Muhammad Ali Jinnah Quotes

Jinnah and other Muslim leaders had stirred up the Muslims to violence to put pressure on all the parties to accede to Jinnah's Muslim League's demand of an independent Muslim nation—Pakistan. Messervy was very sympathetic to the Muslim leadership as he had been feuding with and frustrated by the predominantly Hindu ruling Congress Party. After partition he accepted the mercenary position of Commander in Chief of the Pakistani Army. Then he was shocked and horrified at the slaughter of the terrorist attacks by the Muslims—about 4,000 Sikh men, women and children had been beaten and cut to death. The Sikhs had been targeted largely because Sikh leaders had recently announced that if there were a Partition, Sikhs would refuse to live in nation under Muslim control.

Two months earlier, Jinnah and the Muslim League had, behind the scenes, orchestrated and abetted vicious, murderous, terrorist attacks on Sikhs by Muslim tribesman brought into the Punjab for the purpose." Master Tara Singh

The Sikh's had a long history of living under Muslim domination and wanted no part of any more. Patiala was within the Punjab and Jinnah was insisting that the Punjab should be a Province of the new Pakistan because the Punjab was majority Muslim. However, there were many Sikhs, as well as some Hindus, Buddhists, and Christians and none of these wanted to be a part of Pakistan. Further, a significant portion of the Muslim Punjab population also would prefer to join India for many reasons, not the least of which was that they had become used to a democracy where they had complete freedom of religion and civil right as well, and with the exception of Turkey none of the Muslim countries were democratic and based on the Muslim League which did not democratically elect its leaders, Pakistan would not likely be a democracy that guaranteed civil rights (and they were right). So the majority of the people of the Punjab were opposed to becoming a part of Pakistan. The Sikhs were passionate opponents of being a part of Pakistan.

This was the first call for a separate Indian Islamic State. 17 years later Pakistan was to be born.

A 'kirpan' is a type of knife—a weapon—which all male Sikhs are religiously obligated to have in his possession and on his body at all times. Singh was a Sikh Maharaja (King) of an area that had about an equal number of Muslims and Sikhs. The Sikh's had a long history of living under Muslim domination and wanted no part of any more. Patiala was within the Punjab and Jinnah was insisting that the Punjab should be a Province of the new Pakistan because the Punjab was majority Muslim. However, there were many Sikhs, as well as some Hindus, Buddhists, and Christians and virtually none of these wanted to be a part of Pakistan. Further, a significant portion of the Muslim Punjab population also preferred to join India for many reasons, not the least of which was that they had become used to a democracy where they had complete freedom of religion and civil rights as well, and with the exception of Turkey none of the Muslim countries were democratic. Based on the history, actions, inactions, and statements of the Muslim League which did not democratically elect its leaders, Pakistan would not likely be a democracy that guaranteed civil rights—especially religious rights—to their citizens (and they were right). So the majority of the people of the Punjab were opposed to becoming a part of Pakistan. The Sikhs were passionate opponents of being a part of Pakistan as they knew their Muslim neighbors one of whose major reasons for wanting a Muslim state was that everyone could then be forced to be Muslim or be expelled or ethnically cleansed.

Even into the 21st century, the problem was not solved and Muslims from Pakistan continue their futile but tragic terrorist tactics to try and acquire more territory from India." 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma

There were several difficulties in this definition even for those British and Indian Congress leaders who were willing to accede to an independent Muslim state. Two of the most important where the definition of areas. They could be so defined as to include majority Hindu or Sikh areas surrounded by larger majority Muslim areas—the classic problem of boundary districting and redistricting. This was an insurmountable problem in the Punjab and elsewhere. The 2nd was the undemocratic nature of the demand. The Muslim League, unlike the Congress Party, had never had a very large participation and its leaders were never elected over a series of free and fair elections. Many Muslims were opposed to the Muslim League and there were areas of India, like Kashmir, where a large proportion of the 70% Muslim population were opposed to partition and if there were to be one would prefer to remain with India. With virtually 100% of the Sikhs, Hindus, Buddhists and Christians of Kashmir refusing to be part of a Muslim state, the majority in Kashmir would have then voted to remain a part of India but the Muslim League did not take account of democratic processes at the time. They changed their view later after they had infiltrated tens of thousands of semi nomadic Muslim Tribesmen across the border to gain the majority. Then the Indians would not accede to a plebiscite until the newcomers were removed and India has been in a constant war with Pakistan who has been trying to gain control of Indian Kashmir by war and terrorism.

