Volume 7, No. 1, January 2025
Editor: Rashed Rahman
The Pakistani Revolution – VI
In keeping with the facade of presenting the military coup of October 1958 as a ‘revolution’, within two weeks of its establishment the military dictatorship appointed a Land Reforms Commission, headed by Akhtar Hussain, Governor of West Pakistan. The Commission’s report was issued in February 1959 and was put into effect later that year in West Pakistan, where its provisions were meant to apply. The Commission recommended compulsory acquisition by the State, in return for “fair compensation” amounting to Rs 80 million, of all landholdings in excess of 500 acres of irrigated or 1,000 acres of non-irrigated land. This land was to be sold to peasants, with existing tenants having the first option to purchase. The State acquired under this ‘land reform’ 2.2 million acres. Of this, however, only 0.6 million acres was assessed as “cultivable land”; 1.2 million acres was classed as “cultivable waste” (in India 15 percent of land classed as “cultivable waste” is accounted cultivable, but no comparable estimate is available for Pakistan), and 0.4 million acres as “unfit for cultivation”. After the ‘land reform’ some 6,000 landlords retained 7.4 million acres of land (i.e., three times the amount of land taken from them). The land assumed by the State was resold to 150,000 peasants.
As Mushtaq Ahmad comments: “That more than three times the area given to one and a half lakh (150,000 – Ed.) tenants is retained by 6,000 landlords shows the disparity in ownership that still persists. Landlordism has by no means been abolished…Their (the landlords’ – Ed.) power, and prestige remain unaffected. That their political influence had not diminished was borne out by the election results. They retained their predominant position in the West Pakistan Assembly and also in the representation of West Pakistan in the National Assembly” (Mushtaq Ahmad: Government and Politics in Pakistan, p.199, 246). An article in Pakistan Today confirms this analysis: “The reform measures which have been announced…will leave untouched the fundamental problem of our agrarian econdmy, which is the divorce between ownership and cultivation…The landholdings of some of the biggest landholders will be reduced in size, in return for ‘fair’ compensation, and the excess land will be available for those who can buy it – the existing tenants being given the first option, but who may quite likely prove unable to buy it…The basic structure of our agrarian economy remains unaltered” (Pakistan Today, March/April 1959; p. 2, 27).
Basic Democracy
In April-September 1959 a series of Governors’ Conferences, chaired by President Ayub Khan, elaborated a new system of local government called Basic Democracy (BD). In October 1959 Ayub Khan promoted himself to the rank of Field Marshal, and on the following day promulgated the BD Ordinance. In the same month Rawalpindi was designated the interim capital of Pakistan, pending the construction of a new capital city on a site near Rawalpindi to be known as Islamabad.
The system of ‘Basic Democracies’ consisted of five tiers of councils from Village Councils at the bottom to two Provincial Development Advisory Councils at the top. Each lower council was subordinated to its appropriate superior council. The lowest tier of councils was partly elected, partly appointed, the 80,000 elected members being known as ‘Basic Democrats’ (BDs); the higher tiers were made up of appointed members only. Designed to give a ‘democratic’ facade to the military dictatorship, the system of BD in reality consolidated the power of the dictatorship throughout the country. As an article in Pakistan Today points out: “Far from being a system of democratic decentralisation, the picture that emerges from a survey of the various features of the new system is that of centralisation of control and a consolidation of bureaucratic power. Through the hierarchical system of councils subject to effective surveillance and tight control at every level, we can see a most effective extension of the arm of the bureaucracy, reaching down into every individual village and linking up with the local power of the landed gentry who dominate the countryside. It strengthens the landed gentry by linking it up closely and effectively with the official machinery…The fact that the councils at the lower level are subordinated to those at the higher levels, and the fact also that the councils at the higher levels consist entirely of officials and nominated persons, is quite sufficient to ensure official control of the entire system. However, as an added precaution, the law has designated officials at an appropriate level as the ‘Controlling Authority’ for councils at each level. These officials have been given sweeping powers of direction and control over the councils under their jurisdiction. They can forbid particular actions by the councils, and they can also ask them to undertake any specified action. They may suppress particular councils and take over their functions…The Controlling Authority may remove any particular member of a council. Direct elections are to be restricted…to the lowest bodies in the hierarchy” (“The Basic Democracies” in Pakistan Today, Summer 1960, p. 9, 13).
The BDs were intended also to form an Electoral College under a new Constitution. Through this means the President, the National Assembly (NA) and the Provincial Assemblies (PAs) were to be indirectly elected by a tiny electorate of 80,000 out of a population of 94 million, an electorate dependent upon the continued approval of the military dictatorship for lucrative positions within the framework of BD. “It is obviousily easier to corrupt a small electorate than a whole population” (Mushtaq Ahmad: Government and Politics in Pakistan, p. 226). In December 1959-January 1960, elections were held to elect 80,000 BDs. In January 1960 President Ayub Khan promulgated an ordinance for a ballot of the BDs to indicate their confidence in his leadership. The Election Commissioner later announced that 95.6 percent of the votes cast were in favour of President Ayub Khan, who was then sworn in as the ‘elected’ President.
