Dawn Editorials (with Summary and Vocabulary)
DAWN EDITORIALS
February 15, 2024 (Thursday)
House of Lord
Summary
- Religious tensions in India: The author discusses the
recent controversy surrounding the Gyanvapi mosque in Varanasi, India, and
fears that it could escalate into another Babri Masjid-like situation.
- Historical context: The author provides
historical context for the dispute, mentioning the destruction of Hindu
temples by Muslim rulers and the construction of mosques on their sites.
- Call for peace and
coexistence: The
author urges people to move beyond religious differences and live in peace
and harmony, like neighbors.
- Quote by Bulleh Shah: The author concludes
with a quote by Bulleh Shah, a Sufi saint, emphasizing the importance of
respecting all places of worship and hearts.
Article
IT is not for the first time that people are fighting
over places of worship; and unfortunately, it appears not to be the last. After
the consecration of Ram Mandir in Ayodhya recently, Varanasi, or Banaras, as it
was known historically, has become the focus of another masjid-mandir
controversy. A court has ordered that the mosque’s basement be opened to Hindu
worshippers. The Muslim caretaker is said to be concerned about a Babri
Masjid-like fate.
Ayodhya-Kashi-Mathura is the BJP/RSS ambition in terms
of reclaiming India, nay Bharat, for Hindus. The Gyanvapi mosque is adjacent to
the Kashi Vishwanath temple in Varanasi, which is venerated [regard with great respect;
revere]
as a place where Lord Shiva manifested his presence. The temple had been
attacked and destroyed many times in history, the last being on Aurangzeb’s
directives. The current temple was built on an adjacent site by Ahilyabai
Holkar, a female Maratha ruler, in 1780.
Mathura, also in UP, is important in the Hindu
religion because it is considered the birthplace of Lord Krishna. The
Keshavdeva temple, part of a complex built to mark Krishna’s janamasthan, was
destroyed on Aurangzeb’s orders, and the Shahi Idgah mosque is believed to have
been built on its site.
The question is if it will stop there. So far, as
political expediency goes, it has to. The BJP reclaims the three sacred sites
of Hinduism it considers were usurped [take (a position of power or importance) illegally or
by force],
declares a victory, and moves on. Pushing it any further would be more than
just counterproductive; it would be stupid. The ambition of projecting itself
as a global power must be tempered with inclusion and restraint. All the gilded
mandirs worldwide would not make India shine if it allowed exclusion’s dark
shadow to eclipse it at home.
Can the region’s people interact as
neighbours do?
We have all heard Allama Iqbal’s couplet:
(Those with the warmth of belief in their hearts,
built the mosque overnight; this heart, an old sinner, tried for years but
could not turn to prayers).
The controversy behind it is well-known but worth
summarising. Around 1922, Lahore’s Hindu community built a temple in the Shah
Alam neighbourhood. The Muslims insisted that a mosque be made on the adjacent
plot. The matter was taken to the British court, and legend has it that the
Muslims of the area overnight built a mosque to trump any adverse court order.
Since the mosque was made without the requisite permission of the municipal
committee, it was razed by the government. The quaint [attractively unusual or
old-fashioned]
little mosque one sees presently was constructed in 1934. It would be
interesting to know if the temple that spurred the Muslim fervour to build the
mosque overnight, with shops on the ground floor, is anywhere to be found
today. One is reminded of Jamal Ehsani’s couplet:
(Even such people have notions of changing the world;
who first include shops in their home’s design).
Let us admit that we have all done wrong or have been
brainwashed into believing stuff that does not reflect the whole truth. The
destruction wrought by Mahmud of Ghazni, including the sack of the Somnath
temple, is still taught in schools.
Most readers would know that famous Indian author
Khushwant Singh wished to be buried in Hadali, a town in Khushab, Pakistan,
where he was born in 1915. A plaque outside his school commemorates its
illustrious student who, among his other scholarly achievements, wrote one of
the most comprehensive histories of the evolution of Sikhism. The plaque has Mr
Singh’s ashes mixed in it. Very few would know that Jaswant Singh, a one-time
BJP stalwart, a member of the Lok Sabha, leader of opposition in the Rajya Sabha;
a man who held the portfolios for external affairs, defence, and finance
through times as tough as the Pokhran nuclear tests, Kargil, the Kandahar
hijacking, the scuttled Agra peace summit, attacks on Kashmir and the Indian
parliament; wished for his ashes to be released into the Hingol river in
Balochistan. His wish was fulfilled.
