The two-nation theory was an ideology of religious nationalism that advocated Muslim Indian nationhood, with separate homelands for Indian Muslims and Indian Hindus within a decolonised British India, which ultimately led to the Partition of India in 1947. Its various descriptions of religious differences were the main factor in Muslim separatist thought in the Indian subcontinent, asserting that Indian Muslims and Indian Hindus are two separate nations, each with their own customs, traditions, art, architecture, literature, interests, and ways of life.

Subsequently, it was used by the All India Muslim League to justify the claim that the Muslims of India should have a separate homeland with the withdrawal of British rule from the Indian subcontinent. The assumption of the Muslims of India of belonging to a separate identity and having a right to their own country, also rested on their pre-eminent claim to political power that flowed from the experience of Muslim dominance in India, while simultaneously it made identification with the former imperial Muslim power an essential part of being Muslim. Hindu Mahasabha under the leadership of Vinayak Damodar Savarkar and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) also promoted the Two-nation theory. According to them, Hindus and Muslim cannot live together so they favour India to become a religious Hindu state.

The theory was adopted and promoted by Muhammad Ali Jinnah and became the basis of Pakistan Movement. The Two-Nation theory argued for a different state for the Muslims of the British Indian Empire as Muslims would not be able to succeed politically in a Hindu-majority India; this interpretation nevertheless promised a democratic state where Muslims and non-Muslims would be treated equally. The two nation theory sought to establish a separate state for Indian Muslims from the northwestern provinces and Bengal region of colonial India. Pakistan claims to be the inheritor of the traditions of Muslim India, and the heir of the two-nation theory.

Opposition to the two-nation theory came chiefly from Hindus, and some Muslims. They conceived of India as a single Indian nation, of which Hindus and Muslims are two intertwined communities. The state of India officially rejected the two-nation theory and chose to be a secular state, enshrining the concepts of religious pluralism and composite nationalism in its constitution. Kashmir, a Muslim-majority region three-fifths of which is administered by the Republic of India, and the oldest dispute before the United Nations, is a venue for both competing ideologies of South Asian nationhood.

Pre-Modern India

Pakistani historians such as Ishtiaq Hussain Qureshi base the two-nation theory on the distinctiveness of medieval Indo-Muslim culture or civilization. It is described that by assimilating many aspects of Indian culture in customs, social manners, architecture, painting and music, the Muslims of India established a new distinct Indo-Muslim culture or civilization, which not only maintained its separate identity from other Muslim peoples such as the Arabs and the Persians, etc, but also simultaneously maintained the distinctiveness of this new culture from the former Hindu India by being essentially Indo-Persian in character. This is seen as a conscious decision of the Muslims of India. According to Qureshi, the distinctiveness of Muslim India could only be maintained by the political domination of the Muslims over the Hindus. Any sharing of political power with the Hindus was considered dangerous and the first step towards the political abdication of the Indian Muslims.

It is generally believed in Pakistan that the movement for Muslim self-awakening and identity was started by Ahmad Sirhindi (1564–1624), who fought against emperor Akbar's religious syncretist Din-i Ilahi movement and is thus considered "for contemporary official Pakistani historians" to be the founder of the Two-nation theory, and was particularly intensified under the Muslim reformer Shah Waliullah (1703-1762) who, because he wanted to give back to Muslims their self-consciousness during the decline of the Mughal empire and the rise of the non-Muslim powers like the Marathas, Jats and Sikhs, launched a mass-movement of the religious education which made "them conscious of their distinct nationhood which in turn culminated in the form of Two Nation Theory and ultimately the creation of Pakistan."

Roots of Muslim separatism in Colonial India (17th century–1940s)

M. S. Jain and others have traced the origins of the two nation-theory to Syed Ahmed Khan and the Aligarh Movement, consisting of his followers such as Mohsin-ul-Mulk. Syed Ahmed Khan was the grandson of the Mughal Vizier of Akbar Shah II, Dabir-ud-Daula, while Mohsin-ul-Mulk belonged to a family that played an important part in shaping the fortunes of the Mughal Empire, known as the Sadaat-e-Bara, who had been de-facto sovereigns of the Mughal Empire in the 1710s.

This feudal Indian Muslim service gentry, which performed both clerical and military service for the Mughal Empire and the British, provided cultural and literary patronage, which acted even after the fall of Muslim political power, as preservers of Indo-Persian traditions and values. They consisted of a group of feudal elites with an interest in preserving their power and position in relation to Hindus and the British. The resistance of Hindus towards the Urdu language prompted Syed Ahmed Khan and his associates to view Indian Muslims as not only having their own separate culture, but belonging to a separate nation, using the Urdu word, "Qawm". What Syed Ahmed Khan did was to provide a modern idiom in which to express the quest for Islamic identity, His concept of Indian Muslim identity placed great importance on nativity and the cultural values of Muslim India, and his writings became a dissemination of ideas about a national identity that was both Muslim and Indian.

Thus, many Pakistanis often quote  modernist and reformist scholar Syed Ahmad Khan (1817–1898) as the architect of the two-nation theory. For instance, in 1876, Syed Ahmed Khan exclaimed when speaking at Benares:

In their view, Indo-Muslim culture had participants from certain sections of Hindus as well, who had been influenced a great deal by Indo-Muslim culture and had adopted some Muslim traditions during Muslim rule. However, the cultural ties with Hindus were scuttled due to Hindu revivalism after the advent of the British. The formation of the Indian National Congress was seen politically threatening and he dispensed with composite Indian nationalism. In an 1887 speech, he said:

In 1888, in a critical assessment of the Indian National Congress, which promoted composite nationalism among all the castes and creeds of colonial India, he also considered Muslims to be a separate nationality among many others:

In 1925, during the Aligarh session of the All-India Muslim League, which he chaired, Justice Abdur Rahim (1867–1952) was one of the first to openly articulate on how Muslims and Hindu constitute two nations, and while it would become common rhetoric, later on, the historian S. M. Ikram says that it "created quite a sensation in the twenties":

More substantially and influentially than Justice Rahim, or the historiography of British administrators, the poet-philosopher Muhammad Iqbal (1877–1938) provided the philosophical exposition and Barrister Muhammad Ali Jinnah (1871–1948) translated it into the political reality of a nation-state.

