In a lot of ways, watching my father sitting enchanted on election day, back in 2013, shaped my desire to learn about politics. The idea of learning about that which brought such triumph and such anguish to my father’s generally aloof demeanor greatly excited me. And there seemed so much to be excited for back then: the righteous Imran Khan, blessed with divine favor, was going to unleash justice on the corrupt Sharif and Bhutto families. This would be the birth of a new world order, one that the Napoleons and the Alexanders could only dream of. In this world, in this “Naya Pakistan,” life would be valued, integrity safeguarded and such will be this dawn that all will hail and celebrate.
However, fate, as it often does, had other plans: PML-N, led by the Sharif brothers, had won again. The righteous had lost. My father, much like his leader Khan, could not believe this had happened. The initial dismay followed by denial birthed the long march but more personally, became my first memory of a significant national political event.
Now, nearly ten years later, I feel different. No longer do I naively view Imran Khan as the messiah who will save us all – quite far from it – and no longer do I feel the same unadulterated curiosity to discover all the intricacies of politics that my father seemed to enjoy so much. Quite simply, political participation does not excite me. Rather, I find myself detesting it. I look to political state of the country in a backdrop of rising prices and a rapidly depreciating rupee, and I feel this profound sense of loss. There are shades of disappointment that embody this loss, certainly, but mostly this feeling is colored with hues of apathy and estrangement from what is to come. Because in truth, now it seems unavoidably cyclical – things keep happening, but nothing quite happens.
In my brief few years observing politics, a former prime minister was disqualified, another elected. Then ousted. The brother came into power and now we’re all waiting for the next election. These events are significant to the development of the nation, but they are not new. Much like how the same groups are called corrupt and the same misogynistic comments are passed, these events simply follow a pattern of the powerful going around in their favourite game of musical thrones. Years ago, PTI was demanding elections owing to alleged rigging. Now once again, they are demanding elections, albeit for slightly different reasons. But this is just one very small example of things remaining unchanged. Earlier this year, a suicide bombing in a mosque in Peshawar tragically took the lives of some 80 innocent civilians. We both know that this is not the first time this has happened. Elaborating this only makes me miserable, so I will refrain.
Consider the economic conditions of the country, I cannot remember a time when basic commodities were easy to buy, it has always been a question of difficultly, of hard and harder. In my entire lifetime, quite a few political events have occurred, but nothing has happened. Perhaps more accurately, nothing has improved.
In the past, I would find parallels in my Western education to find comfort. For example, it took France five revolutions and republics to develop into a modern-day democracy, so it surely must be okay if we take our time too, right? The US had to fight a bloody, self-destructive civil war before it became a functioning democracy, so perhaps we too needed to touch rock bottom before we could begin our upward endeavor. Unfortunately, over time, no longer do I find any attraction in such indulgences; they simply feel empty and juvenile.
I do not think this is true for me alone: friends, family, acquaintances, all have echoed similar sentiments. Perhaps the biggest testament to this feeling prevailing is my father – an Imran Khan fanatic way back from 1992, a true nationalist at heart – telling me how I ought to settle abroad, that there is no future here. I still disagree, but his misery is not lost on me.
I recognize that a perspective such as mine is reductive, but know that it is born out of an overwhelming sense of pessimism that goes entirely against my nature. I have always been a positive person. In fact, I have actively put in effort to be that way. But this plague of pessimism continues to contaminate each inkling of already elusive hope that dares to pervade me and in the process, is seeping far into each corner of my being. No matter how spirited I urge myself to be, I am by no means invulnerable. The gloom overwhelms me, and I have never felt more deflated.
There’s this concept in psychology, the delusion of reprieve, that states that a prisoner on death row will delude himself into thinking that he will be somehow reprieved of his punishment and saved before his sentence is carried out. I am voting for the first time in my life this election cycle, much like the prisoner, I too hope that in it there will be reprieve which possibly begin a new era which ushers this country to development. But I do not think the answer will come from mainstream parties. Perhaps, it is time to look beyond. Grassroots movements that defy norms of opportunism and call out injustice of all nature particularly appeal to me. But I am no longer who I was in 2014 and I am acutely aware this time that there is no messiah. In fact, there will be no messiah that will elicit my reprieve.
My reprieve, as I now understand, lies in all of us. Maybe now is the perfect time to shrug off apathy, and channel discontent towards progress, towards improvement. Perhaps now more than ever, individual responsibility to serve the nation is paramount. Nothing seems to happen, yes, but perhaps now it’s time to make it.