Indians were furious we managed to secure the

Americans first: Jamsheed Marker

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jamsheed-marker

Sitting with, and listening to, Jamsheed Marker is a fulfilling experience. History, diplomacy, anecdotes
about politicians, music, culture, and a lot of cricket — he enlightens his audience in many ways. At 94,
he possesses a remarkable memory and speaks coherently even though his physical weakness has
bound him to a wheelchair.

Marker has been Pakistan’s ambassador in more countries than any other diplomat. He has a plethora
of information and memories from those assignments in different capitals of the world. He has seen
the formative phase of Pakistan from close quarters and is witness to some of the most decisive
phases of the country’s history, the separation of East Pakistan being one.

Cricket has also been Marker’s passion. He dawned on the horizon of Pakistani cricket as its earliest
commentator along with the redoubtable Omar Kureishi. The two had amazing chemistry that made
cricket commentary in Pakistan as popular as the sport itself.

Marker, who comes from a Parsi business family, is a lover of music and the arts. He spends a lot of
time in his study where walls are lined with bookracks, memorabilia, paintings and photographs.

Syed Jaffar Ahmed. A number of books have come out in the last 15 years or so that talk about
Pakistan as a failed or failing state. After such a long and rich experience of living in Pakistan, how do
you see its future?

Jamsheed Marker. During the creation of Pakistan, there were doubts whether the state would come
into existence at all. I remember a party one evening at New Delhi Club where a group of people –
Hindus, Muslims and Europeans – were arguing fiercely and plenty of whiskey was flowing around.
This was sometime in July 1947. The subject was ‘how long Pakistan will last — six months or six
years’. I heard [someone] saying, ‘They will come back begging to us within three months, asking us to
take them back.’ Now that was the attitude of a lot of people. We had nothing. When I say nothing I
mean minus, zero. It was just the iron will of this man [Muhammed Ali Jinnah] who really put this
country out. He said, ‘There is no need to get scared; we will survive.’

"Liaquat Ali Khan was in complete command but he exercised his power in an exemplary
fashion"

From Delhi, I came to Karachi. As I was driving [from the airport to the Cantt railway station], I saw
those refugee camps. People in them were all bloodied. They had been through riots. They had no
clothes or anything, just small broken-up suitcases. [But] you heard them shouting ‘Pakistan Zindabad’
from each refugee camp. The situation was such where you couldn’t be happy. You’d see children in
their bloodied clothes crying and mothers on the roads yelling. But those people had unbelievable
passion — all because of this one man. They were determined to survive any situation.

Ahmed. How did this resolve continue after Quaid-e-Azam died?

Marker. We had Liaquat [Ali Khan] who was a man of impeccable devotion for Pakistan. The things
this man did –– you cannot believe that they can be done here. He left a lot of his property, thousands
of acres, in his hometown [in India]. The house he had in Delhi was in the best locality. He knew what
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he had to do for Pakistan. He led from the front and he was totally, totally devoted. His last words
were ‘Allah Pakistan ki hifazat kare’ (May God protect Pakistan).

Ahmed. How did you get to know Liaquat Ali Khan?

Marker. Karachi was a small city and everybody knew everybody else. We happened to have a
friendship with begum Ra’ana Liaquat Ali Khan and the prime minister.

People were trying to destroy what we had and were trying to see what they can get out of it. All those
flatterers one day came to Liaquat Ali Khan and said, ‘Sir, you should have an Englishman as a military
secretary. You should have those British ADCs (aide-de-camps). These are your entitlements. [The
flatterers] didn’t think we had the capability of handling [those duties].

Liaquat Ali Khan said, ‘I’m the prime minister. I decide these matters. I don’t need this kind of privilege.
If I put an Englishman there, it’ll be because I think that is what is needed for Pakistan. I’m not moved
or impressed by these goras in their uniforms.’

Ahmed. During the time of Quaid-e-Azam and Liaquat Ali Khan, the bureaucracy had started taking
over the power of the state. How did that happen?

