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FATHER OF THE NATION
In the endless corridors of history, a name was added in August 1947. It was that of Quid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah.,the Founder of Pakistan.
Born into a Karachi mercantile family on December 25, 1876,Quid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah had his early schooling at Karachi.Later ,he joined the Lincolin’s Inn,to become the youngest Indian barrister to be called to the bar.By sheer native ability and determination ,young Jinnah rose quickly to prominence ,and soon became a successful lawyer.
In 1910 he was elected by Bombay Muslims to the newly constituted Imperial Legislative Council.All through his parliamentry career,which spanned some four decades,he supported or opposed measures solely on their marits.His was also among the most powerful voices on the cause of India's freedom,Indian rights and freedom.
By 1917, Quid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah's reputation as one of the outstanding and highly respected leaders of South-Asian subcontinent was firmly established.He was a prominent member of Congress Party and an outspoken champion India's freedom in the Imperial Legislative Council.Simultaneously, he was the President of all India Muslim-Legue.He brought the Congress and the Legue together, and was chiefly responsible for the Congress-Legue pact (1916),a joint scheme for postwar reforms.For his untiring efforts to effect a communal settelement ,he was hailed as the "ambassador of Hindu-Muslim Unity".
Since he stud for civic freedoms,he resigned from the Imperial Council in 1919,when the Rowlett Bill was passed into law; and since he stood for "Oredered Progress",moderation,gradualism, and constitutionalism,he left the Congress in 1920 when it opted for M.K. Gandhi's direction action and non-cooperation plank.Jinnah's ascendency to national leadership had received a serious setback.
Returning to active politics after three years , Quid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah re-organizes League of which he was President since 1916,and devoted the next seven years to bringing about unity among Muslim ranks.To him a Hindu-Muslim settelment was still a precondition for Indian freedom.He attended several unity conferences,authored the Delhi Muslim proposals (1927),pledged for the incorporation of basic Muslim demands in the Nehru report (1928),fourmulated the "fourteen points" (1929),as minimum Muslim demands for any constitutional settelment and as a riposte to Nehru report ,and participated in the Round Table conference (1930) in London ,called the British to formulate a new constitution of India.
Despaired alike of the "negative" Congress attitude and a chronic disunity in Muslim ranks,he was into self-exile in London (1931),but returned to India. In 1934 at the fervent appeal of Muslims,became the President of reunited Muslim League,and assumed its leadership.
When Quid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah took up the leadership of the Muslims in 1936,they were a mass of demorilised men and women,politically disorganized and without a clear-cut political programme.During the next three years , Quid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah made energetic efforts to broaden his mass support ,bringing the Muslims on the one platform,breating new life into the moribund League, democrating its structure and organizational network, giving it a coherent all-India policy and programme,and made Muslim India a power to be reckoned with.By 1939 he had become the sole spokesman of the Indian Muslims,their Quid-e-Azam ("the Great Leader").
In 1940 he spelled out the concept of Muslim nationhood ,asserting that "We are a nation ,with our own distinctive culture and civilization ,language and litrature ,art and architecture, names and nomen culture,sense of value and propertion,legal laws and moral code,customs and calendar,history and traditions ,aptitudes and ambitions ,in short , we have our own distinctive outlook on and of life.By all canons of international law we are a nation".And on that basis of demand the setting up of an independent Muslim homeland in the predominantly Muslim northwestern and eastern India.
Despite the vehement opposition of the Congress and the antipathy of the British to his demand, Quid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah organized his movement gathered momentum within a few years ,became the central issue in all subsequent constitutional proposals, and was overwhelmingly voted for by Muslims in the 1945-46 general elections.Pakistan was finally established on 14th August, 1947, and Quid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah, then became the first Governer General.
Indeed, few nations in the world started on their career with less resources and in more difficult circumstances than Pakistan. That it survived at all was largely the hardwork of one man Quid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah, who filled in need for a charismatic leader at the critical juncture in the nation's history. He deftly exploited the immense prestige and utmost loyalty he commanded among the people to energize them, to raise their morals ,and canalise the profound feelings of petriotism the coming of freedom had generated, along constructive channels.Thoug tired and in poor health, Quid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah carried the haviest part of the burden in that first, critical year. He devoted the last year of his life to the onrous task of consolidating Pakistan and securing its survival. He died on 11th September, 1948.
Quid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah believed in peace within and without ,and in the principle of "live and let live". Actually, the Pakistan demand itslef, as defined by him ,was based on this principle : "let the two major nations, Hindus and Muslims,manage their affairs in their respective aread according to their own rights and traditions and unthwarted by the instruction of each other, thus paving the way for two nations to live in peace and good neighbourliness with each other in the Subcontinent. "Pakistan presupposed freedom for the Subcontinent as a whole".
His passion for freedom was ,however not restricted either to Muslims or Hindus; It extended to all the enslaved people of the world struggling to liberate themselves from foreign yoke. While engrossed all the while in the consuming task of wresting freedom for Muslims of the South-Asian Subcontinent, he took timeout on on various occasions to lend his and Muslim India's moral support to freedom movements in other Asian and African countries.
One of the great nation builders, Quid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah, invites comparison with some of the greatest names in modern times : Washington, Bismark, Cavour, Gribaldi, Lenin, Ataturk, What, however, makes him so remarkable even in the galaxy of nation- builders is the fact that while others assumed the leadership of traditionally well-defined nations and led them to freedom, he created a nation out of an inchoate and backward minority and established a cultural and national home for it. And all that within a decade.
The Quid 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 polarized viewpoint, The Agha Khan considered him "the greatest man he ever met"; Beverly Nichols, the auther of virdict of India, called him "the most important man in Asia"; and Dr. Kailasnath Katju, the West Bengal Governer in 1948, thought of him as "an outstanding figure of this century, not only in India but in whole world"; While Adul Rehman Azzam Pasha, Secretary General of Arab League, called him "one of the greatest leader in the Muslim world", the Grand Mufti of Palestine considered his death as a "great loss" for the entire world of Islam. It was ,however,given to Sarat Chandra Bose, leader of the forward block Wing of the Indian National Congress to sum up his personal and political achievements. "Mr. Jinnah" he said on his death on 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 as 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 Quid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah,the man and his mission ; such the range of accomplishment and achievements.
Source Father of Nation
:bravo:
