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Showing posts with the label British army

Jinnah and Colonel Blimp

Although everyone says what a superb lawyer Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah was, rarely does one get to read anything about the court appearances that earned him that reputation. I remember years ago in Lahore, Safdar Mir, the great Zeno of Pakistan Times , telling me about the Quaid’s contribution to the “Indianisation” of the British-led and officered army. Though I never made the effort to look up how and where the Quaid had made his contribution, what Safdar Mir has said remained engraved in my memory. The other day, while reading the autobiography of the late Maj. Gen. Ajit Anil “Jik” Rudra, who originally came from Lahore, served in three armies, fought in both World Wars and died in India in 1997 at the age of 93, I came upon an episode that showed that the Quaid’s reputation as a brilliant lawyer was not a Pakistani myth but a fact. The Government of India appointed a committee of the legislature – I am not clear about the year – to study the question of Indianising the