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Home » Modern Indian History » Freedom to Partition (1939 – 1947) » Two-Nation Theory

Introduction

• The two-nation theory  is an ideology of  religious nationalism  which significantly influenced the Indian subcontinent following its independence from the British Empire.
• The plan to partition British India into two states was announced on 3rd June 1947. These two states would be India and Pakistan.
• According to this theory,  Indian Muslims and Indian Hindus are two separate nations, with their own customs, religion, and traditions; therefore, from social and moral points of view, Muslims should be able to have their own separate homeland outside of Hindu-majority India.
• The ideology that religion is the determining factor in defining the nationality of Indian Muslims was undertaken by  Muhammad Ali Jinnah.

Critical events from 1909 to 1947 leading to Partition.

• The partition of Bengal in 1905 served as the first act of the British towards breaking Hindu Muslim unity.
• The reforms introduced a system under which separate electorates were formed, where in only Muslims could vote for Muslim candidates in constituencies reserved for them.
• By so doing the British wanted to promote the idea that the political, economic and cultural interests of the Muslims and Hindus were separate.
• Then, the Montagu Chelmsford reforms or the Government of India Act 1919 in addition to the reserved seats for Muslims.
• However, Following the Chauri Chaura incident(1922) where some British policemen were killed due to some action initiated by the participants of the Non-Cooperation movement, the movement itself was called off by Gandhiji.
• So, now the Muslim leaders felt betrayed since their cause of revolting against the removal of the Caliphate was left unfinished due to the calling off of the movement.
• From that time on, the differences between the Hindus and the Muslims only increased over a period of time and eventually became irreconcilable.
• He argued that Muslims and Hindus constituted two different nation s in themselves and were incompatible.
• At this time, the congress rejected this theory and argued in favour of a united India, based on unity between different religious groups.
• Further, the policy of the British to divide and rule got exemplified in the Communal Award of 1932 . This policy further strengthened the provisions for separate electorates.
• Conclusively, Jinnah in 1940 declared at the Muslim League conference held at Lahore, that “Hindus and the Muslims belong to two different religions, philosophies, social customs and literature. To yoke together two such nations under a single state, one as a numerical minority and the other as a 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”
• The Mission did not accept the demand for Pakistan but allowed for a provision whereby provinces could secede from the Indian Union.
• But, the Congress and the Muslim League interpreted this in their own unique ways.
• There were communal tensions amongst the Hindus and the Muslims in places including Calcutta, Madras, Bombay, Bihar, Punjab
• He was asked by the British government to explore options of creating a united India or the option of partition
• However, the unity signs did not find place, and as a result India and Pakistan dominions were created in 1947

Analysis of Policies/Actions that led to the theory

• The British Colonial state chose to strengthen its power in India by adopting the strategy of dividing social groups and pitting them against each other
• The British said that in order to deal with the problem of Hindu-Muslim discord and in order to avert the threat of Hindu majoritarianism , it was critical to give special representation rights to the minorities.
• Firstly, communities were separated and defined on grounds of religious affiliation. This meant that Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs etc. were treated as separate communities and were given representational rights accordingly.
• Further these communities were believed to be completely different and hostile to each other. Thus, it was argued that only the representatives of each community could represent the interests of that community.
• Thirdly, the British readily accepted the communal spokespersons as the sole representatives of their communities. Towards the end of the British rule, Jinnah was seen as the sole spokesperson of the Muslims in Colonial India, inspite of the fact that other Muslim leaders were present within the Muslim League and in the Congress who were opposed to the idea of Partition.
• Thus, it is evident that Communalism could not have flourished the way it did, without the support of the British Colonial state.
• Thus, the policy of Divide and Rule lead to communalism and further , extreme communalism led to Partition .
• The Indian national movement succeeded in forming an alliance between some classes and communities and in acquiring independence from the British, but it failed to create unity which could have prevented Partition.
• So, what happened in 1947 was a result of the collapse of negotiations between the Congress and the Muslim League.
• One of the reasons for accepting the demand for Pakistan was that the Congress leaders came to the conclusion that the demand was based on ‘popular will’
• It was thought by some that after passions subsided, people would see the futility of Partition and would want to re-unite. 
• The Congress could have opted to oppose the demand for Partition through use of force but this was against its democratic ideals.
• Still, the Congress tried to pressurize the British to transfer power to a united India but didn’t succeed in the endeavour primarily because of its inability to forge a united front with the Muslim League representatives

Eventually, inevitable circumstances led to partition of India into two dominions. However, it all didn’t end here. It was followed by a serious aftermath of communal tensions across the two regions, disturbing peace and stability soon after Independence from British in 1947.

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Two-Nation Theory

• Reference work entry
• First Online: 01 January 2018
• Cite this reference work entry

• Clinton Bennett 4  

Part of the book series: Encyclopedia of Indian Religions ((EIR))

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“Two-Nation Theory” refers to the thesis that Hindus and Muslims in India were two distinct communities that could not coexist within a single state without dominating and discriminating against the other or without constant conflict; it resulted in the 1947 Partition of India and Pakistan.

Locating the Theory’s Origin

The exact chronology of how “Two-Nation Theory” developed is subject to debate. Often associated with the thinking of Sir Syed Aḥmad Khān (1817–1898), some identify Aḥmad Sirhindī (1564–1624) as the theory’s “chief architect” [ 1 ]. Muḥammad Iqbāl (1877–1938) is often credited with explicitly proposing the geopolitical partition of India into two separate states [ 2 ]. However, his state would have been within a federal India, a state within a state [ 3 ], a proposition that Abū’l-A‘lā Mawdūdī (1903–1979) also supported [ 4 ]. The specific proposition to create two sovereign political entities, one with a Muslim, the other a Hindu majority, dates from Raḥmat ‘Alī...

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Bennett, C. (2018). Two-Nation Theory. In: Kassam, Z.R., Greenberg, Y.K., Bagli, J. (eds) Islam, Judaism, and Zoroastrianism. Encyclopedia of Indian Religions. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-024-1267-3_2003

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Two Nation Theory, History, Features and Impacts

Two-Nation theory was principal architect by Sir Syed Ahmed Khan. Read all the details related to two nation theory, History, Features and Impacts for UPSC Exam.

Table of Contents

Two Nation Theory

Following its independence from the British Empire, the Indian subcontinent was heavily affected by the two-nation theory, a religious nationalism ideology. On June 3rd, 1947, the proposal to divide British India into two nations was made public. India and Pakistan would be these two nations.

From a social and moral standpoint, Muslims should be able to have their own homeland outside of India, which has a majority of Hindus, because Indian Muslims and Indian Hindus are two distinct countries with their own customs, faith, and traditions. Muhammad Ali Jinnah developed the viewpoint that an Indian Muslim’s nationality is determined by their faith. Learn everything there is to know about the Two Nations theory for the UPSC exams.

Read about: Indian Independence Act 1947

Two Nation Theory History

A distinct state for Muslims in the subcontinent was emphasised by the two-nation theory. History plainly demonstrates that Muslim nationalism developed after the arrival of Islam on the subcontinent because it was impossible for Muslims and Hindus to coexist without nationalism showing up.

Muslim scholars made an effort to maintain the purity of Islam in response to the Bhakti movement, Deen-e-Ilahi, and other similar philosophies that sought to incorporate Islam into Hinduism. The two-nation theory emerged after the British occupation of the subcontinent due to Hindu dominance, Muslim backwardness, and the danger to their existence, as well as sporadic clashes between Hindus and Muslims.

According to the idea, Muslims are a distinct nation with unique culture, heritage, values, and civilization. The Congress party favored maintaining India’s unity as a secular nation where all faiths are treated equally. However, the two-nation theory led to the division of British India and the creation of Pakistan and India as distinct countries.

The controversial Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), which was approved in the Indian parliament later that year after more than 70 years, led to widespread protests across the nation. With one specific restriction: these refugees cannot be Muslims, the bill was approved to provide a route to citizenship for refugees who came to India from Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Afghanistan.

Read about: Mountbatten Plan

Two Nation Theory Feature

Sir Syed Ahmad Khan was regarded as the main architect of the Two Nation Theory because he used a novel figure of speech to convey the development of the Islamic identity. The Indian subcontinent was primarily impacted by the two-country hypothesis, a strict patriotism ideology, after it gained independence from the British Empire. The two-Nation Theory is a political theory that supports dividing India officially into Pakistan and India.

Sir Syed Ahmad Khan was regarded as the main architect of the Two-Nation theory because he used a novel figure of speech to convey the development of the Islamic identity. The Indian subcontinent was primarily impacted by the two-country hypothesis, a strict patriotism ideology, after it gained independence from the British Empire. The two-Nation Theory is a political theory that supports dividing India officially into Pakistan and India.

Read about: Direct Action Day

Two Nation Theory Impact

Bengal and the North Western Regions served as the birthplace of Muslim ministries. Having gained power through the different electorate framework, some Muslim pioneers have since begun to consider changing the beneficial separate electorate framework into a different patriot theory known as the two-country hypothesis, which claims that Muslims in India fundamentally changed the country in terms of its social, mental, and political makeup.

Sir Syed Ahmad Khan (1817–1898), who started the development of Muslim self-arousal and personality, was the first to articulate this idea. Sir Syed Ahmad forbade the Indian Muslim population from fading over to the Congress nationalist movement. He clarified that Indian Muslims put together their own nation and, for their own best interests, shouldn’t support Congress-driven movements for self-rule. His idea was well received by the early aristocrats, who needed allies to cope with the Congress-promoted development of Indian nationalism.

The Muslim League, which was doomed until 1929, gradually became the vehicle for Muslim governmental issues in Bengal and other Muslim majority regions after the congress’s non-co-activity of the Diarchy constitution at the common level alienated extensive Muslim political components from the patriot legislative issues of the Congress. At the Muslim League meeting in December 1930, writer and scholar Sir Muhammad Iqbal’s official position established the theoretical framework for the two-country hypothesis.

Read about: Interim Government

Two Nation Theory UPSC

When the Interim government and attempts at dialogue and negotiation with the Muslim League failed, the Congress agreed to the proposal for Pakistan. Even so, the Congress tried to persuade the British to hand over power to a united India, but it was unsuccessful in its efforts largely because it was unable to form a solid coalition with the Muslim League representatives.

India was divided into two dominions eventually as a result of unavoidable events. But this wasn’t the end of it all. Soon after the two regions gained independence from the British Empire in 1947, it was followed by a severe aftereffect of communal tensions that disturbed peace and stability.

Read about: Muslim League

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Who proposed two nation theory?

Sir Syed Ahmed Khan was credited with being the main architect of the Two-Nation theory because he gave the search for Islamic identity a contemporary idiom.

Who fathered the two nation theory?

The theory that religion is the determining factor in defining the nationality of Indian Muslims was promoted by Muhammad Ali Jinnah and became the basis of Pakistan Movement.

What was the concept of two nation theory?

The two nation theory is based on the hypothesis that Muslims differ from Hindus in terms of religious, cultural, social and daily life and that they must establish an independent Muslim state in which they can live freely their identities.

What is two nation theory by Jinnah?

Declaring Islam was endangered by a revived Hindu assertiveness, Jinnah and the league posited a “two-nation theory” that argued Indian Muslims were entitled to—and therefore required—a separate, self-governing state in a reconstituted subcontinent.

What are the reasons of two nation theory?

The Two Nation Theory was preaching that both the two major communities in India namely the Muslims and the Hindus wanted their own territorial boundaries which they could rule. The reason it was proposed was because both the communities had unmatched religion, social, political and cultural beliefs.

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• Indian History /

What was the Two Nation Theory?

