“Muslim Politics in India, through a Humanist-Modernist Lens”, India Fact, November 11, 2025
“‘…Now, suppose that all English, and the whole English army, were to leave India, taking with them all their cannon and their splendid weapons and everything, then who would be rulers of India? Is it possible that under these circumstances two nations — the Mahomedans and the Hindus — could sit on the same throne and remain equal in power? Most certainly not. It is necessary that one of them should conquer the other and thrust it down. To hope that both could remain equal is to desire the impossible and the inconceivable….’ (1)
The above is an extract from Sir Syed Ahmed Khan’s speech in Meerut in 1888 and is widely considered to be one of the earliest public pronouncements of the two-nation theory. That it culminated in the partition of India in 1947 and remains the founding idea of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan was affirmed in (now) Field Marshal Asim Munir’s infamous speech delivered in April this year (2).
In the 1946 provincial elections, which were held under the system of separate electorates, the Muslim League won more than 80% of the seats reserved for Muslims. While the franchise was limited to property owners rather than universal suffrage, the results conferred political legitimacy on the League’s claim to be the exclusive representative of India’s Muslims. The path to Partition was soon to become a fait accompli (3)……”
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