History of ethnonationalism is as old as the Pakistani state which was/is premised on the notion of a homogenity of its Muslim community. The notion played an effective political role as long as it was a question of Muslim minority’s struggle for rights against non-Muslim majority in the subcontinent.

With the emergence of Muslim majority state of Pakistan in 1947, it lost its political relevance because Muslim majority regions despite sharing a common faith have historically evolved distinct entities that reflected the universal phenomenon of diversity across South Asia. Each entity that is a constituent of the Pakistani state has its distinct history, culture and language. Above all, it has its historical group memory that distinguishes it from others.

The ruling elite initially comprising landed politicians and bureaucracy – civil, military and judicial – in its zeal of nation building refused to pay heed to the ground reality in the post-Partition era and continued to harp on the old mantra of Muslim homogeneity. Such an ideological construct is defined by two elements; common faith and a common language. The majority inhabiting the regions or provinces no doubt share a common faith among themselves but it isn’t something very unique as they also share it with other Muslim societies across the world having different histories, cultures and languages. Thus the elite in its indecent political haste completely ignored the imperatives of the new situation that confronted the state. It failed to recognise the issue, let alone solve it.

East Pakistan (now independent Bangladesh) was the first to express a voice of dissent against the policy of cultural levelling in the name of monolithic national cohesion. They resisted the imposition of Urdu – an Indian language – as the national language of Pakistan. They were naturally proud of their language and literary assets. Bengali was and still is the only language in our part of the world that produced a Nobel laureate, Rabindranath Tagore. The language issue later morphed into a bigger question of overall rights which were denied to them by the West Pakistani elite. Under the One Unit scheme all the provinces of West Pakistan were unified as one unit in 1955 to counter the numerical strength of East Pakistan with a weirdly strange formula called parity which recognised that the minority of West Pakistan was equal to the majority of East Pakistan putting logic on its head.

Bengalis were coerced to accept it but what it eventually led to is known to all. Additionally, the scheme created resentment in the smaller provinces especially in Sindh which were forced to lose their identities and a modicum of autonomy they seemed to have. Like Bengalis, Sindhis raised the issue of language. The slogan of the rights of Sindhi language which was banned in the schools became a rallying point. After the rise of the People’s Party to power led by Z. A. Bhutto, a Sindhi, rights of Sindhi language were restored and Sindh’s share in the national economic pie increased.

Sindh and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) seem to be integrated with the centre but the issue of rights of the different nationalities hasn’t gone away. It still simmers in the form of rewriting of social and cultural histories of diverse peoples of Pakistan.

Balochistan has its political and economic grievances against the policies of the federation which, they strongly feel, has deprived them of their rights. In the situation it has edged closer to a confrontational stance vis-a-vis the federation.

Ethnic nationalism in Sindh and KP manifests itself at times in strange forms. Its hyperbolic claims make it non-serious and at times ludicrous. Sindhi nationalists, for example, claim that Sindhi is the oldest civilisation deliberately forgetting that they are part of a bigger civilisation called Harappa Civilisation or Indus Valley Civilisation – Indus river has no valley. It has a basin – or Saraswati Indus Civilisation which encompassed large swathes of the subcontinent such as present day Punjab (East and West), Sindh, Haryana, Gujrat, Kathiwar and Rajasthan. Some of them claim that Sindhi language is 5,000 years old while the first classical poet of contemporary Sindhi is Qazi Qadan of the 16th century. Pashtun nationalists live on a self-created myth that they are warriors who have never been subjugated forgetting that they had been occupied by Iranians, Greeks, Huns, Arabs and Turks. The latest to put an end to their excursions into Punjab was Maharaja Ranjit Singh. Any invader from the north that penetrated Punjab and the rest of India first trampled Pashtuns.

The newcomers trying to mount the nationalist stage are Punjabis who represent a pathetic spectacle. Their new-found nationalism has feet of clay. They are the dominant province of the federation and are blamed by other provinces for being exploiters. They are considered to be insensitive to the plight of the peoples of other regions. Nationalism, ethnic or non-ethnic, has to have an enemy against which struggle is to be waged. Punjabis don’t have the luxury of having an enemy in the present scheme of things which ensures their dominance. They can’t even invent one for current political purposes. What they really need is cultural regeneration as they are deprived of their language, cultural heritage and a sense of being rooted. The process of cultural marginalisation started with the advent of colonialism but soon Punjabi elite became complicit in the project. Later Punjabi nexus with the Urdu speaking Uttar Pradesh elite that played a major role in the movement of Muslim separatism further alienated it from its language, culture and history.

To sum up, ours is a story of Pakistani nationalism – based on the notion of monolithic unity – versus ethnic nationalism springing from diversity. To reconcile the demands of both we must revisit our previous policies. Balochistan’s grievances need to be addressed and a formula be evolved in the interest of national unity that would ensure the protection of their political and economic rights to their satisfaction. Sindh and KP are well represented at the federal level though they would continue to make noises to wrest concessions from the federation.

Punjab’s nationalism is a nonstarter and its celebrations are a damp squib. Punjab needs introspection that could make it aware of its monumental cultural loss. Anything other than striving for cultural and linguistic rebirth would add to its intellectual confusion. Punjab must realise that it has nobody to blame except itself for its woes; its enemy is within. — soofi01@hotmail.com

Published in Dawn, December 30th, 2024