Why gandhi supported kalifah movement and jinnah didnt?

[T-Faz]

plz don,t mind faz bhi you are trying to prove that in one sense Quaid and Iqbal were crooks and they merely played in hands of British establishment...
it,s mean TWO nation theory was nothing more than a drama to colour blind Muslims on name of Islam.

Firstly, I do not believe in such things as playing in the hands of British Establishment or British agents and others such conspiracies because if British rulers were that good in manipulation and division, they would have also been able to keep control of British India, by far the best prize for any empire.

Its much easier to throw around accusations of 'British agents', 'Jewish agents', 'American agents' etc without any proof. If the reality or actuality of something is different to what you had believed, it does not mean that the groups or person in question is an agent.

Secondly, I think very highly in regards to Jinnah and know that the great man was clever enough to play the exact game the British played. Similarly I greatly admire the rest of the Muslim Leaguers too from Allama Iqbal to Zafarullah Khan, Aga Khan, Sahibzada Abdul Qayyum, Feroz Khan Noon etc.

I know the reason behind Pakistan, it was a tool to gain equal rights for Muslims of India especially in comparison to the Hindu's of India. The two separate religious groups had a long history of troubled yet dependable relation and as the Muslim continued to slide further down in every possible matter, the eventuality of Hindu dominance was what worried the leaders.

The Quaid and Allama Iqbal were no crooks, no Sir, they were astute leaders who gave us a nation by working most of their lives for it.

Unfortunately, many have been led to believe a different story about these men and their struggle. I am stating the reality that Pakistan was a means to gain rights for the increasingly disadvantaged Muslims of British India who were in a dismal state.

Pakistan was created and it went well until it was highjacked by the same people who opposed it, the religious clergy of British India.

 

[GOD OF WAR]

Why on earth are you trying to project an alliance that never was?

For the simple reason it is the TRUTH

Jinnah was a clear-headed rational barrister, one of the finest legal minds in the Empire; Iqbal was a mystic. Their personal habits differed like chalk and cheese.

You are forgetting that Iqbal was not JUST a mystic, he too was a barrister and studied from Cambridge, Munich and Heidelberg, and had a docterate degree. Iqbal is THE Phenomenon of this century. His teacher professor Arnold said 'Iqbal is the man of his age, Iqbal is the man far ahead of his age, and Iqbal is the man at war with his age'

Thats the whole dilemma, most of us fail to see in any other light other than him being a mystic or a poet. And it is precisely this concern that Iqbal expressed in so many of his countless poetry, that people will only laud him because of his poetic prowess and ignore the real messege in his poetry. In fact, Iqbal would get very annoyed if some one would call him a 'poet'.

The reason of this 101 on Iqbal is to give u 'rationale' of the relationship of these two great leaders. Jinnah Sahab's actions were in direct concord to Iqbal's ideals. its not like cheese and chalk at all, rather fire with fire!

What common grounds would the two have found?

you woule understand more if u studied Allama's poetry and then judge Jinnah Sahab's actions in the same light. Since Alama veiled away before the realization of his dream, on the creation of Pakistan jinnah Sahab is recorded to have said,

'Allama would have been so very delighted that I have accomplished what he had envisaged'!!

 

[REHAN NIAZI FALCON]

once i read some were that don,t trust in historians because all of them are biased in one sense or in other.
same is you may say conservatives or rightest are not fully right but neither are liberals or leftest.
leftest say Quaid have nothing to do with Islam that may inspire only liberals but no one else because it,s logical lie.
same it,s also wrong to say Quaid a mullah.
Actually Quaid was a born leader and ration and practical person who proved theories presented by Iqbal and many even before and after him by practically achieving a land for Indian Muslims in form of PAKISTAN.
theories about GREAT GAME may be partially true but not the complete truth.

 

[REHAN NIAZI FALCON]

Firstly, I do not believe in such things as playing in the hands of British Establishment or British agents and others such conspiracies because if British rulers were that good in manipulation and division, they would have also been able to keep control of British India, by far the best prize for any empire.

