Ike ..Wish there were more Pakistanis like you but...
Maybe you have stayed here for so long that you are looking at the subcontinent with romantic longing. It would be wonderful if Pakistan takes this opportunity to win one for Allah, and desist from the proxy war with India. Imagine India and Pakistan singing from the same sheet of music. 130 +120 million Muslims saying no to terrorism/nihilism and shifting the centre of gravity of Islam from the dysfunctional middle east.
India already has quite a good record in uplifting the poor/disadvantaged through democracy, Bangladesh with Grameen Bank(micro loans to poor), Naya Krishi (sustainable organic farming) etc, has some good experiments going. All alternate ways to the East Asian model of Economic growth, which takes the best of the west without blindly aping the west.
Alas, I wish it were so. Many in Pakistan seem to think that they have more in common with Arab culture than the Indian subcontinent, in an attempt to avoid acknowledging overpowering Indian cultural influence. Meanwhile Pakistan has a problem with the uncontrollable ISI with its drug running, sheilding of Indian Mafia dons, subverting the indian economy and so on. Unless there is civilian control of the military I cannot see how healthy institutions can develop.
I wish Musharraf well, but your positive spin is I am afraid just that. Until 9/11 he was just as committed to the ISI and their dirty tricks as the guy he fired. Granted he made some attempts to clean up law and order within Pakistan, and that he had to tread carefully with the Mullahs, but I think Pakistan's strategy has always been to divert anger over internal failure to India and Kashmir.
The military culture is I am afraid elitist, in both countries, and can hardly be expected to look in the direction of evolving local solutions to local development problems. Thankfully in India development is not the military 's charter there are other institutions, but in Pakistan who else is there other than the military and the madrassahs ? |
