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Monday, May 12, 2014

The Secular Fascists' dilemma of blaming Jinnah and Pakistan for everything

This is a rebuttal to Mahwish Badar’s article appearing in the Express Tribune titled “Jinnah made a mistake and I am ashamed of being Pakistani!”. Although ET publishes a disclaimer at the end of each blog that the views expressed in the article are not newspaper’s policy but it gets difficult to digest realizing the fact that most of the articles have the same tendency of attacking Pakistan’s ideology and its religious base. I wouldn’t have thought of writing this article if Miss Mahwish had the courage to keep her twitter public to get some dose of criticism but I am not surprised as she knew what she would face in the country where her views are rejected by majority and she is justified to write such an article in anger instead of supporting it logically.

She starts with the problems she faces on airports during “hopping” countries without going into details of what caused all this. Did Jinnah cause it or her favorite super power country US by invading foreign lands and expecting the natives to present them flowers. For a single person who was “allegedly” involved in 9/11 they invaded Afghanistan and later Iraq causing the death of millions of human beings as “Collateral Damage”. Those who were trained and treated with utmost respect by White House in 1980s became terrorists overnight.

And then the stereotyping continues as Mahvish goes on to blame dictatorship and later on quotes NY Times article about WHO declaration of polio emergency in Pakistan. Not going into details of who laid the industrial foundation of Pakistan and made institutions like NADRA, HEC, NHA, the polio emergency was never imposed during any dictatorial rule which makes Mahvish’s argument void. And then came the Mullah factor, the same mullah who was supported by the west for their own interest in 1980s. I agree with Mahvish that Pakistan needs to get rid of the Mullah culture but that doesn’t mean giving secular forces the license to operate freely because Jinnah never wanted a theocratic state nor a secular state. I know Mahvish would argue about Jinnah wanting a secular state to which I would recommend her to read the book “Secular Jinnah” written by Salena Karim which is based on evidence, not mere assumptions.

Mahvish is very much worried about the grave situation in Pakistan but still is ashamed of being a Pakistani; both these sentences don’t get along very well. You cannot be worried about something you are ashamed of. When you are worried about a country that is in miseries, you help fix it not that you abandon it and blame the founder for the miseries denying historical facts. The atrocities of Kashmir, Gujrat, Babri Mosque should be enough for a sane person to realize why it was important to have a separate homeland and how wise Jinnah’s decision was in the context.

Attack on Raza Rumi and any other citizen of Pakistan is as much deplorable as raping of thousands of mothers and sisters in Kashmir. The attack on polio workers in Pakistan should be condemned as much as the unmarked graves in Kashmir and mass genocide of Muslim communities in Assam and Gujrat. Mahvish has passed the judgment that any Pakistani that feels proud of being a Pakistani is on the side of murderers and that people supporting a United India like her, despite all the Indian state terrorism for decades, are peaceful citizens.


Mahvish, 180 million Pakistanis are ashamed of people like you who grow up in Pakistan, get a degree, fly abroad and blame the founder instead of returning the favor. The great nations and super powers whom you mentioned in your article didn't become superpower overnight. Their utmost dedication to their country made them great. If you still want to become a Pakistani again, you are most welcome because unlike your ideals, Pakistanis have a big heart.

Written By: Faraan Khan
Faraan tweets at @FaraanKhan (twitter.com/Faraankhan)

Pakistan Cyber Force

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