Is it too much to hope the region’s people could live
in peace and interact as neighbours do, instead of waiting for their mortal
remains to be united with the soil their ancestors called home? Variations of
the following verse are attributed to Bulleh Shah, the 18th-century Sufi:
(Raze the mosque and raze the temple, but don’t raze
anyone’s heart, for that is the house of the Lord.)
Climate –
proofing mandates
Summary
1. Local governance is crucial for climate
resilience:
- Efficient local services are
essential to address climate-induced disasters like floods, droughts, and
heatwaves.
- Strong
local governments are needed for effective disaster response and
preparedness.
- The
absence of local governments weakens Pakistan's ability to tackle climate
challenges.
2. New government needs to prioritize local
government formation:
- The election results mandate
action on local government reform.
- Provinces
should prioritize local government elections and transfer power to local
levels.
- The
federal government can support local government formation through the
Council of Common Interests.
3. Institutional reforms are urgent for climate
action:
- The new government must build
on existing climate commitments and reforms like Climate-PIMA.
- Institutional
reforms need to be accelerated, not delayed.
- A
coalition government can create consensus for a "charter of
economy" to address climate vulnerabilities.
4. Climate-proofing existing policies is
essential:
- Pakistan's sectoral policies
and plans lack climate considerations.
- The
national climate policy and adaptation plan need better costing and
prioritization.
- Climate-proofing
existing policies reduces existential risks from climate change.
5. Implementing existing commitments is key:
- Climate-proofing electoral
mandates simply means fulfilling existing national and international
commitments.
- This is
crucial to ensure a sustainable and climate-resilient future for Pakistan.
Article
ALL politics is local. The nature of
the local polity sets the direction of national policies. In fact, the poor
quality of local governance has determined the quality of electoral processes
and the misplaced national development discourse.
Candidates are elected or re-elected based on their ability to
deliver on local issues. How would the PTI, PML-N, PPP, and MQM, the four
political parties that have bagged the most seats at both the national and
provincial levels, change the ugly realities on the ground? How would they
translate their mandates to deliver local development, described
interchangeably as municipal or environmental services?
Efficient and transparent service delivered at the constituency
level is a necessary building block for climate resilience. Ideally, the
elected representatives will need to climate-proof their mandates to serve
their constituents and the feeble national reform agenda.
In Pakistan, consolidation of the democratic dispensation and
building climate resilience are intertwined. It will be a sustained effort
spread over several years, but the functioning of the new national and
provincial governments and effectiveness of their opposition groups will hinge
on two foundational actions: i) form local government and governance
structures, ii) accept, adopt, and accelerate the institutional reform agenda.
Let’s take a look at them:
Formation of
local government and governance structures: The
absence of constitutional protection to LGs has weakend the foundations of
Pakistan’s economy, institutions, human resource development, and the physical
environment. Democracy cannot consolidate or deliver without the national and
provincial assemblies getting trained human resources from the lowest rung of
society.
LG institutions are the first line of defence against
climate-triggered disasters, ranging from floods, droughts, heatwaves, and
glacial outbursts to snowstorms, mudslides, urban flooding, and tropical
storms. Every district faces at least two of these climate-induced disasters.
At any given time of the year, it is likely that the country would be grappling
[engage in a close fight or struggle
without weapons; wrestle] with at least two climate-triggered
extreme weather events in two or more different regions of the country.
Efficient and
transparent service at the constituency level is necessary for climate
resilience.
This climate vulnerability at the community level is made worse
by the absence of local institutions at the district, tehsil, and union council
levels. Health, education, clean drinking water and sanitation, town planning
for waste collection, pavement of streets, the provision of streetlights,
footpaths, and storm drains, have all become orphan functions over the years,
as has the protection of playgrounds, parks, parking spaces, and communal lands
and wetlands.
These are all provincial functions and the election results have
given a strong mandate for action to these political parties in the provinces.
