Quaid -e- Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah

Baba-e Qaum, Quaid-e Azam Muhammad Ali Jinah was born in Karachi on December the 25th, 1876, in a building known as Wazir Mansion. He got his early education at Karachi and Bombay. He did his barristery from England. He saw the name of Hazrat Muhammad (PBUH) on the top of the gate of Lincoln's Inn. So he decided to study there. After his return, Jinah started his practice in barristery. He joined All India National Congress in 1906. He attended for the first time a meeting of All India Muslim League in 1912. Later he Joined All India Muslim League in 1913. The third political party he joined was the Home Rule League. He was member of both the Congress and Muslim League at the same time. Initially he remained working with the Hindu leaders of Congress. He was given the title of "Ambassador of Hindu Muslim Unity" by prominent politicians. With the passage of time he realised that the Hindu leaders of Congress have a different agenda. He left Congress and became fully involved with Muslim League.

Jinah was a man of principles. He was probably the only person among all the big leaders of the subcontinent, who never went to jail. His motto was: Unity, Faith and Discipline.

When Muslim League finally decided to have a separate country for Muslims of the subcontinent, it was the leadership of Jinah which led the nation to achieve this goal. Because of these leadership qualities and his firm stand on the issue, Britishers found no way to reject the demand of Muslims of the subcontinent for a separate homeland. He took charge as the first Governor General of Pakistan on 14th of August 1947 in a ceremony at Karachi. India never took risk of invading Hyderabad or Junagarh in his life. Jinah died on September the 11th, 1948, at Ziarat near Quetta. He was buried in Karachi. His tomb is a beautiful piece of architecture and is worth visiting.

Liaquat Ali Khan

Liaquat Ali Khan (1895-1951), Pakistani politician and first prime minister of Pakistan after independence. Born into a wealthy family in 1895, Liaquat Ali Khan was educated at the MAO College, and also studied at Allahabad and Oxford universities before becoming a barrister in London in 1922. In 1923 he returned to India and joined the All-India Muslim League, which became the main political party representing Muslims in India before independence. From 1926 to 1940 Liaquat held a variety of positions in local politics, working closely with Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the leader of the League. He helped persuade Jinnah to return to India from London in 1933 and was acknowledged as Jinnah's "right hand" from 1943. From 1940 onwards he worked to popularize the "Pakistan Resolution" around India and to build support for an independent Pakistan, separate from India. He was closely involved in the negotiations over the form of independence to be granted to India after World War II and was finance minister in the Interim Government of 1946-1947. Liaquat was the obvious choice to become prime minister of independent Pakistan in 1947 and became the country's senior leader after Jinnah's death in 1948. His period in office was marked by difficult relations with India, following the Indo-Pakistan War of 1947-1948, but also did much to define and consolidate the new state both internationally and domestically. It was Liaquat who drafted the "Objectives Resolution" of 1949 that charted a course for the country. He did not, however, go far enough in satisfying religious extremists who wanted to base laws on the Koran and was assassinated in 1951, in circumstances which are still obscure.

Choudhary Rehmat Ali

     
    3rd Feb, 1999 marked 48  years  since  the  death of one of the leastknown Muslim intellectuals of the past  century, namely CHOUDHARY RAHMAT ALI. (16 Nov 1897 - 3 Feb 1951).  
    In the years preceding the end of  direct  colonial   rule in South Asia, CHOUDHARY RAHMAT ALI was virtually  alone  in proposing a future for the region and its people, based on historical  facts and Islamic principles as opposed to imperial and nationalistic views.    Ch. Rahamat Ali argued that since  South  Asia  came under colonial rule       many distortion, lies and  myths  have  been   perpetrated  about what is called `India'. The main falsehoods are:   

    1. India has existed from the beginning  of time as a UNITARY state. NOT TRUE - it only became a unitary state under the British Empire. Prior to British rule, no-one ever had full  control  of the Continent - not even   Alexander of Macedonia,  nor  the  Muslims  including  the   Afghans  and  Mughals, etc. This is confirmed by the  Eleventh Edition of Encyclopedia  Britannica (Volume 14) (HUS to ITA) (page 375) which states "the natives of (British) India can scarcely be  said  to have a word of their own by which to express  their  `common'  country."  Thus,   'India'  became the  arbitrary name of the British Empire  in South Asia. In any case readers should consult maps showing  Borders  of all empires between the Arabian Peninsula and `India'  from  1500BC  onwards.   Words  can  be written to mislead but rarely maps.  