Marker. Liaquat Ali Khan was in complete command but he exercised his power in an exemplary
fashion. He said, ‘There has to be a system and we have to work under that.’ If we had two or three
people more like Liaquat Ali Khan, Pakistan would have seen it through. Our leaders saw Pakistan as
an opportunity for themselves, not as an opportunity for the people or the country.

Ahmed. When did you have your fist encounter with people in power?

Marker. It was in the late 1940s. I was in the naval selection board, working under the Government of
India’s home department. Morarji Desai [who would become India’s prime minister later] was working
as home minister [in the pre-Partition administration]. He came to inspect us in this small place called
Porbandar near Pune. Our office used to be in an old Shivaji fort. [Desai] was Gujarati-speaking like
me. He asked me what I thought of [independence]. In those days, we had Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs
in our selection board so I told him to keep that intact but he said, ‘This will never go on because there
is too much impartiality [in it].’ I asked why it couldn’t be done if there was will for it. He said we would
have to find something better suited to the genius of our politicians than [to that of] our people.

He wanted me to work for him. He said to me, ‘What are your plans?’ I told him that I would go back to
my home in Quetta as soon as I was released from the shackles of the government. My family was
there and my business was there. My family had been living in Quetta for three generations. They had
gone there with the British as contractors. He said, ‘Quetta might become Pakistan.’ I said, ‘Quetta will
become Pakistan and I will go there. That is my intention.’

We had a family business of shipping and chemicals based in Keamari, Karachi. Right until 1952, I used
to drive from Karachi to Quetta in my own car and I never experienced any security problems. We
used to leave at around 10 pm, spend the night in Sukkur and go on to Sibi and then to Quetta. The
whole journey was done by night because of the hot weather. We never feared anything. If there was
ever any accident, 20 bus drivers would come along to help within 10 minutes. It was a totally different
[environment].

"There was no concept of bribery at the time. Nobody could even think about it"

Ahmed. Who else were you in touch with among the leaders after Partition?

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Marker. There was I I Chundrigar, Fazlur Rehman (the education minister), Khawaja Nazimuddin. They
were all very dedicated people.

Ahmed. There is this perception about Nazimuddin that he never allowed himself to act as governor
general while Liaquat Ali Khan was alive.

Marker. They were all a team. They used to get together and work hard to solve the problems.
Nazimuddin was not the brightest of them, but he was an honest and modest man. There was no
concept of bribery at the time. Nobody could even think about it. Like I told you before, Liaquat Ali
Khan refused all the honours and [forsook] all his properties. A lot of Hindus left their properties here
during Partition and the same happened on the other side. There was a law about evacuee properties.
The government appointed people to distribute those properties to the ones who didn’t have anything.

Ahmed. There are allegations that false claims were made to get evacuee properties. That is how the
process of corruption started. Is it true?

Marker. Yes, it started [then] and Liaquat Ali Khan tried his best to shut it down. I remember we used
to meet at his house for an informal lunch. He was a very punctual man. Everything had to be done
according to schedule. The time for lunch was 1 pm, and we were there on time but he was late by
about half an hour. Ra’ana Liaquat Ali Khan was angry with him. When he walked in, Ra’ana said, ‘It’s
very shameful that you kept your guest waiting. How can you do something like that?’ Liaquat Ali Khan
was normally a very polite and calm man and that was the first time, perhaps the only time, I saw him
in a fury. He said, ‘You don’t know what has happened to me. These bureaucrats will finish us.’

We came to know later that the property department’s secretary had brought a file to him, trying to
get his signature for the allotment of land to Liaquat Ali Khan himself. When asked about it, the
secretary said, ‘These are your entitlements. These are, in fact, much less than what you should have
gotten.’ Liaquat Ali Khan looked out of the window of the prime minister’s house at the slums which
were all over the country at the time. He took the file and threw it across the room. ‘Look here, go and
see those slums outside. Look at the condition of those poor people. When you have taken care of all
of them and resettled them, then you bring this file to me.’

