Pakistan Press on EU DisinfoLab, Benazir’s Doctrine and Biharis in East Pakistan: New Age Islam's Selection, 26 December 2020
By
New Age Islam Edit Desk
26 December
2020
• EU DisinfoLab:
While Pakistan Was Sleeping
By
Farrukh Khan Pitafi
• The
Forgotten Biharis In East Pakistan
By S
M Hali
•
Suppressed Voices, Grand Dialogues
By
Salman Akram Raja
•
Hindutva Federalism
By
A.G. Noorani
•
Benazir’s Doctrine
By
Mustafa Abdullah Baloch
-----
EU DisinfoLab:
While Pakistan Was Sleeping
By Farrukh
Khan Pitafi
December
26, 2020
The recent
exposé by the EU DisinfoLab pertaining to an Indian propaganda network
functioning around the world is mindboggling. Since the publication of the
report, many good commentaries have been written and I will not bore you with
repetition. Suffice it to say that for 15 years some 750 fake media outlets and
10 UNHRC accredited zombie non-governmental organisations kept fooling various
UN and international fora with their operations in 119 countries. The purpose of
the disinformation campaign bankrolled by one mysterious Srivastava Group: to
discredit Pakistan, build India’s image and impugn all actors it views as
threats. The work of the DisinfoLab is proof that in an open society equipped
with critical thinking such a massive charade cannot go unnoticed indefinitely.
While a commendable work that is not what preoccupied my mind while reading the
report. The single question haunting me since then is this: what was Pakistan,
the main target of this campaign, doing to defend itself, and why it did not
notice it for 15 years despite very clearly being on the receiving end of the
effort.
I am not a
paranoid man. But I learned early on that there can be healthy uses of
paranoia. So, when it comes to matters of national security occasionally, I do
let my imagination run wild for a bit before bringing sanity back to the
system. In case you have not noticed the world is a broken place these days and
something is seriously impairing the world’s judgment, not just Pakistan’s. Then
why should we not be extra cautious and seek to understand what goes wrong?
Therefore, I allowed my mind to take a deep dive into the world of the obscure.
If an influence campaign was going on around the world against you and you did
not notice, is it possible that a similar if separate effort was underway to
ensure you do not notice? And if yes, how? There exists in this country a
regular set of usual suspects, the bogeymen, thus branded fifth columnists,
mostly liberal, even if your average, everyday whipping boys. This shouldn’t be
that difficult. Right? Nah. The problem with this set is that no matter how
vocal it is, it firmly remains a marginalised minority. It definitely does not
control the levers of the country’s threat perception.
In my quest
to understand this systemic failure I came across some remarkably blasé
excuses. It was a very sophisticated operation and Pakistan did not have the
resources to deconstruct it. Sure, but have you visited any of the websites in
question? Half of their hyperlinks (mostly pertaining to other parts of the
world) do not function. Their names are also often oxymoronic. You are telling
me that as a chief victim of their vitriol you never came across these websites
and never noticed anything funny about them? The entire scheme might be
sophisticated but its public presence was not. And in the end, it was a Western
organisation that unmasked it. We were left again in a reactive mode,
redistributing the published work when it had already surfaced.
Speaking of
paranoia, let us talk about the odd coincidences that have become a norm and
nobody among us even thinks about trying to connect these dots no matter how
random they might be. In the contingency planning class back in the college
days we were taught that among other participants of the contingency planning
committee there sits a person called the devil’s advocate whose job it is to
discuss the most far-fetched scenarios just to ensure that no avenue is left
unexplored. Are we left with none? Have you totally failed to notice that every
time there is a horrid incident in India which brings the world’s attention to
Modi’s authoritarian politics, something similarly awful happens in Pakistan
almost immediately as if to balance the matter?
Here are
some random coincidences for your kind consideration. On April 5, 2017, the
Alwar mob lynching of Pehlu Khan brought global scorn to India. As if on a cue,
on April 13, in a university named after the man often referred to as Frontier
Gandhi, a flash mob lynches Mashal Khan on trumped-up charges. In India, every
cow-related lynching is an instrument of the Hindutva policy of repression.
Mercifully in Pakistan blasphemy-related lynchings have gone down substantially
over the years. But I find it odd that many disruptions take place soon after
something big happens in India. You inaugurate the Kartarpur Corridor earning
plaudits from the Sikh community, visibly unnerving the Indian ruling elite and
the next thing you know flash mobs start appearing at Gurdwaras to pelt stones
and the Sikh community comes under attack in Pakistan. India is ridiculed
internationally for the BJP’s ghar wapsi (forced conversion) drive and suddenly
the reports of Hindu girls being kidnapped or eloping only to convert start
skyrocketing. And this one might sound really really far-fetched but humour me.