• Updated on  
• Dec 14, 2023

The famous Two Nation Theory is actually the foundational basis of the creation of Pakistan. In simple words, this theory states that the Hindu and Muslim communities cannot coexist within the same state without discriminating or ending up in conflicts. Although the state of India initially rejected the theory and chose to be a secular state, the nation ended up dividing into two different countries. Wondering how did it all happen? Let’s find out together. 

Table of Contents

• 1 Who Proposed the Two-Nation Theory and When?
• 2 History of the Two-nation Theory
• 3 Events that Led to the Partition of India
• 4 What was the Outcome of the Two Nation Theory?
• 5 FAQs 
• 6 Relevant Blogs

Who Proposed the Two-Nation Theory and When?

The origin of the Two-Nation Theory is a debatable topic. However, the two popular names that are often associated with are Sir Syed Ahmed Khan and Muhammad Ali Jinnah .  

Sir Syed Ahmed Khan

• Sir Syed Ahmed Khan was born on 17 October 1817.
• He was among the most prominent Muslim scholars.
• Interestingly, he is also widely recognized as the father of the Two Nation theory. 
• Sir Syed Ahmed Khan advocated for the rights and education of the Muslim community in India.

Muhammad Ali Jinnah

•  Muhammad Ali Jinnah was born on December 25, 1876.
• He was a famous lawyer and politician.
• Jinnah was an advocate of Sir Syed Ahmed Khan’s Two Nation theory.
• During his lifetime, he advocated for the rights of Muslims and demanded a separate independent nation to form a Muslim-majority state.

Also Read: Ghadar Movement: Motives, Achievements and Drawbacks

History of the Two-nation Theory

The Two-Nation Theory was not an unplanned move. Instead, it was the result of years-old boiling tensions between communities of the Indian subcontinent. Here is the historical overview of the two-nation theory:

• India consisted of both Hindus and Muslims which often ended up in grave conflicts over religious and communal differences.  
• Muslims believed that they were living in a Hindu-dominated country which made it difficult for them to live peacefully as a marginalized group. 
• The British forces implemented policies that ultimately strengthened the rising communal tensions in the country. This gave them an edge over who they were ruling. 
• Certain influential people such as Muhammad Ali Jinnah and Chaudhary Rahmat Ali emerged as key individuals who advocated for the rights of the Muslim community.
• Many people also raised their voices against the inadequate safeguard system for Muslims in the country. This ignited demands for a separate homeland.

Also Read: Kheda Satyagraha

Events that Led to the Partition of India

Also Read: Peasant Movements: Causes, features and Impact

What was the Outcome of the Two Nation Theory?

Lord Mountbatten, the last Viceroy of India announced the partition of India into Muslim-majority and Hindu-majority countries. While the plan was made to ensure a smooth transition to the country’s independence, it unlocked countless conflicts and tension that the country had ever witnessed. 

• The date for partition was set to be August 15, 1947. 
• Cyril John Radcliffe, a British lawyer, was asked to demarcate the country into two separate states. This division came to be known as the Radcliffe Line and was drawn hastily which resulted in the displacement of thousands of people. 
• The nation witnessed massive migration with people leaving their ancestral homelands to establish their lives in a new and foreign state. 
• Similarly, communal violence was at its peak with thousands of people brutally killed and looted from both communities. 
• Women and young children were at the forefront of the violence. Many of them raped, kidnapped, tortured, converted, and married against their own will.

The idea of Pakistan goes back to 1993. It was during this time when Choudhry Rehmat Ali, a Cambridge University student, came up with the idea of a Muslim nation that he called Pakistan or Pak-stan. He included the provinces of Punjab, Sind, Balochistan, Kashmir, North-west Frontier Province, and some parts of Afghanistan.

Mohammed Ali Jinnah is known as the father of Pakistan. He was born in 1876 on December 25 in Karachi, India (now in Pakistan). He was a courageous Indian Muslim politician as well as the first governor-general of Pakistan from 1947 – 1948.

The Two-Nation theory formed India and Pakistan into two separate independent and autonomous nations.  

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The Two-Nation Theory: A Failed Solution to the Religious Divide in British India

• Jai Malhotra Riverdale Country School
• Ellen Baker Riverdale Country School

The Indian Partition in 1947 split India into two independent nations: post-partition India was required to remain secular with a Hindu majority and post-partition Pakistan was required to remain secular with a Muslim majority. Unavoidably, the partition uprooted fifteen million people from their homes; Indians and Pakistanis scrambled to live with their respective religious groups. Although politicians intended for the split of pre-partition India to exterminate religious hatred, violence continued. Between one and two million people died – preceding and following the partition -- due to widespread religious violence, disease, and starvation. This essay will examine the progression of the Two-Nation Theory, and how it contributed to the Indian Partition. Understanding one of the main causes of partition will help to provide historical context for the everlasting religious division between Hindus, Muslims, and Sikhs.

References or Bibliography

Dalrymple, William. “The Great Divide: The Violent Legacy of Indian Partition.” The New Yorker, June 29th, 2015, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/06/29/the-great-divide-books-dalrymple .

Goyal, Divya. “On 107th birth anniversary, a ‘homecoming’ for Saadat Hasan Manto.” The Indian Express (Ludhiana), May 14th, 2019.

Hajari, Nisid. Midnight’s Furies: The Deadly Legacy of India’s Partition. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2015.

Khan, Yasmin. The Great Partition: The Making of India and Pakistan. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2007.

Metcalf, Barbara D., and Thomas R. Metcalf. A Concise History of Modern India. Cambridge University Press, 2012.

Tunzelmann, Alex von. “Who Is to Blame for Partition? Above All, Imperial Britain.” The New York Times, August 18th, 2017.

How to Cite

• Endnote/Zotero/Mendeley (RIS)

Copyright (c) 2023 Jai Malhotra; Ellen Baker

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License .

Copyright holder(s) granted JSR a perpetual, non-exclusive license to distriute & display this article.

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Today's Paper | May 26, 2024

The two-nation reality versus theory.

Just three days after Pakistan observes March 23 as the Pakistan Day to mark the anniversary of the adoption of the Lahore Resolution in 1940, Bangladesh observes March 26 as its own Independence Day. The proximity of these two historic dates — March 23 and 26 — highlights the contrasting contexts through which the two countries that once together represented a single entity view them.

In 2021 there is special celebration because it marks the 50th year of that country’s independence. It was on that day in 1971, when General Yahya Khan, who was the president and the commander-in-chief of Pakistan Army at the time, committed the second catastrophic error of that year by launching Operation Searchlight.

The aim of the operation was to crush the non-violent but also violent civil disobedience movement of the Awami League that had begun on March 1 in response to the first catastrophic blunder by the same general; the last-minute postponement of the first session of the newly-elected National Assembly set for March 3. That first error was compounded by the failure to specify a fresh date. This came five days later and set March 25 for the session. By then, however, trust had been totally shattered.

For the record, the same General Yahya Khan took three wise, progressive actions in 1970. Two of them directly benefitted Bengali East Pakistanis. The first was the decision to hold elections on the basis of one-adult-one-vote. This would accurately reflect the fact that the majority of the country’s population lives in East Pakistan, a fact not previously electorally recognised. The second action was the conduct of the elections themselves in December 1970 on a free and fair basis which alone enabled the massive victory for the Awami League. The third positive action was the abolition of One Unit in West Pakistan and the restoration of the four provinces in what at the time was West Pakistan.

The first of the two dates, March 23, is a landmark in the continuing evolution of Muslim nationalism in South Asia and the struggle for a new nation-state in Muslim-majority regions, East and West. The Lahore Resolution was formally introduced by Fazlul Haq, a veteran leader of Bengal. The second date, March 26, is when the descent into disintegration began of the nation-state established on August 14, 1947. This occurred nine months later on December 16, 1971. That change was enforced only because India’s armed forces — hugely outnumbering the under-resourced Pakistani forces — blatantly violated the territorial sovereignty of East Pakistan on November 21, 1971.

Yet, despite that surgical separation, there remains a binding umbilical cord between the two parts that were previously together for over 24 years. That chord is the basic thematic synergy between the two dates. They have become enduring milestones to mark the predominantly Muslim national identities of both Pakistan and Bangladesh. Though there are multiple definitions of what constitutes a ‘nation’, there is also unanimity that nations certainly exist.

Even before the violent conflict of nine months, Bengali East Pakistanis had justifiably felt they were the victims of discrimination by West Pakistanis. Though significant development took place in East Pakistan after independence, the quantum was not enough to make up in only 24 years for the long neglect of Bengal for about 200 years — first by the British East India Company and then by the British government itself.

Rejection of state, not Muslim identity

On March 26 and December 16, 1971, East Pakistan rejected the state structure of the original edifice of Pakistan. However, by becoming Bangladesh, the people of what once used to be East Bengal reaffirmed with passion their abiding belief in the Two-Nation Reality; that Muslims and Hindus are two distinct, separate nations. Neither in 1971 nor today in 2021 does Bangladesh want to reunite itself with Hindu West Bengal. Nor does it want to be absorbed into India. The pride the people of Bangladesh feel about being Muslims is fully evident in Article 2A of their Constitution. While aptly recognising the equal respect owed to other religions, Article 2A begins with the categorical statement: “The state religion of the Republic is Islam …”

By dictionary-definition, a theory is a “supposition or a system of ideas intended to explain something …” In practical terms, reality comes before theory. Because a theory seeks to ‘explain’ what already exists. Gravity, for instance, existed long before Newton formulated the theory.

Muslims of South Asia — notwithstanding their numerous internal diversities of languages and ethnicities — were long possessed of a sense of being a nation, co-existing with a broad Hindu nation — with its own vast internal diversities — in the same region.

Historic origins

The evolution of the Two-Nation Reality has been taking place in two major dimensions and phases. The first dimension is territorial and pre-Muslim. It began about 7,000 years ago with Mehergarh in Balochistan preceding Moenjodaro in Sindh by about 2,000 years as part of the Indus Valley civilisation, which gave way to the ascent of Buddhism as seen in Taxila and Swat. Except for about 700 years (Mauryan BC — Turko-Mughal-British ) the areas that now constitute Pakistan were autonomous, locally-ruled or mostly dominated by forces from West and Central Asia.

The second phase commenced about 1,300 years ago. It added a new religious Muslim dimension to the territorial, ancestral, cultural heritages already there, later blending with mass migration from the east of the Indus post-1947. The advent came with the first Muslims moving into South Asia in the 7th and 8th centuries, be they newly-converted Arab Muslim traders setting foot on the Kerala coast of south-west Asia or, a few decades later, Muhammad Bin Qasim’s invasion of Sindh. As early as the 11th century, the sharp contrasts between Muslims and Hindus in the region were noted by the formidable Persian scholar-traveller, Abu Rayhan Al Biruni, who visited South Asia in 1017 and then wrote a classical treatise. Numerosity grew through migration from Central and West Asia, permanent settlements, peaceful conversions of indigenous people by Sufi saints, transient conquests, long-term control, and minority Muslim rule over a Hindu majority. With the end of the Mughal dynasty in 1857, there began a new critical phase of about 90 years.

The masterful historian, the late K.K. Aziz — who is far less acknowledged in popular discourse than his exhaustive research and outspoken analysis deserve — maps the evolution of the second phase of the Reality and Theory with 170 stages between 1857 and 1940 in his great study: A History of The Idea of Pakistan . The first stage is on June 24, 1858, when John Bright, a Member of the House of Commons in London, proposed that “five or six large presidencies with complete autonomy, ultimately becoming independent states” should form the British response to 1857.

How prescient. Yet, as pointed out in a previous essay by this writer ‘ Saving the Quaid ; Dawn; Dec 25, 2020], the British government strongly opposed the creation of an independent Pakistan throughout the first six years of the 1940s.