Its much easier to throw around accusations of 'British agents', 'Jewish agents', 'American agents' etc without any proof. If the reality or actuality of something is different to what you had believed, it does not mean that the groups or person in question is an agent.

Secondly, I think very highly in regards to Jinnah and know that the great man was clever enough to play the exact game the British played. Similarly I greatly admire the rest of the Muslim Leaguers too from Allama Iqbal to Zafarullah Khan, Aga Khan, Sahibzada Abdul Qayyum, Feroz Khan Noon etc.

I know the reason behind Pakistan, it was a tool to gain equal rights for Muslims of India especially in comparison to the Hindu's of India. The two separate religious groups had a long history of troubled yet dependable relation and as the Muslim continued to slide further down in every possible matter, the eventuality of Hindu dominance was what worried the leaders.

The Quaid and Allama Iqbal were no crooks, no Sir, they were astute leaders who gave us a nation by working most of their lives for it.

Unfortunately, many have been led to believe a different story about these men and their struggle. I am stating the reality that Pakistan was a means to gain rights for the increasingly disadvantaged Muslims of British India who were in a dismal state.

Pakistan was created and it went well until it was highjacked by the same people who opposed it, the religious clergy of British India.

sir it,s quite unfortunate that this logic of great game is very commonly used by many detracked balochs,sindhise and pashtoons to divide Pakistan because according to them PAKISTAN is nothing more than a game plan of britishers so .....................................

so my point is by lending countenance to such anti-partition stuff we are making some deep mistakes. because our enemy is feeding this conspiracy in our brothers mind to drive a wedge in our Unity and create unrest in PAKISTAN and to shake the moral basis of PAKISTAN.

 

[T-Faz]

sir it,s quite unfortunate that this logic of great game is very commonly used by many detracked balochs,sindhise and pashtoons to divide Pakistan because according to them PAKISTAN is nothing more than a game plan of britishers so .....................................

I am unable to follow you, when exactly have I said that Pakistan was a part of the great game. This whole 'British agent' thing is quite common in the subcontinent, I guess its due to our own being unable to control the events around them.

so my point is by lending countenance to such anti-partition stuff we are making some deep mistakes. because our enemy is feeding this conspiracy in our brothers mind to drive a wedge in our Unity and create unrest in PAKISTAN and to shake the moral basis of PAKISTAN.

What anti-partition stuff, I am stating the fact about how the religious element during the actual times was much lower then made out to be by certain segments of our nation.

This segment itself is causing more harm to us than anyone else. In the last ten years, its only been our own, the religious extremists who have killed more Pakistani's than anyone else. Destroyed more from our nation than anyone else, while you continue to refer to enemies who do not have anything to do with the situation we are in.

Please wake up and realize that for the sake of this country, we have to revert back to the idea as laid out by Jinnah and that the main enemy is within our own boundaries, not outside.

 

[nightcrawler]

This is really a very great thread & thnx Joe Shearer & T-Faz for your contributions...
I have read here that Jinnah & Iqbal are seen in two different personalities but I say that Iqbal wholly depended on Jinnah for the betterment of ML & though he knew Jinnah was secular or liberal but that doesnt mean at all that Jinnah was unIslamic in the eyes of the of much educated Iqbal.

Although being secular & Islamic will derail the subject at hand; but certainly one must acknowledge that unlike the prevailing Maulanas Iqbal was good at mixing modern times with the Islamic teachings & had them expressed through his poetry. One also must acknowledge that his poetry depicted the greatness of Islam & Islamic history but he surely wasn't on a pious mission of spreading Islam.
The essence of his poetry is to make Muslims aware of the present times & prepare them to the coming challenges & unlike Maulanas he never distributed his writings standing in the gates of Mosques telling Muslims how to perform ablutions; how females are to observe veil.....