Instead of usurping the rights and functions of LGs, they can prioritise LG
elections in their respective provinces. The split mandate at the federal level
can be leveraged to adopt a new Charter of Democracy that can help the
provinces prioritise the devolution of powers, transferring finances to local
levels, and strengthening institutions for climate resilience.
On its part, the federal government can help devise new
mechanisms. It can become a champion for the formation of local government and
governance structures. The issue can be accelerated by bringing it up in a
meeting of the Council of Common Interests for national consensus.
There will hardly be any better use of a hung parliament than
utilising the weaknesses of a coalition government to agree on a new magna
carta. The last time the CCI was used for such a higher purpose was when the
PTI from KP, PPP from Sindh, PML-N from Punjab and BAP from Balochistan signed
the National Water Policy and Pakistan Water Charter in 2018.
Accept, adopt
and accelerate reform agenda: The new government will
need to build upon several ongoing national initiatives and global commitments.
It will, for example, have no option but to immediately strike a follow-up
agreement with the IMF. This is important, among other reasons, for the
continuity of financial discipline and reforms that have been initiated,
including the implementation of Climate-PIMA, the IMF checklist for
climate-related institutional reforms at the federal level.
A bigger challenge for the incoming government will, however, be
to accept and own the urgency of institutional reforms rather than undertaking
them reluctantly, grudgingly, and half-heartedly. The secret recipe for the
success of these reforms rests on speed and consistency of action. Pakistan has
already dragged its heels on reforms that were first initiated in the early
1990s. The delays have cost the economy, society, and environment dearly.
The charter must recognise that Pakistan’s climate-smart
planning is overly weak. Policy planning documents need climate-proofing. The
Public Sector Development Programme can be paused, as it has more often than
not funded maladaptation and vulnerability. Its design and purpose need to be
re-envisioned. Poor documentation has failed to increase Pakistan’s ability to
access climate-smart investments and finances.
None of Pakistan’s sectoral policies and plans have been
climate-proofed and made investment-ready. The national climate policy and
adaptation plan, and the Nationally Determined Contributions are neither costed
nor prioritised.
In a risk- and reform-averse environment, these are ambitious
directions. But the climate-proofing of electoral mandates will merely entail
implementing our existing national policies and ongoing international
commitments. After all, climate-proofing electoral mandates is essential to
reduce existential risks to the country.
Warning
for the next PM
Summary
1. Warning to incoming PM Shehbaz Sharif:
- Do not appoint Ishaq Dar as
finance minister again. This would be a disastrous mistake.
- Dar's
previous stint as finance minister resulted in:
- Derailing IMF negotiations
and nearly causing default.
- Making
empty promises and prioritizing ego over sound economic management.
- Leaving
the country in a severely degraded financial position.
2. Reasons why Dar is unsuitable for the role:
- He prioritizes maintaining the
status quo rather than implementing necessary reforms.
- He lacks
the understanding needed to manage the debt, appease creditors, and
protect vulnerable populations.
- His
appointment would jeopardize the new government's chances of success.
3. The article acknowledges Dar's knowledge of
the business landscape and its dark alleys.
- However, this knowledge is
deemed secondary to the ability to implement crucial economic changes.
4. The author emphasizes the importance of
learning from past mistakes and avoiding repeating them.
- Pakistan cannot afford another
economic crisis caused by poor financial leadership.
5. The article is written by a business and
economy journalist with years of experience.
- It is intended as a serious
warning to the incoming PM, not just an opinion piece.
Article
THE first thing that incoming prime
minister Shehbaz Sharif has to realise is that no matter what happens, no
matter how much pressure comes his way from his own party, including from Nawaz
Sharif, he must not, under any circumstances, make Ishaq Dar finance minister
again.
Bringing Dar in as finance minister one more time will be the
worst mistake Shehbaz Sharif can make at this point.
The biggest disaster of his last stint as prime minister was
precisely this. Dar undermined Miftah Ismail at a critical juncture, when the
latter was trying to complete a stalled review of the IMF facility and avert a
near imminent balance-of-payments disaster.
