Making Sense of Pakistan

Making Sense of Pakistan PDF Author: Farzana Shaikh
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190929111
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 295

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Book Description
Pakistan's transformation from supposed model of Muslim enlightenment to a state now threatened by an Islamist takeover has been remarkable. Many account for the change by pointing to Pakistan's controversial partnership with the United States since 9/11; others see it as a consequence of Pakistan's long history of authoritarian rule, which has marginalized liberal opinion and allowed the rise of a religious right. Farzana Shaikh argues the country's decline is rooted primarily in uncertainty about the meaning of Pakistan and the significance of 'being Pakistani'. This has pre-empted a consensus on the role of Islam in the public sphere and encouraged the spread of political Islam. It has also widened the gap between personal piety and public morality, corrupting the country's economic foundations and tearing apart its social fabric. More ominously still, it has given rise to a new and dangerous symbiosis between the country's powerful armed forces and Muslim extremists. Shaikh demonstrates how the ideology that constrained Indo-Muslim politics in the years leading to Partition in 1947 has left its mark, skillfully deploying insights from history to better understand Pakistan's troubled present.

Making Sense of Pakistan

Making Sense of Pakistan PDF Author: Farzana Shaikh
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190929111
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 295

Get Book

Book Description
Pakistan's transformation from supposed model of Muslim enlightenment to a state now threatened by an Islamist takeover has been remarkable. Many account for the change by pointing to Pakistan's controversial partnership with the United States since 9/11; others see it as a consequence of Pakistan's long history of authoritarian rule, which has marginalized liberal opinion and allowed the rise of a religious right. Farzana Shaikh argues the country's decline is rooted primarily in uncertainty about the meaning of Pakistan and the significance of 'being Pakistani'. This has pre-empted a consensus on the role of Islam in the public sphere and encouraged the spread of political Islam. It has also widened the gap between personal piety and public morality, corrupting the country's economic foundations and tearing apart its social fabric. More ominously still, it has given rise to a new and dangerous symbiosis between the country's powerful armed forces and Muslim extremists. Shaikh demonstrates how the ideology that constrained Indo-Muslim politics in the years leading to Partition in 1947 has left its mark, skillfully deploying insights from history to better understand Pakistan's troubled present.

The Making of Pakistan

The Making of Pakistan PDF Author: Khursheed Kamal Aziz
Publisher: Sang-E-Meel Publication
ISBN:
Category : India
Languages : en
Pages : 232

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Book Description


Eating Grass

Eating Grass PDF Author: Feroz Khan
Publisher: Stanford University Press
ISBN: 0804784809
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 550

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Book Description
The history of Pakistan's nuclear program is the history of Pakistan. Fascinated with the new nuclear science, the young nation's leaders launched a nuclear energy program in 1956 and consciously interwove nuclear developments into the broader narrative of Pakistani nationalism. Then, impelled first by the 1965 and 1971 India-Pakistan Wars, and more urgently by India's first nuclear weapon test in 1974, Pakistani senior officials tapped into the country's pool of young nuclear scientists and engineers and molded them into a motivated cadre committed to building the 'ultimate weapon.' The tenacity of this group and the central place of its mission in Pakistan's national identity allowed the program to outlast the perennial political crises of the next 20 years, culminating in the test of a nuclear device in 1998. Written by a 30-year professional in the Pakistani Army who played a senior role formulating and advocating Pakistan's security policy on nuclear and conventional arms control, this book tells the compelling story of how and why Pakistan's government, scientists, and military, persevered in the face of a wide array of obstacles to acquire nuclear weapons. It lays out the conditions that sparked the shift from a peaceful quest to acquire nuclear energy into a full-fledged weapons program, details how the nuclear program was organized, reveals the role played by outside powers in nuclear decisions, and explains how Pakistani scientists overcome the many technical hurdles they encountered. Thanks to General Khan's unique insider perspective, it unveils and unravels the fascinating and turbulent interplay of personalities and organizations that took place and reveals how international opposition to the program only made it an even more significant issue of national resolve. Listen to a podcast of a related presentation by Feroz Khan at the Stanford Center for International Security and Cooperation at cisac.stanford.edu/events/recording/7458/2/765.

The Indus Saga and the Making of Pakistan

The Indus Saga and the Making of Pakistan PDF Author: Aitzaz Ahsan
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780195778298
Category : India
Languages : en
Pages : 413

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Book Description


Empire and Islam

Empire and Islam PDF Author: David Gilmartin
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 280

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Book Description
The tensions inherent in the structure and ideology of colonial organization thus provide the backdrop for the study. Gilmartin's extensive use of private papers, biographies, and autobiographies of prominent as well as less prominent political leaders helps give this study a balanced viewpoint. He also draws on a range of popular and private Urdu materials that lend the book an authentic voice."--BOOK JACKET.

