Saleena Karim in her book ‘Secular Jinnah’ (2010) attributes the
usage of the term ‘Islamic socialism’
to Jinnah himself ‘as well as the early leaders of Pakistan.’ Furthermore, she
states: ‘Liaquat Ali Khan considered the abolition of landlordism a necessary
step towards establishing this Islamic Socialism.’ However the subsequent
social and political developments lead to a constitution which clearly intended
to be based in the ‘Islamic ideals’ as understood by Iqbal and Jinnah but was at
the same time inconsistent. No wonder, she says, the opposition leaders of the
time ‘raised some legitimate criticisms’ on the then proposed constitutional
framework so as to promote their notion of ‘modern
democratic state’ – the term falsely attributed to Jinnah in Justice
Munir’s book ‘From Jinnah to Zia’ (1979).
Why was it then
that the intentions could not result in the necessary actions required to
innovate a new socio-political and economic system of governance based on the ‘Islamic ideals’ for which Pakistan was
created? Part of the answer is the early death of the ideological fathers of
Pakistan thus leaving an intellectual gap which was not filled. But this does
not do justice with the immense significance of the question and is only a way
of avoiding it by pretending to having answered it.
Jinnah had
abhorred the ‘modern democratic form
of Government’ in his address to the Hostel Parliament of Ismail Yusuf College
(dated 1st Feb 1943) while demanding ‘a true democracy in accordance with Islam and not a
Parliamentary Government of the Western or Congress type.’ Later in the same
year, Jinnah said in his Presidential address at the Muslim League’s Annual
Session (dated 24th April 1943), “I have no doubt that a large body of us visualise Pakistan as a
people’s government.… The
constitution of Pakistan can only be framed by the millat and the people.”
The using of
the words ‘large body of us’ makes it
clear that ideology of Pakistan was well understood by the Leaguers’ and the
notion of Jinnah’s death leaving behind an intellectual gap is overemphasised. The
intellectual clarity of the ‘large body
of us’ which Jinnah left behind can be depicted by their debates with the
opposition during the first Constituent Assembly and unanimity on drafting of
the constitution by the ‘people’s
government’ in ‘accordance with Islam.’
This brings us back to the above question to which the answer, in fact, lies
not with Jinnah but with Iqbal.
In one of the
letter to Jinnah (dated 28th May 1937), Iqbal wrote, “The atheistic
socialism of Jawaharlal is not likely to receive much response from the
Muslims. The question therefore is how is it possible to solve the problem of
Muslim poverty? And the whole future of
the League depends on the League’s activity to solve this question.” With
Iqbal’s death, all the energies of the League shifted towards manoeuvring the
realities of the time so as to achieve their political objective. The league’s
future was therefore only till what they had managed to answer and was destined
to see its end when the time for the next question came.
While the
Leaguers’ knew what they did not want for Pakistan – Secular Capitalistic
Democracy of the West and Atheistic Socialist Communism of the East – they had
not yet answered Iqbal’s crucial question. This is apparent from Jinnah’s
address at the Opening Ceremony of State Bank of Pakistan. Jinnah categorically
refuted the notion of adopting the ‘economic system of the west’ which ‘created
insoluble problems for humanity’ and propagated for ‘evolving banking practices
compatible with Islamic ideas of social
and economic life’ and hence the term ‘Islamic
socialism.’ However, nowhere in the Leaguers’ speeches does one find what
these ‘practices’ or principles were except in broader terms of equality, freedom
and socio-economic justice as embedded in Islam.
In fact, Jinnah
had formed a Planning Committee in 1943 to chart out a five year plan for the
socio-economic uplift of Pakistan. The Committee – consisting of economics,
engineering and other professionals – held its first meeting in September 1944
and was advised by Jinnah in the following words: ‘Our ideals should not be capitalistic but Islamic.’ However, the
Committee could not complete the second phase of its objective of focusing
primarily on Pakistan specific areas due to the turn of events in the short
span of time.
It is my
understanding that the success of Pakistan lies in returning to completing the work
initiated by Jinnah so as to find the answer to Iqbal’s question. However, it
is highly unlikely to escape the shackles of both ‘capitalism’ and ‘socialism’ in
our pursuit towards reaching our destiny without having understood the Islamic socio-economic view. And for
this goal of applying ‘Islamic ideals’
to create our distinct socio-economic system promising justice and mutual
wellbeing, the starting point is to study their first hand application by the
very person who introduced such ‘Ideals.’
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