The question of new provinces

That the Federation is to be recast beyond the present four provinces is almost a certainty now. The PPP took an important step in that direction last March when President Zardari directed his party's manifesto committee to make the creation of a Seraiki province in southern Punjab a part of the manifesto for the next general elections - a position later reiterated by Prime Minister Gilani.
PML-Q, a new coalition partner of the PPP, is a strong supporter, too, of the idea of new provinces. The PML-N ruling in Punjab, from which the Seraiki province is to be carved out, so far had maintained ambivalence. Not any more. Speaking after his election as president of the party for a fresh term at Wednesday's Central General Council meeting, Nawaz Sharif averred that he is "in favour of creating new provinces, when and where these are necessary, to resolve the people's problems."
But he did strike a note of caution, saying that if new provinces are made on linguistic or ethnic basis that would damage the country's security and integrity. He emphasised "this should only be done to strengthen national integration and only in public interest for administrative purposes, and not to draw new lines of alienation and hatred or as part of a new political game."
Although the demand for a Seraiki province goes back a long time, it gained momentum about two years ago when a PML-Q senator raised the issue, and several PPP legislators also joined in. The Nawaz League vice president, Javed Hashmi, also went against the party line to champion the cause of Seraiki province. That reflected the depth of the sentiment prevailing in southern Punjab.
The demand is based on the claim that the Seraiki belt remains the least developed part of Punjab, but it has linguistic overtones as well. Nonetheless, it is not the Seraiki people alone who want a separate province. Renaming of the erstwhile NWFP as Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa has created a sense of loss of identity among its Hindko-speaking Hazarawal population, leading to an unending agitation for the Hazara province. Some of the Pashtuns of Balochistan want to merge with Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (KP) while others demand a separate province.
There is nothing wrong or new about creating more provinces. It is pertinent to recall here that since Independence, India has created several new states, and 'reorganised' eastern Punjab twice along linguistic lines to add two new units to the Union. However, Pakistan has its own peculiar problems, which advise against using linguistic identities to change the number of the federation's units. Doing so will create more problems than solving the present ones. If the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa name and the reaction it generated among the Hazarawals is any guide, language-based divisions of existing provinces needs to be avoided.
Using administrative ease rule seems to be the best way forward. As noted earlier, there is a strong perception in the Seraiki areas that the government in the far off provincial capital Lahore has little or no interest in addressing myriad backwardness problems confronting their part of the province. They have valid reasons to complain, and need to have the power to manage their own affairs.
Such decentralisation in fact would be in consonance with the consensus 18th Amendment - an important feature of which is devolution of power to the provinces - and also help Punjab get rid of the menacing big brother image. It goes without saying that the issue requires a consensus. The government needs to set up a national commission, representing various stakeholders, especially representatives of parties in Parliament, to examine different possibilities and devise a common principle for the creation of new provinces. And, of course, it must ensure that they are economically viable and politically harmonious.