A burgeoning slogan for “Naya Pakistan” seems to be clouding the Pakistani political horizon for some time now. This began with Imran Khan and was used by his vociferous supporters, and later by Nawaz Sharif (PML-N) as well, though in a muted tone. But none of them have so far substantially defined what it stands for, how different it is going to be either from the present day Pakistan or Pakistan of yesteryear. But the slogan itself is extremely catchy and those who are raising it, I suspect, do not really know what it really means.

Slogans sans substance have over the decades been extremely popular in Pakistan, usually cashing in the general gullibility of the ignorant and the semi-literate, which the exploitative political elites usually resort to, in order to keep themselves in business and their shops running. This general observation is, however, not meant to cast any sort of aspersion on down-to-honest Imran Khan and other slogan raisers, but only to explain how slogans can become exploitative tools in the hands of clever and scheming politicians.

Bhutto’s “New Pakistan”

However, the slogan Naya Pakistan is neither really new nor original. It was first used in its English version, “New Pakistan” by Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto when he assumed power on December 20, 1971 in what was till then West Pakistan. In that tragic year Pakistan had somehow managed to get itself dismembered, with the majority in East Pakistan opting to hoist Bangladesh as a new nation state on the world’s map. Because of the physical transformation Pakistan had undergone, with the erstwhile West Pakistan becoming the whole of Pakistan, Bhutto’s slogan of a “New Pakistan” was not altogether unjustified.

Against that traumatic background, Bhutto proved himself to be the man of the moment.  Bold, energetic, pragmatic and visionary, he was a born leader, endowed with great qualities of head and heart. Patiently, indeed very patiently and methodically, he sought to pick up the pieces and tried to build up a ‘New Pakistan’. He took a series of measures to put the house in order internally and address the problems and pressures externally. And all the while, he was engaged in morale-boosting, facilitating and inducing Pakistanis to shed their slough of defeat and despondency, rise above the day-to-day rough and tumble to acquire a new pride, dream a new destiny and make a new future.

The crafting of a new constitution by consensus in 1973 seemed to ensure the strengthening and streamlining of the extant polity with a democratic structure, appurtenances and ethos. And all this was the handiwork of one man – Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. That’s why I regard Bhutto as the man of the hour at that moment – the man who saved (West) Pakistan in that traumatic hour. But for him, with Wali Khan, Ghaus Bux Bizenjo and G. M. Syed sniping all the time from their havens in the three smaller provinces and the success of the Bangladesh revolt serving as an incentive and inspiration, the still nebulous campaign for four Pakistans in the West would surely have gathered force and momentum, with none in a position to forecast the denouement. It’s high time that Bhutto’s singular contribution in saving Pakistan be recognized. After years and years of research, scanning the relevant documents, I have come to the definite conclusion that Bhutto had no part in the dismemberment of Pakistan for which the military rulers and Sheikh Mujibur Rahman were alone responsible. Hence it is also high time that the myth of Bhutto’s involvement, which somehow has persisted for some four decades be also finally laid to rest.

Despite all his achievements, Bhutto could not avoid coming to a sad end. That, in the ultimate analysis, should be put down to his own penchant for a dominating role. Despite his rhetoric, despite tall claims, despite the crafting of the 1973 constitution, Bhutto was not inherently democracy oriented. His claims and the constitution proved to be a mere trapping, a façade without any solid democratic structure behind it except for the 1973 constitution, which Bhutto used to build himself up adroitly as an absolute ruler, the master of black and white. Otherwise, he would not have created the FSF as a private army owing allegiance to him alone, imposed minority PPP governments in the NAP-JUI dominated NWFP and Balochistan, initiated military action in the latter, banned the NAP and instituted the Hyderabad trial of the NAP leaders, downgraded, marginalized and persecuted the opposition groups and suppressed opposition newspapers and journals off and on, imposed emergency and Section 144 throughout his rule, rigged almost every by-election during the period and rigged massively the March 1997 general elections which proved itself as the last straw on the camel’s back.

Why Bhutto’s “New Pakistan” failed

Thus, despite Bhutto’s singular role in saving what remained as Pakistan from further break-up, his Bonapartism, though in democratic garb, indicated that his “New Pakistan” was merely a catchy slogan sans substance so far as Pakistan’s polity, democratic norms and institutions, civic rights, fundamental freedoms and civil society were concerned. This was brazenly demonstrated during the five- month long, burgeoning PNA movement enveloping the entire length and breadth of Pakistan. No wonder, his “New Pakistan” project, initiated with such fanfare, ultimately ended in smoke with Bhutto himself tragically coming to an end, whether legally justified or not. It was indeed a tragedy for Pakistan itself – for having lost a bold visionary and dynamic leader. In the ultimate analysis, however, all this occurred if only because Bhutto failed to provide substance at the domestic level in terms of a democratic, stable, self-sustaining and vibrant polity to his “New Pakistan” slogan or project.