On September 7, this year, the world was shocked to learn that an 86-year-old
woman was raped in India’s capital. We were trying to wrap our heads around
this sad tragedy when lightning strikes our own home and on September 9, the
horrendous motorway gang rape incident takes place and from the beginning to
the very end it remains shrouded in mystery. I know the dates do not exactly
correspond partly because the FIR was registered arbitrarily by the police in
IIOJ&K obscuring the date of abduction but the Kathua gang rape and Zainab
murder also took place too close to each other.
Here is
another interesting angle. India bans TikTok to punish China for the Ladakh
showdown and lobbies to get it banned in the United States. Suddenly we also
start noticing that there is too much obscenity in the app. Likewise whenever
the Indian government notices that Pakistani social media handles are hurting
its image and they cannot be banned on its request, suddenly controversies
emerge in Pakistan about social media giving way to emotive arguments in
support of banning social media entirely. Right when India is again attracting
global attention for its mishandling of farmers and its disinformation
campaigns, out of the blue Omar Saeed Sheikh is cleared of all charges, and
Bernard Henry Levi, a RAW adjacent French intellectual once again calls
Pakistan a rogue state. And I don’t know whether you have noticed that in the
past six years whenever the Indian government is confronted with agitation,
unrest starts simmering in Pakistan too?
I know many
of the above might be purely coincidental but they are only a few of the
examples. Go through the last six years of any credible Indian newspaper and
then one from Pakistan and you may come across enough incidents to convince you
that we are trapped in a mirror world with a delayed impact. All of this brings
me back to the original question. Why have we stopped questioning things? The
questions may sound silly at times, but they are unlikely to harm you. Only
indifference will.
https://tribune.com.pk/story/2277446/while-you-were-sleeping
------
The
Forgotten Biharis in East Pakistan
By S M
Hali
December
26, 2020
Bihari is a
generic term, which implies the migrants from the Indian state of Bihar, who
headed for then East Pakistan, after the partition of India in 1947. Later all
Urdu speaking people, even the Punjabis, Pathans, Sindhi and Baloch from West
Pakistan, who were posted to East Pakistan or settled in the Eastern Wing, were
labelled as Biharis by Bengalis.
The mass
exodus of Muslims from the province of Bihar, which was adjacent to Bengal as
well as quite a few from UP and other Indian states, where Muslims were
minorities, had to flee to escape the wrath of the militant Hindus, who
attacked Muslim communities in repercussion to the partition announcement,
looting, killing and raping their women.
It is a
travesty of fate that Sheikh Mujibur Rahman (then a student leader) but an
ardent follower of one of the founding fathers of Pakistan, Hussein Shaheed
Suhrawardy—then Prime Minister of Bengal in 1946—toured affected villages in
Bihar with his relief team and touched by the plight of the Biharis, had asked
the Bihari refugees to move to East Bengal in 1947.
Muslims
migrating to East Pakistan, were initially welcomed by the Bengalis. According
to the 1951 census, 671,000 Bihari refugees were in East Bengal; by 1961, the
refugee population had reached 850,000. Broad estimates suggest that about 1.5
million Muslims migrated from West Bengal and Bihar to East Bengal in the two
decades after partition.
The
migrants were mostly educated and hardworking; they were easily absorbed in the
fields of education, medicine, railways, police, armed forces and other
important cadres. By dint of hard work, they rose to higher positions,
replacing the Hindus that had migrated to India.
The first
fissures between the two communities appeared as early as 1948 because of the
language movement, when the Federal Government of Pakistan declared Urdu as the
sole national language, sparking extensive protests among the Bengali-speaking
majority of East Bengal. The Biharis, whose mother tongue was Urdu, did not
join in the language movement, which was resented by the Bengalis.
Indian
propaganda, which exploited the sense of disparity with West Pakistan and
deprivation felt by the Bengalis, also alienated the Biharis. The Bengalis
became resentful of the relative progress of the Biharis in various government
slots.
Fast
forward to the events of 1970 and 1971, when following the 1970 general
elections and landslide victory of Sheikh Mujib and his Awami League, the
military junta at the helm of the government and the west Pakistani politicians
refused to ask the winning political party to form the government.
