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| Jinnah's Father |
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| With Fatima Jinnah |
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| With Fatima Jinnah |
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| Quaid with daughter, Dina |
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| With Fatima Jinnah |
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| With Fatima Jinnah |
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| Jinnah in familydress December(1896) |
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| With Fatima Jinnah |
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| With Fatima Jinnah |
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| Jinnah's Wife (Mrs.Ruttenbai Jinnah) |
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| With Fatima jinnah & Daughter, Dina |
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| Quaid's brother Ahmed Ali with Wife |
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| The Quaid at home, 10 Aurangzeb Road, New Delhi |
Life of the Quaid-i-Azam was not be bed of roses. The struggle he had begun in his early 
days continued till the end. At the age of 70 age, after a long hard and distinguished career in law and politics, when most people in the evening of their life look forward to days of retirement and leisure, the Quaid had accepted the challenge and responsibilities of head of a new State he had founded. Constant toil in the service of his people had had taken heavy toll of Quaid’s failing health, but he insisted on keeping his finger on the pulse of the nation. He was soul that thirsted for service in a body that was worn out by overwork and ill-health. Despite the advice of his doctors, he did not spare himself, refusing to take rest or respite. He worked harder and harder as the end approached. In the words of Fatima Jinnah his constant companion and sister, “Nature had gifted him with a giant’s strength in so far as his determination to achieve the tasks that he had set for himself were concerned, but it had clothed that will in a frail body, unable to keep pace with the driving force of his restless mind and will. It was bitter to be afflicted with health that could not stand the rigours of a tumultuous life in the face of overwhelming odds, and to be gifted with a tenaciousness that wanted to triumph over all obstacles to lead his people to their ultimate destiny.
His political activities and responsibilities had increased manifold during the last ten years of his life, when he had already entered the morning [?] of his old age. Work, work and more work. He drained away the last reserves of his energy like a spendthrift child of nature. Alarmed at his poor health, when I sometimes begged of him not to work such long hours and to give up for some time his constant and whirlwind tours that carried him from one end of India to another, he would say, “Have you ever heard of a General take a holiday, when his army is fighting for its very survival on a battlefield?” He had the reputation of demolishing a well-build up case with one sentence, and what match could I be for him when it came to arguments? On such occasions I abandoned logic for sentiment, “But your life is precious; and you must take good care of it.” With a distant look in his eyes, he said, “What is the health of one individual, when I am concerned with the very existence of ten crore Muslims of India? Do you realize how much is at stake?” This was enough to silence sentimentalism, and he plunged himself deeper and deeper into the stormy ocean of political struggle to the utter neglect of his health.
Although the Quaid-i-Azam never rested a moment after he had become the Governor-General and literally worked himself to death, his first months were the busiest and most anxious. War in Kashmir, ill-equipped armed forces, stagnant economy, empty treasury, paralyzed administration, refugees problem, and myriads of national and international problems had taken a heavy toll of Quaid’s health. However, it was a period of great trial and he had been unnerved, then Pakistan would have succumbed in the very hour of its birth. But the Quaid exerted himself to the utter neglect of his health and thundered in these uncertain days, “Pakistan has come to stay”, and, as everyone knows, it stayed and shall stay. But at what grievous cost to himself.
During February and March of 1948, Quaid-i-Azam still worked long hours at his desk. His secretary at this time has said, “His seriousness was contagious: there was no lightness or humour in our work. When Bills arrived for him to sign, he would go through them sentence by sentence” . The Quaid-i-Azam, however, continued to go through every minute administarative details of the state. He had his eyes on every aspect of the structure of Pakistan. Despite of his ill-health, he toured the country extensively. In February, 1948, he visited Baluchistan. In March, he flew the thousand miles to East Pakistan, where he endured a Programme of receptions, reviews and speeches, during several days. From April 15 for seven days the Quaid-i-Azam was on the North West Frontier, where there were more receptions, reviews and speeches: when he returned to Karachi he was too ill to work at his desk for very long. Sir Francis Mudie, one of Quaid-i-Azam’s last guest in Karachi has recalled, “I stayed with him for a few days late in May, he was very ill and spent most of the time in bed”.
One morning, also in February, Mr. Ian Stephens went to see the Quaid, He wrote afterwards, “…at that time, though no one realized it, the creator of Pakistan was dying, his lungs riddled with the unsuspected tuberculosis which a few months later killed him”.