So yes one must see the similarities in the personalities of Jinnah/Iqbal that they shared common value in the betterment of Indian Muslims while utilising modern tools such as ML which in no-way were anti-Islamic....& by the way never did Jinnah did/said something heinous to Islam.
With the beautiful Iqbal :

Maullah ko hay jo hind me sajday ki ijazat
Nadan ye samjta hay ke hay Islam azad

he did outrage many India scholars but likewise he also stated his notion clearly to others that he is on common grounds with Jinnah

 

[Joe Shearer]

I appreciate your sympathetic comments. As far as T-Faz is concerned, he astonishes one, again and again; his interventions leave me wishing I had written that myself.

May I however clarify some aspects which have come to your notice? It is simply this, in my opinion (I am not unbiased, as you may have noticed), I, too, agree with your view that Allama Iqbal looked to Jinnah for a political lead, although he was more than clear in his mind about what he himself wanted. It was in that sense an asymmetric relationship; I cannot believe that Jinnah was dependent on any other person for formulating his beliefs and positions, after Gokhale, to whom he seems to have been very attached. What gets lost in the surcharged atmosphere that pervades such discussions is that Jinnah was a great favourite for committee work, for his ability to weave together the views of all concerned into a harmonious whole. He was also very popular among young people, for whom he had infinite patience, quite unlike his refusal to suffer fools gladly. All these qualities shone out in full brilliance in his leadership of the AIML decades later.

After Gokhale and that whole faction was displaced by Gandhi on his return from Africa, Jinnah seems to have worked things out for himself very carefully and in detail, with little known dependence.

On the other hand, there is no doubt that Jinnah and Allama Iqbal viewed each other with sympathy.

Third, while I am profoundly impressed by Jinnah's secularism, it was not my intention to hint or to imply that this amounted to any kind of anti-Islamic feeling. This is a latter-day misinterpretation of secularism, that secularism stands for anti-religion. Nothing of the sort; in Jinnah's view, and unlike the Congress view, secularism was the exclusion of religion from day-to-day state administration, while it was secure in the personal and social life of individual citizens.The difference, it must be understood, is from the south Asian model which associates all religions with day-to-day state administration. This model frankly makes me nervous. Even today, it should be the Westphalian model that Jinnah preferred that should prevail, but it does not, anywhere in the sub-continent.

By and large, your comments are entirely consistent with my own reading of the situation then.

One last comment: let's not forget that the sajda was a central Asian concept, and a court ceremonial, a demonstration of imperial authority, introduced quite late by the Mughals, as far as I know. It was also opposed by many right through the history of the Mughal court.

Without pretending not to have understood what Iqbal might have implied in the context of inter-communal relations, and the implications for Muslims living in Hindu-majority areas, as a born Hindu with currently agnostic views, I believe that Iqbal was exaggerating - grossly - for effect. No sajdas are required of anyone in independent India; some bureaucrats offered it when they were merely asked to bow, as an eminent politician quipped after the Emergency.

This is really a very great thread & thnx Joe Shearer & T-Faz for your contributions...
I have read here that Jinnah & Iqbal are seen in two different personalities but I say that Iqbal wholly depended on Jinnah for the betterment of ML & though he knew Jinnah was secular or liberal but that doesnt mean at all that Jinnah was unIslamic in the eyes of the of much educated Iqbal.

Although being secular & Islamic will derail the subject at hand; but certainly one must acknowledge that unlike the prevailing Maulanas Iqbal was good at mixing modern times with the Islamic teachings & had them expressed through his poetry. One also must acknowledge that his poetry depicted the greatness of Islam & Islamic history but he surely wasn't on a pious mission of spreading Islam.
The essence of his poetry is to make Muslims aware of the present times & prepare them to the coming challenges & unlike Maulanas he never distributed his writings standing in the gates of Mosques telling Muslims how to perform ablutions; how females are to observe veil.....

