“May no one be a wandering Jew. Straws are heavier than those uprooted from their soil,” says Sultan Bahu, a sixteenth century poet of a great philosophic depth, hinting at what the alienation from the soil could possibly entail for those who willingly or unwillingly drift. Roots are loved because they support what flourishes. But we also see in history migrations and invasions by aliens that force indigenous people to re-define themselves in terms other than those offered by their self-awareness. Self image gets blurred and distorted or re-hashed depending on the nature of migration and invasion. This is not to claim that what is indigenous is always robust and what is considered alien is invariably contaminating. Interaction between different peoples and cultures is an important underlying motive force of historical process that creates human civilisation.

Punjab, the cradle of sub-continental civilisation, has a diverse and pluralistic culture as a result of a long historical process shaped by migrations and invasions from without since Harappa times. The last great intervention in the form of colonialism had huge consequences. It was so sweeping in its reach and so penetrating in its pervasiveness that nothing indigenous remained untouched by it. The so-called great Mughal empire manned by parasitic aristocracy of foreign origins having no deep roots fell like a proverbial house of cards in the face of assaults launched by white adventurers riding the crest of science and technology developed by knowledge-based endvaour of social forces in the resource-poor Europe. The colonialism at the one hand exposed the hollowness of politico-economic institutions in India based on what scholars called despotism and Asiatic mode of production that had outlived their historical relevance and on the other debunked the sacred myth of social and cultural values driven by religious mumbo jumbo. The upside of colonialism expressed itself in its greed driven ability to usher in modern industrial age in the sub-continent with the introduction of mechanical industry, railways, asphalt roads, telephone and telegraph along with secular education and politico-legal institutions which were defining features of industrial age. The down-side was that it had but utter contempt for anything and everything that seemed to it alien. This initiated a process of dehumanisation in the colony creating among the natives self-loathing that forced them to disown what was dynamic and authentic offered by their previous historical experience as an organised social entity.

Creating a vast and intricate network of canals designed to boost agricultural production changed the socio-economic landscape in large tracts of hitherto uncultivated lands in the Punjab. Increased production accompanied by demographic changes created a whole new class that benefited from this new colonial largesse and in return owed unconditional allegiance to its new masters. Other colonial enterprise though less spectacular but more enduring in its consequences was the deliberate dismantling of indigenous system of education and replacing it with new European schooling aimed at producing new type of educated men and women who could ape all things western uncritically. Not that everything was fine with the traditional education. Rather much of it was decadent and had a stink of superstitious garble handed down from generation to generation and blindly learnt by rote. It lacked a fundamental element of good education: questioning. The tradition ridiculed the rationality and conviction derided the doubt. The new schooling derived its strength from rational and empirical sources of modern knowledge. But what proved to be lethal was the medium of instruction. Indigenous languages were replaced by foreign languages in the schools i.e. English and Urdu. And that was undoing of Punjab. It cut off the people of Punjab from their history, culture, wisdom and other sources of inspiration.

Immediately after the emergence of Pakistan the elite dominated by Urdu speaking immigrants and Punjabis continued the practice with the added emphasis on religion making it potently explosive. One good thing about the traditional education was that it was not exclusively geared to getting jobs. A part of it attempted to generate knowledge. Job oriented education introduced by the colonialists and carried forward by Punjab’s elite in cohort with the upper crust of Urdu speakers has peaked in recent times. Mushrooming of public and private universities with phony glitter of modernity is disgustingly stunning. What they promise with pomp and show is jobs and snobbery, not knowledge. And the knowledge which is little more than a semblance, they pretend to produce, have no connect with our soil, people and their actual needs; economic and cultural. Just have a look at their syllabi. You will find nothing indigenous. In a department of linguistics you may be forced to study the most obscure European linguists but you will find no mention of the great Panini of Taxila who with his universally celebrated book ”Ashtadhyayi” pioneered the study of linguistics on scientific lines in 4th century B.C. As a student of political science you may be compelled to study the important political scientists of the West including Machiavelli but no professor with a degree from Oxford or Berkley will tell you about another genius from Taxila, Chanakya Kautilya (350-283 B.C) who was the first in the recorded history to compose an all time great book (Arthshastra) on the state and statecraft exposing the dirty secrets of realpolitik. The learned professors of our awe-inspiring universities sing of the greatness of Galileo, Newton and Einstein (no doubt about their greatness) but will not tell you who introduced the concept of ‘Sunya’. It was great Brahmagupta (650 A.D) who for the first time conceived ‘Sunya’ both as a symbol and as an idea without which no great progress in mathematics and physical science would have been possible. ‘Sunya’ later became ‘Sifer’ in Arabic and ‘Zero’ in English.

The policies of state institutions and universities in respect of knowledge and culture are reflected in the administrative and financial support they extend to so-called literary and cultural festivals and conferences held every year in Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad. All they have to offer is saleable writings in English and Urdu pretending that these represent the creative output of Pakistani people. The fact is conveniently ignored that the real creative experience of Pakistani people finds its expression in Pakistani languages i.e. Sindhi, Pushto, Balochi, Punjabi and score of other native languages. Only an idiot or an alien can imagine the Pakistani culture and literature without the diverse richness of Sindh, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Balochistan, Punjab and Northern Areas. Officially sponsored literary and cultural festivals actually negate what they claim to represent. They put on display the literary and cultural poverty of Pakistan. But who is pushed in this country full of proud philistines where knowledge means a job and culture means a trite folk-song. Our alienated elite niggles more about the appearance than what lies beneath it. Knowledge or culture loses its meaning when shell seems to be more substantive than its kernel.