Statecraft | China, England, France
Democracy in Pakistan
One needs to have no major [undergraduate] in Political Science, Sociology, Public Administration etc. to conclude that The Islamic Republic of Pakistan is purely a kleptocratic oligarchy. With the budget 2024–25, presented by the ‘elected’ coterie in power one does not have to look into the different phases of the country’s history, for the conclusion.
With the Indian elections concluded last week, albeit returning Modi with a third term, the Indian voters can rightly be proud of making an indelible dent in the right-wing philosophy of BJP & RSS.
Electioneering has not improved in Pakistan since 1990, which were held after the dismissal of the Benazir Bhutto Government by President Ghulam Ishaq Khan, employing Clause 58 ii (b) of the Constitution’s eighth amendment, enacted by a Parliament, which was created by the Martial Law regime of Gen. Zia ul Haq in 1985, with a party less election.
Pakistan never tasted democracy, even during the days of Jinnah and Liaquat. The former was an autocratic dictator [albeit ensuring prior legality of his actions] while the later was a Nawab, who left his estate in India, and was devoid of a national vision, with a conviction that all Muslims speak ‘Urdu’ in South Asia.
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Pakistani Rulers as Bandits & Warlords
The progeny of the 1985 clique still forms the core of our ruling elite, supplemented by army generals, who are obsessed with promotions and tenure extensions, the land-owning feudal, the tax-evading industrialists, and last but not least, the nouveau riche; the collective of which has been successful in siphoning off billions of dollars for investment in private properties, private islands, and offshore funds.
Dubai leaks revealed that Pakistanis own properties in Dubai [alone] valued at over USD 12 billion. No numbers are available for Australia, UK, and France.
A few days after presentation of Federal Budget 2024–25, NEPRA raised electricity tariffs by 20%. This is to compensate the IPPs and Distribution Companies for their inefficiency and theft, which the government has been unable to control since 1994.
In 1994 the decision was taken to privatize thermal power generation and unbundle WAPDA [Water and Power Development Authority]. These two moves by an elected government [PPP/Benazir] could not even be reversed, by the military regime of Gen Pervez Musharraf, given the power of the influential oligarchy in Pakistan. With his dubious sense of sincerity, he had joined them. [Musharraf & family have the distinction of making investments in Dubai real estate.] Needless to add that both these decisions in cascade have played havoc with the country’s economy.
Notwithstanding our general lack of historical knowledge, some people are aware of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre of 1919, at Amritsar in which British army opened fire on a festive congregation shooting dead reportedly 1500 innocent people. Few may be aware of the British shooting down hundreds of protesters at the Qissa Khawni Bazar in 1930 CE.
However, hardly anyone today is aware of the brutal massacre of allegedly 600 Pakistanis by the Government of N.W.F.P. at Babrra, near Peshawar, by the Chief Minister appointed by Jinnah, Khan Abdul Qayyum Khan. It happened only a few days before the first independence day celebrations ofin 1948 CE. He was such an evil manipulator, that he was a part of PPP Federal Cabinet in the early 1971. Initially a die hard Congressite, he joined the Muslim League after getting some foresight.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babrra_massacre
A week after independence Jinnah had managed to dismiss the elected government of N.W.F.P. and install Khan as its Chief minister. His rule was brutal. He was perhaps the only known author who proscribed his own book, which he had written against Jinnah and Muslim League, while he was member of the Indian National Congress.
This sole example is sufficient to elaborate that nothing was right in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan from day one, or even day one minus one decade. Here I am referring to the unholy alliance that Jinnah made with the clergy, peers and sajjada nasheens of The Punjab, to contest the 1945–46 elections. The blood bath that Punjab went through in 1947 had its roots in the employment of religion in politics, other than greed.
The firing on protesting student near Dacca Medical College on February 21, 1952, killed 19 persons, not four, as reported by the government. This incident became the foundation for the struggle for an independent Bangladesh.
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Statecraft
During the last ten thousand years of known history, humankind has experienced the age of hunter-gatherers, pastoral nomads, agriculture settlements, tribal hierarchy, fiefdoms, kingdoms, empires, superpowers, and recently nation states and democracy.
Contrary to popular belief democracy, a modern notion is much more than the concept of bringing in a set of rulers for a fixed period [say five years] and leaving things to them, because they are elected and have the right to rule representing the voters.
Democracy which developed during the last few hundred years, abhors absolute power. Powers are separated, usually in the institutions of the Legislature, Executive, and the Judiciary. Check and balance are enshrined in the core democratic philosophy.
