Had Bhutto been alive today he would have been 92 . Every year his partymen observe his death anniversary on 4th April, the day in 1979, on which he was hanged by Zia and this year too wasn’t an exception. He must be, however, turning in his grave over what his successors did with his party ideals.
There is no gainsaying the fact that his entry into the politics was like a breath of fresh air . The common man had pinned great hopes when he had launched his party in the house of Dr Mubashar Hasan in 1967. Incidently he too passed away a couple of days ago , heart broken like many other stalwarts of the PPP who felt betrayed when its leader carried out reforms promised by him at the hustings rather half -heartedly and deviated from his party manifesto with the passage of time . Small wonder many old workers of this party who had been instrumental in the PPP’s rise to power went into self-imposed isolation towards the fag end of 1970 when they realised that the party’s high command wasn’t listening to them at all.
The common man loved Bhutto tremendously because he was the man who gave him his identity and his voice . He was the man who had spoken for the first time in the political history of Pakistan for him. He was , therefore, liked by the working class till end despite his drawbacks and foibles. He was a victim of a highly controversial verdict and his hanging is billed in many legal quarters as a judicial murder.
The love and esteem for himself which he had generated in the heart of the common man can be gleaned from the fact that after his death his party was brought to power not once but thrice by the electorate. It is another matter that his successors didn’t come up to the expectations of the common man.