Pakistan’s clash of ideology and identity

On 17 April, a week before the terrorist attack in Pahalgam, Kashmir, Pakistan’s Chief of Army Staff, General Asim Munir, reasserted the Two-Nation Theory—the ideological foundation that justified Pakistan’s creation as a homeland for South Asian Muslims. Kashmir, he said to the assembly of Pakistani expatriates, was the “jugular vein” of Pakistan. But along the country’s western frontier, where ethnic and tribal identities run deep, this narrative is unravelling.

Islam alone can no longer contain the fractures emerging from within Pakistan. From the resurgence of Pashtun nationalism to the long-running Baloch insurgency and the growing resentment over Punjabi dominance, Pakistan is facing a crisis of identity—and legitimacy.

The most visible rupture lies along the Durand Line, the colonial-era border that separates Pakistan from Afghanistan.While Islamabad insists it is a settled international boundary, the Afghan Taliban—now back in power in Kabul and Kandahar—categorically reject it.

This isn’t merely a territorial dispute; it is a clash of civilisational visions. The Afghan Taliban may share religious conservatism with Pakistan’s military, but their worldview is grounded in Pashtunwali—a tribal code that values nang (honour), badal (revenge), melmastia (hospitality), and, above all, azadi (autonomy).

This indigenous code predates Islam’s arrival in the region, and often operates alongside, or even above, religious edicts. Pashtuns are overwhelmingly Sunni Muslims, but their practice of Islam is inseparable from their cultural identity. Tribal jirgas settle disputes in ways that reflect both Sharia and Pashtunwali, while shrines of Sufi saints remain integral to spiritual life. Religious scholars (mullahs) may hold moral sway, but they rarely outrank tribal elders (maliks) or local councils. Islam is respected—but it is interpreted, localised, and mediated by tribal customs.

Pakistan’s state-sponsored Islam, shaped by Deobandi orthodoxy and military interests, often clashes with this localised faith. This disconnect has turned Islamabad’s “strategic depth” doctrine on its head. The very actors it once nurtured for leverage in Afghanistan—the Taliban—now act autonomously. The Taliban emir in Kandahar may lack formal statehood, but in swathes of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, he holds greater moral authority than any general in Rawalpindi.

This erosion of state authority is not just symbolic—it is violent. The Tehreek-e-Taliban-e-Pakistan (TTP), ideologically aligned with the Afghan Taliban, but focused on toppling the Pakistani state, has regained ground. A collapsed ceasefire in 2022 was followed by a sharp rise in attacks on security forces in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan.

The TTP’s resilience stems not only from religious ideology but from decades of accumulated grievances—military operations, displacement, and enforced disappearances—that have scarred Pashtun communities. To many, Islamabad’s invocation of Islam rings hollow when accompanied by helicopter gunships and mass detentions.

Here again, Islam becomes a contested terrain. Competing interpretations vie for legitimacy, and the state no longer holds monopoly.

Movements like the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM), a social movement for Pashtun human rights based in Khyber Pakhtunwa and Balochistan provinces of Pakistan, articulate this tension in civilian, peaceful terms. The PTM does not reject Islam—it rejects its weaponisation. Its calls for dignity, justice, and demilitarisation are rooted in both Pashtunwali and universal rights. Its protest culture draws on poetry, oral history, and tribal solidarity—an identity forged long before Pakistan’s 1947 inception.

What PTM exposes is a deeper civilisational divide: a state that defines itself through ideology, and a people who define themselves through history and culture.

In a post-Pahalgam public statement, Maulana Fazl-ur-Rehman, the president of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam and a prominent Pakistani politician and cleric, has openly criticised Pakistan’s government and military for rising India-Pakistan tensions, warning that even the Taliban now leans pro-India due to Islamabad’s strategic failures.

Nowhere is this tension more pronounced than in Balochistan, Pakistan’s largest yet most marginalised province. The Baloch struggle for rights and recognition is decades old. What unites its many strands—from armed insurgents to peaceful protesters—is the demand to be seen and heard.

Figures like Dr. Mahrang Baloch have become symbolic of this resistance. Her leadership in protests against enforced disappearances has drawn national and international attention. The state’s response—travel bans, intimidation, and silence—only amplifies the perception of Balochistan as a colonised territory within its own country.

The Baloch identity, much like the Pashtun identity, is grounded in language, land, and history. And like the Pashtuns, the Baloch see the Pakistani state’s religious narrative as a mask for Punjabi dominance.

Underlying these regional discontents is a structural imbalance: Punjab’s dominance. With its overwhelming share in Pakistan’s military, bureaucracy, and economic life, Punjab is often seen not just as the heart of the federation, but as its overlord.

For many in the peripheries, the Islamic Republic is less of a neutral state, than a Punjabi-led project wrapped in Islamic symbols. The consequence is alienation—political, economic, and existential.

Pakistan once claimed the mantle of ideological leadership in the Muslim world. Today, it is being challenged in its own terrain. The Taliban in Kandahar assert that their model as more authentic. The TTP claims to be fighting for a truer Islam. Voices from PTM and Balochistan argue that legitimacy comes not from dogma, but from justice.

Even traditional allies are recalibrating. Qatar now deals with the Taliban as sovereign equals, often sidelining Pakistan. Saudi Arabia, pursuing a post-Islamist identity at home, is visibly disengaging from Pakistan’s ideological script.

General Munir’s reaffirmation of the Two-Nation Theory may still resonate in military academies and official textbooks, but it is increasingly out of step with the frontier’s lived realities.

Islam, while central to Pakistan’s founding, can no longer bear the full weight of its nationhood. The state must reckon with its civilisational diversity. That means embracing pluralism, addressing Punjabi centralism, and reimagining federalism—not as a threat, but as a path to survival.

If Pakistan continues to paper over deep-rooted ethnic and civilisational rifts with ideological rhetoric, it risks accelerating its internal unravelling. The peripheries are no longer asking for integration on the State’s terms—they are demanding recognition on their own. Without a shift in vision, Islamabad may soon find that it is not just its borders that are contested, but the very idea of Pakistan itself.

Sumeer Bhasin is an independent geopolitical analyst and Afghanistan expert.

This article was exclusively written for Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations. You can read more exclusive content here.

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