Ultimately,
thoroughly disgusted by the attitude of West Pakistan and the prodding of
India, the Bengalis declared Independence on March 25 and started the barbarous
slaughter of Biharis and West Pakistani bureaucrats and west Pakistani armed
forces posted in East Pakistan. The Biharis being soft targets, being unarmed
and living in specific communities, bore the brunt of the massacre. Recent
investigations indicate that Indian soldiers and guerrilla forces masquerading
as Bengalis along with some disgruntled East Pakistanis led the charge of
atrocities of mass rape of the Biharis and other non-Bengalis.
Pakistan
Army, which had a contingency plan, launched Operation Searchlight to save the
Biharis and other non-Bengalis from the brutality unleashed on them and wrest back
control of East Pakistan from the rebels. Unable to sit back, Bihari youth
enmass joined volunteer groups along with Jamaat-e-Islami in East Pakistan, to
fight alongside Pakistan Army to defend the motherland against Indian and
insurgents’ incursions.
Nine months
of the war against secession, being blockaded by India and the adverse
international opinion against Pakistan owing to massive Indian propaganda, the
endgame came in November 1971, when India launched a full-fledged attack
against East Pakistan. Pakistani troops and the volunteer groups comprising
Biharis and Jamaat-e-Islami Razakars, fought valiantly. West Pakistan failed to
launch a retaliatory attack in the western theatre and delayed it till December
3rd. For the beleaguered troops in East Pakistan, the end was obvious, facing
an external enemy ten times its size equipped with massive air cover with a
surreptitious enemy within in the shape of Indian guerrillas masquerading as
Mukti Bahini causing sabotage, disruption and sporadic hit and run assaults, a
demoralized and battle fatigued Pakistan Army surrendered on December 16.
Pakistan
Army and the west Pakistani bureaucrats posted in erstwhile East Pakistan were
taken Prisoners of War but the Biharis, now devoid of any support were targeted
by blood thirsty Indian guerrillas and some deranged Bengalis thirsting for
revenge. Thousands were massacred and raped even after the Fall of Dhaka. It is
to the credit of many God-fearing Bengalis who protected the Biharis by hiding
them.
Ultimately,
the Biharis, who were once a well to do community, were rounded up and herded
into camps, where they continue to exist in squalor, poverty, disease and
deprivation. Some managed to escape via Nepal or through India and managed to
reach Pakistan, while the rest remain in Bangladesh.
A handful
were formally accepted by Pakistan but the doors were shut for them.
Unable to
claim United Nations refugee status due to a number of technicalities, this
ethnic and linguistic minority was legally stateless, ‘officially dead’.
Members of Jamaat-e-Islami have been tried for treason and hanged while the
Biharis languish in the concentration camps, forced to eke out a survival,
waiting for a messiah, who never came. Their only crime is that they stood for
a united Pakistan.
https://dailytimes.com.pk/705972/the-forgotten-biharis-in-east-pakistan/
------
Suppressed
Voices, Grand Dialogues
By
Salman Akram Raja
December
26, 2020
When,
nearly two years ago, Meesha Shafi accused a prominent singer and actor of
inappropriate physical contact on multiple occasions she walked onto a legal
chessboard mined against her. Soon she, and the other women who came out with
similar allegations, as well as those who sought to support her found
themselves facing what the Guardian has described as the ‘asphyxiating vortex
of litigation’ that awaits any woman in most parts of the world who has been
harassed and has chosen not to remain silent.
It would be
entirely inappropriate for this piece to attempt to comment on the veracity or
otherwise of Ms Shafi’s claim. It is, however, entirely apt to examine the
structure of the law within which her claim is being processed.
Pakistan’s
criminal defamation laws are weaponized to silence, stifle and suppress. The
burden of proof placed on the woman speaking out leaves her, eventually, in a
desperate bid to salvage whatever dignity she can.
Two
distinct attitudes towards defamation have come to exist in modern legal
systems. The United States inherited its defamation jurisprudence from the
English common law tradition but since the civil rights movement of the 1960s
defamation law in the US has departed, radically, from that tradition.
The English
tradition, that Pakistani law continues to follow, places the burden to prove
the truth of an apparently defamatory statement on the maker of the statement.
Federal and state laws in the US have, increasingly, come to require the
complainant to prove the falsity of what is claimed to be defamation committed
by the defendant.
So great
has been the distaste in the US for the English tradition that judgments of
English courts in defamation cases based only on the defendant’s failure to
establish the truth of her or his defamatory statement have been held by
American courts to be against the public policy embedded in the speech rights
guaranteed by the constitution of the United States.
