Page 6 - Pakistan Link - August 13, 2021

P6 – PAKISTAN LINK – AUGUST 13, 2021 OPINION
n By Faiz Ahmed Faiz Faiz on the Dream of Pakistan ual affront and insult at the hands of men not
The Pakistan Times as good as oneself; it meant freedom from the
Lahore constant violence that one’s integrity and intel-
(March 23rd, 1949) ligence was subjected to, by men who had risen
to power through fraud and treachery or birth
lmost exactly nine years ago the Mus- and riches. The people wanted freedom from
lim people of undivided India adopted the British and the Bania, not because these two
APakistan as their goal of political en- were personally undesirable but because they
deavor. As the late Quaid-i-Azam repeatedly were committed to support everything that was
explained, the Muslim declaration for Paki- retrograde and undesirable in our social and
stan was not a declaration of war against the economic existence and to stifle ev-erything
non-Muslim majority in the sub-continent. It that was progressive and radically beneficent.
was, on the other hand, a declaration of peace. Once we get rid of this destructive combine, the
It was merely intended to end the vertical di- people said, we shall be able to sweep all minor
vision that separated the two major peoples of obstructions aside – the stupid, vainglorious
the sub-continent wherever they resided, by a feudal grandee, tubthumping obscurantist dem-
horizontal division so that the divided halves agogue, the tyrannous policeman, the grasping
could each develop an internal harmony that rent-racketeer, the incompetent corrupt of-
the undivided whole lacked. It was hoped that ficial, the censor and the CID. We shall march
once this harmony had been attained the two forward, the people said, led by the best among
halves would live happily ever after. us, and on pukka roads running straight to vari-
The dream is as yet unfulfilled. The division ous well-defined destinations and not flounder
has come but neither half is as yet completely among dim jungle-paths crisscrossing in bewil-
at peace, either with itself or with its neighbor. dered confusion and leading nowhere; we shall
Internal harmony was made impossible because build hospitals and schools and playgrounds,
neither side chalked out or planned a pattern of and ships and aeroplanes; we shall set up fac-
free and secure existence for the minorities left tories and laboratories and theatres and concert
in its care, a pattern similar to the one that each halls, write poetry and listen to music and work
majority has managed to obtain for itself. The like the devil.
fair visage of freedom, therefore, was daubed ed not by this but by other components of the The failures that we This dream, too, is as yet unfulfilled. It
and besmeared with blood and bitter tears. Ex- dream. The devotion and fervor that he so plen- would be stupid petulance to insist that it should
ternal harmony was made impossible because tifully offered to the national cause sprung from have witnessed and shall have been fulfilled within the short number of
each side felt that the division had not been other connotations of the term Pakistan and it days we have spent since we achieved freedom,
fairly done and it had been deprived of much connoted above all, freedom and independence. continue to witness in the but it is certainly right to examine the progress
that was morally its due. Under the circum- No one precisely knew what the nature of the fight to realize the dream we have made towards it.
stances, the more powerful side naturally sought new order would be and what sort of freedom it The examination reveals much that should
to exploit its advantage by holding back what it should bring, and no one cared to explain. Ev- that Pakistan stands for have been done but has not been done and
should have given and by grabbing what did not eryone felt, however, that Pakistan meant free- much that has been done but should not have
belong to it. The weaker side retaliated when it dom from the poignant humiliation of being have also been and will been done. There is nothing to be discouraged
could, and when retaliation was not possible it governed by an alien people; it meant freedom be failures of individuals. about. Individuals, many of them distinguished
just sulked, and felt horribly annoyed in both from the economic stranglehold of a ruthless in rank and tested in previous struggles, failed
inter-communal and inter-Dominion relations. class of exploiters whose class antagonism to the Pakistan came in spite of us miserably in the fight for Pakistan. The fail-
Therefore, the ideals implicit in the Lahore Res- victims was reinforced by differences of culture, ures that we have witnessed and shall continue
olution have yet to be realized, although unfor- creed and outlook; it meant freedom from the Khizar, and its people will to witness in the fight to realize the dream that
tunately this realization depends as much and tyranny of officials big and small who derived progress in spite of his Pakistan stands for have also been and will be
more on the good sense of our neighbors as on their authority from a foreign source; it also failures of individuals. Pakistan came in spite of
our own rectitude. meant freedom to speak one’s language without successors Khizar, and its people will progress in spite of
The common man, however, was fascinat- feeling abashed. It means freedom from perpet- his successors.

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