K.K. Aziz continues to trace the path to Pakistan by naming several individuals, organisations and events that advanced the passage. Sir Syed Ahmad Khan helped empower Muslims through education. Ironically, vital contributions obliging Muslims to think of themselves as a separate nation were made by the emergence of exclusivist Hindu forums in the second half of the 19th century and the first three decades of the 20th century. These included the Arya Samaj, Hindu Mahasabha, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and others.

Iqbal, Rehmat Ali, Jinnah

In his presidential address at the Muslim League’s annual session in Allahabad in December 1930, Allama Iqbal stated: “I would like to see the Punjab, North West Frontier Province, Sindh and Balochistan amalgamated into a single state. (Writer’s note: by ‘state’ he meant ‘province’). Self-government within the British empire or without the British empire the formation of a consolidated North West Indian Muslim state appears to me to be the final destiny of the Muslims at least of North West of India.”

Therefore, credit is rightly attributed to him for being so specific about the Muslim aspirations for autonomy on a regional basis. But there was a notable lack of clarity and consistency. For instance, about 10 months later in a rejoinder-letter published in The Times , London, on October 12, 1931, to correct a misinterpretation of his Allahabad address, Allama Iqbal wrote: “I do not put forward a demand for a Muslim State, outside the British empire, but only a guess at a possible outcome in the dim future of the mighty forces now shaping the destiny of the … subcontinent. No Indian Muslim with any pretence to sanity contemplates a Muslim state or series of states in North West India outside the British Commonwealth of nations as a plan of practical practice.” Nevertheless, Allama Iqbal continued to emphasise the need for a special status of the Muslim community.

The name and the rationale

It was Chaudhri Rehmat Ali’s invention of the word ‘Pakistan’ and his absolutist focus on a new sovereign entity by that name which makes him the first individual to set down in explicit terms the definitive foundation for the Reality and Theory. His rationale for Pakistan reflected persuasive lucidity. Even a brief excerpt from Now or Never , the pamphlet he wrote and published in 1933, is pungently correct and eloquent:

“India, constituted as it is at the present time, is not the name of one single country; nor the home of one single nation. It is, in fact, the designation of a state created for the first time in history, by the British. It includes peoples who have never previously formed part of India at any period of its history; but who have, on the other hand, from the dawn of history till the advent of the British possessed and retained distinct nationalities of their own.

“In the five Northern Provinces of India, out of a total population of about forty millions, we, the Muslims, constitute about thirty millions. Our religion, culture, history, tradition, economic system, laws of inheritance, succession and marriage are basically and fundamentally different from those of the people living in the rest of India. The ideals which move our thirty million brethren in-faith living in these Provinces to make the highest sacrifices are fundamentally different from those which inspire the Hindus. These differences are not confined to the broad basic principles — far from it. They extend to the minutest details of our lives. We do not inter-dine; we do not inter-marry. Our national customs and calendars, even our diet and dress, are different”.

Like a superb athlete charged to run — and win — the last lap in a relay race, the supreme credit for transforming the Reality and Theory into the solid form of a new nation-state goes to Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah alone.

The Quaid's openmindedness

It is relevant to remember that, as demonstrated by the Quaid, the Reality and Theory were accommodative and flexible — up to a point. As late as in the second half of 1946, the Muslim League accepted the Cabinet Mission Plan. This formula called for a single, confederal-type state inclusive of Muslim-majority units with the option to reconsider continued association, or secession after 10 years. Nehru and Patel sabotaged the Plan after having initially agreed. This left the Quaid with no choice but to revert to the demand for an independent, sovereign Pakistan.

Yet the Quaid remained open even to radical new options. In May 1947, when Hussain Shaheed Suhrawardy proposed a sovereign, united Bengal, Mr. Jinnah fully endorsed the concept. The Congress rejected the proposal because it did not want the Hindu minority of West Bengal to be ruled by an overall Muslim majority.

The Reality and Theory are sometimes misrepresented by detractors as a vision based on hatred of Hindus. At not a single point in their contributions to the process did Allama Iqbal, Chaudhri Rehmat Ali or Muhammad Ali Jinnah ever express hatred. Nor did they stoke xenophobia against Hindus or Sikhs or the followers of other faiths. They simply stressed the stark difference of identity markers between the two communities — to show that Muslims were far too numerous and separate from Hindus in fundamental ways to allow their future to be determined on the simple ‘majority’ principle of democracy. Because, to accept that principle would mean that Muslims could never hope to shape the policies, conditions and environment in which they live — as Hindus would always be in the majority.

The worsening condition of Muslims in India since 1857 under the Brit-ish rule and post-Independence in 1947 under the Hindu-dominated Congress rule became increasingly visible. So obvious was the discrimination that the Sarkar Committee appointed during Congress rule in the 1990s concluded that the majority of Indian Muslims were in a more depressed condition than even the ‘untouchable’ Dalits. The slide has become faster after 2014 with the takeover of the Indian state by the fascist, extremist Hindu-majority forces of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP and RSS).

Opposed to partition

So inclusive and pluralist is the Two-Nation Reality and Theory that even in May 1947, just three months before independence, Mr. Jinnah strongly and urgently requested British Prime Minister Clement Atlee to reject the partition of Punjab and Bengal that was being urged by the Congress and Viceroy Mountbatten. The Quaid wanted large numbers of non-Muslims — Hindus and Sikhs — to remain in their ancestral homes and become citizens of the new state of Pakistan without facing sudden displacement and insecurity. His speech of August 11, 1947, unequivocally projected the synergestic dimension of the philosophy of Pakistan.

The Two-Nation Reality is cognisant of hard facts not oblivious to them.

The larger scale of Muslim nationalism respects the loyalty of Muslims resident in the different states of South Asia to their respective countries. This is a harmony between two levels of identity. There is no contradiction in the coexistence of fealty to a particular state of which Muslims are citizens and, on the level of personal religious belief, their adherence to Islam, or their pride in their own local ancestries of tribes, clans, communities, dialects, traditions etc.

From two states to three states

From the Two-Nation-Two-State stage of evolution reached in 1947, the Reality moved to a new Two-Nation-Three-State stage in 1971 because South Asian religion-based Muslim nationalism had always encompassed streams of region-based identity. One such form is Bengali Muslim nationalism as in Bangladesh, Pakistani Muslim nationalism as in Pakistan, Indian Muslim nationalism as in India. The first of these is ethnically and linguistically homogenous. The second and third are ethnically and linguistically diverse. Muslims in Nepal, Sri Lanka and the Maldives are also conscious of their exclusive Muslim identities distinct from their fellow non-Muslim citizens.

On certain occasions, the religious affinity may transcend national borders. There are both positive and negative aspects to this linkage. Pakistani Muslims will travel across the border to pay respects at the shrines of Hazrat Nizamuddin Aulia in Delhi and Hazrat Khawaja Moinuddin Chishty in Ajmer. Indian Hindus have travelled to pay homage to the historic temple in Hingol, Balochistan, and in Sadhubela, Sukkur. But when extremists in India attack Muslims in India, or when extremists in Pakistan attack temples in Pakistan, then the solidarity and sympathy crosses territorial frontiers. Governments protest that such expressions of sympathy violate principles of non-interference in internal affairs. The dilemma continues.

Like the South Asian region, there are other regions in which national identities shaped by religious faith — or vice versa — have also featured simultaneous affinities with other levels of identity. For instance, in Europe. At one end of its Western, off-shore extreme, Northern Ireland is the scene where violent conflict raged for decades in the 20th century due to conflicts between Catholic and Protestant sects — with loyalties divided between predominantly Protestant United Kingdom and the predominantly Catholic Republic of Ireland.

At the other extreme in south-eastern Europe, the bloodshed that erupted in the early 1990s with the disintegration of Yugoslavia into Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo prominently reflected the conflict between adherence to faith and citizenship-loyalty to old or new state entities.

As it has done over the past 1,300 years, the Two-Nation Reality will continue to evolve in the eras to come. Humanity’s willingness to accept new forms of mass organisation will be a determinative factor. But in its own parameters, the Reality will hopefully move from its first stage of concretisation — the formation of two major Muslim nation-states in South Asia and others in which Muslim nations reside in large or in small numbers — to the next stages of progress. After the acceptance of the first of 3Ds, the ‘Distinctiveness’ of Muslims, the Reality will address the challenges of the second ‘D’, which is equitable ‘Development’, an advancement that will erode disparities of gender, income, race, faith and political power. Perhaps this will take several decades. Perhaps less. The effort is well worth making — to approach the third ‘D’, a ‘Destiny’ that fulfils the aspirations of the Muslims of South Asia. The next phase will be subject to multiple factors; some within the control of states, some not so. March 23. March 26. They may be markers of convergence or divergence, but what they represent for sure is remarkable endurance.

The writer is an author of, among other books, ‘Pakistan: Unique Origins; Unique Destiny?’

Published in Dawn, March 23rd, 2021

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• What Was The Concept Of Two Nation Theory

What was the concept of two nation theory?

The Two-Nation theory stated that Hindus and Muslims in India are two distinct communities that could not exist within a single state without dominating and discriminating against the other or without constant conflict.

It was the principal reason that led to the partition of India in 1947. The state of India officially rejected the two-nation theory and chose to be a secular state, enshrining the concepts of religious pluralism and composite nationalism in its constitution.

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Two Nation Theory: The Myth, The Reality

One lesson I have learnt from the history of Muslims. At critical moments in their history it is Islam that has saved Muslims and not vice versa. (Sir Muhammad Iqbal)

Why Ideology of Pakistan is Important:

Today the world community comprises of more than 180 countries. Pakistan appeared on the world map in August 1947, and became the first Islamic ideological state of the modern times. Unlike the non-ideological states, it was not established due to any geographical conflict or territorial domination by a group of people. If the ideology of such a state like Pakistan is dead then its existence can be questioned. Therefore, Pakistan cant exist if there is no more ideology of Pakistan.

Pakistan is an ideological state established in the name of the Islam. But on the 31st of December 1971, this land of ours, lost its east wing. And East Pakistan emerged on the world map as Bangladesh. The then prime minister of India Ms. Indra Gandhi claimed that the birth of Bangladesh is the death of the two-nation theory If, as said, the ideology of Pakistan came to an end in 1971, then the objective behind the creation of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan would have come to an end too.

Purpose of Pakistan

The breakup of the country in 1971 raised cynical eyebrows about national identity and gave rise to the theory of sub-nationalities on the basis of race, religion and language. Thus questions are being asked about the very existence of Pakistan.

The debate about the motivating force behind the making of Pakistan has been one endless exercise. Was there any need of Pakistan at all? Is this just another Muslim state like many others? Was creation of Pakistan a conspiracy of the British and/or of Muslim League? Was it to retrieve the ancient glory of the Islamic era, or to find a base for the reconstruction of Islamic thought and the resurgence and re-adaptation of its message to our day and age? Was Pakistan created accidentally? Was the sacrifice of thousands of Muslims in 1947 useless? Should Pakistan and India be merged together to form Akhand Bharat to restore peace in the Sub-continent?

What is Two Nation Theory?

Two-Nation theory is the basis of creation of Pakistan. It states that Muslims and Hindus are two separate nations from every definition; therefore Muslims should have a separate homeland in the Muslim majority areas of India, where they can spend their lives according to the glorious teachings of Islam.

If Muslims of the sub-continent comprise an Islamic nation then they have the right to have separate homeland as Muhammad Ali Jinnah, (in his address to the annual session of Muslim League) mentioned and I quote:

History has presented to us many examples, such as the Union of Great Britain and Ireland, of Czechoslovakia and Poland. History has also shown to us many geographical tracts, much smaller than the sub-continent of India, which otherwise might have been called one country, but which have been divided into as many seven or eight sovereign states. Like-wise, the Portuguese and the Spanish stand divided in the Iberian Peninsula.

