A leader leads, serves and guides, while a ruler governs and rules – people follow a leader, they are dragged and ruled by a ruler.
It never ceases to amaze me when the media refers to our ruler as a 'leader'. Do a google search for 'pakisani ruler' (557 results today) and another one for 'pakistani leader' (124,000 results today). While its true that there have been many real Pakistani leaders that those thousands of websites refer to, why do only 557 (Five hundred and fifty seven only) websites exist that acknowledge that some such thing as a "Pakistani ruler" actually exists?
Pakistani bloggers, please be a bit honest and at least use the correct term in your posts – unless, of course, you think you are being 'led'.
I just changed the wikipedia entry text from 'leader of Pakistan' to 'ruler of Pakistan' in the text:
"After the coup of Pervez Musharraf in 1999, Musharraf assumed the role of Chief Executive, and was the sole ruler of Pakistan."
on the page Prime_Minister_of_Pakistan as the first step. Lets see if it stays that way. Maybe one of you can edit Musharraf's page now.
You are right that we have never really had a leader who serves and guides except Jinnah. Some people even criticize Jinnah that he was autocratic because he dissolved the NWFP assembly and said in a speech that only Urdu will have a status of national language. But looking at the disservice that Abdul Ghaffar Khan did to the cause of Pakistan only an angel, saint or probably Gandhi could’ve forgiven him. lol.
I agree that a ruler does not imply a leader. Big difference.
Thanks for your comments guys.
Nauman: Had Jinnah lived for a few more years, maybe things would have been different. Perhaps there’s a different version of Pakistan in another parallel universe 🙂
Sara: I’m surprised how easily we (the general public – the ‘ruled’) accept our new rulers without questioning their right to rule. Perhaps the 150 years of British rule has embedded this in our genes and we start feeling uncomfortable whenever we are ruler-less.
Most of the credible intellectuals say that there would have not been so much difference had Jinnah lived for few more years. This is because the upcoming leadership or rulers were all consisted of selfish Beurotcrates, feudals and most importantly Army adventurers. Jinnah also complained about the shortcomings of his associates.
You are so true when you say, we have, being exploited, embedded in our genes. We just need an inevitable dose of bloody revolution, things will be alright after that.
Bloody or not, a revolution would certainly be welcome. I do see your point Ahmad, which is also the opinion in the post here:http://www.chowrangi.com/i-want-pakistan-of-1948.html