Away from the lunatic fringe
Is there a connection between the absence of madressahs and guns and that of violence in the public sphere? The election campaign’s images coming out of Gilgit-Baltistan are just old world enthralling. The region is set to go to the polls on Nov 12, and big and small leaders of political parties like the PPP, the PML-N and –Q, the MQM and others have been holding mammoth election rallies throughout the region. Conspicuous by its absence from the scene is the self-righteous religious brigade comprising the erstwhile MMA, the short-lived conglomerate of six religious parties, which was the creation of the Musharraf enterprise.
The national and local leaders addressing the rallies do not seem to have an overbearing presence of security cordons around them. They are seen holding forth from behind an old-fashioned podium without the bullet proof glass to protect them from a potential terrorist. This is old world Pakistan, if anyone’s memory serves them right. My friend and a fellow blogger, Nadeem F. Paracha, keeps telling us that it was a religious right’s student wing that first brought violence to campuses in Pakistan back in the 1960s.
Now seeing the absence of such elements from the election campaign in Gilgit-Baltistan, I am finally waking up to the potency of his claim. There are no firearms, hence no aerial firing and no overbearing personal security guards protecting the leaders who have converged on the region to lead their supporters.
Likewise, the religious lexicon of the political debate that is now so common in politics in the rest of the country is also missing. Instead, the leaders have chosen to talk about the underdeveloped and for long neglected region’s real issues that affect the people’s everyday lives. This makes you marvel at how the same agenda gets subverted by an overdose of religious sentiment that directly links up with anti-Americanism and the many conspiracy theories about an Israel-US-India nexus trying to push Pakistan and its nuclear programme into an abyss, when the same leaders address Pakistanis elsewhere. You also wonder that if they can keep their sanity in Gilgit-Baltistan, why can’t they do the same everywhere else. Is it the mullahs, with their obscurantist, xenophobic rhetoric, who subvert the entire democratic debate by pushing the secular parties to dragging religion into everything they have to say? Are the politicians also so gullible?
I am reminded of the poet Iqbal who composed a beautiful poem on the subject. It starts with a scene in the presence of God who has just ordered a mullah to be taken to paradise. The poet marvels at the decision, unable to understand what the mullah will do in paradise. The punch line verse I am referring to runs thus: Hai bad-amoozi-i-aqwaam o melel kaam iss ka; aur jannat mein na masjid na kalisa na kunisht (His job is to malign and pit peoples and nations against one another; and paradise has no mosque, no church, no temple). And given its natural splendour, Gilgit-Baltistan is paradise no less.
It is also paradise because of the absence of the freak turf war between religious parties. Time was under General Zia’s rule when sectarian and born-again Islamic parties had tried to bulldoze their agenda of an intolerant, extremist creed into the region, which has a majority non-Sunni population. Entire villages were attacked in the dead of the night by armed lashkars in the Gilgit area; the assailants woke you up from sleep and demanded you recite the kalema, as they told you, or face the sword. Dozens died in the assaults; many were even burnt alive. But then that wave of terror subsided as government ensured that such people were not allowed entry into Gilgit-Baltistan.
The indigenous people in the region comprise speakers of several languages and practice four wider faiths. There are the Shina speakers in Gilgit proper, Burushaski speakers in Hunza, Nagar and Gojal, Wakhi speakers in the upper Hunza valley, and then the mainstream Balti speakers spread across Baltistan. There are Ismailis, Twelver Shias, the followers of Noor Bakhsh (a halfway house between Twelver Shia and the Barelvi school of Sunni thought), and a sprinkling of mainstream Sunnis. They have lived peacefully in the region for centuries, even practicing inter-faith marriages. If there’s one place in Pakistan where Islam is in no danger, it is Gilgit-Baltistan; hence the absence of the self-styled defenders of the faith there.
The few small seminaries there are in the region remain the poor man’s innocuous neighbourhood madressahs that teach the children how to read the Quran and little else besides.
There are no petro-dollar grants coming in from the Gulf countries to support them nor is there a beeline of pushy mullahs to get government grants from the Auqaf Department.