The Definition Of Nation

The significance and reality of Pakistan has not been fully understood in the west. To the west, nationality based on religion is an alien and often-incomprehensible phenomenon. This is because religion in the West has come to play such a restricted role. In the West, Germans and French are accepted as two separate nations. However, the fact of Hindus and Muslims in India representing two separate cultural entities is seldom appreciated. A young French student may visit a family in Germany, share their meals, may attend the same church and even marry a girl in the family without creating a scandal or surprise. But such instances of intermarriage have been extremely rare in the Indo-Pak Sub-Continent. Even some of the most ardent Indian Nationalist has found the idea totally unacceptable. As Sir Abdur Rahim observed: Any of us Indian Muslims traveling for instances in Afghanistan, Persia and Central Asia among Chinese Muslims, Arabs and Turks, would at once be made at home and would not find anything to which we are not accustomed. On the contrary, in India we find ourselves in all social matters total aliens when we cross the street and enter that part of the town where our Hindu fellow townsmen live.

Is Two Nation Theory A New Concept A point generally raised by the opponent of the two-nation theory is that Pakistan was created accidentally and that the intellect of most of the Muslims at that time was overpowered by emotions. Moreover, that this phenomenon emerged in the early decade of the 20th century.

But, what the history reveals is something different. Two-Nation theory was not at all as new phenomenon.

History of Two Nation Theory

Mahatma Gandhi, speaking in the second session of the Round table conference in London in 1931, said that the quarrel between Hindus and Muslims was coreview with the British advent in India. It would be difficult to maintain such a position historically because the conflict between Hindus and Muslims had started long before the emergence of the British power in India.

The phenomenon of Two-Nation theory originated with the advent of Islam in the Sub-Continent (712AD). According to Jinnah, The concept of two nation theory originated the day, the first Hindu converted to Muslim.

The partition of India was proposed more than seven hundred years prior to the Lahore resolution. In 1192 AD, on the eve of battle of Tarian, according to famous historian Farishta, Sultan Muizz-ud-Din had suggested to his rival, Pirthviraj, the partition of India, leaving the region of Sirhind, Punjab and Multan with Sultan and retaining the rest of India for himself. This proposal cropped up again after 150 years, when Al-Beruni pointed out the existence of the two big groups of people subscribing to two different religions. This (the religious difference) renders any connection with them says Beruni, quite impossible and constitutes the widest of gulf between them and us (Hindu and Muslims).

Perhaps Emperor Aurengzeb (1658-1707) was responsible for increasing Hindu Muslim tensions by trying to Islamize the Mughal government. Several Muslim historians have actually glorified Aurengzeb for making Muslims conscious of their separate religious and ideological identity. It is also true that Maratha and Sikh leaders raised their banner of revolt against Aurangzeb because in trying to organize his government on Islamic lines, the emperor was acting against their interest. Sir Jaduanath Sarkar observation on the role of Shivaji, the Maratha leader, is revealing:

Shivaji has shown that the tree of Hinduism is not really dead. That it can rise from beneath the seemingly crushing load of centuries of political bondage, exclusion from the administration, and legal repression; it can put forth new leaves and branches it can again lift its head up to the skies.

After Aurangzeb death, Muslim power started disintegrating. Muslims were so alarmed by the growing power of the Hindus under Maratha leadership that even a Sufi scholar like Shah Walliullha (1703-81) was moved into writing a letter to the Afghan King Shah Walliullah. He wrote:

In short, the Muslim community is in a pitiable condition. All control of the machinery of government is in the hands of Hindus, because they are the only people who are capable and industrious. Wealth and prosperity are concentrated in their hands; while the share of Muslims is nothing but poverty and misery At this time you are the only King who is powerful, far-sighted, and capable of defeating the enemy forces. Certainly it is incumbent upon you to march to India, destroy the Maratha domination and rescue weak and old Muslims from the clutches of Non-Muslims. If, God forbid, domination by infidels continues, Muslims will forget Islam and within a short time become such a nation that there will be nothing left distinguish them from non-Muslims.

This letter by Shah Walliullah to a foreign Muslim against the local Non-Muslims again reflects that Muslims living in any part of the world are the part of one Muslim Nation.

The Two Nations

Although the Hindus and Muslims had been living together for centuries in the Indian sub-continent, yet there had never been either any signs of merger of the Hindu and Muslims societies, or any serious attempt to develop a working relationship between the two major ethnic groups. The two have always remained as two distinct social systems, two separate and distinct cultures and last but not the least, two different civilizations.

In fact, Hindu fanaticism has always been against those who do not belong to them and against all outsiders, whom they consider maleech or unclean. So they are against having any connection with such people, what to speak of inter-marriage, a Hindu is often forbidden eat or drink or to even shake hand with a Muslim or for that matter with a person belonging to any other faith or religion. In short the Hindu customs and their hatred for Muslims was the main factor against developing a working relationship between the two major societies. Lala Lajpat Rai, a very astute politician and staunch Hindu Mahasabhite, in his letter to Mr. C.R. Das, which was written 12 or 15 years prior to Pakistan Resolution, wrote:

There is one point more which has been troubling me very much of late and one which I want you to think (about) carefully, and that is the question of Hindu Mohammedan unity. I have devoted most of my time during the last six months to the study of Muslim history and Muslim law, and I am inclined to think it is neither possible nor practicable. Assuming and admitting the sincerity of Mohammedan leaders in the non-cooperation movement, I think their religion provides an effective bar to anything of that kind And nothing would relieve more than to be convinced that it is so. But if it is right, then it comes to this, that although we can unite against the British, we cannot do so to rule Hindustan on British lines. We cannot do so to rule Hindustan on democratic lines.

Muhammad Ali Jinnah, (in his address to the annual session of Muslim League) mentioned: It is extremely difficult to appreciate why our Hindu friends fail to understand the real nature of Islam and Hinduism. They are not religions in the strict sense of the word, but are, in fact, different social orders. It is a dream that the Hindu and Muslims can ever evolve a common nationality; and this misconception of one Indian nation has gone far beyond the limits, and is the cause of most of our troubles, and will lead India to destruction, if we fail to revise our notions in time. The Hindus and the Muslims belong to two different religious philosophies, social customs and literature. They neither intermarry, nor interline together and indeed they belong to two different civilizations, which are based mainly on conflicting ideas and conceptions. Their aspects on life and of life are different. It is quite clear that Hindus and Musalmans derive their inspiration from different sources of history. They have different epics, their heroes are different, and they have different episodes. Very often the hero of one is a foe of the other, and likewise, their victories and defeats overlap. To yoke together two such nations under a single state, one as a numerical minority and the other as a majority, must lead to growing discontent and the final destruction of any fabric that may be so built up for the government of such a state.

Is Pakistan a Conspiracy of British And / Or Jinnah

For the congress, the establishment of Pakistan was a cruel blow to their claim of being a nationalist organization. It meant that Muslims did not trust the Hindus as a majority community to be just and generous towards Muslims interests and culture. This explains why congress leaders have often tended to attribute the creation of Pakistan almost entirely to the British policy of divide and rule.

However, a closer look at the history after the establishment of the British rule in India will reveal that the Hindus were much closer to the British government than the Muslims. The Hindus, who were fed up with the Muslim rule, welcomed the British rule over India. This state of affairs resulted in the patronage of the Hindus by the British and suspicion and distrust against the Muslims of the sub-continent. The Hindus were economically better off than the Muslims. The events of 1857 further diminished the prospects of economic growth of the Muslim community in the sub-continent. From 1857 onwards, when the British had taken complete control of the Indian Administration, they elevated the Hindu community to the status of landlords, gave the Hindus proprietary rights and provided them the opportunity to accumulate the wealth which should have otherwise gone to the Muslims who were at the helm of affairs.

Hindus were given more jobs in the government and military compared to Muslims.

Lets now look see whether the establishment of Pakistan in 1947 as the largest Muslim state was a conspiracy of Jinnah. Muhammad Ali Jinnah remained an active member of the Indian National Congress for about 25 years, and because of his personal efforts to bring about a rapprochement between Hindus and Muslims was even hailed as the Ambassador of Hindu-Muslim unity. As long as effective power in India was in the hands of the British, it appeared as if a true nationalism was growing in that country. However, with the introduction of representative institutions and the devolution of political authority, the Hindus started showing their true colors by imposing their superiority over the Muslim minority, as a result of which a struggle between Hindus and Muslims ensued. Jinnah was greatly disappointed by these movements by the congress leaders and so he resigned from the Congress. The behavior of the Congress leader changed his mind and realized him that the Congress is a Hindu Congress.

Another popular view regards Pakistan as no more than a personal triumph of the brilliant strategy and will power of Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah. Some have even gone so far as to suggest that had Jinnah died earlier, there would not have been any Pakistan. It is true that Jinnah great role was a highly important contributing factor; but without intense religious zeal for an Islamic state on the part of Muslim masses, Jinnah could not have achieved Pakistan. Khilafat leaders like Maulana Muhammad Ali and Maulana Abul Kalam Azad and poets like Hali, Akbar Allahabdi and Iqbal were mainly responsible for making Muslims conscious of their separate national and cultural identity. Thus, when the message of Pakistan was presented to the masses, it fell on fertile soil. Jinnah, who did not know Urdu, could not have achieved Pakistan without able and zealous lieutenants and without the vision of an Islamic state as an inspiring stimulant. One may even go so far as to say that the Muslim League, led largely by the middle-class Muslim Leaders, would have probably come to some sort of compromise on the issue of Pakistan had they not been swept off their feet by the intense Islamic fervor of the masses and the astounding success that the Muslim League achieved during the elections of 1945-46. It has been reported that the Quaid-e-Azam himself never expected to see Pakistan in his lifetime.

Congress leaders tried to challenge the two-nation theory by pointing out that a large number of Muslims in India were descendants of Hindu forebears who had converted to Islam. They also argued that there was hardly any cultural difference between Hindus and Muslims in the rural areas where the vast majority of both communities lived. But these arguments could not alter the fact that a change in one religion from Hinduism to Islam in the Indian context not merely implied a change in one religion, but also a significant change in man social and cultural status. The new convert became the member of an egalitarian social and cultural force in large parts of India. Particularly in the North Western part of India, which constitutes Pakistan today, the dominant culture that emerged was clearly Islam.

From Bande Mataram to Pakistan

The first provincial elections under the 1935 Act were held in 1937, as a result of these elections, the congress was invited to form ministries in seven provinces. The attitude of the congress government towards the Muslims was very cruel, and it opened the eyes of Muslims to the impending danger. The hostile attitude of Congress government towards the Muslims was by itself a proof of Hindus being a separate Nation. The experience of living under Congress rule was one major factor which shook the Muslims from their political slumber and made them instantly conscious of their distinct national identity.

Let consider the example of Bande Mataram. The Bande Mataram was adopted as the national anthem in the Congress Governed provinces. Muslim children were compelled to sing this anthem, which the Quaid described as Idolatrous and worse— a hymn of hatred for Muslims.

