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Quid-e-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah (1876–1948)
Politician and the founder of Pakistan
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Quaid-e-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah was born at Karachi
on December 25, 1876. He was a lawyer and politician who fought for the cause of
India's independence from Britain, then moved on to found a Muslim state in
Pakistan in 1947. Jinnah entered politics in India in 1905 and by 1917 his
charisma and diplomacy had made him a national leader and the most visible
supporter of Hindu-Muslim unity. His strong belief in gradual and peaceful
change was in contrast to the civil disobedience strategies of Mohandas Gandhi,
and in the '30s Jinnah broke from the Indian National Congress to focus on an
independent Muslim state. In 1940 he demanded a separate nation in Pakistan and
by 1947 he somehow managed to get it from the British and India. Through civil
wars, a rotten economy and millions of displaced refugees, Quaid-i-Azam
Mohammad Ali Jinnah ("the great leader") pretty much built a country from
scratch.
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Sir Alama Mohammad Iqbal (1877–1938)
Poet, philosopher, and political leader
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Allama Iqbal was born at Silkot on November 9, 1877
and studied at Government College, Lahore, Cambridge, and the Univ. of Munich,
and then he taught philosophy at Government College and practiced law. He was
elected (1927) to the Punjab provincial legislature and served (1930) as
president of the Muslim League. A staunch advocate of Indian nationalism, he
became a supporter of an independent homeland for India's Muslims and he is
regarded as the spiritual founder of Pakistan, and the anniversary of his death
(Apr. 21) is a national holiday. Iqbal was the foremost Muslim thinker of his
period, and in his many volumes of poetry (written in Urdu and Persian) and
essays, he urged a regeneration of Islam through the love of God and the active
development of the self. He was a firm believer in freedom and the creative
force that freedom can exert on men. He was knighted in 1922. His works include
The Secrets of the Self (1915, tr. 1940), and Javid-nama (1934, tr. 1966).
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