Religion retains its pristine spiritual beauty and simplicity, which was the norm across Pakistan until the 1970s, despite the religious parties which had started flexing their muscles for public mind and space in the 1960s, but nothing beyond that.
The Aga Khan Foundation has done wonders over the years to make basic amenities available to people across the region, even in the vast areas that do not have Ismaili population. Water and sanitation works, the building of tertiary roads, education, healthcare centres and vocational institutes are the sectors where co-operative rather than competitive module of development has been applied, and the results are showing. It is now up to the government to build on the basic spade work that has already been done there.
The absence of coercion and xenophobia — that have come to define life in the rest of the country — makes Gilgit-Baltistan a refreshing exception, and a model for the rest of the country to follow. It is hoped that the election to the Gilgit-Baltistan legislative assembly will also lead to the people of this region acquiring representation in Pakistan’s parliament.
Even more so, it is also hoped that Gilgit-Baltistan will retain and strengthen their own people’s culture of tolerance and acceptance of diversity, and not fall for jingoistic and obscurantist rhetoric of safeguarding the country’s ideological frontiers and the like, which some politicians having sympathies elsewhere may try to dupe them with. That’s definitely not the way to go.
Murtaza Razvi is Editor, Magazines, of Dawn.
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Let’s thank Mr Razvi for taking out the time to write about Gilgit-Baltistan. For those who have heard little about the region, its a an informative article.
Having said that and being a native, I think the picture he paints is very rosy. The rampage of Gilgit suburbs by Afghani militia in 1988 mentioned by the writer was the beginning of sectarianism here. Interfaith marriages and sectarian harmony was exemplary before that incident.
But the area has its share of extremists and religious lunatics. Though they may not be so visible for the outside world, the elections had “religious” constituencies. For example, the vote-bank in GBLA 1 and GBLA 2 is purely religious. Just before the elections, the Shia and Sunni mosques openly declared their support for the respective contenders! Its just one example of the sectarian divide that exists in today’s Gilgit Baltistan society. Its this context that the comments of my fellow native Mr Noor Muhammad must be read here above.
The need of the hour is sensitize the masses about their own people. Falling back of Mullahs on important issues and making the mosques stakeholders in important decisions has empowered the low-lying religious fanatics. This trend must be discouraged now that people have chosen their representatives.
Keeping this in mind, if you look at the media then you tend to question that why is the media trying to show all these gruesome pictures which they take after a suicide bomb blast takes place? Are they trying to cause awareness or cause a mass amount of helpless frustration in the Pakistani society? Furthermore do they not realize what kind of a global impact can this have on our country?
Well written based on facts!!!
The article is a hodgepodge of author’s opinions. It’s short on facts, and lacks critical and analytical analyses.
I visited this area many years ago and also had friends belong to this area.
I fully agree with Mr. Murtaza that there is no Mullah no fight. I also advise
native people to watch carefully about new madressh opening and who is and what is teaching and who is given them money. Whole country destroyed by these so called Islamist and same jihadist now killing own people in the name of Islam.
Gilgit is originally, a very peaceful area. People from other areas did try to spoil the peaceful environment of the area, thank God they could not wield much success.
Thanks to Mr. Rizvi for disclosing such a realistic and highly valuable prospect of Gilgit-Baltistan. Decades ago, with the so-called religious dictator ignited the sectarian based clashes among Gilgit-Baltistan masses, but thanks to our deeper and sedimented cultural values, which shielded from the damage to our pluralistic society. The relations among Gilgit-Baltistan adobes are more above the religious diversity.
What I’m trying to say is all we need are bigger hearts and tolerant minds to end the hate and accept one another, live and let live. Every sect, every religion is preaching for the positive factors of human beings, but in our country religion has been used as a tool of self dominancy, for a sustained influence and political objectives, which is incorrect.
Being a native of that area i can submit following things.
The attitude, culture and life style of these people is very very peaceful. In my life time of around 40 years, I have yet to hear a case of robbery, seldom a case of theft, a limited accounts of murders, no rape, no mugging, no nothing. The crime rate is a virtual zero.
There had been a very little violence in the area. Until sectarianism was introduced by great Zia ul Haq. However majority of incidents involved pathans and afghani molvies coming and inciting in the name of religion. Majority of people still live peacefully, believe in respecting each others faith.
