Imran Ali Brohi
I am describing one of my favourite authors through this platform who enhanced my know-how about Indo-Pak history and let me understand the history of Pakistan from a new point of view. Dr professor Ishtiaq Ahmed was born on 24 February 1947 in Lahore. He pursued his basic education from Lahore and went to Rawalpindi later to teach. Later on, he along with his elder brother went to Sweden where he did his PhD in Political Science. Throughout the years, he spent his life teaching and learning as a professor. He wrote several books and taught the masses to live harmoniously and lovingly. In 1974 while he was a PhD student in Sweden and was working on his thesis, an idea twisted in his mind that ” Everyone seems talking about making an Islamic State, what does it mean, why Pakistan was created, and what was ideology behind it”? What was the implication of it on our society? It is said that the subcontinent’s partition is the partition of Punjab. In the partition of Punjab, 10 lac people lost their lives of which 8 lac people were ‘Hindu, Sikh, and Muslim. From the total population of 4 crores of Hindustan, 50 lac were compelled to migrate, and from the 3 crores 40 lac population of Punjab, 1 crore people left their homes and migrated from one border to another. The problem arose when the news of 14 August spread like wildfire, Punjab was partitioned and the governments established both sides. The last governor of Punjab wrote in the secret report of August that 5200 people have been massacred on both sides and the number can reach up to 10 thousand. But when we look at the ramifications after the segregation like the PGCG report and plethora of books and research and strive to count the total number of death tolls, no one is ready to reveal what happened after 14th August. Dr Ishtiaq granted three years to research and publish the report. Moreover, he took 11 years to accomplish such a paramount task. In 2002, Dr Instructed some volunteers to meet old age people to explore the issue of partition from both sides. His assistant used to find old age people from partition time and call the Dr to interview them and ask questions. In this way, he interviewed people from both sides and more than 450 European citizens and strived to gain insightful knowledge about the partition. When he finally accomplished his book ” The Partition of Punjab”, he deeply contemplated that Hindustan, after this saga, headed towards a democratic journey, made a Constitution, and sorted out the lingual and regional imbroglios. But why we failed to do so? To answer these questions he published another book, ”Pakistan eik askri riyasat”. After this book, he mulled over who was behind these mushrooming crises. He finally reached the point that Quid e Azam was the main architect behind this whole saga. And, he wrote a book, ”Jinnah, his success, failures, and his role in history” and published it. He emphasizes that in Pakistan it is taught that Jinnah did nothing wrong and was right in doing everything. But I think no human being is always right and perfect. Therefore, I studied his different spheres of life, be it political career, legal aspiration, or political evolution. This resulted in a book aforementioned. Dr Ishtiaq asked the most frequent question from every man he interviewed” Should the partition have taken place”? The answer was not and Punjab’s partition is historically one of the grave tragedies of humanity. The massacre started in March 1947, the partition took place in August, and the governments of both sides forced other communities to migrate. Dr Ishtiaq was deeply shocked when the people during the interview emphasised the point that we used to live lovingly from the centuries and we could have lived for another century peacefully and harmoniously. Hindustan’s partition is considered a tragedy from the start for two reasons: One due to partition and the second eradicating the centuries of love, peace, coexistence, and social cohesion. Men of humanity from both sides reject the division. When Dr Ishtiaq was asked to shed light on ”what’s the reason behind Pakistan’s insolvency, collapse, and the growing extremism and India’s rapidly growing economy and scientific progress”. He simply with utmost frankness uttered that when ” you create a state in the name of religion, and give space to religious extremism, that will be the repercussions. I think it is better to limit the religion to only the caste system. If it brought in the politics and played for political ends, it is like rising tyranny and chaos”. The current state of Pakistan is because of the ”Two Nation Theory” that divided the subcontinent in the name of religion and segregated and evacuated Hindus, Sikhs, and Muslims forcefully. Two Nation Theory utterly failed right after the partition because it could not hold together Muslims, raised ” Shia-Sunni” sectarian conflicts and led to two distinct groups in the country. Even, Ahmadis were declared Non-Muslims. The riots and rebellion sects went on to vandalize further. The Two Nation theory was the British idea to create hatred and violence among the masses to rule them and keep up, ” The divide and rule” policy. The question is, are we better than India socially, politically, economically, geographically, demographically, scientifically, regionally, and educationally today? To have these developments in Pakistan is like a cry in the wilderness. I think we are so closely connected, our culture, DNAs, music, education, likes, dislikes, folks, languages, meals, and dressing styles resemble. In Pakistan, people use the song of the Indian Singer ”Lata” in marriages and watch Indian movies and films. We have so much in common that can bring us even closer. It would be great if we resume diplomatic talks with India, and restart trade, export and import. It can greatly help us stir the struggling economy out of the doldrums and put the state on the path to peace and prosperity.
