Sibte Hassan’s Writing and Its Formative Influences on Pakistan’s Historiography

Abstract

After the creation of Pakistan 1947, the popularity of non-secular voices and capitalist ideas have been measured, largely, in term of their success in representing Pakistan as a theocratic or a capitalist state. This has led to an oversight of various secular and socialist writers such as Sibte Hassan who stood against the non-secular and capitalist forces. Sibte Hassan is omnipresent in the intellectual community of national and international scholars. In this research paper an attempt is being made to highlight Sibte Hassan biography, analysis of his writing’s themes, and the impact of his writings on Pakistan historiography. In the light of political and social context, it discusses various ups and downs of his socialist, journalist, intellectual and political career. The main themes of his works such as socialist interpretation of the history of Pakistan, struggle between secularism and fundamentalism in Pakistan, feudalism, dictatorship and democracy will be discussed in detail. It also focuses on his writings which left an enormous impact on Pakistan’s historiography. He is generally credited as being the man behind the dissemination of socialist ideas in Pakistan. Despite his command over English, Persian, much of his literary and non-literary writings are in Urdu. He was inspired by Karl Marx (1818-1883) and Fredrich Engle’s (1820-1895) ideas which paved the way for his socialist interpretation of Pakistan’s history. He had profound influence over the younger generation of Pakistan.