A Critical Review of the Pamphlet, 'Fateh-e-Qadian' — Page 16
16 A critical Review of the Pamphlet—‘f a te h -e-Qadian’ that they had speeded up the movement to poison the public mind against the Promised Messiah as. (For details see ‘As a -e-M u s a , p. 418) Sudden Arrival of P i r [Meher ‘Al i ] in Lahore P i r [Meher ‘Al i ] made a clever move at this time. His announcement had been published on August 21. A few days after publishing his announcement—without waiting for the reply of the Promised Messiah as —P i r Sahib arrived in Lahore on August 24, 1900, accompanied by a large entourage of his disciples. Out of the three people the Promised Messiah as had suggested as arbiters for the contest of written commentary, Maulav i Muhammad H usain Batalv i , set out towards Shimla on the pretext of some personal business and the other two arbiters, Maulav i ‘Abdul Jabb a r Ghaznav i and Maulav i ‘Abdull a h Tonk i , Professor at the Oriental College, Lahore, presented themselves in Lahore on the same day as the P i r. Many people from outlying areas also gathered to hear the proceedings of the so-called debate. Muhammad H usain Bat a lv i wrote: My humble self. . . considered the claims of Mirz a of the face-to-face contest of writing commentary and manifestation of signs as his old boast. . . and avoided any part in it by going to Shimla on some personal business. ( Ish a ‘at-us-Sunnah, vol. 19, p. 129)