December 30, 2006

The Raja of Mahmudabad (1914-1973) was the third of the triumvirate which created Pakistan. As Treasurer he ranked immediately after the President and Honorary Secretary of the All India Muslim League. A prince who would be pauper, he sacrificed his fabulous wealth for the cause of Pakistan, and on the success of his mission, refused to partake of its fruits and retired from politics. He was the only member of the All-India Muslim League hierarchy to undergo ideological stress. He personified the transition from Movement-oriented to State oriented politics in Pakistan.

The Raja of Mahmudabad's endeavors towards the establishment of Pakistan consisted mainly of financing and organizing the Movement. This began with the 1937 Lucknow session of the All India Muslim League. Earlier that year the Muslim League had lost the elections, enabling the Congress to form provincial governments without coalitions. This was the bleakest phase in the Muslim League's history. The Lucknow session was an attempt to set the direction of the All India Muslim League back towards victory. The Raja of Mahmudabad made extended tours of the United Provinces to garner support for his party. He made stirring speeches in Agra, Muzaffarnagar and Amroha among other places. As a result, the Lucknow Session was both well attended and well represented. The premiers of Bengal, Punjab and Assam had accepted invitations.

The Raja of Mahmudabad escorted the Quaid-i-Azam in a procession. He was attired in coarse hand spun clothes and was barefooted. The uniformed volunteers who had come from other cities numbered at least one thousand. The uniforms were green and the procession took four hours to reach Kaiserbagh. The Raja of Mahmudabad, as Chairman of the Reception Committee made an inspiring speech suited to the occasion, "we are not here to follow history, but to create it" The expenses incurred personally by the Raja was Rs. 30,00,000 (thirty lacs) a sum which was more than a fortune in 1937. The Lucknow Session was only the beginning. According to Choudhry Khaliquzzaman, the Raja opened his purse strings to meet election expenses whatever the amount. During the Jhansi by-election for example, the Raja of Mahmudabad gave Rs. 10,000 and a car. The Raja's efforts reversed the effects of the 1937 defeat by winning 86% of the seats in the by-elections.

Apart from helping out during elections, the Raja of Mahmudabad made regular contributions to Dawn. On 1 September 1941, Liaquat Ali Khan wrote to the Raja:

Sometime ago you were generous enough to offer a sum of Rs.300/- per month in connection with Muslim League work. As I told you, it has been decided under the instructions of Mr Jinnah to start an English weekly from Delhi to further the objects of the Muslim League. May I request you to give us the amount you had kindly promised, from October 1941. On 3rd October 1942, he gave a lump sum of Rs.5000, as demanded by the Quaid-i-Azam. All these efforts won him the appreciation of the Quaid-i-Azam. Mr. M.A. Jinnah held in Bombay the largest dinner of his life, inviting 400 guests to honour the Raja of Mahmudabad. "The Raja of Mahmudabad, although young in age," Jinnah told his guests, "is a great man in wisdom and sagacity". This was a momentous tribute, but it unfortunately marked the point from where the tide ebbed.

The Raja of Mahmudabad could afford to make donations to the Muslim League because he held the largest estates in the United Provinces. The Raja has become legendary because he never let his holdings dent his political idealism, and this trait was evident from the beginning. In 1936 when it became evident that the young Raja was about to join the Muslim League, the Governor of UP, Sir Harry Haig tried to dissuade him, asking him to join the National Agriculturist Party instead. When he refused, Haig's threat to confiscate his estate left the Raja unperturbed. He remained indifferent to its fate during the Pakistan Movement. When asked during a public meeting at Lakhinpur Kheri, what would he do, since his estate would not be included in Pakistan, the Raja replied, "I will sacrifice my State for Pakistan".

In 1940, the Raja had decided to renounce his titles to Mahmudabad. It was the Quaid-i-Azam who managed to dissuade him. "When Raja Sahib hesitated, he became awfully angry with him. It was with much difficulty that the Raja Sahib withdrew his letter of renouncement". Mukhtar Zaman was present on the occasion when the Raja had drawn up papers to convert the Mahmudabad Estate into a cooperative making every farmer a shareholder. Raising his voice, he said, "In future, if any inhabitant of the Palace oppresses you, set fire to the Palace."

These egalitarian principles sprang from the religious upbringing of the Raja of Mahmudabad. Addressing girl students at Nagore on 16th October 1943, the Raja said that he had asked his wife and daughter to grind wheat with their own hands. He exhorted the students to follow the example of Hazrat Fatimah Zahra (AS), he advised them to read the Holy Quran carefully. Recently, criticism has been voiced of the Raja's frugality and austerity citing the theory of comparative advantage. We need only to reflect that if the ruling class of Pakistan were in the habit of eating plain meals and wearing modest apparel, the exchequer of the country would not have suffered. By doing his own manual labour, the Raja was setting an example which the poorest farmer of Mahmudabad could follow. It was the dignity of labour which was his ideal, not the division of labour.

