Pakistan, June 13 — The reference to the “Two-Nation Theory” in a recent speech delivered by the Field Marshal General Syed Asim Munir has reignited debate on the subject. Nearly eight decades after the creation of Pakistan, the nation has yet to transcend the Two-Nation Theory, which continues to serve as a recurring theme, and a source of controversy and division, within Pakistani society. In contrast, India, Pakistan’s twin and Bangladesh its sister state have moved beyond ideological debates, anchoring their polities in clear constitutional frameworks. These foundations, aligned with evolving global norms, have enabled both nations to progress and compete internationally.
Before examining the concept of the Two-Nation Theory and the socio-cultural conditions and compulsions in British India under which Muhammad Ali Jinnah strategically instrumentalised it as a primary defence to safeguard the interests of the numerically far smaller, financially, and politically disadvantaged, as well as educationally backward Muslim community of British India, it is essential first to understand what defines a nation, nationalism, and the role of ideology in nation-building.
Understanding and defining nationalism remains elusive, as no single definition or theory fully captures its complexity. However, numerous influential theories and scholarly interpretations have attempted to explain its origins and manifestations. Among the most notable is Benedict Anderson’s Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, widely regarded as a seminal work. Anderson conceptualizes the nation as an “imagined community” a socially constructed entity bound together by shared narratives such as history, literature, language, collective memory, theories and ideologies which unify people in pursuit of a common political identity.
The theory offers valuable insight into the shifting identity of Muslims in the Indian subcontinent following the watershed events of 1857. The end of nearly 700 years of Muslim political dominance came with the brutal suppression of the War of Rebellion and later crushing defeat by the British, who held Muslims primarily responsible for the uprising. Branded as eternal enemies of the empire, Muslims who lacked modern education and finances were subjected to severe marginalization, alienation and harsh imperial treatment. In contrast, Hindus, better positioned in trade and modern education, were favoured by colonial machinery and ascended to influential roles in the imperial bureaucracy.
Alongside British hostility, Hindu reckoning and revivalism also began to rise in the 1870s. Bankim Chandra Chatterjee’s novel Anandamath and later ideological work of Damodar Savarkar titled; Essential of Hindutva in 1922 leading to the birth of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) in 1925 fueled Hindu nationalism and anti-Muslim sentiments, portraying Muslims as threats to Hindu culture, therefore, be expelled or eliminated to preserve Hindu Rashtra. This cultural awakening led to movements demanding Sanskritised Hindi as the official language and the marginalization of Persianised Urdu, further deepening communal divides. Thus, a once-dominant community was relegated to a politically and socially marginalized minority, planting a seed in search of a collective self-definition, identity, and, eventually, nationalist aspirations.
Leadership plays a pivotal role in shaping history and guiding those adrift in despair. In such a bleak context, Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, a modernist and enlightened reformer, emerged as a visionary leader, championing modern education, social progress, and political awareness to uplift the Muslim community. While Shah Waliullah emphasized religious separation to preserve Islamic orthodoxy, Sir Syed built on the idea of two distinct nations in a political and cultural context. He laid the intellectual foundation for Muslim identity and empowerment in colonial India, becoming one of the key architects of the Two-Nation Theory. The sense of a distinct Muslim identity, lost in the aftermath of 1857, was revived through the monumental contributions of Sayyed Ahmed Khan such as laying the basis of what would become the Mohammedan Anglo-Oriental College, later the university at Aligarh, one of the early secular institutes in the entire Muslim world. His practical efforts as well as theoretical foundation transformed a demoralized minority into a confident and educated community.
Later, Muhammad Ali Jinnah became the torchbearer of Sayyed Ahmed’s vision, eventually becoming the principal advocate of the Two-Nation Theory and the sole representative of the Muslims. However, this transformation was neither immediate nor effortless, it was the result of decades of struggle and leadership.
Muhammad Ali Jinnah, who had long been a dedicated member of the Indian National Congress and was widely regarded as the Ambassador of Hindu-Muslim Unity, eventually distanced himself from the Congress after a series of disillusioning experiences and his doctrinal discord with Gandhi.