Churchill was reported to be so angry and exasperated that his face turned red and he was sputtering. During World War II, Gandhi, Nehru and other Indian Nationalists were leading protests against British control of India. This not only bogged down British soldiers surprising the nationalists rather than fighting in Burma or in other war theaters, but India supplied a huge number of battalions to the British Army the world over and if that manpower dried up, the allied war effort would suffer. The American State Department wanted Churchill to announce that after Japan was defeated, there would be a process toward self-government. This way, they thought, the Indians would redouble their effort to defeat the Japanese and stop the then current protests and strikes. Churchill was strongly opposed to any diminution of the British Empire, but beyond that, he knew India quite well and realized that at any hint of Independence the large Muslim minority in India would insist on autonomy or a partition of the country and use sectarian violence and terror to intimidate the Indian Congress party and the British, but the major victims of the terror—the Hindus and the Sikhs would not remain passive, but would retaliate in kind. President Roosevelt was in the midst of planning the Normandy Landings of the D-Day invasion and did not want to pressure Churchill and the British at this point in time, so the door to independence was not opened during the war and Britain had to deal with the protests throughout. However, when, after the war, the Labor Government, started a process toward Indian independence which resulted in exactly what Churchill predicted. At least 2 million Indians were slaughtered in the internecine terrorist cycles of fear and retaliation motivated terror attacks what were so extensive that the British military could not really control it.

He was echoing proposals that he made in the Delhi Emergency Committee that had been called to cope with the butchery and murder when the Hindus and Sikhs were trying to leave the areas that were to be part of Pakistan under the Partition and the retaliations against the Delhi Muslims who were trying to flee to the new Pakistan. Unfortunately, the Muslim leadership did not want such a truce as while the land had been partitioned, Indian Money, military equipment, and other resources were yet to be divided and the Muslim leaders who had been so successful playing the violence card to gain and independent Pakistan, did not want to give up that option in the remainder of the division of India. Also, it was not at all clear that the Muslim political leaders could even then control the mobs who they had already whipped up to violence.

At Indian Independence from Britain, people could choose whether they wanted to be citizens of India or the new Muslim state created because many Muslims insisted on living in a country that was majority Muslim. However, and what came as a great shock to the then new Pakistani leadership, the majority of the Muslims of India choose not to become citizens of the new Islamic state and preferred to stay in Hindu dominated India which they knew would be democratic, free, and would protect their right to practice Islam as they saw fit. Many feared that in Pakistan Islamic extremists would dictate the exact form of Islam that Muslims must follow, and that is exactly what happened in Pakistan—not only from government action proscribing religious practice but from the government tolerating and not interfering with Islamic fundamentalist extremist terrorists who often assassinated Muslims whose particular form of worship was offensive to them or people would call for reforms of the protection of human rights.

Muhammad Ali Jinnah and the other Muslim League leaders wanted to stir up India's Muslims in order to prevent Indian Independence from Britain unless India were partitioned and the Muslims could have their own nation. At that point the British and the Congress Party of India—the majority political party were both starting to plan for independence. Jinnah and most of the Muslim nationalists did not want to have Muslims in a Majority Hindu nation. To stop it, they first used fear to try and separate the many Indian Muslims who were politically active from their roles in and loyalty to the Congress Party which although Hindu dominated had Muslim members and officials. All the Muslims who were literate were aware of the terrible revelations of the Nazi Concentration Camps and the attempted extermination of all the Jews of Europe. The "party line" of the Muslim League was that once the British turned the government of India over to the Congress Party, they would turn on the Muslims and exterminate them so that India would be all Hindu. There were no such plans or even suggestions be anyone in the Congress party, the paranoia and the conspiracy theory resonated with many Indian Muslims just as conspiracy theories are believed by some people in every society. In this case, the paranoia that was unleashed by the Muslim League would have tragic consequences as with Independence getting closer many Muslims struck out and preemptively attacked and butchered Hindus and Sikhs who retaliated in kind and the butchery went on all through the Independence process and the partition of India to create a Muslim state—Pakistan. Almost 2 million people would be murdered in the sectarian violence that was unleashed.