The 1962 Constitution
Immediately after his ‘election’ as President in January 1960, Ayub appointed an 11-man Constitution Commission, headed by Justice Mohammad Shahabuddin of the Supreme Court, to draft a new Constitution. The Commission presented its report in May 1961. In March 1962 the President promulgated a new Constitution that utterly disregarded the findings of the Constitution Commission, which had earlier favoured the immediate establishment of a Parliamentary system. “The Constitution as it emerged was by and large a product of the President’s own thinking” (Mushtaq Ahmad: Government and Politics in Pakistan, Karachi, 1963, p. 254).
While the 1956 Constitution had described Pakistan throughout as a “Federal Republic” with a “Federal Government”, the preamble to the 1962 Constitution states vaguely that the State “should be a form of federation” but nowhere outside the preamble is the term “Federal” used: the “Federal Republic” and “Federal Government” of the 1956 Constitution have in the 1962 Constitution become the “Republic” and the “Central Government” respectively. The new Constitution gave dictatorial powers to the President on behalf of the ‘Karachi’ clique: “The executive authority of the Republic is vested in the President. Members of the Presidential Cabinet…known as the Council of Ministers, are appointed by him and are removable by him. He has a free hand in selecting his team…The Constitution places no restriction on his discretion except that the Ministers must be eligible for membership of the National Assembly, but not necessarily its members…The members of the Presidential Cabinet are more like advisers of the President than his colleagues. Their advice may be accepted or rejected or not sought at all, even on important national affairs…As master of the Cabinet, the President also has complete control of the Central Administration…The Pakistan President is free to fill high military, civil and judicial posts with men of his own choice…The President is not only the head of the executive branch but also an integral part of the legislature. The Central Legislature consists of the President and one House known as the National Assembly…No bill can become law without his assent unless the veto is overridden by a two-thirds majority in the National Assembly, and even after such a vote the President can hold a referendum on the disputed bill in the electoral college. When the Legislature is not in session, the President has the power to promulgate ordinances over any field of Central Legislation, and the ordinances have the full force of law until revoked by the Assembly. Besides, he enjoys wide financial powers in respect of charged and committed expenditure, which the Assembly may discuss but on which it cannot vote. This will enable him to run the administration and implement the projects already in hand without the danger of supplies being cut off by the assembly…The most important weapon the President has in his armoury is the power to dissolve the National Assembly in case the differences between them become irreconcilable…The threat of dissolution can be used as a lever to enforce the President’s will in legislation. The Presidency is constructed on the theory that in the legislative as well as in the executive sphere the President can maintain his supremacy. The validity of laws passed by the Legislature cannot be questioned in a court of law, even if the law in question has been passed in excess of the jurisdiction of the legislature…The Constitution, as it stands in Pakistan, affords no remedy against the passage of laws that may violate fundamental rights, since of their validity the Legislature is the sole judge” (Mushtaq Ahmad: ibid., p. 256, 257, 258, 259, 260, 263).
The powers of the Central Government over the Provincial Governments were absolute: “In the event of a conflict of jurisdiction, Central legislation will prevail over Provincial legislation” (Mushtaq Ahmad: ibid., p.260). The President, together with the NA and the two PAs, was to be indirectly elected by an Electoral College consisting of the 80,000 BDs: “A vital respect in which the new Constitution differs from the old, and in fact from the constitutions of other countries…is its faith in the efficacy of indirect elections” (Mushtaq Ahmad: ibid. p. 263). Introducing his dictatorial Constitution as “a blending of democracy with discipline”, President Ayub Khan declared: “The Parliamentary system…we tried and it failed…We have not yet attained several sophistications that are necessary for its successful operation.”
In April 1962 indirect elections took place for the NA. Seventy landlords were elected (58 from West Pakistan, 12 from East Pakistan) in a House of 156. Although political parties remained banned, a large number of leading figures in the former political parties, not specifically barred by the Elective Bodies (Disqualification) Ordinance (EBDO), were returned: “Despite the ban on political parties for the election 44 percent of the individuals named in the Assembly are members of proscribed political groups, and many are critical of the new Constitution’s curb on legislative and judicial authority” (New York Times, May 4, 1962). In May 1962 new PAs were elected on the same pattern as the NA. As the new NA met in June 1962 at Rawalpindi, Ayub Khan was sworn in as first President of the Second Republic. On the same day the Martial Law (Repeal) Ordinance was promulgated repealing Martial Law after almost four years. In July 1962 an Advisory Council on Islamic Ideology was appointed.
