A review of Dr. Sikandar Hayat’s book which discusses Pakistan Movement as a historical process based on the journey and contributions of six prominent Muslims leaders.

Dr. Sikandar Hayat is a renowned historian of Pakistan and he has been researching and writing on the Pakistan Movement for a long time. This time, he has tackled the most difficult task of reconstructing the story of Pakistan by highlighting the six main leaders of the Pakistan Movement as it evolved, beginning with the Muslim revival by Sir Syed Ahmad Khan. The leaders, besides Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, are: the Aga Khan, Syed Ameer Ali, Maulana Mohamed Ali, Allama Muhammad Iqbal, and Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah. These leaders were committed to preserving and protecting the interests of Indian Muslims. Some of them coped with the contemporary socioeconomic and political challenges, not only of these Muslims but also of the broad Muslim ummah. 
Dr. Hayat argues that, for long, there was clear evidence of Muslim separatism in India, but over time, this sentiment was greatly heightened and transformed during the British Raj. Democracy and the electoral system put the Hindu majority on the top. Already, the Hindus had started several religio-political and educational movements in the 1820s, which marginalized the Muslims further. Thus, the whole line of Muslim leadership from Sir Syed Ahmad Khan to Jinnah struggled, first to define and then lay the groundwork for a separate Muslim identity. In the light of the ever-expanding Hindu domination of the society, Muslims were left behind in all areas of life which led, for the first time, to a serious beginning of Muslim differentiation from Hindus aimed at securing their due rights in united India. The Congress failed to keep Muslims’ interests in its sight which led to the founding of a very parochial socio-political atmosphere in India. Dr. Hayat refutes the argument that Pakistan was historically ordained, arguing instead that Pakistan was the result of a long journey of a new kind of thought process and struggle which was mostly carried out by the ever-alive and conscientious leadership of the Muslims. The six leaders analyzed by him, from Sir Syed Ahmad Khan to Jinnah, comprise some prominent leaders among the long line of leadership. The periods of these leaders often overlapped but, many a time, they succeeded each other in separate eras. However, the line of their leadership runs more or less straight from Sir Syed Ahmad Khan to Jinnah. As one’s era came to an end, there was always another one to carry the baton and so the Muslim struggle for their rights was pushed forward with its rhythm and its unique ups and downs. Although some of these leaders had religious upbringings, primarily, Pakistan was achieved by establishing a separate nation-state through a long political struggle. Since each one of these six leaders made important contributions to the Muslim cause, the task faced by the author of giving each his proper due was a very difficult one. However, he has succeeded in making the story of Pakistan Movement quite simple, coherent, and clear. The style is so interesting that it appears like a historical drama, a six-part series, where each episode describes the story and then smoothly gives way to the next character till the creation of Pakistan. Each character in the story is given proper weightage with a fresh perspective. Therefore, readers would not like to miss an episode because the presentation of each character is distinct and mostly self-contained in its contents. 

Advancing Muslim separatism in the second half of the nineteenth century, Sir Syed Ahmad Khan was one of the topmost political leaders and reformers of his time in India. He accepted the challenge of the British occupation of India and in response awakened the sentiments of Muslim separate identity as the British administration introduced political reforms.

This movement became known in history as the ‘Aligarh Movement’ and it later spearheaded Pakistan Movement. As a result of the earliest phase of this Aligarh Movement, many well-known historical figures appeared on the scene such as Mohsin-ul-Mulk, and Wiqar-ul-Mulk who organised the Simla Deputation (October 1, 1906) and established the All India Muslim League (December 30, 1906). Hereafter emerged the next line of great leaders like the Aga Khan, Syed Ameer Ali and Maulana Mohamed Ali. 

