Media in Pakistan got its long desired freedom in near past. We saw media excelling be it print or electronic; newspaper publishing houses went in to business of TV news channels with their long journalism experience. So far so good but in recent times we see an extra ordinary activism in this pillar of state particularly on the side of electronic media. Media Anchors seem to put their nose everywhere whether it is in the interest of state or not; they can take up any topic from a dogs fight in a street to embarrassing couples in public parks to road accidents to plane crash to defense strategies to functioning of institutions to failure of governments to toppling of governments etc.

Their claim of being an important player in restoring democracy and of a watchdog on government performance doesn’t impress me much. Let me remind them the Pakistan Movement and Quaid-e-Azam who lead against all odds and won this country for us didn’t had them at all. They have failed in the capacity of a watchdog too as Musharraf Regime had to bow due to their own mistakes and current government is still in power besides all their mismanagement and bad governance.

The anchors talk about moral values and ethics for almost every one else in the society but they have forgotten their own. This attitude unfortunately prevails in entire society i.e. after the successful lawyers’ movement some lawyers thought they were above the law. Someone joins Police thinks he has the immunity against both criminal and civil proceedings. Constitution allows every citizen to take part in politics but when an anchor sits in front of a camera with a mike on hand or collar his role changes altogether but it is unfortunate that some anchors forget this. Further to it the camera or mike doesn’t give the right to insult others in simple words camera and mike doesn’t make you a super human.

I will not name anyone personally but would definitely refer to shows on a lighter note;

Kharri Baat doesn’t mean to be rude, disrespectful and putting your words in to other’s mouth.

Bolta Pakistan where only two persons roar and entire Pakistan remains silent, if someone dares to call is given a shut up call immediately.

Aapas ki Baat should stay as Aapas ki Baat why do they take calls but have anyone watched them announcing the number to call on or even the number displayed on-screen even if someone then for how many fractions of seconds?

Capital Talk impressive as far as promo video is concerned.

Aaj Kamran Khan Ke Saath sounds like a trailer full of thrill instead of end day news review.

Kal Tak yeah all is well but why so artificial expression at the start of show and where does it go during conversation?

Lekin has too many lekins lekin someone needs to prepare well before maligning or favoring someone.

In Session is where everybody else seems to be in session except the host.

Cross Fire starts and one has to find the remote to reduce the volume and it is not a Cross Fire at all but single sided fire to be exactly.

ShahidNama the name says it all, when its Nama why are other participants invited?

Meray Mutabiq is so confusing; I still have to figure out that actually “Kis ke Mutabiq.”

Policy Matters lacks the policy itself.

To the point; the one watching it from start till end remains clueless about what was the point.

News Night with Talat as name suggests needs some news not a topic or a particular situation only.

Nukta e Nazar but shouldn’t it be told once and for all?

Off the record how ridiculous it shows all the shit thrown around and still is off the record.

Besides all the news talk shows the morning shows Jagta Pakistan, Ba Khabar Sawera, Subha Saweray etc. though I am not a regular on these but watched a video on YouTube where a host is running after couples in public parks violating the basic rights of citizens but no one is there to challenge.

Who is responsible for all this mess? Media House Owners, Anchors, PEMRA or ones who watch them? Is there any code of conduct? Is there any check on the biased reporting or ethics to converse? In print media is there check on plagiarism? Does any journo have the courage to clarify allegations of plagiarism, getting plots, houses or other unlawful privileges during different regimes against him or if he cannot then leave journalism forever? Do they have tolerance to be questioned or they are the only ones to have the right to question?

This will probably be one of the many articles that I plan to write about the construction of contemporary Pakistani national identity. While I have many versions of theories of nation available to undertake this project, I have decided to focus primarily on the mainstream statist narrative that Pakistani media, the school system, and the foundational intellectuals rely on to  construct the narrative of Pakistan.

In this highly idealized and ideological narrative, Pakistan is posited as the terminal outcome of an elitist dream of separatism defined in difference and in conflict with the larger “Hindu” nationalism of India before partition. We have been telling this story to our children, showing its unfolding in well crafted historical TV shows and movies. As a result, the Pakistani national narrative has now streamlined itself as more or less a religious narrative of nationhood. In my humble opinion, unless Pakistan dismantles and restructures this psuedo-religious national narrative, it will continue to struggle as a nation perpetually in crisis.

There is a dire need for a new kind of historiography: a historiography that does not rely on usual clichés of a great leader fighting against the machinations of Hindus and the British to wrest a country for Indian Muslims. Those of us who have read the events and politics of the creation of Pakistan know, through textual analysis, that mr. Jinnah, until the very end, would have been happy if the British and Indian National Congress had agreed to a sort of federation in which the Muslims of India could have had parity at the federal level. It was the failure of this particular thrust of Jinnah’s struggle that ultimately resulted in the failure of his larger dream and creation of Pakistan as a less-than-perfect alternative. We need to seriously read and discuss this hidden aspect of the creation of Pakistan.

We also need to seriously question all those who assert that Pakistan was to be exclusively a Muslim nation: that was never what Jinnah had intended. In fact, the religious leaders–most of them–were opposed to the creation of Pakistan and did not lend their full support to Mr. Jinnah until the very end.

