The last time I wandered the dust-laden streets of Karachi, in 2007, Benazir Bhutto was still alive, Pervez Musharraf was president, Imran Khan was more renowned for his cricket career and former lovers than for his politics, and Asif Ali Zardari was in intermittent self-imposed exile, desperately dodging corruption charges. Pakistanis were wildly paranoid about India, blamed their extremist undercurrents on Afghan refugees and were deeply suspicious of the United States. I returned for a visit late last year, and as soon as I set foot in the gritty city of Karachi again, I knew that everything had changed and yet nothing had changed.
I have visited Pakistan throughout the years and grew up hearing the gruesome tales of Partition. “Partition.” What a flaccid name for the brutal revolution that claimed one million lives. I still have family whom I have never met because they sided with India. In 1947, my grandfather was one of millions of Muslims who left India in search of a more tolerant nation. Fearing for his life, he fled in the middle of the night and narrowly escaped the clutches of the Indian army on the treacherous journey to Pakistan. After five years of absence, I returned to the land of my heritage in December with hopes of understanding why my ancestors gambled everything for this country. I left confused, disheartened, ashamed of its government and deeply empathetic towards its beautiful people who deserve better.
Between the corridors of Saddar, Karachi’s old city, sunlit storefronts still flaunt glorious silks and chiffons, offering distractions from striking poverty on the street. Majestic facades of dilapidated colonial buildings transported me to a time when the British Raj occupied South Asia. The founding of Pakistan was supposed to birth a progressive state where Muslims like my grandparents would no longer be marginalised by India or exploited by the British Empire. Instead, Pakistanis are now subjugated by their own corrupt politicians, who not only pocket their “10 percent”, but also pilfer their citizens’ dignity. In its notoriously endemic paranoia, Pakistan has always seen the United States and India as the cause of its troubles. However, Conspiracy Theory Fatigue now wafts in the air and the dwindling middle-class simply wants clean water, electricity and a chance to abandon their ghettos and pursue education.
Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani was recently indicted for failing to pursue a corruption case against Zardari, now the president. Elements of the Pakistani government remain so deeply committed to the protection of Zardari that there is little energy for much else. Public expenditure on education is approximately 2.7 percent of GDP and has remained stagnant for several years. With illiteracy rates over 40 percent and an estimated poverty rate of nearly 50 percent, Pakistanis rightly hold their government responsible for their destitution.
In December, several busy streets in Karachi were shut down, forcing traffic to a halt for several hours and stranding people at the airport, just so Gilani could be driven across Karachi to visit Zardari. Public indignation was so great that a television station repeatedly ran aerial footage of Karachi’s massive traffic jams next to footage of quiet, undisturbed London streets while the prime minister David Cameron travelled through his city. As the segment was shown in a local shop, the proprietor furiously declared, “This is why Pakistan is in the pitiful state it is in.”
While the lacklustre concrete fortifications of diplomats’ homes in Islamabad do little to complement its natural beauty, Karachi remains a luscious visual gumbo. High society women don sexy designer fashions amid round-bellied street vendors inviting passers-by to try a samosa. Sophisticated Pakistanis who take pride in a culture rich with literature, art and intellectual discourse take exception to being lumped in with narrow-minded extremists. Theirs is the Pakistan of punk rock concerts, edgy fashion shows, transvestites’ rights movements and, now, even an Oscar winner.
It is true, though – more burqas sweep Pakistan’s roads than before, reflecting the Salafi and Wahabi elements that have crept into Pakistan’s tapestry. However, several women who recently began wearing niqab told me they did so because it offers cultural protection against violent crime and sexual harassment. In truth, burqas are but one slice of Pakistani society. A Pakistani television programme recently showcased a prominent journalist Maya Khan searching for unmarried couples on dates. She interrogated them and even asked for marriage certificates. Public anger over the intrusive antics was widespread, and in a bold move showcasing Pakistan’s progressive voices, Khan was fired.
The average Pakistani man is more interested in providing a healthy future for his children than in religious zealotry, yet all the government offers its citizens is apathy. Half-naked children bathing in sewage and cloaked in misery remain a relentless alarm clock on Pakistan’s collective conscious. Almost 30 percent of Pakistani children under age 5 are underweight and 40 percent are growth stunted, yet Pakistan’s per capita expenditure on health is only $23 (Rs 2,093), compared to the recommended $35 to $50 (Rs 3,185 to Rs 4,550). Pakistan has spent twice as much on defence during peacetime as it has on education and healthcare combined.