This Bhutto episode has some cardinal lesions to the Naya Pakistan advocates – unless they wish to repeat history without learning from it. All said and done, we have only two models in our legacy which we are familiar with. One is “Jinnah’s Pakistan” and the other “Zardari’s Pakistan”, as Pakistan has been shaped and governed during the past five years under Zardari and Gilani. Everyone knows what a ghoulish and grisly experience Zardari’s “People’s Government/Pakistan” has been. Hence the May 11 electoral verdict was in favour of “change”, and everyone from top to bottom yearned for change, and for moving ahead and away from the Zardari model. That leaves “Jinnah’s Pakistan” as the only option. And in view of a movement in favour of a return to “Jinnah’s Pakistan” spearheaded by the vibrant Jinnah Society under Liaquat Merchan, and popularized by several respected and renowned columnists like Ardeshir Cowasjee, there exists widespread support for this concept throughout Pakistan. The sell-out of the OUP’s second edition of 2000 copies of the The Jinnah Anthology (2010) within two months of its launch indexes a burgeoning yearning for such a return. Indeed, Jinnah is still the role model for the new generation, the youth bulge constituting about one-half of Pakistan’s 180 million population, as a recent British Council survey has revealed, and the youth all dedicated to working for change, as the recent British Council publication Next Generation Goes to the Ballot Box (March 2013), indicates. Hence if this Naya Pakistan concept is to be meaningful, productive, result-yielding and relevant in the Pakistani context, it should draw its core subsistence and substance from the basic determinants of “Jinnah’s Pakistan”.

“Jinnah’s Pakistan”

The core all-encompassing high point of Jinnah’s Pakistan is the concept of an indivisible Pakistani nationhood – a nationhood with all those inhabiting Pakistan as full citizens with equal rights, equal privileges and equal obligations. This dictum Jinnah had formally laid down in his August 11, 1947 address to the Pakistan Constituent Assembly. Therein, he had pronounced a paradigmatic shift from the two-nation theory to a two nation-states theory, with the two nations being India and Pakistan, not Hindus and Muslims. Six months later¸ in February 1948, he told the people of the United States that he was “sure” that the Pakistan Constitution would be of “a democratic type, embodying the essential principles of Islam”. In the same breath, he had also warned that “Pakistan is not going to be a theocratic state – to be ruled by priests with a divine mission”.

In all his pronouncements he had emphasized the humanistic values of Islam such as freedom, solidarity, democracy, equality, brotherhood, social justice, tolerance, etc. And in all this, the architect of Pakistan was on the same page as the ideologue.

And in the context of rampant discrimination against the minorities in present day Pakistan such as Gojra (2009) and Badami Bagh (2013)mayhem in the Punjab, the searing Hindu saga of kidnappings and forced conversions and marriages (2012) in interior Sindh, and the Election Commission of Pakistan’s inexplicable notification to prepare a separate list of Ahmedi voters even under a joint electorate system in the 2013 elections – which inevitably led to the Ahmedis’ boycott of the elections – this twin equal-citizenship and anti-theocratic dictum needs to be emphasized and acted upon religiously and routinely. In fact, to call them minorities tantamounts to preparing the ground for marginalising them. Remember, again, what Jinnah had said on August 11 “everyone of you no matter to what community he belongs, no matter what relations he had with you in the past, no matter what is his colour, caste or creed, is first, second and last a citizen of this state with equal rights, privileges and obligations”.

Indeed, the immediate task is to forget the past and help eradicate the angularities of the majority and minority communities. After all, the latter are an integral component of a united Pakistani nation and are entitled to security of life and property and the pursuit of happiness, as in any civilized society and under any sort of democratic dispensation worth the name. And, for one, Pakistan was conceived as a civilized society and as a democracy.

This brings us to Jinnah’s deep commitment to democracy, democratic ideals and democratic ethos – a strand that was ever dominant throughout his public life. He had put a high premium on democratic institutions and mechanisms such as political parties and programmes, assemblies, fair and free elections and the sanctity of the ballot box, an independent judiciary, and a free press. He stood for constitutionalism, for the supremacy of the constitution, and for a system of checks and balances; he stood for the rule of law and respect for law. He stood for the sanctity of civic rights, and all through his life he had opposed every measure designed to curb or curtail those rights. He also believed that controversies should be resolved through discussion and debate in the assemblies, and not in the streets through sheer muscle power. He believed in democracy alone.

Jinnah stood for clean politics, for accountability of one and all, and for a code of public morality. He stood for an end to corruption of all sorts, to jobbery, nepotism and favouritism he stood for social development of all classes of people, for human resource development, for full women participation in all spheres of life and for women’s empowerment.

These principles and attributes among others are the hallmark of a welfare state, and Jinnah stood for one. And if the Naya Pakistan advocates stand for – as they should – for a modern, progressive, forward looking, democratic, egalitarian, Islamic oriented and vibrant Pakistan – a state dedicated to the social welfare of the people as a whole – they should incorporate these values from “Jinnah’s Pakistan” as the core substance of their Naya Pakistan project.

The wirter is a HEC Distinguished National Professor, has recently edited Unesco’s History of Humanity, vol. VI, and The Jinnah Anthology (2010), and In quest of Jinnah (2007), the only oral history on Pakistan’s founding father.