Some Hindu nationalists also tended to believe Hindus and Muslims are different peoples, as illustrated by a statement made by Vinayak Damodar Savarkar in 1937 during the 19th session of the Hindu Mahasabha in Ahmedabad regarding two nations:-

The All-India Muslim League, in attempting to represent Indian Muslims, felt that the Muslims of the subcontinent were a distinct and separate nation from the Hindus. At first they demanded separate electorates, but when they opined that Muslims would not be safe in a Hindu-dominated India, they began to demand a separate state. The League demanded self-determination for Muslim-majority areas in the form of a sovereign state promising minorities equal rights and safeguards in these Muslim majority areas.

Many scholars argue that the creation of Pakistan through the partition of India was orchestrated by an elite class of Muslims in colonial India, not the common man. A large number of Islamic political parties, religious schools, and organizations opposed the partition of India and advocated a composite nationalism of all the people of the country in opposition to British rule (especially the All India Azad Muslim Conference).

On the other hand, Ian Copland, in his book discussing the end of the British rule in the Indian subcontinent, precises that it was not an élite-driven movement alone, who are said to have birthed separatism "as a defence against the threats posed to their social position by the introduction of representative government and competitive recruitment to the public service", but that the Muslim masses participated into it massively because of the religious polarization which had been created by Hindu revivalism towards the last quarter of the 19th century, especially with the openly anti-Islamic Arya Samaj and the whole cow protection movement, and "the fact that some of the loudest spokesmen for the Hindu cause and some of the biggest donors to the Arya Samaj and the cow protection movement came from the Hindu merchant and money lending communities, the principal agents of lower-class Muslim economic dependency, reinforced this sense of insecurity", and because of Muslim resistance, "each year brought new riots" so that "by the end of the century, Hindu-Muslim relations had become so soured by this deadly roundabout of blood-letting, grief and revenge that it would have taken a mighty concerted effort by the leaders of the two communities to repair the breach."

Relevant opinions

The theory rested on the view that Muslim Indians and Hindu Indians were two separate nations due to being from different religious communities. It asserted that India was not a nation. It also asserted that Hindus and Muslims of the Indian subcontinent were each a nation, despite great variations in language, culture and ethnicity within each of those groups.

British officials

Theodore Beck, who played a major role in founding of the All-India Muslim League in 1906, was supportive of two-nation theory. Another British official includes Theodore Morison. Both Beck and Morison believed that parliamentary system of majority rule would be disadvantageous for the Muslims.

Arya Samaj

Bhai Parmanand while reading letters of Lala Lajpat Rai to him in 1909, had jotted an idea that "the territory beyond Sindh could be united with North-West Frontier Province into a great Musulman Kingdom. The Hindus of the region should come away, while at the same time the Musulmans in the rest of the country should go and settle in this territory".

Lala Lajpat Rai laid out his own version of two-nation theory. He wrote in The Tribune on 14 December 1924:

Savarkar, Hindu Mahasabha and RSS

The embryonic form of a two-nation theory was seen in Hindutva ideology since 1920s. Savarkar in 1937 during the 19th session of the Hindu Mahasabha in Ahmedabad supported two-nation theory. He said:-

Savarkar declared on August 15, 1943 in Nagpur:

Savarkar saw Muslims in the Indian police and military to be "potential traitors". He advocated that India reduce the number of Muslims in the military, police and public service and ban Muslims from owning or working in munitions factories. Savarkar criticized Gandhi for being concerned about Indian Muslims.

Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) chief M. S. Golwalkar believed that the 'partition' actually "meant an acknowledgement that the Muslims formed a distinct and antagonistic national community ... won for itself a distinct state by vivisection of the country in which they had originally come as invaders and where they had been trying to settle down as conquerors".

Muhammad Ali Jinnah

In Muhammad Ali Jinnah's All India Muslim League presidential address delivered in Lahore, on March 22, 1940, he explained:

In 1944, Jinnah said:

In an interview with British journalist Beverley Nichols, he said in 1943:

In May 1947, he took an entirely different approach when he told Mountbatten, who was in charge of British India's transition to independence:

Mountbatten replied:

Support of Ahmadis

The Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama'at staunchly supported Jinnah and his two-nation theory. Chaudary Zafarullah Khan, an Ahmadi leader, drafted the Lahore Resolution that separatist leaders interpreted as calling for the creation of Pakistan. Chaudary Zafarullah Khan was asked by Jinnah to represent the Muslim League to the Radcliffe Commission, which was charged with drawing the line between an independent India and newly created Pakistan. Ahmadis argued to try to ensure that the city of Qadian, India would fall into the newly created state of Pakistan, though they were unsuccessful in doing so  Upon the creation of Pakistan, many Ahmadis held prominent posts in government positions; in the Indo-Pakistani War of 1947–1948, in which Pakistan tried to capture the state of Jammu and Kashmir, the Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama'at created the Furqan Force to fight Indian troops.

