For months now, the air in Pakistan was hanging thick with expectations of a near certain political assassination. The speculation was only on the victim. For, Pakistan'spolitical history is drawn by these. The tragedy of the country, waging war to establish democracy, is that Benazir Bhutto, who was shot dead on Thursday, December 27, 2007, was a true mass leader. She was head and shoulders above the men in politics in Pakistan. Crowds thronged where she went. The reception she got when she came back to Pakistan in October after her exile must go down in history as one of the most mammoth political rallies. That it turned out to be a tragedy should have rung alarm bells in all quarters.
But the confidence with which Benazir went about her campaigning for the joke of elections in January, one was lulled into believing that she had the political sanction of not only the army but also the jehadis. She had of late become vocally critical of terrorists, spurred no doubt by her hosts during exile. Political observers were clear that she was coming back, to be anointed prime minister, with the blessings of the western masters of Pakistan. It is in fact this shifting of trust by America from Musharraf to Benazir that has fuelled the suspicion of the army being behind the assassination.
Though she grew up in the legacy of her father, she in her own steam made the Pakistan Peoples Party one of the strongest political forces in the region. Despite being out of power for so long, at the receiving end of dictatorship, and the leadership in exile without a set time limit, if PPP has held on as a cohesive political unit, the credit should go to her. There is not even a second leader because there was no need. With age at her side, there was no hurry to build a second line. In time, she might have groomed one of her children, the way her father prepared her. Suave, western educated and yet rooted in the soil of her country, Benazir played politics with ease. She did not defy the clergy, she followed the dress code and kept her dignity.
In India she was looked at with much hope, especially when she first became prime minister and Rajiv Gandhi then was heading the government here. There was much hype about the rapport between the two and their capacity to sort out Kashmir as both had been born after the partition, and hence started off on a relatively cleaner emotional political slate. But soon after her return to Pakistan after her meeting with Rajiv Gandhi, she disillusioned many in India with her cry for ?azadi, azadi, azadi? for Kashmir along with terrorists in Pakistan.
Pakistan survives economically with dollars from America and politically on anti-India rhetoric. As far as Kashmir was concerned, Benazir did not break any new ground when she was in power twice. There was very little hope that she would have been different had she come to power a third time. But a democratic Pakistan, however fragile it might have held, would have spelt relative peace for India. And if Benazir meant what she said about fighting terrorism, she would have found a more than willing ally in India. And that it is a loss for India and the loss of an opportunity for Pakistan to correct its course, to join the countries of East Asia in its economic march.
Benazir'sassassination is a tragic end to a life of promise. It is accentuated by the fact that she was a woman and women mass leaders take a long time building.
