Abstract notions like nationalism, secularism, and Islamism still haunts scholars of as real a movement as the one that culminated in the Independence of India and the creation of Pakistan. The politics of the Indian National Congress and the All India Muslim League is compared and contrasted against the backdrop of British imperialism to answer the still elusive question of the raison d’être of the Pakistan movement. The perspectives of the founding fathers of both India and Pakistan, i.e. Gandhi and Jinnah, are vigorously debated by academicians, historians, and politicians across the politico-ideological spectrum. Jinnah: Myth and Reality is an effort by Yasser Latif Hamdani, a well known lawyer and columnist from Pakistan, to argue his position on the life and politics of Muhammad Ali Jinnah in order to suggest a way forward for Pakistani policymakers to tackle the existing problems of the country.
March 2015, volume 39, No 3