A critical historiography will highlight these aspects of the struggle for Pakistan and will also open space for imagining a more diverse, equal, and egalitarian Pakistan. A kind of Pakistan in which histories of minorities, women, and peasants are not whitewashed but foregrounded.

Our national narrative should also focus on the rapacious role of the zamindari system, the sardari system, and the destruction of our public sphere by the mullahs and their followers. We should have the courage to challenge all these sectors of political power that seek to present Pakistan in their own contorted and outdated vision of  national life. Unless Pakistan tells a story in which the people have the ultimate power and, Pakistan will remain the crisis state that it is so aptly dubbed by its friends and foes alike.

Most importantly our historians and writers need to stop valorizing the military and need to highlight the destructive role that the armed forces have played in keeping democracy in check and in maintaining the socio-economic status quo.

The stories that we tell our children should be about a more diverse and democratic Pakistan and not of a religiously defined nation perpetually in embrace with all the outdated and repressive forces in of our public sphere. All assertions of exclusive ideas of identity–may it be regional, political, or religious–must be challenged and questioned perpetually by the public intellectuals and the media.

A critical historiography, a democratic didactics, and a re-imagining of our past to create a vision of a better future would be a good start!

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© 2011, Masood Ashraf Raja. This article may not be reproduced in any form without providing an active attribution link/ reference to The Pakistan Forum. All attribution links within the article must also be retained.

By Amaar Ahmad:

There is a vociferous debate surrounding Pakistan’s national identity. Let there be no doubt that there will not be a Pakistani today more patriotic than the founder of Pakistan – Muhammad Ali Jinnah. On the 11th August, 1947, Jinnah addressed the first Constituent Assembly of Pakistan as the man who had led and inspired the Pakistan Movement. In his historic address, he does not shy away from mentioning “India”, in relation to the “Pakistani Identity”. In fact, his entire speech hovers around the task of building the Pakistani Identity. In his speech, he mentions “India” at least 10 times, very deliberately, very positively and very unapologetically.

We need not try to be more loyal than the king. In view of this unchallenged status of Jinnah, it may be prudent to examine his understanding of the identity of the country he made.There is a feeling that people are looking to construct a new identity for Pakistan. Some may describe Pakistan simply as the Anti-India as if the reason for Pakistan’s existence today needs a hostile India. But Jinnah clearly had a different understanding.

Following are ten quotes from the speech of Jinnah:

1. “…the whole world is wondering at this unprecedented cyclonic revolution which has brought about the clan of creating and establishing two independent sovereign Dominions in this Sub-continent.

2. “This mighty Sub-continent with all kinds of inhabitants has been brought under a plan which is titanic, unknown, unparalleled.”

3. “One of the biggest curses from which India is suffering – I do not say that other countries are free from it, but, I think our condition is much worse – is bribery and corruption.”

4. “I know there are people who do not quite agree with the division of India…”

5. “…it will be proved by actual experience as we go on that was the only solution of India’sconstitutional problem.”

6. “Any idea of a united India could never have worked and in my judgement it would have led us to terrific disaster. Maybe that view is correct; maybe it is not; that remains to be seen.”

7. “We should begin to work in that spirit and in course of time all these angularities of the majority and minority communities, the Hindu community and the Muslim community, because even as regards Muslims you have Pathans, Punjabis, Shias, Sunnis and so on, and among the Hindus you have Brahmins, Vashnavas, Khatris, also Bengalis, Madrasis and so on, will vanish.”

8. “Indeed if you ask me, this has been the biggest hindrance in the way of India to attain the freedom and independence and but for this we would have been free people long long ago.”

9. “No power can hold another nation, and specially a nation of 400 million souls in subjection; nobody could have conquered you, and even if it had happened, nobody could have continued its hold on you for any length of time, but for this.”

10. “…history shows that in England, conditions, some time ago, were much worse than those prevailing in India today.”

Let these words guide the objective reader to reflect. If one thing is evident from these quotes from the famous 11th August 1947 speech, it is the fact that “India”, the word, the name, the region, the culture, the history and the nation, are all very much part of the “Pakistani Identity”. Regardless of what name we give it – British India, United India, Undivided India, Pre-Partition India or the Indian Subcontinent – the fact remains that Pakistan was born out of it, as was today’s Republic of India. It appears that Jinnah almost identifies Pakistan with India.

In the ninth quote above “No power can hold another nation, and specially a nation of 400 million souls in subjection; nobody could have conquered you, and even if it had happened, nobody could have continued its hold on you for any length of time, but for this” Jinnah treats the Indian Subcontinent as one nation about to be politically partitioned into two states. He clearly speaks of “a nation”, defining it by its strength of 400 million – the population of the Subcontinent rather than that of the emerging Pakistani state alone.

We need not search for any new Pakistani identity as the job has clearly been done by the founder of Pakistan. Pakistan is simply a country comprising the Muslim-majority states of the Indian Subcontinent. Pakistan is as much heir to the thousands of years of history and culture of the Indian Subcontinent as our neighbor Republic of India itself. This recognition is perhaps necessary to defang the extremists in both sides of the border.