Islam & Pakistan's Identity

In analyzing the religio-political developments, which led to the creation of Pakistan, this book repeats the old story, forgotten and probably erased from the collective memory of the present generation of Pakistanis. It also attempts to provide answers to a series of questions which emerge from the foregoing analysis. In context: was Pakistan established as a result of the hastily articulated ‘two-nation theory’ or was it spawned by a protracted conflict between two cultures in the sub-continent? Is there any merit in the argument that since the region comprising Pakistan had different geo-political features, that its inhabitants (even in pre-Islamic times) had been ethnically, linguistically and culturally different from the rest of India, that it represented a different nation, a different entity? If Islam is the basis of Pakistan, then which interpretation of Islam was its inspiration? Why were most of the Ulema (religious scholars) opposed to its creation?