The author has divided his book into seven chapters. The first chapter is the background chapter which highlights the origin and growth of Muslim separatism in the Indian Subcontinent. He underscores the social, religious, economic and political factors to prove his point. He argues that since the conquest of Mohammad Bin Qasim (711 CE) to the  British colonial period, the gulf between Muslims and Non-Muslims, Hindus in particular, remained a cardinal feature of the Indian society. The tolerant King Akbar the Great impressed the Hindus deeply with his plurality but gradually the Hindus' estrangement turned into communalism which eventually paved the way for Muslim separatism. During the British Raj, Muslim separatism and Hindu communalism became more obvious and eventually led to the re-drawing of India’s borders in 1947. Although the author has chosen six main leaders, there were others – national and regional – who contributed to Muslims’ struggle, especially the Pakistan Movement. These six leaders, however, were head and shoulders above others for their sterling contributions to the Muslim cause. 
Advancing Muslim separatism in the second half of the nineteenth century, Sir Syed Ahmad Khan was one of the topmost political leaders and reformers of his time in India. He accepted the challenge of the British occupation of India and in response awakened the sentiments of Muslim separate identity as the British administration introduced political reforms. Much before the emergence of the Indian National Congress in 1885, he spelled out the pros and cons of the introduction of democracy in India. He defined the concept of a Muslim political community whose special interests in the democratic system needed protection in the form of reservation of seats and the principle of separate electorates. He helped Muslims revive their glorious past by creating an enabling socio-cultural and political environment. He was successful in uniting Indian Muslims under the umbrella of Aligarh College which became a centre of their socio-cultural, educational and political activities. This movement became known in history as the ‘Aligarh Movement’ and it later spearheaded Pakistan Movement. As a result of the earliest phase of this Aligarh Movement, many well-known historical figures appeared on the scene such as Mohsin-ul-Mulk and Wiqar-ul-Mulk who organised the Simla Deputation (October 1, 1906) and established the All India Muslim League (December 30, 1906). Hereafter emerged the next line of great leaders like the Aga Khan, Syed Ameer Ali and Maulana Mohamed Ali. 
Syed Ameer Ali’s services span the second half of the nineteenth century to the first quarter of the twentieth century. The author specifically highlights his services in promoting academic and political awareness in Bengal and at the all-India levels. Ameer Ali was a contemporary of Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, but he approached the Muslims’ situation differently. He stressed the need for establishing a political party for political struggle. He established the Central National  Muhammadan Association in 1877. He was happy over the success of the Simla Deputation and the establishment of the All India Muslim League (AIML). He established the London Branch of AIML and played a significant part in securing separate electorates for the Muslims in 1909. 
At this time, Sir Sultan Muhammad Shah, popularly known as the Aga Khan, joined the odyssey of top Muslim leadership and played his significant political role in the freedom movement. His political insights, his connections with the higher authorities in the Congress and the British government, and his resourcefulness promoted the cause of the Muslims in India from 1906 onwards. He headed the Simla Deputation and was elected the first President of the All India Muslim League. Whenever required, he promoted and projected Muslim interests in India and England till his death. The Aga Khan also contributed to the protection of the Ottoman Empire and the institution of the Caliphate which has been an understudied topic. He provided a handsome amount to Turkey to meet the war expenditure. He also insisted upon the British authorities in England to take a lenient stance on the Ottoman Empire after the War. So, like other Muslim leaders of India, he realized the Muslim separatism in India and worked for the protection and promotion of the Muslims’ interests as a distinct community. He remained active in the Roud Table Conference and on other important occasions to help strengthen the Muslim case.

Gradually, the Maulana understood the latent objectives of Gandhi’s philosophy, especially after the publication of the Nehru Report, following which he became an adherent supporter of Jinnah and his philosophy. He came to realize that the majority will permanently enslave the minority and, hence, a different course of action was required for the Muslims to retain their independent socio-political identity. The ‘Nehru Report’ proved to be a turning point in his political career, and indeed forced him to move irrevocably towards the Muslim separatist political movement. 

As a mature, experienced, and progressive politician, Jinnah explored all political options to work under the Indian Federation by keeping Muslim interests and identity intact under the Government of India Act 1935. However, after reading the Hindus’ mindset and his own experience in dealing with the Congress, Jinnah concluded, thus, that “the Musalmans were in gravest danger”. 

