Except our own thoughts, there is nothing absolutely in our control. — Rene Descartes

PERHAPS no one could ever have imagined that the place where the British troops stationed in Peshawar would build their cemetery will one day assume such paramount importance in the lives of the people of this town. That place will later come to be known as ‘Gora Qabristan,’ and since it mournfully sits right in the middle of Peshawar, it is not possible to avoid crossing this milestone while aiming to travel from one part of the town to the other.

‘Gora Qabristan’ is the slate at which we have to mark our attendance every day of our life, and it is for this very solid reason that the slate tells us so precisely about our past, present and future.

It is always best to keep to the first lane to the extreme right while waiting for one’s turn to pass through the security check posts set up at ‘Gora Qabristan.’ To the left is complete melee, a free for all as motorists attempt to outdo and outwit each other. To the right it may be a test of endurance but then there are beggars to keep shooing away, and the notices hanging from the poles in the median.

We may be negligent in all essential aspects of the worldly affairs, but we do ensure to publically flaunt our spiritual credentials. Hanging from the poles are the various attributes of the Prophet (pbuh). Tahir, Madani, Arabi, Mustafa, each of the attributes acts like a celebrated milestone taking one closer to his destination. It is at ‘Raufun’ (the loving one) where a soldier could be seen signaling with the soft movement of his palms and fingers that the ordeal partially ends.

Culture is said to have no standard definition. It is perhaps owing to this all pervasive ambivalence that our culture appears to be going haywire. Some people, and that Some few notes about our evolving cultureincludes people who matter by virtue of their positions, would like us to believe that culture has got everything to do with performing arts like singing, dancing and drama and little with the way we comport ourselves. These people at the top of the totem poles are grossly mistaken, but since they matter to our existence their say prevails.

It could be argued that performing arts are merely the mediums through which people in civilized societies can portray their lifestyles in entertaining ways with the avowed aim of casting an impression. For instance the Indian classical ‘Kathak’ dance does exactly this and perhaps so does our exclusively male ‘Khattak’ dance.

It is thus our lifestyle that is the be all and end all of culture, and that in the case of the Pashtuns of the erstwhile northwestern Frontier seems to be in a state of perpetual turmoil. If anything, the scene at the ‘Gora Qabristan’ provides a glimpse into that.

One has to admit that the Pashtun culture over the last some decades is evolving, and evolving for the worse. The Pashtun culture is particularly adaptable when it comes to imbibing ruinous foreign influences. In any society with a modicum of responsibility and accountability, one would have considered many times before choosing to represent the unrepentant militants at any forum.

But as things stand here in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa some well known people proudly represented the thugs in talks with the government without a blemish to their public faces. They were carried around in helicopters to the hideouts of the Taliban and presented on the television screens as celebrities with no questions asked as regards their links to the underworld.

Recent events in KP have also brought into sharp focus our perceived aversion to education. Militancy has hit the entire country in one form or the other, but it is in KP where education appears to be at the centre of the raging conflict. One has to confess it couldn’t have happened without some primeval tendency with regard there to it. There has to be some kind of a culture of atavism still in place for such crimes to go unpunished.

Some people would like to rate Pashtuns very highly for a culture characterized by accommodation. Pashtuns get profoundly flattered being praised as such. However, empirical data would suggest that Pashtuns have paid a very heavy price for being so excessively accommodative in all spheres of life. Starting from offering hospitality even to unknown guests, the culture of accommodation has permeated down to the level of delivery of services in the public sector organizations that has let the system rot beyond repair.

Of all the evils that have corrupted the Pashtun culture, perhaps the ugliest is the prevalence of drugs and the acceptance of those dealing in the manufacturing and trafficking of drugs as respectable members of the society. It carries no shame or stigma to befriend and mix up with people with ostensible connection to the illicit trade. With addicts huddled on our thoroughfares in groups of three and four and injecting themselves with heroin, the worst in our culture of indifference and outright complicity comes out for all to be seen.

It is painful to hear that it is in Pashtun inhabited areas in Karachi where polio vaccination is administered under police watch. It says something about the Pashtun culture, and we cannot feign ignorance as we have multiplied at a very fast pace in the recent past. We need to act and look cultured or else the antonym of it is not very sweet to the ears.

Published in Dawn, February 9th, 2015

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