All he managed to do was derail the IMF programme, and resume the
country’s march towards default. Having done that, he proceeded to make the
economic management of the country hostage to his ego. “I don’t care! I don’t
care if they come! I don’t have to plead before them!” he shouted angrily when
asked by a TV anchor about what the IMF would think of all the things he was
saying and doing. “Sir, you may not care, but the country’s economy does,” the
anchor replied.
This was an iconic exchange from those times, one of those
moments in a public figure’s life that will long be remembered as a moment when
the veil of civility dropped and we all saw a glimpse of the man behind the
mask. It happened in the first week of December 2022, when the ninth review of
the troubled Extended Fund Facility that Pakistan had signed in 2019, and
limped along with on and off since then, had stalled once again. By then, the
talks with the Fund had broken down entirely.
Whatever
happens, it is critical that Ishaq Dar is not made finance minister again.
Everybody knows how things worked out after that. Everybody saw
it happen. More than anyone else, Shehbaz Sharif himself knows, because it is
he who opened a separate channel of communication with the managing director of
the IMF in the first week of January 2023, after Dar’s own lines of
communication had broken down. That was an eventful week as well.
Of course, that meeting proved fruitless too. To cut a long
story short, the review remained stalled till
June 2022, the month when the facility was to end, and no extensions were
possible. That was the fateful month, when the country was supposed to land up
with gross reserves of $17.1 billion, sufficient for 2.3 months of import
cover.
The prime minister might remember the rushed conversations with
the IMF MD, the last-minute Stand-by
Arrangement that was announced in the closing days of June, and
the mad rush to arrange a $3bn inflow from
Saudi Arabia and the UAE to complete the financing envelope of the SBA.
Remember how both the inflow arrived hours before the IMF board was to sit down
and deliberate Pakistan’s request for an SBA?
It should never have come down to the wire like that. A country
of 240 million people should not have been driven that close to the edge of
disaster simply because one man thought he could do something that he
eventually turned out not to be able to do. He thought he could tough-talk the
creditors and the markets into obeying his commands. He was wrong. He couldn’t.
And along the way, the country nearly drowned in insolvency [the state of being insolvent; inability to pay one's debts].
Whatever happens, it is critical that Ishaq Dar is not made
finance minister again. This is not advice. This is disaster management on my
part. Perhaps he has many attributes that endear him to his party leadership.
He knows the business landscape of this country. He knows the
rackets that big business operate, and the rents they are addicted to. He knows
who is making how much money, where their fortunes are hidden, the ways and
means they use to conceal their real earnings and where they stash the proceeds
from the mis-declaration of trade. He understands the games that take place
under the table, and this knowledge is useful and required in a finance
minister.
But it is not the most important requirement. It is even more
important to understand the depth of the change that needs to be brought about
in the economy to put it on a sustainable footing.
That is where Dar fails. He knows how to operate and game the
status quo. He does not know how to change it. Change is what is needed to
manage the debt load, the creditors’ requirements, to protect the poor, to
create jobs, to generate revenues without choking dynamism. If Shehbaz Sharif
appoints Dar again as finance minister, his game will be over even before it
has begun.
A lousy election
Summary
- Pakistan's recent election
results are surprising and defy expectations. Despite being in jail,
Imran Khan's party performed well, while established parties like PML-N
and PPP fell short.
- The author argues that this
election highlights the flaws in Pakistan's "hybrid democracy," where powerful actors
like the military continue to influence the political process.
- There are concerns about the
stability of the new coalition government, formed by PML-N and PPP.
Some experts predict an uneasy alliance and potential conflict.
- The article criticizes the
Election Commission for its handling of the election, questioning the use of
hand-counting and calling for improvements to the electoral process.
- The author concludes by asking
how many more elections it will take to "de-louse" Pakistan's
democracy.
Article
PAKISTAN is the only faux-democracy [made in imitation; artificial] that holds
general elections yet learns nothing from each experience.
Many remember the general elections of December 1970 — the first
(and some say only) free and fair elections in our history. The electoral mood
then bordered on the euphoric [characterized
by or feeling intense excitement and happiness].
President Ayub Khan’s ham-fisted experiments with Basic Democracy had been
relegated to oblivion. His renegade [a
person who deserts and betrays an organization, country, or set of principles]
ex-foreign minister, Z.A. Bhutto, had launched his PPP. He crisscrossed the
country, mustering support for his home brand of social democracy.