Maulana Mohamed Ali was the youngest, energetic, vibrant and most impactful leader among the masses. His contributions to the Indian Muslims form a complex story because, at this point time, there was an overlap and therefore some confusion in the Muslim minds about separatism, Indian Nationalism, and Pan Islamism. Dr. Hayat, with his characteristic deftness of the pen, however, has made it so simple while writing about the life, thoughts and work of Maulana. The Maulana had a multifaceted personality, as a journalist, essayist, thinker, politician, and radical nationalist. Muslim separatism kept evolving side by side with the growth of Indian nationalism. The Maulana understood Muslim interests and joined the Muslim League at its founding; he was one of its founding fathers and wrote the minutes of the historical meeting. His love for Pan-Islamism affected him to the extent that he became a diehard anti-British. These sentiments were reflected in his speeches, statements, and writings. He went to England to fight for the protection of the institution of the Caliphate and sacred places under the Caliphate but all his efforts were in vain. His ideas converged with the philosophy of Gandhi who knew how to use them against the British government. Gradually, the Maulana understood the latent objectives of Gandhi’s philosophy, especially after the publication of the Nehru Report, following which he became an adherent supporter of Jinnah and his philosophy. He came to realize that the majority will permanently enslave the minority and, hence, a different course of action was required for the Muslims to retain their independent socio-political identity. The ‘Nehru Report’ proved to be a turning point in his political career, and indeed forced him to move irrevocably towards the Muslim separatist political movement.¹
Allama Muhammad Iqbal, according to the author, occupies a unique place in the odyssey of the Muslim leadership. Allama Iqbal believed that Indian Muslims were not a political community, but, more realistically, a ‘political nationality’². He laid the foundation of his philosophy based on separatism which reached the status of a separate ‘nation’. He identified not only the principal features of a nation but also demonstrated how a nation emerges and grows, and thus based on the historical, religious, economical and political considerations relevant to India, he demanded a separate homeland where Muslims formed the majority. Allama Iqbal’s pen, with poetry or prose, awakened Muslim nationalism and his lyrics were read and recited later on in every meeting and rally of the Pakistan Movement. Allama Iqbal believed that Jinnah was the man who can lead the Muslims and take the Muslim nation to its destination. Indeed, he encouraged Jinnah to come back from England (from his self-imposed exile in the early 1930s) and assume the political leadership of the Muslims. Allama Iqbal spelled out the idea of Pakistan and saw in Jinnah the saviour, the hero, and the game-changer leader who could be the catalyst of the big change. He regularly wrote letters to Jinnah for taking the responsibility of leading the nation. His idea of a separate nation of Muslims went hand in hand with his efforts of prompting Jinnah to return from England and lead them. In the end, Jinnah became convinced of Allama Iqbal’s stance and, after abandoning his self-exile, returned to India to lead the nation on the lines laid down by the Allama, who had advocated a separate homeland for Muslims. Jinnah forcefully demanded it in March 1940 at Lahore.³ In Iqbal’s view, Jinnah was ‘the only Muslim in India to whom the community had a right to look up to for safe guidance through the storm which, he felt, was ‘coming to North-West India and perhaps to the whole of India’.⁴

Allama Muhammad Iqbal, according to the author, occupies a unique place in the odyssey of the Muslim leadership. Allama Iqbal believed that Indian Muslims were not a political community but, more realistically, a ‘political nationality’ . He laid the foundation of his philosophy based on separatism which reached the status of a separate ‘nation’. He identified not only the principal features of a nation but also demonstrated how a nation emerges and grows, and thus based on the historical, religious, economical and political considerations relevant to India, he demanded a separate homeland where Muslims formed the majority. 

