Gandhi embodied compassion - Jinnah did not wish to touch the poor, but then Gandhi's instincts were rooted in India and life long he soiled his hands in helping the squalid poor. This brought them into close contact with literally thousands of people... Much of what we know about the two comes from the testimonies of these witnesses. Einstein called him the greatest Human to walk the Earth in the 20th Century. His ability to reach out informally across political and social divides was extraordinary; during his trip to England in 1931, he managed to befriend the very mill workers that his hand-spinning was intended to condemn to unemployment. Jaswant Singh said he was "saddened" by the ban. The two men parted with protestations of friendship, but it seems with some underlying feeling of bitterness. Contemporary critics of Gandhi were not usually close to him, mainly because he tended not to leave cast-offs... One exception was Jawaharlal Nehru, who frequently expressed his exasperation at the Mahatma’s twists and turns. The extended confrontation between Mohammed Ali Jinnah (1876–1948) and Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (1869–1948) was one of the great dramas of the twentieth century. Extracted from the book Jinnah: India-Partition-Independence; by Jaswant Singh; Publisher: Rupa & co; pp: 669; Price: Rs 695. We have earlier, though very briefly, considered these two great but incompatible Indians, both born of Kathiawari trading communities but not endowed with much other similarities. Chagla described him as ‘cold and unemotional’. Gandhi, it must be said, left a much better impression on most of his contemporaries than Jinnah, and this has heavily tilted the verdict of history in as far as it is influenced by personal memoirs. He writes: 'Jinnah was a source of power'. This was an ungracious and discouraging response to Jinnah's warm welcome and had a dampening effect. An extract from the book that riled India's Bharatiya Janata Party and led to the expulsion of its author Jaswant Singh, one of the founder members, of the party. "The day we start banning books, we are banning thinking," he said. The book examines the role of Congress party leader and the country's first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, and Mr Patel in the partition of India in 1947. For this he desired 'that frame of mind, that state, that condition which they had to bring about between the two communities, when most of their problems, he had no doubt, would easily be solved.' 499. Site best viewed in IE ver 6.0 @ 1024 x 768 resolution, Japan election set to break political pattern, U.S. political rivals unite at Kennedy memorial, Jackson homicide; all his To M A Jinnah: Segaon, February 3, 1938. Mr and Mrs Jinnah by Sheela Reddy and The Secret Diary of Kasturba Gandhi by Neelima Dalmia Adhar are books that are painstakingly researched and well-written and take you deep into the lives of two women who married men, who were the harbingers of freedom for the nation. But the Mahatma’s mild nature never failed, and there is very little contemporary criticism of his character to be found, especially not from his inner circle. The most sincere voices that speak up for him come largely from those impressed by his easy brilliance, and relate to his early years. DEAR MR. JINNAH, Pandit Nehru told me yesterday that you were complaining to Maulana Sahib about the absence of any reply from me to your letter of the 5th November in reply to mine of the 19th October. Gandhi inspired many, including Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela, and is spoken off as if he were a saint. Each preferred to be the leader of the movement they were involved with and were very goal-oriented. All Rights Reserved.| Mohammad Ali Jinnah cited Thoughts on Pakistan to Gandhi, during their talks in Bombay in September 1944, and in his letter to Gandhi of September 17, 1944. Mr Singh writes that Mr Patel was "far off the mark" in many ways with his projections about the division and future of India. Ambedkar on Gandhi and Jinnah. Several senior members of the Congress did later write memoirs containing criticisms of Gandhi ranging from mild to severe. As leaders and thinkers, Jinnah and Gandhi deserve full appreciation of their talents, clear assessments of their objectives and measured criticism of their weaknesses. The range of critical remarks he made about Jinnah is quite striking. Jinnah and Edwina. After his release Gandhi proposed talks with Jinnah on his two-nation theory and negotiating on issue of partition. It is a fascinating theme, a study of these two great Indians. Introduction: The meeting of Bhimarao Ramji Ambedkar (1891-1956), Mohammed Ali Jinnah (1876- ) and Erode Venkatappa Ramaswamy Naicker (1879-1973) (hereinafter mentioned Ambedkar, Jinnah and EVR) took place at Bombay on January 8, 1940.It is not that they never meet each other earlier. doctors under investigation. The result has been a body of literature about him that is saccharine in the extreme. English had become his principal language and would remain so throughout his life. This was the period when the British government, very concerned about Jinnah, his Hindu-Muslim unity moves, was endeavouring hard to keep the All India Muslim League away from the Indian National Congress. Khurshid also recounted, how, a few days after Partition and before he left for Karachi, Jinnah responded when he was told of the many massacres (it is estimated that more than one million were killed on both sides). (Excerpted with permission from Hachette India. He found it impossible to support the burning of valuable clothes and the denial of schooling to young Indians that the boycott required. To oppose him coming from within either