Dawn.com: by Zubeida Mustafa.
Jinnah, it seems, did not envisage Pakistan as a state exclusively for Muslims — especially those of a particular sect. Had he done so he would have been trapped in a futile debate on semantics.
Admittedly, he spoke of following Islamic principles, though in a broad sense. Jinnah, who spoke of justice and fairness and had a very secular lifestyle, would have found it unbelievable that anyone could arrogate to himself the right to sit in judgment on the religious beliefs of another person irrespective of his sect or faith.
Against this backdrop, when I read Qasim Rashid’s book on the Ahmadi community, An Untold Story of Persecution and Perseverance, I felt a deep sense of anguish. I also felt a sense of profound loss.
ANNIVERSARIES are a time for reflection. And if they are also marked with celebration, the idea is to reaffirm the spirit of the event that is being commemorated. That is what Pakistan’s independence day anniversary means to most of us.
There would be barely two million people left in Pakistan who would have any memory of the partition of India. Those who were old enough in 1947 to comprehend what was happening would be even fewer. Soon those who were witness to this momentous event will be gone and partition will live only in history books. Given our distorted historiography our progeny may never learn the truth.
I was too young to understand the wider implications of the political events of 1947. But I could feel the excitement of living in a new country in a state of fear generated by the bloodletting. There was, however, no sense of the ‘other’ who had to be hated and destroyed. The massacre that accompanied the events of 1947 had more of a political dimension than a religious one.