Ahmed. How right was it for Pakistan to opt for joining the Western Bloc when Mohammad Ali Bogra
was the prime minister, rather than adopting a non-aligned policy?

Marker. Everyone asks me this question. The answer is that, at the time, it was in our national interest
to be friends with the Americans. The whole world was looking towards America because it was the
only country with money. We beat the Indians to it. This was a great stroke of diplomacy. At the time,
the Indians were furious that we had managed to secure the Americans first. [It] was a great success.

Ahmed. Don’t you think that a non-aligned policy would have been more useful for Pakistan?

Marker. Not under the circumstances then prevailing. The pressure from India was so great that this
was the only way Pakistan could have stood up to the Indians.

Ahmed. Was the Indian threat real or did we make more of it than was necessary?

Marker. The threat was real. [The Indians] made it quite clear that they were out to break Pakistan one
way or the other, by hook or by crook. Every attempt was made to demolish and destroy Pakistan.
[India would have attacked Pakistan] if Krishna Menon had been successful in bringing around [Pandit
Jawaharlal] Nehru, and if the Chinese had not thrown the Indians out [in the 1962 war]. I mean, he was
completely Nehru’s man and he was a rare, evil genius and a Rasputin. There were many Indian
Rasputins but he was the chief Rasputin.
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It was also due to Quaid-e-Azam’s obduracy that no Hindu engineer, civil servant or politician opted for
Pakistan. Though many Hindus lived in East Pakistan, we did not mentally [accept them as Pakistanis].
That was the beginning of the struggle between East and West Pakistan. Here, two things happened.
The first was when Jinnah said Urdu would be the national language of Pakistan. I think it was a major
blunder. One of the few he has made.

"We behaved abnormally, with contempt, towards the Bengalis. It was a very difficult
situation to begin with."

It was a blunder which undid all the work that he had done for the creation [of Pakistan]. And then
Miss [Fatima] Jinnah did the same kind of thing. [People in East Pakistan] were already in a very
sensitive mood and there was already an attitude [in West Pakistan] of looking down upon the
Bengalis. It was an attitude.

Once we were in Dhaka for a cricket match. I told all my friends to look at the enthusiasm of the crowd
for the Pakistani team. I was in awe of that, with so many Bengalis [cheering for Pakistan]. But we did
not have a single Bengali [player in our team]. It was the most colonial dismissal with which they said,
‘These Bengalis cannot play cricket.’ How the succession of [East] Bengal [from Pakistan happened] is
another historical thing. Can you think of another country in which the majority secedes from the
minority?

Ahmed. If this colonial mindset was there in the selection of the cricket team, don’t you think it was
also there in the domains of politics and statecraft?

Marker. There was. We behaved abnormally, with contempt, towards the Bengalis. It was a very
difficult situation to begin with. There was the issue of population [disparity], wherein the majority was
being controlled by the minority. We never accepted [the Bengalis] wholeheartedly.

Ahmed. How do you look at the emergence of the military’s power in statecraft?

Marker. West Pakistan’s politicians brought it on themselves. They raised this tiger themselves and
today we are facing the consequences of that. Before independence, it was very hard to find Muslim
army officers. The senior ones were either Englishmen or Hindus. This tradition passed on after
independence.

Ahmed. You have been Pakistan’s ambassador in more countries than perhaps any other
ambassador…...

Marker. I always submitted my resignation each time the government changed ... I was not in the
[Foreign] Service so I did not have to hack my way to the top [to become an ambassador].

Ahmed. In 1965, Pakistan had started gravitating towards China, and the United States had started to
have a very sceptical view of Pakistan…...

Marker. Yes, and the [Americans] bullied us like hell. They bullied us over India, telling us that India is
a good country and is our neighbour and that we should be friends with it.

Ahmed. Who was the architect of Pakistan’s relations with China?

Marker. [Huseyn Shaheed] Suhrawardy, unquestionably. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto [came to it later], going
around wearing those Mao caps.

