demonstrators refused to move, and troops opened fire, killing two hundred activists. More people poured out onto the streets, their numbers compelling the troops to withdraw. Peshawar was under the control of its people for four whole days without any violence prior to the entry of British military reinforcements. The massacre and its aftermath were described by a colonial officer, Sir Herbert Thompson, as a typical case of “a child astonished by its own tantrum, returning to the security of the nanny’s hand.”*

  Despite the extensive use of policy spies and infiltrated agents, the British could not bring forward a single charge of violence against Ghaffar Khan and his supporters, but this did not prevent them from continually harassing, imprisoning, and maltreating the leaders and activists. The Qissa Khwani massacre increased support for the Redshirts, and because, despite his Muslim beliefs, Ghaffar Khan believed in a unified and secular India, he came to the attention of Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru. The Redshirts formally applied to join the Congress Party and were admitted. The result was a Congress presence in the province that led to the party winning successive elections from 1937 onward. Nehru would later write in his autobiography:

  It was surprising how this Pathan accepted the idea of non-violence, far more so in theory than many of us. And it was because he believed in it that he managed to impress his people with the importance of remaining peaceful in spite of provocation.... [T]he self-discipline that the frontier people showed in 1930 and subsequent years has been something amazing.

  This area with a large Muslim majority preferred to remain aloof from the Muslim League and the idea of Pakistan, though the League would acquire a base in the province with the help of the imperial bureaucracy and police force and a combination of chicanery and violence. The British, who had assiduously encouraged the division between the Hindu and Muslim communities, were confused and irritated by the Redshirts. In the work of another British colonial officer, Sir Olaf Caroe, this was expressed in the form of a reactionary mysticism. Caroe’s generally interesting history of the Pashtun (Pathan to the colonists) people contains oddities such as “It is hard to see how the Pathan tradition could reconcile itself for long to Hindu leadership, by so many regarded as smooth-faced, pharisaical and double-dealing. . . . How then could he have associated himself with a party under Indian, even Brahmin, inspiration . . .” There is more nonsense along similar lines. Those Pashtuns who were not prepared to fall into line with the British were dealt with brutally.

  A U.S. journalist who witnessed the conflict interviewed Mahatma Gandhi. “What,” he asked the Indian leader, “do you think of Western civilization?” The old fox smiled. “It would be a good idea,” he replied, the treatment of Pashtun nationalists foremost in his mind. British agents would bribe the tribes while their propagandists spread rumors that Ghaffar Khan, a pious Muslim, was a secret Brahman. Congress leaders were barred from visiting the province while all doors were opened for the pro-British Muslim League. That this special benevolence on the part of the British was repeatedly rejected by a majority of the Pashtuns is an indication of the strength of Ghaffar Khan’s movement. His ideas of nonviolence and a unified, independent India went deep. It would take decades of bribery and repression (including after the birth of Pakistan) to wrench them out of the soil, with disastrous consequences.

  An imperial stereotype of the “childlike” but “noble savage” Pathan pervades much of colonial literature, including Kipling’s short stories and his repressed homoerotic novel Kim. Having convinced themselves that these ancient warrior tribes were incapable of rational thought and needed to be spoon-fed forever, the British were genuinely surprised when this turned out not to be the case. In colonial historiography, violence and Pashtun could never be opposites.

  The tensions and violent undercurrents that mark Peshawar today have little to do with previous centuries, but are a direct result of the continuing wars in neighboring Afghanistan, whose impact on Pakistan, China, and the United States/European Union is discussed in a subsequent chapter. Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) is the only province named geographically and thus denied its ethnic Pashtun identity.

  Since October 2002, the MMA, a united front consisting of the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) and the Jamiat-Ulema-e-Islam (JUI), together with four minor religious sects, has governed here, though losing badly in 2008. Though it has at times dominated the NWFP, the Islamist coalition won only 15 percent of the national vote in 2002, their highest ever, but still far removed from winning power nationally through the ballot box. The two parties are different in character. Of the two parties, the JI was more rigid in its interpretation of religion. It had been founded in Lahore in 1941 as a riposte to the Muslim League and the Pakistan Resolution and was viewed by its founder, Abul Ala Maududi (1903–79), as a “counter-League.” Maududi was highly regarded as a theologian, and his links with the Wahhabis of Saudi Arabia predated the formation of Pakistan. The JUI was based in the North-West Frontier and Baluchistan. Its leader, Mufti Mahmud (1919–80), was a wily political operator, capable of alliances with secular nationalists to further his aims. The origins of this group lay in the Deoband seminary that was regarded as the home of Sunni orthodoxy in prepartition India. Both parties saw the birth of Pakistan as a secular nationalist conspiracy against the “real truths of Islam.”