Support of Ambedkar

In his 1945 book Pakistan, Or the Partition of India, the Indian statesman, Buddhist and Dalit activist, Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, wrote a sub-chapter titled "If Muslims truly and deeply desire Pakistan, their choice ought to be accepted". Ambedkar's anti-Muslim rhetoric in his book was paradoxical, which in order to agree with Jinnah's two-nation theory, played on every stereotype of Muslim barbarism. It emphasized the threat that the Muslim dominance in the Indian army posed to free India, and about the frightful fate that the Hindus would face if Pakistan was not separated. He asserted that, if the Muslims were bent on the creation of Pakistan, the demand should be conceded in the interest of the safety of India. He asks whether Muslims in the army could be trusted to defend India in the event of Muslims invading India or in the case of a Muslim rebellion, as the bulk of the fighting forces available for the defence of India mostly came from areas which were to be included in Pakistan. "[W]hom would the Indian Muslims in the army side with?" he questioned. According to him, the assumption that Hindus and Muslims could live under one state if they were distinct nations was but "an empty sermon, a mad project, to which no sane man would agree". In direct relation to the two-nation theory, he notably says in the book:

According to Ambedkar, Hindu Nationalists naturally felt a resentment towards the assertion that Muslim India was a separate nation, because the Hindus felt ashamed to admit that India was not a nation, and despite attempts by the Hindus to prove to the English that India was in fact a nation, a deadlier blow arrived from the Muslim League which "cuts the whole ground from under the feet of the Hindu politicians." However, Ambedkar asserted that the separation of Muslims from India would benefit India, as the army would no longed be dominated by Muslims. Therefore, the Hindu civilian government would not be vulnerable to the army.

Views of the Barelvis

The founder of the Barelvi movement, Ahmad Raza Khan, supported the Muslim League and Pakistan's demand, arguing that befriending 'unbelievers' was forbidden in Islam. Other Barelvi scholars opposed the partition of India and the League's demand to be seen as the only representative of Indian Muslims. Ahmad Raza Khan wrote in the Fatawa-e-Radaviyyah:

 "Pay heed, at this time in which the country is not in their hands [Hindus], how many obstacles they place for your religious symbols...When authority shall be in their hands, what can be guessed of that time? For example, at this time ritual slaughtering [qurbānī] occurs with restrictions and limitations...at that time they shall make it a crime worse than murder of a human.

Shall the [British] government grant you [Muslims] alone the country? This is not possible. Nor shall they [Hindus] alone be granted it, then you shall have to share, or you shall have to divide the country. In the event of the second, it is apparent that no Indian city is free from Muslim population, then upon those hundreds of thousands of Muslims you have implemented laws in opposition to your pure Sharīáh with your united effort and you shall be responsible for that...In the event of the first, shall the Hindus agree that the country be shared and that the laws be solely the laws of Islām? Certainly not! Eventually you shall have to agree with them in one law or another that is in opposition to Islām...This is all in the case that dispute does not arise, and if it does break out, and experience informs that it certainly shall, if at that time the Hindus, as per their habit, play innocent and place all the blame upon your heads, then who shall be responsible for raising mischief in the land and opposing the Divine command, "Do not throw yourselves into destruction", placing the lives and honour of yourselves and of hundreds of thousands of innocent Muslims in danger? May Allāh grant correct understanding! Āmīn."

In 1946, the support of the Barelvi Ulama across India was formalized in support of Pakistan in order to give it religious legitimacy. Pir Jamaat Ali Shah, who claimed an extensive following in rural Northern Punjab and influential Muslims elsewhere, lent unequivocal support for the anti-Hindu stance of the Barelvi Ulama.

Pro-Muslim League Newspapers
The case for Indo-Muslim identity was based on cultural grounds, understood as an ethnic Muslim identity as well as a clearly identifiable cultural history. In 1947, Dawn made a case for cultural nationalism based on art, literature, and way of life, and crucial to this claim of a nationhood separated from the majority 'Hindu' community was the fixing of a national culture that could be specific to Indian Muslims. In this case, the writer's rather sophisticated definition of 'common culture' - 'developed manifestations of thought and feeling' - serve to reinforce this distinctiveness. Indian Muslims thought differently, felt differently, had a different and unique history and therefore had a common purpose and interest, and therefore belonged to a different nation.

Opposition to the partition of India

The state of India officially rejected the two-nation theory and chose to be a secular state, enshrining the concepts of religious pluralism and composite nationalism in its constitution.

All India Azad Muslim Conference
The All India Azad Muslim Conference, which represented nationalist Muslims, gathered in Delhi in April 1940 to voice its support for an independent and united India. The British government, however, sidelined this nationalist Muslim organization and came to see Jinnah, who advocated separatism, as the sole representative of Indian Muslims.

Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan and the Khudai Khidmatgar
Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, also known as the "Frontier Gandhi" or "Sarhadi Gandhi", was not convinced by the two-nation theory and wanted a single united India as a home for both Hindus and Muslims. He was from the North West Frontier Province of British India, now in present-day Pakistan. He believed that the partition would be harmful to the Muslims of the Indian subcontinent. After partition, following a majority of the NWFP voters going for Pakistan in a controversial referendum, Ghaffar Khan resigned himself to their choice and took an oath of allegiance to the new country on February 23, 1948, during a session of the Constituent Assembly, and his second son, Wali Khan, "played by the rules of the political system" as well.

Mahatma Gandhi's view
Mahatma Gandhi was against the division of India on the basis of religion. He once wrote:

Maulana Sayyid Abul Kalam Azad's view
Maulana Sayyid Abul Kalam Azad was a member of the Indian National Congress and was known as a champion of Hindu-Muslim unity. He argued that Muslims were native to India and had made India their home. Cultural treasures of undivided India such as the Red Fort of Delhi to the Taj Mahal of Agra to the Badshahi Mosque of Lahore reflected an Indo-Islamic cultural legacy in the whole country, which would remain inaccessible to Muslims if they were divided through a partition of India. He opposed the partition of India for as long as he lived.

View of the Deobandi ulema

The two-nation theory and the partition of India were vehemently opposed by the vast majority of Deobandi Islamic religious scholars, being represented by the Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind that supported both the All India Azad Muslim Conference and Indian National Congress. The principal of Darul Uloom Deoband, Maulana Hussain Ahmad Madni, not only opposed the two-nation theory but sought to redefine the Indian Muslim nationhood. He advocated composite Indian nationalism, believing that nations in modern times were formed on the basis of land, culture, and history.  He and other leading Deobandi ulama endorsed territorial nationalism, stating that Islam permitted it.

