Mohammad Ali Jinnah was a giant. The 20th century produced some great personalities and leaders. Churchill, FDR, Mao, Kenyatta, Gandhi. But Jinnah stands tall - because he created a country called Pakistan, along with a small band of comrades. Our elders would have us believe that millions of Muslims were slaughtered in the independence struggle. Not true. Yes, there were a few pogroms, especially during migration, East to West, or West to East. But by and large Jinnah managed a largely peaceful transition by the dint of his strategic and tactical brilliance. He out thought the British and the leaders of the Indian national congress. Jawaharlal Nehru was no match for Jinnah who drew circles around him. Edwina Mountbatten (the Viceroy's wife) and Nehru were quite close. Very often when Jinnah was winning, Nehru would turn to Edwina and ask her to intercede on his behalf with the Viceroy. In Great Britain, Jinnah had to deal with Prime Minister Winston Churchill. Churchill was against the partition of India. He disliked all Indians. He described Gandhi as a fakir. Churchill famously stated, "We did not win the war to liquidate His Majesty's Empire". Jinnah even neutralized Churchill who was at the time the most famous man in the world. Jinnah handed us Pakistan on a platter. Therefore, we did not value this country, because our ancestors sacrificed not much. We took Pakistan for granted, as our birthright. That Jinnah made it look so easy, compared to other struggles for independence, he is also, for want of a better word, a villain. But for Jinnah's winning strategy, millions of Muslims would have perished in the making of Pakistan. Then our generations would have valued and venerated statehood.
Perhaps we should have named our country Jinnahistan. Other countries are named after their founders. Bolivia is named after Simon Bolivar. Saudi Arabia (first only called Arabia) is named after Ibn-e-Saud. Rhodesia was named after Cecil Rhodes, a great scoundrel and thief. On his deathbed Cecil Rhodes requested that the name of the country should never be changed. It's now called Zimbabwe.
My daughter resides in Vietnam. Now a peaceful and prosperous country. The late General Giap out fought two great powers. First, he defeated the French Army at Dien Bien Phu. Thereafter, the Americans moved in. They threw everything at North Vietnam - Napalm, Agent Orange, B-52s, etc. General Westmoreland predicted victory soon. But General Giap prevailed. This was a humiliating defeat for the US. Millions of Vietnamese men died. Even today, the man-woman ratio in Vietnam is 45:55. Jinnah spared us all this. When Algeria gained independence after the 1961-64 war, four million Algerians died. For France, Algeria was not a colony, it was France II, a normal extension of France. France threw everything into the war: Firepower, plunder, rape. Eventually De Gaulle realized he had to concede. 11 known attempts were made to assassinate De Gaulle after this decision. The Revolutionary leaders like Ben Bella, Boumediene, etc. had to console the deaths of 4 million Algerians. Jinnah spared us all this. Mao was responsible for 40 million deaths in the 'Great Leap Forward'. In the book "Chairman Mao", there is a photograph of Mao with Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, circa 1976. ZAB was the last foreign leader to meet Mao before his death. The photograph shows the Chairman reclining on a sofa (he was very ill), wearing his traditional dress. ZAB is standing in front of Mao, wearing a pinstriped suit, Italian shoes and a fancy tie. The contrast could not be more glaring.
So, Jinnah is Pakistan's founder and everlasting hero. He is also, for want of a better word, a villain. He gave us Pakistan very easily. We took it for granted and forgot our obligations to statehood, tolerance, unity, discipline, sacrifice, hard work and patriotism.
(The writer is a former Executive Director of the Management Association of Pakistan)