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21 " No one who is a friend of Pakistan must say anything that harms its reputation; anyone who dares to ask tough questions or make adverse remarks must be prepared to be categorized as Pakistan’s enemy. "
― Husain Haqqani , Reimagining Pakistan: Transforming a Dysfunctional Nuclear State
22 " Pakistan’s view of itself as a ‘citadel of Islam’ has created an environment in which violence is normal provided it is committed in the name of Islam. "
23 " Bengali leader, Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy (who served as Pakistan’s prime minister in 1956) had noted as early as March 1948 that Pakistan’s elite was predisposed to ‘raising the cry of “Pakistan in danger” for the purpose of arousing Muslim sentiments and binding them together’ to maintain its power. "
24 " In popular sentiment, just as conspiracies have made Pakistan weak and vulnerable, its destined economic greatness has been thwarted by corruption, not poor policy choices. "
25 " The exigencies of maintaining the West Pakistani political, bureaucratic and military elite in power were the major reason why, after Jinnah’s death, the secular Muslim nationalist path was hurriedly abandoned. "
26 " Many of Pakistan’s problems—from falling behind in secular education to the rise of Islamist extremism—can be traced to the country’s founding on the basis of religious nationalism. "
27 " An army is a vital national institution but a nation is more than its army. It needs a vibrant economy, an educated and competitive workforce, as well as intellectual and scientific curiosity and creativity. "
28 " But insecurity remains the hallmark of Pakistan’s political and intellectual conversation. Even a comment about, say, Pakistan’s relatively low ranking among nations for book readership, is portrayed as an attack on the idea of Pakistan. "
29 " One can sympathize with the sentiment of Pakistanis who must constantly defend their country against criticism ranging from questioning of its very creation to its current policies. But it is equally important to understand that mere survival does not equate success and that progress often requires uninhibited introspection. "
30 " It is noteworthy that the Muslim League had campaigned for Pakistan for seven years without deciding what its capital might be. The Bengalis proposed Dhaka while others suggested Lahore and even Multan, a historic city in the south of Punjab. But the subject was never seriously discussed while rallying Muslims to the cause of Pakistan. After belatedly deciding on Karachi as the capital, Muslim League leaders expected the British Indian Army to resolve the problems they might encounter in accommodating the government of their new country. This was one of the earliest manifestations of Pakistan’s tendency to rely on the military as the solution to problems normally falling in the civilian domain. "
31 " Pakistanis often recount how civil servants in Pakistan’s early days worked out of makeshift offices, lived in tents and ran the government with limited stationery supplies. While the account is generally accurate, and the sacrifice of the officials admirable, it is equally important to understand that the difficulty was the result of a poor choice. Pakistan’s founder had selected the country’s capital to be located in a city lacking adequate facilities, preferring it over another provincial capital with a better establishment. "
32 " Contrary to what Pakistani children are taught in schools, the Islamic ideology currently in vogue in Pakistan did not give birth to the country; it was born after Pakistan’s creation in its present form. "
33 " Beginning with Liaquat, moving forward with Ayub Khan and culminating with Zia-ul-Haq, Pakistan’s leaders proceeded to delineate a ‘noble and eternal’ ideology that would give Pakistan ‘a tremendous power of cohesion and resistance’, insisting that it was on the basis of Islam ‘that we fought for and got Pakistan’. Islam, hostility to India, and the Urdu language were identified as the cornerstones of this new national ideology. "
34 " Pakistan’s efforts to consolidate itself by popularizing theology as national or even national-security policy have unleashed violent forces that Pakistan is now contending with. Instead of strengthening the country and raising the morale of its people in permanently confronting India, the ‘Ghazwa-e-Hind’ type of thinking has resulted in terrorist attacks within Pakistan and set the stage for divisions among jihadis that are hurting Pakistan’s security instead of enhancing it. The theologically rooted view of what threatens Pakistan— as opposed to what might really threaten Pakistan—undermines the prospect of a realistic foreign policy. Conspiracy theories and contending interpretations of religious prophecies cast Don Quixotes tilting at windmills as ‘national security experts’ rather than producing hard-thinking analysts anticipating actual policies of other governments. "
35 " Ignored in the self-laudatory commentary about the stock market’s performance were other less positive facts. The Karachi Stock Exchange’s market capitalization in 2016 stood at a meagre $89 billion, which compares unfavourably with the $320 billion capitalization of the Dhaka Stock Exchange in Bangladesh. "
36 " Pakistan’s poor performance in education is not a function of poverty but of according lower priority by successive governments. There are forty-three countries in the world that are poorer than Pakistan on a per capita GDP basis45 but twenty-four of them send more children to primary school than Pakistan does. Pakistan’s budgetary allocation for education—a meagre 2.6 per cent of GDP in 2015—is abysmally low and actual expenditure—1.5 per cent of GDP—is even less. Pakistan spends around seven times more on its military than on primary education. According to one estimate, just one-fifth of Pakistan’s military budget would be sufficient to finance universal primary education. "
37 " Pakistan’s unfortunate history may justify the description of Pakistan as being ‘insufficiently imagined’, but imagination is by definition not a finite process. An entity that is insufficiently imagined can be reimagined "
38 " Unlike other countries, where the apex court is only the court of final appeal in criminal matters, Pakistan’s Supreme Court acts politically to directly make pronouncements in response to media articles or petitions by political rivals. One need not be convicted of disloyalty to the state after due process of law when innuendo, fabricated media reports and public comments by Supreme Court judges can suffice to tarnish reputations and cut public support. "
39 " International assistance, especially from the United States and some from China and Saudi Arabia, has brought Pakistan back from the brink in the past. But rising xenophobia and Islamo-nationalism— exhibited prominently after the discovery of Osama bin Laden in a Pakistani garrison town—coupled with Pakistan’s policies in Afghanistan make continued US support for Pakistan difficult. "
40 " Armed with nuclear weapons, Pakistan does not need to live in fear or insecurity. The state of insecurity fostered in Pakistan is psychological and should now be replaced with a logical self-confidence. Once pluralism and secularism are no longer dirty words, and all national discussions need not be framed within the confines of an Islamist ideology, it will become easier for Pakistan to tackle the jihadi menace. The state would have to end support for any militant jihadi group based on false strategic premises. Jihadi terrorism is now a threat to Pakistan and must be eliminated for Pakistan’s sake. "