Despite opposition from the leading Deobandi scholars, Ashraf Ali Thanvi and Mufti Muhammad Shafi instead tried to justify the two-nation theory and concept of Pakistan. The most decisive Deobandi refutation of Madani's "united nationalism", was the commentary I'la al-Sunan, written by Ashraf Ali Thanvi's nephew, which stated that in a mixed nation society, the distinction and identity of Muslim life is diluted. A unified nation where non-Muslims form the numerical majority would result in the "destruction of Islam, its laws, and its rituals, and it is therefore forbidden from the viewpoint of the Shari'ah." Since the distinguishing the Muslims from unbelievers is one of the "fundamentals" of the Shari'ah, anyone who denies the importance of Islamic law in maintaining sharp boundaries between Muslim and non-Muslim - he says in a thiny veiled allusion to Madani - "is neither a competent scholar of Islamic law nor even a proper Muslim." In order to reconcile the two views, Muhammad Zakariya Kandhlawi, who travelled between India and Pakistan several times to resolve the split on the nationalist question, he decared that the split did not constitute a contradiction within Deobandi school based in theology, but merely the political attitude towards the question of sovereign power.

Post-partition debate
Similar debates on national identity existed within India at the linguistic, provincial and religious levels. While some argued that Indian Muslims were one nation, others argued they were not.

Since the partition, the theory has been subjected to animated debates and different interpretations on several grounds. Mr. Niaz Murtaza, a Pakistani scholar with a doctoral degree from the Berkeley-based University of California, wrote in his Dawn column (April 11, 2017):

To Indian nationalists, the British government intentionally divided India in order to keep the nation weak. According to Ambedkar, the British colonial government and British commentators made "it a point of speaking of Indians as the people of India and avoid speaking of an Indian nation." This was cited as a key reason for British control of the country: since Indians were not a nation, they were theoretically not capable of national self-government. While some Indian leaders insisted that Indians were one nation, others agreed that Indians were not yet a nation but there was "no reason why in the course of time they should not grow into a nation." Scholars note that a national consciousness has always been present in "India", or more broadly the Indian subcontinent, even if it was not articulated in modern terms. Indian historians such as Shashi Tharoor have claimed that the partition of India was a result of the divide-and-rule policies of the British colonial government initiated after Hindus and Muslims united together to fight against the British East India Company in the Indian Rebellion of 1857.  Some, such as Ambedkar argued that Indian Muslims were not yet a nation, but could be forged into one.

According to the Gilani, Pakistani school textbooks make a mistake as Muhammad bin Qasim is often referred to as the first Pakistani.  While Prakash K. Singh attributes the arrival of Muhammad bin Qasim as the first step towards the creation of Pakistan. Muhammad Ali Jinnah considered the Pakistan movement to have started when the first Muslim put a foot in the Gateway of Islam.

Many common Muslims criticized the two-nation theory as favoring only the elite class of Muslims, causing the deaths of over one million innocent people.

In his memoirs entitled Pathway to Pakistan (1961), Chaudhry Khaliquzzaman, a prominent leader of the Pakistan movement and the first president of the Pakistan Muslim League, has written: "The two-nation theory, which we had used in the fight for Pakistan, had created not only bad blood against the Muslims of the minority provinces but also an ideological wedge, between them and the Hindus of India.". He further wrote: "He (Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy) doubted the utility of the two-nation theory, which to my mind also had never paid any dividends to us, but after the partition, it proved positively injurious to the Muslims of India, and on a long-view basis for Muslims everywhere."

According to Khaliquzzaman, on August 1, 1947, Jinnah invited the Muslim League members of India's constituent assembly to a farewell meeting at his Delhi house.

In his August 11, 1947 speech, Jinnah had spoken of composite Pakistani nationalism, effectively negating the faith-based nationalism that he had advocated in his speech of March 22, 1940. In his August 11 speech, he said that non-Muslims would be equal citizens of Pakistan and that there would be no discrimination against them. "You may belong to any religion or caste or creed that has nothing to do with the business of the state." On the other hand, far from being an ideological point (transition from faith-based to composite nationalism), it was mainly tactical: Dilip Hiro says that "extracts of this speech were widely disseminated" in order to abort the communal violence in Punjab and the NWFP, where Muslims and Sikhs-Hindus were butchering each other and which greatly disturbed Jinnah on a personal level, but "the tactic had little, if any, impact on the horrendous barbarity that was being perpetrated on the plains of Punjab." Another Indian scholar, Venkat Dhulipala, who in his book Creating a New Medina precisely shows that Pakistan was meant to be a new Medina, an Islamic state, and not only a state for Muslims, so it was meant to be ideological from the beginning with no space for composite nationalism, in an interview also says that the speech "was made primarily keeping in mind the tremendous violence that was going on", that it was "directed at protecting Muslims from even greater violence in areas where they were vulnerable", "it was pragmatism", and to vindicate this, the historian goes on to say that "after all, a few months later, when asked to open the doors of the Muslim League to all Pakistanis irrespective of their religion or creed, the same Jinnah refused, saying that Pakistan was not ready for it."

The theory has faced scepticism because Muslims did not entirely separate from Hindus and about one-third of all Muslims continued to live in post-partition India as Indian citizens alongside a much larger Hindu majority.

Impact of Bangladesh's creation
The subsequent partition of Pakistan itself into the present-day nations of Pakistan and Bangladesh was cited as proof both that Muslims did not constitute one nation and that religion alone was not a defining factor for nationhood. Some historians have claimed that the theory was a creation of a few Muslim intellectuals. Altaf Hussain, founder of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement believes that history has proved the two-nation theory wrong. He contended, "The idea of Pakistan was dead at its inception when the majority of Muslims (in Muslim-minority areas of India) chose to stay back after partition, a truism reiterated in the creation of Bangladesh in 1971". The Pakistani scholar Tarek Fatah termed the two-nation theory "absurd".

