THIS is with reference to the letters ‘A case of biasness’ (March 24) and “Is there a conspiracy afoot against the ‘right hand’ man of Jinnah?” (April 9). I fully agree with the contents of the said pieces of correspondence.

There, indeed, seems to be a certain lobby that is biased against the first prime minister of the country, Nawabzada Liaquat Ali Khan, although he was among the few who sacrifised both life and property for the sake of Pakistan without lodging any claims with the evacuee property trust.

In fact, a retired bureaucrat-turned-analyst was also observed indulging in character assassination and attacking the personality of the first prime minister in one of his interviews on a private television channel, which went viral on social media.

As regards Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, his self-explanatory views about the natives of the subcontinent have been in the public eye for long. He visited England and on Oct 15, 1869, he wrote from London: “Without flattering the English, I can truly say that the natives of India, high and low, merchants and petty shopkeepers, educated and illiterate, when contrasted with the English in education, manners and uprightness, are as like them as a dirty animal is to an able and handsome man. Do you look upon an animal as a thing to be honoured? Do you think it necessary to treat an animal court-eously, or the reverse? You do not.

“We have no right to courteous treatment. The English have reason for believing us in India to be imbecile brutes.” (The History and Culture of the Indian People, vol 10, 307-8pp).

This is food for thought, especially for those at the helm of national affairs who seem to have rather strangely taken the responsibility upon them-selves to distort and doctor our history.

Muhammad K. Sufi
Islamabad

Published in Dawn, April 14th, 2023