Leaders of the countrys freedom movement accepted partition of the Indian Sub-continent (albeit reluctantly) as the only solution to Hindu-Muslim problem under conditions then obtaining in the country. Pakistan drove out all Hindus and Sikhs and has, therefore, solved the problem once and for all times. India has sizeable Muslim population even after partition. This population has been steadily growing. The Hindu-Muslim problem remains far from solved so far as India is concerned. Mahatma Gandhi spent his life-time in solving the problem but failed completely. Will the small men who shout Gandhis name from the house-top succeed where the formidable Mahatma had himself failed? What are the implications of a second failure on the Hindu-Muslim front?

Manifestations of hatred of Jews and Israel have risen over the last few decades in the Arab and Muslim world. But is such hatred the result of Islamic anti-Semitism? This title explains that while anti-Semitism is the credo of fanatic groups and regimes, such an attitude is not representative of traditional and contemporary Islam.

Gandhi, a devout Hindu, believed faith could nurture the civilizational harmony of India, a land where every religion had flourished. Jinnah, a political Muslim rather than a practicing believer, was determined to carve up a syncretic subcontinent in the name of Islam. His confidence came from a wartime deal with Britain, embodied in the 'August Offer' of 1940. Gandhi's strength lay in ideological commitment which was, in the end, ravaged by the communal violence that engineered partition. The price of this epic confrontation, paid by the people, has stretched into generations. M.J. Akbar's book, meticulously researched from original sources, reveals the astonishing blunders, lapses and conscious chicanery that permeated the politics of seven explosive years between 1940 and 1947. Facts from the archives challenge the conventional narrative, and disturb the conspiratorial silence used to protect the image of famous icons. Gandhi's Hinduism: The Struggle Against Jinnah's Islam delves into both the ideology and the personality of those who shaped the fate of a region between Iran and Burma. It is essential reading for anyone interested in modern Indian history, and the past as a prelude to the future.

A Fascinating Account Of The Muslims In Twentieth-Century India, Pakistan And Bangladesh Through His Biographical Sketches Of Eight Prominent Muslims- Sayyid Ahmed Khan (1817-1898), Fazlul Haq (1873-1962), Muhammad Ali Jinnah (1876-1948), Muhammad Iqbal (1876-1938), Muhammad Ali (1878-1931), Abul Kalam Azad (1888-1958), Liaqat Ali Khan (1895-1951) And Zakir Hussain (1897-1969) Rajmohan Gandhi, The Grandson Of Mahatma Gandhi, Provides A Deeply Insightful And Comprehensive Picture Of The Community In The Subcontinent Today.

Concerned with the fate of the minority in the age of the nation-state, Muslim political thought in modern South Asia has often been associated with religious nationalism and the creation of Pakistan. The Muslim Secular complicates that story by reconstructing the ideas of three prominent thinker-actors of the Indian freedom struggle: the Indian National Congress leader Abul Kalam Azad, the popular Kashmiri politician Sheikh Abdullah, and the nonviolent Pashtun activist Abdul Ghaffar Khan. Revising the common view that they were mere acolytes of their celebrated Hindu colleagues M.K. Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru, this book argues that these three men collectively produced a distinct Muslim secularity from within the grander family of secular Indian nationalism; an intellectual tradition that has retained religion within the public space while nevertheless preventing it from defining either national membership or the state. At a time when many across the decolonising world believed that identity-based majorities and minorities were incompatible and had to be separated out into sovereign equals, Azad, Abdullah, and Ghaffar Khan thought differently about the problem of religious pluralism in a postcolonial democracy. The minority, they contended, could conceive of the majority not just as an antagonistic entity that is set against it, but to which it can belong and uniquely complete. Premising its claim to a single, united India upon the universalism of Islam, champions of the Muslim secular mobilised notions of federation and popular sovereignty to replace older monarchical and communitarian forms of power. But to finally jettison the demographic inequality between Hindus and Muslims, these thinkers redefined equality itself. Rejecting its liberal definition for being too abstract and thus prone to majoritarian assimilation, they replaced it with their own rendition of Indian parity to simultaneously evoke commonality and distinction between Hindu and Muslim peers. Azad, Abdullah, and Ghaffar Khan achieved this by deploying a range of concepts from profane inheritance and theological autonomy to linguistic diversity and ethical pledges. Retaining their Muslimness and Indian nationality in full, this crowning notion of equality-as-parity challenged both Gandhi and Nehru's abstractions and Mohammad Ali Jinnah's supposedly dangerous demand for Pakistan.

