11 September 1948 gave the new born Pakistan it’s first blow. The ailing father of the feeble nation passed away after battling with death for many months, while continuing with his duties as founder and governor general all this while. It was only shortly before the death that his doctors, including the one closest to him Col Dr Illahi Bux, advised him to move to a better climate and get full rest.
He had worked most of his life almost 16-18 hours a day.
The following passage from Fatima Jinnah’s “My Brother” shows us the scene from the last moments;
"He slept for about two hours, undisturbed. And then he opened his eyes, saw me, and signaled with his head and eyes for me to come .near him. He made one last attempt and whispered, “Fati, Khuda Hafiz. … La Ilaha Il Allah … Mohammad … Rasul … Allah.” His head dropped slightly to his right, his eyes closed.
***I ran out of the room, shouting, screaming, "Doctor, doctor. Be quick. My brother is dying. Where are the Doctors?" In a few minutes they were there, examining him and giving him injections. I stood there, motionless, speechless. Then I saw them cover his whole body, head to foot, with a white sheet. I knew what it meant. Death had come to take him away from this life that must end to a life which is Eternal; Immortal. ***
***Col. Ilahi Bux walked on heavy feet towards me, put his right palm over my left shoulder, and wept like a little child. Those tears, in a language without words or voice, conveyed to me the fatal news. I searched for tears, but the well where one finds them had dried up. I wanted to scream and cry, but my voice had sunk into the abyss of speechlessness. I dragged myself to his bed side, and flung myself like a log of wood on the floor.***
***The news of his death must have spread far and wide. The huge iron-gates of the Governor-General's House, where normally strict security measures prevent unauthorized entry, opened themselves wide, and endless streams of peoples came from all directions. ***
***Soon many of them were in the room, where he lay, undisturbed, in a sleep that was beyond awakening. I sat there, oblivious of my surroundings. I lost count of time, I had completely lost myself in my irreparable loss.***
***I do not know how long I sat there, staring at the white sheet that covered my brother's body."***
Check out photographs from the Quaid’s funeral here;
http://pakistanspace.tripod.com/gallery/48jinnah_funeral4.htm
The Quaid had been at Ziarat at the house which is now a famous land mark and tourist attraction. Take a virtual tour or see pictures of the house where Quaid spent his last days, here;
http://www.imedia.ae/projects/Ziarat_QuaidRes/Index_Quaid.html
The Quaid’s last Message and some popular tributes to him;
http://www.cybercity-online.net/quaid.htm#The
It was, with a sense of supreme satisfaction at the fulfillment of his mission that Jinnah told the nation in his last message on 14 August, 1948: “The foundations of your State have been laid and it is now for you to build and build as quickly and as well as you can”. In accomplishing the task he had taken upon himself on the morrow of Pakistan’s birth, Jinnah had worked himself to death, but he had, to quote richard Symons, “contributed more than any other man to Pakistan’s survivial”. He died on 11 September, 1948. How true was Lord Pethick Lawrence, the former Secretary of State for India, when he said, “Gandhi died by the hands of an assassin; Jinnah died by his devotion to Pakistan”.
A man such as Jinnah, who had fought for the inherent rights of his people all through his life and who had taken up the somewhat unconventional and the largely misinterpreted cause of Pakistan, was bound to generate violent opposition and excite implacable hostility and was likely to be largely misunderstood. But what is most remarkable about Jinnah is that he was the recipient of some of the greatest tributes paid to any one in modern times, some of them even from those who held a diametrically opposed viewpoint.
The Aga Khan considered him “the greatest man he ever met”, Beverley Nichols, the author of `Verdict on India’, called him “the most important man in Asia”, and Dr. Kailashnath Katju, the West Bengal Governor in 1948, thought of him as “an outstanding figure of this century not only in India, but in the whole world”. While Abdul Rahman Azzam Pasha, Secretary General of the Arab League, called him “one of the greatest leaders in the Muslim world”, the Grand Mufti of Palestine considered his death as a “great loss” to the entire world of Islam. It was, however, given to Surat Chandra Bose, leader of the Forward Bloc wing of the Indian National Congress, to sum up succinctly his personal and political achievements. “Mr Jinnah”, he said on his death in 1948, “was great as a lawyer, once great as a Congressman, great as a leader of Muslims, great as a world politician and diplomat, and greatest of all as a man of action, By Mr. Jinnah’s passing away, the world has lost one of the greatest statesmen and Pakistan its life-giver, philosopher and guide”. Such was Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah, the man and his mission, such the range of his accomplishments and achievements.
As always with lives as important, controversy stirs in one form or another, and Quaid’s last moments have been a subject of much debate. It is said he breathed his last in an unfit ambulance on way to the city from the Karachi airport after arriving from Quetta in his Dakota. Whatever may or may not have been. We mark this day to pay rich tributes to the founding father of Pakistan, the man who gave us an identity and got us freedom. May he rest in peace and may e blessed and have high ranks in heaven.
**Share sober views & show respect please. **Thankyou.