Ahmed. But Suhrawardy remained prime minister for only thirteen months in 1956 and 1957.
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Marker. What is important about [relations with China] is that it did not change, but it was only
redirected [when Bhutto became foreign minister].

"It did [annoy the world] and the Indians exploited that. They said Pakistan had a slave’s
mentality towards the West."

Ahmed. What do you say about Suhrawardy’s position on the Suez Canal Crisis when he supported the
West against Egypt?

Marker. He said the Arabs were zero plus zero plus zero and he was quite right. They were thoroughly
useless.

Ahmed. But didn’t it annoy people around the world? Nationalistic feelings were on the rise at the
time?

Marker. It did [annoy the world] and the Indians exploited that. They said Pakistan had a slave’s
mentality towards the West.

Ahmed. In 1969, Bhutto wrote The Myth of Independence in which he observed that we went an extra
mile to befriend the United States, yet the United States did not fully reciprocate. To what extent was
his analysis correct?

Marker. Bhutto’s foreign policy for Pakistan was what was good for Bhutto. Deep down, he didn’t care
about Pakistan ... [Even when he was running a pro-China foreign policy], he was accumulating
support and recognition for himself. He got that recognition, even from China that [felt], ‘He could be
our man.’

Ahmed. But Bhutto was not the only person running the state. He remained foreign minister for not
more than three years. I mean, Ayub Khan was there. The military establishment was there and both
were more powerful than the foreign minister.

Marker. They were very fiercely supported by Bhutto because he knew that was where the power
rested in Pakistan –– in the General Headquarters.

Ahmed. Let’s move to the separation of East Pakistan. Who do you hold responsible for that?

Marker. It’s easy. There were three people: Yahya Khan, Bhutto and Shiekh Mujibur Rahman –– and
each of them [for] his own reason. There’s no question about that.

Ahmed. Mujib was in Suhrawardy’s party so how did he become a breaker of Pakistan?

Marker. Because he had organised the Bengalis in the direction [of separation]. I was there when
there was a fierce discussion between Mujibur Rahman and Suhrawardy [at an] informal get-together.
Mujib attacked Suhrawardy and asked why he had accepted [electoral] parity [between the two wings
of the country] in 1955. He said that East Pakistan had the majority and the power was all theirs to
wield. He kept quoting the 1940 resolution — and correctly so as [to highlight the rights of East
Pakistan].

I see no reason why, at the time, they could not have got together [to talk]. It would have worked, it
would’ve been messy but there might not have been this horrible bloodshed.

Ahmed. Mujibur Rahman could have become the prime minister of all of Pakistan with the
parliamentary majority he had.

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Marker. I don’t think so. I think he was being maligned [so that he could not become the prime
minister]. Although it was not horrible to think of him as our prime minister, but the kind of noise that
was being made about him at the time was a wrong thing to do.

Ahmed. Do you think it would have been wrong if the country was given to him?

Marker. As long as he had maintained a coalition with the Baloch [political parties], that would have
kept Pakistan together. A combination of Balochistan and [East] Bengal would have held Pakistan
together. [But] Yahya was determined to remain in power and he had some assurance from Bhutto.
Bhutto pursued [the idea that giving power to the Bengalis would upset the whole civil-military
arrangement]. He realised that this was the only way in which he could have become the ruler of the
country.

"The fact is that we surely used to have our relationship with China before [Bhutto] and
afterwards, of course, it was Ziaul Haq [who took care of the nuclear programme]."

Ahmed. How do you look back at Bhutto’s tenure?

Marker. Three events turned the course of history in Pakistan. The first was Ayub Khan’s martial law
which was entirely peaceful. People were happy. The second was when Bhutto came and changed the
thinking of Pakistan. As a taxi driver in New York once told me, ‘Sir, he gave us our freedom to speak.’