  The JI is probably the best-organized political grouping in the country. Its internal structure was modeled on that of traditional Communist parties, and it retains a cell structure in every major city to this day. The JUI was more traditional, confined to the border provinces, and dependent on kinship structures. During the Cold War the JI, through its close links with Saudi Arabia, was firmly committed to the West, while the JUI flirted with the pro-Soviet groups in Pakistan. Today both claim to be hostile to Washington, but the differences are largely tactical and local. Both parties would probably be prepared for a serious deal with Washington and, like the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, view how the pro-NATO Islamists run Turkey as a possible model for future relations. The notion that these are hard-core Islamists hell-bent on imposing a caliphate is frivolous. Prevented from any real autonomy in the socioeconomic sphere, they have chosen to assert their Islamist identity by agitating for the Sharia laws, targeting coeducational institutions such as the University of Peshawar (where gender relations have been relatively relaxed since the foundation of the country), painting out women on advertising billboards, threatening video shops, etc.

  During a sixty-minute debate with a JI ideologue on CNBC (Pakistan) a few years ago, I asked why they were so obsessed with women. Why not leave them alone? Why try and obliterate their images? His reply was reminiscent of that of a radical feminist from the seventies (when campaigns against pornography and sex parlors were much in vogue): “We do not like women being treated as sex objects. Do you?” I admitted I didn’t either, but surely painting over them was hardly a solution. And what about men? I inquired politely. Were they not sex objects as well? At this point the host of the show hurriedly moved on to safer territory. He assumed I was referring to male homosexuality, forbidden by the Koran, which is widespread throughout the country and has strong roots in the Frontier regions, which some trace back to Alexander’s invasion and the Greeks that stayed behind. There are other and more mundane reasons. However, I was not merely referring to homosexuality but men as sex objects for women. Why should this be tolerated? I was hoping to move on and discuss the mushrooming of sex videos and porn since the MMA electoral triumph, but there was no more time.

  The general disgust with traditional politics has created a moral vacuum, which is filled by pornography and religiosity of various sorts. In some areas religion and pornography go together: the highest sales of porn videos are in Peshawar and Quetta, strongholds of the religious parties. Taliban leaders in Pakistan target video shops, but the dealers merely go underground. Nor should it be imagined that the bulk of the porn comes from the West. There is a thriving clandestine industry in Pakistan, with its own local stars, male and female. Sexual frustration has the country in thrall.

  TO DISCUSS THE state of the NWFP, I met with a group of local intellectuals, journalists, and secular nationalist politicians, some of them heirs of the old Redshirt tradition even though the shirts are now somewhat soiled. Ghaffar Khan’s son and grandson were infected with the disease that afflicts traditional Pakistani politicians, being bereft of principle or program, cutting deals with the military and the Muslim League to further Awami National Party (ANP) interests. We were meeting at the Ghaffar Khan Centre, which is both party headquarters

  and a library and meeting place. The discussion centered on the MMA, the Taliban, and the U.S./EU occupation of Afghanistan. The view here was that the MMA had only won because they were backed by the military and had equated a vote for them with a vote for the Koran. This was no doubt partially true, but left the tarnished record of the ANP’s period in office out of the equation. Understandable enough given the location and circumstances, but something that needs to be addressed if they are to move forward again. This is the only secular force in the region with a sprinkling of cadres who are still
capable of seeing the larger picture. They realize they need a strategic plan, and that continually shifting positions and political somersaults spell disaster. The written program of the party has not changed much over the years—land reforms, social justice, etc.—but the remoteness of all this from its practice has led to a great deal of cynicism. In addition, the party has now abandoned its anti-imperialist rhetoric and, like the Bhutto family’s Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), is banking its hopes on a prolonged U.S. presence in the region to get rid of its religious opponents.

  Some of the key problems confronting the Frontier Province relate to neighboring Afghanistan. Afrasiab Khattak, the most intelligent leader of the ANP, believes that the worst period in the region’s history began during General Zia’s dictatorship, when the country was awash with heroin, Western and Mossad agents, and unlimited weaponry and cash to fight the Soviet troops then encamped in Afghanistan. This is true, but some of the principal leaders of the ANP, including Ajmal Khattak, wholeheartedly backed the Soviet intervention and settled down in Afghanistan for the duration. This was, alas, a common view of much of what passed for the left in Pakistan at that time. Some well-known Pakistani commentators who supported the U.S./NATO occupation in 2001 had reacted with a similar enthusiasm when Soviet troops moved southward across the Oxus in 1979.

  THE FAILURE OF the NATO occupation has revived the Taliban as well as the trade in heroin and destabilized northwestern Pakistan. The indiscriminate bombing raids by U.S. drones have killed too many innocent civilians, and the culture of revenge remains strong in the region. The corruption and cronyism that are the hallmarks of the NATO-installed Karzai government have grown like an untreated tumor and alienated many Afghans who had welcomed the toppling of Mullah Omar and hoped for better times. Instead they have witnessed landgrabs and the construction of luxury villas by Karzai’s colleagues. Western funds designed to aid some reconstruction were rapidly siphoned off to build fancy homes for the native enforcers. In year two of the occupation there was a gigantic housing scandal. Cabinet ministers awarded themselves and favored cronies prime real estate in Kabul, where land prices reached a high point after the occupation since the occupiers and their camp followers had to live in the style to which they had become accustomed. Karzai’s colleagues built their large villas, protected by NATO troops, in full view of the poor.

