Peel off the rhetoric of Islam and the all-too-familiar pattern of power politics can be seen running through Pakistani history. In an attempt to dodge, fudge, and suppress the ethnic and linguistic diversity of the country, successive civil and military regimes have played up religion as a symbol of unity. None of them has been successful. In fact, the more the state relied on Islam as a political slogan, the sharper and more irreconcilable these divisions have become.
In the process the myth that Pakistan is a religiously homogenous Muslim country has also been shattered. Those who identify themselves as Muslims are more precisely either Shias or Sunni-Barelvis or Sunni-Deobandis, or Wahhabi or Ahle-Hadith or Maududi’s followers, or belong to one or the other of the many mutually exclusive sects and cults. (Even the constitution of Pakistan concedes that “[I]n the application…to the personal law of any Muslim sect, the expression ‘Qur’an and Sunnah’ shall mean the Qur’an and Sunnah as interpreted by that sect.) So problematic has been the task of interpreting “true” Islam that the constitution had to be amended to insert a clause to define who is a Muslim -- rather who is a non-Muslim. Similar sectarian disputes, which have marked efforts to Islamize education and laws, have often taken a violent turn. [...]
From HERE, great article, I recommend you read it all.