State and Government are not the same. Governments come and go but a State endures. Laws do not change with the taking over of a different government, notwithstanding that the tyranny of the majority often breaks the rule.
While a government may be formed in a span of weeks a State takes decades to mature. Inbuilt into the concept of State is the ‘Rule of Law’ and ‘Political Accountability’.
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China
China emerged as the world's first nation state in 221 BCE under the Qin dynasty [‘chin’, as in English]. The emergence of Imperial China was a result of three centuries of wars among six domains/factions in China. The process was extremely destructive and bloody. With 12 ruling dynasties thereafter, Imperial China endured for more than two thousand years.
Numerous inventions come from China. They include silk, paper, magnetic compass, and gunpowder. However, the greatest innovation which the Chinese Emperors introduced was a civil service based on merit.
The ‘Imperial Examinations’ was the norm for selecting entrants into the Chinese State bureaucracy, where there was no bar or precondition of birth or ancestry to take the examinations. Once a year, the aspirants from all over the country, were locked up in a room with food for three days, to express their ability in Chinese classics.
The concept was replicated much later by France in the Napoleonic era, Prussia, and Britain.
China remained an isolated albeit rich Imperium until its decline, starting from the mid- seventeenth century, under the Qing dynasty. By the nineteenth century most of its Pacific coast was occupied by European powers and the British East India Company was selling Opium to China. Resistance to buy opium resulted in two wars.
China became a republic in 1911 but the conditions did not improve. Japan captured the Northern province of Manchuria in 1931, and in 1937 invaded Southward to practically grab most of the populated areas of China. The nationalist government also faced a communist uprising under the leadership of Mao Tse Tung. The latter succeeded with the emergence of The Peoples Republic of China in October 1949.
Millions died as a result of the Japanese colonization, civil war, and the several [inhumane] initiatives after 1949, by Mao Tse Tung to turn the country around. [e.g. The Great Leap Forward, The Cultural Revolution.] PRC remained an ostracized nation until US President Nixon’s historic visit to China in 1972.
China changed after the death of Mao Tse Tung in 1976 when Den Xiaoping took over the leadership of the Communist Party of China. He crushed dissent and established a system where the political order would remain firmly with CPC, while the economy would be based on capitalism.
Today China is the World’s second largest economy after USA, and number one in purchase power parity.
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England
Despite the restrictions placed on arbitrarily taxing the masses, on King John of England by the English nobles [Parliamentarians] with the signing of the Magna Carta in 1215, the general conditions for the common man in England were not very different from that of continental Europe. [Dicken’s England]
However, England had some advantages at the root level. Unlike Europe, where the law was ‘codified’ the English law corpus developed from precedents. i.e. It was the Judge at the lowest level who decided what was right in a dispute. He had the benefit of the local customs, traditions, and situations. Corpus of such Judgements founded the concept of ‘Common Law’.
Several Law ‘codes’ are well known. That from Hammurabi [Babylon, 1750 BCE], Cyrus [Persia, 530 BCE], and Justinian [Constantinople, 527 CE]. After the French Revolution [1789] Napolean gave his own ‘code’ to France, which formed an important element in France's emerging as a modern state.
England went to civil war during 1642–51 as a result of which the King, Charles I was beheaded. The army against the King’s forces was led by a Parliamentarian, Oliver Cromwell, who ruled as Lord Protector of the Commonwealth. Cromwell died in 1658 and the reluctant brother of the executed king, Charles II, was restored to the monarchy in 1660.
The legacy of Cromwell is debated. To some, he was a military dictator [Winston Churchill], to others [Thomas Carlyle] he was a hero of liberty.
The year 1688 marks another point of inflection in English history when the [Stuart] King James VII [Catholic] was replaced by his Protestant daughter, Mary, and her Dutch husband William of Orange. When the Royal couple sailed from the Netherlands to England in 1689, they were accompanied by John Locke [1632–1704 |philosopher, physician, and considered the father of liberalism].
The rest is history!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Locke
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France
When the great statesman of China, Chu en Lai was asked about his views on the French Revolution he said, it was too early to comment.
He had hit the nail on its head. The storming of the Bastille on July 14, 1789, was not a coup d’etat that changed France overnight. Stability was not achieved until the establishment of the Fifth French Republic under Charles De Gaulle in 1958.