Initially a proponent of a united India, Jinnah grew disillusioned with Gandhi’s mass mobilization, which he saw as infused with overt Hindu symbolism, turning the freedom struggle into a revival of Hindu identity. Even Muhammad Ali, former Congress president (1923-24) and once a close ally of Gandhi, later remarked that Gandhi’s goal was not true independence, but to make 70 million Muslims in British India subservient to the right-wing Hindu Mahasabha (noted on page 120 of Eight Lives, a book by Rajmohan Gandhi). This, along with the Congress’s apparent majoritarian mindset, became especially evident during several critical moments, including the watershed 1937 provincial elections.
Following the Congress’s electoral victory in 1937 and the Muslims under Congress rule from 1937 to 1939, several policies were enacted that were an attempt to assert Hindu dominance. These included efforts to declare the Congress flag as the national flag, promote Hindi as the national language, and adopt the Devanagari script as the official script. Additional measures such as the banning of new mosque constructions, compelling Muslims to chant “Vande Mataram,” and introducing the Wardha Scheme (also known as the Vidya Mandir education plan) which aimed to prioritize Hindu cultural values in education, deepened the sense of alienation among Muslims. The British author Beverley Nichols in his book titled, “Verdict on India” exposes the Congress’s discriminatory policies toward Muslims, criticises Congress for exhibiting Hindu majoritarian bias, marginalizing Muslims in employment and education, pressuring them to adopt Hindu Cultural practices and treating Muslims as minority with limited share in decision making during Congress rule from 1937 to 1939.
The tipping point came during the political manoeuvring following the 1946 elections. The Congress, through a bluff and political malice, assigned the crucial Ministry of Finance to the All India Muslim League assuming either that the League would decline due to a lack of expertise or that it would fail in managing the technically complex portfolio as noted on page 197 of India Wins Freedom, a book by Maulana Azaad). Additionally, Congress’s eventual rejection of the mutually agreed-upon Cabinet Mission Plan, combined with Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel’s ambition to retain the Home Ministry (as noted on page 197 of India Wins Freedom), further eroded Jinnah’s trust in a unified Indian polity.
As a seasoned lawyer and a visionary leader, Jinnah’s strategic foresight allowed him to perceive the long-term implications of Hindu majoritarianism. His spatial reasoning, coupled with the harsh lessons of the 1937 elections, made it clear to him that regardless of electoral performance, Muslims would remain a numerical minority, and thus politically marginalized in a Hindu-majority India. The Congress’s conduct during its brief tenure in power marked by policies driven by majoritarian hubris and a Hindu-centric vision of India, further confirmed that Muslims were likely to face systemic discrimination in united India.
These cumulative experiences compelled Jinnah first to resign from the Congress in 1920, which had failed to uphold its proclaimed secular and national character, and yet another Nehru’s betrayal of rejecting the Cabinet Mission on July 10, 1946, eventually forced Jinnah to conclude on 27 July 1946 that the only viable path for the Muslim community was the creation of a separate, sovereign state of Pakistan.
Following Nehru’s repudiation and dishonouring of the Cabinet Mission Plan, Jinnah famously remarked that “if Congress could renege on agreements while the British were still in power, what guarantees could minorities expect once power had fully transferred into Congress’s hands”. This realization ultimately led to the adoption and successful execution of the Two-Nation Theory, upon which Jinnah built the ideological foundation of Pakistan.
In the socio-cultural and historical context of India, no other strategy could have more effectively secured an independent homeland for Muslims than the Two-Nation Theory. Jinnah, with his political acumen and masterful articulation, pragmatically employed this defence to permanently safeguard the cause of a vulnerable minority. His efforts culminated in the freedom of Pakistan at midnight on the 14th and 15th of August 1947, though at an immense human cost.
The Two-Nation doctrine was adopted, socially constructed, and imagined as a political instrument to preserve identity and secure nationhood for a vulnerable minority. This construct of the nation theory became a unifying force and means of mobilizing Muslim masses in British India, who, after 1857, faced deep marginalization, struggling for identity, survival, and a voice in a declining socioeconomic and political landscape. Under such conditions, no other force or ideological framework could have so effectively transformed and unifying psychological effects on a disempowered minority into a confident, politically assertive community than the two-nation theory. Partition, as Jaswant Singh notes on page 498 of Jinnah: India-Partition Independence, set the Muslim League free from the “unreliable political hands of a Hindu Congress.” Ultimately, the Two-Nation Theory played a decisive role in the creation of a separate sovereign state, culminating in the partition of the Indian Subcontinent.