The final and sixth character of Pakistan’s story is Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah. According to the author, Jinnah had emerged as a charismatic leader by the end of the 1930s and was the right person for the right job. His task was the most challenging because the Muslim separatism had transformed the community into a politically active entity and a concept of a separate nation in the light of Allama Iqbal’s Allahabad address of 1930, which had begun to take shape very clearly. Jinnah, as a statesman, took time to agree with Allama Iqbal, and eventually came to the same conclusion. As a mature, experienced, and progressive politician, Jinnah explored all political options to work under the Indian Federation by keeping Muslim interests and identity intact under the Government of India Act 1935. However, after reading the Hindus’ mindset and his own experience in dealing with the Congress, Jinnah concluded, thus, that “the Musalmans were in gravest danger”.5 After the sufferings of Congress Ministries which proved to be the last nail in the coffin of ‘composite nationalism’ and united India, Jinnah finally demanded a separate nation-state for the Muslims by carving the Muslim-majority provinces in North-West and North-East of India on March 23, 1940, in Lahore. The timing of the demand, and participation of a wide range of political leadership, particularly of the two main premiers of the Muslim-majority provinces of the Punjab and Bengal, was a proof of his unmatched qualities of leadership. In 1936, the same Muslim leadership in their provinces had refused to contest elections on the  League platform. Now, they had come around to his views and were demanding the partition of India and indeed showed their willingness to achieve Pakistan under his leadership. 
Jinnah’s charisma appeared in full bloom after the Lahore Resolution, as he led the Pakistan movement from the front. He organized and mobilized the Muslim leaders and masses alike by infusing a spirit of nationalism that turned the Lahore Resolution into the Pakistan Movement. With the demand of a separate Muslim nation-state, the sense of separate identity in the Muslims was transformed into a separate nation, resultantly – irrespective of gender, caste, creed, and colour – all the Indian Muslims felt like a separate nation and struggled together to achieve Pakistan. The result was the landslide victory of the general elections in 1945-1946 that validated his ‘Two-nation Theory’ and the demand for Pakistan based on the Lahore Resolution. Jinnah’s methods to achieve his goal of Pakistan were nonviolent, peaceful, and constitutional. He never called for any agitation or provoked his voters and supporters to violate any law. The ‘Great Calcutta Killing’ was not the outcome of his call for the ‘Direct Action Day’. Instead, the Hindu mindset of superiority and local communal tangle caused the riots and bloodshed. Lord Wavell witnessed and recorded more Muslim killings than those of the Hindus and then a chain of Muslim massacres spread throughout India and eventually went on till the Partition in 1947. Jinnah was always open for talks and engaged himself with the Rajagopalachari Formula (1944), Gandhi-Jinnah Talks (1944), and Simla Conferences (1945-46). He adopted constitutional measures; he contested elections, accepted the Cabinet Mission Plan, and finally,  the 3rd June Partition Plan.
Jinnah never ‘bargained’ once he had decided to achieve Pakistan based on the Lahore Resolution. He did not accept the notion that acceptance of the Cabinet Mission Plan was a better option than the Lahore Resolution. Indeed, the Congress leadership misread Jinnah’s mind in accepting the Plan, for ‘tactical’ reasons. It was Congress that rejected it even though it had accepted the short-term part of the Plan, the formation of the Interim Government. Lord Mountbatten observed that India was on the verge of a civil war and decided to scuttle and thus, from the remains of British India, emerged two new countries which were quite contrary to the letter and spirit of the Cabinet Mission Plan. The British departure from India was a ‘shameful flight’. In the process, Jinnah was deprived of his original demand of the full Muslim-majority provinces of the Punjab and Bengal. Instead, he was given husk, maimed, and ‘moth-eaten Pakistan’ that caused the drawing up of new borders which resulted in a huge two-way migration, riots, and bloodshed of millions of people. 
Dr. Hayat, in a successful scholarly endeavour, proved his thesis that Muslim separatism in India was based on historical processes. He argued that the experiences of Muslim leaders from Sir Syed Ahmad Khan to Jinnah passed through a continuously evolving political thought and action, and thus they played a vital role in the long journey of the Pakistan Movement. Forced into a political system where majority rule was inevitable and permanent, the Muslim leaders made a conscious and deliberate effort to protect, promote, and secure Muslim interests and seek a separate homeland for the Muslims. Pakistan was neither the outcome of an imperial design nor was it ‘ordained’, but as the author demonstrated, the result of an ‘instrumentalist’ choice of the makers of Pakistan, these six Muslim political leaders of British India. This was a political struggle, through a political process. Religion served as a basis for the Two-nation Theory. Before the author, many historians have attempted to pen down the Pakistan Movement and the role of the founders of Pakistan, but hardly any of them engaged in historiographic debates and brought forth a clear picture of these leaders both for the scholars and average readers. Of course, there is no final verdict on the subject, but this book has laid a strong foundation for a highly meaningful and comprehensive evaluation of the major leaders of Pakistan. Although the book deals with the ‘high politics’, there is useful information about the masses they led as well. I strongly recommend this book to students, scholars, researchers, and readers for following this thorough and systematic analysis of Muslim separatism and the ultimate achievement of a separate state of Pakistan at the hands of six aforementioned prominent Muslim leaders of British India. Together, these leaders went on to constitute a ‘leadership odyssey’ – an appropriate title of the book. 

The writer is former Dean of Arts and Humanities and Chairman, Department of History and Pakistan Studies at Punjab University.
E-mail: [email protected]

1. Dr. Sikandar Hayat, A Leadership Odyssey: Muslim Separatism and the Achievement of the Separate State of Pakistan, Oxford University Press (2021), p. 161.
2. Dr. Sikandar Hayat, A Leadership Odyssey: Muslim Separatism and the Achievement of the Separate State of Pakistan, Oxford University Press (2021), p. 193.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.
5. Dr. Sikandar Hayat, A Leadership Odyssey: Muslim Separatism and the Achievement of the Separate State of Pakistan, Oxford University Press (2021), p. 236.