To escape from the heat and humidity of Karachi and on the advice of his personal physician, the Quaid decided to fly to Quetta. In June, the Quaid moved, to a bungalow at Ziarat, eighty miles from Quetta. Lt. Mazhar Ahmed, one of his A.D.C.s describing Quaid-i-Azam’s days at Ziarat wrote, “Here was neither the heat of Karachi nor the formality of the Governor-General’s House. Here the Governor-General was just Quaid-i-Azam, and Quaid-i-Azam was just a man on a holiday. In the sitting room jokes were cracked, yarns were spun, discussions were prolonged, and even the A.D.Cs talked”.
According to Lt. Mazhar Ahmad, the Quaid-i-Azam was in a happy mood during the first days of his stay in Ziarat, “he had a sharp sense of humour and was full of jokes and anecdotes for all occasion. At one time he was talking of his visit to the Jacko Mill in Simla and spoke of the monkeys that dwelt there. He had some peanuts in his pocket and threw a handful to a large number of monkeys at one place. He was surprised to see that no monkey moved; there was no mad rush amongst them. The mystery was soon solved when a big fat monkey moved down from a tree towards the peanuts and the monkey gave way and stood in a line in silence, all the chirping having suddenly ceased. This fat monkey was their leader for whom they had exhibited so much discipline and respect. Even monkeys had discipline!”.
The Quaid-i-Azam knew no rest even during his stay in Ziarat. Lt. Mazhar Ahmad has said, “We raised the Governor-General’s dark blue flag over the quite house and hoped that the Quaid would rest. But it was not in his nature. The black dispatch-boxes arrived each day from Karachi, with M.A.J. stamped on them, in gold. They were ful of work to be done. My clearest memory of his is of his slim hands, busy with papers”.
Some days later, the Governor-General flew from Quetta to Karachi to perform the opening ceremony of the State Bank of Pakistan himself Accompanying his sister, he drove to the Bank in the State coach and delivered an impressive speech. In the archives of the Karachi broadcasting station, there is a gramophone record of the speech that the Quaid made on July 1, 1948. Whosoever, heard him on this occasion, realized Quaid-i-Azam was in bad health, his voice scarcely audible, pausing, coughing, as he proceeded with the text of his speech. He looked so pale and anaemic, but within that amaciated body there burnt the dazzling flame of genius.
Lt. Mazhar Ahmad has described the episodes of that day” Quaid-i-Azam was very weak and tired as he stepped into the coach. The thousands of people pressed towards him, as if they wished to touch him, but the outsiders made this impossible; so the near one extended their hands towards the coach – as if this would complete their ecstasy. When we arrived back at Government House, we climbed the stairs together and turned right, towards Mr. Jinnah’s room. After a few paces he dismissed me. At the top of the stairs I turned and saw him staggering towards his door. I know then how ill he was”.
After five days’ stay at Karachi, where he attended to some very important files, he went back to Quetta by air. Once again in Quetta requests began to pour in from various institutions and demands were made from so many individuals and leaders, who were anxious to see him. He felt dejected that his health could not permit him to oblige them . The Quaid, however, was in very bad health. Mir Laik Ali, who had come to see the Quaid in Quetta to take his definite attitude towards Hyderabad, writers: “It was a little before eleven o’ clock in the morning that I had reached Quetta. Every minute was hanging heavy on me… Most of the time I had spent with Miss Jinnah, hoping all along that the Quaid would soon recover enough to spare me a few minutes, Miss Jinnah kept frequently going into his room and returned disappointed each time that he was no better. Finally, she was able to convey to him that I was in Quetta and had been waiting for a long time in other room. The Quaid, she told me, only with great difficulty, waved his fingers indicating that his agony was too great”.
Quaid-i-Azam’s health, however, was bad and his doctors were worried. They decided to move him up to Ziarat, where it would be cooler than Quetta and decidedly more restful.
Back in the bungalow at Ziarat, twenty-three days after the opening of the State Bank, the Quaid had to yield to the constant care of Colonel Ilahi Bakhsh. He was reduced to a skelton weighing only 70 pounds . The Colonel Bakhsh found him ‘Shockingly weak and thin’ . Farrukh Amin, also on the Quaid’s staff at Ziarat wrote in the Dawn “Often in these days did I find him walking up and down his bedroom at dead of night”.
It was obvious to those around him at Ziarat that his health was fast deteriorating and Lt. Ahmad writes, “Miss Fatima Jinnah who for years had been the Quaid’s companion…in there days of ill-health looked after the Quaid-i-Azam with an affection and devotion which only a sister is capable of. Often she would go without sleep for nights on end, nursing him, humouring him, reading out to him, or just sitting by his side” .
S.M. Yusuf, his Private Secretary, who was close to him in those days, could discern the ravages that sickness was making on his health, but “sickness and failing health did not deter the Quaid-i-Azam from attending to his duty. He went on working to the very least and continued to deal with important State papers until his death”.