So yes one must see the similarities in the personalities of Jinnah/Iqbal that they shared common value in the betterment of Indian Muslims while utilising modern tools such as ML which in no-way were anti-Islamic....& by the way never did Jinnah did/said something heinous to Islam.
With the beautiful Iqbal :

Maullah ko hay jo hind me sajday ki ijazat
Nadan ye samjta hay ke hay Islam azad

he did outrage many India scholars but likewise he also stated his notion clearly to others that he is on common grounds with Jinnah

 

[nightcrawler]

@JoeShearer

One last comment: let's not forget that the sajda was a central Asian concept, and a court ceremonial, a demonstration of imperial authority, introduced quite late by the Mughals, as far as I know. It was also opposed by many right through the history of the Mughal court.

Without pretending not to have understood what Iqbal might have implied in the context of inter-communal relations, and the implications for Muslims living in Hindu-majority areas, as a born Hindu with currently agnostic views, I believe that Iqbal was exaggerating - grossly - for effect. No sajdas are required of anyone in independent India; some bureaucrats offered it when they were merely asked to bow, as an eminent politician quipped after the Emergency.

I am afraid sir that you have misunderstood the poetry word sajda in the given context.
It relates to the physical motion during Muslim prayers!!
Yes the sajda in our [Muslim] prayer is the most important physical posture that you touch your face to the ground as if bowing & totally submitting towards God.
I hope I have made myself clear

 

[Bang Galore]

Jinnah Sahab especially adopted the dress code that was affilated with the Muslims. i.e. a Sherwani and a Cap, known as the Jinnah Cap. This Cap does not directly symbolize the dress code of the muslims, (it was gifted by the Baloch to Jinnah Sahab, and he adopted it since he liked it a lot) however, Islamic dress code dictates that muslims must cover their heads. All these things denote that Jinnah Sahab was indeed aiming for a Muslim Sovereign State.

Hardly. Jinnah was 61 when he first wore that on 15th Oct 1937 at the Lucknow session of the Muslim League.He wore it sparingly even after that. He much preferred his Saville Row suits with starched shirts & two tone leather or suede shoes.

 

[Joe Shearer]

@JoeShearer


I am afraid sir that you have misunderstood the poetry word sajda in the given context.
It relates to the physical motion during Muslim prayers!!
Yes the sajda in our [Muslim] prayer is the most important physical posture that you touch your face to the ground as if bowing & totally submitting towards God.
I hope I have made myself clear

Oh, I see.

I thought that he was saying just because we are allowed to bow in prayer, don't think we are free; we are being allowed to bow in submission to an emperor.

Just goes to show.

Thanks for clearing it up; much obliged. It seems so straightforward now.

 

[H2O3C4Nitrogen]

Is there a possibility that it was primarily a political movement of Muslims of particular region and class and religion was roped in to gain access to mass?

It could have been,.. But again By Large Muslims suffered hugely under dominant Hindu Society which failed to guaranty even the basic Regional Human Rights.
Muslims by large were in the shackles of Darkness and illiteracy and couldn't catch up with the Hindus who were well established and integrated into the British Raj in India.
The only way there rights could be saved was to have a struggle for a separate homeland which could guarantee there basic rights.Religion played the Foremost Role to separate Muslims of Hindustan from Hindustan.
Needles to say The Muslim population who left behind continue to suffer to date under a staunch Hindu Dominant Society....But the trend might change over the period as the overall economics of the region improves, but thats rather too optimistic...

 

[LaBong]

your assertions are scary.BUt I see it quite an usual style of urs.

No,its not true that even a single South Indian Muslim didn't choose to go Pakistan. There are many muslim from south India particularly the rich aristocrats from the state of Hyderabad and Myrose did go to Pakistan.Though later on some came back as they found Pakistan culturally very different from south India.

So it seems Pakistan was for people of a particular culture, not of people across the subcontinent who believes in Islam.

I think the acronym - Pakistan also says so.

PS: Hyderabad is not South India.

 

[LaBong]

It could have been,.. But again By Large Muslims suffered hugely under dominant Hindu Society which failed to guaranty even the basic Regional Human Rights.
Muslims by large were in the shackles of Darkness and illiteracy and couldn't catch up with the Hindus who were well established and integrated into the British Raj in India.
The only way there rights could be saved was to have a struggle for a separate homeland which could guarantee there basic rights.Religion played the Foremost Role to separate Muslims of Hindustan from Hindustan.
Needles to say The Muslim population who left behind continue to suffer to date under a staunch Hindu Dominant Society....But the trend might change over the period as the overall economics of the region improves, but thats rather too optimistic...

