Pakistan through the tortuous alleys of August

The Islamabad High Court has suspended the Toshakhana case against former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan and has ordered his immediate release. Whether he will in fact walk free, given that scores upon scores of cases are yet stacked against him, remains in question.
The interesting part of the Imran Khan story is that the IHC has pronounced judgment on him in the month of August, a period in the calendar which is of significance in Pakistan's history. Khan was taken into custody earlier this month and transported to Attock prison where, according to his lawyers, conditions have not been conducive to his status as a former head of government.
Much more remains to be said about Imran Khan as Pakistan's courts, its government and its army go into action, each in its own way, on how to deal with him. Back in August 1947, be it remembered, it was the future that beckoned the Muslims of the Indian subcontinent through the idea of Pakistan.
On 11 August, three days before the creation of Pakistan through the partition of India, Mohammad Ali Jinnah spoke of a country where the followers of all religions --- Muslims, Hindus, Christians and others --- would be free to pursue their faiths, noting that the state would have nothing to do with matters of people's religious beliefs.
It struck people as rather odd that while Jinnah's campaign since 1940 had been aimed at the creation of a Muslim Pakistan, the soon-to-be founder of Pakistan was now speaking of a state in plainly secular terms. On 14 August, Pakistan came into being, with its two wings separated by a thousand miles of Indian territory.
In effect, the state of Pakistan began from scratch in almost every respect, with even chairs and tables and other office paraphernalia needing to be divided between the dominions of India and Pakistan. And let us not forget that August 1947 was also the month when tens of thousands of refugees made their way to new homes across the border. Along the way, two million people were killed. As many as fourteen million Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs were displaced.
Go back a little, to August 1946, when the Muslim League ministry in Bengal proclaimed on Jinnah's instructions a so-called Direct Action Day. The consequences were horrific, with anywhere between 5,000 and 10,000 Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs losing their lives in the communal riots which engulfed Calcutta over a period of four days. It was an eerie sign that India could not stay in one piece.
In August 1971, the Yahya Khan military junta placed Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, who had led his party the Awami League to a massive electoral victory in December 1970, on trial before a secret military court in Mianwali. The charge was waging war against Pakistan. The court was presided over by Brigadier Rahimuddin Khan, who in later years was promoted to lieutenant general. It may be recalled that a sentence of death was passed on Bangabandhu in November 1971 by the court.
August has resonance for Pakistan in relation to the constitutional moves undertaken following the loss of the province of East Pakistan in December 1971 through the emergence of the independent state of Bangladesh. In August 1973, the government of President Zulfikar Ali Bhutto reached a deal with the political opposition on returning the country to parliamentary democracy.
A constitution, the third in Pakistan's history after 1956 and 1962, was adopted by the national assembly. Its members were the 138 lawmakers who had been elected in December 1970, with the majority number of members, 169, having become part of the constituent assembly of Bangladesh.
Under the new constitution, Bhutto took over as Prime Minister, with Fazle Elahi Chaudhry becoming President. Pakistan's four provinces --- Punjab, Sindh, Balochistan and the North-West Frontier Province (today's Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa) --- went for administrative changes with chief ministers becoming the centres of power and governors exercising authority as figurehead symbols of constitutional rule.
The 1973 constitution was quite a remarkable document, given that unlike the constitutions of 1956 and 1962 it was a harbinger of proper democracy in the country. Unfortunately, beginning with General Ziaul Haque, the constitution would go through several amendments that would undermine its very spirit, principally reducing the powers of the Prime Minister and enhancing those of the President.
In August 1988, Ziaul Haq, who had ensured Bhutto's execution after a sham of a trial of the former Prime Minister in April 1979, died when the C-130 aircraft he was on with senior military leaders and the US ambassador, crashed in Bahawalpur moments after take-off. There was no way to identify the bodies of the dead, save a piece of Zia through his teeth and moustache.
The government of acting President Ghulam Ishaq Khan made arrangements for a grand state funeral for Zia, whose remains, assuming that they were his, were buried in the compound of the King Faisal Mosque in Islamabad. All these years after Zia's death, his legacy or whatever there was of it is conspicuous by its absence. He remains a reviled name in Pakistan's history.
In December 1971, four days after the liberation of Bangladesh, General Agha Mohammad Yahya Khan handed over the presidency of a rump Pakistan to Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. One of the first acts of the Bhutto government was to send Yahya Khan and other senior officers of the Pakistan army into retirement. Additionally, Bhutto placed Yahya Khan under house arrest. When the Hamoodur Rahman Commission was constituted to inquire into the causes of Pakistan's military debacle in Bangladesh in 1971, Yahya Khan was summoned before it to explain his actions in that period.
Among others who testified before the commission were Bhutto himself as well as former President Ayub Khan. In the end, the commission produced a lengthy report that was never revealed to the public. It is said that a copy was handed over to Bhutto, who promptly had it hidden away. Reports have also abounded that in his times, General Ziaul Haq came across a copy and quickly destroyed it.
Yahya Khan was freed from house confinement by the Ziaul Haq regime once the government of Prime Minister Bhutto had been overthrown in a coup. He spent the final years of his life away from the public eye, unable to face the wrath of the people over his role in the cataclysmic events of 1971. Yahya Khan died on 10 August 1980. In what was a bizarre state of affairs, he was accorded a funeral with full military honours by the Zia regime.
August is thus inextricably linked with Pakistan's history. Imran Khan is but the newest episode in the telling of the tale.

[email protected]