By Akbar S. Ahmed

Routledge, New York

274 pp.

Would Muslims of the Indian subcontinent have been better off in an undivided India? More than half a century after the division of the Indian subcontinent into India and Pakistan, this question is still passionately discussed by Muslims of the subcontinent. Was Mohammed Ali Jinnah correct in insisting on a Pakistan, even if it was "moth-eaten" or "truncated"? Was Jinnah a megalomaniac insisting on a separate country of his own? Or, was he utterly convinced that in an undivided India, aspirations of the Muslims would be suppressed by an intolerant majority?

Akbar Ahmed tackles these and a variety of other difficult questions in considerable depth indicative of his mastery of the subject of the dynamics of transfer of power at the end of the British rule. If Jinnah were alive and witnessing the mess that Pakistan has become, with extreme corruption and exploitation being the normative, would he still insist on his Pakistan? Ahmed answers by posing a reflective question. What if there were no Pakistan and Jinnah were alive in his native Bombay post-1992 riots following the destruction of the Babri mosque? Ahmed contends that Jinnah would have been shaken to the core by the communal violence, pogroms and prejudices. He would have been justified in saying that a moth-eaten Pakistan was still better than the living hell of Bombay.

Ahmed states at the outset that he wishes to correct the prevailing perceptions that Jinnah, in contrast with the saintly Mahatma Gandhi of India, was a villainous figure. A number of books and the 1980s epic movie "Gandhi" dealt a great deal of injustice to the memory of Jinnah. He articulates that the increasingly religious color of the Indian independence movement championed by the Congress left Jinnah with no choice except asking for partition.

That Jinnah was an uncompromisingly principled man of exceptional integrity is evidenced by the record. In his painstaking research of notes, minutes and papers pertaining to the transfer of power, H. M. Seervai, former Advocate of the Indian Supreme Court, has established that, indeed, Jinnah tried his best to work for an undivided India. The duality of the leadership of Congress convinced him that not only Muslims, but other minorities and underprivileged communities such as the Dalits ("untouchables"), will be dealt a raw deal.

Since Jinnah had taken a position against marginalization of the untouchables, the Dalits gave him a great deal of support. Paradoxically, the contemporary Dalit leadership in India holds Jinnah in high regard and views Gandhi as an exploiter of the untouchables. Mindful of the potential suffering of the minorities under a tyrannical majority in India, Jinnah set the tone at his inauguration as the Governor General of independent Pakistan by proclaiming himself as the "Protector General of minorities." Ahmed provides ample evidence that Jinnah was not only a morally upright leader, but a rare visionary who virtually single-handedly obtained Pakistan under adverse conditions. Mindful of the Muslims left in India, he articulated a framework for coexistence that was furthered by his protégé, Liaquat Ali Khan, the first prime minister of Pakistan.

In a thought-provoking chapter at the end of the book, the author poses the question: Is Jinnah still relevant? He then skillfully argues that given the prevailing intolerances in the entire subcontinent, including Bangladesh, the message of Jinnah and indeed that of Mohandas Gandhi is more relevant than ever. Despite his stated passion to correct the record about Jinnah, the author analyzed the other side of the coin – India, its leadership, its history and religions – in a fair and objective manner. The book will be enjoyed by those familiar with the history of the partition of India. It cannot serve as a history lesson for the unfamiliar.