Is the dark, long night about to end?

“Few individuals significantly alter the course of history,” wrote Stanley Wolpert in the preface to his book on Mr Jinnah. “Fewer still modify the map of the world. Hardly anyone can be credited with creating a nation-state. Mohammad Ali Jinnah did all three.” By 1940, the mystical bond linking Jinnah and the people was so profound that nobody could challenge Jinnah’s leadership of the Muslims of India. He was their sole spokesman.

Beverly Nichols, who first met Mr Jinnah on December 18, 1943, called him a giant, the most important man in Asia. “India is likely to be the world’s greatest problem for some years to come, and Mr Jinnah is in a position of unique strategic importance. He can sway the battle this way or that as he chooses. His 100 million Muslims will march to the left, to the right, to the front, to the rear at his bidding and at nobody else’s… that is the point.” Without Jinnah, it is safe to say, there would have been no Pakistan. Rarely, in the history of human endeavour, have so many owed so much to one, single, solitary person.