In Human Interest

Dr. Tariq Rahman

The NEWS of the morning of 31 August was exhilarating. It reported that the government had taken immediate action in the rape case of Sonia and a judicial enquiry had been ordered. Much to its credit the opposition had also put pressure on the government to take such an action. Indeed, the opposition had rightly claimed that not only the less powerful offenders but the most powerful ones, such as the SP who had harassed the woman, should also be dealt with according to the law. But if the law takes too long for justice to be delivered or if the victims are harmed during the process through private mafia-like revenge, future victims will keep quiet—something which has been happening far too long. There is another news item which is also a source of rejoicing and optimism—that the prisoners in India will be returned. That this has been neglected by government functionaries too should not go unpunished. And that the press can do so much good by efficient reporting should not go unnoticed. The press, especially the English press, has done a lost of good work in the last fifteen years. It is one sector of Pakistani society which has held up its head against medieval obscurantism, fanaticism in the name of religion, official authoritarianism and the inertia of the society. This too should not go without giving the credit where it is due.

But this is only one of the points of my article today. The other point emerges from the fact that there are many cases which give humanity a bad name but they are allowed to exist even when the press does report them. Last year I happened to be abroad and I know that they gave Pakistan a very bad name. People in the United States either do not know about Pakistan’s existence and, worse still, what they do know is with reference to terrorism and war in the Western tribal areas. Experts on south Asia, paradoxically, know a lot about it and are authors of learned books and articles on Pakistan. The Pakistanis settled in the USA are also interested in the country of their origin. When such people sit down they tend to discuss what is happening in the country. Last and this year, what they used to discuss was the Shazia rape case and the Mai Mukhtaran case. These two issues did give Pakistan a bad name. The Shazia rape case was much discussed and the consensus of the gossipers was that the perpetrator, who was from the military, had been shielded because of that fact. The Pakistani press was quoted in the discussions and people came away with the impression that in Pakistan might was right and, in Orwellian terms, ‘some were more equal than others’. I suppose anybody could call this as being against the national interest. As for myself, I think it was against human interest. And, in this case at least, it was against national interest precisely because it was against human interest. It outraged peoples’ sense of justice and fair play. No friend of Pakistan or of the Pakistani military or of General Musharraf would have advised such a handling of the situation. It created a very bad image of Pakistan.

The Mai Mukhtaran case occurred in June 2005 when I was about to return to Pakistan so I could not follow it in detail. The outlines were, however, clear. Mai Mukhtaran, the victim of rape ordered by a local council of village elders, had become a symbol of protest against such outrageous concepts of tribal honour. She had been invited by a human rights group in the United States to speak in a forum. The expectation was that she would be allowed to attend but, Lo and behold! the authorities stopped her. Apparently official thinking was that she would be used by the enemies of Pakistan to give the country a bad name. Ironically, it was stopping her which gave the country a bad name while she could have said nothing which was not known had she been allowed to proceed without a hitch. I do not know who the advisers of the decision-makers were but this particular advice served to malign the country. It was not in the human interest and, as in the previous case, it was not also in the national interest. Had it not occurred, Pakistan would have improved its image better and faster.

I do not know how people have responded to the recent news of high handedness by eminent state functionaries and their dependents. However, only recently two cases were reported. One was that of a Minister’s son beating up a PIA passenger and the other one was about Dr Qadeer Khan’s son-in-law thrashing a British diplomat. Whereas action was taken in the second case the public was informed of no such action in the first one. This created the impression that, Qadeer Khan being relegated to a powerless, peripheral position, people associated with him could be proceeded against while powerful ones were still immune. Such an impression is against human interest as it is against national interest. Pakistan’s negative image would be corrected if the public is given to understand that the rule of the law is respected and nobody is above it.

These issues are straightforward and everybody will take up the position that the rule of law and human decency should be upheld and that they are eventually much more in the country’s long term interest than shielding people in power or stopping them from speaking the truth. What is more difficult to understand is why such things happen. And, even more importantly, is there anything wrong with our character as a nation that we do such things? The answer to this can only be tentative and I am sure other people will find answers better than the one I am coming up with. My answer is that it is the system which is wrong. Our political system respects power but not the rule of law. During the Mughal empire princes had to fight each other to become the ruler. The law of primogeniture was never respected as it was in England for a long time. Then when Pakistan was established the prime minister was only powerful when he happened to be a strong personality. He was not powerful because prime ministers are powerful by law in the parliamentary system of democracy. So, our political culture has not really changed from Mughal days and this makes one respect power not law. Out rural areas also respect power because the feudal lords who control the lives of millions there, know they would not be punished for their misdeeds. The colonial-style officials in the city also know they can make people wait for them and humiliate them. Such experiences create an excessive fear of power but complete cynicism for the law. Thus such cases occur because they are the expression of power. As we know, most rape cases are not about sex; they are about power. The kind of rapes reported in our press are certainly about power. This is against humanity and against national interest but it will not change unless the rule of law is established in all fields and all privileges are abolished. It will not happen unless the democratic system functions uninterrupted for so long a period that it becomes the natural way of acquiring political power in the land as it has in India.

Related to this is the question of our national character. I submit that it takes two to make liars and cowards and bullies. The system makes people tell lies because it punishes the truth. This happens in any country where freedom is curtailed or the intelligence agencies and police become interfering and dictatorial. It happened in the Soviet Union during the Stalinist era and in the Shah’s Iran and in Latin American countries under military rule. The worst case of this kind now is North Korea. In all these countries people are afraid to tell the truth; there is no free press and so people become liars, sycophants and cowards. In such cases good journalism and academic research dies and the country becomes backward and weak. In short, a bad system can distort character and undo the strengths of a nation. Liberal democratic practices can curtail the power of the intelligence agencies and the police and save Pakistan from such a calamity.

As for creating bullies, the system creates them when it does not punish them in such a manner that the people can see and be deterred. That is what is wrong with dictatorships: they make it impossible to punish the dictator and those he favours because institutions are weak and personalities strong. That is why no kings, including the Mughals whom we celebrate as being great, can ever be praised as an institution. They may be individually good but they promote the concept of one-person rule which is as good as the person himself. What the state wants is the rule of institutions, the law and to ensure that this does happen we need a very truthful and courageous press and an independent judiciary. When these two institutions improve, national character will also improve and we will start acting according to human interest which, incidentally, will also be in the national interest.

THE AUTHOR IS A LINGUISTIC HISTORIAN

DR. Tariq Rahman