“The Mahatma Misunderstood” studies the relationship between the production of novels in late-colonial India and nationalist agitation promoted by the Indian National Congress. The volume examines the process by which novelists who were critically engaged with Gandhian nationalism, and who saw both the potentials and the pitfalls of Gandhian political strategies, came to be seen as the Mahatma’s standard-bearers rather than his loyal opposition.

Quite distinct from the abundant literature available on Mahatma Gandhi, this historical biography attempts to articulate the historiography of India's freedom struggle, of which Gandhi was undoubtedly the central figure. Relooking at key issues and themes that have been raised in the research conducted over the past few decades, this is an interpretative essay that seeks to contextualize Gandhi and his ideology of ahimsa and satyagraha. Instead of focusing merely on Gandhi's personal life, Prof Bidyut Chakrabarty conceptualizes the evolution of his ideas in the context of anti-colonial nationalism. A nationalism of the Mahatma that for the first time in the history of the independence struggle reached every village and taluk of the state. A nationalism for a country and a society based on his principles of nai talim (new education) and sarvodaya (upliftment of all). But was it the right path and ideology for a new and emerging nation? Despite being Gandhi-centred, the biography is thus imbued with questions, which it attempts to answer. Through a unique study of one of the most prominent personalities of the twentieth century, it addresses areas of human concerns, which will always remain universal in scope and content.

This decisive account of the role of nonviolence in Islam and Muslim societies, both historically and in current times, chronicles an often-obscured but longstanding pacifist tradition. "Islam" Means Peace: Understanding the Muslim Principle of Nonviolence Today provides a rebuttal to general misperceptions about the religion by documenting its rich tradition of nonviolence. To that end, the book examines the sources of Islam—the Qur'an, the main religious text of Islam, and the Hadith, the deeds and sayings of the Prophet Muhammad. It contests the prevalent notion that Islam is built on violence in part by illuminating the role of the tolerant, mystical tradition of Sufism in Islam, while at the same time examining the misunderstood place of jihad in the religion. The book is not, however, a historical or theological treatise. Rather, it focuses on the tradition of nonviolence in modern Muslim societies. By spotlighting recent peaceful protest movements in Muslim communities, the book underscores the truly global and multicultural nature of the Islamic tradition of nonviolence. The findings here will be invaluable for Muslims and non-Muslims alike, revealing an alternative tradition both can embrace.

`A sensitive and intelligent account of the Indian nationalist thought and the difficulties it faced in doing justice to India`s Islamic inheritance' - Lord Parekh Fellow of the British Academy `A thoughtful, well-researched and original analysis of the nationalist conceptualisation of the Muslim presence in India' - Professor Noel O`Sullivan , University of Hull Amalendu Misra shows that while some eminent nationalist leaders were implacably hostile to Muslims, even wholly secular ones were uneasy with India’s Muslim past and had a generally unfavourable disposition towards both Muslims and Islam. The book explicates this by focusing on the writings of Vivekananda, Gandhi, Nehru and Savarkar supported by a wealth of examples from a wide range of contexts. It argues that the views of these four prominent individuals were heavily shaped by British historiography as well as their respective visions of independent India. The author goes on to suggest how modern India needs to redefine itself to flourish as a genuinely secular democracy.