Saleh Mohammad was gardener at the Residency while Quaid-i-Azam stayed at Ziarat. Saleh Mohamad, describing Quaid’s days and daily routine at Ziarat, said, “Every day a table and a chair was laid for him in the lawn and he used to work. It was only a few days before his departure that he stopped working”. He said further, “The Quaid used to walk on the road that goes from the Residency to the swimming pool…. He used to walk slow and appreciate the juniper trees and wild flowers. After reaching the swimming pool he used to rest for some time and come back. Morning and evening, day after day, I went with him to the swimming pool and back to the Residency. There used to be a perpetual and unforgettable smile on his lips. I do not member having seen him without this smile, not even during the worst days of his illness…. He was terribly weak during those days of his illness but he did not lose hope” . In spite of his physical disabilities, the Quaid’s mind was active and alert, his spirit undamped and undaunted. He had won many battles in life; he faced his struggle against ill-health, with confidence. For, as Farrukh Amin, who was on his personal staff at Ziarat, wrote in the Dawn, they had seen the Quaid “so many times overcome the repeated illness by sheer willpower” . He had spent all his life treading the fiery path of struggle and defiance, and he did not want to end it in the ashes of defeat. He wanted to do so much, but he had so little time and strength left to do it.
The condition of Quaid-i-Azam was getting worse day by day. When the Doctor Bakhsh complained about his working habits during his last illness at Ziarat, he said “There is nothing wrong with me. I have stomach trouble and exhaustion due to overwork and worry. For forty years I have worked for fourteen hours a day, never knowing what disease was. For the last few years I have had annual attacks of fever and cough. My doctors in Bombay regarded these attacks as bronchitis….For the last years or two, however, they have increased, both in frequency and severity, and they are much more exhausting” . Quaid-i-Azam continued, “I do not think that there is anything organically wrong with me. If my stomach can be put right I will recover soon”.
But the tests of the doctors revealed a different story. Samples of the Quaid’s blood and sputum revealed on examination he was suffering from an infection of the lungs; it was thought he had been suffereing from it for about two years . Dr. Bakhsh had to break the grave news to the patient. After a short pause Quaid asked “Have you told Miss Jinnah? “yes”, he said, “No, you shouldn’t have done it. After all she is a woman. However, it does not matter. What is done is done” .
The Quaid-i-Azam wished that his sister alone should look after him. But he had to yield to the doctor and a nurse.
The nurse refused to tell him his temperature without the permission of the doctor. The Quaid felt pleased with her sense of discipline .
Under pressure from his doctors he was ultimately forced to give up all work connected with his official duties, as Governor-General. Disappointed, the Quaid kept himself away from his files, hoping he would be soon well to tackle the problems of Pakistan at its difficult period of history. No visitor was allowed to see him. But when M.A.H. Ispahani, who was to leave Pakistan within the next few days for Washington came to the Residency at Ziarat, an exception was made in his case. Having talked with Quaid-i-Azam for about half an hour, Ispahani, realized that the great leader was in very bad health indeed.
On July 29, X-ray photograph proved the damage to the Quaid’s lungs to be more terrible than was supposed. Ian Stephens writes, “Two-thirds of one lung seemed gone, and about a quarter of the other” . Sister Dunham was called in from Quetta to nurse him . On the first day when she wanted to adjust the pillows, he said, “Leave me alone’ don’t touch me” . She said, “All right, if you don’t wish to be helped, I won’t help you. The doctor has ordered…” “I don’t take orders; I give orders”, came the reply. Sister Dunham withdrew the word ‘order’ and said’ “The doctor has requested….” . Such outbursts of temper were due to the malignant disease. Otherwise he was not harsh, though it is admitted on all hands that he was a little hard, no doubt.
A few days later doctors found his blood pressure very low, and there was swelling on his feet . After a prolonged conference the doctors held that, in their opinion, the altitude of Ziarat was not good for him in that condition of health. On August 9, the doctors decided that the Quaid must be moved from the perilous heights of Ziarat, to Quetta. But the Quaid refused to travel unless he was properly dressed. A brand new coat, his pump shoes and his monocle had to be got ready. A fresh, snowy handkerchief was brought and unfolded; he held it between his fingers. For the whole of his life he enjoyed the distinciotn of being the best-dressed man. During his last days of illness he did not wish to tarnish that reputation.