The fall of Bastille was followed by chaos, terror, introduction of Guillotine, and beheading of tens of thousands, until a pause when France embraced monarchy again in 1799. Emperor Napolean Bonaparte was not a Bourbon royal, not even a French, but a Corsican who had joined the French army as an artillery officer. His dint of military genius propelled him to command the French Army.
His coronation ceremony was interesting. He crowned himself as the French Emperor on December 02, 1804, at the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris. He did not allow the Pope to place the Crown on his head. He took the Crown from the Pope’s hand and put it in his head. An impressive painting depicting the ceremony is displayed in Louvres [9.8 m x 6.2 m].
Napolean is well known for his bloody wars against the contemporary European monarchies including Austria, Prussia, and Tsarist Russia. He was finally defeated at Waterloo by a combined Anglo-Prussian Army in 1815. Exiled to the remote Atlantic Island of St. Helena, he died in 1821.
More lasting have been the reforms he carried out in post-Bastille France. They includ enforcement of the Napoleonic Code, establishing Educational Institutions for training of technocrats and civil servants, and creating a civil service based on merit.
Public offices in Europe were generally a privilege of birth. The appointment was made by the king or Emperor. In pre-revolution France, such positions were sold by public auction to the highest bidder. The positions bought were often hereditary.
A similar mode of sale prevails in Pakistan although it inherited one of the finest civil services ever created, from the Raj at independence. France was completely bankrupt when the Sun King Louis XIV died [r. 1643–1715]. His successors resorted to increasing taxes on the commoners and selling public offices. Pakistan is following the historic example, oblivious that a great revolution had erupted in recent history as a result of such one-sided measures.
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The Mughals in India
Historically the Mughal rule in India lasted between 1526 and 1857, however at its zenith, it was between 1556 and 1707. This one and a half century was presided over by four Mughal Emperors: Akbar, Jehangir, Shahjahan and Aurangzeb. India produced one-fourth of global wealth and these four royal houses were the richest in the world. The suzerainty of the empire under Akbar and Aurangzeb extended to almost the entire Indian subcontinent, including parts of Afghanistan.
Such a vast empire required a state machine that was in place, but not institutionalized. The administrative system was based on patronage, which was called Mansabdari [Positions]. Mansabdars were appointed by the emperor and served at his pleasure. The estate awarded to them was not hereditary. It was confiscated on their demise, or at the displeasure of the emperor.
It was quite natural that the system was ab initio extractive. The Mansabdars generally squeezed their serfs and had little interest in investing in the infrastructure of their estates [Jagirs], due to the uncertainty of their own existence.
The highest ranking Mansabdar was the Hafthazari, who was required to maintain a cavalry of seven thousand mounts. The Mansabdars, big or small were Kings in their domain. They could levy taxes and dispense justice. They were also military commanders. With the exception of an intelligence system that sent notes directly to the emperor’s court, there was no visible check of balance in administration. The Mughal administration was therefore extractive, and the common man was no better than a contemporary Russian serf.
The Mughal legacy exists in their opulence, architecture, paintings, attire, perfumes and cuisines. The buildings they left behind were not public, with the exception of mosques. They invested in iconic forts, gardens, and mausoleums, the most famous of them being The Taj Mahal, for their own rest and recreation. They built mausoleums for their pets too.
Unfortunately, their legacy is devoid of any academic or innovative scientific pursuits.
The house of Mughals fell like a house of cards with the death of Aurangzeb in 1707, who spent 29 out of 49 years of his reign, fighting the Marathas, and the Muslim [Shia] kingdoms of South Asia.
It is unfortunate that the other two contemporary Muslim empires, The Safavids, and The Ottomans shunned from embracing scientific discoveries and industrial innovations, and consequently perished in due course.
‘Tumhari dastaan tak bhi na ho gi dasttano mey’.
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Ahmed, Ishtiaq | Punjab Bloodied, Partitioned and Cleansed | Oxford University Press, Pakistan | 2012 | ISBN 978–0–19–940028–7
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Dickens, Charles | Oliver Twist, A Tale of Two Cities
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Hasan, Syed Sibte |Pakistan Mey Tahzeeb ka Itriqa
Niaz, Ilhan | The Culture of Power and Governance of Pakistan 1947–2008 | Oxford University Press, Pakistan | 2010 | ISBN 978–0–19–547731–3
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Sehgal, Ikram & Robotka, Bettina | Blood over Different Shades of Green |Oxford University Press, Pakistan | 2020 | ISBN 978–0–19–070227–4
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MSJ | Karachi | June 17, 2024
