Should Seraiki identity be the basis for the administrative restructuring of Punjab?
Many believe that restructuring Pakistan into smaller units will lead to better administration, but what should be the basis of this restructuring? On Feburary 19, at 7 pm PKT, the Herald has invited three panellists to discuss the idea behind the creation of the Seraiki province.
Asad Farooq has previously studied and worked at the University of Warwick, the School of Oriental & African Studies and at Chancellor College, University of Malawi. His main areas of interest include human rights discourse and practice, law in development, alternative theorisations of law, and popular reason in law and politics. He has worked as an activist in south Punjab for many years.
Mushtaq Gaadi teaches at Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad and is editor of the Seraiki journal Sunjjan. He comes from a community of activists which has worked for the promotion of the Seraiki language, culture and identity for many decades.
Anwar Shah is is Director of the Centre for Public Economics, SWUFE, Chengdu/Wenjiang, China and also serves as an advisor to the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank . His areas of interest include distribution of financial resources among the units of a federation. His recent books include Fiscal Federalism (with Robin Boadway), The Practice of Fiscal Federalism: Comparative Perspectives, and Local Governance in Developing Countries and Performance Accountability and Combating Corruption.
No time for making province, absolutely not. Security and safety and jobs and inflation should be the first priority.This gov is clueless and only knows how to loot and divide.Punjab is a stronghold of Pakistan. We should not break it into smaller portion not at this time in any sense.
I respect your openion, however we need make more provinces in Pakistan. This will give them power to bring change…….After making more provinces, we shall have better administartion and better quality of life in general Insha-Allah.
Except that the state of Bahawalpur was never a part of the Punjab. It was a separate state for centuries before independence. In 1956 it was merged with the new unit of West Pakistan and it shouldn’t have been given to Punjab under the 1973 constitution.
I believe, this should be linguistic basis, except for Sindh, in the recognition of greatest price paid by the people of Sindh in creating Pakistan.
However, quesiton is will Seraiki Province will have independence in negotiating water accord, or will be boound by somewhat heavy handed distribution formula for the biggest arrigatable part of the country?
The price of freedom was paid by every Muslim and every province of Pakistan. we should not restrict it to only one province. No doubt, Sindh has paid the price but even greater and irreversible price was paid by Punjab and Bengal which were cut into halves, lost hundreds of kilometers of their land, their rivers, their strategic locations and Punjab also lost hundreds of thousands lives and honors. Punjab is not a scapegoat to be sacrificed again and again. Whatever the basis of dividing the provinces it should be applied across the Board to all provinces equally with no excuse. Language, ethnicity, poverty, mehroomi whatever, every province can be divided and should be divided. Otherwise, Punjab should not be discriminated, otherwise, we Punjabis will feel as we are being victimized in our own homeland. Discrimination will not be good for the State of Pakistan in the long run.
Pakistan needs to divided into more units by dividing each province into 3 parts. It should be done on administrative purpose rather on ethanicity or language. It will be a great step if Seriaki province is made. It is becoming tiresome task for Punjab to manage on its own. Punjab only benifits nothern portion and ignores southern portion, where development continues to be neglected. If Seriaki province is made then it will develop at better pace and southern portion will benifit alot. In terms of investment and development. One thing has to finish no matter how many provinces are made, it is feudalism and extremism that has to end.
Sir I am Awan of North Punjab and infact all Awans are North Punjabis according to their history but I want to say that your knowledge of Geography is Poor. Kindly study Geography and then comment as Northern Punjab include Only Salt Range like Chakwal, Khushab , Jhelum, some parts of Mianwali and Attock Division and they are the very much underdeveloped region in Punjab and many areas of South Punjab are better than them. Do you know Lahore and all bigger cities of Punjab even dont fall into North Punjab so the Mantra of North Punjab as the most developed dont fall into any discussion at all.
In 1905, Bengal was the largest province of United India having an area of 189000 sq miles / 302400 sq kms having a population of 78 Millions. It contained Hindus, Muslim Bengalis, and minorities of other sects. They used to speak different languages even their religions were also poles apart. Even having such a great amount of heterogeneity, the basis of partition of Bengal was purely “Administrative”. Although critics believe that it was an Englishmen conspiracy against Muslims and Hindus, but there is no such evidence in history.
Keeping in mind this example, we need to focus on the situtation of Pakistan which is also a heterogeneous mixture of people. Being Sindhi, Balochi, Punjabi and Pakhtuns are of more value to us than a ”Pakistani”. In such a dispersed and disintegrated society if we start developing new provinces on purely ethnic basis, it will lead to further disintegration as the conflict will be then purely on sub-national basis. In the current scenario, people of all provinces are already gnashing teeth upon subjugation of their rights by the largest province, so if we keep making new provinces on ethnic basis, that may lead to further dismemberment of society.
In a nutshell, it is in the best interest to keep ethnic and lingual differences aside and envision a broader view. Lets start working for the development and progress of Pakistan in the best manner, set goals and burn candles at both ends to meet these goals. Only then Pakistan will be able to position itself among progressive nations of the world.
