It is still a commonplace to attribute the overthrow of the Shah and the rise of Ayatollah Khomeini to the repressive nature of the previous regime. There is a measure of truth in it. Instead of harnessing the Western-educated intelligentsia to his purpose of pushing Iran into the 21st century, the Shah alienated it by refusing to share power with it.
But if he was unpopular because he was autocratic and arbitrary in his ways, why does the Ayatollah remain popular despite his equally arbitrary style of functioning and the all-round chaos it has produced in every walk of life in Iran?
So an additional explanation is being offered for the collapse of the Shah’s regime. It is now being said that the sudden injection of billions of petro-dollars into the economy after the oil price hike in 1973 and acceleration of the pace of growth led to intolerable inflation and disparities between the rich and the poor. There is considerable merit in this assessment as well as in the other proposition that the Shah had angered the small shopkeepers through his trade policies and that the bazaar played a major role in the struggle against him.
But all this only proves that the Shah could have lasted if he was less of a megalomaniac, if he was more receptive to advice from honourable men and if his management of the economy was more efficient. It does not prove that he could have made himself popular with the people. This he could not have done. By attacking the powerful ayatollahs he had placed himself at a grave disadvantage. He tried to overcome it by recalling the glorious pre-Islamic past of Iran, by trying to give the people the feeling that they were a distinct nation by virtue of that heritage and by projecting the country as a great power in the Indian Ocean region.
The attempt failed, as it was bound to. For nationalism just cannot supersede Islam in any Muslim country even if it happens to belong to the minority Shia sect as Iran does. The Shah further increased the odds against himself by aligning his regime closely with the “infidel” West and Israel and by giving Iranian “nationalism” an anti-Arab orientation.
Alien Concepts
In Islamic terms, the Shah was worse than ideologically bankrupt; he was an enemy. His concept of a “great society” could not but leave the people cold. And the resistance to him had to come from, and be led by the ulema because they were the only possible alternative centre of authority in Iran. The liberal and leftist intelligentsia joined the movement against him. But it could not seize the leadership of a truly popular upsurge.
It is fashionable to describe the triumph of the ayatollahs in Iran as a revolution or a counter-revolution. But both are Western concepts which do not apply to the developments in Iran. Revolution means the supersession of a decaying class which has exhausted its constructive potentialities by a new rising class – slave-owners by feudal lords, feudal lords by the bourgeoisie, the bourgeoisie by the working class. And counter-revolution means return of the old order and the old ruling class. Neither phenomenon has been witnessed in Iran. The country has descended into confusion and chaos, and it is not likely to emerge from it because the mullahs have no conception of how modern societies and states are run. Hopefully this may discredit the revivalists and the fundamentalists even among the uneducated faithful. But that is not an immediate prospect.
The story is different in the case of Pakistan. Unlike the Shah, Mr Bhutto was not ideologically bankrupt. As noted in the previous article, he had harnessed to his purpose the radical strain in Islam. Unlike in 1966 when he rose to prominence as an independent actor on Pakistan’s political stage, he was unable to whip up a “Hate India” campaign and exploit it to consolidate his power because India’s far superior military and economic power made such a stance on his part impractical. But he made a determined effort to develop nuclear weapons in order to gain at least parity with, if not superiority over, this country.
While Mr Bhutto did not turn anti-West – he could not afford to do so if only for fear of pushing it towards increased friendship towards New Delhi – he studiously cultivated the Arabs so much so that he talked of an “Islamic” bomb and not of a Pakistani one. He could, therefore, have survived if he had not brought trouble on himself by rigging the election in 1977. Pakistan could have also escaped the dangerous experiment in revivalism if the coup had not been led by a fundamentalist like General Zia. Unlike in Iran, there has been no popular upsurge in that country in favour of a theocratic state.
Bhutto’s Bid
The fundamentalists had, however, begun to assert themselves successfully in Pakistan long before Mr Bhutto fell. They had forced him to yield on the question of the status of the Ahmediyas in 1974. He was party to their exclusion from the body of Islam. The fundamentalists had tried to force the issue as early as 1953, and had failed. But in 1974 the situation was far more favourable, partly because Mr Bhutto wanted to draw close to the Arab world which meant Saudi Arabia and other conservative regimes. And after 1974, Mr Bhutto had found it increasingly necessary to de-emphasise his modernity, emphasise his adherence to Islamic precepts, and take steps like prohibition, ban on gambling and racing in order to propitiate the mullahs.
Mr Bhutto’s task in containing the fundamentalists would have been facilitated if he had been in a position to mount a political, if not a military, challenge to India. This could have eased the pressure on him and mobilised Pakistani “nationalism” on his side. Apparently he was planning to do so. The, search for nuclear weapons was one facet of his overall strategy. The Islamic conference and the call for a meeting of all third world countries outside the framework of the non-aligned group of which India was a prominent member were two others. But he needed time to make the bomb.
All that apart, there is a world of difference between Iran and Pakistan. General Zia is not a Pakistani version of the Ayatollah. He lacks the latter’s mass appeal. This is important by itself even if it only indicates that the General is less skilful in manipulating the emotions of the people. For revivalism is a form of populism and as such needs a demagogue to prosper.
It also appears from various accounts that General Zia’s so-called Islamic punishments have not caught the imagination of the people of Pakistan. On the contrary, many of them seem to be appalled by them. If this is, indeed, so and if Mr Bhutto dead is more powerful than Mr Bhutto alive as appears to be the case in view of the Pakistan People’s Party’s sweeping victory in the recent local elections and President Zia’s subsequent decision to put off the general election indefinitely, ban all political parties and activities and arrest political activists, it sheds a hopeful light on Pakistan. For it would show that the revivalist sentiment in that country is not as virulent as it is in Iran.
Weakness
The Western impact on Pakistan has clearly been much deeper than on Iran. Unlike the latter, it was directly and therefore more responsibly governed by Britain. Its military-bureaucratic elite has been patterned on the British model and has thought of itself as the successor of the Raj. The military regime under President Ayub Khan was a fairly mild affair in the whole of Pakistan and under President Yahya Khan in West Pakistan with the result that the people did not need to turn to orthodox elements for leading them against the Generals. The ulema themselves did not challenge the military rulers. There was, therefore, no question of their throwing up a heroic figure like the Ayatollah. On the whole, the ulema as a class in predominantly Sunni Pakistan also appear to command far less prestige and influence than the ayatollahs in the largely Shia Iran.
There is perhaps another aspect to the relative weakness of the revivalist sentiment in Pakistan. In the latter part of the 19th century when the Muslims in undivided India finally woke up to the fact of their educational backwardness and consequent low status in the services and the professions, they had a choice between co-operation with the British and participation in the freedom movement. By and large they made the first choice. However painful the consequences of the choice, it has ensured that by and large Muslims in the subcontinent have not acquired a strong anti-Western bias.
Events could also have taken a different turn in Pakistan in case it had not got involved in a dispute over Kashmir, if instead of following the policy of non-alignment India had made common cause with the West against the communist bloc and if the United States had not gone in for the mutual security pact with Pakistan. In that case orthodoxy might have asserted itself much sooner and much more strongly in that country. But gradually these safeguards against revivalism have worn thin.
It has become difficult for Pakistan to define its identity in anti-Indian terms and as it wishes to move closer to the Arab world it is likely to emphasise its Islamic identity.
(Concluded)
The Times of India, 8 November 1979