    2. India is a country or a subcontinent.  NOT TRUE - both geographically and historically, India  (Dinia  to  be  more   accurate)  is a CONTINENT  having seas and mountains that are  more   stupendous than those of other continents and consisting of  nations,   tribes, civilisations, languages more diverse than even the continent of Europe.   

    3. Pakistan was a territory carved  OUT  of  India.   NOT TRUE - most of  present day Pakistan did not  even  form   part  of 'India' until Britain seized the territory and  made  it   an  administrative  region  of their British Indian  Empire.   In  doing  so,  they  'Indianised'  the  Muslim population, making them a MINORITY of  the British Indian Raj. Moreover, much of Northern and Central Dinia were  dependencies of the Islamic Pak Nation - that is   the  Muslim  territory  that  was  once  the UNDIVIDED EASTERN FLANK to the heartland of Islam which included Iran, Afghanistan    and Central Asia.  

    4. The events of  1947  are  described  as   'Partition'.  NOT TRUE - the original aim was  INDEPENDENCE  from    Imperialism,   Indianism,  Indian Federation  and   Hindoo  Nationalism   and  reversion  to  the   original Fatherland and Federation  with  ancestral  homelands   from  where Islam first came into India, that is, from  the Arabian peninsula, through to: Iran, Afghanistan and Central Asia.  

    5. Muslims were a minority  in  India.  NOT  TRUE   - for over a thousand  years, Muslims from the Pak  Empire  [that   includes  Iran, Afghanistan, Central Asia and present day Pakistan]  had ruled parts of the Continent of India. Those areas in  'India'  that  came   under Muslim control were  considered as Dependencies of the  Pak   Empire.  A comparable example is  the  Ottoman  Empire  -   where  the   Turk  Nation  is  Turkey  and   its  dependencies  were  Yugoslavia,  Romania,  Greece,   etc.  Similarly, the  British Empire no  longer  exists   but  the  British  Nation still does. EMPIRES are short-lived but not NATIONS!  

    It should now be apparent that the  history  of South Asia has been told from an INDIAN bias by the former  colonial  power, and not from the Pak or Islamic perspective  (see  how  Islam  progressed   from  the  Arabian Peninsula eastwards and  the  Islamic   homelands  that were built on the eastern flank of the heartland of Islam).   

    Ch. Rahmat Ali saw the dangers  of  these  falsehoods   to the Muslims of  South Asia and surrounding  territory  and   to address these dangers, he  developed the name and concept of   P.A.K.I.S.T.A.N.  (not to be confused  with the present day entity which he called Pastan).  

    In 1933, he published a  392-page  book  called   `P.A.K.I.S.T.A.N.,  THE  FATHERLAND OF PAK NATION', in which he proposed an Islamic federation of all contiguous Islamic territory  that  lay  on the eastern flank of the heartland of Islam.  

    On pages 223-224, he provided a detailed explanation for the name:   

    P - Punjab. C.R. Ali asked  for  territory   proportionate  to the Muslim  population.  

    A - Afghania. The real name of the  North  West Frontier Province (NWFP) is Afghania. NWFP is  a  gross  distortion  because   it  is  the British designation for the North western region  of their Indian empire that no  longer exists. Also, NWFP is not  a  Frontier   as  far as the indigenous      population, the Pashtoons  are  concerned.  How  an earth can one have a   frontier between the same people with one-half living in Afghanistan and the other half in Afghania ?  

    K - Kashmir  

    I - Iran. When Alexander of  Macdeonia  attacked  the Persian Empire, he  invaded up to the area of what  is  today   Pakistan,  because in ancient  times, Pakistan was part  of   Ancient  Persia.  He  did not attack India proper because he was not at  war  with  India  - only Persia! Until 100      years ago, Farsi  was  the  language  of   the  educated.  Many  poems by poet-philosopher, Mohammad Iqbal are in Farsi.  

    S - Sindh  

    T - Tukharistan. This name is not  used  anymore  but the area exists as  Turkmenistan and parts of the other contiguous Central Asian states.  

    A - Afghanistan  

    N - BalochistaN - the other half  of  Balochistan is in south-east Iran!  Balochistan makes up 44% of the landmass of today's Pakistan (Pastan)     

    More than half of present day Pakistan (Pastan), in particular Afghania, Balochistan, Rojhan in Sindh  and  Dera  Ismail  and   Dera Ghazi Khan in  Punjab were hardly ever  part  of  India   until  the  British seized the  territory and incorporated it as   part  of the British Indian Raj. Those      Paks living in Afghania and  Balochistan  e.g. Pashtoons, Balochs, Farsi speakers, etc have never regarded  themselves  as  'Indian', though they may have been unwilling subjects of the Crown Colony of British India.