Long Live Pakistan.
Sister Sehrish, I agree and disagree with you on some points, please read my comments below.
I want to add that first of all define Seraiki identity. Is it Racial, Ethnic, Cultural, Historical or just related to the language because if it is Ethnic and heritage based then most of the tribes of South Punjab like Khar, Kharrals,, Bhuttas, Many Sub-clans of Juts, Many Sub-clans of Gujjars and Northern Punjabis including Abbasis, Awan, Malik, Sardar Khokhar etc can never be Seraikis as they are Historically Northern and Central Punjabis and their history simply states that.
The same contention cannot make Seraiki a totally separate Ethnic identity as Seraiki cannot fall into Different Ethnic background at all as most of the Seraikis like Balochs are immigrants in South Punjab and they have their different heritage and most of the people of South Punjab have the same Heritage as the rest of the Punjab.
So first of all kindly let us know what is an Enigma that is known as Seraiki as Obviously Racially they are not different than the rest of population. Similarly Center of Older Civilization was along the whole Indus and Indus Valley Civilization was from Northern Punjab until Sindh so their older heritage is similar as well.
The remaining thing is only Dialects and Lingual difference as even culturally many people of South Punjab are not any different in their way of life than Northern and Central Punjab so even culturally my contention is that there is not much difference so how Come Seraikis make a Separate Ethnic Group.?
Well, we shall divide Pakistan into more than 5 provinces and it shall be ONLY for better administrative purpose.
Now, ……….ALL the existing provinces shall be given new names, which shall NOT reflect ethnicity……….and WE CAN still maintain our identity and our cultural values as good Balochi, Sindhi, Mohajir, Pathan, Panjabi, Seraiki, Makranni, etc.
For example: I do not need to live in Panjab for being Panjabi….I can still be Panjabi and live in Karachi………..
And being Pakistani, we will personally enjoy each culture and even celebrate when my Pakistani Bhai/sister will celebrate his or her culture……..
When Al’lan Fakir sings, we do not care which culture he belongs to, we just know we always love him and his songs…………….
Please remember this, ethnicity may be our identity for our cultural values (not to become better then anyone, but jut to be comfortable in our everyday life……), but in the end, we want to die only as Muslim or people of other faith (who live in Pakistan) …………now everyone please smile:)
Live discussion on Seraiki province: Dividing a large state or province in to smaller ones for administrative purpose is not only smart, it is more democratic. You do not want one province so large that it is larger than the whole country in influence. There are many more reasons in favor as so many people are demanding. It is the same thing in India. We do not have to accept historical provinces as population changes. India had several states divided in to smaller states and they are still doing it. They have not seen any negative effects. I believe it will be the same for Pakistan and its people.
The price of freedom was paid by every Muslim and every province of Pakistan. we should not restrict it to only one province. No doubt, Sindh has paid the price but even greater and irreversible price was paid by Punjab and Bengal which were cut into halves, lost hundreds of kilometers of their land, their rivers, their strategic locations and Punjab also lost hundreds of thousands lives and honors. Punjab is not a scapegoat to be sacrificed again and again. Whatever the basis of dividing the provinces it should be applied across the Board to all provinces equally with no excuse. Language, ethnicity, poverty, mehroomi whatever, every province can be divided and should be divided. Otherwise, Punjab should not be discriminated, otherwise, we Punjabis will feel as we are being victimized in our own homeland. Discrimination will not be good for the State of Pakistan in the long run.
it is unfortunate It is un fortunate that serious issue are treated like political slogans to create a hysteria for political gains. Democracy means well of the people, current situation for Seraiki province is not suitable for Pakistan or any political party has the power to create new provinces.
This issue is raised by PPP to gain more votes in south Punjab or we can say it is a drama
. I would say that Seraiki people should act according to their own well for a movement of Seraiki province. They should not be used by political parties for their election vote
Sixty-Two percent of the population of Pakistan lives in the Punjab province. The accumulation of resources is just in some parts of this province and it is literally unmanageable. British Raj kept Punjab large because it wanted to keep it backward and underdeveloped, and the feudal mindset accepted that approach.
The results are horrendous and heart-wrenching. States like Bahawalpur, which were the richest in Asia before partition are now one of the most backward in Pakistan. The literacy rate was hundred percent back in pre-partition era, but now illiteracy is everywhere and the educational infrastructure is null. Same is the case with the region called as Seraiki belt. If you look at the 3 year rule of Shahbaz Sharif, you would see that he has only concentrated on the Lahore and its suburbs and sometime on Rawalpindi. Rest of the province is just for his helicopter or snaps short visits rarely. He has been termed as chief minister of Lahore many times. The budget of Lahore is more than the budget of rest of the Punjab. The truth is that theSeraiki belt and Bahawalpur should be made two separate provinces. The belt consisting of Rawalpindi, Attock, Sargodha, and Chakwal, up to Bhera should be made another province. Punjab should be divided into such small provinces to make it manageable and governable.