The song Bande Mataram is from an old Bengali novel, Anand Math, written by Bankim Chandra Chattrji. It tells the story of a secret religio-political society of Hindus plotting the overthrow of the Muslim power in Bengal in the 18th century. The new recruits to the secret society recited the Bande Mataram as a vow. A new recruit, Mohendra, was led by the leader, Bhavananda, to the temple of Anand Math to have darshan of the Mother. In the first chamber Mohendra was greeted by a massive four-armed Vishnu, flanked by the idols of Lakshami and Arawati, and a lonely image sitting on his lap. Bhavanda pointing to the lady on the lap of Lord Vishnu told Mohendra that she is the Mother and we are her children. The next chamber was decorated with the image of Jagatdhari, another deity who was explained, as The mother was first like this, the next camber where ten-armed Durga was presiding, attended by Lakshami and Sarawati. Bhavanda explained: “This is what the Mother will be like when the enemy has been crushed under her feet. Mohendra was overcome with religious fervor and chanted these lines of Bande Mataram to be confirmed as a member of the anti-Muslim secret society:

Thou art Durga with ten arms: And thou art Lakshmi, the lotus ranging; And thou art Vani that Givweth knowledge; I salute thee

The Congress Government went to such an extent as to replace Urdu by Hindi, banning of Cow slaughter and even celebrating Gandhi Birthday officially and compelling the students Hindus and non-Hindus to worship the picture of Mahatma Gandhi.

From the above very brief but factual analysis of the relationship which had developed between the two major Communities of India i.e; the Hindus and the Muslims, it should no longer be a questionable proposition as to why the Muslims insisted on the partition of India and having a separate Homeland for the Muslims.

The Tragedy of 1971

The separation of East Pakistan was no doubt the biggest tragedy in the history of Pakistan. However, it should not be regarded as death of Two Nation Theory. First of all Bangladesh, though no more a part of Pakistan but still is neither a Hindu state nor a secular state rather is a Muslim State. The elite of West Pakistan were not able to understand the real situation in East Pakistan and they absolutely failed to tackle it. In spite of all these mistakes by the government, the involvement of the foreign hand in separation of East Pakistan, is a solid reality. Those who cry today upon the cross-border terrorism in Kashmir (in spite of the fact that there is no international border in Kashmir) have totally forgotten the hands and faces behind the Muktibahini. The way the Bangla youth was brain washed by Hindu teachers and scholars is an open secret. The fact is that not much literature was available in the Bangla language about Islam, neither any translation of Iqbal nor of Moududi. On the other hand Robinder Nath Tegore and Chander Mukr Ji were very popular.

The Muslim Bangladesh though no more a part of Pakistan is independent from the fright of Hindu domination.

Ms. Indra Gandhi statement about the creation of Bangladesh, was by itself a proof of the existence of the Two-Nation Theory. She claimed that today we have taken the revenge of the 1000 years slavery but in 1971 Pakistan was just 24 years old!!! Then what was she referring to by mentioning the 1000 years? Definitely she was talking about the era when Muslims ruled India. This means Pakistan didno’t emerge neither with the advent of British to India, nor is a result of Divide and Conquer, nor is a conspiracy of the Muslim League, nor is a symbol of nationalism based on territory. Pakistan-based on the Two-Nation theory existed long before August 47 in the heart of every Muslim of the Sub-Continent, who wanted the revival of the Muslim Ummah.

Two Nation Theory At Present

Keeping in view the above discussion in light of facts and figures from history, it can be claimed that theTwo Nation Theory is a reality even today. Unfortunately, the Hindu community of the sub-continent has never accepted this reality from the very beginning and they still want to convert the Indo-Pak sub-continent to Maha Bharat. They want all non-Hindus to change their faith to Hinduism. The top leadership of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which is currently ruling India, has not only publicly denounced the two-nation theory but has also declared that it does not accept the partition of the Sub-Continent in 1947 which was based on this theory. On the same analogy, the BJP claims that Kashmir is an integral part of India. The BJP also advises the Muslims in India that they must stop looking towards Makkah and Medina as they can live only by accepting Hindutva. The BJP government, in order to assimilate the Muslim population in India with the Hindu majority, also intends to amend Muslim personal laws. A movement has also been launched in India, with the blessing of the BJP government, that all the Indians, irrespective of their religious beliefs, should call themselves Hindus, as they are the citizens of Hindustan. The non-Hindus in India, particularly the Muslims, are also being advised that by adopting the Hindu faith they may ensure for themselves an honorable place in the country.

It may be recalled that Madhav Sadarish Golwalker, the head of the RSS, whom the Indian Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, considers his soul and mentor, in his book entitled “WE: our own nationhood defined, while branding the Muslims of India as enemies belonging to foreign races, recommended that the foreign races in Hindustan must either adopt Hindu culture and language, must entertain no idea but those of the glorification of the Hindu race and culture, i.e; of the Hindu nation, must lose their separate existence to merge in the Hindu race, or may stay in the country, wholly subordinated to the Hindu race, claiming nothing, deserving no privilege, far less any preferential treatment not even citizen right.

The enormous difficulties, which the Muslims are encountering for the protection of their religious beliefs and for the restitution of their political, economic and other rights in the so-called secular but Hindu-dominated India, bear testimony to the political acumen and far sightedness of Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah who so rightly had perceived the establishment of a separate state for the Muslims of the Sub-Continent to save them from unfair treatment by the Hindu Majority.

Many opponents of the Two-Nation theory, base their arguments on the fact that India at present has a Muslim community, which is larger in population than the Muslim population in Pakistan. Therefore, according to the Two-Nation theory, Pakistan border should be opened to all of them, and in case this is not done then the creation of Pakistan was a selfish act of the Muslims living in the areas comprising Pakistan today, since, it has changed Muslims in India to an even smaller minority.

First of all opening the borders of Pakistan to all the Muslims is a misinterpretation of the Two-Nation theory, and is simply not applicable. Pakistan was created to have a fortress for the Muslim Ummah. All the Muslim leaders had it very much clear in their mind that all the Muslims would never be the citizens of Pakistan. Many of them became the citizens of India, after 1947, but had struggled for the creation of Pakistan, throughout their lives. Pakistan movement in the Hindu majority provinces was much stronger than in the Hindu minority areas. What does all this reveal? Pakistan is much more than a piece of land. They never struggled for a piece of land to name it Pakistan; they had struggled for the Ideology named Pakistan.

The Muslim leaders of the sub-continent struggled for Pakistan on the same guidelines as the Islamic state of Medina Munawara. Many Muslims migrated along with the Prophet (Salalaho Allehe Wa Aalehi Wasalam) to Medina Munawara, however many of them were left in Makkah. Those who had migrated along the Prophet (Salalaho Allehe Wa Aalehi Wasalam) and those who were the citizens of Medina, lived peacefully. While those who were left in Makkah were subjected to the cruelties of the Kaffar in Makkah. Was this unfair with them? It would have been unfair if the people of Medina had not participated in Badar, Uhed and Khandeq and rather would have opted for celebrating “Basant in Pakistan” at the same time when the people from Pakistan had been sold in Tora Bora. In that case it would have been unfair but this certainly does not mean that establishment of Medina was an unfair decision rather it meant that those elements should be subjected to accountability which turn jihad till Fatah-e-Makkah to Basant Bahar the part of our culture.

The condition of the Indian Muslims after fifty-five years reveals the truth of the so-called Indian secularism. The Muslims in India are still getting a raw deal in every sphere of life. They are still living in the curse of poverty and backwardness. And above all they are still fighting the threats to their religious and cultural identity. The sense of insecurity experienced by the Indian Muslims in the post partition period has been compounded in recent years. In terms of numbers, the Muslims are only next to the Hindus, totaling 95.2 million (1991 census) and constituting about 12 percent of the population. Yet they are considered by the Hindus even less important than the Jains and Buddhists who are only 0.43 and 0.41 percent of the population respectively (1991 census). A prominent Hindu writer S. Harrison admits that the dominant note in the Hindu attitude towards Muslim today is that, “Hindus have a natural right to rule in modern India as a form of long overdue retribution for the sins of the Mughal overlords. It is not enough that unified state with a Hindu majority, clearly dominant over a Muslim minority now reduced to 12 percent, has been established at long last in the Indian sub-continent. The fulfillment of Indian nationalism requires an assertion of Hindu hegemony over the Muslims of the subcontinent in one form or the other.”

They also have been subjected to the interference in their religion. It usually takes the form of insulting attacks on Islam made in school textbooks, or in the press, desecration of mosques and shrines, or deliberate incitement of feelings of religious hatred against the Muslims. In most of the Hindu dominated Indian states Hindu religious beliefs, philosophy and methodology have been introduced into the text books in the name of Indian culture,. This is to an extent that a glance through the officially prescribed school textbooks leaves an impression that those responsible for them regard India (a supposedly multi religious country) as the home of Brahmans and attach value only to their deities, temples, religious customs and practices. Countless incidents can be cited of the desecration of mosques by the Hindu communists during the last few decades. The 16th century historic Babri mosque was razed to ground by thousands of Hindu fanatics in Ayodhya, (UP) on 16th Dec 1992 and the immense loss of human lives that followed was no secret.

The Two Nation Theory is still alive. Had there been no Two Nation Theory today, the issues like Kargil, nuclear arms race, and tension on the borders would have never risen. The basic conflict between India and Pakistani nation is still the same. Indians believe in nationality based on territory and therefore want to merge Pakistan back into India. While Pakistanis have been fighting for the last 52 years, to safeguard the Land which they got in the name of Islam. The Kashmir issue, if alive even after 52 years, in spite of India utmost effort to crush the lovers of freedom, is crystal clear proof of the reality of the Two Nation Theory.

It should be understood that the creation of Pakistan was not the result of an accident but it had a meaning. The meaning of Pakistan was not to have a separate homeland for the Muslims of Indo-Pakistan to have a better living; it was not to have industries or nuclear capability.

The significance of the creation of the fortress of Islam was to give the Muslims of the Sub-Continent in particular and the Muslims of the world in general an idea of brotherhood. A brotherhood based on irrespective of color or creed. Pakistan wanted to have Unity among the Muslims from Morocco to Indonesia and to create a sense of spiritual vision that could be left and understand beyond this materialistic world in which man is fighting with man. The Muslim brotherhood has disagreements and the world is dominated by imperial powers and destined according to their wishes.

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Understanding the Two-Nation Theory | CSS Essay Material

By: Syed Abdul Ahad Wasim

The general understanding of two nation theory is that Hindus and Muslims are two distinct nations, indeed two different civilisations, that are unique, as Jinnah put it, in their “culture and civilisation, language and literature, art and architecture, names and nomenclature, sense of value and proportion, legal laws and moral codes, customs and calendar, history and traditions, aptitudes and ambitions…outlook on life and of life.” The co-existence of two such foundationally different, almost antithetical, peoples is not possible. Therefore, it was necessary for Muslims of India to have a separate homeland—which eventually became Pakistan.

The rationale for the creation of Pakistan, a claim to nationhood on the basis of religion, is still questioned to this date. If, for example, Hindus and Muslims were so incompatibly distinct, how was it possible that so many Muslims—almost 35 million at the time of partition—stayed back in India? In the opinion of many, the secession of East Bengal, the frontline state in the Pakistan Movement, brought forth the inherent inadequacy of the Two-Nation Theory. Were Muslims really a “nation”—given that apart from ‘Islam in danger’ providing a source of mutual worry, the Muslims of India were conspicuously diverse people and had hardly anything beyond religion that united them? Furthermore, the fact that so many Hindus were part of Pakistan after partition necessitated an exegesis of two-nation theory that could accommodate them in Pakistan as equal citizens of state. Such an interpretation of Two-Nation Theory would have posed a question mark on Pakistan’s very raison d’etre: how could people who till yesterday were fundamentally incompatible now be told that they could co-exist in the new state?

A simple explanation based on incompatibility of faiths and therefore of peoples was way too simplistic. Ayesha Jalal’s ‘The Sole Spokesman’ rejected that proposition 35 years ago. Over the years, many authoritative historians on South Asia have said the same in one way or another. Being ‘simplistic’ did not mean it was wrong; it was simply insufficient. A more wholesome explanation was, therefore, essential. This article argues that there is another side of the Two-Nation Theory, which when neglected renders the meaning of the thesis inadequate.