It is the
balancing in the US between the reputational rights of the accused and the
speech rights of the accusers that has allowed abused women, and men, to come
out against men, both powerful and sly, and survive with confessions by the
abusers and convictions granted by the courts.
Pakistani
law, it turns out, provides no plausible remedy to a woman, or indeed to a
child or man, who has been molested or subjected to unwanted sexual advances,
but not raped, at a place that is not the victim’s workplace. A woman who
alleges sexual harassment becomes a hunted being. Consider.
An
essential attribute of power in our land is the ability to ensnare an opponent
in a criminal case through the registration of a first information report, the
FIR, against him or her. The FIR transforms an indignant opponent into a
cowering accused. The colonial state understood the profound efficacy of this
degradation.
An FIR
silences those who might have spoken to expose or protest inequity, injustice
or sexual harassment. Apart from the civil wrong of defamation that may result
in monetary compensation, criminal defamation and criminal annoyance came to
share space in the colonial penal code with seditious speech against the state.
Criminal
defamation was, and is, punishable with imprisonment. Around the world,
prosecution for criminal defamation has become extremely rare – with state
authorities refusing to register criminal cases. In other jurisdictions,
criminal defamation has been removed altogether from the penal code. Not so in
Pakistan.
Section 509
of the Penal Code of 1860, as amended in 2010, defines the offence of sexual
harassment through verbal or physical conduct and prescribes the punishment of
imprisonment up to three years or fine of up to five hundred thousand rupees or
both. The same penal code also carries, since 1860, section 499 that defines
the offence of criminal defamation with imprisonment up to two years. If the
alleged defamation is carried out through an electronic information system the
Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act of 2016 kicks in and provides for
imprisonment up to three years or fine up to one million rupees or both.
The
Defamation Ordinance of 2002 also allows for money damages in civil
proceedings, on top of the punishment for criminal defamation, against a person
said to have committed defamation. All laws on the Pakistani statute book,
criminal and civil, ultimately place the burden to establish truth on the woman
who claims sexual or other harassment.
Ms Shafi
wisely chose not to press charges under section 509 of the Penal Code. Proving
the crime of sexual harassment imposes on the accuser the usual criminal law
burden of producing evidence that establishes the ingredients of the crime,
from groping in the dark to wilfulness on the part of the offender, beyond any
reasonable doubt. Given the opportunistic circumstances alleged by Ms Shafi,
such conclusive evidence would have been impossible to produce before a court.
Ms Shafi
made her allegations on the electronic media and filed a complaint before the
Ombudsman for Sexual Harassment, who acts in terms of the Protection Against
Harassment of Women at the Workplace Act of, 2010. The standard of proof
required in the administrative proceedings before the ombudsman is lower than
before a criminal court.
The legal
blowback that Ms Shafi now faces has scratched on the dark landscape of
misogyny the need for an urgent redesign of the harassment and defamation laws
of the country. Her complaint before the ombudsman stands quashed on the ground
that the sexual harassment law only recognises harassment at the workplace
between an employer and an employee, or by one employee against another. It was
held that neither Ms Shafi nor her alleged harasser had an ‘employment
relationship’ covered by the Protection Against Harassment of Women at the
Workplace Act of, 2010.
Ms Shafi
and the women who have come out in her support must, however, face criminal
defamation charges as well as civil action for monetary damages on account of
the alleged reputational harm caused by them to the alleged groper. On
September 29 this year, FIRs were registered against them under section 20 of
the Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act, 2016.
The women
have either left the country, capitulated and sought pardon, or have obtained
bail in order to retain their freedom and dignity as the accused in a criminal
trial. A successful defence in the trial would require them to establish
through evidence beyond reasonable doubt that the alleged harassment did indeed
occur.
Defence of
the civil action for damages also places on Ms Shafi the burden of proving the
allegations made through evidence that satisfies the lower, but still onerous,
evidentiary threshold of balance of probabilities. The situation is grim.
Prospects
for the abused will remain bleak until the burden of proof is re-balanced
between the accuser and the accused in matters of sexual harassment, and
criminal defamation is removed as a threat to those speaking out.
Circumstances
are bleaker for another set of victims. Children inappropriately touched, often
for years, by relatives and tutors abound around us – scarred psyches and small
voices muzzled by a mist of denial. Much before the law – defective as it might
be – can be invoked, the awareness and courage to call out a predator is
needed. Children need that awareness and overcoming of guilt to be instilled in
them. Societal taboos are letting them down. Efforts to have awareness about
sexual abuse included in school curricula have met with outrage.
