What’s there in a name? Ask Pak. physicists

Prof. Abdus Salam of Pakistan receives his Nobel Prize in Physics from Sweden’s King Carl Gustaf in Ceremony in Concert Hall.

In December 2016, then Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif issued an executive order renaming the National Centre for Physics in Islamabad’s Quaid-e-Azam University as Abdus Salam Center for Physics, after the country’s first Nobel Prize winner. Dr. Abdus Salam won Nobel in 1979 for his ground-braking works in physics. But in Pakistan, Dr. Salam, who belonged to the minority Ahmadi community, remained a controversial figure because of his faith.

Ironically, it’s Mr. Sharif’s son-in-law, Captain Muhammad Safdar, who is in the forefront of attacking Dr. Salam, who died in 1996. On Thursday, Mr. Safdar presented a resolution in the National Assembly, which got support of a majority, for renaming the Physics Department of the Quaid-e-Azam University after scientist Abu al Fath Abdul Rahman Al-Khazini. “It was necessary to make the world realise that the scientist (Al-Khazini) was as brilliant as his teacher Abu Rayhan Al-Biruni,” it stated. Khazini was a 12th century astronomer, whose astronomical tables are considered major works in mathematical astronomy of the medieval period.

Pakistan is home to the world’s largest Ahmadi population. In 1974, when Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto was the PM, the country amended the Constitution, declaring Ahmadis to be non-Muslims

A day before submitting the resolution, Mr. Safdar told reporters in Islamabad that the name of Dr. Salam was controversial in Pakistan. “He never accepted the Constitution which declared him a non-Muslim. Why should we honour him? We will rename the centre on some Muslim scientist who excelled in science much before non-Muslims,” he said. Pakistan is home for the world’s largest Ahmadi population. In 1974, when Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto was the Prime Minister, Pakistan passed a constitutional amendment declaring Ahmadis non-Muslims.

Amendments in blasphemy law by former military dictator General Ziaul Haq in the 1980s further increased the problems for the Ahmadis as many of them were jailed over their views on prophethood that’s different from Sunni Islam. They were even penalised for calling themselves Muslims.

Mr. Safdar, known for his anti-Ahmadi position, had previously gone on record to criticise the decision to rename the university’s physics centre after Dr. Salam.

The Quaid-i-Azam University spokesperson clarified that the latest name change proposed by the National Assembly was for the Physics Department and not the Centre for Physics. However, he admitted that there was no provision for renaming any department in an assembly resolution. Mr. Safdar’s party, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, is yet to respond on the issue.

‘We are sorry’

Daily Times wrote a scathing article against the resolution titled: ‘We are sorry, Dr Salam’. “From the defacing of your grave to the attempts to remove your legacy from one of the country’s leading universities that paid tribute to your outstanding contribution to the world of science. We are sorry that a Nobel Prize, Pakistan’s first, was not enough for the religious right to see beyond your faith. Just as we are sorry that the criminalisation of the latter occurred on democracy’s watch,” the paper stated.

Almost at the same time, across the border, a controversy over a portrait of Mohammad Ali Jinnah shook India’s Aligarh Muslim University. The issue was raised by a lawmaker from the ruling BJP, who questioned why a Jinnah portrait is hung on the walls of an Indian university. It seems the progressive voices defined by people like Jinnah and Mahatma Gandhi are being overpowered by exclusivist ideas.