In its September issue, the well-known Pakistani journal, The Herald, has devoted its cover story to a discussion of various aspects of Islamic fundamentalism in the country which, despite some obvious gaps, is remarkable for its objectivity and grasp.
Though it will be an exaggeration to say that the investigators and commentators have more or less conceded victory to the forces of fundamentalism, they are clearly pessimistic. And it is difficult to fault them. The small group of liberals apart, opponents of fundamentalism can at best seek to circumvent it. They dare not confront it.
To take up first the long-term developments feeding Islamic fundamentalism, there has been a steady decline in the appeal of Sufi mazars (shrines) which are known to have been the dominant influence in the religious lives of people in Punjab and Sind for centuries and a simultaneous rise in the prestige and power of maulvis who in the past were treated as mere retainers by local landlords. Several factors account for this remarkable shift in religious loyalty.
Rural Phenomenon
Personality-based, ecstatic, ritualistic and unpuritanical Sufi Islam of dervishes and maraabouts, as is well known, is essentially a rural phenomenon. It belongs to the oral as opposed to the literate tradition. Inevitably, it has been on the decline all over the Muslim world as urban populations have grown and with it literacy and the appeal of scriptural, puritanical and unitarian Islam. In Pakistan the urban population has increased more than four-fold from 9.6 million in 1961 to 39.12 million in 1991. As a result, even Sufi mazars, have been taken over by the Aukaf department.
A number of semi-urban townships and mandis (trading centres) have arisen as a consequence of billions of dollars that have poured into rural Pakistan by way of remittances from workers in oil-rich Gulf countries in the last two decades. These are bastions of conservatism for they represent a break from the rural ethos; the rural youth in these centres provide ideal material for the mullahs; and upwardly mobile Muslims in Pakistan, as in India and elsewhere, are quick to put their women behind the purdah. The purdah has been the badge of respectability in Islam since its very beginning.
The number of madrasahs (schools of traditional learning where memorisation of the Koran commands top priority) and mosques too have multiplied on account of the munificence of the new rich in search of social status and Allah’s grace, official grants to religious trusts and formation of zakat and ushar committees all over the country during General Zia-ul-Haq’s 11-year long rule. Though the reporters of The Herald rightly attach great importance to growth of madrasahs attached to mosques, they have not provided us figures in respect of such institutions and their students. What a pity!
An Eye Opener
They have, however, provided us a glimpse into the working of Jamiatul Mohsinah (girls) school run by the Jamaat-i-Islami in Karachi which is quite an eye opener. The curriculum is, of course, wholly traditional; the school is secluded; students are discouraged from establishing contacts outside the school; and they are kept under strict supervision. Incidentally, out of 40 students in all, 17 currently come from the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. They are going through a two-year training course so that on ‘returning’ home they can set up similar madrasahs “to incite the people to Jihad” (holy war).
The growth of fundamentalism in Pakistan is, of course, not a sudden development. It is the cumulative result of measures that have been taken, especially since prime minister Bhutto under siege by a ulema-led movement yielded to the clamour to declare the Ahmediyas as non-Muslims, ban liquor shops, close night clubs and change the weekly day of rest from Sunday to Friday. If a retreat from this surrender on the part of the Pakistan government was at all possible, President Zia took steps to make it virtually impossible.
By giving them stipends, President Zia raised the status of mullahs and made it possible for them to challenge the power of landlords. He set up a parallel judiciary consisting of maulvis to try cases involving the Shariat and to decide which laws are, or not, in conformity with it. The Federal Shariat Court’s ruling holding interest on loans and deposits as unlawful in terms of the Shariat is one of the consequences of the new ascendancy of the maulvis. The ruling elite is trying to circumvent it through an appeal to the Supreme Court.
In conformity with his general approach, President Zia enacted the infamous Hudood Ordinance in 1979 whereby the victim of rape is required to provide evidence, failing which she can attract the charge of adultery. And the Qisas and Diyats Ordinance of 1979 goes so far as to restore the old tribal tradition whereby compensation or forgiveness is permitted for even the crime of murder. The payment for a female victim under this ordinance is half of that for a male just as a woman’s evidence is worth half that of a man.
Surely, these measures, clearly abhorrent to modem sensibilities in Pakistan as much as elsewhere, would have been annulled by the popularly elected government of Ms Benazir Bhutto if they did not enjoy widespread support. Apparently they do. Possibly much of the support is negative; the people are afraid of coming out against what is represented as true Islam. On that reckoning, it has to be inferred that proponents of fundamentalism dominate the scene even if this domination is not translated into votes for religious parties at the hustings. Even so the 10 per cent steady vote for the Jamaat-e-Islami cannot be dismissed as inconsequential.
Jihad
The general upsurge of fundamentalism in the Muslim world has understandably strengthened its appeal in Pakistan. But no single external development has been so crucial in this regard as the Pakistan-based jihad against the ‘godless’ communists, Soviet and their local allies, in Kabul. Despite the anti-American sentiment that simmers just below the surface ready to explode, as in 1979 when the US embassy in Islamabad was put on fire by angry mobs, Washington fully supported this jihad. That bought the US a measure of goodwill in Pakistan. But that phase is over. Anti-Americanism is available to fundamentalists as an instrument for whipping up popular passions.
A couple of factors restrain the further upsurge of fundamentalism in Pakistan. One of these is the rise of ethnicity in Sind among the mohajirs as well as the local people; the Jamaat-e-Islami enjoyed powerful support among the Mohajirs up to the eighties when the Mohajir Qaumi Movement (MQM) replaced it on the strength of ethnicity. The other and more important factor is the ruling elite’s dependence on US goodwill, especially in view of its strained relations with India, and consequent refusal to adopt publicly an anti-American stance. But this elite is in no position to mount a liberal anti-fundamentalist platform. It straddles two very different and hostile worlds. It is difficult to say how long this uneasy situation can last.
The Times of India, 19 November 1992