A generation down the memory lane view and policy-wise Iran is where it was on February 11, 1979, that is, the day when the Islamic Revolution took place. True, the global situation has underwent a sea-change and Iran, after passing through tumultuous initial phase and eight-year long war with Iraq, has emerged as a regional super power having the potential to take on any enemy in the Middle East. If the recent CIA sponsored study is to be believed by 2025 Iran and Turkey, along with China, are likely to pose a serious threat to the US hegemony.
One may agree or disagree with many aspects of Iran in the last three decades, yet a historian needs to be objective in his/her assessment on the developments which took place there. Unfortunately that did not happen in this case and till date Iran continued to get a bad Press.
Our students are made to study and praise the French Revolution of 1789, though it failed horribly in achieving any of its major goals. But the western historians and writers never find a single good thing about the great upheaval in Iran to write about. This is intellectual dishonesty.
If ideologically Iran is today where it was 30 years ago, this itself is a great achievement. Revolutions seldom realise their goals and if they succeed, they start losing their track after a few initial years. If the French Revolutions failed in 1789, 1831 and 1848, the 1917 Russian Revolution lost its very objective after the first few years of its existence. That Iran is still sticking to the ideals of the Islamic Revolution and continue to be ruthlessly anti-Zionist and anti-America, it itself shows the maturity of the country. No doubt sometimes its leaders do indulge in rhetoric yet they are not windbags like many other Muslim leaders. Be it scientifically or technologically, Iran’s progress has shocked the western world. In the field of nuclear energy, missile programme and satellite research the country has made enormous progress and that too without much help of anyone.
One thing stands unique about the Iranian Revolution. It was led by a 79-year old man, Ayatollah Khomeini, in itself a record of a sort. This man’s tenacity to fight the corrupt monarchy in this late age itself needs to be written in the golden letters of history, as by this age a person, how much revolutionary he or she may be, not only becomes extremely weak but also loses all his/her hope. He touched down on Iran on February 11, 1979 after 15 years of non-stop struggle and exile to Iraq, Turkey and lastly France.
“I will carry out my struggle even if I am deported from one airport to the other all over the world,” this grand old man said during those heydays of the Revolution in which thousands of Iranians lost their lives.
Several attempts were made on his life and one of his sons was even killed by the agents of much-married Shah of Iran, Raza Pehlavi, who used to run the country like his personal fiefdom. Yet biasness blinded the western writers so much that they even failed to highlight the firm commitment and resolve for a cause by this man.
There were many things special about the Iranian Revolution. Ayatollah Khomeini brought about a huge change in the global world view of the Shias. He denounced the best friends of Iran, the United States and Israel. He declared the former as a Great Satan and the latter as an illegal state. But while doing so it did not go close to the Soviet Union, which was then the alternative Super Power having its long border with Iran. True, Iran wanted to deal with the Russian invasion of Afghanistan in a different way yet it maintained distance with the evil Soviet empire too.
The biggest achievement, however, of the Iranian Revolution was that outside that country, at least in the initial phase, it won more Sunni mass support than perhaps of Shias. Several traditional Shia clerics – not all – were too sceptics of his policy. Some of the Shias’ hatred for Khomeini can be gauged from the fact that in Siwan district of Bihar one of them named his dog after him. However, that same man became his admirer years later when the Iranian leader took a stiff stand on the issue of Salman Rushdie.
In Lucknow and Hyderabad a section of Shias took out a street protest when the then President Hashmi Rafsanjani visited these two cities as late as mid-1990s, that is 15 years after the Revolution. They wanted that Iran remove the ban on Muta’h (temporary marriage) and other radical steps.
It took years for the Shia leaders outside Iran to accept the reality. However, this does not mean that the Revolution did not have any impact on the Shias as such. It in fact gave a new lease of life to the Shia movement in several places, in particular Lebanon, where Hizbollah became a virtual headache for Israel.
The tragedy, however, is that unlike the response of their mass, many Sunni traditional leaders failed to take a step ahead in the direction of friendship to close the gap. A respected Indian Aalim (now he is no more) from Lucknow deemed it fit to write a book attacking Shiaism. Not only the timing of the book was wrong, the very objective was questionable. Since kings, tinpot dictators and emirs wanted to overthrow Khomeini, they tried to widen the rift between the two sects. This when the other side was trying to bridge it. The September 22, 1980 Iraqi attack on Iran, in which millions lost their lives, was one such step.
The Islamic Revolution in Iran may have activated Shias in some places of the world. But this does not necessarily mean that it has brought the two sects face to face. In the trouble-torn Pakistan Shia’s Tehreek-e-Islami was a part of the Mutahhida Majlis-e-Amal, an alliance of the religious party of that country. But that was mostly possible because of the Jamaat-e-Islami, which in the sub-continent always welcomed the Iranian gesture. But even this positive development did not get highlighted.
Perhaps no other revolution in the recent years had to face such a hostile global atmosphere as Iran, at least in the first few years. Not only Saddam’s Iraq at the instance of the United States, attacked Iran, the saboteurs too caused extensive damage within the country. The Left-leaning leaders, who were initially with the Islamists, too wrought havoc in that country. In one such bomb attack 80 MPs, including President Mohammad Ali Rajai, the Prime Minister Dr Jawwad Bahonar and the leader of the Islamic Republican Party, Ali Bahishti died. Yet the business of the country went on as usual.
Today there may be serious differences among the Iranian leaders on how to tackle the global challenge. President Ahmadinejad may have his own extreme view, while former Presidents Hujat-ul-Islam Hashmi Rafsanjani and Ayatollah Khatmi may hold different view. But nobody can deny the fact that Ahmedinejad lives in a two-room house, drives his own small car, takes his own lunch box, his children simply walk down to school and he cleanse his own Presidential office.
Today globally Muslims may be confused – thanks to the western and eastern propaganda. Yet in this age of despondency there is no dearth of people in the Muslim world who look towards Iran with hope. Some people may be still suspicious of Shiaism yet even they cannot deny the responsible role played by the Iranian in Lebanon, Bosnia and even the present day Iraq. They have not excelled just in international diplomacy, but even in the field of academics, sports, film, treatment of women, science and technology, etc. They have shown to the world that they are something to be paid attention to.