In his Dawn column Irfan Husain, a well-known political commentator, observed that it has now become an "impossible and exceedingly boring task of defending a defunct theory". However some Pakistanis, including a retired Pakistani brigadier, Shaukat Qadir, believe that the theory could only be disproved with the reunification of independent Bangladesh, and Republic of India.

According to Professor Sharif al Mujahid, one of the most preeminent experts on Jinnah and the Pakistan movement, the two-nation theory was relevant only in the pre-1947 subcontinental context. He is of the opinion that the creation of Pakistan rendered it obsolete because the two nations had transformed themselves into Indian and Pakistani nations. Muqtada Mansoor, a columnist for Express newspaper, has quoted Farooq Sattar, a prominent leader of the MQM, as saying that his party did not accept the two-nation theory. "Even if there was such a theory, it has sunk in the Bay of Bengal."

In 1973, there was a movement against the recognition of Bangladesh in Pakistan. Its main argument was that Bangladesh's recognition would negate the two-nation theory. However, Salman Sayyid says that 1971 is not so much the failure of the two-nation theory and the advent of a united Islamic polity despite ethnic and cultural difference, but more so the defeat of "a Westphalian-style nation-state, which insists that linguistic, cultural and ethnic homogeneity is necessary for high 'sociopolitical cohesion'. The break-up of united Pakistan should be seen as another failure of this Westphalian-inspired Kemalist model of nation-building, rather than an illustration of the inability of Muslim political identity to sustain a unified state structure."

Some Bangladesh academics have rejected the notion that 1971 erased the legitimacy of the two-nation theory as well, like Akhand Akhtar Hossain, who thus notes that, after independence, "Bengali ethnicity soon lost influence as a marker of identity for the country's majority population, their Muslim identity regaining prominence and differentiating them from the Hindus of West Bengal", or Taj ul-Islam Hashmi, who says that Islam came back to Bangladeshi politics in August 1975, as the death of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman "brought Islam-oriented state ideology by shunning secularism and socialism." He has quoted Basant Chatterjee, an Indian Bengali journalist, as rebuking the idea of the failure of two-nation theory, arguing that, had it happened, Muslim-majority Bangladesh would have joined Hindu-majority West Bengal in India.

J. N. Dixit, a former ambassador of India to Pakistan, thought the same, stating that Bangladeshis "wanted to emerge not only as an independent Bengali country but as an independent Bengali Muslim country. In this, they proved the British Viceroy Lord George Curzon (1899-1905) correct. His partition of Bengal in 1905 creating two provinces, one with a Muslim majority and the other with a Hindu majority, seems to have been confirmed by Bangladesh's emergence as a Muslim state. So one should not be carried away by the claim of the two-nation theory having been disproved." Dixit has narrated an anecdote. During Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's visit to Dhaka in July 1974, after Sheikh Mujibur Rahman went to Lahore to attend the Islamic summit in February 1974: "As the motorcade moved out, Mujib's car was decorated with garlands of chappals and anti-Awami League slogans were shouted together with slogans such as: "Bhutto Zindabad", and "Bangladesh-Pakistan Friendship Zindabad"." He opines that Bhutto's aim was "to revive the Islamic consciousness in Bangladesh" and "India might have created Bangladesh, but he would see that India would have to deal with not one, but two Pakistans, one in the west and another in the east."

Ethnic and provincial groups in Pakistan

Several ethnic and provincial leaders in Pakistan also began to use the term "nation" to describe their provinces and argued that their very existence was threatened by the concept of amalgamation into a Pakistani nation on the basis that Muslims were one nation. It has also been alleged that the idea that Islam is the basis of nationhood embroils Pakistan too deeply in the affairs of other predominantly Muslim states and regions, prevents the emergence of a unique sense of Pakistani nationhood that is independent of reference to India, and encourages the growth of a fundamentalist culture in the country.

Also, because partition divided Indian Muslims into three groups (of roughly 190 million people each in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh) instead of forming a single community inside a united India that would have numbered about 570 million people and potentially exercised great influence over the entire subcontinent. So, the two-nation theory is sometimes alleged to have ultimately weakened the position of Muslims on the subcontinent and resulted in large-scale territorial shrinkage or skewing for cultural aspects that became associated with Muslims (e.g., the decline of Urdu language in India).

This criticism has received a mixed response in Pakistan. A poll conducted by Gallup Pakistan in 2011 shows that an overwhelming majority (92%) of Pakistanis held the view that separation from India was justified in 1947. Pakistani commentators have contended that two nations did not necessarily imply two states, and the fact that Bangladesh did not merge into India after separating from Pakistan supports the two-nation theory.

Counters to this question was the argument that despite the still-extant Muslim minority in India, and asserted variously that Indian Muslims have been "Hinduized" (i.e., lost much of their Muslim identity due to assimilation into Hindu culture), or that they are treated as an excluded or alien group by an allegedly Hindu-dominated India. Factors such as lower literacy and education levels among Indian Muslims as compared to Indian Hindus, longstanding cultural differences, and outbreaks of religious violence such as those occurring during the 2002 Gujarat riots in India are cited.

Pan-Islamic identity

The emergence of a sense of identity that is pan-Islamic rather than Pakistani has been defended as consistent with the founding ideology of Pakistan and the concept that "Islam itself is a nationality," despite the commonly held notion of "nationality, to Muslims, is like idol worship." While some have emphasized that promoting the primacy of a pan-Islamic identity (over all other identities) is essential to maintaining a distinctiveness from India and preventing national "collapse", others have argued that the two-nation theory has served its purpose in "midwifing" Pakistan into existence and should now be discarded to allow Pakistan to emerge as a normal nation-state.

