TO EVERY STRUGGLE, KARBALA

When one thinks of sac­ri­fice, two his­tor­i­cal fig­ures stand above the rest — Jesus Christ and Imam Hus­sein. Jesus, accord­ing to Chris­t­ian belief, climbed the cross to save human­i­ty, while Imam Hus­sein offered him­self to the des­o­late desert of Kar­bala to uphold cer­tain val­ues and rights. Imam Hussein’s sac­ri­fice how­ev­er remains sin­gu­lar­ly dis­tinc­tive, as human his­to­ry knows of no oth­er indi­vid­ual who sac­ri­ficed not just him­self but his entire kith and kin for a high­er cause, a greater strug­gle.

I will not go on at length about the events that took place in Kar­bala, but the sig­nif­i­cance of a 1400-year old inci­dent that still inspires orga­nized activism around the world can­not be doubt­ed.

There are times when one los­es inter­est in a strug­gle, or the charm of the cause one stands for begins to fade away. Hope­less­ness creeps in, urg­ing us to just give up. But it is pre­cise­ly at such moments that our will is test­ed. How we then choose to respond is not only a tes­ta­ment of our resolve but a defin­ing moment, because what we stand for defines who we ulti­mate­ly become.

Pak­istan is going through upset­ting times, but the fight is not over just yet.

If out­comes were deter­mined sole­ly on the basis of greater resources or num­bers, Kar­bala would have been a for­got­ten sto­ry. But the truth of the mat­ter is that the alam (ban­ner) of Hussein’s army, which was car­ried by the fall­en Abbas Alam­dar (stan­dard-bear­er) in Kar­bala, is vis­i­ble in streets, vil­lages and metrop­o­lis­es even today. I have per­son­al­ly wit­nessed the over­whelm­ing effect on peo­ple that the sto­ry of Kar­bala has had. This is as clear a proof as any that strength is not derived from mate­r­i­al advan­tage, but more often than not, is a result of un-waver­ing belief in one’s strug­gle and an unshake­able will. Per­haps the poet who penned these lines said it best:

Aik pal ki thi bus haku­mat Yazeed ki /
Sadiyan Hus­sein ki hain, zamana Hus­sein ka

The future does not exist in the present, nor has it been promised to any of us. The glo­ri­ous past depict­ed in the (dis­tort­ed) books of his­to­ry can­not be con­jured, no mat­ter how hard one tries. Thus all we tru­ly have is the present – a present which reveals that 100 mil­lion-strong youth of Pak­istan are yearn­ing for a bet­ter tomor­row.

If the cur­rent sit­u­a­tion of Pak­istan were to be com­pared to a sea­son, I would say it is like autumn. Autumn is when nightin­gales are melan­cholic because their gar­dens have lost spir­it. Late-autumn days are thought-pro­vok­ing; the shad­ows that fall­en yel­low leaves cast are over­come by hope that fresh ones in their place will bear a bet­ter gar­den.

As I cur­rent­ly com­plete a fel­low­ship miles away from home in Europe, I yearn to return as soon as pos­si­ble. I miss the strug­gle I saw on the streets of Pak­istan every day. Every woman, man and child is a war­rior fight­ing for their right to the basic neces­si­ties of life, and some­times even their right to live. Even if some have giv­en up, a vast major­i­ty still car­ries on. Every day they wake up to chal­lenge a cor­rupt sys­tem, an unjust judi­cia­ry and an inse­cure secu­ri­ty estab­lish­ment. The aston­ish­ing thing is that most of them have not lost hope and con­tin­ue to believe in ‘change’.

I have trav­elled all over Pak­istan in the last few years, work­ing on the ground with dif­fer­ent com­mu­ni­ties and address­ing a vari­ety of issues. The smiles that appear on the faces of such peo­ple despite all their trou­bles, the courage that I see in the face of adver­si­ty and the will to carve out a bet­ter life and a bet­ter coun­try res­onates in every cor­ner. We bat­tled through the worst nat­ur­al dis­as­ters of mod­ern his­to­ry, we oust­ed dic­ta­tors, fought for our demo­c­ra­t­ic rights — we are in the midst of a war that has caused unprece­dent­ed dam­age to our social fab­ric, but despite the extrem­ism and intol­er­ance that threat­ens our way of life, we find a way to co-exist in this melt­ing pot of lan­guages, eth­nic­i­ties, cul­tures and ide­olo­gies that we call Pak­istan.

The strug­gle that we see on the streets every day relays a silent mes­sage of hope; we might just find trea­sure in the ruin. The harsh con­di­tions we face might end up help­ing us as the relent­less rubs might pol­ish the gems in us. The cracks in our soci­ety might be the open­ing points for light to enter. We only have to believe and shrug off the fear of fail­ure, for even if we don’t suc­ceed, we have a chance to fail bet­ter. We need to learn from Kar­bala how not to lose the most impor­tant resource we are gift­ed with: our deter­mi­na­tion.

Har daur apnay saath laa­ta hai aik Yazeed
Har daur ku zaru­rat rahay gi Hus­sein ki

May the right to wit­ness the spring, the yearn­ing for true love and the event of Kar­bala inspire us to take Pak­istan for­ward.

To every autumn, spring
To every heart, true love
To every strug­gle, Kar­bala