Jinnah of Pakistan

The old forget - The young don't know

Mausoleum




"You must remember that Islam is not merely a religious doctrine but a realistic and practical code of conduct. I am thinking in terms of life, of everything important in life. I am thinking in terms of our history, our heroes, our art, our architecture, our music, our laws, our jurisprudence....... In all things our outlook is not only fundamentally different but often radically antagonistic to the Hindus. We are different beings. There is nothing in life which links us together. Our names, our clothes, our foods -- they are all different; our economic life, our educational ideas, our treatment of women, our attitude to animals... .... we challenge each other at every point of the compass."

"To yoke together two such nations under a single state, one as a numerical minority and the other as majority, must lead to growing discontent and final destruction of any fabric that may be so built up for the government of such a state."

Pakistan

Quaid-e-Azam
Mohammad Ali Jinnah

Interview with Beverly Nichols, 1943.


Introduction


Mazar-e-Quaid-e-Azam: Symbol of Hope for all Mankind


This Mausoleum enshrines the mortal remains of Quaid-e-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah, Founder of Pakistan and its first Head of State.

Baba-e-Quam Mohammad Ali Jinnah Born in this city on December 25, 1876, he raised it to a pinnacle of glory on August 14, 1947, when he accepted the transfer of power from British hands.

Unique among world leaders he willed a State into being. For Muslims, Pakistan was a murmur on the distant horizon till the Quaid-e-Azam seized the helm. He transformed it into reality.

Undeterred by illness or the dissent of the waverers and faint-hearted he pursued his ideal with a resolute will and an iron determination.

Once a powerful advocate of unity between the Hindu and Muslim nations inhabiting the subcontinent to achieve freedom, he abondoned this solution when convinced of its unreality - that it was unattainable.

For bondage in a spurious unity preached by Congress leaders he propagated freedom through partition and separation of the two feuding nations.

But for long and bitter years the cause he epoused with such inflexible devotion was ridiculed and resisted on false economic and political grounds, ignoring the basic religious issue.

As a result the subcontinent was swept by a holocaust of bloodshed, and human misery. When the Indian National Congress begrudgingly conceded that Partition was inevitable, freedom came overnight to 500 million, with the end of a 200-year struggle against colonial domination.

The Quaid's triumph altered the destinies of one-fifth of the human race. He could well be acclaimed not only the Founder of Pakistan but the real Architect of Freedom for the entire subcontinent.

His victory was immeasurable for it changed the course of world history. It shattered the foundations of an Empire which enveloped the globe - the greatest ever known. European colonialism crumbled with the reduction of its mightiest bastion, the British Indian Empire.

On September 11, 1948, in the city which he had known and loved since childhood, death closed the chapter on the Quaid's incomparable contribution to the liberation of his fellow-men.

But the spirit he invoked endures in the great Resurgence of Islam dedicated to the attainment of Liberty, Equality and a Brotherhood of Man.

His Mausoleum stands on hallowed ground, perpetuating the memory of the Father of the Nation, but to countless millions of all faiths, creeds and races it is a shining symbol of hope for the downtrodden and oppressed among all mankind.

F. D. Douglas

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