Can I Still Play Cricket in Heaven?

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OUTSIDE OF PAKISTAN. I am mainly known for my 2 1 -year-long cricket career. But
in my home country. I am the head of a party that is battling to take on a political elite
that has for more than six decades stymied this great country. depriving it of its Godgiven
potential. Ruled alternately by military dictators like President Musharraf. or as a
fiefdom by families like the Bhuttos and Sharifs. Pakistan has drifted far from the ideals
of its founders. Far from being the Islamic welfare state that was envisaged. Pakistan is
a country where politics is a game of loot and plunder and any challenger to the status
quo - even somebody with my kind of public profile and popularity - can be suddenly
arrested and threatened with violence. Founded as a homeland for Indian Muslims on
the principle of the unifying qualities of Islam. it remains a fractured country. Kashmir
to the north-east has been. since independence. the subject of a violent dispute between
India and Pakistan. the region divided between the two. In the north-west a civil war
between the army and militants plagues the Pashtun heartlands of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
and FATA (the Federally Administered Tribal Areas) . Baluchistan. a vast. rugged.
unexplored and thinly populated province bordering Iran and Afghanistan. simmers with
a separatist insurgency. To the south the Arabian Sea washes against the shores of
Baluchistan and Sindh. where the provincial capital Karachi is riven with fighting
between various ethnic groups. including Pashtun immigrants and the descendants of
Muslims who came from the other side of the border at Partition. referred to as Mohajirs
or refugees. Meanwhile. Punjab. home to more than half of the country's population. is
resented by other provinces for monopolizing Pakistani political power and prosperity.
For me our country' s woes began soon after Pakistan was created in 1 9 4 7 . when
we lost our great leader Jinnah. Pakistan - which means Land of the Pure - was just five
years old when I was born. We had such pride in our country then. such optimism. We
were a new nation. wrested out of the dying British Raj as a homeland for Muslims.
Gone were the insidious humiliations of colonialism and the fear of being drowned in an
overwhelming Hindu majority in an independent India. We were a free people. free to
rediscover an Islamic culture that had once towered over the subcontinent. Free. too. to
implement the ideals of Islam based on equality. and social and economic justice. A
democracy. as Pakistan ' s founding father Muhammad Ali Jinnah said. not a theocracy.
We were to be the shining example in the Muslim world of what Islam could achieve
were it allowed to flourish. Such dreams we had. It was only much later that we
discovered how hard it would be to fulfil these dreams. even in a brand-new nation like
ours. unburdened by the rigidities of history. As the years went by. we built our own
tormented history. and drifted further and further away from the ideals that had inspired
Pakistan's creation.
Pakistan ' s roots lay in the final days of the British Raj in India. Before then the
territory - roughly defined as the Punjab. the North-West Frontier Province. the
coastline on the Arabian sea of Sindh province and Baluchistan - had not been defined
as Pakistan but. over the centuries. became first part of one empire and then another.
The British. initially through the East India Company and later through the British
Army. controlled the area from the early part of the nineteenth century onward. From
the 1 880s. though. the aim for millions of people throughout the subcontinent who
wanted self-determination was the end of British rule. The Indian National Congress.
which initially included Muslims. worked to achieve this end. The British did not want
to relinquish control but the Second World War weakened Britain economically and
politically. and by then the empire on which ' the sun never sets' was in its twilight
years.
The Indian National Congress negotiated with the British to bring about the end
of their rule over India. and they wanted to see the whole subcontinent remain one
country. Here the histories of the two nations starts to diverge; wary of Hindu
nationalism. and mindful of the kind of violence that took place at sporadic intervals
over the 1 920s and 1 9 30s in different cities and provinces in India. the All-India Muslim
League took a different view. As part of this league. two men in particular were
fundamental in the foundation of Pakistan. Jinnah and Allama Muhammad Iqbal.
Iqbal. who died in 1 938. nine years before the creation of Pakistan. is the
visionary poet-philosopher considered to be the spiritual founder of Pakistan. In 1 930 in
an address to the All-India Muslim League. he said. 'I would like to see the Punjab.
North-West Frontier Province. Sindh and Baluchistan amalgamated into a single State.
Self-government within the British Empire or without the British Empire. the formation
of a consolidated North-West Indian Muslim State appears to me to be the final destiny
of Muslims. at least of North-West India. ' Believing that ' the Indian Muslim is entitled
to full and free development on the lines of his own culture and tradition in his own
Indian homelands, ' Iqbal felt that this was a necessary stage for the Muslim community
to develop its collective selfhood. or khudi.
Iqbal not only conceived of a self-governing Muslim state. his passionate voice
awakened and activated Indian Muslims. motivating them not only to strive to free
themselves from the bondage of imperialism and colonialism. but also to challenge other
forms of totalitarian control. Believing fervently in human equality and the right of
human beings to dignity. justice and freedom. Iqbal empowered the disempowered to
stand up and be counted.
When I was older. I found Iqbal ' s work hugely inspirational. He argued against
an unquestioning acceptance of Western democracy as the self-governing model. and
instead suggested that by following the rules of Islam a society would tend naturally
towards social justice. tolerance. peace and equality. Iqbal ' s interpretation of Islam
differs very widely from the narrow meaning that is sometimes given to it. For Iqbal.
Islam is not just the name for certain beliefs and forms of worship. The difference
between a Muslim and a non-Muslim is not merely a theological one - it is a difference
of a fundamental attitude towards life.
Iqbal considered pride in one ' s lineage or caste to be one of the major reasons for
the downfall of Muslims. In his view. in Islam. based on the principles of 'equality.
solidarity and freedom ' . there was no hierarchy or aristocracy. and the criterion for
assessing the merit of human beings was taqwa (righteousness) . As Prophet Muhammad
(Peace Be Upon Him) said: 'The noblest of human beings are those who fear God most. '
In other words. those who are humane and just. because when you fear God you believe
you are accountable to Him and must act accordingly.