Punjab and South Asian peace —Ishtiaq Ahmed

Free movement of people and goods between the two Punjabs across a legal but open border should satisfy everyone who can think rationally. There will indeed be stiff resistance to such peace overtures

The ninth annual conference of the World Punjabi Congress was held in the last week of January in Lahore. It was an unusually high profile event. Who could imagine just a few months ago that the chief ministers of East and West Punjab would address an international gathering of Punjabis from the same podium, speaking about a common Punjabi culture and origin and the need to eliminate restrictions so the Punjabis could meet freely.

East Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amrinder Singh went so far as to call the international borders, dividing Punjab into an eastern and a western part and placing them into two separate states, artificial. On the other hand, West Punjab Chief Minister Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi stressed the importance of recognising and accepting that Punjabis were now divided into two separate and independent states, although their cultural bonds were unbreakable.

Much of what was said was sentimental and perhaps part of the conventional rhetoric politicians employ on such occasions to embellish their statements with emotive imagery. But the two speeches also represented different political perceptions of contemporary political reality. Whereas Indians in general and Punjabi Indians in particular tend to look beyond borders when visualising everlasting peace in the region, Pakistanis in general and West Punjabis in particular are keen to remind the world that they have chosen to be an integral part of a different nation and, therefore, peace between India and Pakistan would mean maintaining the separate and distinct national entities of the two countries.

There is however an irony involved: the current perceptions of the two sides are actually a complete reversal of how Punjab was seen more than 56 years ago when the question of its division was first aired. Ironically it was the Sikh-Congress alliance which demanded the division of Punjab, arguing that if India were to be partitioned on the basis of contiguous Hindu-Sikh and Muslim majorities then Punjab should also be divided on the same basis. On the other hand, the Muslim League wanted to keep the Punjab united. This was given legal effect when the Punjab Assembly voted on this matter: Hindus and Sikhs voted to divide Punjab and Muslims to keep it united.

The reasons why the Sikhs and Congress demanded the division of Punjab were varied, but the main ones were anxiety and fear. The idea that Pakistan would become an Islamic state had been propagated throughout the Punjab during the 1945-46 election campaign. It naturally made Hindus and Sikhs feel vulnerable, and their worst fears were confirmed when massive violent attacks against these two communities occurred in the Rawalpindi-Jhelum and Multan areas in March 1947. Punjabi Muslims in Lahore and Amritsar also faced intimidation during March, but their real ordeal with communal frenzy started on a massive scale from July onwards when Sikh and Hindu hordes let loose a reign of terror directed against them in the eastern districts where they were in a minority.

The earliest estimates of deaths by Sir Penderel Moon put Muslim casualties in East Punjab at least twice as high compared to that of Hindus and Sikhs in west Punjab. However, his total number of 200,000 deaths is now considered too low. Current estimates range from 800,000 to two million. How many of these were Muslims and how many Hindus and Sikhs will never be known, but with a tragedy of such magnitude any normalisation between the two parts and their people will require a lot of forgiving and forgetting.

I have not followed the discussion in the Indian press on the current liaison between East and West Punjab, but in Pakistan some people have expressed great suspicion about these two parts coming closer. It is alleged that the two-nation theory is in danger of being subverted if the religious foundations of nationalism are supplanted with a secular culture; additionally, it is argued that if the Pakistan government is allowing the two Punjabs to hold annual meetings then it should also let Sindhis, Pukhtuns and the Urdu-speaking people meet and re-establish their common cultural links. Indeed such concerns are genuine and we need to address them in a candid and open manner.

As regards the two-nation theory, I think it is no longer relevant once Pakistan came into being. The new state did not include all the Muslims of India and therefore only those Muslims who became citizens of Pakistan are now Pakistanis. Equally, not all non-Muslims left Pakistan. Those who stayed on should have equal rights along with Muslims.

A continuation of the two-nation theory argument only helps the fundamentalists justify blasphemy, hudood and other such discriminatory and oppressive laws. It is time that Pakistani nationalism based on territorial principles should replace the religious basis of nationalism. This will not harm Pakistan. In fact it will enable the state to emerge as a proper democracy.

As far as the rights of the other nationalities to meet freely, I see no reason why it should not be possible once everyone realises the permanence of the separate and independent status of Pakistan. There is no reason why people who speak the same language should be lumped into one state. After all except for Brazil the rest of Latin America is Spanish-speaking. This has not meant that the several territorial states of Spanish-speakers seek union into one state.

There is however one fundamental reason why peace between the two Punjabs is a pre-condition to peace in the entire South Asia. Apart from Bengal, it is the only province that was divided on communal lines. Unless the two Punjabs decide honestly and sincerely to seek friendship and peace, there will not be durable peace in the region. Punjab remains the key province, just as it did in the 1940s and even now, 56 years after independence, for determining the direction of politics in the subcontinent.

It is important that the governments of India and Pakistan capitalise on this opportunity when the Punjabis are ready for peace. Free movement of people and goods between the two Punjabs across a legal but open border should satisfy everyone who can think rationally. There will indeed be stiff resistance to such peace overtures from the pathological elements on both sides, but now is the time to make tough and firm decisions.

The author is an associate professor of Political Science at Stockholm University. He is the author of two books. His email address is Ishtiaq.Ahmed@statsvet.su.se