orthodox Hinduism or broad Congress philosophy would have seemed either irreverent or un-Indian. They added up the movement’s mass popularity and multiplied it by the Congress’s opposition to British rule and came out with a neat calculation that defined Gandhi as a nationalist demagogue and an enemy — in sum, a fascist. were Mahatma Gandhi, Nehru and Jinnah People state various reasons of the separation but no one exactly knows the reason why the two nations were separated. Bose became increasingly frustrated with Gandhi through the 1930s. Gandhi, most remarkably, became a master practitioner of the politics of protest. Friendlessness or isolation is a recurring theme in Jinnah’s life. Gandhi, somewhat hesitant at first, could, in that early phase, see no other route but of following Gokhale, Jinnah and some of the other moderate leaders. In this interview to NH, Nayar expressed his views about 3 great personalities of Indian sub-continent - Gandhi, Jinnah and Bhagat Singh Through out his political career Jinnah was in two parties i.e. Jinnah And Gandhi Were Human After All. Gujaratis in South Africa were both Hindus and Muslims," Guha said. S.C. Bose was less restrained in The Indian Struggle. Subscribe here.). Besides, there was no province, not one, not then, not later, that he could rely upon totally as his exclusive parish. "Jinnah was a briefless lawyer in Bombay in 1897. Bose’s eventual resignation from the Congress in 1939 ended the dispute, and Bose’s subsequent career as an authoritarian, militaristic, national-socialist amply displays his basic differences with Gandhi as philosopher and leader. Gandhi had singled out Jinnah as a Muslim, though, neither in appearance or in conduct was Jinnah anywhere near to being any of the stereotypes of the religious identity ascribed by Gandhi. One was devoutly and expressly Hindu, the other but a casual votary of Islam. He transformed a people, who on account of prolonged foreign rule had acquired a style of subservience. Gandhi and Jinnah belonged to Gujarat and were in the same profession, but had different objectives and personalities. Gandhi's birth in a prominent family - his father was, after all, a diwan (prime minister) of an Indian state - helped immeasurably. Jaswant Singh is a 71-year-old party veteran who has served as finance and external affairs minister in BJP cabinets. Gandhi Ji and Jinnah were for lot of time friend but later on became political adversary. Das in 1923, and Bose in 1939 had to leave and create their own platforms to oppose him at an all-India level. He took the plea that he would study all the Indian questions from 'his own point of view,' a reasonable enough assertion; also because Gokhale had advised him to study the situation for at least a year before entering politics. It was because of his popularity and standing that Jinnah had been invited to preside over a garden party given by the Gurjar Sabha, an association of the Gurjar (Gujar) community, arranged to welcome Mr and Mrs Gandhi, on his arrival on 13 January 1915. He was a persistent doubter, and an inveterate opponent of Gandhi’s chosen heir, Nehru. Criticizing the Mahatma was potentially a short cut to the political wilderness. It was Motilal Nehru who had primed Jinnah to oppose Gandhi… Study some biographies on the Mahatma by writers who have no axe to grind, or his own letters and essays. No such advantage of birth gave Jinnah a leg up, it was entirely through his endeavours. When it failed, Jinnah called it the “saddest day of his life” and Gandhi refused to talk to Nehru for 4-5 days. File Photo: PTI/ Courtesy Roli Books. ), Printable version | May 13, 2021 3:33:25 AM | https://www.thehindu.com/books/friends-and-enemies-an-excerpt-from-roderick-matthews-book-jinnah-vs-gandhi/article12689070.ece. Just as importantly, his methods were thought to be correct; Indian freedom under Gandhi was to be won in an Indian way. There is no real evidence about an affair between Jinnah … Gandhi demanded joint defense and foreign affairs allowing only 3 out of 6 Muslims to be free. Kanji Dwarkadas, in Freedom for India (1966), is critical of Gandhi’s inconstancy, his ‘continuously changing moods and policies’. Described often as the "Iron Man of India", Mr Patel played an important role in the country's independence and the integration of the different states in the Indian union. Whether he was consciously projecting an image or not, this kind of observation feeds easily into readings of Jinnah’s character, both positive — that he was a man apart, carrying a crushing burden — and negative — that he was aloof and haughty. He was expelled from the party last week. The picture that emerges is, of course, unclear, because although politics may be about trying to win friends, the result is often the making of enemies. In 1900, P. H. Dastoor, a Bombay presidency magistrate, left the post temporarily and Jinnah … Officially, at the time, Mountbatten settled for ‘cold’, though afterwards he was rather less kind, calling him mad, megalomaniac, a clot, a bastard and, most famously, ‘a psychotic case’. Besides, by then (1920) Gandhi had won acceptance from the British government too, even though that was through the good offices of Gokhale, who 'exerted the full weight of his prestige and influence upon the Viceroy, Lord Hardinge, to bring the Government of India solidly behind Gandhi.' The stakes were high, and the eventual outcome not only created South Asia’s two principal nation states, but also shaped their political and social character, and has had a direct influence on wider geopolitical concerns, including superpower relations, nuclear proliferation and the development of international terrorism. 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