Page 187 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol V

1964 berkshire encyclopedia of world history

Call for a Separate Homeland for Muslims in South Asia

At the March 1940 meeting of the Muslim League in a Minority and of course we have got used to it for
Lahore, League leader Mohammad Ali Jinnah called such a long time that these settled notions sometimes
for a separate homeland for Muslims. Such a home- are very difficult to remove.The Mussulmans are not
land was established in Pakistan but it did not end con- a Minority.The Mussulmans are a nation by any def-
flict among Hindus and Muslims in India nor in South inition. The British and particularly the Congress
Asia in general. proceed on the basis, “Well, you are a Minority after
all, what do you want?” “What else do the Minorities
As far as our internal position is concerned we have
want?” Just as Baba Rajendra Prasad said. But surely
also been examining it and, you know, there are sev-
the Mussulmans are not a Minority.We find that even
eral schemes which have been sent by various well-
according to the British map of India we occupy large
informed constitutionalists and others who take
parts of this country, where the Mussulmans are in a
interest in the problem of India’s future constitution,
majority—such as Benga, the Punjab, North-West
and we have also appointed a sub-committee to
Frontier Province, Sind and Baluchistan.
examine the details of the schemes that have come in
Source: Sharma, J. S. (1965). India’s struggle for freedom: Select documents and sources.
so far. But one thing is quite clear. It has always been Vol. 2 (pp. 521–522). Delhi, India: S. Chand & Co.
taken for granted mistakenly that the Mussulmans are

stretched from Spain in the west to India in the east and have stressed the effects of the plague or the power of the
from southern Arabia to Central Asia. Although the new religion (Islam) and ideology (jihad). Still others
caliphate dissolved into many Muslim states as early as have emphasized the personal qualities of the first
the eighth century, Islam continued to spread among new caliphs, the Ottoman sultans, and the founders of the
peoples, including the Turks and the Persians, who both Safavid and Mughal empires, as well as the valor of Mus-
were to play major roles in Islamic history. Although no lim fighters.To this long list we should add the ability of
Muslim state existed in Spain by the sixteenth century, Muslim rulers to establish professional armies and effec-
Islam made new advances in the Balkans and central tive state bureaucracies and financial organizations.
Europe under the Ottoman Turks (c. 1300–1922). Of the Building on the foundations of Caliph ‘Umar (reigned
major sixteenth-century Islamic empires, the Ottomans 634–644), who established the first garrison towns and
controlled parts of Hungary, the Balkans, Anatolia, and the first registers of the names and salaries of the troops,
most of the Middle East, the Safavids (1501–1722/ the Umayyads completed the transformation of a tribal
1736) ruled over Persia and parts of Iraq and Afghan- migration into a professional army.Around 700, the sol-
istan, and the Mughals (1526–1857) conquered much of diers in the garrison cities throughout the caliphate might
India. Although military conquest were important in the have numbered some 250,000 men. The soldiers were
spread of Islam, in territories outside the effective radius paid in minted coins and supported by an efficient logis-
of Muslim armies, such as the Indonesian archipelago, tical system and bureaucracy.
the Malay peninsula, and parts of Africa, mass conversion Starting in the 830s, the Abbasid dynasty (749/750–
was achieved via merchants and missionaries, making the 1258) began to recruit Turkish-speaking mounted archers
spread of Islam in those regions a cultural rather than a from Central Asia, predominantly as slave-soldiers.
military advance. Though only a couple of thousand in number, their new
military technique (mounted archery), tactics (feigned
The Expansion of Islam retreat), skills in horsemanship, and superior horses
Historians have tried to explain the remarkably swift and added considerably to Muslim armies’ speed, maneuver-
enduring Muslim conquests in many ways. Some have ability, and firepower. Soon, most Muslim armies were
stressed the relative weakness of their opponents; others dominated by Turkish soldiers.