Post-partition perspectives in India
The state of India officially rejected the two-nation theory and chose to be a secular state, enshrining the concepts of religious pluralism and composite nationalism in its constitution. Constitutionally, India rejects the two-nation theory and regards Indian Muslims as equal citizens.

Nevertheless, in post-independence India, the two-nation theory helped advance the cause of Hindu nationalist groups seeking to identify a "Hindu national culture" as the core identity of an Indian. This allows the acknowledgment of the common ethnicity of Indian Hindus and Muslims while requiring that all adopt a Hindu identity to be truly Indian. From the Hindu nationalist perspective, this concedes the ethnic reality that Indian Muslims are "flesh of our flesh and blood of our blood" but still presses for an officially recognized equation of national and religious identity, i.e., that "an Indian is a Hindu."

The theory and the very existence of Pakistan has caused Indian far-right extremist groups to allege that Indian Muslims "cannot be loyal citizens of India" or any other non-Muslim nation, and are "always capable and ready to perform traitorous acts". BJP's general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya has said that after the partition in 1947, whatever was left of India constituted a "Hindu Rashtra" (Hindu Nation).

Opinions in Pakistan and Bangladesh
With the rise of the Bharatiya Janata Party and the attendant marginalisation of Muslims in India, some in Pakistan and Bangladesh have argued that Jinnah's views had been vindicated. They believe that the separation of the Muslim-majority areas into Pakistan has saved many Muslims from domination by the Hindu nationalists.

See also

 Pakistanism
 Composite nationalism
 Madani–Iqbal debate

References

Bibliography

External links

 A critique of the Two Nation Theory: Sharpening the saw; by Varsha Bhosle; 26 July 1999; Rediff India
Story of the Nation divided by group connected by heart; two nation theory E-Gyankosh

Pakistani nationalism
Pakistan Movement
Segregation
Partition of India
Political terminology in Pakistan
Political ideologies
Constitution of Pakistan

Two-nation theory


Zhang Miao (died 195), courtesy name Mengzhuo, was a Chinese politician and warlord who lived in the late Eastern Han dynasty of China.

Early life and career
Zhang Miao was from Shouzhang County (), Dongping Commandery (), which is in present-day Yanggu County, Shandong. He was known for being chivalrous as a youth, and he often helped the poor and the needy. He earned much respect from the scholar-gentry for his deeds. He was also a friend of Cao Cao and Yuan Shao.

Zhang Miao was later recruited into the civil service and was commissioned as a Cavalry Commandant () after achieving excellent results in the imperial examination. He was subsequently promoted to be the Administrator () of Chenliu Commandery (陳留郡; around present-day Kaifeng, Henan).

Campaign against Dong Zhuo

In 190, Zhang Miao and Cao Cao were among the first to take up arms against Dong Zhuo, leading to the formation of a coalition and the launching of a campaign against Dong. During a battle at Bianshui (), Zhang Miao sent his subordinate Wei Zi () to lead troops to assist Cao Cao. At the time, Yuan Shao, who was the coalition chief, behaved arrogantly and elicited strong criticism from Zhang Miao. Yuan Shao was furious and he told Cao Cao to kill Zhang Miao, but Cao refused and said, "Mengzhuo is our friend so we should be tolerate him. Now, the Empire has yet to be pacified, so we shouldn't start an internal conflict." Zhang Miao was very grateful to Cao Cao when he heard about it, but he also felt uneasy.

In Yan Province
Later, before Cao Cao embarked on a campaign against Tao Qian in Xu Province, he instructed his family, "If I don't return, you must take shelter under Mengzhuo." After returning from the campaign, Cao Cao met Zhang Miao and they shed tears of joy. They were such close friends.

When Lü Bu left Yuan Shao to join Zhang Yang in Henei (河內; in present-day Henan), he passed by Chenliu and met Zhang Miao. Zhang Miao treated him generously and made a pledge of friendship with him when he saw him off. Yuan Shao was angry when he heard that Zhang Miao had befriended Lü Bu. Zhang Miao also feared that Cao Cao might ally with Yuan Shao to attack him so he felt very uncomfortable. Besides, his jurisdiction, Chenliu, was in Yan Province, which was under Cao Cao's control.

Betraying Cao Cao

In 194, when Cao Cao was away on another campaign against Tao Qian, Zhang Miao's younger brother Zhang Chao (), along with Cao's subordinates Chen Gong, Xu Si () and Wang Kai (), started a rebellion against Cao in Yan Province. Chen Gong successfully persuaded Zhang Miao to rebel against Cao Cao as well and invite Lü Bu into Yan Province. Chen Gong led his men from Dong Commandery (東郡; around present-day Liaocheng, Shandong) eastward to meet Lü Bu and they occupied Puyang (濮陽; in present-day Puyang, Henan). Lü Bu was declared Governor of Yan Province (). The various commanderies and counties in Yan Province responded to Lü Bu's call and defected to his side, except for Juancheng, Dong'e and Fan counties, which still remained under Cao Cao's control.

Upon receiving news of the revolt and Lü Bu's intrusion, Cao Cao aborted the Xu Province campaign and headed back to Yan Province, where the forces of Lü Bu and Cao Cao clashed in Puyang. Cao Cao was unable to overcome Lü Bu and both sides were locked in a stalemate for over 100 days. Around the time, the area was plagued by locusts and droughts so the people suffered from famine and many had resorted to cannibalism to survive. Lü Bu moved his base further east to Shanyang (山陽; in present-day southern Shandong). Within two years, Cao Cao managed to take back all his territories in Yan Province and he defeated Lü Bu in a battle at Juye County. Lü Bu fled to Xu Province and took refuge under Liu Bei.

