Daily Times

As indicated in Part II of this article, Jinnah, during a broadcast talk to the people of the United States on Pakistan recorded February 1948, said, “…I do not know what the ultimate shape of this constitution is going to be, but I am sure that it will be of a democratic type, embodying the essential principle of Islam. Today, they are as applicable in actual life as they were 1,300 years ago. Islam and its idealism have taught us democracy…” This indicates that he undoubtedly had an Islamic agenda, which he portrayed differently so as to be accepted by the American people.

The fact is that the early Islamic state was a theocratic state that is based on belief of being a slave or submissive to Allah and that is also based on the Allah-and-Prophet-made laws from the Quran/Hadiths. But this Islamic state was not a democratic state that is normally based on personal freedoms of all kinds and founded on a man-made constitution and/or laws of the government of the people, by the people, and for the people all of whom are treated equally regardless of their religions and/or ethnicities. Democracy is a Western concept started by the Greeks (Athenians) in circa 594 BCE, which indicates that it is the Greeks that taught us democracy. So, neither Islam nor its idealism seems to have ever taught democracy to Muslims. Also, Islam (per the Quran) never treats Muslims and non-Muslims equally and the Quran even forbids Muslims to befriend, or ally with, Jews and/or Christians.

Also, during his broadcast talk, Jinnah seems to have appeased the American people just like his hero Sir Syed Ahmad Khan did when he once said this while referring to the British rulers who were Christians: “…God has given us the light of religion and the Quran is present for our guidance, which has ordained them and us to be friends. Now God has made them rulers over us. Therefore, we should cultivate friendship with them…”. But as indicated above, the Quran forbids Muslims to befriend Christians. So, one can conclude that both past leaders who are revered by many Pakistani Muslims occasionally had a similar mindset.

It is a massive myth that Jinnah was a modern-thinking, secular person who envisioned Pakistan to be a secular state that would have a separation of religions and the state matters

2—Jinnah said the following in 1948, in an address to Sibi Darbar: “I have one underlying principle in mind: the principle of Muslim democracy. It is my belief that our salvation lies in following the golden rules of conduct set for us by our great lawgiver, the Prophet of Islam.”

As explained above, in Islam, there is no such thing as a Muslim democracy. The laws given by the “great lawgiver”, which laws are or have been used, for examples, by the Taliban, Al-Qaeda, or ISIS, are as follows: cutting the hands of thieves, lashing the fornicators, stoning the adulterers, two female witnesses equal one male witness, a sister gets half the inheritance that the brother gets, a woman is a property (like a domestic animal) of a man (father, older brother or husband), halala (forcing a divorced woman to marry another man and get a divorce again before she could re-marry her ex-husband), and other laws of Islamic Sharia, many of which have been found to contravene the modern ethics.

3—Jinnah said the following during an address to Karachi Bar Association on 25 January 1948: “I cannot understand the logic of those who have been deliberately and mischievously propagating that the Constitution of Pakistan will not be based on Islamic Sharia. Islamic principles today are as much applicable to life as they were 1300 years ago.”

Jinnah, here, seems to want Islamic Sharia that is reportedly also the main demand of the Taliban, Al-Qaeda, ISIS, and other Islamist organizations, which contains those and many other laws that are mentioned above, and which they want to see imposed in all Islamic countries. Many Islamic Sharia laws, as indicated above, contravene the modern ethics or modern values.

4—A year after founding country Pakistan, Jinnah said the following in a message to the Nation on the first Anniversary of Pakistan on 14 August 1948: “I have full faith in my people that they will rise to every occasion worthy of our’ past Islamic history, glory and traditions”.

Here Jinnah seems to be agitating Pakistani Muslims–essentially giving them a pep-talk like an Islamist leader, by saying “rise to every occasion” while simultaneously referring to the Islamic history which is full of brutal, barbaric, bloody acts committed in over a thousand years of Islamic expansion during which time estimated 80 million Hindus and other non-Muslims were killed/massacred just in the Indian subcontinent alone, It is no wonder why these days Hindu hardliners like Modi and his cronies who seem to have been suddenly awakened to the Islamic history are often in a retaliatory mode against Muslims whose ancestors committed murderous acts in India for many centuries.

5—Jinnah said the following in his reply to an address of the Welcome Note presented by the Parsi Community of Sindh, Karachi on February 3, 1948: “As you may be aware, the Government has been making genuine efforts to allay the fears and the suspicions of the minorities and if their (Hindu minority’s) exodus from Sindh still continues, it is Not because they are not wanted here, but because they are more prone to listen to people across the border who are interested in pulling them out. I am sorry for those misguided people for nothing, but disillusionment awaits them in their ‘PROMISED LAND’.”

Here, Jinnah whose Islamic agenda seemingly is to impose Islamic Sharia, which treats religious minorities separately and which might have justifiably frightened them, calls them out for listening to others across the border and mentions the secular India by sarcastically calling it “PROMISED LAND'” for the apprehensive religious minorities (non-Muslims) in Pakistan. Also, by doing so, he instigates an anti-India sentiment, which, thanks to him and other likes of him these days, is still prevalent in Pakistan. Incidentally, it is worth mentioning that to redress the persecution of the religious minorities of its neighboring Islamic countries, especially Pakistan, the Indian government headed by Modi and his party’s hardliner Hindus has passed the Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019 which grants a citizenship to all non-Muslims seeking a refuge in India from the neighboring Islamic countries.

The 5 examples after the founding of Pakistan and other examples prior to the creation of Pakistan (as detailed in Part I of this article) overwhelmingly show that Jinnah had an Islamic agenda all along and envisioned Pakistan to be an Islamic country with a constitution strictly based on the Islamic Sharia laws, in other words, a theocratic state. Additionally, from these examples, he seemed to have demonstrated to be essentially an Islamist figure just like the Islamist poet Iqbal, the Islamic Pakistan’s dreamer.

So, it is a massive myth that Jinnah was a modern-thinking, secular person who envisioned Pakistan to be a secular state that would have a separation of religions and the state matters.

Further, these examples give credence to mainly a Western viewpoint that not only devout Muslims resist the modernity or modern civilization, but also nominal Muslims who, no matter how highly educated or Westernized they are, can revert to the real Islam—the Quran/Hadiths at any time in their life if they still carry the flame of Islam in their heart, can potentially impede the modernity and/or modern civilization. …To be continued to Part IV.

The writer is based in California, US