Yesterday, at the stroke of midnight, I was woken up by stressful noise coming from the neighborhood. As it happens after half an hour's sleep, I was disoriented and bewildered trying to figure out the cause of that coarse sound coupled with gunfire crackles. May be terrorist attack. May be a fight between armed groups. May be an ongoing robbery. However, orientation took effect, firing sounded more like fireworks which gave the impression of a marriage celebrations but soon it changed when it dawned upon me that these were Independence Celebrations. And that stressful sound emanated from Azadi Vuvuzela. And next two hours of uninterrupted freedom celebration sounds unleashed a train of thoughts. Am I running out of steam? Or am I just being grumpy for sleep disturbance? Where is my patriotism? Or is this the only form of patriotic expression we are left with? Are we really free to celebrate anything at all?
Deep scars of Colonial subjugation translated into rule of Desi Gora Sahab. We kept writing our history and we kept deleting it. Ayub's dictatorship was celebrated. It followed romanticism with his nemesis and prodigy Bhutto. Then a sea change. Butto's nemises Zia attracted our attention through his version of Islam. For better or for worse, it changed Pakistan. Patron (Zia) gave way to prodigy (NS). Democracy set in which turned out to be the best revenge. Instead of economic reformation like China we became a consumer market without means. Our answer to high tide of globalized materialism was corrupt practices which trickled from top to bottom. Then we gave democracy a break and switched to hybrid democratic dictatorial rule of Musharraf. In his tenure, middleclass got bank loans, hence, cars increased and road space decreased. Then the 'leadership' returned and democratic forces took reins. Its thirteenth consecutive year of successive democratic forces in power. Establishment decreased its direct involvement and politicians introduced a new form of bribe i.e extension. Resultantly, we are reeling on economic front. On diplomatic front, aligning with Ale Saud and US means indirectly supporting Israel and playing right into the hands of final world order. Governance is plagued by corruption of 90s. Nothing much to say on judiaciary and its hooligan wing of Wokala (وکلاء) because the matter is sub-judicious i.e judges are listening and advocates are speaking. They have spoken on numerous occasions by now and proved their mettle. Thanks to Zia's version of Islam, big chunk of society (particularly rural) is hostage to Mullah whereas remaining small chunk is totally confused by extremist liberals, anti-Pakistan narrative and growing fashion of atheism. At the turn of millennial, we adopted another cancerous trend i.e. evil nexus of politics and media. Agenda of politicians is sold by prime time media anchors like Hamids, Malicks, Kamran Shahids etc who party late night with each other and laugh at the sorry state of this nation. Brain drain is costing us. Iqbal and MA Jinnah were brains but they returned to subcontinent and paid back their due to the nation. Brains of free Pakistan are just keyboard warriors because western lifestyle is more addictive than they initially thought.
Hence, our standard of celebrating independence is fireworks modernized by sweet sound of azadi vuvuzela and not to mention silencerless bikes of Pindi Boys. Happy 73rd Indepence Day sans Indepence hoping to have one soon Insha Allah. Hope is our only hope.
Only Allah knows the whole Truth.
