Excerpts from Zafar Anjum’s ‘Iqbal’: In the end, Pakistan champion Muhammad Iqbal had doubts about the Two-Nation theory

After advocating the idea of a separate country for Muslims, the poet began to have reservations about it: Scroll.in

Iqbal is credited with creating the idea of Pakistan. In truth, the Two-Nation theory was already common currency when Iqbal became its most vocal proponent. Iqbal the patriot embraced the Two-Nation theory and devised the idea of a north-western Muslim province when he became convinced that Muslims faced extinction in India. He demanded the formation of a Muslim state in these words: ‘I demand the formation of a consolidated Muslim state in the best interests of India and Islam. For India, it means security and peace resulting from an internal balance of power; for Islam, an opportunity to rid itself of the stamp that Arabian imperialism was forced to give it, to mobilize its law, its education, its culture, and to bring them into closer contact with its own original spirit and with the spirit of modern times.’