Another outcome of his religious idealism was to make him the votary of an Islamic State. It was this idealism which would cause him ideological stress. On 28th July 1940, he wrote to the Quaid-i-Azam:

"But if we can manage to express our own opinions in strict coordination with the Islamic conception of State, then there will be an Ideal, substantial and dynamic enough to take the greatest amount of sacrifice from us. When I say an Islamic State, I do not mean a Muslim State."

Prof Abdul Waheed Siddiqui has counted 90 speeches made by Jinnah between 1940 and 1947 in which he spoke of an Islamic State. Be as that may, these differences over an Islamic State have been documented, by the Raja of Mahmudabad himself, Mirza Abul Hasan Ispahani, Abdur Rahman Siddiqui through Qurrat ul Ain Hyder. However, only one version advances the reasons behind Jinnah's objection, the unpublished autobiography of Isha'at Habibullah.

The Raja started off by saying that since the Lahore resolution had been passed earlier that year, if and when Pakistan was formed, it was undoubtedly to be an Islamic State with the Sunna and Shariah as its bedrock. The Quaid's face went red and he turned to ask Raja whether he had taken leave of his senses. Mr. Jinnah added: `Did you realize that there are over seventy sects and differences of opinion regarding the Islamic faith, and if what the Raja was suggesting was to be followed, the consequences would be a struggle of religious opinion from the very inception of the State leading to its very dissolution. Mr. Jinnah banged his hands on the table and said: We shall not be an Islamic State but a Liberal Democratic Muslim State.

Later in the 1950s, when the Raja was taxed on this point by Qurratul Ain Hyder, he replied that he alone was not to blame. However in the 1940s an Islamic State was not merely an idea hanging in the air. The Raja of Mahmudabad had formed at Aligarh a complete Islami Jama'at cell within the Muslim League. It had published its Aims and Objectives and had appointed a committee of eminent scholars to be the conveners. Among them the figure most familiar to this campus was Dr. M. Afzal Qadri. The very fact that a founder of the Islami Jama'at in India came into conflict with the Jama'at-i-Islami in Pakistan highlights the potential of conflict apprehended by Jinnah. The Raja was the only leader to attempt a stratification of the Muslim League. He recalled that the third rung of its leadership appealed to religious sentiments which explains why a controversy has risen at all. It is possible that by espousing an alternative creed, the Raja was pushing for an alternate leadership. This matter came to the surface on 5th July 1944, when the Raja had put forward the name of his teacher Maulana Ibn Hasan Jarchawi in preference to Allama Raghib Ahsan for the Constituent Assembly:

What is needed there, is, a fair knowledge of constitutional law and parliamentary procedure ... Please do not think that I am trying to make out a case for myself. Far from it. I fully realize my limitations and shortcomings and at this juncture of our political life, I would be the last person to overestimate my capabilities.

Apart from mentioning his conflict with Jinnah over an Islamic State, the Raja, writing in 1970 admitted that he had been wrong and Jinnah right. This realization came years after his uncle Jinnah had been dead. In their lifetime, this difference was causing great tension. On 20th April 1940, the Raja wrote to the Quaid-i-Azam:

I have been lately very ill mentally. My brain works like a wireless in bad atmospherics. I cannot think, and even if an idea comes, it is so mutilated that I myself cannot understand it.

This was a very unusual letter for the Raja to write and an even more unusual letter for Jinnah to receive. It shows that holding up an Islamic State as an ideal to galvanize the Muslims had been a retrospective argument. On the other hand, what Isha'at Habibullah recalls, reveals that Jinnah's objection to an Islamic State was not ideological but practical, even historical. There is one ideological strand on which Jinnah and Mahmudabad were in agreement and that was Islamic Socialism. Apart from having a long Middle East pedigree, this concept had its origin in the so called fundamentalist circle with Syed Qutb and Mustafa al Sibai at its head. Syed Qutb had said in 1948 that Islamic Socialism avoided both the pitfalls of Christianity's separation of religion and society and those of communist atheism. The Quaid-i-Azam mentioned it as an ideal in Chittagong on 26 March 1948, Liaquat Ali Khan said in Lahore on 3rd September 1949. "For us there is only one 'ism' - Islamic Socialism". Fatimah Jinnah stated in Karachi in February 1951 that Islamic Socialism did not allow any class struggle. The Raja of Mahmudabad in Karachi in Katrak Hall in 1967 argued cogently in favour of Islamic Socialism. All these are Muslim League stalwarts, so the question which arises is how is it possible for people to disagree on an Islamic State but agree on Islamic Socialism? The Holy Quran 68:7-14 specifies the types of people who should not be obeyed, it does not proscribe any political system. On the other side, strictures against economic crimes are clear and manifest: Usury, hoarding, gambling, cheating in weights and measures. It is on avoidance of these ills that societies' pillars have to be raised. What structure is to be based on these pillars is again left to society.

