even if it was secular and democratic in outlook.
It was in this context that the a
ll
-i
ndia
m
Uslim
l
eagUe
(AIML) was formed in 1906. Jinnah, who
was not a very devout Muslim, deferred joining it
until 1913 and became its president in 1916. His
strategy was to maintain Muslim-Hindu coopera-
tion in the nationalist cause, but he quit the INC
in 1920 because of his concern that m
ohandas
k. g
andhi
(d. 1948), a fellow-Gujarati and rising
star in the INC, was giving the movement a more
Hindu character than he could accept. He was
unhappy both with Gandhi’s support of the k
hila
-
Fat
m
ovement
and with his strategy of mobilizing
the masses to participate in nonviolent acts of civil
disobedience. He, on the other hand, preferred to
work through the existing political system that
was dominated by India’s educated elites, operat-
ing within the limits of British colonial law.
During the 1920s, Jinnah struggled to keep
AIML united, obtain assurances from the INC that
Muslims would be guaranteed representation in
any future local and national legislatures, and win
recognition for Muslim representation in Mus-
lim majority regions of Northwest India (Sindh
and the Punjab). He left India in frustration in
1930 and stayed in London until 1935, when
he returned to reunite the AIML and renew its
participation in the nationalist cause. The league
suffered a surprising defeat in India’s first national
election in 1937. It failed to win in Muslim-major-
ity provinces, while the INC, on the other hand,
achieved impressive victories and gained control
of the parliament. Jinnah did not give up but
changed tactics to gain popular support for AIML
by mobilizing India’s Sufis and campaigning in the
countryside. Moreover, unlike the INC, the AIML
under his leadership declared its support for the
British during World War II, which placed it in a
favorable position vis-à-vis the British when the
war ended in 1945. As a result, AIML swept all the
seats reserved for Muslims in the parliamentary
election of 1946.
The elections, however, rather than lead-
ing to an intercommunal consensus for national
unity, exacerbated tensions between Hindus and
Muslims in northern India. AIML and its sup-
porters called for a separate homeland for Mus-
lims—p
akistan
(Pure Land). This idea had been
first proposed by m
Uhammad
i
qbal
(d. 1938), an
Indian intellectual and poet, in 1930, when he
was inaugurated as president of AIML. Iqbal urged
Jinnah after the 1937 elections to support self-
determination for the Muslims of northwest India
and Bengal. Jinnah was not enthusiastic about
a separate homeland, but, in 1940, he declared
that Hindus and Muslims constituted two differ-
ent nations that had never been united and never
would be. In the postwar climate, he pushed more
forcefully for an independent Pakistan, believing
that Congress under the leadership of Gandhi
and Jawaharlal Nehru (d. 1964) would never
agree to share power with AIML or give Muslims
a guaranteed percentage of seats in parliament.
Democracy would only bring about a Hindu raj
(rule) in place of the British one. In 1946, a Brit-
ish proposal to make India into a loose federation
of provinces grouped according to religious affili-
ation failed to win support from either AIML or
INC. Jinnah called for Muslims to take “direct
action” on behalf of the idea of an Indian Muslim
homeland by going on strike and conducting pub-
lic protests, but this led to outbreaks of communal
violence in different parts of India, especially in
Bengal, Calcutta, and Bihar. Pakistan emerged as
an independent state with Jinnah as its first leader,
or governor-general, on August 14, 1947, while
India proclaimed independence from Britain on
August 15, 1947.
Jinnah’s career as leader of the newly indepen-
dent country was short-lived. He died of tubercu-
losis and lung cancer on September 11, 1948. His
burial place on a hill in Karachi, Pakistan’s provi-
sional capital, has become a national monument.
He has also been memorialized on Pakistan’s
currency, and one of its most prominent universi-
ties, the Qaid-i Azam University (also known as
Quaid-i Azam University) in Islamabad, has been
named after him.
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