The observance today of the death anniversary of the Father of the Nation, Quaid-e-Azam, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, will serve, as usual, as an occasion to mourn the great loss in the very second year of the independent Muslim State he had helped his people to carve out of the heart of history of the South Asian subcontinent.
Saddening, though, the commemoration has been over decades past, it has been accompanied by a profound sense of admiration and gratitude for his qualities of head and heart and peerless leadership. For not only did he lead the nation to win independence from the British rule, but also provided them with a long evasive opportunity to gain freedom from exploitation at the hands of a revivalist Hindu majority, through an unprecedented democratic revolution in its real sense.
This, of course, was owed primarily to his firm conviction in the worth and value of democratic dispensation in a multi-religious, multi-ethnic and multi-cultural society in this subcontinent. The Muslim masses whole-heartedly responded to his clarion call when they found themselves reduced to a helpless minority even in the areas where they were in majority, and left condemned to live in poverty and ignorance, and deprived of the right to live in dignity.
Needless to point out, their plight was owed to many and varied hostile influences at work, that kept them away even from the spiritual force of their dynamic faith. They were at a loss to find a way out of their ignominy and poverty, that had come to be regarded as their destiny.
Their predicament, though consisting of many causes, had only worsened by incoherent ideas and obscure initiatives of various sections of the self-styled Muslim leadership, with a few noble exceptions. Himself, a staunch advocate of democracy in its real sense, the Quaid chose to lead them out of their plight through an unbeatable constitutional democratic struggle. Democracy he was quick enough to discern was in the very life blood of the Muslims, and this approach instantly appealed to the Muslim masses, as it galvanised them with the right spirit, unlike several obscurantist initiatives the previous generation of political leadership and religious scholars had taken in the name of revival of lost Muslim glory.
Surely, appealing single-mindedly to the sense of worth and value of democracy, he succeeded in arousing the Muslims to fight for their freedom, and thus the earth-shaking Pakistan movement he led, culminated in the establishment of a separate Muslim state in the subcontinent, not through violent agitation, but through the battle of the ballot boxes. What stunned the world at this phenomenal outcome was that the poor and the rich and the educated and the illiterate voters, all alike, exercised their franchise strictly in accordance with the norms of democracy, exactly in the way of civilised people anywhere else in the world.
Unfortunately, the ideal democratic State the Quaid-e-Azam had envisioned, which was cherished by the teeming millions, fell a victim to his successors' waywardness. Remaining engaged in fighting for the loaves and fishes of offices, and trivialities of governance, they allowed the vitality of the new nation to wither rather too long, thereby leading the people away from their role in consolidating the gains of independence.
Reference, in this context, may also be made to the emergence of arch rivalry and mistrust between Pakistan and India, the two countries born together, thereby resulting in increased waste of resources away from socio-economic development, due to excessive investment in defence preparations. It is, however, just another matter that both lately seem to have awakened to the need of compensating for the losses suffered on this count.
A peace process has started, though it has yet to gain the desired momentum in the right direction. Again, it will be noted that while both the countries have suffered in economic terms because of hostile relations, Pakistan has suffered the most.
For the deep commitment to democracy that won the country its independence has been eroded, basically, because of deviation from the great leader's path by his successors who toyed with diverse authoritarian ideas as opposed to his firm conviction in democracy and fair play. However, the alternatives, including military intervention from time to time, have proved of little avail. Now that democratic dispensation has been given another chance, time has come to give serious thought to how best and how soon to mould it fully in accordance with the aspirations of the Father of the Nation. That will be the nation's best tribute to him.