BOOK REVIEW

JINNAH OF PAKISTAN
STANLEY WOLPERT

SUBMITTED TO
SIR HIMAYATULLAH

SUBMITTED BY
SHAFIQUE AHMED
MPHILL. Pakistan Studies
(FIRST SEMESTER)

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 BOOK REVIEW
1. Title
Jinnah of Pakistan
2. Author
Stanley Wolpert, an American historian, academician, Indologist, and Author of ‘Jinnah of
Pakistan’, has passed away aged 91. Wolpert was also famous for his intellectual discourses on
the history of modern Pakistan and India. He wrote numerous books on different genres including
fiction, biographies and non-fiction. He was a professor at the prestigious University of California,
Los Angeles (UCLA) from 1959-2002. Jinnah of Pakistan is regarded as one of the finest
biographies by Wolpert on the life of Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah.

3. Publisher
Oxford university press
4. Place of publication
Oxford university press New York UK
5. Year of publication
New York 1984
Oxford University paperback in Pakistan 1993
6. Price
595
7. Pages
421
8. Reviewed by
Shafique Ahmed
MPhil Pakistan studies 1st semester

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Quaid-i-Azam was the most prominent figure in the politics of his time. Quaid-i-Azam
Muhammad Ali Jinnah the great ambassador of Hindu-Muslim unity, the man who divided India
and the leader who fought for the Muslims. Stanley Wolpert's informative book on Jinnah reveals
many unknown things about the great leader. He was a lawyer and greatest ambassador of Hindu-
Muslim unity to a person who the book is regarded as one of the best biographical books on the
life of Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah.
Stanley Wolpert’s book is the most authentic book on Jinnah the most mysterious and powerful
leader of the last century. Others often misrepresent Jinnah. However, Wolpert’s work does a great
service to this great leader by making his contributions known for centuries to come. Stanley
Wolpert records at least seven decades of Indian history along with the public and private life of
Jinnah to the highpoint where India achieves its independence from the British. The book reveals
Jinnah's relationships with many significant people in his life throughout, from his wife Ratti Bai
to Nehru, Gandhi and the British.
Jinnah was a genius lawyer, a man of words and character, an expert negotiator, an outstanding
charismatic leader and a wise political leader. He was humiliated and betrayed several times in his
struggles first for the united India, and then for the equal representation of Muslims in the union
and finally for Pakistan.
The book takes the readers to the hometown of Jinnah, Karachi and follows him to London,
Bombay, Lahore, New Delhi, Nagpur, Amritsar, Shimla, Calcutta, Lucknow, Srinagar, Peshawar,
Quetta and Ziarat. The book deals with Jinnah's strong objectives and stubbornness from when he
laid great emphasis on the amiable relations of Hindus and Muslims to the point where he openly
criticized the Hindus. He failed many times throughout his career but always gained his objective.
Jinnah was a tolerant, patient and a hopeful person who dealt with many failings, loneliness, an
estranged marriage and a disease, which he never revealed publicly but did not let these obstacles
come in the way of achieving his goal- Pakistan. With politics Wolpert also gives the readers an
interesting insight to his private life and his marriage with his wife Ratti Petit the daughter of a
famous and wealthy Parsi businessman Sir Dinshaw Petit, Jinnah loved her immensely, Ratti also
cherished and adored Jinnah just as much that she gave up her family and religion just to marry
Jinnah. In their early years, the marriage proved to be very successful, but the winds changed their
direction as Jinnah became a workaholic and neglected his wife, Ratti who felt lonely befriended
Kanji Dwarkadas but both of them never stopped loving each other despite their quarrels. Wolpert
quotes in his book: "It (the funeral) was a painfully slow ritual. Jinnah sat silent through all of its
five hours. As Ratti’s body was being lowered into the grave, Jinnah as the nearest relative was
the first to throw the earth on the grave. He broke down suddenly, wept, and sobbed like a child
for minutes together. That was the only time when I found Jinnah betraying some shadow of human
weakness.”
For almost twenty-four years of his life Jinnah fought for the unity of Hindus and Muslims, many
of his reforms and arguments were rejected. After twenty-four years of endless arguments with
people who were not able to inculcate his ideas Jinnah changed his mind and thus began a new
era, in 1937 Jinnah addressed the League's session in Lucknow where he said: "Think a hundred
times before you take any decision, but when that decision is taken, stand by it as one man". Jinnah

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had made a firm decision after twenty-four years of lingering on one point that was Hindu-Muslim
unity but now he wanted something different and began his work for the creation of Pakistan.
Jinnah's only supporter who stood by him throughout his life was his younger sister Fatima Jinnah
who gave up her dentistry career to support her brother. Jinnah's only daughter was Dina Wadia
from Ratti, during the last years of his life when he was on the brink of achieving Pakistan Dina a
young girl expressed her desire to marry a Parsi boy to her father, Jinnah completely refused to
accept this, the book mentions that Jinnah told her that "There are millions of Muslim boys in India
and you could have anyone you chose" Dina at this reminded his father that "There were millions
of Muslim girls in India, why didn't you marry one of them (She was referring that her mother
Ratti Bai Petit was also a Parsi). Jinnah was angry at his daughter, both of them after this addressed
to each other as "Mr. Jinnah" and "Mrs. Wadia" which shows the heated up relation between the
two. Therefore, during his course of life, Jinnah lost his wife not only because of her demise but
also because of their separation and then he lost his only daughter.
Despite that, Jinnah did not succumb to life's harsh realities but resurrected each time and rose up
higher like the Phoenix bird. After Pakistan came into being Jinnah became so frail and less
energetic due to various diseases such as pneumonia and lung cancer that he once invited the
Mountbatten’s on lunch on few days after Pakistan came into being, what he forgot however that
was it was Ramadan and he had to change the invitation to dinner. This shows how weak Jinnah
had become mentally and physically. His last peaceful days were spent in Ziarat, Balochistan
where his health deteriorated and he was shifted to his home city of Karachi where a "handsome
domed monument of pink marble now stands, housing the remains of one of history's most
remarkable, tenacious and enigmatic figures" as Wolpert quotes.
Stanley Wolpert covers all the major and minor events of Jinnah's life in this remarkable book
which helps the reader to understand Jinnah's decisions and the steps he took in his life to achieve
Pakistan. It consists of actual letters of Jinnah, which tells the reader what Jinnah was truly
thinking. It is by far the most authentic book on Pakistan's great leader and founder Quaid-i-Azam
Muhammad Ali Jinnah.

Stanley Wolpert
“Few individuals significantly alter the course of history. Fewer still modify the map of the world.
Hardly anyone can be credited with creating a nation-state. Muhammad Ali Jinnah did all three.”

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