Tilak Devasher’s Pakistan: Courting the Abyss is a comprehensive and clinical survey of a deeply troubled country which has become a centre of extremist ideologies and terrorist violence; consequently, a threat to many of its own nationals as also to countries in its neighbourhood and beyond. Devasher competently examines the causes for Pakistan’s evolution along this trajectory as well as the failure of its political process to develop firm democratic roots and its economy remaining stunted.
The foundations of Pakistan are embedded in the Muslim elite’s despondency at the loss of political power to the British and its failure to accept democracy as the future system for a united and Independent India. That led to separatist tendencies which, after the establishment of the Muslim League in 1906, took concrete shape in the demand for separate electorates. Muslim separatism was encouraged by the British as part of their policy of “divide and rule”. Muhammad Ali Jinnah, once an ambassador of Hindu Muslim unity and later the Muslim Quaid-e-Azam took this separatism to its culmination in the Partition of India. Devasher navigates events and processes of the creation of Pakistan and shows how they continue to cast a shadow on the country.
Devasher also looks at the question: Was Pakistan meant to be a homeland for the Muslims or an Islamic state. For Jinnah, it was perhaps the former but for his followers it was certainly the latter. Jinnah’s Pakistan got buried soon with the man himself and Pakistan’s ideological and theological journey continued along ever-narrower paths of rigid and extreme interpretations of the faith.
President Zia-ul-Haq left his imprint on Pakistan and its Army through backing a Nazaria-e-Pakistan that is now taught in Pakistani schools and which India should not ignore. Devasher does well to quote the Sustainable Development Policy Institute which notes, “Hatred against India and Hindus has been an essential component of the ideology of Pakistan because for its proponents, the existence of Pakistan was defined only in relation to Hindus, and hence the Hindu had to be painted as negatively as possible...” It is this ideology that the Pakistan Army is sworn to defend.
Pakistan has attempted to push its various national contradictions under the carpet of the unifying force of Islam. The clash of ethnic and provincial identities and the passions for linguistic preferences have been unsuccessfully sought to be reconciled by Islam. Ironically, Islam itself has become a divisive entity. The rise of sectarianism fuelled through the support of external actors principally Saudi Arabia and Iran has led to continuing violence. The seeds of this problem were present at the beginning; Devasher notes that for Jinnah, an Itnashari Shia, the rites of his sect were performed in private at his death but in public he was buried according to Sunni rites. Even then the Sunni majority could not accept that the Quaid-e-Azam was a Shia.
Devasher’s major contribution is to focus on Pakistan’s water situation, its education sector, its economy and its population growth. He does so in a section he titles, “The WEEP Analysis”. Pakistan’s water crisis is real and is the result of a rising population and the neglect of water infrastructure. However, it is attributed to India’s cheating on its commitments under the Indus Waters Treaty. A country that was water abundant became water stressed and is now water scarce.
Pakistan ranks 113 out of 120 in the Education Development Index and is in an education emergency. However, education is not a national priority. This is reflected in the distortions of school curricula as in low literacy rates. Worse, there are, as Devasher notes no signs of change.
Pakistan watchers rarely look at the country’s demographic situation. To Devasher’s credit he looks at its contours and rightly concludes that the outlook is grim. The once-in-a lifetime demographic dividend is in danger of turning into a demographic nightmare. No wonder the children of many generals have left to live in the West.
Pakistan’s economy suffers from structural deficiencies. This has led to growing poverty levels amidst growth. The low savings rate ensures that high economic growth cannot be sustained. It remains to be seen if the massive investments in the power sector envisaged in under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor will be realised.
No book on Pakistan can ignore civil-military relations. Devasher believes that Bhutto, Zardari and Nawaz Sharif missed opportunities to cut the Army to size. This is on overly optimistic view. The Army has the ability to keep its hold on Pakistan’s security policy and will not give it up.
This is not a book on India-Pakistan relations but Devasher considers them as part of his survey of Pakistan’s ties with other select countries — Afghanistan, China and America. He outlines the key elements of these relations. What he could do in the next edition is to consider the impact of the China-Pakistan nexus on India. Their relations have been based on a shared antipathy towards India but a new positive element has emerged through the CPEC, which is both strategic and economic. Devasher deals with CPEC but it requires fuller treatment.
Pakistan’s basic urge is to maintain parity with India even at the cost of its own well-being. In this sense it is continuing the approaches of the League. Thus India for Pakistan is Hindu. Devasher’s stark realism and prognosis on India-Pakistan ties should be taken into account by all Indian policymakers who deal with a state with nuclear weapons that has made the use of terror a part of its security doctrine.
This book ought to be compulsory reading for those who take an interest in Pakistan.
Vivek Katju is a retired foreign service officer
