Dr Ishtiaq Ahmed

With regard to identities deriving from religion, sect and caste, it was religion that became the identity around which the three main communities of pre-partition Punjab, the Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs, were mobilised 

The annual conference of the Trust for History, Arts and Architecture of Pakistan (THAAP) was held in Lahore between December 6 and 10, 2013. The theme this year was ‘Cultural Roots of Art and Architecture of the Punjab’. The first three days consisted of paper presentations and discussions, and on the last two days the participants went to Gujrat, north of Lahore, where apart from sightseeing they visited Gujrat University. The next day, they went to Harappa, south of Lahore. It is considered the cradle of one of the oldest civilisations in the Indian subcontinent dating from pre-historic times. THAAP was founded as a trust by Professor Sajida Vandal and Professor Pervaiz Vandal. Both are prominent scholars in the fields of art and architecture and have also been part of the politics of resistance to extremism and intolerance on the Lahore horizon. 

This was the second time I presented a paper; earlier in 2011, I had also come to the annual conference with a paper on Lahore. Each time the experience has been extremely invigorating and encouraging. This is because THAAP has evolved a very rigourous and impartial procedure for evaluating papers. It is only papers that the committee of experts considers to be of high quality that are approved for the conference. Four sessions spread over the whole day meant that one was involved from morning to evening. 

The greatest strength of the THAAP annual conference is that it provides scope for scholarly contributions on a very wide number of topics but all subsumed under a specific theme. As a result, this year, the topics on Punjab varied from history and politics to specific subjects such as Nila Gumbad, Lahore, as a cultural palimpsest, the Mughal tent culture, Lahore’s cultural roots in the Ghaznavid period and so on. We also learnt about the Silk Route and bazaars as cultural spaces and indeed many other very interesting facets of Punjab’s rich and variegated cultural heritage. I was simply amazed by the commitment and dedication of the scholars, a majority of whom were young people. 

Every year, some participants are invited from abroad to the THAAP conference. This time, a strong Indian presence greatly enhanced the comparative perspective as experiences not only from Indian Punjab but also Gujarat were presented. What I learnt was that human creativity and artistic talent exist everywhere, and we should encourage the most ordinary people to also develop their talents. This can be done with a bit of sympathy and fantasy.

Professor Rajmohan Gandhi’s paper, ‘Clash versus common sense’, was eagerly heard by the audience. He argued that Punjabi historical and cultural ethos was constituted by two broad philosophical strands: there was the purist or high culture tradition of various religious communities, which represented the proclivity towards confrontation and recurring clashes between them and the diametrically opposite tradition of the common people to live-and-let-live and adjust to each other’s peculiarities. He argued that it is the people’s culture that represented the true wisdom of Punjab. His thesis was received very positively. 

My paper, ‘Who are Punjabis and what is Punjabiyat?’ elicited very spirited discussions. I argued that individual and collective identities are multidimensional and relational. It is the context and specific situation that determines which particular dimension of the multiple identities that all individuals and groups bear would be relevant in a given situation.

While it seemed that the least problematic description of Punjabis should be that all those who spoke the Punjabi language were Punjabis, it was by no means incontrovertible. There are ethnic Punjabis who have settled outside Punjab in both India and Pakistan. Over time, the younger generations do not speak Punjabi anymore but many continue to describe themselves as Punjabis and are even regarded as Punjabis by others. 

With regard to identities deriving from religion, sect and caste, it was religion that became the identity around which the three main communities of pre-partition Punjab, the Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs, were mobilised. However, in 1947, the Hindus and Sikhs became one group called the non-Muslims while Muslims of all sects and persuasions became the other group. Demonisation and dehumanisation by these two groupings followed and it culminated in horrendous killings during the partition of Punjab. 

Afterwards, the Sikhs and Hindus fell out over the future shape of East Punjab and it was split into two major parts in 1966, when Hindi-speaking areas were separated from it and given to Haryana while some Punjabi-speaking areas were given to Himachal Pradesh. In the 1980s, the Khalistan movement emerged and communal violence and terrorism ravaged East Punjab. In the Pakistani West Punjab, sectarianism raised its ugly head in 1953 and again from the 1990s onwards Shia-Sunni conflict wrecked hundreds of lives. In all these developments, being Punjabis was not of much use to build solidarity. 

Yet, an emotive undercurrent of Punjabiyat permeates ordinary encounters between Punjabis of all sorts. I have experienced this all over the world where Indian and Pakistani Punjabis meet — cricket matches, conferences, mushairas (poetry recitations) and just random interactions at bus stops and underground stations. Can it ever be the basis of solidarity between Punjabis, which transcends the incidences of caste, creed and sect? This does not seem very likely at present but one can never be absolutely sure it will not ever happen. One thing, however, is very clear to me: THAAP conferences are just the right forum to probe who Punjabis are and what is Punjabiyat.

The reviewer is a visiting professor, LUMS, Pakistan, professor emeritus of Political Science, Stockholm University, and honorary senior fellow, Institute of South Asian Studies, National University of Singapore. Latest publications: Winner of the Best Non-Fiction Book award at the Karachi Literature Festival: The Punjab Bloodied, Partitioned and Cleansed, Oxford, 2012; and Pakistan: The Garrison State, Origins, Evolution, Consequences (1947-2011), Oxford, 2013. He can be reached at: billumian@gmail.com