  Not all the Pashtun tribes in Pakistan and Afghanistan have recognized the Durand Line imposed by the British. And so, when anti-NATO guerrillas flee to the tribal areas under Pakistani control, they are not handed over to Islamabad, but are fed and clothed till they go back or are protected like the Al Qaeda leaders. This is what the fighting in South Waziristan is largely about. Washington wants to see more bodies and feels that Musharraf’s deals with tribal elders border on capitulation to the Taliban. This makes the Americans angry because Pakistan’s military actions are paid for directly by CENTCOM (United States Central Command) and they feel they are not getting value for their money. This is not to mention the $10 billion Pakistan has received since 9/11 for signing up for the “war on terror.”

  The problem is that some elements within Pakistani military intelligence feel that they can take Afghanistan back once Operation Enduring Freedom has come to an end. For this reason they refuse to give up their links with some of the guerrilla leaders. They even think that the United States might ultimately favor such an action, and as is known, Karzai has put out serious feelers to the Taliban. I doubt whether this is possible since other players are in the region. Iranian influence is strong in Herat and western Afghanistan. The Northern Alliance receives Russian weapons. India is the largest regional power. The only lasting settlement would be a regional guarantee of Afghan stability and the formation of a national government after a NATO withdrawal.

  Even if Washington accepted a cleansed version of the Taliban, the others will not, and a new set of civil conflicts could only lead to disintegration this time. Were this to happen, the Pashtuns on both sides of the Durand Line might opt to create their own state and further bifurcate Pakistan. It sounds extremely far-fetched today, but what if the confederation of tribes that is Afghanistan were to split up into little statelets, each under the protection of a larger power?

  BACK IN THE heart of Pakistan the most difficult and explosive issue remains social and economic inequality. This is not unrelated to the increase in the number of madrassas. If there were a half-decent state education system, poor families might not feel the need to hand over a son or daughter to the clerics in the hope that at least one child will be clothed, fed, and educated. Were there even the semblance of a health system, many would be saved from illnesses contracted as a result of fatigue and poverty. No government since 1947 has done much to reduce inequality. The notion that the late Benazir Bhutto, perched on Musharraf’s shoulder, equaled progress is as risible as Nawaz Sharif’s imagining that millions of people would turn out to receive him when he arrived at Islamabad airport in July 2007. The outlook is bleak. There is no serious political alternative to military rule.

  I spent my last day in Karachi with fishermen in a village near Korangi Creek. The government has signed away the mangroves where shellfish and lobsters flourish, and land is being reclaimed to build Diamond City, Sugar City, and other monstrosities on the Gulf model. The fishermen have been campaigning against these encroachments, but with little success. “We need a tsunami,” one of them half joked. We talked about their living conditions. “All we dream of is schools for our children, medicines and clinics in our villages, clean water and electricity in our homes,” one woman said. “Is that too much to ask for?” Nobody even mentioned religion.

  And religion was barely mentioned in the elections that took place in February 2008. It had been generally assumed that these would be royally rigged, but Musharraf’s successor at GHQ, General Ashfaq Kayani, instructed the ISI and its notorious “election cell” not to interfere with the process. This had a dramatic impact. Despite the boycott by some parties and the generally low turnout (40 percent or less), those who did vote treated the polls as a referendum on Musharraf and voted against his faction of the Muslim League. The joint victors were the Sharif brothers and, as the BBC reported, the “widower Bhutto,” preferring this to his proper name. Musharraf should have resigned, but insisted on hanging on to power, helped by the U.S. ambassador, who summoned the widower to remind him of the deal done with his late wife. There is little doubt that the dynastic politicians, both the widower and the grandson of Ghaffar Khan, will do Washington’s bidding, if what is demanded is not completely irrational.

  2

  REWINDING PAKISTAN

  Birth of Tragedy

  IT STARTED BADLY. FOR THREE HELLISH MONTHS A MULTIFORM, irrational mood gripped parts of India. There was a great deal of bloodshed as Hindus, Muslims, and Sikhs in northern and eastern India— Punjab and Bengal—slaughtered each other in preparation for the big day: August 14, 1947, when India would hurriedly be partitioned by a collapsing empire. There was little joy as people on both sides in northern and eastern India, still in a daze, counted their dead and thought of the homes they had left behind. A flood of refugees swamped cities on both sides of the divide. Some Muslims from Delhi and elsewhere who had fled to Pakistan were already disappointed and wanted to go back, only to find their homes and shops had been occupied by others. Old railway stations in new Pakistan were packed with men and women dead to the world, lying on the ground, their makeshift bedding often dyed with blood, soiled with urine and excrement. All were hungry. Some had contracted cholera. Others were desperate for water. There were not enough refugee camps, let alone other facilities. Those who made the decisions had not foreseen the scale of the disaster. It was difficult to predict what might happen next.