Finally there is a genuine happiness in Gilgit Baltistan for the latest status given by the govt.
I am from india and come in contact with people of different faiths. The common thing which is noticed by me when we interact amongst ourselves is that all human beings are basically good and warm hearted. And i met Pakistani friends in Uk who were equally warm hearted.
When we observe the core principles of any religion they talk of love, universal brotherhood, compassion, non violence, charity etc. I have a suspicion that religious preachers do not highlight what is positive in their religion because common man will get up and say that other religions are also talking about the same thoughts and he would go and attend other congregations also. The power of the religious preacher gets diminished. Inorder to keep the flock in his congregation he would say how he is superior than other religions and how other religions are inferior. Power and money can be retained with the preachers only by creating hatred for others. Common man should understand this strategy of religious preachers and regain his freedom and goodness which God has blessed him with.
Thanks to Murtaza Rizvi for writing such a nice article.
We should apply this to the rest of Pakistan and it means the closure of all Madressahs and converting them to centres of eductaion with a carriculam approved by the Govt of Pakistan, banning the religious parties from politics and seek the help of Institutions like the The Aga Khan Foundation to play a role in National development.
I really appreciate the views of the author and his understanding of the real faith which teaches good virtues, compassion, and common humanity. God bless all and Peace.
Thanks to Murtaza Rizvi for writing such a nice article.
Sir, I wonder if any of the mullahs that you’ve referred to, can read and understand it. Many of us know that academic qualification of these mullahs sitting in the national assembly is not high. An attempt was made in the past to bring the minimum required education to BA in-order to participate in the national elections. Obviously, it was strongly opposed by all mullahs and as usual, government had to step back.
I totally agree with you when you say that religious extremism was initiated by Zia ul Haq and funded by some countries, for reasons I don’t want to evoke here. Question here is what have we achieved since then? Has there been any social progress in our country? Do we understand more about our religion? Have we improved the image of our country in the west? Zia ul Haq had thrown us into this infernal cycle of sectarian problems and we are still struggling to save whatever can be saved. Musharaf tried to crush this phenomena and he was partially successful in crushing a major sectarian movement but could not eradicate it. Now when we talk about talibans, to me, there is no doubt it is the rest of the same notorious sectarian movement that assassinated many scholars over a decade and perpetrated bomb blasts in Mosques and Imambargahs.
I’ve had the chance to travel many a times to all these beautiful northern areas and I can confirm your point of view regarding religious tolerance over there. Let us hope these Mullahs will never reach these northern highlands. We don’t want these areas be polluted by these Mullahs.
I’m really pleased to have read such a nice article after a long time (though I find you timid on certain issues). I encourage you with all my force to continue your efforts in this direction. Never hesitate in pointing your finger to what you consider wrong. I also read regularly Nadeem Paracha’s articles. He has his own style, which I like it.
Yes I love my country. Yes Pakistan is my identity. I don’t want to lose my identity as without identity, people or populations are condemned to disappear.
God bless you for this nice work
God bless our country Pakistan.
Kind regards
Asad
Nice to read about that there is some tolerance in our society but we have to be careful that we should not neglect the rights of gilgitites because this is the basis of all menace and intolereance.
There is still HOPE for Pakistan.
Gilgit-Baltistan — a paradise of Tolerance and Diversity.
Why doesn’t the rest of Pakistan migrate to Gilgit-Baltistan?
No there is no connection between the two. The reason that arms and ammunition are uncommon in the election rallies in the Gilgit-Baltistan area stems from their culture, political values, centuries old traditions, precedents and history – to say the least.
The reason why MMA is missing from campaigning and not holding election rallies over there while other political parties are trying to make their presence felt is simple and straight forward – MMA is no more a political party and as stated many times by its ex ‘movers and shakers’ the alliance is almost dead like PNA of the 1970s and IDA of the 1980s.
