A propos I find this statement by Suman to be highly amusing, “the Islamic utopia of Pakistan that Latif is convinced of.” I do not consider to be Pakistan an Islamic utopia nevertheless it is a nation rooted in Islamic mores. I do find Pakistan is the best hope for Islam and were it to collapse then Islam as a doctrinal ideology, as a religion will have failed (many Muslims inexplicably seem to take offence at this statement). Pakistan’s national existence was rooted in an Islamic cause and it is not surprising that it has been called an attempt “by Perso-Turkic émigrés to form a nation predicated on an Islamic identity”.
It is an undeniable fact that Islam forms the basis for much of the Pakistani culture and there have been recent attempts to purge the residual Hindu influences. Nevertheless that will fail since it is an inexorable identity of Pakistan in much the same manner Islam is. It is why I advocate a cohesive national identity, which incorporates our unique past as a crossroads of cultures and civilisations. Pakistan cannot be relegated to a single identity in the same manner as India, which is oft regarded by her citizens as a bastion of Hinduism, rather it is a multi faceted culture borne millennia ago in Kot Diji.
No evidence of the memes of sophistication or tolerance passed down the millenia; No reason to believe that Pakistani people are sophisticated and tolerant today because of their glorious pre-Harappan heritage.
When a nation has been settled for millennia it inevitably develops a sophistication that permeates its citizens. It is the cognisance of belonging to an unbroken chain of settlements and civilisations that lends an inimitable gravity. The strength of a rustic age-old civilisation thus markedly differentiates Pakistan from other Islamic nations, especially in her tolerance to religious minorities. I remember when as a child I embarked on the hours long journey from Islamabad to Swat, in the far north, and during the course of the journey we rested by the banks of the Indus. The aura of resting upon such an ancient river, which had been continuously inhabited by the same populace for so many millennia, was indeed awe-inspiring.
Kot Diji is part of the subcontinents pre-history, not part of a Pakistani identity!
Nevertheless the Kot Diji culture is an essential fabric to a Pakistani identity and highlights our distinctive nature from other races. It is the Kot Diji culture, which fundamentally proves the ancient boundaries of our nation and validates our existence. The continuous civilisation of 5,000 on the Indus Valley lends an unique sophistication to the region. Having been settled by civilised inhabitants coheres and lends credence to a national identity that spans the millennia.
Suman refers to a “subcontinental” history, which is a vague term. The sub-continent, as previously stated, rivals Europe in its scope and diversity, thus continually referring to a “subcontinental” history is akin to labelling the history of England or Greece as that of merely European. For instance the Hellenistic Golden age, which has dramatically influenced the intellectual history of Europe, is indeed part of Europe’s history but does not negate the fact that it is a primarily Greek heritage. The Greeks for instance take pride in their long history, is it a crime for Pakistanis to likewise take pride in Kot Diji?
I find that the heavy concentration of Palaeolithic and Neolithic sites in Pakistan to be hardly a happenstance rather it merely demonstrates the ancient nature of our state. Indeed to be perfectly honest equating Pakistani history with the Subcontinent is a covert way of merely airbrushing Pakistan’s past. Pannini was born in and perfected Sanskrit grammar in Taxila*(a city most ancient and 45 minutes west from Islamabad) whilst the Vedic scriptures, which provide a doctrinal unity to Hinduism, were primarily composed on the Punjab plains. The Harrapan civilisation is centred wholly in Pakistan (it is a laughable attempt by the Indian government to salvage some historic authenticity by referring to a few meagre settlements in Gujarat as a Harrapan legacy) and the earliest phase of Aryan civilisation flourished primarily in Pakistan (though the distasteful caste system arose in the Ganges valley). Pakistan has always been more cosmopolitan and exposed to cultural contact as opposed to the rest of the Sub-continent for instance Buddhism’s last outpost was in Sindhi and Tantric Buddhism heavily influenced the religious practises of West Punjab.
Jared Diamond in "Guns, Germs & Steel" discusses; "The snail's pace of crop exchange between Pakistan's Indus Valley and South India" and how "farther eastward in India the shift from predominantly winter rainfall to predominantly summer rainfall contributed to a much more delayed extension of argirculture, involving different crops and farming techniques, into the Ganges plain of northeastern India". There is a clear geographic (and inevitably cultural) demarcation in the Sub-continent, which implies that one cannot carelessly subsume regional histories into that of the sub-continent.