Are our
women and children to be restored their voices? In the season for grand
dialogues, do we have an ear for such things?
https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/764349-suppressed-voices-grand-dialogues
------
Hindutva
Federalism
By
A.G. Noorani
26 Dec 2020
INDIA’S
constitution is not federal with unitary features but unitary with federal
features, a British constitutional lawyer remarked. But that was shortly after
it came into force in 1950. Now that judgement stands validated. After the Modi
government came to power in May 2014, it is the unitary not federal features
that have assumed greater force.
The reasons
are largely but not entirely constitutional, though the constitution itself
paved the way for its own distortion. The union wields vast powers over the
states. The centre appoints their governors, mostly without consultation. The
union could oust the state government and take over their administration.
Constitutional amendments made matters worse. Law and order is an exclusively
state subject. But this was whittled down by an amendment empowering the centre
to deploy emergency paramilitary forces in states ‘in aid of the civil power’
even without state consent. The centre enjoys wide powers of giving states ‘directives’.
By and
large, the supreme court’s rulings were in favour of the centre. But in 1994,
it imposed strong curbs on the centre’s power to impose direct rule, ie
‘president’s rule’. The court ruled that it had the power to summon and see the
material on the basis of which central rule was imposed.
But the
governor is an anachronism unknown to most other federations. Appointed by the
centre, he can hold office for life. He is not removable by state law, even on
grounds of proven misbehaviour. A hostile centre can keep him in office as long
as it wishes.
Indira
Gandhi appointed a commission on centre-state relations chaired by Justice R.S.
Sarkaria who had by then lived up to his name. He had been used to ‘fix’ Tamil
Nadu chief minister M. Karunanidhi, and was later appointed chairman of the
Press Council of India, a reliable favourite. His colleagues on the commission
were both ‘reliable’ bureaucrats. V.P. Singh appointed an inter-state council,
only to let it wither on the vane.
One
academic recently noted, “Having persuaded states to give up their
constitutionally-mandated taxing powers … with the promise that their revenue
shortfall will be made good, the centre has now coolly reneged on that promise.
… Education … is in the concurrent list; but the centre has recently come out
with a new education policy, without any consultation…. Agriculture belongs to
the state list; and yet the centre has just rushed three bills through
parliament….
“…[Any]
state can cease to exist as a state and can be carved up into any number of
fragments any time, by placing it under governor’s rule, and taking the consent
of the governor who is handpicked by the centre as being legally equivalent to
the consent of the state legislature. When the very existence of a state becomes
a matter of central discretion, a substantial step has been taken towards a
unitary state. Converting India into a de facto unitary state is the agenda of
both the Hindutva forces and the corporate-financial oligarchy integrated with
globalised finance capital; it constitutes therefore a prominent element on the
common agenda of the corporate-Hindutva alliance that is currently dominating
Indian politics.”
The Modi
government has accelerated an old process and inspired it with the Hindutva
ethos. The Jan Sangh and its successor BJP never felt comfortable with the
concept of federalism.
But then,
not one prime minister, regardless of political affiliation, was known for
empathy towards the states. That includes Jawaharlal Nehru, who had decided on
a planning commission in 1949 even as the constitution was being drafted, but
refused to give it any constitutional status. States rushed to it for
allocation of funds; the centre’s power increased. Governors loyal to New
Delhi began throwing their weight about. The Sarkaria commission recommended
that no governor belonging to an opposition party should be appointed; all
ignored this. Modi’s regime has gone one better; it chose men hostile to
non-BJP-ruled states who publicly criticise, even demonise, state governments.
The West Bengal governor has begun acting as if he was the chief election
campaigner of the BJP for the state election next year.
There is,
however, a deeper malaise. The parties are centrist by their own constitution
and none hold elections to party posts. Tickets for election to the
legislatures are awarded by party oligarchs. Chief ministers need the approval
of their bosses at the centre to select and remove cabinet colleagues. Chief
ministers cannot recommend dissolving the state assembly without central party
leadership approval. Their own ‘election’ by MLAs is a formality for they were
themselves nominated by the party president in New Delhi. How much can such
chief ministers stand up to the centre for their states’ rights?
India’s
democracy is run by undemocratic political parties, and its federalism is
warped by highly centralised political practices.
-----
A.G.