When the Quaid, however, agreed to be shifted to Quetta, Lt. Ahmad, with the help of the Military A.D.C. and two Pathan servants, carried the Quaid’s frail body on a stretcher, down the stairs. Lt. Mazhar Ahmad has said, “When I lifted Quaid-i-Azam into the car, I had to hold him so close that his cheek was next to mine, and I could hear his soft breathing. I placed him on a mattress, but not quite where he would be table. I was still holding him when he said, ‘Mazhar, you are out of breath and I am out of breath. Let us Pause’. So I waited a moment, and then I moved him again. I asked him, “Are you comfortable’? He smiled, so sweetly, and then asked, “where is my handkerchief?” I found it from him; Then the others all got into cars and the journey began” .
However, Quaid-i-Azam left Ziarat for Quetta on 13th August, 1948 . The car moved slowly to avoid jerks and bumps, taking four hours to reach Quetta. As soon as they reached the residency to Quetta, the doctors examined him and found he had stood the journey well .
14th August, 1948, when Pakistan was to celebrate its first anniversary of independence, was drawing near and in spite of his doctor’s advice to the contrary, he was working on the message he wanted to give to the nation on that occasion. He was busy at it, his failing health notwithstanding . In spite of his physical disabilities, the Quaid’s mind was very active and alert. He worked in a tenser and more emotional way. His doctors never succeeded in stopping the onward rush of his mighty ocean of his will that wanted to sweep away all obstacles standing as hindrances in the path of his people.
On August 16, the doctors were pleased to tell him that there was a forty percent improvement in the conditions of his lungs . Two days later he was able to begin work again, on Government Papers, for an hour a day . The word holiday was alien to his mind. Once he was asked about his Chief recreations to forget his office worries. He answered, “My profession is such that it never allows me time for recreation” . However, overwork killed him.
During these days, Mr. Mohammad Ali, Secretary of the Cabinet, had arrived from Karachi, and he thought the Quaid, mentally more alert and altogether more like his old self’.
Eid-ul-Fitr was to fall that year on 27th August, and he was busy preparing his Eid day message to the nation. The message he delivered on this occasion, turned out to be his last recorded words. In the last stages of his illness, the doctors advised him to go down to Karachi as soon as possible. But he said, “Go slow, Don’t hustle me. I do want to get up and walk about but I am not so strong as yet, Don’t think I am not keen to get out of bed and don’t apply to me the treatment which a doctor did to a women who said she could not walk.
“She was seriously ill and had been confined to bed for many months. When she recovered from her illness, the doctor told her to get up, but she said, she was too weak to do so. After about a weak, the doctor again told her to get up., but she would not get up. After that another doctor was consulted who examined with her, she must get up and walk about; but she refused to follow his advice too”.
The Quaid then paused for a few seconds, gazed at the doctors and continued, “Then another doctor came who, like you, was all for quick action. He set fire to the bed without her knowledge and this made the patient jump out of it and take to her heels”. At this the Quaid laughed and added: “Don’t do that to me” . The doctors joined in the laughter.
In the first days of September, the doctors, attending on the Quaid felt as if chances of his recovery were receding. To add to his difficulties, the altitude of Quetta was having an adverse effect on his health, as he was finding difficulty in breathing, making it necessary to frequently give him oxygen.
On the evening of September 5, 1948, the Quaid developed pneumonia . For three days he ran high temperature . Worry and despair weighed heavily on those around him, and they spent their time in anxious days and sleepless nights. His end was drawing near at a time when he knew there was so much he was expected to do for his nation. In spite of afflictions of ill-health, his mind continued to breathe burden of responsibilities of State. The problems confronting the new State were his unshakable pre-occupation, and often in his sleep he would say “Pakistan”. His Sub-conscious self revealed the innermost mumble the words, “Kashmir”, “Refugees”, “Constitution”, wished of an anxious heart . In the words of Fatima Jinnah, “in spite of his physical disabilities, his mind was active and alert, his spirit undampened and undaunted. He had won may battles in life; he faced his struggle against ill-health with confidence. He had spent all his life treading the fiery path of struggle and defiance, and he did not want to end it in the ashes of complacency. He continued to talk to me frequently about a new constitution, about Kashmir, about the refugees and I could see in his words the agony of a soul that wanted to do so much and who had so little time and strength left to do it. Nonetheless, he believed the candle should go on shedding its light until the dawn had taken over its task” . In a desperate attempt to save his life, it was decided to remove him from the altitude of Quetta to the sea-level of Karachi. Discreetly, the news was conveyed to the Quaid-i-Azam that it was essential to leave Quetta at once for Karachi.
On September 10, Dr. Bakhsh had to tell Miss Jinnah that there was little hope of her brother living for more than a few days . Next morning, three aircrafts were landed nearby, including the Quaid’s beautiful Viking, to which he was carried on a stretcher. As he was being carried on a stretcher into the cabin of the Vicking, the pilot and the crew lined up to give him a salute. He raised his feeble and trembling hand with difficulty to return the salute.
