Bangladesh’s separation affected the debate around religion in Pakistan in three significant ways: it was a blow to Pakistan’s self-identification as a Muslim homeland, forcing it to seek its raison d’être not in the Two Nation Theory of the Muslim League but the Islamic ideology of those religious parties that had opposed the Muslim League during the Pakistan Movement. It stripped Pakistan of the bulk of its non-Muslim minorities. Finally, it elevated religious parties, particularly Mufti Mahmood and Maulana Maududi, to the status of a national opposition. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and his PPP as the government were forced to coopt their agenda time and again during the next decade as a matter of expediency. The 1973 Constitution thus represented more the compromise between a larger religious opposition and the secular or mainstream parties in Pakistan than what was possible in a united Pakistan.
Yet, while the 1973 Constitution purports to be an Islamic constitution with a state religion and offices of both the president and prime minister reserved for Muslims, it is not technically supposed to be a theocratic constitution for several reasons. Legislation is to be done by parliament that represents the general will of all citizens of Pakistan. The ultimate arbiters of what is Islamic or un-Islamic are the members of this parliament. Laws are to be interpreted by the Supreme Court (SC) and not some religious council. The Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) has an advisory role and not a legislative one. However, the most important reason why it is not supposed to be a theocratic constitution is because it seeks to enable Muslims to live according to Islam and not force them to live according to Islam. Unfortunately, very few lawyers, jurists and members of the religious clergy make that distinction. In practice, therefore, we have converted Pakistan into a theocracy.

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