Two-Nation Theory is analogous to a coin that like every other coin has two sides. One side is ‘Islam in danger’: that Muslims of Muslim-minority provinces of subcontinent felt that Islam was in danger and therefore demanded a separate space or homeland in order to prosper without being subjugated or suppressed. The question arises: if Islam was in danger, what was endangering it? The answer to this question is the other side of the Two-Nation coin: Islam was endangered by the majoritarianism of Congress.

A complete statement of two-nation theory would make a case for a separate homeland not just on the basis cultural or civilisational uniqueness of Islam, but also on the basis of the legitimate fears of subjugation of numerically weak Muslims of India vis-à-vis numerically strong Congress and Hindu nationalists.

It is true that two nation theory espoused the incompatibility of two nations of Muslims and Hindus. But to read it exclusively as religious/cultural incompatibility is a partial reading of the idea. It leaves out or ignores a very significant argument that was extended throughout the history of the Pakistan Movement: the fear of majoritarianism. Notwithstanding the ‘Islam in danger’ paradigm, the fear of being subjugated to Hindu rule for perpetuity given the numerical weakness of Muslims in subcontinent was the bedrock of the case that All India Muslim League built for the necessity of having a separate homeland.

The aversion towards majoritarianism can help us understand why Jinnah was reluctant to describe Pakistan as a theological state. Why, one wonders, would a leader who was so clear about the distinctive character of Muslims as to declare them to be a “nation” shy away from describing Pakistan as an Islamic state when the entire case for Pakistan was apparently based on religious nationalism? That is the whole point. The rationale for the creation of Pakistan was not hatred for Hindus or Hinduism. It was anti-majoritarianism—in the Subcontinent’s case, religious majoritarianism. Since Jinnah had fought against the religious majoritarianism of Congress, he was not ready to impose the same on Hindus (or minorities of Pakistan) by declaring Pakistan an Islamic state. To a liberal constitutionalist like Jinnah, doing so would have simply meant repeating the principle of religious majoritarianism of Congress in Pakistan. If Jinnah had built a case exclusively on the basis of religious distinctiveness, he would not have felt any qualms in declaring Pakistan what the logic demanded it to be—a nation-state for Muslims or an Islamic state. His reluctance to do so is proof that anti-majoritarianism, not hatred towards Hindus, was the basis of Two-Nation Theory, or at least formed a very significant part of it.

Jinnah’s idea of Pakistan was a lofty one then. It was to be a heaven for those against majoritarianism in all its manifestations, and not just people who believed in Islam. The minorities of Pakistan were to be part of Pakistani fabric as thoroughly as Muslims were. The dislike for majoritarianism was something that Pakistanis were to pride themselves in. It was to be a counter-model, a state where, unlike in Congress-led India, exclusionary anti-majoritarianism would not be practiced. Pakistan was to provide a better, higher, version of state governance that would show Congress how to run a country democratically and inclusively.

All these ideals were lost, forgotten, erased from national memory after Jinnah departed and religious right began to claim the monopoly of interpreting the Two Nation Theory.

It is imperative that in order to create a democratic, forward-looking, twenty-first century Pakistan, we revisit our roots and reinterpret them, rather reclaim them, in light of modern knowledge and as per the necessities of the circumstances that we find ourselves in.

Reading the Two-Nation Theory as a verdict against anti-majoritarianism can help us build a thoroughly democratic narrative. The struggle against majoritarianism was a struggle for defending the rights of Muslims who were in numerical minority as compared to Hindus. From this historical fact, a case can be built that accommodating the rights of all, regardless of class, creed, religion, on anything else, is antithetical to history of Muslims of India—as it is to Islam. Therefore, Pakistan would be a state that would accommodate everyone. Wishful as this may sound, such an inclusive narrative can help Pakistani state reinstate democratic culture and initiate a process of social change by rethinking and reinterpreting history. If our nation can learn to pride itself in their struggle against majoritarianism, they can also come to see that authoritarianism or any kind of model of governance that disregards widespread consensus in making decisions is irreconcilable with their history.

If materialised, such an interpretation will certainly facilitate our long-pending desire for national integration. The distinct cultures, ethnicities, religions that call Pakistan their home can come together and identify that Pakistan is not a land exclusively reserved for Muslims of India; rather, it is a home for all those who rejected majoritarianism in favour of pluralism and respect for minority voices by associating themselves with the Muslim League. The anti-majoritarian ethos of Pakistan Movement can be seen in the fact that of the five seats reserved for Muslims on Viceroy’s Executive Council in 1946, Muslim League gave one to Jogendra Nath Mandal, a leader of the Scheduled Castes (Dalits).

It is about time that we recast our national narrative and reframe it in democratic terms. Otherwise, as democracy entrenches itself, future generations would find it difficult to buy the exclusionary narrative of incompatibility of Muslims and Hindus given their long history of co-existence prior to British advent in India and given the increasingly negative connotations attached to identity politics.

Published in Daily Nation

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What is the Two Nation Theory? History & Features of 2 Nation Theory

Two Nation Theory

The Two Nation Theory is a political and ideological concept that played a significant role in the creation of Pakistan in 1947. It was developed by Allama Muhammad Iqbal, a philosopher, poet, and politician. Further articulated and implemented by Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan. The theory is rooted in the idea that Hindus and Muslims in British India were distinct nations with their own religious, cultural, social, and political identities. Here are the key history and features of the Two Nation Theory:

1. Historical Background:

• The British colonial rule in India from the 18th century led to political, social, and religious tensions among various communities, including Hindus and Muslims.
• The Indian National Congress, initially a secular organization, eventually started representing the interests of the Hindu majority.

2. Allama Iqbal’s Contribution:

• Allama Muhammad Iqbal, a prominent philosopher and poet, first proposed the idea of separate Muslim states within India in the early 20th century.
• He argued that Muslims in India should have their own political entity to safeguard their interests and religious freedom.

3. Muhammad Ali Jinnah and the Muslim League:

• Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the leader of the All-India Muslim League, embraced the Two Nation Theory and became its most prominent advocate.
• Jinnah believed that Hindus and Muslims had distinct cultural, religious, and political interests. And that a united India would not adequately protect the rights and aspirations of the Muslim minority.

4. Demand for Pakistan:

• The Muslim League, under Jinnah’s leadership, officially demanded the creation of a separate Muslim state, Pakistan, during the Lahore Resolution in 1940.
• The demand for Pakistan was based on the Two Nation Theory, asserting that Muslims and Hindus. Were two separate nations that could not coexist within a single, united India.

5. Partition of India:

• The Two Nation Theory played a crucial role in the negotiations leading to the partition of India in 1947.
• India was divided into two independent nations: India and Pakistan, with Pakistan comprising West Pakistan (present-day Pakistan) and East Pakistan (now Bangladesh).

6. Features of the Two Nation Theory:

• Distinct Identity: It posits that Hindus and Muslims have distinct religious, cultural, and social identities.
• Separate Homelands: It asserts that Muslims should have their own separate homeland(s) to protect their interests and rights.
• Political Sovereignty: It calls for the establishment of independent Muslim-majority states to achieve political sovereignty.

Key features of the Two Nation Theory:

• Religious Divide: The theory emphasizes the religious differences between Hindus and Muslims as the primary basis for the division. It argued that Muslims and Hindus followed different religions (Islam and Hinduism) with distinct belief systems, rituals, and social practices.
• Separate Identities: The theory posited that Hindus and Muslims had separate cultural, historical, and social identities. That had evolved over centuries and were fundamentally incompatible.
• Political Separation: The Two Nation Theory called for the creation of separate Muslim-majority and Hindu-majority states in the Indian subcontinent. Muslims would have their own state, which later became Pakistan, and Hindus would reside in India.
• Safeguarding Muslim Interests: Advocates of the theory argued that Muslims would be marginalized and their rights would be threatened in a united, predominantly Hindu India. They believed that only a separate Muslim state could ensure the protection of their political, social, and religious interests.
• Political Struggle: The Two Nation Theory served as the ideological foundation for the demand for Pakistan during the Indian independence movement. Muhammad Ali Jinnah and the Muslim League used this theory to push for a separate Muslim state, ultimately leading to the creation of Pakistan in 1947.
• Demographic Considerations: The theory also took into account the demographic distribution of Hindus and Muslims in different regions of British India. Further reinforcing the argument for a separate state for Muslims.

The Two Nation Theory remains a significant part of Pakistan’s historical and ideological heritage. It influenced the creation of Pakistan as a homeland for Muslims and continues to shape the country’s identity and politics. However, it has also been a subject of debate and controversy, and its relevance has evolved over time.

The Two Nation Theory is a concept in South Asian history that played a pivotal role in the creation of Pakistan in 1947. It was a political and ideological framework advanced by Muslim leaders in British India. Primarily the All-India Muslim League and its leader, Muhammad Ali Jinnah. The theory argued that Hindus and Muslims in British India. Were two distinct nations with their own religious, social, and cultural identities. Therefore, they could not coexist within a single unified nation.

It’s important to note that the Two Nation Theory was a divisive concept that led to significant political. And religious tensions during the struggle for independence. It was a major factor in the partition of India in 1947. Which resulted in the creation of Pakistan and India as two independent nations. The partition also led to widespread communal violence and the displacement of millions of people. Making it a complex and controversial period in South Asian history.

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Two Nation Theory – Origin and Evolution

Emergence of political consciousness amongst indian muslims.

This article traces the origin and evolution of the Two-Nation Theory.  For this purpose, the article provides a chronological account of the Socioeconomic and political conditions that Indian Muslims had to face in the aftermath Indian Revolt 1857. 

Origin of Two-National Theory

The origin of the Two-Nation Theory is traced to the post-1857 Indian Revolt times.  It were both the Hindus and Muslims who rebelled together against the British with an aim to drive them out of India. But in the aftermath of the revolt, Muslims gradually felt that the British specifically pointed them out for the war as part of their revenge policy. They were subjected to cruelty in all possible ways. They left no stone unturned to crush Muslims socially, economically, and politically. 

The Muslims also felt that the dominant community in the Indian subcontinent also supported the British in their attempt to subjugate Muslims completely. 

Given below is a brief picture of the socioeconomic and political conditions of Muslims that Muslims faced after 1857.

Social  conditions of Muslims

British replaced Urdu as court language as a result of the 1867 Hindi-Urdu Controversy. For some Hindus, Urdu was the language of Muslims and did not represent Hindus. Hence, they pressed for the replacement of Urdu with Hindi. Muslim leaders, like Sir Syed Ahmad, were annoyed by this attitude of the Hindus. 

Similarly, the British stopped grants to Muslim schools that where Urdu was the medium of instruction. These schools provided Islamic education along with secular education. Moreover, Muslims did not send their children to English schools as they thought English education was against Islam. Consequently, a generation of Muslims could not get modern education. Unlike Muslims, the Hindus sent their children to English schools that dominated almost all fields of life in later years.

Economic Conditions of Muslims

After 1857, the British left no stone unturned to subject Muslims to economically miserable life. They confiscated the lands of Muslims and handed them over to people of other communities.  Unlike Muslims, Hindus dominated business and commerce activities only because of their pro-British and anti-Muslim approach. As a result, Muslim economic conditions deteriorated. This had a correspondingly negative impact on the social stature of Muslims.

Political Conditions of Muslims

Muslims increasingly felt that Hindus supported the British in the implementation of anti-Muslim British policies. Hindus enjoyed more political powers as compared to Muslims.  The denial of Muslim representation in the viceroy’s executive and imperial council further reinforced their belief in the anti-Muslim Hindu-British nexus.