He was laid comfortably in the seats that had been converted into an improvised bed in the front cabin, and with him sat Miss Fatima Jinnah, and the nurse, sister Dunham. Within a few minutes the air craft was flying at 7000 feet, over the rugged Quetta hills… after about two hours flying, the Viking landed at Mauripur Airport at 4:15 P.M. the arrival was kept a close secret.
As instructed in advance, there was no one at the airport. Colonel Geofrey Knowles, the Military Secretary of the Governor-General, was there to receive the party. The Quaid was carried on a stretcher to a military ambulance that had been kept ready to drive him to the Governor-General’s House. Miss Fatima Jinnah and Sister Dunham sat with him in the ambulance, while the other members of the party left in cars in advance, only a Cadillac car with the doctors and the Military Secretary was following the slow moving ambulance.
After it had covered about four miles, the ambulance broke down Fatima Jinnah wrote, “After we had covered about four miles, the ambulance coughed, as if gasping for breath, and came to a sudden stop. After about five minutes, I came out of the ambulance and was told that it had run short of petrol. The driver started fidgeting with the engine, but it would not start as I entered the ambulance again, the Quaid’s hands moved slightly, and his eyes looked at me in an inquiring manner. I bent low and said to him, There is a breakdown in the engine of the ambulance.” He closed his eyes. Sister Dunham and I fanned his face by turns, waiting for another ambulance to come, every Minute an eternity of agony. He could not be shifted to the Cadillac, as it was not big enough for the stretcher. And so we waited, hoping…..
Near by stood hundreds of huts of refugees, who went about their business, not knowing that their Quaid, who had given them a homeland, was in their midst, lying helpless in an ambulance that had run out of petrol. Cars honked on their way, buses and trucks streamed to their destination, and we stood there immobilized in an ambulance that refused to move an inch, with a precious life ebbing away, drop by drop, breath by breath.
Usually there is a strong sea-breeze in Karachi, which keeps the temperature down, but that day there was no breeze, and the heat was unbearable. To add to his discomfort, scores of flies buzzed around his face and his hands had lost their strength to raise themselves to ward them off .
Sister Dunham has described the terrible hour of waiting. “We were still near enough to the refugee camp, and the mud, to be pestered by hundreds of flies I found a peace of cardboard and fanned a few minutes and he made a gesture I shall never forget. He moved his arms free of the sheet, and placed his hands on my arms. He did not speak, but there was such a look of gratitude in his eyes”.
After long and painful waiting, there came another ambulance. He was carried on the stretcher to the newly arrived ambulance and the last lap of journey began. There was no flag on the ambulance . So it moved through the city unnoticed by the crowds who had come out to enjoy the first cool breeze of evening.
At ten minutes past six in the evening the ambulance arrived at government House, and the Quaid was carried up to his room, soon to set out to his final journey. The doctors and sister Dunham tried to stimulate him with a heart tonic, but he was so weak that the medicine dribbled from the corners of his mouth.
At about 9:30 P.M. The Quaid showed signs of acute discomfort. His doctors were by his beside, examining him. His doctors raised the end of the Quaid-i-Azam’s bed, to hasten the flow of blood to his heart. Then they tried to inject a drug into his veins, but the veins had collapsed . At 9:50 Colonel Ilahi Bakhsh leaned over and whispered, “Sir, we have given you an injection to strengthen you, and it will soon have its effect. God Willing, you are going to live”.
The Quaid-i-Azam moved his head and spoke for the last time: he said faintly, “No, I am not”. Thirty minutes later, while sleeping peacefully, he breathed his last. The news of Quaid’s death spread fast and wide. There was sorrow in every heart and home throughout Pakistan. His death was felt as a personal loss for every Pakistani. It was an irreparable loss to the nascent state of Pakistan, and of the entire Muslim world. The newborn state was orphaned. The piloting light was gone when it was most needed.
He, however, was a truly great man and precious treasure. The Quaid knew what the people needed from him. He therefore, sacrificed all chances of recovery of his health and assumed the responsibility of helping the new state to overcome the initial difficulties as Governor General of Pakistan.
Notes and References
Fatima Jinnah, My Brother, edited by Sharif-Al-Mujahid, Karachi 1987 pp. 1-2.
M. Rafique, Afzal, Selected Speeches and Statements of the Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah (1911-34 and 1947-48), p. 439.
Hector Bolitho, Jinnah the Creator of Pakistan, London 1964. 214.
Ian Stephens, Pakistan an old country and new nation, London 1967 p. 50.
G. Allana, Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah The story of a Nation. Karachi 1967, p. 22.
Mir Laik Ali, Tragedy of Hyderabad, Karachi, 1967, p. 258.