The problem with your analysis is, you're viewing the partition in today's context. The year was 1940s, the rulers were British with whatsoever no regard to both Hindus and Muslims.

Yes the Hindu dominant society was partly true in East Bengal/East Pakistan/Bangladesh, but not in West Pakistan and Northern India, where most land-owners were Muslims.

 

[Joe Shearer]

Don't you find telling everyone the truth, and then in the next sentence, breaking out into loud self-pity, a little bizarre?

It could have been,.. But again By Large Muslims suffered hugely under dominant Hindu Society which failed to guaranty even the basic Regional Human Rights.

The statement in bold that you have made is completely wrong. There was a battle for scarce resources, in this case, education at institutions where seats were strictly limited, and Muslims lost that battle because of their own slow realisation of the advantages of a western education. Basic human rights nowhere came into it.

Muslims by large were in the shackles of Darkness and illiteracy and couldn't catch up with the Hindus who were well established and integrated into the British Raj in India.

Precisely.

If you know what the situation was, why do you obscure it by introducing human rights violations which never existed?

The only way there rights could be saved was to have a struggle for a separate homeland which could guarantee there basic rights.Religion played the Foremost Role to separate Muslims of Hindustan from Hindustan.

<sigh!>

And there you go again.

You know what the truth was; you have mentioned it more than once. Why do you keep twisting the truth? Do you feel better about partition if you can put up a story about being ill-treated as an excuse?

Needles to say The Muslim population who left behind continue to suffer to date under a staunch Hindu Dominant Society....But the trend might change over the period as the overall economics of the region improves, but thats rather too optimistic...



Yes, sure, whatever makes you feel good about being where you are, and Indian Muslims being where they are.

@Abir

In any case, the analysis is hopelessly wrong. Refer to Hamza Alavi for an example of who constituted the rank and file of the AIML.

 

[Bang Galore]

It could have been,.. But again By Large Muslims suffered hugely under dominant Hindu Society which failed to guaranty even the basic Regional Human Rights.

Suffered? How exactly? The British were ruling and were the only ones doing any dominating. This looks like the case of post partition distorted history that makes you believe that. The Muslims having been a dominant group for 800 years feared the loss of that dominance when faced with democracy and if anything there was a fear of suffering Hindu dominance rather than anything real that lead to their demands.

Muslims by large were in the shackles of Darkness and illiteracy and couldn't catch up with the Hindus who were well established and integrated into the British Raj in India.

They were and they only had themselves to blame for it. The perceived loss of power depressed them so greatly that they opposed every attempt to learn English (the language of their conquerors) seeing it as an attempt to further strip them of even their culture while the Hindus had no such problem because they were moving from one foreign language(Persian) to another. Actually, in Bengal they even opposed a setting up of a college to teach Sanskrit preferring English instead.

The only way there rights could be saved was to have a struggle for a separate homeland which could guarantee there basic rights.Religion played the Foremost Role to separate Muslims of Hindustan from Hindustan.

The Only way? Maybe true, who knows? It is impossible to sit here in 2010 & understand accurately the fears running around in the minds of men in the late 19th & early & mid 20th century. The world was a different place then, the sub continent certainly was & I for one have come to the conclusion that maybe the partition of India worked out best.

Needles to say The Muslim population who left behind continue to suffer to date under a staunch Hindu Dominant Society....But the trend might change over the period as the overall economics of the region improves, but thats rather too optimistic...

Would be careful going down there. All the Muslims who went along with the idea of Pakistan have not exactly had a life of a bed of roses. The experience of Muslims killing Muslims, I am sure you will agree has replaced the fear of being dominated by Hindus. The experiences would vary depending on the community one belongs to but it would be fair to say that everyone fears domination just that the precise nature of the perceived oppressor changes with time.