There are sectarian problems also in Gilgit Balitistan at times between Sunni and Shia. This has flared up several times causing one group or another to flee. There have been bombings and deaths on many occasions between these groups. Also there are many who distrust the work of the NGOs there who are giving preference to one group over another. You seem to mistake the lesser degree of violence In Gilgit Baltistan with greater tolerance. The truth is that there is a smaller population there compared to more densely populated parts of Pakistan. Otherwise the scourge of sectarianism is there too.
The presence of madressahs is not the problem. The problem is the absence of science and arts and literature.
very interesting to read that all is well in gilgit and baltistan. In fact when i was born in kashmir and brought up there, my mother and sisters never used to travel standing in a bus, they always had a seat for them. kashmir was all about education, most of us aspired to become doctors or engineers,and religion was not a barrier.
Well lets hope that this peace of heaven remains and out lasts the war and hatred and serves as a hope- raiser for people like me who have no idea where we are heading.
I guess what I’m trying to say is all we need are bigger hearts and tolerant minds to end the hate and accept one another? and live and let live?
Thanks for writing this article; takes me back to my younger days in Pakistan, and how blissful they were without the forced religiosity that many have imported into Pakistan. However, the genie is now out of the bag, and refuses to go back in. How long before the bliss that you describe in Gilgit/Baltistan is shattered by the arrival of the Demons?
Thank you Mr. Razvi for an eloquent analysis. Having lived the latter parts of the 60s in Pakistan I recognise the Gilgit atmosphere, then prevailing in most of the country. It is deplorable that some used religion as a tool. Hope many of the young generation will read your article and contemplate over a possible option to the current state.
It is a good effort to write for the people of Gilgit Baltistan. As the elections for NALC is going to be held on 12th November, so, now a days, the media and the politicians are focusing this region, and trying to address the social and economic grievances(and their sympathies as well) of the indigenous people. My question is that why we people always try to focus on such issues in extreme cases? Why don’t we focus every region and their issues periodically, so that people at least think that the nation and its supporting pillars are giving them due importance. Media is one of the key opinion builders of the nation, and it has the power to transform the government decisions, so please highlight such issues periodically which would be an eye-opener for our rulers and the ruled.
Regards
I partially agree with the writer, being a resident of Gilgit – Baltistan.
Just a minor clarification, Gojal and “upper Hunza” are the same. Besides, Shina speakers are also living in Ghizar, Diamir, Hunza – Nagar and Astore Districts. Similarly, Wakhi speakers are also living in parts of Ghizar district. Further, there is a sizable number of people who speak Khowar (Chitrali) language in Ghizar district.
What I don’t agree with is the rosy, non-sectarian, vibes coming out of this otherwise well written piece.
Fact of the matter is that in order to win, candidates have to be backed by this or that “Masjid Committee” in various parts of the region.
The aftermath of 1988’s sectarian incursion is continuous mistrust and frequent sectarian tussles between the Shia and Sunni populations.
In 2005 schools and colleges remained closed for months in Gilgit city, capital of the unique political construct christened “Gilgit – Baltistan”, due to broad daylight murder of a Shia leader and the resulting target killings!
Very recently, just after announcing the much touted “empowerment” eyewash for the region, a series of sectarian killings took tens of lives in Gilgit city!
Yes, the leaders don’t need bullet and bomb proof podiums to save their lives. But the psychological and economic cost of continuous sectarian strife can not be downplayed, in this land of beauty!
Jai Ho, PEOPLE of Gilgit-Baltistan.
Agree with you. Wow! what a thrill.
Democracy = Excitement about unfulfilled potential of ALL the People.
Borders were made by peoples, who did not care about ordinary people like me.
INDIVIDUALS have HUMAN RIGHTS, not ANY religion.
Jai Ho, PEOPLE of Gilgit-Baltistan. More power to you.
Chithra KarunaKaran
City University of New York.
Indeed, the people of Gilgit Baltistan and Skardu have now accepted that they have been cheated by the National political parties in the past.
I was in Hunza, trying to figure out how i could possibly help the people there with homeopathy when i heard that BB’s 1st govt had fallen. I immediately changed my plans and began a four day journey to Karachi.
That was my fourth and last visit to Northern Pakistan. There is much that i am a witness to. During those four visits i was already able to sense the origins of the ‘lunatic fringe’ this article is referring to.