Nazir Ahmad Sheikh, Quaid-i-Azam Father of the Nation, Lahroe 1968, p. 118.
Hector Bolitho, op.cit., p. 219.
Hector Bolitho, op. cit., p. 219.
Hector Bolitho, op.cit., p.220.
Ian Stephens, op.cit., p. 231.
Hector Bolitho, op.cit., p. 222.
Hector Bolitho, op.cit., p. 222.
Hector Bolitho, op.cit, p. 223.
Hector Bolitho, op.cit., p. 223.
Fatima Jinnah, op.cit., p. 223.
Hector Bolitho, op.cit., p.223.
Fatima Jinnah, op.cit., P. 224.
Hector Bolitho, op.cit., p. 224.
By Prof Sharif al Mujahid
Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah's claim to statesmanship lay in his two attributes: (i) his rational approach towards politics, and (ii) his keeping himself in close touch with the objective ground realities, however awkward, however complex, however shifting or confusing. Little surprising, he often made the right choice at the right moment.
Prescience, idealism, intellectual vigour, faith and resolution these qualities Jinnah had in an abundant measure. Qualities that having crystallized with the years had transformed him what he finally turned out to be in the last decade of his eventful life.
His sense of realism would never fail him, with this decisions stemming from a genuine pragmatic approach. An approach, which would always take the world as it was in its changing historic realities, only to have it improved to the extent that the existing possibilities permitted, with a view to upholding the ideals of freedom and the common good. Yet underlying all of Jinnah's politics were a specific set of moral values, reflecting the intellectual traditions and sociological norms among the historical realities of Indian Islam.
Jinnah, like Konred Adenauer of West Germany, was averse to following "a purely positively utilitarian policy of expediency". This is because he was not prepared to sacrifice moral principles and spiritual necessities for temporary political gains. Nor would he allow his realism to deflect him into a policy of opportunism. For his realism had a sound ethical base, his being a policy of conviction and of conscience all the time.
Nevertheless, his overwhelming sense of pragmatism shied him away, from the futile task of abstract theorizing and enabled him to concentrate all his energies on the practical mastery of the tangible, day-to-day, political problems and tasks.
Chance, and particularly the chance of genius, says Voltaire, "is an incalculable, factor in the story of the past". "Chance because it decides which people will survive", because it determines, what names will survive the ravages of time and tide. And that he should be able to rise to any occasion is perhaps the most significant mark of greatness in a statesman. Jinnah could do something more: he could crystallise a lifetime's faith into a single bold action. And such actions over a 30-year provide the key to his political career and success.
Barely twelve years after his debut into politics for instance, Jinnah brought the divided Hindu and Muslims on one platform, a "miracle" that had never happened again.
He also got this Hindu-Muslim unity consecrated in the famous (Congress-League) Lucknow Pact of 1916. For all that it meant, it was not the handwork of a mere politician. It was an act of faith: faith in Hindu-Muslim unity as the condition of Indian freedom. And it called for utmost tact, persuasive powers, and statesmanship of the highest order to breathe a spirit of compromise, of give-and-take, into the two warring parties, so mortally suspicious of each other.
Some ten years later, he devised an extremely viable formula for a Hindu-Muslim settlement. This was in the Delhi Muslim Proposals (1927). Despite Muslim reservations about joint electorates, he offered to waive the Muslim right to separate electorates, if certain basic Muslim demands were met. These demands were: Proportional representation for Muslims in the Punjab and Bengal, the separation of Sindh from Bombay Presidency the extension of reforms to the NWFP and Balochistan and one-third Muslim representation at the center. Within the united Indian framework, the Delhi Proposal ensured the setting up of five stable Muslim Provinces to match the six Hindu ones. Hence Maulana Abul Kalaam Azad hailing them as opening. "The door for the first time to the recognition of the real rights of Muslims in India". While negating the long-standing Hindu reservations on separate electorates, the Proposals guaranteed Muslims "a proper share in the future of India".
Initially, the Congress welcomed and accepted the Proposals, Later, however, it gave in to the Hindu Mahasabhaite pressure, and opposed the Muslim demands except for the one relating to the NWFP, and for a conditional acceptance of Sindh's separation.
This mean that Jinnah's spirit of accommodation was sadly supporting on the other side. He requested that "the Muslims should be made to feel that they are secured and safeguarded against any act of oppression of the majority" fell on deaf cars. So did his plea "to rise to that statesmanship which Sir Tej Bahadur describes". But for the rejection of his impassioned pleas, the subsequent history of India would have been different. Mere politicians, out to score tactical gains let slip through their fingers the chance of a lifetime. At this juncture, the only other political leader who could match Jinnah's breadth of vision and statesmanship was Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru.
