Pakistan, as it stands in 2014, has only two Nobel prize laureates. First one of them, Mohammad Abdus Salam and then came a young girl, Malala Yousafzai. Their story is somewhat same, and the first thing you will find common among them is that they’re Pakistani and they’re (Abdus Salam was) having a motto to make foreign people believe Pakistan is a state of peace and not of terrorism. But, they got hit by their own people and criticism started to hold tight onto them, not by others, but by the people of their own kind, Pakistanis.
Mohammad Abdus Salam
Born on 29 January 1926, in Jhang (Punjab, Pakistan) was the first Pakistani to win a Nobel prize in 1979 for his remarkable work in Physics. He was the “one and only” guy behind the major idea of SUPARCO, fully named as “Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission”. His most remarkable work was the electroweak theory (for which he won the prize too). Salam is still remembered as the scientific father of mathematical and theoretical physics in Pakistan.
He did only work for himself, but tried his best to raise the Pakistani Physics community in the Physic community of world. Salam had worked in the threory of neutrino too.
Not only this, Salam has other contributions to the science, not locally but globally. Scientists and physicists specially all over the globe witness his greatness and his sincerity for science, humanity, and specially Pakistan. The first guy, to introduce the atomic bombs in 1971 was Abdus Salam when he travelled to United States and returned back with the theories for the Atomic bombs and weapons.
“in 1978, Abdus Salam with PAEC officials, paid a secret visit to China, and was an instrumental initiating the industrial nuclear cooperation between the two countries.”, is written inside the Book of Indian scholar Ravi Singh.
In 1974, he founded International Nathiagali Summer College (INSC) to promote science in his country. This witnesses the greatness and love of Abdus Salam for science in Pakistan, and the support of physicists in Pakistan for the innovation in Pakistan. Abdus Salam left Pakistan, for sake of inventions, because being an Ahmadi is an open invitation in Pakistan to kill him. He left Pakistan, but never forsaked Pakistan and the most prominent scientists in Pakistan, agree to accept him as their teacher and mentor. Salam left Pakistan only as a protest, because Ahmadis were declared non-muslims in constitution of Pakistan.
Salam was a devout Muslim, and had a firm belief in Islam. He was a member of Ahmaddiya Muslim Community and he saw his religion to be the common and essential part of his research and daily life work. He had written once,
The Holy Qur’an enjoins us to reflect on the verities of Allah’s created laws of nature; however, that our generation has been privileged to glimpse a part of His design is a bounty and a grace for which I render thanks with a humble heart.
Salam died in 1996, in Oxford at the age of 70. His body was sent back, and was burried in Bahishti Maqbira at the location of Rabwah, Punjab, Pakistan along with his parents. His tomb had the “First Muslim Nobel Laureate” written, but sooner, on orders by court, “Muslim” was removed from his grave.
Dr. Salam’s genius was like a magic… And there was always an element of eastern mysticism in his ideas that left one wondering how to fathom his genius…
Malala Yousafzai
Malala was born on 12 July 1997 in Swat Valley of Pakistan. She is an activist for female education in her own valley and is the youngest ever Nobel prize laureate. Her family runs a group of schools in their location and due to this fact, she always had a keen interest in education and wanted every single child to get education.
When she was just 11-12 she used to pen her feelings and thoughts, so that world outside Swat can know what and how she feels and how she has to fight back against terrorisms, stopping young girls from getting education. She wrote a blog for BBC which had her thoughts and her life, under the influence of terrorism. She wrote about Taliban taking over their schools, and the massacre that Taliban had created. Her blogs are underlinde by “Gul Mukai”.
Her first ever BBC blog was posted in 2009, she used to pen write them and then a scanner was involved to scan and email the blog posts to the BBC team.
School systems were banned in Swat by Taliban, this is the first step to ruin a community. In her blog she stated,
It seems that it is only when dozens of schools have been destroyed and hundreds others closed down that the army thinks about protecting them. Had they conducted their operations here properly, this situation would not have arisen.
The girls schools were re-opened, and she wrote in her blog post that she and her friends,
played a lot in class and enjoyed ourselves like we used to before
The strength of the class was growing, but however Taliban was still active and was working to stop girls from getting education. In a documentary created, she said,
I have a new dream … I must be a politician to save this country. There are so many crises in our country. I want to remove these crises.
She was, attacked because she was fighting for her rights, and after the incident she said,
I think of it often and imagine the scene clearly. Even if they come to kill me, I will tell them what they are trying to do is wrong, that education is our basic right.
Common things
The things that were common in them are much prominent and anyone can feel and get to know them. Not only they were Pakistani, but they were working devotedly for Pakistan and their people.
They worked, throughout their career (hopefully Malala does the same as Salam did) they worked hard to make sure their country, people and family is remembered as peace makers and good people and not as terrorists or dumb.
They both won Nobel prize, categories differ, Salam won it for Physics whereas Malala won it for Peace. Category doesn’t matter, atleast they won a Nobel prize for Pakistan and tried to let Pakistan move on step further in the list of countries with more than one Nobel prize laureates.
The final similarity among them is, that they’re both being criticized, in their own particular way. Abdus Salam was criticized and was called “non-muslim” and had to leave the country. They’re still asking “Why did he leave Pakistan?“. Malala is right now being criticized for doing nothing for Pakistan. Yes, she has done nothing, because Pakistan is a male dominated country and males here want people to do something for males only. No one would every care for women. Malala gets this attitude and gets called agent of US just because she is a lady with guts.
I have no more words to describe the stupidity of Pakistanis! Just the following picture and I am out. May Allah guide us all.
Afzaal Ahmad Zeeshan 