There come many days in the calendar around the year we hail as holidays, one of them being the Defense day on 6th of September. The common trend celebrating the defense day nowadays include changing your Facebook profile picture, tweeting up a defense day tweet and spending the whole day at home doing nothing productive. Only a few dig around and really read about one of the most important days in our history or make enough effort to ask their parents, their grandparents about the day, the events, the people we own our lives to. Let us have a glimpse of the day Pakistan stood still as told by our elders and history.
It was a calm and quiet morning, the people slumbered in their beds had not a slightest clue of what awaited them. The “Zinda dilan e Lahore” were busy making their traditional breakfasts when suddenly a familiar voice was heard over the wire.
“Mere Aziz Hamawano”, it was the president, “We are under attack”, the people silenced as he continued, “The enemy has attacked the frontier border of Lahore”.
The sun of 6th September shone with a dreadful news of a vicious war awaited to test the spirits of a nation. But this news did not cause any panic or mayhem rather instilled a sense of responsibility in the hearts of the people to protect the motherland from the ungodly plans of the nemesis.
The role that Pakistani defense forces played that day is quiet well known to all of us but something rather amazing happened on 6th September. It was not only the military that is to be accredited alone for the victory that day but the unsung civil warriors, the teenage girls, the enthusiastic boys, the men, the women every individual gave his best that day.
Everyone just wanted to contribute to the struggle somehow.
My Nana Abu used to tell us that there were air crafts flying all over the sky battling the enemy crafts and people stood on their rooftops, in the streets chanting slogans in the support of their Air force, people calling out “ O pichion Marr, Side te side te marr” not a wise thing, one might say to do in the times of war but people were so emotional at the time that rather a common feel prevailed that not the country but our very home is under attack and our brothers from the Army, the Navy, the Air force are trying to push back the adversaries.
People volunteered to gather funds, donated money, blood, food, medicines and sent letters of support to their “Fauji bhai” on the border to boost up their morale.
We the generation of today can only imagine what the atmosphere was back then but our fathers and grandfathers who live to tell the tale claim that they had not seen a day that United Pakistan as the war of 1965.
Another factor which played a very vital role in the uplifting of the emotions in the nation were the singers, the musicians. The songs like:
“Ae rahe haq k shaheddon”
“Mereya toll siphaya tenu rab dian rakhan”
stirred up such an emotional frenzy that they left their permanent marks in the hearts of people.
Now let us look at the current scenario with a different aspect, while it is undoubtedly true that Pakistani people have proven themselves capable of protecting its motherland in debt to their emotional love for the country, the same thing can become hazardous if not accompanied with a reality check.
We ought to get very emotional in a lot of matters and lose our cool even in the matters where strong mental stability and compromises are required whether it be the Balochistan Issue, the Blasphemy law or some other national matter.
As biter as it may sound all matters cannot be dealt with the same mindset that won us the war of 1965. In the world today we don’t need “The youth”, “The students” to go strap yourself up with bombs and lay down before the enemy tanks, we need you to study and work hard to achieve excellence in your respective academic field and make this country proud. We need the same spirit as that of our elders disguised in a manner as to fit in the demands of the country today .The people who gave their lives did so that YOU may take this country to great heights and we are greatly indebted towards them.
And the trends today that how we spend these national days like defense day really need to be changed. These people and events ought to be recognized every year and instead of having to spend the whole day at home doing nothing, the people especially the children ought to be given lectures in schools/colleges to remind them about the sacrifices made then for their now. The thing is that we should realize that what we have today is an opportunity to lift this country high and to outshine the world and this opportunity should not be taken for granted.
(This article was originally written for HealPakistan )
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