And the third was Ziaul Haq’s [takeover of power]. He was a cold but patriotic man. Zia inflicted a lot of
damage on Pakistan but he also stood up for our nuclear programme. If it weren’t for him and [Air
Marshal] Nur Khan, [the nuclear programme] wouldn’t have been possible.

Ahmed. Wasn’t Bhutto the initiator of that programme?

Marker. That is what his soldiers claimed. He also claimed to be the initiator of relations with China.
[Both] are key elements in the strengthening of Pakistan. But the fact is that we surely used to have
our relationship with China before [Bhutto] and afterwards, of course, it was Ziaul Haq [who took care
of the nuclear programme].

Ahmed. Coming back to my very first question, how do you look at Pakistan’s future? Marker. The
people of Pakistan have been let down by political [leaders]. As long as that continues, we will continue
to lurch. The other thing I am depressed about is that everyone feels that we ought to be friendly with
India –– everyone except India. We have to stop this rivalry and avoid wasting resources [on it].

Ahmed. People talk about the Quaid’s speech of 1947 to argue that he envisaged a democratic,
secular Pakistan. Do you think this is what our national narrative should be?

Marker. You can’t be talking of the 12th century at the present time and hope for it to be successful.
There was this reception held at a banker’s conference during Ziaul Haq’s time where I asked a
German how the conference was going. He said very badly. I said what happened and he said, ‘In the
20th century, we are talking of bringing banking procedures of the 14th century. We don’t see any
benefit in it nor are we interested in it. If that’s the way you decide to go, then God help you.’

Ahmed. If Ziaul Haq promoted religious fundamentalism, why do you give him credit for good things?

Marker. One good thing, for which I give him credit for more than any other, is that he stood up to the
Americans on the nuclear issue. Pakistan was playing in the hands of the Americans and had agreed
to become the front line state vis-a-vis Afghanistan. It was either the sagacity of Ziaul Haq or the

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Americans preferred to overlook it, but that enabled us to complete the nuclear plant. It was Ziaul
Haq’s determination to take whatever the Americans would throw at him as long as he could [continue
work on the plant]. The Americans were in no way going to kill us for that.

Ahmed. There is a narrative that flows from Quaid’s August 11 speech — that the state will have
nothing to do with religious affiliations of the citizens. Then there is another narrative that flows from
Ziaul Haq — that takes us to a theocratic Pakistan. Where do you think the future lies?

Marker. I think it’s one of Pakistan’s greatest misfortunes that we have been forced into this
fundamentalist mindset. Nowif we’re talking in terms of democracy, you have to accept that we are
being driven by the force [of popular will]. If we reject it, that will mean a conflict. There has to be
popular consent. And I fear we are losing the battle [for that]. We are taking these poor people to the
wrong path. [We should take them] towards the secular part of the narrative.

Ahmed. How do you recall your days as a cricket commentator, working alongside the late Omar
Kureishi?

Marker. He was a great friend of mine. He brought cricket not only to Pakistan but spread it to South
Asia. It is incongruous [with our culture]. It is not one of our instinctive national games. It is an
expensive game.

Ahmed. If I were to ask you about the three greatest Pakistani cricketers, who would you name?

Marker. I’m not following cricket these days. [Abdul Hafeez] Kardar, Fazal Mahmood and Imtiaz
Ahmed are my favourites and, oh yes, the Little Master [Hanif Mohammed] too.

I have been disappointed, I must say, [with how the game has evolved]. In the old classic days, the
players went on to the field like white sparrows, not dressed like clowns.

Ahmed. Cricket is not just about sport, it is also about values. How do you assess its evolution in the
context of values?

Marker. Values were bound to change because cricket has not been able to sustain itself in the
present. Look at how county cricket has changed in England. Nobody has time now. Somebody asked
Danny Kaye, the American humorist and actor, about his experience after he had been to Lords to see
a cricket match. He said, ‘I have seen cricket, and I know it isn’t true.'

This article was originally published in the Herald's February 2017 issue.

Syed Jaffar Ahmed is a professor of politics and history, & holds a PhD in social & political sciences.

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