Muslims’ belief in Hindus’ deliberate support to British in their its anti-Muslim policy led to the theory that co-existence between the two major communities would be impossible in long run. 

Evolution of Two-Nation Theory

As discussed above, in 1867 a group of Hindus demanded to replace Urdu as the court language with Hindi. On this Sir Syed Ahmad Khan expressed his dislike and termed the demand a threat to Hindu-Muslim co-existence in the long run. The language controversy moved Sir Syed to even state that if the anti-Muslim attitude of Hindus continued, it would be difficult for people of both communities to live together.

Sir Syed was the first person to use the word nation for Muslims. He was conscious of the fact that due to anti-English and British feelings Muslims lacked behind in education and economic life. He worried about the future of Muslims amidst the educated majority Hindu population. Therefore, he urged Muslims to get modern education and come at par with Hindus to live a dignified life. The pro-Hindu approach of the congress reinforced the very thinking of Muslims that the congress championed the independence of India with the only purpose of imposing Hindu Raj in India.

Indian National Congress and Sir Syed 

Sir Syed Ahmad Khan urged Muslims to keep aloof from Congress and focus on developing better relations. Sir Syed opposed the introduction of the western democratic system in India. In the joint electorate, Muslims would always be underrepresented.

Establishment of All India Muslim League in 1906

The All India Muslim League was established in 1906. The league as per its stated aims struggled for the constitutional safeguard of Muslim rights and interests. One of the achievements of the league was the provision of separate electorates for Muslims in Minto-Morley Reforms 1909. Other immediate achievements included one-third representation at the center, quota in civil service and government jobs, etc. in a united India.

Indian National Congress opposed the establishment of the league as a British tactic of its divide and rule policy. It opposed the efforts and achievements of the league without any second thought. For example, it opposed separate electorates provided in the Indian Councils Act 1909 for Muslims

Congress and Hindus Tyranny in 1937-39

Later on, when Congress made its government in provinces, it left no stone unturned to torture Muslims socially, religiously, economically, and politically. Muslim homes and properties were set on fire, noisy processions were held outside mosques during prayer times including throwing pigs into mosques. Any complaint made to authorities fell on deaf ears.

These atrocities of Hindus and the Congress convinced Muslims that any formula of United India would not suit Muslim interests.  Now they wanted a separate homeland where they could live their lives as per their own will and religious teachings. This was the background of the league’s demand for a separate state for Muslims of the Indian subcontinent on 23rd March 1940.

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Quantum dialectics

When quantum mechanics posed a threat to the marxist doctrine of materialism, communist physicists sought to reconcile the two.

by Jim Baggott   + BIO

The quantum revolution in physics played out over a period of 22 years, from 1905 to 1927. When it was done, the new theory of quantum mechanics had completely undermined the basis for our understanding of the material world. The familiar and intuitively appealing description of an atom as a tiny solar system, with electrons orbiting the atomic nucleus, was no longer satisfactory. The electron had instead become a phantom. Physicists discovered that in one kind of experiment, electrons behave like regular particles – as small, concentrated bits of matter. In another kind of experiment, electrons behave like waves. No experiment can be devised to show both types of behaviour at the same time. Quantum mechanics is unable to tell us what an electron is .

More unpalatable consequences ensued. The uncertainty principle placed fundamental limits on what we can hope to discover about the properties of quantum ‘wave-particles’. Quantum mechanics also broke the sacred link between cause and effect, wreaking havoc on determinism, reducing scientific prediction to a matter of probability – to a roll of the dice. We could no longer say: when we do this , that will definitely happen. We could say only: when we do this, that will happen with a certain probability.

As the founders of the theory argued about what it meant, the views of the Danish physicist Niels Bohr began to dominate. He concluded that we have no choice but to describe our experiments and their results using seemingly contradictory, but nevertheless complementary, concepts of waves and particles borrowed from classical (pre-quantum) physics. This is Bohr’s principle of ‘complementarity’. He argued that there is no contradiction because, in the context of the quantum world, our use of these concepts is purely symbolic. We reach for whichever description – waves or particles – best serves the situation at hand, and we should not take the theory too literally. It has no meaning beyond its ability to connect our experiences of the quantum world as they are projected to us by the classical instruments we use to study it.

Bohr emphasised that complementarity did not deny the existence of an objective quantum reality lying beneath the phenomena. But it did deny that we can discover anything meaningful about this. Alas, despite his strenuous efforts to exercise care in his use of language, Bohr could be notoriously vague and more than occasionally incomprehensible. Pronouncements were delivered in tortured ‘Bohrish’. It is said of his last recorded lecture that it took a team of linguists a week to discover the language he was speaking. And physicists of Bohr’s school, most notably the German theorist Werner Heisenberg, were guilty of using language that, though less tortured, was frequently less cautious.

It was all too easy to interpret some of Heisenberg’s pronouncements as a return to radical subjectivism, to the notion that our knowledge of the world is conjured only in the mind without reference to a real external world. It did not help that Bohr and physicists of Bohr’s school sought to shoehorn complementarity into other domains of enquiry, such as biology and psychology, and attempted to use it to resolve age-old conundrums concerning free will and the nature of life. Such efforts garnered little support from the wider scientific community and attracted plenty of opprobrium.

Albert Einstein famously pushed back, declaring that, unlike quantum mechanics, God does not play dice . He argued that, while quantum mechanics was undoubtedly powerful, it was in some measure incomplete.

In 1927, Bohr and Einstein commenced a lively debate. Einstein was joined in dissent by the Austrian physicist Erwin Schrödinger, who devised the conundrum of ‘Schrödinger’s cat’ to highlight the seemingly absurd implications of quantum mechanics. But although both Einstein and Schrödinger remained strident critics, they offered no counter-interpretation of their own. Despite their misgivings, there was simply no consensus on a viable alternative to complementarity.

C omplementarity also fell foul of the principal political ideologies that, in different ways, dominated human affairs from the early 1930s, through the Second World War, to the Cold War that followed. Both Bohr and Einstein were of Jewish descent and, to Nazi ideologues, complementarity and relativity theory were poisonous Jewish abstractions, at odds with the nationalistic programme of Deutsche Physik , or ‘Aryan physics’. But the proponents of Deutsche Physik failed to secure the backing of the Nazi leadership, and any threat to complementarity from Nazi ideology disappeared with the war’s ending. Much more enduring were the objections of Soviet communist philosophers who argued that complementarity was at odds with the official Marxist doctrine of ‘dialectical materialism’.

Vladimir Lenin, who had led the Bolshevik Party in the October Revolution of 1917, was a dogmatic advocate of the materialist worldview expounded by the German philosophers Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, authors of The Communist Manifesto , first published in 1848. The world according to Marxism consists of objectively existing matter in constant motion, bound by laws. Such laws govern different levels of existence that we attempt to describe through different scientific disciplines that are not necessarily reducible one to another. For example, sociology – regarded as an empirical science – is not reducible to physics and is therefore bound by its own laws of human social and economic behaviour.

Marx and Engels observed that such behaviour breeds functional contradictions within an organised society. To survive, people submit to exploitative relationships with the means of economic production and those who own them. Distinct classes emerge: masters and their slaves, lords and their serfs, business owners (the bourgeoisie) and their low-wage workers (the proletariat).

It was not enough just to interpret the world, Marx claimed. Philosophers must also seek to change it

These functional contradictions are ultimately resolved through inevitable class struggle resulting in irreversible changes in social organisation and the means of production. The classical antiquity of Greece and Rome had given way to feudalism. Feudalism had given way to capitalism. And capitalism was destined to give way to socialism and communism, to the utopia of a classless society. But the necessary changes in social organisation would not happen by themselves. The path led first through socialism and the ‘dictatorship of the proletariat’, supported by an autocratic state that would eventually no longer be needed when the communist utopia was realised. For Lenin, the ends justified the means, which included the violent repression of bourgeois capitalist and counter-revolutionary forces.

In Marxist philosophy, the method of studying and apprehending both social and physical phenomena is dialectical, and the interpretation of natural phenomena is firmly materialistic. It was not enough just to interpret the world, Marx claimed. Philosophers must also seek to change it, and this could not be done in a world built only from perceptions and ideas. Any philosophy that sought to disconnect us from material reality, by reducing the world to mere sensation and experience, posed a threat to Marxism.

In Materialism and Empirio-Criticism (1909), Lenin had berated the physicist Ernst Mach and his Russian followers, and the German philosopher Richard Avenarius, who had formulated the positivist doctrine of empirio-criticism. The philosophy of positivism was anathema, as it sought to reduce knowledge of the world to sensory experience. Lenin argued that such thinking led only to a subjective idealism, or even solipsism. To him, this was just so much ‘gibberish’.

Complementarity looked just like the kind of positivist gibberish that Lenin had sought to annihilate. A reality accessible only in the form of quantum probabilities did not suit the needs of the official philosophy of Soviet communists. It appeared to undermine orthodox materialism. Nevertheless, an influential group of Soviet physicists, including Vladimir Fock, Lev Landau, Igor Tamm and Matvei Bronstein, promoted Bohr’s views and for a time represented the ‘Russian branch’ of Bohr’s school. This was not without some risk. Communist Party philosophers sought their dismissal, to no avail, largely because they could not agree on the issues among themselves.

T he situation in the Soviet Union changed dramatically a few years later. As his health declined, Lenin had tried to remove the Communist Party’s general secretary, Joseph Stalin, whom he deemed unfit for the role. But Stalin had been quietly consolidating his position and had placed loyalists in key administrative posts. After a brief power struggle following Lenin’s death in 1924, Stalin became supreme leader. In 1937-38, he tightened his grip by unleashing a reign of terror, known as the Great Purge, in which many of the old Bolsheviks who had fought alongside Lenin in 1917 were executed. Although the total death toll is difficult to determine, a figure of 1 million is not unreasonable. Physicists were not exempt. Bronstein was arrested, accused of terrorism offences, and executed in February 1938.

Stalin put his own stamp on the political ideology of Soviet communists in his short text titled Dialectical and Historical Materialism (1938), a formulation of Marxist philosophy that would be adopted as the official Communist Party line. Those intellectuals who resisted the official doctrine now faced real risks of losing more than just their jobs.

An outspoken commitment to complementarity became positively dangerous

The distractions of the Second World War meant that little changed for physicists until Andrei Zhdanov, the Party’s philosopher and propagandist-in-chief, who was thought by many to be Stalin’s successor-in-waiting, specifically targeted the interpretation of quantum mechanics in a speech delivered in June 1947. ‘The Kantian vagaries of modern bourgeois atomic physicists,’ he proclaimed, ‘lead them to inferences about the electron’s possessing “free will”, to attempts to describe matter as only a certain conjunction of waves, and to other devilish tricks.’ This was the beginning, writes the historian Loren Graham, ‘of the most intense ideological campaign in the history of Soviet scholarship’. An outspoken commitment to complementarity became positively dangerous.

Soviet physicists scrambled to defensible positions. Fock retreated from complementarity as an objective law of nature, and criticised Bohr for his vagueness. Others sought ways to ‘materialise’ quantum mechanics. Dmitry Blokhintsev, a student of Tamm’s, favoured a statistical interpretation based on the collective properties of an ‘ensemble’ of real particles. In such an interpretation we are obliged to deal with probabilities simply because we are ignorant of the properties and behaviours of the individual material particles that make up the ensemble. Einstein had used this conception in the opening salvo of his debate with Bohr in 1927. Yakov Terletsky who, like Tamm, had studied under the Soviet physicist Leonid Mandelstam, favoured a ‘pilot-wave’ interpretation of the kind that had initially been promoted by the French physicist Louis de Broglie before it was shot down by Bohr’s school in 1927. In this interpretation, a real wave field guides real particles, and probabilities again arise because we are ignorant of the details.

