Pakistani troops retreated but not without gains. The UN-backed ceasefire took a part of Kashmir to Pakistan's control. This is how Pakistani military made its tribal collaborators taste war and its spoils.

More recently, towards the end of the era of an intensified Cold War that led the two superpowers, the USA and USSR, to bay for each others blood, Afghanistan was somehow turned into a virtual theatre for a final showdown. This happened right at the doorsteps of tribal irregulars where Pakistani generals saw a heaven-sent opportunity and trained these men with all resources to take on the might of Russians. And, thus, a process began that opened up channels for the flow of a veritable military and monetary aid from Washington to Islamabad. It might have slowed down and stopped altogether after the  Russians left Afghanistan. But it was resumed, courtesy the war on terror set off by 9/11.

Faith in jihad was thought to be the greatest source of motivation for NWFP fighters who joined the war against the 'evil' Russians alongside their Afghan brethren. The CIA, operating in tandem with Pakistan's ISI, encouraged this in order to make the Godless Russian troops bleed profusely. Throughout the war against Soviet Russia in Afghanistan, Pakistan nursed the desire to reemploy its fighters against India and, thus, it ran a low-intensity, covert yet consistent conflict in Kashmir that flared up in Kargil in 1999. It was  mainly meant to test the gorilla power  of its fighters in Afghanistan as also of  their regular mentors in Pakistan's military.

Once the Russians were out of Afghanistan and the tribal robots used in the fight against them could not be serviced through American supplies via Pakistan at the rate prevalent during the peak of the struggle, trouble was bound to hit the suppliers and distributors of billions of dollars of aid (dole actually). Pakistan found it beyond its means to control the battle-hardened mercenaries drawn from not only its tribal areas or Afghanistan but also from far off regions like Sudan, Morocco, Yemen and Saudi Arabia who had joined the war against the Russians.

These mercenaries were far better versed in selling jihad to keep their firm hold on power in whichever part they could find themselves in than any of the Pakistani generals. They used this to lull dissent, buy obedience and postpone normal conditions in Afghanistan and neighbouring Pakistan, creating immense hardship and dread for the common man and far worse for women and children. Schools were shut down and turned into sanctuaries and armouries. Moving out without veil not only became impossible for women but they were also required to move in the company of male kin. Physician-turned-novelist Khaled Hosseini in his magnum opus The Kite Runner followed by A Thousand Splendid Suns recounts movingly the plight of children and women in his country. Hosseini himself had to move out of Kabul to settle in the U.S. along with his family in order to escape pan tribalism sweeping through Afghanistan and parts of Pakistan.

Yet the competitive bigotry thus set off had its fair share of skeptics as well among the clergy against what had turned out to be the worst kind of medievalism. Even when it got too deeply entrenched, a group of clergymen issued fatwa or edict against suicide bombings and use of rockets grenades and guns in the name of Islam and jihad. But sadly the man behind the move and highly vocal critic of Taliban and Al Qaeda, Maulana Sarfraz Naeemi, was killed June 12 by an unidentified suicide bomber. Three others sitting with him in Jamia Naeemia, the Lahore institution founded by him, also fell in the attack.

For over two months now the Pakistan Army has been fighting and bombing Taliban strongholds in Malakand division that falls in NWFP and includes Swat region. This came about after Pakistan's brief armistice with Taliban came to a naught. And ever since the military operation began in the region at least 1,500 people have been killed, according to conservative estimates. Artillery guns backed by the country's air force have been put on the job creating widespread displacement of local people who have been running away from the war zone in droves to escape the deadly crossfire and landing up in refugee camps set up for internally displaced people by the federal government. The number of those who have thus far fled their homes is put at 3.5 million, resulting in support from international humanitarian agencies to tackle the appalling conditions of the camps that are able to provide some shelter but face shortages of food, safe water and medicines.

The refugees are landing up through the better off parts of Pakistan including prosperous Punjab and vast plains of Sindh. The possibility of Taliban lurking in the midst of refugees has been giving a nightmare to the provincial heads and governments of these two states. The June 12 Lahore attack at Jamia Naeemia has made this possibility a real threat for Pakistani cities though in the past too targeted attacks have been carried out by Taliban bombers in mainland Pakistan and its urban centres. The fear is that the large scale exodus of people from tribal areas to down south may further intensify select attacks by Taliban on important persons and institutions. Among other things this may well blur the distinction between the victim and oppressor setting out from the embattled regions of the northwest.

The question is how has such a widespread and deeply embedded schizophrenia overwhelmed Pakistan? Delhi-based veteran writer and analyst, Inder Malhotra, attributes Pakistan's grave imperilment to intense Islamisation that started off during the reign of General Zia ul Haq who deposed and seized power from the late Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto over three decades ago. This, indeed, opened institutions and mechanisms meant to run the country to be tinkered with by the clergy and the Shoora councils formed by it. Clergy's whims replaced the writ of the State and its numerous arms, including courts. These either medievalised or junked modern institutions. The process could not be reversed by those who succeeded General Zia though the late Benazir Bhutto and former president General Pervez Musharraf tried to put the collapsing system of governance back on rails during their rule of Pakistan.

Nawaz Sharif, who ruled Pakistan in between the tenures of Benazir and Musharraf, too did his bit to restore institutions and redeem lost ground. Yet the death of Benazir during the fag end of Musharraf's rule put the clock back once again. Benazir fell to unknown assassin's bullets on December 27, 2007 in Rawalpindi.

One wonders why with each passing day Pakistan is getting trapped in this sad and grim state of affairs even though democracy has returned to the country after Benazir's tragic assassination. Right after her death when this writer asked a Pakistani media professional how his country's most loved leader could be killed so blatantly, his answer came clearly in an Urdu couplet. Translated into English it means: 'Everybody is ensconced in his own little mosque. He will never understand  what you say. His understanding is that he is doing a great task by killing others.'

This is the reality. Pakistan-born and London-based scholar and writer Tariq Ali puts it in a different and more profound way. He says there are as many interpretations to Koran as people read it and try to imbibe its teachings and thoughts and impart it to others. Hardened Islamist clergy interpret the Holy Scripture to rob women and children of their freedom, particularly of those who get in the way of their brand of fundamentalist teachings. This lies at the root of the problems that Pakistan is facing today.

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