: At what point do the personal and public meet? How is objectivity even possible when your dearest Papa is killed and you are not even allowed to file an FIR? Can you combat the president of the country, whom you suspect of having a role in the act? Her columns are about the denial of human rights and the like. Her poems, written from when she was 12, are about violence, a cry for justice. If the world ever needed documentation of the lawlessness that pervades Pakistan, Fatima Bhutto almost epitomises the daily travesties. Her just released memoir to her father is called Songs of Blood and Sword. So nothing prepares you for the cheerful, almost effervescent, and diminutive, not to forget vegan author with a strong sense of hope in her land’s future that you encounter over soup and dimsums. Suman Tarafdar came away with quite a few notions demolished. Excerpts:
Given that you learned a lot more about your father while researching the book, somethings even hurtful, was it as much a catharsis as a reigniting of wounds?
It was a very important journey for me to go on, not just to bring out the truth behind my father’s murder, but also other murders, which you don’t hear about. Also for my brother Zulfikar, who was six when my father was killed. I was 14 and lucky to have all those years. I wanted to uncover things for him. I met all these people he had known. I made a lot of discoveries and thought of him as alive when I was working on the book.
The idea of the book came in 2004 as the tenth anniversary of my father’s death was going to come up in 2006. Ten years and no justice, no safety, nothing. Despite telling my father just before he died that I would write about him, earlier I had never felt ready. By 2006 I had started interviewing, and started writing in 2008. The writing process took two years.
Lenin’s statues, Che posters in his room. From the book, your father emerges as quite a different person from the popular image of him.
He was very idealistic. I always knew that growing up. This negative impression of him was what others put out. I remember my father telling me about the Intifada and the PLOs. I also grew up knowing him as an incredibly generous, principled person. Very surprising for any politician. To discover the similarities in my father and my brother was interesting. A college friend of my father said he loved environment studies class, while my brother is a huge environmentalist. We always wondered where did Zulfi get this keen sense of geography and environment. It was really nice to find those out–to know my father when he was young.
Is it important to correct this general image of him?
I think it’s a disservice. A lot of myths have been made around all the characters in this family. Myths in general are like looking through a foggy glass, and you can’t really talk about the truth unless you look through the open window. This clears all the myths. It was important for me to be critical, to say why I disagree, to give a fuller picture.
The portrait of young Benazir as an introvert is interesting…
Ya, you would imagine people are born that way, that they wake up and they are ambitious. Well, she wasn’t as a child. Not at all, in fact. I think I try to defend her somewhat. As an eldest child myself I understand how an eldest child can feel different. Even when you grow up, you really overcome things like age. Benazir always kept her aloofness with her family, which I think is indicative of something.
Your search for justice involves a personal, as well as a moral side. Do you think, given the way Pakistan is presently placed, will it be possible?
The moral responsibility is something I keep talking about. It’s not as simple as a yes or no. We’ve had justice denied to us in the 14 years, the last being the exoneration of the police in my father’s murder case. The people we hold responsible are in the highest positions in the country. Justice takes long, and that is true for any country. We’ve appealed against the recent police exoneration, but its very difficult to appeal against the President. He has immunity, it’s a very dangerous thing to do. It will take time.
Given the numerous fissures within Pakistan, where do you think it is headed?
You have to remember that it is a young nation. We’ve been cursed with bad governments. Pakistani people want democracy, they want to live without fear of violence. The sky is the limit for Pakistan. All post-colonial societies are ridden with violence, due to what the colonial powers did to us. It’s something we have so much in common within the sub-continent. In Pakistan, the hope is not with the two parties that keep coming and going, it’s with the people on the ground, and that gives me a lot of hope.
To what extent has power destroyed the Bhuttos?
Power is a destructive and violent force by its nature, anywhere. Certainly, power very much changed Benazir, changed the person I knew as a child. Which is not unique to her. Anyone in a powerful position is in such an overwhelming position. I am sure you change. That said, I think you always have a choice.
You detail your grandfather’s tenure, pointing out controversial areas like nuclearisation or Baluchistan. What is the legacy like now?
It is also the nature of the beast that does make you paranoid about causes you would otherwise support. As a journalist, we can support this cause or the other. But when you are sent to rule a province, say, it escalates a sense of threat. When your next vote depends on it, it becomes an important issue, and Zulfikar certainly was susceptible to it. As I have written in the book, I think he should have been different on the Baluchistan issue.
You see that in south Asian politics?
Nah!! In south Asia, the worse you do, the more time you need. In our part of the world, politicians seem to think they deserve hundreds of opportunities.
If you were to admire a particular Bhutto for politics...
I admire my grandfather’s imagination. And his determination to make things possible. With my father and uncle, I admire their resistance and their incorruptibility and their ability to fight an unjust system. My mother (Ghinwa) has both the imagination and the resistance.
Where is the next generation of Bhuttos headed?
My future’s in writing. My brother Zulfikar is a committed journalist and an incredibly gifted painter. I think that’s where his interests lie. Sassi, Shahnawaz’s daughter, is finishing her masters in human rights from Columbia. We have big goals, but they are not political goals. I hope we are allowed to have our lives, follow our dreams. I have no idea of what is going on on the other side....
Source :
http://www.financialexpress.com/news/benaziralwayskeptalooffromherfamily/599586/4
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