Fazl-e-Umar — Page 162
Fazle Umar 162 The Sunday Times, London, wrote in its issue of 9 April 1933: “There was a large gathering in the grounds of the mosque in Melrose Road, Wimbledon, where Mr Jinnah, the famous Indian Muslim, spoke on India’s future. Mr Jinnah made unfavourable comments on the Indian White Paper from a national point of view. The chairman, Sir Nairn Stewart Sandeman M. P. , took up the Churchill attitude on the subject, and this led to heckling by some of the Muslim students, who were, however, eventually calmed by the Imam of the mosque. ” M U HA M M A d A L I j I n n A H R E T U R n S TO I n d IA Mr Jinnah returned to India and put himself at the head of the Muslim League into which he infused a new life. He was elected a member of the Indian Legislative Assembly in which, for a time, he led the Independent Group, but soon he formed his own Muslim League Party and the Muslim members of the Legislative Assembly rallied round him. He early put forward the claim that the Muslim League alone represented Muslim public opinion in the political field. But it took him some time and a spell of very hard work to establish that position in fact and to have it recognised by the government and his non-Muslim opponents. From the beginning, however, the trend had set in very strongly in his favour and in the very first elections to the legislatures the Muslim League representation became a factor to be reckoned with. The Khalifatul Masih and the Community lent him their support throughout and became a source of strength for him upon which he could rely confidently. In the 1937 elections the Muslim League succeeded in consolidating its position in the Muslim majority provinces and also won almost all the Muslim seats in the provinces in which Muslims were in a minority. The Congress had won majorities in