At the time, I happened to be in Gambat, in the interior of
Sindh, managing our family textile mill. Political loyalty in that area was
sharply divided between the feudal Pir Pagaro and the progressive Mr Bhutto.
Both sought to call on me to raise election contributions. My
family was divided: the eldest brother followed Pagaro, another Bhutto. I was
told to receive Pir sahib. During our discussions, Pir sahib predicted victory
for his group.
‘They are all
the same in the fact that they will never be the same.’
After the results came in, I called on Pir sahib at Pir jo Goth
to congratulate him on the victory of his candidate (his brother Sain Nadir
Shah) over his PPP rival. Seeing me, Pir sahib crowed: “We have won by a margin
of 35,000 votes.” I replied: “Pir sain, by my calculation, you’ve actually lost
by 95,000 votes. If in your own stronghold of Sanghar, so many dared vote for
the PPP and not you, you have actually lost by that number.”
Fifty-four years later, the scenario of 1970 has been repeated.
Then, the Bengali leader Mujibur Rehman was in jail in West Pakistan. Yet, in
distant East Pakistan, his Awami League swept 160 of the 162 general seats.
Today, the PTI chief Mr Imran Khan is in Adiala jail. No stone
has been left un-hurled at him and his wife, even the charge of adultery. Yet,
his PTI nominees — bat-less, denied an uneven playing field, hamstrung and
harassed — rode the crest of his popularity and secured 100-plus NA seats for
him, more than any other single party.
In cricket, that number carries a special aura of success. For
the other main political parties and their invisible sponsors, that number
reeks of their failure.
The results have yielded inexplicable surprises. Jahangir
Tareen’s coffers funded Imran Khan’s PTI’s fledgling years. He left it, founded
a new party (IPP), and lost in two constituencies. PML-N’s Saad Rafique endured
victimisation and jail only to be defeated by PTI’s Latif Khosa (until only
three months ago a PPP diehard). The Jamaat-i-Islami chief Sirajul Haq lost.
Former prime minister Yousuf Raza Gilani won by only 104 votes. PTI’s Dr Yasmin
Rashid from her Adiala jail cell gave the PML supremo and thrice PM Nawaz
Sharif a run for his money. She secured 115,643 votes in his PML-N stronghold.
Even before the ballot papers had been distributed, Nawaz Sharif
had warned his sponsors that he would not accept the premiership if he was not
given a clear majority. His ambition has been scuttled. His PML-N with 73-plus
seats must now cohabit with the PPP’s 54-plus in a coalition euphemistically
labelled a ‘national unity government’. As one wit put it: “They are all the
same in the fact that they will never be the same.”
Even before the results have been sanctified by the Election
Commission, President Dr Alvi regretted that ballot papers were being
hand-counted when the ECP/ Nadra has had the last five years to perfect the
electronic voting machine system.
Even as the political parties jostled for supremacy, the COAS
(speaking for the establishment) cautioned them: “Elections are not a zero-sum
competition of winning and losing but an exercise to determine the mandate of
the people. Political leadership and their workers should rise above
self-interests and synergise efforts in governing and serving the people.”
Such a belated homily [a
sermon] notwithstanding, many Western pundits believe
that the election results are an indictment [a
formal charge or accusation of a serious crime] of
hybrid democracy. They foresee an uneasy alliance between the same parties
whose last PDM coalition removed Imran Khan’s PTI government two years ago.
The new coalition may all too soon fulfil the prophecy made by a
17th-century Royalist to his Roundhead captors: “Now that you have done with
us, go fight among yourselves.”
Following the 1970 electoral impasse, Dr Henry Kissinger met Gen
Yahya Khan on July 8, 1971. He recalled: “Am I a dictator?” Yahya Khan asked
every American and Pakistani present. Naturally, everyone protested that he was
not. When Kissinger’s turn came, he told Yahya bluntly: “I don’t know, Mr
President, except that for a dictator you run a lousy election.”
How many more elections will be needed to delouse [rid (a person or animal) of lice and other parasitic insects] our democracy?
Comments
Post a Comment