Some Portrayals of Jinnah: A Critique by Anil Nauriya
From: Minority Identities and
the Nation-State
by
D.L.Sheth and Gurpreet Mahajan (eds) Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 1999.
Pages 73-112
The rise of Hindutva, particularly
since the eighties, is paralleled by strenuous contemporaneous attempts by
writers like Ayesha Jalal and H.M. Seervai to present a sanitized version of
the politics of M.A. Jinnah. Such accounts have had an appreciable circulation.
Some of the conceptual questions arising on the above basis and having
implications for the notion of ‘minority’ and ‘minority politics’ are dealt
with in this paper.
Part I of the essay
sets out the idea of community-for-itself, a conception which lies at
the core of the later politics of both Savarkar and Jinnah. Part
II examines the extent to which such politics may be seen as nationalist
politics; while Part III discusses the parity theory—that is, the notion that
Jinnah wanted parity rather than partition. Part IV examines the claim that
League politics involved an espousal of ‘civil rights’ or ‘minority rights’ as
against communalist demands. Parts V and VI are concerned
with two occasionally conflicting explanations and descriptions of Muslim
League politics that are currently in circulation. The first depicts this
politics as a reaction to the pre-freedom Congress; the second seeks to set out
League demands as being ‘secular’ in nature. This usage is ostensibly in the
sense of ‘being of this world’, but is loaded with other implications which are
also critically examined.
Essentially, it is
argued that, as with Savarkar, few of Jinnah’s political positions
till the partition of India and formation of Pakistan can find a natural place
in a secular constitution. Some of these may even serve to legitimize a
Hindutva framework. In fact, many of Jinnah’s ideological positions are
comparable to, where they are not drawn from, Hindutva. It
is, therefore, not logically possible to counter Hindutva from a
Jinnahesque political stance.
Those who have been reproducing the standard Jalal-Seervai arguments are, we submit, on a
mistaken track. Without an upright critique of the politics of the
Muslim League, it will not be possible logically or adequately to
counter Hindutva. The notion that Jinnah represented the position of
the Muslims at large prior to 1947 tends to be accepted without
question, As a consequence writers tend to go soft on Jinnah
and his politics lest they be understood as having been harsh to
Muslims as a whole; also, with the exception of a few prominent ones, those
Muslims who struggled for Indian freedom unconditionally, or as plain Indian
nationalists, tend to be ignored in such writings.
I. The
Community-for-Itself Idea
The 1928 All Parties
Conference at which the Nehru Report on framing a constitution for India was
discussed is sometimes presented as marking a ‘parting of the ways’
between Jinnah and the Congress [1].
In fact, matters were more complicated and there was more than one turning
point. The important issue at this stage was to obtain an agreement that would
command wide support. A crucial event that occurred immediately after was the
meeting of the Council of the All India Muslim League, which took place in
March 1929 at Delhi. This meeting has perhaps not received from historians and
other writers the attention that it deserves [2].
The Council of the
League met in Delhi on 29 March 1929, on the eve of the open session of the
League. The 20th Session of the All India Muslim League began on 30 March 1929
with Jinnah in the Chair. On the previous day, the Council of
the ‘Jinnah faction’ of the League had appointed a Committee to
consider Jinnah’s draft resolution and to report upon it the next day. This
Committee consisted of Jinnah, Maulana Azad, Maulana Mohamed Ali,
Malik Barkat Ali, Nawab Ismail Khan, Dr Shafaat Ahmed Khan and Dr
Saifuddin Kitchlew.
The open session of
the Muslim League was attended by Maulana Azad, T.A.K. Sherwani and S.A.
Brelvi. Their participation and the passage of an agreed resolution moved by
Abdul Rahman Ghazi, in the subjects committee was a development of great
significance. The resolution accepted the Nehru Report, subject to five
modifications, one of which was proposed by Brelvi. Dr Mohd. Alam was also
present at this session. The resolution which was passed in the subjects
committee was also passed in the open session but in the absence of Jinnah.
Having been based on approval also by Azad, Sherwani and Brelvi, the Ghazi
resolution signalled the possible evolution of a position between that of the
Congress and the League.
The notion that the
Congress was set against all modifications in the Nehru Report and that the All
Parties Conference in December 1928 was the turning point is put somewhat into
question by the adoption of this resolution by the Muslim League in the
presence of Azad, Brelvi and Sherwani… read more: http://sacw.net/article13396.html
Also see:
Sris Chandra Chattopadhya on the Objectives Resolution, Constituent Assembly of Pakistan March 12, 1949
Communist Party of India Report (1950) - Imperialist aggression in Kashmir
CPI's Dhanwantri report: Bleeding Punjab Warns
Pakistan's Law Minister, Jogendra Nath Mandal's Resignation Letter, October 1950
Remembering Gehal Singh, who gave his life for communal harmony
Communist Party of India Report (1950) - Imperialist aggression in Kashmir
CPI's Dhanwantri report: Bleeding Punjab Warns
Pakistan's Law Minister, Jogendra Nath Mandal's Resignation Letter, October 1950
Remembering Gehal Singh, who gave his life for communal harmony
1948: Assassination of Gandhi
The Abolition of truth: on the Parivar's celebration of Godse
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The Abolition of truth: on the Parivar's celebration of Godse
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