The Glory of the Moguls

"I can't imagine what sort of reception my husband will get in your country," said Liaquat Ali Khan's wife last week. "Americans will probably think he is Rita Hayworth's brother-in-law or perhaps a distant cousin of the Shah of Iran." Liaquat Ali Khan, the 54-year-old Prime Minister of Pakistan, due to arrive in Washington this week, is not related to any Oriental potentates, but his power and influence are far greater than those of any princeling in the Islamic world.

While Mohamed Ali Jinnah performed the pyrotechnics which achieved the separation of Pakistan as a state in the 1947 partition of India, Lawyer Liaquat did the hard behind-the-scenes work in the Moslem League. With Jinnah's death, Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan inherited his power.

Two Tickets. Like his leader Jinnah, and his rival Nehru, Liaquat is part Westerner, part Oriental. He is Oxford-educated. Except for his Persian lamb cap, he usually dresses in Western garb, wears loud Broadway ties. But there is in Liaquat none of the East-West conflict which has characterized Jinnah and Nehru; the tensions of the struggle to make a new nation have left no mark on him. Liaqyat is calmly determined to mingle in Pakistan the best of East and West. Says he: "The East has no tradition of democracy. It is our duty to build one up."

A chain-smoker, Liaquat takes an occasional gimlet (gin and lime), likes to repair radios and cigarette lighters, and sometimes beats a hot drum at parties. He also likes to sing the songs of Iqbal, a great Urdu poet, accompanying himself on the harmonium.

The Begum Liaquat Ali Khan, the Prime Minister's black-haired, bouncy wife, is the daughter of a Hindu Brahman turned Christian. She herself became a devout Moslem. To free Moslem women from purdah, she organized the white-pajamaed, pigtailed Pakistan Women's National Guard. "See these women?" she says, "they were in purdah once. Do you see any purdah now?" Married 17 years, Liaquat and the Begum have two sons, Ashraf, 12, and Akbar, 9, both aspiring musicians.

Liaquat is fond of saying that he came to Karachi as a refugee, just like 6,000,000 other citizens of the new state. Behind him in India he left extensive real estate, was amused recently to receive a notice from India's internal revenue department reminding him to pay his taxes on it.

The average Pakistani finds nothing amusing about India. Almost everything in Pakistan life is powerfully influenced by fear and hatred of India. When Nehru was the lion of the Commonwealth Prime Ministers Conference last spring, Pakistanis got the idea that Britain favored India, retaliated by the obvious gesture of wooing Soviet Russia. They welcomed Russian trade and cultural delegations, maneuvered an invitation for Liaquat to visit Moscow. Since the U.S. invitation to Liaquat, there has been little talk of Russia or the Moscow trip, and Liaquat insists that Pakistanis are the world's most unbending antiCommunists.

Five Borders. Pakistan's claimed 80-odd million population, fifth largest in the world, is split between two land areas at opposite sides of the subcontinent (see map): crowded, fertile East Pakistan, about the size of Wisconsin, and West Pakistan, somewhat larger than Texas. The double territory gives Pakistan five borders to protect, has meant a fabulous expenditure for defense. Almost every sign of backwardness in Pakistan--poor housing, lack of schools--is blamed on the high cost of the army.

Some fanatical Pakistanis agitate for an attack on India: their cry is "On to Delhi. Recover the glory of the Moguls!" But Liaquat knows that war with India would be sure suicide for Pakistan and he is willing to go far to keep peace with his stronger neighbor. Although he is far more secure in his post than Nehru, Liaquat would not last a day if he gave up Kashmir, the rich region claimed by both countries. Kashmir is a prime factor in the restless belligerence of the Pakistanis: they are ready to fight for Kashmir, but they would far rather go ahead with the proposed Kashmir plebiscite, which they are sure Pakistan would win.

Peace with India is important to another Pakistan ambition: industrialization. On his visit to the U.S., Liaquat hopes to persuade American businessmen that Pakistan can keep at peace long enough to be a good investment risk.

Until a trade agreement was signed last week, trade between India and Pakistan had come to a near-standstill. All of East Pakistan's exports & imports, shut out from India, had to go through Chittagong, an overgrown fishing village with a commercial fac,ade. Determined to transform Chittagong into a major port, the government hired Hans Hansen, a Finnish-born American citizen, who was a stevedore before the war. Hansen has cut unloading time in half, increased wharfage space threefold, and imported barges from the Philippines for offshore loading. His job is a shining, rare example of Point Four aid.

Last week, TIME Correspondent Robert Lubar gave an estimate of Pakistan's future: "With foreign technical aid, with peace from India, Liaquat can make something of Pakistan. His people have unity of spirit and a fierce national pride. It is a pride which causes them to dream beyond the limitations of reality, and to be abnormally sensitive about any hint that they are not as good or as great as they think they are. A foreigner who has been watching Pakistan since its inception commented: 'They have pride but sometimes a little too much pride. They're forever stubbing their toes. They try their darndest to be humble, but they can only be humble for a couple of minutes.' "

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