During my visit to Bilquis Paediatric Cancer Hospital, the lack of equipment and ancillary staff was staggering. Bald children whose faces were mapped with grime-entrenched creases lay limp with frailty, sniffing back streams of snot. The physician on rounds had coincidentally treated a patient I had transferred from Afghanistan. Last year, I volunteered as a physician treating children at Kabul hospitals. When Afghan children needed a higher level of care for cardiac surgery, critical illness or chemotherapy, we always transferred them to Pakistan. There were never any obstacles, such as funding or visas. The Pakistani government allowed Afghan children into the country without so much as a border-crossing fee. Still, despite President Hamid Karzai’s repeated affirmations of brotherhood, the relationship remains speckled with suspicion on both sides, similar to Pakistan’s ties with the United States.
The unremitting Western narrative of Pakistan is that of a “failed state”. Neglected in that narrative is the fact that the American-led war on terror has resulted in approximately 30,000 Pakistani civilian casualties, the equivalent of a 9/11, every year. Last November, NATO forces inadvertently killed 24 Pakistani soldiers. United States drone strikes have killed 1,717 to 2,680 individuals from 2004 to present, with a 17 percent non-militant casualty rate since 2004, according to the New America Foundation. Then there was the “vaccination” programme which, according to The Guardian, was set up to help gather intelligence on Osama bin Laden. Anger about the vaccine scheme caused officials from the aid agency Save the Children to evacuate the country for two weeks and fuelled distrust of immunisations. In a region where nearly 1 in 10 children die before their fifth birthday – the majority from diarrhoea, pneumonia or vaccine-preventable diseases – this was a major public health setback.
Still, Pakistan must accept responsibility for paving its own tragic pathway. Not the United States, nor Afghanistan, nor India assassinated Salmaan Taseer, a politician who took a brave stance against Pakistan’s blasphemy laws. Nor were they responsible for the tragic bombing of Karachi’s Marriot Hotel. Nor did they assassinate Benazir Bhutto. United States Secretary of Defence Leon Panetta recently announced that America would end its combat role in Afghanistan in 2013. The last time the United States left the Afghan army to its own devices was after the Soviets were defeated. Fast-forward a few decades and here we are, still embroiled in the region’s turmoil. Pakistan, a nuclear state 170-million strong, brimming with ethnic divisions, unrelenting fraud, and vulnerable to the very jihadists it emboldens in its backyard, is enough to make one yearn for the issues of Afghanistan instead.
It is not – nor will it ever be – home to me, yet Pakistan rivers its way through my veins. Memories of vibrant streets peppered with multi-hued buses swerving on lane-less highways are dear to me. Karachi pulsates with intricate labyrinths of bazaars interspersed with stunning, chic women decked out in the finest fashions. The air, laced with fragrant cardamom chai still haunts me. Karachi’s real soul lies in its people – people who invite you to stay at their homes upon first introductions, shop owners who call to make sure you got home safely, people with a solid work ethic, who love celebrating life and love, famous for weddings that last for days. The Pakistan I reminisce about is one where the sun peeks through stately British colonial architecture, bathing the streets in amber and framing the dreams of yesteryear.
My grandfather traversed monstrous terrain as a refugee in search of a principled country that accepted him. Instead, Pakistan is on the brink of chaos, drowning in sectarian tensions and paranoia, its destiny been relinquished to corrupt leaders. When my grandfather first moved to Pakistan at Partition, he was often unable to afford meals and wandered refugee camps in search of family. Though he later completed higher education and climbed the ranks of his profession, he claimed that, despite its horrific conditions, Pakistan still had promise and integrity. I doubt he would maintain that today.
Seema Jilani is a physician on medical evacuation flights for critically ill children at Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston. She has done humanitarian aid work in Afghanistan, Sudan, the West Bank and Gaza, Israel, Lebanon, Egypt, and the Balkans. She is also a freelance writer whose work has appeared in The Guardian, BBC, The Washington Post, McClatchy Newspapers, The Independent and The Huffington Post.