In 1937 came another chance for a Hindu-Muslim rapprochement. From 1935 onwards, Jinnah had established an entente with the Congress at the center. In February 1935, he tried to negotiate an alternative to the Communal Award (1932) with Babu Rajendra Prasad, the Congress President. A viable formula was finally worked out, but the pressure built up by the Congress Nationalist Party under Pandit Madan Mohan Malaviya, especially in Bengal and the Punjab, scuttled their efforts.
In the pre-1937 election period, despite Pandit Nehru's provocative denial of Muslim entity and identity in India's body politics on September 18, 1936, Jinnah had managed to keep him cool, offering the Congress an olive branch repeatedly. "Ours is not a hostile movement", he assured on August 20, 1936. He urged his Peshawar audience on October 19, "to unite to hammer out an advance nationalist bloc" from amongst themselves "to send to the Provincial Assembly". He exhorted Hindus and Muslims alike, at a public meeting at Nagpur's Chitnawis Park on January 1, 1937, to produce by a process of hammering fine steel and weed out those obstructing their march to freedom".
He declared on January 20, 1937 that "the urgent question facing every nationalist in India is how to create unity out of diversity and not of fight each other'.
With this end in view, he promoted the establishment of "something like a concordat" with the Congress during the 1937 elections, especially in the U.P. and Bombay. After the elections, he instructed the League Leaders to shun joining the interim ministries in these provinces. He instructed A.M.K. Dehalvi, Muslim League Assembly Party leader in Bombay, to reject out of hand Governor Brabourn's offer to head the interim ministry. Husseinally Rahimtulla and the Raja of Salempur were expelled for joining the Cooper and Chatter ministries in Bombay and the U.P. respectively.
Yet, when the Congress finally took office in July 1937, it by passed the Muslim League and Jinnah. It opted for Unitarianism a la the Nehru Report as against Muslim federalism, offered "absorption" instead of "partnership", and called for the dissolution of Muslim League parties in the legislatures for being considered for a share in power. The Congress justified the formation of exclusive one-party governments on the basis of the collective responsibility principle, but when it came to provinces such as the NWFP and Assam where it did not command an absolute majority, it flouted this principle and went in coalition ministries.
The failure of the Congress to exploit its spectacular electoral gains in 1937 for extending the areas of cooperation with the League is inexplicable unless explained in terms of it becoming "heady" with its unexpected victory and of a terrible lack of political prescience and foresight. For a plural society and for a multi-national country like India, Switzerland rather than England was the model coalition, rather than one-party government, the rule.
History shows that neglected opportunities do not, as a rule, return. However, Congress was presented the opportunity of reaching a peaceful settlement of the communal question in 1928, during 1930 (at the time of the Round Table Conference), during 1935-37 (Jinnah-Prasad Formula and the formation of provincial governments), and, finally, in 1946. But each time it failed, rather miserably. Of all these, the Cabinet Mission Plan (1946) presented the Congress leaders at this crossroad of history the chance of a lifetime, the chance perhaps of centuries. But none of them could rise to the occasion, because none of them had that "incredible clarity of vision", that "statecraft", and that "practical Bismarckian sense of the best possible" which, was Jinnah's alone, to quote the Aga Khan.
Bismarck, it is said, "was always emphatic that he could not make events". And if Jinnah had been asked about this situation at this juncture, he would have most probably said in the Bismarckian vein" "Politics are not a science based on logic; they are the capacity of always choosing at each instant, in constantly changing situations, the least harmful, the most useful". Again, like Bismarck, Jinnah, though perhaps taken by surprise by the Congress" reservations on the Cabinet Mission Plan, would turn the blunders of his enemies to his own advantage, to emerge victorious in the end.
But this anticipates. For the moment, it would suffice to note that Jinnah's crucial decision to accept the Cabinet Mission Plan demonstrated, perhaps more than anything else, this genius in statesmanship - a measure of statesmanship perhaps unmatched by the political giants involved in writing the last chapter of the British Raj in India. Hence the Aga Khans' verdict:
"In the one decision to accept the Cabinet Mission Plan, combining as it did sagacity, shrewdness, and unequalled political flair, he justified.... My claim that he was the most remarkable of all the great statesmen that I have known. In puts him on a level with Bismarck."
Remember, the Aga Khan was himself a statesman of a rare caliber, having occupied the president ship of the League of Nations.