Death
Zhang Miao followed Lü Bu after they were defeated by Cao Cao in Yan Province. He left his brother Zhang Chao and their family behind in Yongqiu (雍丘; present-day Qi County, Henan). Zhang Miao went to seek help from Yuan Shu but was killed by his own men before he reached his destination. Cao Cao besieged Yongqiu for some months and eventually conquered it, after which he executed Zhang Miao's clan.

The Xiandi Chunqiu () recorded that Yuan Shu once discussed with Zhang Miao and others about proclaiming himself emperor – which he did in early 197. Zhang Miao dissuaded Yuan Shu from doing so. Pei Songzhi, who annotated Zhang Miao's biography in the Sanguozhi, commented that there was some ambiguity in the Xiandi Chunqiu account because Zhang Miao's biography stated that he was killed by his own men before he arrived at Yuan Shu's place even though it was possible that he met Yuan earlier.

See also
 Lists of people of the Three Kingdoms

References

 Chen, Shou (3rd century). Records of the Three Kingdoms (Sanguozhi).
 Fan, Ye (5th century). Book of the Later Han (Houhanshu).
 Pei, Songzhi (5th century). Annotations to Records of the Three Kingdoms (Sanguozhi zhu).
 Sima, Guang (1084). Zizhi Tongjian.

Year of birth unknown
195 deaths
Assassinated Chinese politicians
Han dynasty warlords
Government officials under Cao Cao
Politicians from Liaocheng
Political office-holders in Henan
Ancient assassinated Chinese people

Zhang Miao (politician)


The David Hunt Three-Decker is a historic triple decker in Worcester, Massachusetts.  Built about 1900, it is a well-preserved example of the building type with Queen Anne Victorian features.  It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1990.

Description and history
The David Hunt Three-Decker is located in Worcester's southeastern Vernon Hill neighborhood, on the east side of Louise Street.  It is a three-story frame structure, covered by a hip roof and a combination of wooden clapboards and decorative scalloped shingles.  The roof has extended eaves adorned with Italianate brackets.  The front facade has a stack of porches on the left side, and a rounded window bay on the right, with bands of decorative shingles separating the floors.  The porches have shingled skirts with a section of short balustrade at the center, and are supported by square columns with simple capitals.  The right side of the building has a projecting jog that extends to the rear; at the end of this section is a back entrance, sheltered by a portico with turned posts.

The well-preserved Queen Anne Victorian was built c. 1900, during an early period of development in the Vernon Hill area.  The area where it was built, on the southern slope of the hill, was populated at the time mainly by Irish immigrants working in the city's wire factories.  David Hunt, the first owner, was employed as a wire worker.

See also
National Register of Historic Places listings in eastern Worcester, Massachusetts

References

Apartment buildings in Worcester, Massachusetts
Apartment buildings on the National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts
Queen Anne architecture in Massachusetts
Houses completed in 1900
National Register of Historic Places in Worcester, Massachusetts

David Hunt Three-Decker


Kevin Allen is an American sports journalist and author. He was the national hockey writer for USA Today from 1986 to December 2019. Since Allen left USA Today, he has freelanced.

Early life and education
Allen graduated from Wayne Memorial High School in 1974 and attended Eastern Michigan University. In his freshman year, he earned his first paid writing assignment with the University newspaper by interviewing Eastern Michigan football coach George Mans.

Career
After university, Allen accepted a position with a local paper as a sports and political writer. He covered high school Native American reservation football and Arizona State football games. He began his sports journalism career with The Times Herald in 1982 as a writer covering the Detroit Red Wings from 1982 to 1986. As a reporter, Allen broke the news of Mario Lemieux coming out of retirement to play for the Pittsburgh Penguins. Of the incident Eric Duhatschek, Vice President of the Professional Hockey Writers Association, stated "That was a clean kill by Kevin. Nobody else had it. Local guys didn't get a whiff of it. National guys didn't get a whiff of it. Kevin got it. You only get stuff like that with one part asking the right question at the right time, but also having a lot of people in your sphere who trust you and to tell you things."

In 2003, Allen was elected president of the Professional Hockey Writers' Association. Allen has also authored 16 hockey-related books. He was awarded the Lester Patrick Trophy in 2013, for his contributions to hockey in the United States. The next year, he was the 2014 recipient of the Elmer Ferguson Memorial Award. In 2019, Frank Seravalli was elected the new president of the Professional Hockey Writers' Association and Allen was named secretary.

References

Living people
Lester Patrick Trophy recipients
Year of birth missing (living people)
Elmer Ferguson Award winners
Eastern Michigan University alumni
Canadian columnists
Canadian sports journalists
Canadian sportswriters
Canadian male non-fiction writers

Kevin Allen (journalist)


The University of Applied Sciences Utrecht (HU) is a higher vocational education in Utrecht, Netherlands.

Several student communities are present in the university. On April 19, 2021, it was announced that the Celsius student team won three awards in the Solar Decathlon Build Challenge held by United States Department of Energy.

History
The Hogeschool van Utrecht (HvU) was created in 1988 through a merger of several polytechnics schools in the city and province of Utrecht. On 1 September 2005, the HvU merged with the polytechnic school in Driebergen (De Horst). At the same time, the name was changed to Hogeschool Utrecht (HU) and the English (HU University of Applied Sciences Utrecht) name was adopted

Employees
At the end of 2020, 3,552 employees were employed. Of these, 2,409 were teaching/research staff and 1,143 were support staff. In that year, 91% of the teaching staff had a master's degree and 13% had a PhD. At the end of 2020, 49 professors were working on practice-oriented research. In that year, 347 lecturers and other researchers were involved in practice-oriented research, while 118 employees conducted PhD research.

Students
There are 27,800 full-time Bachelor's students, 5,019 part-time and dual Bachelor's students, 2,801 Master's students and 565 association degree students (reference date: 31 December 2020). More than a fifth of the students at Hogeschool Utrecht are working professionals.

References

Vocational universities in the Netherlands
Education in Utrecht (city)


Andrew Rock (born January 23, 1982) is an American sprinter who specializes in the 400 meter dash.

