What if Pakistan never existed?
One of the things that is still highly prevalent in the Muslim world, is national pride.
Maybe it is a human nature thing, tribalism and all that — and hence why it was so easy for the British to divide and conquer as it spoke to the hearts. But Islam has always been about the collective over the individual.
But what is the overall impact of such beliefs? Is it harmless or does it have strategic bigger picture implications? Let’s compare two countries, Pakistan and Turkey, and their founding fathers, Mohammad Ali Jinnah and Kemal Ataturk. Were they good and did they do the right thing overall?
Ask any proud Turk or any proud Pakistani and they will never hear a bad word said against either of them. Some of that may be conditioning — if you grew up being taught that these were fathers of the nation, national heroes, leaders, etc it’s hard to think of anything other than that in your later years. Even if you learn the truth, it will still be, oh, everyone has faults but he still did this for our people. It’s why Winston Churchill is considered a hero by people in the UK, because he led them to victory in WWII even though it is pretty widely known he was an abhorrent individual.
As I am of Pakistani origin myself, it is a good example to look at to understand the wider point I am getting to. Every Pakistani loves Jinnah and is proud of Pakistan, our own Muslim state, founded upon Islam etc etc. But has it been actually the best thing for Islam? Are the Muslims as a whole stronger or weaker for Pakistan being created? Ditto Turkey? I would actually argue a whole lot weaker.
Why? If Pakistan was not created — it would just be part of India. Bangladesh naturally would not exist too, as that was borne out of East Pakistan. That means, in the one country of India, you have around 500M-600M Muslims, out of a 1.5bn total population of the three. That is by far the largest population in the world, over double and nearly triple that of the biggest today, of Indonesia. What do you think would then happen, politically?
Let’s say India continued being a democracy. Could the rights of over a third of the voting populace ever be ignored by anyone seeking power in that country? Hence it would be very Muslim friendly — perhaps with Muslims in positions of power even? Certainly not the enemy of Islam as it is today with Modi and BJP. Even if it was overall ruled by Hindus. The population would surpass that of China — and the economy would be boosted significantly. There would less ‘geopolitical’ threat — would the US or Israel really be enemies of the wider India? Or would they try and be allies of such a strong power? How much more productive and efficient could a unified country be? Currently, half of Pakistan’s current energies goes on internal politics, the rest on worrying about India.
It’s almost like the 80/20 rule — if 20% of the global Muslim population are already united and collective as one country, it can act as a very strong base to move forward and achieve. That coupled with what was already a very strong scholarship base (even in the time of the caliphate, Indian scholarship was considered world class and they would frequently convene world conferences to discuss the big issues happening in the Ummah). It’s fair to say the Muslim world would be transformed if this big beast of a nation existed today.
It’s the same with Turkey. I can accept the fact that Turkey itself may be ‘better off’ as its own country, with its own system etc since Ataturk did his shenanigans than they may have been individually during Ottoman rule — but it’s the wrong question to focus on. That question is ego based — me me me. Islam asks us to be empathy based — what is good for the collective. What is better for Islam is the unity, even if it means some sacrifice for the individual.
A good example of seeing this in modern action is the UK and the EU. You can see the damage Brexit is already doing to the UK and it hasn’t even kicked in yet. Eventually the UK will stabilise and may even thrive but Europe will be weaker for it overall and the UK will be insignificant overall.
So, which do you choose? Unity or nationalism? It just depends which team you want to go out to bat for. Just a little food for thought next time you’re cheering your international team in the World Cup…
