Sixty per cent Pakistanis want better relationship with India

Sixty per cent of Pakistanis believe their country should improve ties with India, according to a survey published in Islamabad.

Most Pakistanis want sectarian parties banned, support the nuclear program and believe their politicians are corrupt.

But overall they are optimistic about the future, the survey published on Friday, January 24, said.

The survey of 1,260 people in seven cities across the country was done last November, just after Benazir Bhutto's government was sacked on charges of rampant corruption and economic mismanagement.

Conducted by a well-respected monthly news magazine, The Herald, the survey showed 95 per cent believe most politicians are corrupt.

The survey also showed that most Pakistani's are skeptical about attempts to root out corruption, with 55 per cent saying they did not believe corrupt bureaucrats would ever be punished.

But there was some optimism.

Seventy-two per cent of the respondents believe they are better off than their parents, and 67 per cent believe their children will do even better.

Pakistanis are divided on the issue of military spending, with 49 per cent calling for a bigger military budget and 51 per cent calling for cuts.

The army budget is roughly a third of the country's annual budget.

But respondents were hawkish about Pakistan's nuclear programme, with 84 per cent supporting the nuclear option, even if the West, most notably the United States, offers protection.

Seventy-two per cent said Pakistan had more to gain from other Muslim countries than from the West, but a majority rejected fundamentalism in government.

Eighty-one per cent said mosques should not be used as political forums. Seventy-two per cent said Pakistan's religious parties have caused more harm than good, and 74 per cent called for them to be banned.

Sixty-three per cent of respondents said they believe women should be treated equally before the courts, and 59 per cent called for women to have equal divorce rights as men.

Seventy per cent, especially in poor rural areas, said they favoured family planning programmes. Ninety per cent said they favored arranged marriages, with 66 per cent saying they would not allow their daughters to marry of their own free will.

A third of the Pakistanis said they favoured strict Islamic traditions that force women to wear veils and forbid them from venturing out in public without a male companion.

The Herald reported a fierce gender divide on this question, however.

"While 76 per cent of women overall are horrified at the prospect of being declared invisible, only 59 per cent of men are willing to resist such Draconian measures," The Herald pointed out.

UNI