The Revival of Political Parties
The 1962 Constitution envisaged a NA, and a country, without political parties. That this had been, as Ayub Khan expressed it later, “a miscalculation”, (Mohammad Ayub Khan: Friends not Masters. A Political Autobiography, Oxford, 1967, p. 221) was demonstrated in June 1962. In this month nine politicians from East Pakistan – headed by three former Chief Ministers of the Province – Nurul Amin, Abu Hussain Sarkar and Ataur Rahman Khan – issued a statement calling for “political action” to secure a new Constitution. This statement was widely interpreted as a call for extra-constitutional political action, i.e., for political action outside the machinery of BD controlled by the military dictatorship. The ‘Karachi’ clique saw as a danger signal: “The disposition of boycott which is crystallising in the political circles of East Pakistan…This is a dangerous situation and threatens to force a gulf between the East and the West” (Editorial, Pakistan Times, July 24, 1962). Six days after the issue of this threatening statement, on June 30,1962, the government secured the adoption in the NA of the Political Parties Bill, permitting the formation of “approved” political parties – those which, in the opinion of the government, were not guilty of “propagating any opinion, or acting in a manner prejudicial to the integrity or security of Pakistan” or of being “in receipt of foreign aid”. The basic motive behind this move was to create a political party dominated by the ‘Karachi’ clique in order to broaden the base of support for the military dictatorship, and to divert opposition political action from the building of a mass movement outside the Constitution into the harmless channels of a ‘parliamentary opposition’ within the machinery of BD controlled by the military dictatorship. In July 1962 Ayub told a press conference that he “…would like right-minded people from both wings of the country to meet at a convention and form a broad-based political party” (Dawn, July 21, 1962).
In August it was reported that: “The formation of a broad-based national party, which will in all probability be named the Muslim League, was discussed at a special meeting of the Presidential Cabinet today. The meeting was presided over by President Ayub Khan” (Pakistan Times, August 17, 1962). In September 1962 the Muslim League (ML) was formally revived at a Convention held in Karachi, becoming known as the Convention Muslim League (CML). In May 1963 President Ayub Khan joined the party, and in December 1963 was elected its President. As Mushtaq Ahmad comments: “The Convention Muslim League is a party behind the power rather than a party in power. The initiative in calling a Convention of the Muslim Leaguers held at Karachi in September 1962 was taken by Ministers who were closely associated with its proceedings and decisions. By the fact of being a pro-Government party it is also a pro-Constitution party” (Mushtaq Ahmad: ibid.; p. 282).
The formation of the CML as a ‘President’s Party’ in such a blatantly crude manner, a Party openly serving the interests of the ‘Karachi’ clique and its military dictatorship, was deliberately designed to force former ML politicians associated with the ‘Punjabi’ and ‘Bengali’ cligues (figures such as Mian Mumtaz Mohammad Khan Daultana and Khwaja Nazimuddin) to dissociate themselves from it and form an opposition party which could rally other opposition parties into the constitutional framework of BD. This design was successful.
In October 1962 the former Council of the old ML met in Dacca and revived what it claimed to be the “true” ML, which became known as the Council Muslim League. Its President was Khwaja Nazimuddin, its General Secretary Sardar Bahadur Khan, brother of President Ayub Khan. In July 1962 Sardar Bahadur Khan had issued an appeal for a “united front” of all parties, groups and individuals who wished for the restoration of “parliamentary democracy”, and in October, under the leadership of Suhrawardy (who had been released from prison in August) such a ‘united front’ was formed under the name of the National Democratic Front (NDF). To evade the operation of EBDO, Suhrawardy insisted that the NDF was not a political party, but a “movement”: “We are not working on a party level, but we are all united for the cause of the democratisation of the Constitution” (H S Suhrawardy: Address at Mymensingh, October 27, 1962). The Awami League, in fact, envisaged the NDF as a movement operating primarily outside the constitutional machinery of BD controlled by the military dictatorship. To meet this threat, in January 1963 the government promulgated two ordinances: one provided that a person disqualified under Elective Bodies (Disqualification) Ordinance (EBDO) could be sent to prison for participating in any political activity, including addressing a meeting, issuing a leaflet or holding a press interview; by the other the President was empowered to waive disqualification of any EBDO politician (i.e., of any who were prepared to direct their political activity along the constitutional lines approved by the military dictatorship). As Suhrawardy said of these two ordinances: “This is the most blatant form of corruption on the one hand, and coercion and suppression on the other” (The Times, London, January 9, 1963). These ordinances did not, however, prevent the holding of a meeting later in January 1963 at Suhrawardy’s residence in Karachi at which the NDF was extended to West Pakistan. The 35 politicians who took part in this meeting were arrested and charged with sedition. With the death of Suhrawardy, its leading figure, in December 1963, the NDF ceased to play a significant role.
The government followed the ordinances of January 1963 with concessions to the opposition designed to give support to the view that fundamental reforms could be effected constitutionally. In March 1963 it sponsored the Constitution (First Amendment) Bill, which sought to win the support of the conservative mullahs by renaming the state “The Islamic Republic of Pakistan”, and to placate the opposition by making fundamental rights justifiable in the courts (except for 21 laws adopted by the Martial Law Administration!). This measure was successful in persuading Khwaja Nazimuddin to instruct the Council ML Members of the NA to vote with the government on the Bill. The dictatorship also sought to soften the hostility of the East Pakistan national bourgeoisie by supporting, in April 1963, an opposition motion to set up a Parity Committee with the official aim (which was never put into effect) of removing West/East disparity in the services, and by making Dacca, in East Pakistan, a “subsidiary capital” of Pakistan.
(To be continued)