A s the 1930s progressed towards world war, many Western intellectuals had embraced communism as the only perceived alternative to the looming threat of Nazism. Numbered among the small group of Jewish communist physicists gathered around J Robert Oppenheimer at the University of California, Berkeley was David Bohm. As Oppenheimer began to recruit a team of theorists to work on the physics of the atomic bomb at the newly established Los Alamos National Laboratory in early 1943, Bohm was high on his list. But Bohm’s communist affiliations led the director of the Manhattan Project, Leslie Groves, to deny him the security clearance necessary to join the project.

Bohm was left behind at Berkeley and joined with his fellow communist and close friend Joseph Weinberg in teaching the absent Oppenheimer’s course on quantum mechanics. His long discussions with Weinberg, who argued that complementarity was itself a form of dialectic and so not in conflict with Marxist philosophy, encouraged him to accept Bohr’s arguments, although he was not free of doubt. In his textbook Quantum Theory (1951), derived in part from his experiences teaching Oppenheimer’s course, Bohm broadly adhered to Bohr’s views.

Bohm had by this time moved to Princeton University in New Jersey. Einstein, who in 1933 had fled from Nazi Germany to Princeton’s Institute for Advanced Study, asked to meet with him sometime in the spring of 1951. The meeting re-awakened the Marxist materialist in Bohm. As Einstein explained the basis for his own misgivings, Bohm’s doubts returned. ‘This encounter with Einstein had a strong effect on the direction of my research,’ he later wrote, ‘because I then became seriously interested in whether a deterministic extension of the quantum theory could be found.’ Was there, after all, a more materialistic alternative to complementarity? ‘My discussions with Einstein … encouraged me to look again.’ Although there is no documented evidence to support it, Bohm later claimed he had also been influenced ‘probably by Blokhintsev or some other Russian theorist like Terletsky’.

Bohm’s theory sought to restore causality and determinism to the quantum world

But Bohm’s relationship with Weinberg had by now returned to haunt him. In March 1943, Weinberg had been caught betraying atomic secrets by an illegal FBI bug planted in the home of Steve Nelson, a key figure in the Communist Party apparatus in the San Francisco Bay Area. This evidence was inadmissible in court. In an attempt to expose Weinberg’s betrayal, in May 1949 Bohm had been called to testify to the House Un-American Activities Committee, set up by the House of Representatives to investigate communist subversion in the US. He pleaded the Fifth Amendment, a standard means of avoiding self-incrimination, which only raised more suspicion.

Bohm was arrested, then brought to trial in May 1951. He was acquitted (as was Weinberg a couple of years later). Now caught in the anti-communist hysteria whipped up by Joseph McCarthy, Bohm lost his position at Princeton. Only Einstein tried to help, offering to bring him to the Institute. But its new director – Oppenheimer, now lauded as the ‘father of the atomic bomb’ and increasingly haunted by the FBI’s interest in his own Leftist past – vetoed Bohm’s appointment. Bohm left the US for exile in Brazil, from where he published two papers setting out what was, in effect, a re-discovery of de Broglie’s pilot-wave theory. The theory sought to restore causality and determinism to the quantum world and was firmly materialist. Oppenheimer rejected Bohm’s efforts as ‘juvenile deviationism’. Einstein, who had once toyed with a similar approach and might have been expected to be sympathetic, declared it ‘too cheap’.

Under a barrage of criticism, Bohm gained support from the French physicist Jean-Pierre Vigier, then assistant to de Broglie in Paris. He was just what Bohm needed: a resourceful theorist, a man of action, a hero of the French Resistance during the war, and a friend of the president of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh. Invited to join Einstein in Princeton, Vigier’s communist associations had led the Department of State to forbid his entry into the US. He worked with Bohm on another variation of the pilot-wave theory and persuaded de Broglie to rekindle his interest in it, sounding alarm bells among the Bohr faithful: ‘Catholics and communists in France are uniting against complementarity!’

B ut Bohm’s mission to restore materiality to quantum mechanics amounted to more than demonstrating the possibility of a deterministic alternative. In 1935, working with his Princeton colleagues Boris Podolsky and Nathan Rosen, Einstein had set up a stubborn challenge, a last throw of the dice in his debate with Bohr. In the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen (EPR) thought experiment, a pair of quantum particles interact and move apart, to the left and right, their properties correlated by some physical law. Schrödinger invented the term ‘ entanglement ’ to describe their situation. For simplicity, we assume that the particles can have properties ‘up’ and ‘down’, each with a 50 per cent probability.

We have no way of knowing in advance what results we’re going to get for each particle. But if the particle on the left is found to be ‘up’, the correlated particle on the right must be ‘down’, and vice versa. Now, according to quantum mechanics, the entangled particles are mysteriously bound together no matter how far apart they get, and the correlation persists. Suppose the particles move so far apart that any message or influence sent from one cannot get to the other even if it travels at the speed of light. How then does the particle on the right ‘know’ what result we obtained for the particle on the left, so that it can correlate itself?

We could assume that when they are sufficiently far apart the particles can be considered separate and distinct, or ‘locally real’. But this conflicts with Einstein’s special theory of relativity, which forbids messages or influences from travelling faster than light, as Einstein himself explained: ‘One can escape from this conclusion only by either assuming that the measurement of [the particle on the left] (telepathically) changes the real situation of [the particle on the right] or by denying independent real situations as such to things which are spatially separated from each other . Both alternatives appear to me entirely unacceptable.’ (Emphasis added.) Particles that do not exist independently of each other are said to be ‘nonlocal’.

A prospective Soviet spy codenamed ‘Quantum’ attended a meeting at the Soviet embassy in Washington, DC

Einstein was known for his pacifist and Leftist inclinations. Podolsky was Russian-born, and Rosen was a first-generation descendant of Russian émigrés. Both of Einstein’s assistants were sympathetic to the Soviet cause. Six months after the publication of the EPR paper, Rosen asked Einstein to recommend him for a job in the Soviet Union. Einstein wrote to the chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars, Vyacheslav Molotov, praising Rosen for his talents as a physicist. Rosen was at first delighted with his new home, and soon he had a son. ‘I hope,’ Einstein wrote in congratulation, ‘that he too can help in furthering the great cultural mission that the new Russia has undertaken with such energy.’ But by October 1938 Rosen was back in the US, having discovered that his research did not prosper in the people’s paradise.

Podolsky had earned his PhD at the California Institute of Technology and had returned to the Soviet Union in 1931 to work with Fock and Landau (and the visiting English theorist Paul Dirac) at the Ukrainian Institute of Physics and Technology in Kharkiv. From there, he joined Einstein at the Institute in Princeton in 1933. Ten years later, a prospective atomic spy assigned the codename ‘Quantum’ by Soviet intelligence attended a meeting at the Soviet embassy in Washington, DC and spoke with a high-ranking diplomat. Quantum was seeking an opportunity to join the Soviet effort to build an atomic bomb, and offered information on a technique for separating quantities of the fissile isotope uranium-235 . He was paid $300 for his trouble. In Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) files made public in 2009, Quantum was revealed to be Podolsky.

B ohm examined the EPR experiment in considerable detail. He developed an alternative that offered the prospect of translation from a thought experiment into a real one. With the Israeli physicist Yakir Aharonov, in 1957 he sought to demonstrate that real experiments had in fact already been done (in 1950), concluding that they did indeed deny independent real situations to the separated particles, such that these cannot be considered locally real.

This was far from the end of the matter. Befuddled in his turn by Bohrian vagueness and inspired by Bohm, the Irish physicist John Bell also pushed back against complementarity and in 1964 built on Bohm’s version of EPR to develop his theorem and inequality. The experiments of 1950 had not gone far enough. Further experiments to test Bell’s inequality in 1972 and in 1981-82 demonstrated entanglement and nonlocality with few grounds for doubt.

It began to dawn on the wider scientific community that entanglement and nonlocality were real phenomena, leading to speculations on the possibility of building a quantum computer, and on the use of entangled particles in a system of quantum cryptography. The 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded to the three experimentalists who had done most to expose the reality of entanglement and its promise of ‘a new kind of quantum technology’. The projected value of the quantum computing industry is estimated to be somewhere between $9 billion and $93 billion by 2040. I doubt there is any other example in history of such a high-value industry constructed on a physical principle that nobody understands.

Marxism powered many objections to Bohr’s complementarity, and so helped to shape the development of postwar quantum mechanics. Soviet physicist-philosophers lent their support by finding positivist tendencies in Bohr’s teaching in conflict with dialectical materialism. Some sought an alternative materialistic interpretation. Podolsky and Rosen both admired the Soviet Union and in different ways sought to contribute to its mission. Bohm laboured at a time when there was little appetite for what many physicists judged to be philosophical, and therefore irrelevant, foundational questions. It says much about Bohm’s commitment that he resisted the temptation to leave such questions to play out in the theatre of the mind. The Marxist in Bohm sought not only to show that a materialistic alternative was possible, but also to find a way to bring the arguments into the real world of the laboratory.

It was not enough just to interpret the world. Bohm also sought to change it.

This essay is dedicated to the memory of my colleague, co-author and friend, John Heilbron, who died on 5 November 2023.

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Call for Papers: Gulf South/Global South (The Global South 19.1, 2026)

Scholars have long noted the benefits and difficulties of studying the circum-Caribbean—including land masses touching the Gulf of Mexico—as a global region that shares historical and aesthetic forms but includes many nations and languages. Previous studies, often influenced by postcolonial theory, have featured histories of direct cultural exchange; in the realm of literature and the arts, these include the literary “baroque” and “marvelous real.” This issue of The Global South  returns to and builds on that work with different terminology for two reasons. 

• While “Gulf South” has recently become important for institutions in the United States addressing ecological and infrastructural problems, many writers, artists, and activists have suggested that neither these challenges nor quests for solutions can be separated from the broader region’s shared history of racial exploitation and the epistemologies developed by the Black, Indigenous, immigrant, and working-class peoples that have had to navigate injustices in these locales. This issue of The Global South  solicits essays that place study of the larger circum-Caribbean region—including, for example, its cultural exchanges, histories of conflict, human migrations, corporate expansions, expressive forms, and activist strategies—in conversation with local histories, arts, experiences, and tactics.
• The “Global South” similarly traverses sociopolitical and humanistic inquiry. Sometimes treated as a term for “developing nations,” it also mobilizes a history through which residents of multiple nations have organized around shared concerns and goals—seeking to combat ecological destruction and the abuses of racial capitalism while also collaborating to create new tactics of interpretation and resistance. Many of the economic forms central to Gulf South and circum-Caribbean history and contemporaneity—including plantation agriculture and petroleum extraction—have been and are prevalent in other global regions. Essays in this issue of  The Global South  might demonstrate, for example, how forms of expression, analysis, and activism circulate across these contexts.

The Global South  is published by Indiana University Press and available via JSTOR and Project Muse .  An interdisciplinary journal, it publishes articles in many areas of the humanities and social sciences. For inclusion in this issue, please send 500-word proposals plus a short bio to Leigh Anne Duck ( [email protected] ) by September 9, 2024 . If selected, manuscripts of 6,000 to 10,000 words will be due by March 17, 2025 . 

Contributions must be original, and authors must cite all publications and acknowledge all sources that have shaped their scholarship. Manuscripts will be sent out for anonymous (“double-blind”) peer review. Citations should be formatted according to the guidelines of the 9th edition of the MLA Handbook.

Leigh Anne Duck, University of Mississippi