Let’s remember forgotten hero Ch Rahmat Ali

Educated young generation is not happy with leaders who have forgotten the man who coined the word ‘Pakistan’ when he was a student and worked for the new Muslim homeland.

He was Chaudhry Rahmat Ali born on 16 November, 1897, at Mohar village in Hoshiarpur district. A part-time staffer in the well-known Paisa Akhbaar, he was also on the editorial desk of the Kashmiri Gazette to overcome his financial problem. He also joined the Law College of Lahore, and later he served as House Master in the Atchison College.

Ch. Rahmat Ali left the job in 1930 and went abroad for higher studies, and got admission in Emmanuel College of Cambridge on 5 January 1931 as an affiliated student from the University of the Punjab. He passed the M.A. examination from the same institution.

He became a Barrister-at-Law in January 1943 from the Inner Temple Inn, London, where M.A. Jinnah also had studied. The unsung hero launched the Pakistan National Movement and published several pamphlets on partition of the sub-continent. It was he who proposed the word “Pakistan”, and presented his ideas for the first time in a circular letter dated 8 January 1933 to the members of the Joint Parliamentary Committee on the Indian Constitutional Reforms.

He entitled his famous pamphlet Now or Never, which, in fact, was an appeal on behalf of nearly 30 million Muslims of the sub-continent for recognition of their national status quite distinct from other inhabitants of India.

His active struggle for Pakistan, timely initiative and campaign, start of the Pakistan National Movement, united work of his associates and friends to join hands with M.A. Jinnah generated the interest of the masses in his performance and personality.

The man, who won the hearts of all those who loved Pakistan, came to Karachi soon after the Partition; but ordered to leave the country he went back dejected along with his revolutionary ideas and concept of the people’s welfare state as envisioned by Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah according to the teachings of Islam.

The son of a peasant — who fought for freedom from the Farangi Raaj and dreamed an exploitation-free state breathed his last in 1951 and was buried as ‘Amanat’ (trust) at Cambridge in England.

There was a debate in 2005 where the remains of the great man should be buried. Some said it would have been in fitness of things if Islamabad were his final abode; others suggested Lahore where the demand for Pakistan was raised in a resolution in March 1940; and there were many who proposed Karachi where father of the nation was laid to rest.

Muhammad Zaman of Sahiwal, who was a federal minister in 1992, talked to this scribe about the significant role of Ch. Rahmat Ali in the freedom movement and struggle for Pakistan, but he criticised all the governments for ignoring the services of Ch. Rahmat Ali, and not honouring his will.

“How unkind and thankless we are to our heroes!” lament the city youths.

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