THIS refers to the editorial ‘East Pakistan lessons’ (Dec 16). The seeds of estrangement and alienation of the Bengalis was sowed when Ayub Khan shifted the country’s capital from Karachi to Islamabad. Karachi as the capital city was acceptable to the East Pakistanis as it was the birthplace as well as the last resting place of Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah, the father of the nation.

The Bengalis rightly felt that if the capital had to be shifted at all, Dhaka should have been the preferred choice, particularly when they had numerical majority. But Ayub Khan felt more secure in moving to an uninhabited and barren location, which he called Islamabad, as it was close to his constituency, Rawalpindi, the General Headquarters (GHQ), and his hometown Haripur.

Billions of rupees were allocated for building the city from scratch. The East Pakistanis argued that the massive funds assigned for the new city could have profitably been deployed in the development of both the wings.

The West Pakistani troika comprising feudals, generals and bureaucrats felt more comfortable in the serene and cosy environment of Islamabad, though distanced from knowing the pulse of the people. Even today, those sitting in Islamabad are isolated from the mainstream society. A sense of alienation is felt by people across the country and voices can be heard intermittently against the elite city of the rulers that remain insensitive to the problems of the masses.

Huma Arif
Karachi

Published in Dawn, December 29th, 2021