The 138th birthday of the poet philosopher Allama Dr Muhammad Iqbal, who was a great inspiration for the Pakistan Movement, is being celebrated throughout the country today. In Lahore, a colourful change of guard ceremony will be held at the mazar of Allama Iqbal who gave the idea of a separate and independent homeland for the Muslims of South Asia. The Pakistan government officially declared him the national poet.
Though the Federal government, Punjab , Sindh and Balochistan governments have not declared Iqbal Day a public holiday yet the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has declared it a public holiday across the province for his poetry embodies the Ideology of Pakistan.
The Markazi Majlis-e-Iqbal, various educational institutions, literary bodies, social and cultural organisations, TV channels have chalked out programmes to highlight Iqbal's massage and pay tribute to the Poet of East.
Iqbal was born on 9 November 1877 in Sialkot. He died on 21 April 1938 in Lahore.
His major philosophical and poetry works include:
The reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam, Asrar-e-Khudi, Rumuz-e-Bekhudi, Payam-e-Mashriq, Bang-e-Dara, Zabur-e-Ajam, Javed Nama, Bal-e-Jibril, and Zarb-Kalim.