Freedom from eternal Hindu scorn? Paradox of Jinnah's Pakistan

Express Tribune

21-06-2025

The writer is a chemical engineer with interest in Society, Politics & Economy. Contact him at: [e-mail]
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The irony of Pakistan's birth is this: the people who would inhabit its land never truly allowed to escape possessive identities, the ancient curse of caste and hierarchy, or the feudal-clientelist systems that still strangle them. They were denied the chance to build a modern state rooted in self-determination and individual rights. Jinnah provided an exit — outwardly embraced but never implemented by the State of Pakistan, yet.
Both Muslims and Hindus were marginalised after the British seized Bengal in 1757. Yet while Hindus adapted, Muslims sank into a slumber of self-condemnation. Even Sir Syed's push for modern education and Iqbal's calls to awaken Muslim potential were met with apathy.
Pakistan was not born from organic grassroots struggle. It emerged unexpectedly — a byproduct of lobbying by Muslim ashraafia in UP, demanding British-granted political rights, employment, and support for business opportunities. These concessions came not from British compassion but to counterbalance Hindu nationalism.
Jinnah and the Muslim League (1906), initially loyal to the British Raj (a shield against Hindu majoritarianism), sought a negotiated constitutional role for Muslims in a united India, mirroring the early Congress demands (1885). But Congress later rejected any reforms for Hindu self-rule that accommodated Muslims. The British, however, enforced electoral reforms and held legislative elections in 1937.
Muslims remained blind to Hindu discrimination, evident in communal violence particularly after Bengal's partition, and to the League's hard-won safeguards like separate electorates (1909). Gratitude failed to translate into votes: The League flopped in 1937. Why?
The answer was naked self-interest. Muslim-majority provinces clung to their feudal strongholds, abandoning the plight of minority-province Muslims — their support could have fortified the League's fight against Hindu domination. Let's see how each province failed to support Jinnah's Nobel cause:
Punjab, ruled by British-crafted feudal-military-bureaucratic loyalists (the future PakRaj), gave the League just 2/84 seats. Sindh, trapped in sufi-wadero culture but resentful of Hindu traders, granted only 3/35 seats. Sindhi nationalists triumphed. NWFP (KPK), obsessed with Pashtun nationalism under the Red Shirts, rejected the League entirely (0/36 seats). Bengal, home to the 1857 Revolt's sepoys, was receptive (40/119 seats), but peasant parties dominated. Balochistan had no elections; Kashmir remained a princely state.
Congress won 8 of 11 ministries but refused to share power, oppressing Muslims under its rule, as documented in Jinnah's 1938 'Suffering Muslim Minorities' report.
A crushing outcome for Jinnah. Yet he didn't give up and reinvented the League: from an ashraafia guild to a mass movement, shifting focus from resisting British to defying Majority Hindu rule. He synthesised Hindu discrimination with religious emotion, weaponised it, and crafted the 'Two-Nation Theory' demanding a separate Muslim state in the 1940 Lahore Resolution. (Congress had demanded full independence in 1930.)
British control waned. Their constitutional reforms — falling short of independence but including Muslim safeguards — were rejected by Congress, radicalising Hindus against both the British and Muslims. Jinnah established that Muslims, a perpetual minority in united India (Hindus 66%, Muslims 24%, 1941 Census), without doubt face eternal discrimination by Hindus' legislative domination - passing laws adversely affecting Muslims, leading to their social, economic and cultural erasure.
The British last-ditch effort to preserve India under a weak federal structure (Jinnah favoured) collapsed due to Congress's objection after the July 1946 elections, splitting the subcontinent: Congress won Hindu support for united India; the League became Muslims' sole voice for Pakistan.
Jinnah's political mantra and surging public sentiment coerced reluctant provinces to switch sides: Sindh endorsed Pakistan first (1943) under GM Syed, backing Jinnah in 1946, though Syed later became disillusioned by Pakistan's federal politics and demanded Sindhudesh. Punjab joined only when Pakistan's inevitability became obvious (1946). East Bengal overwhelmingly accepted Pakistan in 1946. NWFP, perhaps fearing Afghan annexation, agreed but remained immersed in the Pakhtunistan dream. Balochistan was reluctant but coerced (March 1948) and still rebels.
Kashmir, a Muslim-majority princely state, was invaded by Pakistan in 1947 after its Hindu ruler opted for India. India's intervention birthed the Line of Control and conflict between the two nations. India blamed Pakistan for the recent Pahalgam incident and launched retaliatory strikes. However, Pakistan's swift and overwhelming response — leveraging advanced Chinese military technology — forced India into an immediate ceasefire, at least for now.
British intransigence after the January 1946 elections pushed Jinnah to call for Direct Action Day (16 August 1946), triggering Bengal riots that spread nationwide. The Raj's indifference, poor management and hasty withdrawal ignited history's largest migration and over a million deaths. Pakistan — a state for some Muslims of India — was born on 14 August 1947.
Jinnah was fully aware of the new country's socio-political and economic impediments and its "moth-eaten, truncated" territory. Besides, he knew that millions of Muslims spread across India could not benefit from his design, yet he endeavoured to provide freedom to those who did not want it to begin with. Jinnah's calculus — perpetual Hindu domination of all Muslims versus a flawed independent Pakistan — drove him to choose the latter.
The ultimate irony is that post-1857, the British cultivated a Punjab-centric feudal-military-bureaucracy in a close, dependent relationship to secure their rule, which oddly could not help them retain power in India. They never imagined this system would outlive them, morphing into the governing structure of Pakistan, as the PakRaj. Jinnah was acutely aware of their presence and inherent opposition to a modern, democratic, egalitarian Pakistan and their dominance of politics, governance and economy.
Jinnah's stark warning was that while Pakistan could not be easily challenged externally, it would collapse under its own contradictions — the PakRaj, denied genuine and fair democratic rule, resulted in Pakistan's breakup in less than a few decades. Alas!
There is never a precise time to undo past wrongs; one must willfully choose to correct the course — it is always a matter of will.