Political genius, it is often said, lies in compromise. But this is only true within limits. An empirical approach is a distinguishing characteristic of a statesman, but that statesman alone is great who does not lose his purposive political creed in the exercise of power vested in him. The Muslim nation had, of course, authorized Jinnah to negotiate was operative only within the framework of the nation's cherished aspirations and supreme objective. The genius for compromise could never be carried beyond a recognizable point. The genius for compromise could never be carried beyond a recognizable point, the limit to compromise being set by the words of high purpose, such as Justice, Honour and Equity. In accepting the Mission Plan, Jinnah had compromised to the extent of suffering central control over the Muslim areas in respect of Defence, Foreign Affairs and Communications. But in attempting to erode the grouping provision on the one hand and envisaging and strenuously striving for a strong Centre on the other, the Congress had brazenly trespassed the limits to compromise. The Mission Plan, as formulated by its authors, ensured for Muslim Justice, Honour and Equity in the future Indian dispensation - though not in full, but in a substantial measure. The Plan, as the Congress had interpreted and proposed for implementation, had sought to cut across these high, non-compromisable principles. Jinnah had, therefore, to revoke his earlier acceptance of the Plan.
"The Future", says A.J.P. Taylor, a British historian, "is a land of which there are no maps; and historians err when they describe even the most purposeful statesman as though he were marching down a broad highroad with his objective already in sight. More flexible historians admit that a statesman has an alternative course before him; yet even they depict him as one choosing his route at crossroad. Certainly the development of history has its own logical laws. But these laws resemble rather those by which floodwater flows into hitherto unseen channels and forces itself finally to an unpredictable sea."
And if the Mission Plan had forced Indian politics through hitherto unseen channels on to an unpredictable sea, Jinnah, like Bismarck in such situations "proved himself master of the storm, a daring pilot in extremities. Like Bismarck again, even in the extremely difficult situation spawned by the British adverse verdict on the Pakistan demand, he never, even for a moment, let the initiative slip through his dexterous fingers.
Part of the wisdom of statecraft, to barrow a phrase from Richard Goodwin, is "to leave as many options open as possible and decide as little as possible... Since almost all-important judgments are speculative, you must avoid risking too much on the conviction that you are right. "The other half of the wisdom of statecraft is to "accept the chronic lubricity and obscurity of events without yielding, in Lincoln's words, firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right. Such acceptance rules out the contingency of keeping too many options open for too long, lest such keeping should paralyse the lobe of decision and end up in losing the game altogether. Thus, within the parameters of this framework, Jinnah's crucial decisions, first to accept the Mission Plan and later, when confronted with impossible congress conditions, to reject it, represent the two-halves of the wisdom of statecraft.
Jinnah's statecraft as well fulfils a test proffered by Bismarck himself: "Man cannot create the current of events. He can only float with it and steer." And the genius of Jinnah lay in his adroitly and successfully steering the adverse current of events during 1946 to bring the battered Muslim ship, safe and sound ashore within a year.
To sum up, then, Jinnah had a keep appreciation of the truth that politics is the art of the possible, that ends must conjoin and be conducive to means, that the best must be made of what is beyond one's power to change. Not only did he adroitly exploit to the full opportunities provided by his opponents. More importantly, like Mazzini, he also believed in creating opportunities through his own efforts. He had an iron will, and an unwilling faith in himself and his mission. To make these attributes the more impregnable and consequential, he was also resolute, fearless, courageous, calculating, and even somewhat reckless at time.
Yet he was farsighted, and, not withstanding the fierce invectives he had hurled oft and anon in the face of the "hated" congress, he always preferred the path of moderation and conciliation. Cautious for most part, he never took a step he could not retrace. The enabled him to stretch the hand of conciliation and compromise whenever such an opportunity presented itself. And it is a measure of the elasticity of his temper that the could change his political theosophy dewing his mid. Sixties, after over thirty years in public life, that he could accept the Mission Plan after pronouncing the "Pakistan-or- Perish" dictum, that he could call for "burying the hatchet" once the goal was achieved, that he could even preach friendship and collaboration with those to whom he was but lately so vehemently opposed. And, as in the case of Bismarck, his greatest, and perhaps most admirable, quality was to be content with limited success.
All told, it were these qualities that enabled him to surpass "possibly everyone else in India, in practical political intelligence" that earned him probably one of the highest tributes from a statesman whose stature and calibre were themselves universally recognized. In his Memoirs, the Aga Khan remarks:
Of all the statesmen that I have known in my life - Clamenceau, Lloyd George, Churchill, Curzon, Mussolini, Mahatma Gandhi - Jinnah is the most remarkable.
None of these men in my view outshone him in strength of character and in that almost uncanny combination of prescience and resolution, which is statecraft.
(The writer was founder-Director, Quaid-e-Azam Academy (1976-89), and authored "Jinnah: Studies in Interpretation (1981)", the only work to qualify for the president's Award for Best Books on Quaid-e-Azam)
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