Pakistan’s History before Islam:
The Kot Diji & Harrapan cultures; need to state these are the oldest civilisations in the world. Brisk trade was occurring between Dilmun, Mesopotamian cultures, Elamite Iran and the Indus Valley during this period.
The Aryan invasions; the earliest phase of the Aryan conquests exclusively involved Pakistan. The Dardic peoples, who are remnant from the first gradual settlements, are centred primarily in western Afghanistan, northern Pakistan and Kashmir. Their primary settlement patterns were in the mountainous regions of the north, now made accessible by the domestication of the horse**.
The Persian Empire; As a a Persophile I would keenly examine the maps of the Persian Empire. What is astounding, not least for many Pakistanis who perused the maps, is that the “Indian Satrapies” were in fact the Western Punjab and the Sindh? Roughly the entire region of the Pakistan was part of the Persian Empire, which resulted in the cross fertilisation of cultures. The name India and Hindu is derived from the Indus River. Previously called Sindhu by its inhabitants, the ancient Persians mispronounced it as Indus and the Greeks simplified it to Ind. The Arabs then on to render it as Hindu and thus India derives her present name from the Indus Valley.
The Hellenistic Period; Alexander conquered Pakistan, why the famed King Porus himself hailed from the Jhelum River. As I stated earlier Alexander stopped at the banks of the Beas River, which is roughly the border between Pakistan and India. The Hellenistic period continued with a few interruptions, such as the Maurya Empire, and with the advent of Buddhism these strands defined Indus Principalities. Despite the Hindu resurgence after the White Huns invasion, it did not lessen the influence of Buddhist though on the religious practises of pre-Islamic Pakistan.
It predates the arrival of Islam in the region by over 3000 years. After the demise of the Harappan civilization and before the arrival of Islam in the Indus Valley region, a great deal of cultural and theological churning went on courtesy of the waves of Central Asiatic Aryans, Greeks, Mongols and a legion of Hindu Kings. Enough to ensure that nothing remotely Harappan or pre-Harappan survived the times. The only thing we know about the "influence" the Kot Diji had on any culture is the Harappan civilization it preceded.
Concerning the ancient Harrapans:
The Kot Diji culture, as Suman correctly stated, organically developed into the Harrapan culture. The Harrapans were most assuredly Dravidians and purveyors of Pakistan’s Neolithic culture. Their genetic contribution and linguistic legacy are still in extant and their heritage indeed defines the entire sub-continent. The Indo-Aryan languages are distinguished from even the closely related Iranian group because of this Dravidian sub-strata. There are unique features to the Indic tongues, for instance aspiration (found in English as well) and the retroflex feature. Pushtu, an Iranian language, has also incorporated the retroflex feature because of its sojourn in the Indus Valley, an indication of the deep Harrapan legacy!
“Elite language dominance” is especially valid when considering the Aryan invasions since rather than a complete replacement of the indigenous population, the Aryans gradually settled across the plains and hills of the Indus Valley before moving on to the southerly Ganges Valley.
Phallic worship and the proto-Shiva come to mind immediately. There has been some tenuous speculation about its influence (and pervasiveness) on modern Dravidian (south indian) culture.
A propos Pakistan has an indigenous Dravidian Muslim minority in Baluchistan who number a million souls and are the subject of intense speculation in that they are the indigenous remnants of the Harrapans, who were not assimilated by the Aryan invaders..
*Taxila university was on the Grand Trunk Road (for more here) and a noted centre of learning. "Its scholarly alumni and instructors included Prasenajit, Jivika, Chark (one of the founder of Aryuvedic branch of medicine), Kautilya (author of the Arthasastra) and Paninni, the renowned Sanskrit Scholar, who taught Sanskrit grammar."
** The domestication of the horse is the single most important factor in determining the present state of our world. The Aryans putatively domesticated this animal in the slopes of Southern Russia and through it (and the chariot) were able to conquer the classical civilisations. Their foremost legacies are the Indo-European languages, spoken by a majority of the world’s population, patriarchy (I believe that Minoan civilisation was primarily matriarchal, for instance even now Dravidian Kerala is matriarchal society, and most of the sub-strate non Indo-European mythologies worship centred around a Earth Mother Goddess) and religious practises (the trinity in Christian theology is reminiscent of the Indo-European tripartite social system).
Zachary Latif 15:12 |