Before we end this account of the Raja's role in the Muslim League, we have perforce to touch upon his contribution to its two subsidiary bodies. The Muslim National Guards and the Muslim Students Federation. Raja of Mahmudabad was the founding Chairman of both bodies. He remained head of the National Guards till 1944 and of the MSF till early August 1946, a full year before independence. Why he left the Muslim National Guards is quite clear.

On 28th July 1940 Mahmudabad wrote to Jinnah of his dissatisfaction with Muslim National Guards affairs. He deplored the fact that the organization had been left to the provincial and district bodies of the Muslim League. Instead of being under strict military discipline as he had wanted, the appointment of the guards would be subject to party politics. He complained that organization was proceeding at a snail's pace and the Provincial Commander was beholden to the ML Provincial Committee for even those ordinary things that should not have been their concern. Thus when Nawab Siddique Ali Khan replaced the Raja in 1944, it is almost certain that this change had the Raja's blessings. Firstly because the Raja wanted centralization of the Muslim National Guards which was not forthcoming, and secondly because the Nawab praised the Raja effusively in his memoirs.

With regard to the Muslim Students Federation, the matter is not clear. The Raja presided over MSF meetings generating enthusiasm and funds. Yet Mohammad Noman, the General Secretary, complained to Liaquat Ali Khan on 16th March 1941 of the Raja Sahib's indifference. Liaquat Ali Khan on his part wrote to Jinnah of the Raja's fits of inactivity. Such behavior cannot be reconciled with either the Raja of Mahmudabad's commitment, nor his wealth. A possible clue is provided by a small sentence of the Quaid-i-Azam: "You mean to say that you will not see me until you make your contribution to the League fund?" This underscores the temperament of the Raja. I was told by Professor Mujtaba Husain that when the Rani of Mahmudabad (The Rani of Balehra in her own right) would not allow him to make payments to the Muslim League, the Raja would go on hunger strikes lasting more than three days. In the end she always gave way, still the hunger strikes and the attendant mental strain are enough to explain his fits of inactivity. This explanation does not cover his resignation since two months later, he refused to lend even a thousand rupees to the MSF. His Private Secretary wrote to say that there was no balance in the MSF funds.

The Private Secretary Anwar Husain could not recall this correspondence when I interviewed him on 10th October 1999. Mukhtar Zaman replying to my query only a week before his death gave the bland and unsatisfactory answer that the Raja was "too busy". It is difficult to precisely date the Raja's differences with Jinnah because Anwar Husain said and Ali Mohtashim confirmed that the Raja was called to Jinnah's constituency in Bombay. The Raja with his secretary stayed with Seth Rajab Ali at 13 Motlabai Street. Both Jinnah and Mahmudabad won. When I asked Anwar Husain whether the Raja had developed differences with Jinnah over the issue of an Islamic State, he replied:

There was some coldness over the issue of an Islamic State, but to my knowledge the sharper difference was over the Third June Plan. The Raja Sahib was of the opinion that Jinnah Sahib bide his time and not accept the division of Bengal and Punjab. In the meeting, Jinnah had said: "Amir, sit down".

There was a third and sharper cause of difference. In the aftermath of the 1946 riots when the Raja had already left the MSF he went to the North-West Frontier Province buying up arms to give the Muslims. Jinnah had reprimanded Mahmudabad severely. The reprimand on the Third June Plan was the second one, thus it is no wonder that the Raja in spite of being in Hyderabad (Sindh) on 14th August 1947 had refused to go to Karachi for the Independence ceremony. In all of the three issues, his insistence on an Islamic State, his insistence that Jinnah risk the creation of Pakistan to prevent partition, and taking recourse to violence during the riots, Jinnah was right and the Raja was wrong. Still the situation was emotionally trying. On 16th December 1943, the Raja had written to Jinnah:

But I have nobody except you whom I regard in place of my father and the prodigal son in trouble returns only to his father.

Now in 1947 the son was prodigal and there was no father to return to. The only meeting that the Raja had with the Quaid-i-Azam after independence was when he was made to disembark in Karachi on his way to Lucknow. The scene was stormy but this time quite uncharacteristically the Quaid-i-Azam displayed patience:

Amir! You have no idea of the situation here, I am surrounded by traitors. I can not entrust the fate of Pakistan to them.

According to the Raja the Quaid-i-Azam reiterated the statement twice to him. I on my part need not reiterate how the Raja came to Pakistan after a decade in 1957 and how he left Pakistan, again after a decade in 1967. It is also common knowledge that he shunned the offers of high office given by Presidents Iskander Mirza, Ayub Khan and Yahya Khan. What is noteworthy is that he also fought the temptation to adopt a cheap approach to politics. Addressing a Muslim League meeting in Drigh Road, Karachi he said:

You people complain that provincialism is spreading like an epidemic. Sometimes you blame the Bengalis, sometimes the Punjabis but I tell you that it is you Muhajirs who have spread prejudice by asserting that you have made Pakistan. The Raja of Mahmudabad sacrificed only his wealth, not his nobility.

—The writer is the Editorial Consultant,Oxford University Press

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