Illustration by Abro
Illustration by Abro

Tauqeer, an old college friend of mine from the 1980s, emailed me the other day, and titled it ‘The Pakistani right in a flux.’

Tauqeer is an established chartered accountant in the United States and this is what he wrote: ‘Pakistani religious parties are in a flux. The sudden burst of activity on their part, like rallies, protest marches, angry posters and all, is proof of this. They were the last ones to realise that a shift in thinking is taking place in the military establishment and, consequently, in the civilian ruling circles. A sudden, late realisation of this has thrown the parties in a bog [sic] …’

But why am I quoting from an email on the present affairs of Pakistan’s right-wing parties written by a chartered accountant?

Well, Tauqeer was one of the leading men of the Islami Jamiat Talba (IJT) at the college in Karachi where we were both students between 1984 and 1987. The IJT is the student-wing of the Jamaat-i-Islami (JI). Though Tauqeer was an opponent of the ‘progressive’ student outfit that I was a member of, we still managed to strike an amicable and lasting friendship.

He remained with the IJT till 1990, and even when he joined a bank after completing his MBA in 1991, he continued to be a supporter and voter of the JI. He left Pakistan for greener pastures in 1998, first to Qatar and then the United States where he lives today.


A gradual paradigm shift in the thinking and narrative of Pakistan’s mighty military establishment and the teetering civilian polity has left the religious parties feeling nervous, uncertain and maybe even isolated


Tauqeer was a voracious reader with a keen understanding of political trends in the Muslim world. In his email, he added: “Though Jamaat still has my sympathies, but decades of being pampered and appeased by the establishment, all religious parties failed to notice and adjust to the undercurrents of change shaping Pakistan. Now that they have, they are striking chaotically, conjuring up bygone slogans and fears which truthfully have no place left in the new realities of our country …”

Tauqeer is correct to note that a slow but gradual paradigm shift is taking place in the thinking and narrative of Pakistan’s mighty military-establishment, and wobbly civilian polity.

I also agree that the shift has left the religious parties feeling nervous, uncertain and maybe even isolated.

Events such as the passing of the Women’s Protection Bill by the Punjab Assembly; the carrying out of the sentence against the assassin of the former governor of Punjab; widespread military and police operations against extremist groups; and the changing nature of the national and social narrative being shaped by the military, the civilian government and the parliament, are being seen by the religious groups as an onslaught against the narrative that was largely moulded by these groups from the late 1970s onward.

These groups were fully brought into the mainstream of politics and strengthened by the Ziaul Haq dictatorship (1977-88). They have remained influential ever since.

But as Tauqeer noted, they now believe that this influence of theirs is eroding mainly because of the change taking place in the armed forces and also within the large centre-right party, the PML-N, which was once seen as a ‘natural ally’ of smaller right-wing groups.

But this is not the first time that the religious parties have felt the need to react in the manner that they are doing today. The first time such a reaction emerged from them was in the late 1960s.

But 40 years ago they were trying to make their way into the mainstream scheme of politics in Pakistan; whereas today they are reacting in a similar manner as a desperate attempt to retain the influence and relevance they eventually gained from 1977 onward.

Last year, during research for a chapter in my recently published book, End of The Past, I managed to get access to some transcripts of speeches by certain JI and Jamiat Ulema Pakistan (JUP) between 1969 and 1970.

The speeches warned Pakistanis of how “Pakistan’s ideology” was coming under the attack of leftist and “atheistic forces”. Some speeches also derided the Ayub Khan regime’s “secular policies”which “undermined the ulema”, despite the fact that Ayub had resigned in early 1969 and handed over power to Gen Yahya Khan.

The speeches read quite like the ones one is hearing today from politico-religious outfits. But the intensity of the polarising narrative that was used in the late 1960s by these outfits is best captured by veteran journalist, Muhammad Ali Siddiqi, in his book, Memories of a Journalist.

As a young journalist, Mr. Siddiqi extensively covered the tumultuous political events of the late 1960s. In his book, he writes that after Ayub’s resignation and the rise of populist, leftist parties such as the PPP and NAP, JI changed tack and began to indirectly support the Yahya regime, even though the party had opposed the Ayub set-up.

In one incident, Mr Siddiqi writes, the JI used an Urdu pamphlet which claimed that “in communist countries, old people are shot (!)”; and that the same would happen to religious people in Pakistan if the PPP came to power.

Mr Siddiqi then adds that almost overnight, large business interests (that were fattened during the Ayub regime) began to ally themselves with the JI, fearing the coming into power of “socialists” such as the PPP and NAP.

A journalist who was a member of the JI told Mr Siddiqi that “the leftists are making lists against the religious people” and “planning to wipe them out.” According to Siddiqi, a senior JI leader advised party members to shift up (if they were staying on the ground floor) to “avoid a swoop at an unearthly hour by the socialists and the secularists”.

Mr Siddiqi writes that at first he thought his counterpart was cracking a joke, but realised he wasn’t when he (the journalist) too moved to the top floor of his apartment building!

Well, the dreaded ‘swoop’ never came, but left-leaning parties did sweep the 1970 election. Again, as my friend Tauqeer said, in the late 1960s, the restlessness of religious parties was due to them wanting to fully enter the mainstream political scene; the current restiveness is because of them now feeling isolated.

I wrote back to Tauqeer and also quoted to him sections from Mr Siddiqi’s book. I asked him how would the religious parties’ current malady pan out.

His reply: “Find out how many of them have moved to the top floors”.

Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, March 27th, 2016

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