Book Reviews 

Stanley WOLPERT, Jinnuh of Pakistan. Published by Oxford 
University Press, 1984. $24.95. PP 421. 
Sharif-AL-MUJAHID, Jinnuh-Studies in Interpretation, Published 
by Quaid-i-Azam Academy, Karachi 1981. $20.00. PP 806. 

Reviewed by: A h  Faisal* 

F e w  individuals significantly altered the course of history. F e w e r  still 
modified t h e  m a p  of the world. Hardly anyone can be credited with 
creating a nation-State. Mohammad Ali J i n n a h  did all three. I t  is 
indeed surprising t h a t  a leader of such s t a t u r e  a n d  achievement should 
have received such scant attention from the historians a n d  biographers. 
Both Gandhi and J i n n a h  were contemporary leaders of t h e  Indian Sub- 
continent and while hosts of books have been written on Gandhi, even 
movies have been made ( “ 9  hours to R a m a ” a n d  “Gandhi”), t h e r e  has been 
very little literature on J i n n a h ,  the creator of Pakistan. Although three 
very little literature on Jinnah, the creator of Pakistan. Although there 
have been a few attempts at sketching a biography of Quaid-i-Azam-as 
J i n n a h  is called by his grateful nation-by some Indian and Pakistani 
writers, there has been hardly any authoritative or sustained study on 
Jinnah, his role in the Pakistan Movement a n d  how it affected the 
political f u t u r e  and geography of the entire Sub-Continent. Hector 
Bolitho was commissioned by the Government of Pakistan in t h e  early 
1950s to write a biography of t h e  Quaid-“Jinnah, creator of Pakistan”, 
but it failed to evoke any excitement or even meet t h e  standards of a 
biography. I t  is exactly after 30 years after Hector Bolitho’s publication 
t h a t  a n  a t t e m p t  has been made by Stanley Wolpert, a professor of history 
at UCLA to reconstruct a chronicle of this pivotal figure in the Indian 
politics d u r i n g  the turbulent decades t h a t  led to the creation of Pakistan. 

Wolpert is a n  old a n d  respected expert on South Asia and has written 
extensively on t h e  politics of the Sub-Continent. H e  brings this intimate 
knowledge and insight of the region to bear upon this excellent 

~~ ~~ 

*Abu Faisal is a pen name of a senior Muslim diplomat in Washington, D.C. 

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biography of the Quaid. The book not only fills the vacuum that has 
existed in the accurate and dispassionate portrayal of Jinnah, but his 
meticulous research and scholarship adds new dimensions to our 
understanding of Jinnah and the momentous events in which he was 
involved. The deification of Gandhi and the distortion of historical facts 
and perspectives through the film “Gandhi” has made i t  essential, 
particularly for the Western public, to get a more balanced view of his 
adversary-Jinnah, and the motivation and inspiration that guided his 
struggle for an independent Muslim nation on the Subcontinent. The 
image of Jinnah as “one of history’s most remarkable, tenacious 
enigmatic figures”, which emerges in Wolpert’s book contrasts sharply 
with the generally held biased view of him as a stubborn and 
unreasonable leader bent on the partition of India. Wolpert deserves 
credit for projection of the personality of the Quaid and the whole 
Muslim League Movement in the correct perspective of the Muslimself- 
determination and tumultous politics of the Sub-Continent. 

JINNAH-STUDIES IN INTERPRETATION is an earlier attempt 
by Prof. Sharif-al-Mujahid, a noted Pakistani historian. However, 
Sharif-al-Mujahid does not attempt a biography of the Quaid in a 
conventional sense but offers interpretations of his role in the Indian 
National Congress, his espousal of the two nation theory, his aversion to 
the style and substnace of the Gandhian politics, and his stress on the 
ideological basis of Pakistan. The eight essays contained in this volume 
deal with Jinnah’s statesmanship and politics in this context. The 800 
page book has the singular merit of some 200 pages of the basic 
documents covering the period 1910 to 1947 and another 80 pages of 
biographical notes on the personalities that have been referred to in the 
text. These notes add enormously to the understanding of the political 
scene and would be a useful tool for any subsequent research. Sharif-al- 
Mujahid maintains that the Pakistan Movement was in the tradition of 
Shah Walli Ullah who represented the Indo-Muslim resistance to the 
concentration of power in the non-Muslim hands. The Movement, 
however, gained momentum because of Jinnah’s “pragmatic, tactful, 
resolute, confident and self-reliant leadership”. One has often heard the 
criticism that any historical research or analysis of politics of the sub- 
continent by a Pakistani scholar is i p s o f a c t o  tainted by subjectivity. 
Mujahid’s book largely escapes such a criticism. Indeed, he has offered 
some interesting and bold analyses and interpretations of Jinnah’s 
address to the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan on 11 August, 1947, 
which have not been received very kindly by the official guardians of 
Pakistan ideology. 

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