However, in the aftermath of partition, an important question remains: What is the continued relevance and application of the Two-Nation Theory in post-partitioned Pakistan? Furthermore, how should one interpret the message conveyed by Muhammad Ali Jinnah in his epoch-making and historically significant speech of 11 August 1947, delivered just days before the formal creation of Pakistan?
Jinnah, a successful lawyer, principled yet pragmatic politician, and committed constitutionalist, was deeply contemptuous of any theocratic model of governance or religious interference in political affairs. With a prescient vision, Jinnah strategically and pragmatically used the Two-Nation Theory in a pre-partition context to safeguard Muslim identity, leading to Pakistan’s creation. However, post-1947, he foresaw its fading relevance amid an international shift toward civic nationalism, inclusivity, rule of law, pluralism, and equal citizenship, values surpassing religious or ethnic nationalism. In his epoch-making speech on 11 August 1947, Jinnah redefined the foundational principles of Pakistan by emphasizing equal citizenship and rejected any idea of nationalism in which fundamental rights are guaranteed to the citizens based on religious affiliation or turning a state into a confessionist state. He stated:
“We are starting with this fundamental principle: that we are all citizens and equal citizens of one State. Now I think we should keep that in front of us as our ideal, and you will find that over time Hindus would cease to be Hindus and Muslims would cease to be Muslims-not in the religious sense, because that is the personal faith of each individual-but in the political sense as citizens of the State.”
This monumental speech marked a clear shift in Jinnah’s approach, from religious nationalism to an inclusive vision rooted in civic nationalism. While the Two-Nation Theory was undeniably the ideological basis for the creation of Pakistan, a theory, in the pre-partition context even acknowledged by a staunch Hindu Nationalist and the founder of Hindutva, Damodar Savarkar and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel acknowledging the existence of two states however Jinnah’s post-partition vision sought to socially reconstruct and reimagine a new Pakistani identity completely divorced from two nation however grounded in the principles of civic nationalism such as equal citizenry, uniformity, rule of law, pluralism, and national unity, effectively closing the chapter of religious and communal division in newly created polity of Pakistan.
If understood through Derrida’s deconstruction, the Two-Nation Theory does not stand as a fixed truth but rather as a shifting signifier, its meaning shaped and reshaped by historical context. In the pre-Partition era, it signified political survival and identity preservation for a marginalized Muslim minority, constructed in opposition to rising Hindu majoritarianism. In the post-Partition context, however, the signifier begins to unravel, Pakistan has been created, yet millions of Muslims remain in India, and Jinnah shifts toward civic nationalism, clearly manifested in his 11 August 1947 speech, where he emphasizes equal citizenship over religious identity. Once a unifying political force, the theory becomes ideologically obsolete in a rapidly changing global order, its meaning deferred, unstable, and ultimately replaced by more inclusive and modern ideals of nationhood. The theory was not a timeless truth, but as a strategic construct, powerful in one moment, inadequate in the next. Unfortunately, the Two-Nation Theory, once a powerful force that mobilized and unified a vulnerable Muslim community facing cultural extinction and political marginalization is often misunderstood without its full pre- and post-Partition context. This detachment continues to fuel controversy and confusion, hindering Pakistan from fully realizing the economic and political vision laid out by the Quaid.
Ideological clarity is essential to a nation’s foundation. It provides guiding principles, a unified sense of direction, and most importantly, national cohesion and internal stability. Without it, societies risk becoming trapped in endless internal conflict and divisive debate, an unfortunate reality Pakistan grapples with today.
The Two-Nation Theory is reaffirmed daily in Modi’s India, yet its relevance has ended in today’s Pakistan. Ideological confusion breeds division and a cycle of conflict, posing an existential threat to the state. Ideological division takes a nation not forward, but backward. Political stakeholders must adopt extraordinary measures to provide ideological clarity grounded in civic nationalism, equal citizenship, and pluralism.