India was soon to be granted Independence by the Labor Government, much to the chagrin of Winston Churchill and other Conservative politicians who wanted to diminish the British Empire as little as possible. Jinnah, not wanting the majority Muslim areas of India to be part of a Hindu majority India, came up with this clever alternative. Britain would grant independence only to the Hindu parts of India and the remainder—Pakistan—would remain in the Empire as an autonomous colony. Many of the British politicians believed that that would be a constant friction in the Empire as many of the "Pakistanis" would then want their own independence and use the terror tactics to fight for it. Besides, the Conservatives did not have enough votes to stop Independence to all of India. Jinnah's efforts however were enough to lengthen the debate in the British Parliament thereby delaying independence for all of India and angering the pro-independence leaders throughout India. Jinnah, by then an autocrat, did this in secret, behind the backs of his own Muslim colleagues, many of whom had Independence as their highest priority.

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He had little difficulty until he and the British Government announced the plan to grant independence to India. At that point the Muslim League came up with the notion of Partition of India which polarized the Indian politicians mostly along religious lines, and much of India was "up for grabs". No one wanted to concede anything to the other side as this might strengthen the other side's image of its power and just encourage them to go for more. Wavell's job became impossible.

The Muslim League was demanding that the Punjab become a part of Pakistan when independence was granted later. However, the Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, and Christians were all adamant that they would not live in a Muslim nation which would soon become a de facto theocracy if the British could not control them. The Punjab was divided between India and Pakistan, and hundreds of thousands died in Sikh-Muslim attacks and then Hindu-Muslim conflict in the Punjab.

The fear of the Sikhs was that if the Punjab became a part of the new Muslim State of Pakistan, they would not be allowed to practice their religion and that the new Islamic state would discriminate against non-Muslims. They were successful in keeping the Punjab as a part of India, and turned out to have been right about the intolerance of the new Muslim state.

The throwing of flaming torches to burn out members of the other religion got out of control and the fires spread to the homes of all residents. The fires were so prevalent that the riot was then and has since been referred to as the "Shahalmi Gate Blaze". At the time Jinnah was horrified at the violence, but by the following year he and other Muslim League leaders were aiding and abetting Muslim terrorist attacks to put pressure on the government to create a separate Muslim state upon Indian independence—Pakistan. Most historians agree that the Muslim terrorism in the short run had worked, as it would have been unlikely that India would have been partitioned in the absence of violence. However, it set in motion a cultural pattern of religious hate, bigotry, intolerance, violence and murder which would plague Pakistan thereafter. The politicians throughout the country's history have tried to use the Muslim religious, fundamentalist, extremists for their purposes only to find that the fanatics were out of control and the entire Pakistani population has lived in fear, lest an extremist decide that what they did or say was inimical to Islam and assassinate him or her. They have assassinated even the highest levels of politicians—President, Governors of Provinces, National Legislatures as well as Journalists, writers and academics. But the average Pakistani citizen has always been at risk of brutal murder with hundreds killed every year in an atmosphere of total impunity for the murderers. They have even murdered married women who had been raped on the grounds that they were adulterers and were therefore stoned.

He was arguing to reserve some states as Muslim states by designation. 7 years later he would insist on a separate homeland. India was partitioned and Pakistan and Bangladesh resulted but at a fearful cost of tens of millions of lives.

The Muslim League had whipped up and armed Muslims to fight for a separate Islamic state within India. However, instead of revolt or attacks on the Indian officials, things got out of hand and even after they had won the partition of India, the Muslim mobs went on a frenzy and attacked the Hindus and Sikhs in the areas where the Muslims were in the majority. Part of the reason was to intimidate the Indian and British authorities {627153} and the other part was for ethnic cleansing so when there was a partition—Pakistan—the minority Hindus and Sikhs would have converted, been frightened off, of killed. {627149}. Tragically, Hindus and Sikhs retaliated where they were in the majority and no one really knows how many millions of Indians were butchered in the creation of Pakistan.

This do called “Direct Action” resolution was a threat of war. The view of these Muslims was that living in a democracy with a majority of Hindus would be “slavery.” Faced with this intimidation and that of Jinnah {627169} the British agreed to partition India.

Culturally and historically Muslims have an urgent need to dominate the societies in which they live. By the logic of Islam, how else could they institute Islamic Law—Sharia—which was religiously imperative.