Sunday, July 24, 2011

Demand for Pakistan


It was Choudhari Rehmat Ali, a Cambridge student who ionvented the word Pakistan in 1933. He took ‘P’ from Punjab, A from Afghanistan ,‘K’ from Kashmir, ‘S’ from Sind and ‘tan’ from Baluchistan and coined the term Pakistan which literally means ‘Land of the pure in Urdu’. It is to be noted that until 1937 Jinnah and Muslim League dismissed the idea of Pakistan as a students’ ‘Pipe –dream’

.The year 1937 was a turning point in the history of Muslim communalism. In the elections held for provincial legislatures the League won only 109 out of 492 Muslim reserved seats and only 4.8% of total Muslim votes. This poor performance showed the League that its popular base is dismal. Therefore the League raised the cry of Islam in danger and threat from Hindu Raj. Soon they turned a campaign of hatred against the followers of other religions. Jinnah declared that the real aim of the Congress was not independence but a Hindu Raj. The demand for Pakistan inevitably flowed from the politics of fear and hatred adopted by the League after 1937. At its Lahore session in 1940 the League passed the Lahore Resolution demanding a sovereign state for Pakistan on the ground that Hindus and Muslims were two nations.

After the outbreak of the Second World War, Muslim League was fostered by Viceroy Linlithgow who used Pakistan demand to counter the demand of Congress. Muslim league was recognized as the representative voice of Muslims and promised that no political settlement would be made unless it was agreeable to Muslim League.

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