Noorani is an author and lawyer based in Mumbai.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1597882/hindutva-federalism
-----
Benazir’s
Doctrine
By Mustafa
Abdullah Baloch
December
26, 2020
July 3,
1972 – a historic midsummer day when the Simla Accord was signed between Z A
Bhutto and his Indian counterpart Indra Gandhi. The Accord was a milestone
success of Bhutto, who was accompanied by his young daughter who silently
observed all the negotiation tactics of her father.
Hardly was
she aware that 16 years after the Simla Accord she would be taking oath as
prime minister herself. Benazir Bhutto’s struggle was not easy, facing the
patriarchal political system and merciless dictatorship of Zia who hanged her
father and imposed martial law in the country.
It won’t be
wrong to say that Benazir Bhutto was a born leader, exhibiting all the traits
of leadership which she inherited. This was reflected in her early days at
Oxford. She showed all the signs of leadership since her days in student
politics and an impeccable debating career.
“I never
chose politics, politics chose me” said late Benazir – something Bilawal often
quotes when he is asked by the media about how it feels to be in politics when
he could have easily opted for a safer career. Benazir Bhutto converted the
anger and anguish of her father’s loss into courage and determination; being a
woman, she had to face multiple challenges as all the responsibility of her
father’s party was on her shoulders.
It was not
easy for her to bring the dead body of her younger brother Shahnawaz Bhutto,
who was apparently poisoned in France, just a few years after losing her
father. Both emotionally and practically it was a tough patch for a woman who
was fighting the battle all alone. But her wisdom helped her revamp the party.
The 28-year-old daughter of Bhutto brought together all the mainstream parties
and formed the Movement for Restoration of Democracy (MRD) against Zia. The MRD
gave a tough time to Zia, especially since he got himself elected president in
a dubious manner.
On her
return to Pakistan on April 10, 1986 in Lahore Benazir was welcomed by
millions, said to be the biggest political turnout in the history of Lahore.
She was simply unstoppable; a month later she landed in Karachi and it took
almost eight hours to reach the meeting venue near the Quaid-e-Azam mausoleum
from Karachi airport which otherwise would have been a 15-20-minute drive.
In 1988,
Benazir Bhutto won the general elections and formed the federal government and
became the first woman prime minister of the Muslim world. When she came to
power in 1988, after a prolonged struggle, she opted for democracy and never
believed in revenge against the opposition which had given her and her party a
tough time during Zia’s dictatorship.
The late
Benazir was the only democratic leader who defeated two dictators in her
political career. When Pervez Musharraf was calling the shots, she was in exile
for the second time in her life while her husband was incarcerated in Pakistan
and her party was in opposition – but she flew back to her homeland despite
death threats by militants. Indeed, she was the force behind the revival of
democracy in Pakistan twice; and her iconic personality and charisma brought
attention to Pakistan on international forums.
Looking at
the current scenario in Pakistan, it is need of the hour to form a Truth and
Reconciliation Commission to acknowledge victims of politically motivated persecution.
NAB must be replaced with an independent accountability commission that should
allow zero influence by the sitting government and should investigate any
malpractice impartially. Governance must be improved to help the common
citizen, by giving access to quality social services like education, health,
employment. Some of these points are also mentioned in the Charter of
Democracy.
Democracy
is facing turmoil in Pakistan where the opposition is being suppressed, the
economy squeezed and the buying power of the people being crushed with rising
inflation and weak governance. One thing Imran Khan must learn from history is
that those who make peaceful revolution impossible, they make violent
revolution inevitable.
Pakistan is
asking for a leader like Shaheed Benazir Bhutto who could rescue the nation.
The Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) has challenged Imran Khan over his
incompetence and vengeful politics. The PDM must be taking inspiration from
Benazir Bhutto who stood firm against tyranny twice.
“Democracy
is the best revenge” – Benazir’s motto was for the larger interest of the
country. She never resorted to vengeful politics but rather believed in
inclusivity. She believed in an egalitarian Pakistan.
Today,
Pakistan is experiencing economic crunch and political polarization,
exacerbated by Imran Khan – but can the country afford this misadventure? For
that, one would have to revisit history, which shows that there is only one way
towards stability: by adopting Benazir’s Doctrine for a peaceful, non-polarized
and economically stable Pakistan where political dissent is faced in a
democratic way keeping personal differences aside.
Today when
Zia, Musharraf and Ishaq Khan are irrelevant, the doctrine of Shaheed Benazir
Bhutto still continues to emerge as a beacon of hope for a better, brighter and
tolerant Pakistan.
https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/764352-benazir-s-doctrine
-----
URL: https://newageislam.com/pakistan-press/pakistan-press-eu-disinfolab,-benazir’s/d/123882
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