There is more to Pakistan’s troubles than merely economic problems, asserts Levi-Strauss in the first article he wrote for the Courier, in May 1951. A young nation founded on an ancient civilization, Pakistan synthesizes in its problems the whole of human development.
Of all the countries which make up our inhabited globe, Pakistan is perhaps the one which presents the most unusual characteristics. The laws defining its existence declared it was founded as a state where all Moslems could live according to the principles of Islam. As such it provides a spiritual home for all members of a single religious community regardless of their national origin. Nevertheless, Pakistan remains in the deepest sense of the word a nation. It groups under one unified authority lands that for thousands of years have been inhabited by the same people, most of whom have shared for centuries the same moral, political and religious principles forming the basis of the new state
This dual aspect -the spiritual home and the national reality- characterizes the Pakistan of today. It explains too, certain paradoxes. For although Pakistan hope is to bring together Moslem from all over pre-partition India, in reality 40 million Moslems- or roughly 30 per cent of the total number- are still scattered in other parts of the sub-continent.
As a nation, Pakistan has defined frontiers and distinctive geographic and sociological features. As a spiritual home, it somewhat anticipates its national individuality. For it must mould itself - with undiminished creative zeal - in the image of the great promise it wishes to be, not only for its own people but also for all those who some day may come seeking a means of life in keeping with their faith.
The Golden Fibre
One has only to glance at a map to understand the complexity of the problems confronting this nation which has set itself such lofty requirements. Not only do a thousand miles of Indian Territory split East and West Pakistan but differences in climate, physiography and even language separate the two regions. Eastern Pakistan, though by far the smaller area, has the larger population; yet it is West Pakistan, which is less fertile, that compensates for the food shortages of the eastern zone. This zone (East Bengal) is almost entirely devoted to the cultivation of jute- the crop which enables the government to balance its national budget.
Pakistan happens to hold practically a world monopoly of raw jute yet not only is the country unable to convert the fibre for lack of any jute-goods industry but inadequate port facilities even impede its exportation.
To remedy this situation, the government has embarked on a series of vast industrialization projects for the construction of the first jute mills in Narayanganj, a hydro-electric dam and a paper mill on the Karnafully –River, additional port facilities at Chittagong, a new port at the Ganges Delta, power stations at Malakand, and sugar refineries at Mardan.
But the immense problems of financing these projects and of transforming a large portion of illiterate peasants into technically and socially educated workmen present formidable obstacles. Here United Nations and UNESCO Technical Assistance and U.S. Point IV programmes may help in meeting some of the difficulties.
Partition and with it the independence of Pakistan brought in its wake immense misery and suffering. Since 1947, eight million refugees have trekked into West Pakistan (Sind and Punjab) from all parts of India, leaving behind them everything they cherished – their personal belongings, their fortunes, their land and the tombs of their ancestors – in order to join the spiritual community of their own choosing;
Despite the efforts of the Central Government, hundreds of thousands of these refugees still live in conditions that defy description. Undoubtedly material aid must first be given to the adults; but surely the problem of re-adapting and rehabilitating the children is no less important than that of other children during and after the last world war when psychologists, sociologists, psychiatrists and educators from all over the world joined to find a solution.
Pearl button crisis
Similar problems - and others even more specialised - also face East Bengal. To solve them will require no small degree of imagination and international collaboration. For even the most intensive jute cultivation cannot be expected to absorb the manpower or assure the livelihood of population which exceeds in density 2,500 inhabitants per square mile. In fact for centuries the people have sought a secondary means of income in cottage industries, such as the manufacture of muslin cloth which has made Dacca famous. But even these rural crafts are conditioned by unique circumstances. They depend on international markets not only as a source for raw materials but as a sales outlet for the finished products.
To take a specific case, in East Bengal, I recently visited a number of villages of incredible poverty in the region of Langalbund not far from Dacca. There, over 50,000 people live only by the manufacture of mother-of-pearl buttons. These buttons of the kind used for cheap tee-shirts and underwear, are produced in huge quantities by hand tools which might well have belonged to the early Middle Ages.
The raw materials needed for their production such as chemicals, cardboard and the foil spangles used to mount the buttons on the cardboard, have ceased coming in from abroad since Pakistan became independent. Following a world slump in demand, pearl button production in the villages has declined from 60,000 gross per week to less than 50,000 per month while the price paid to the village craftsman has fallen 75 per cent.
This is only one example of the distressing problems facing Pakistan today. It would be a mistake, however, to view them merely as economic problems. No doubt the key to the dilemma lies first with the technicians.
For example, the material conditions of the Bengali peasant could almost be unbelievably improved by the introduction of small specially manufactured, hand operated machines. These would simplify the different stages of work in the button industry. But who better than UNESCO can draw the attention of scientists and technicians to the fact (which they so often tend to overlook) that the purposes of science are not only to solve scientific problems but to find answers to social problems as well. The efforts of science should not only enable mankind to surpass itself; they must also help those who lag behind to catch up.
A young nation founded on an ancient civilization, Pakistan like other nations of Asia or America, synthesizes in its problems the whole of human development. At one and the same time, it suffers and lives in our Middle Ages which its villages perpetuate; in our 18th and 19th centuries which its first attempts at industrialization reproduce; in our 20th century whose advantages it is determined to secure. Perhaps the more developed nations, by providing Pakistan with some of the means to bridge these gaps and overcome such contradictions, may learn in return how man can succeed in attaining his full individual stature without denying any part of his heritage and of his past.
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