Partition

Partition PDF Author: Barney White-Spunner
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781471148033
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 432

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Book Description
The International Bestseller 'Barney White-Spunner's book stands out for its judicious and unsparing look at events from a British perspective.' Dominic Sandbrook, Sunday Times Review 'This book is at its most powerful in its month-by-month narrative of how Partition tore apart northern and eastern India, with the new state of Pakistan carved out of communities who had lived together for the past millennium.' Zareer Masani BBC History Magazine 'A highly readable account . . .' Times Literary Review Between January and August 1947 the conflicting political, religious and social tensions in India culminated in independence from Britain and the creation of Pakistan. Those months saw the end of ninety years of the British Raj, and the effective power of the Maharajahs, as the Congress Party established itself commanding a democratic government in Delhi. They also witnessed the rushed creation of Pakistan as a country in two halves whose capitals were two thousand kilometers apart. From September to December 1947 the euphoria surrounding the realization of the dream of independence dissipated into shame and incrimination; nearly 1 million people died and countless more lost their homes and their livelihoods as partition was realized. The events of those months would dictate the history of South Asia for the next seventy years, leading to three wars, countless acts of terrorism, polarization around the Cold War powers and to two nations with millions living in poverty spending disproportionate amounts on their military. The roots of much of the violence in the region today, and worldwide, are in the decisions taken that year. Not only were those decisions controversial but the people who made them were themselves to become some of the most enduring characters of the twentieth century. Gandhi and Nehru enjoyed almost saint like status in India, and still do, whilst Jinnah is lionized in Pakistan. The British cast, from Churchill to Attlee and Mountbatten, find their contribution praised and damned in equal measure. Yet it is not only the national players whose stories fascinate. Many of those ordinary people who witnessed the events of that year are still alive. Although most were, predictably, only children, there are still some in their late eighties and nineties who have a clear recollection of the excitement and the horror. Illustrating the story of 1947 with their experiences and what independence and partition meant to the farmers of the Punjab, those living in Lahore and Calcutta, or what it felt like to be a soldier in a divided and largely passive army, makes the story real. Partition will bring to life this terrible era for the Indian Sub Continent.

Creating a New Medina

Creating a New Medina PDF Author: Venkat Dhulipala
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1316258386
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 554

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Book Description
This book examines how the idea of Pakistan was articulated and debated in the public sphere and how popular enthusiasm was generated for its successful achievement, especially in the crucial province of UP (now Uttar Pradesh) in the last decade of British colonial rule in India. It argues that Pakistan was not a simply a vague idea that serendipitously emerged as a nation-state, but was popularly imagined as a sovereign Islamic State, a new Medina, as some called it. In this regard, it was envisaged as the harbinger of Islam's renewal and rise in the twentieth century, the new leader and protector of the global community of Muslims, and a worthy successor to the defunct Turkish Caliphate. The book also specifically foregrounds the critical role played by Deobandi ulama in articulating this imagined national community with an awareness of Pakistan's global historical significance.

The Struggle for Pakistan

The Struggle for Pakistan PDF Author: Ayesha Jalal
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674744993
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
In a probing biography of her native land, Ayesha Jalal provides a unique insider’s assessment of how the nuclear-armed Muslim nation of Pakistan evolved into a country besieged by military domination and militant religious extremism, and explains why its dilemmas weigh so heavily on prospects for peace in the region.

Pakistan

Pakistan PDF Author: Anatol Lieven
Publisher: PublicAffairs
ISBN: 1610391624
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 608

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Book Description
In the past decade Pakistan has become a country of immense importance to its region, the United States, and the world. With almost 200 million people, a 500,000-man army, nuclear weapons, and a large diaspora in Britain and North America, Pakistan is central to the hopes of jihadis and the fears of their enemies. Yet the greatest short-term threat to Pakistan is not Islamist insurgency as such, but the actions of the United States, and the greatest longterm threat is ecological change. Anatol Lieven's book is a magisterial investigation of this highly complex and often poorly understood country. Engagingly written, combining history and profound analysis with reportage from Lieven's extensive travels as a journalist and academic, Pakistan: A Hard Country is both utterly compelling and deeply revealing.

A Testament of Sindh

A Testament of Sindh PDF Author: Muhammad Soaleh Korejo
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 308

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Book Description
Among the problems facing Sindh today, ethnic militarism, sectarian extremism, and political terrorism have acquired menacing proportions. The book is an attempt to seriously and frankly analyse the current problems of Sindh.