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7 Pakistan’s Atomic Publics: Survey Results Haider Nizamani Pakistani society is riddled with fissures on almost every aspect concerning the nature of the political system, nation building, the meaning of national identity and the means to ensure it. When it comes to the nuclear issue amid this cacophony and chaos, General Pervez Musharraf asserts that the nation is in complete consensus on Pakistan’s nuclear program. Leaders of Jamaat-e-Islami, the most vocal political party in espousing the cause of nuclear Pakistan, argue that barring a few antinuclear individuals , the overwhelming majority of Pakistanis consider nuclear weapons essential for the country’s security. But is there really a consensus in Pakistan regarding the nuclear option? Have people thought about their country’s nuclear weapons program and policy? Have they considered the likely costs? Do they know who controls the country’s nuclear infrastructure? These questions address the command-and-control dimension of the nuclear program, the role of nuclear weapons in current and future policy making, the probability of their accidental use, and scenarios in which Pakistanis might support their deliberate use. Probing these issues, which are the staple diet of traditional security studies, will help us understand the role played by nuclear weapons in the political sociology of Pakistan. Peoples’ responses to Pakistan’s nuclear weapons program will inform us about the nature of society and politics in that country. 134 · Pakistan’s Atomic Publics In seeking answers to these questions, I conducted a countrywide survey, with the help of dedicated volunteers, between June and August 2000 to gauge the level of nuclear nationalism and its related aspects in the world’s newest nuclear power, and to ascertain the reactions of ordinary men and women living in different parts of the country.1 With illiteracy hovering at around 60 percent, the majority of people living in rural areas, and women often considered as silent spectators in the political culture, earlier surveys on the nuclear issue have only solicited the views of the elite urbanized section of the population. Although useful in some respects, those surveys tell us little about the presumed consensus on the nuclear issue. The present survey tries to fill that gap by also reaching out to the marginalized and rural sections of the population in order to elucidate the various public opinions and attitudes about Pakistan’s security, with special reference to the different aspects of the nuclear issue in the post-Chagai period. Pakistan: Profile and Context To familiarize readers with Pakistan’s political landscape, I begin with a brief profile of Pakistan, as well as a demographic breakdown of the survey respondents. Pakistan’s whopping population clock was ticking at 157 million as of August 2006. According to a 1998 census, the population at that time was 132 million, with the majority (67%) living in rural areas. Pakistan comprises four provinces (the Punjab, Sindh, North-West Frontier Province [NWFP], and Balochistan), the federal capital territory of Islamabad, and the federally administered tribal areas (FATA). The Punjab is the most populous province of Pakistan with a population of about 74 million, approximately 56 percent of the total population. For the purposes of this chapter, I include Islamabad, which is technically federal capital territory, in the Punjab, which today is seen as the region that most ardently supports the prevailing official vision of Pakistan. The Punjab is the big brother who bullies the smaller provinces of Pakistan because of its overwhelming presence in the armed forces—the institution that has directly ruled the country for almost half its existence. Like other provinces of the country, the Punjab is multilingual; the Siraikispeaking population lives in the southern part of the province, whereas those who speak Punjabi are in the center and the north. The central districts of the Punjab were impacted the most by the 1947 Partition. Millions of Punjabi Muslim refugees arrived in this region of the newly carved-out Pakistan with stories of the atrocities committed against them in India. In subsequent years Partition has cast a long shadow on Punjab’s political psyche, with India seen through the lens of the Partition tragedy. Sindh, the second most populous province of Pakistan, has a population of about 29.9 million, approximately 23 percent of Pakistan’s total population. There are two main linguistic groups in Sindh. The Mohajirs, which literally means “immigrants,” speak Urdu and are mainly from Northern India, having arrived in the province during [3.131.110.169] Project MUSE (2024...

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