Early career
Rock was born in Marshfield, Wisconsin, and grew up in Stratford, Wisconsin, where he graduated from high school in 2000. His high school career concluded at the 2000 Wisconsin State Championships, where he became the first athlete in meet history to win four individual titles at the same championships by winning the 110 m hurdles, 300 m hurdles, 200 m dash, and long jump. Despite this success, he was not a heavily recruited athlete.

Rock attended the University of Wisconsin–La Crosse, where he was a nine-time National Champion and a 17-time All-American. After finishing runner-up seven times between the 2001 and 2002 seasons, Rock hit his stride in 2003 and 2004, winning eight consecutive titles in the 400 m dash and  relay. Rock holds nine UW–LaCrosse records (four individual; five relays) and six WIAC records (three individual; three relays) and was twice named first-team Academic All-American by CoSIDA. In addition to these achievements, Rock also claimed the fastest 400 m time in Division III history, running a 44.66 at a USATF meet in Carson, California, thereby announcing his arrival onto the elite track scene. Rock turned professional soon after graduating from UW–La Crosse with a finance degree by signing a multi-year contract with Adidas.

As of 2017, Rock is head coach of the track and field teams at Bethel University.

Professional career

Rock finished 6th in the 400 m at the 2004 Olympic Trials, earning him a spot in the relay pool for the Olympic Games in Athens, Greece. In the 2004 Olympic Games, he ran for the American  relay team in the qualifying heats, securing the team a place in the final. The relay took first in the final, securing Rock a gold medal. In the 2005 World Championships in Helsinki, he competed in 400m and won a silver medal, setting a new personal best of 44.35. Later in the meet, he led off the  relay team to a World Championship gold medal. Rock followed his 2005 season with a 2006 campaign highlighted by his 400 m win at the AT&T USA Outdoor Championships in Indianapolis.

Personal bests

Career highlights

 2001-2004: 9-time NCAA Division III Champion, 17-time NCAA Division III All-American
 2004: Olympic 4x400m relay gold medalist, ranked #7 in the United States
 2005: World Outdoor 400m silver medalist, World Outdoor 4x400m gold medalist, ranked #2 in the United States and #3 in the World
 2006: USATF Outdoor Champion, 400 m, ranked #3 in the United States and #4 in the World
 2007: ranked #7 in the United States

Coaching career

 2010-2012: Carleton College (Assistant Cross Country and Track Coach)
 Coached five conference champion sprinters/middle distance runners
 Carleton 800m runners set two new school records
 2012-present: Bethel University (Head Men's & Women's Track & Field Coach)
 2015: Named the Women's Indoor MIAC Coach of the Year
 2016: Karl Olsen earned men's outdoor MIAC Elite 22 award
 2017: Named the Men's Indoor MIAC Coach of the Year
 2017: Men's 4x400-meter relay finished runner-up at NCAA national outdoor meet
 2017: Bethel men finished third at and MIAC Indoor meet—tied for highest finish in program history
 2017: Coached 10 All-Americans
 2018: Bethel men finished third at and MIAC Indoor meet—tied for highest finish in program history
 2018: Karl Olsen finished as the 400m runner-up at NCAA national indoor meet
 2018: Karl Olsen voted Academic All-American
 2018: Annika Halverson voted Academic All-American
 2018: Women's 4x400-meter relay recorded back-to-back Indoor & Outdoor All-American finishes
 2018: Coached 19 All-Americans
 2019: Women's 4x400-meter relay recorded back-to-back Indoor & Outdoor All-American finishes
 2019: Karl Olsen awarded NCAA Post Graduate Scholarship
 2019: Carl Klamm runner-up in 400m at NCAA national outdoor meet
 2019: Coached 18 All-Americans
 2020: Coached 10 All-Americans
 2021: Bethel women finished second at MIAC Outdoor meet—highest finish in program history
 2021: Coached 3 All-Americans
 2021: Joel Smith runner-up in 400m Hurdles at NCAA national outdoor meet
 Coached 82 National Meet Qualifiers and 64 All-Americans, 149 MIAC Champions and 329 MIAC All-Conference winners
 47 school records broken since Coach Rock's tenure began in 2013

References

External links

 Wisconsin Track & Field Bio
 Andrew Rock Bio

1982 births
Living people
American male sprinters
Athletes (track and field) at the 2004 Summer Olympics
Sportspeople from La Crosse, Wisconsin
Track and field athletes from Wisconsin
University of Wisconsin–La Crosse alumni
Olympic gold medalists for the United States in track and field
People from Marshfield, Wisconsin
World Athletics Championships medalists
Medalists at the 2004 Summer Olympics
People from Stratford, Wisconsin
World Athletics Championships winners

Andrew Rock


Harold Corsini (August 28, 1919 – January 1, 2008) was an American photographer.

Harold Corsini was born to Italian immigrants in New York City and began his career there as a freelancer. A photo he took when he was about 16, an aerial shot of football players, is archived in the George Eastman Collection in Rochester, New York. He assisted Arnold S. Eagle for three years as a photography teacher for the National Youth Administration. Corsini admired the work of Roy Stryker's Farm Security Administration photographers and aspired to the documentary style they practiced. He joined the Photo League in 1938, "the only free camera club in New York City", whose members were socially concerned photographers.

After a stint with Life magazine, in 1943 Corsini joined the Standard Oil documentary project under Roy Stryker, where he worked longer than any other photographer. In 1950, he accompanied Stryker to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and assisted him as head of the photographic department at the Pittsburgh Photographic Library. There he chronicled the city's first Renaissance, which included redevelopment of the Point and construction of Gateway Center. He remained in Pittsburgh when the PPL disbanded to begin his own commercial photography business. Eventually became the official photographer for U.S. Steel.  Corsini's work with U.S. Steel reflected the industry from labor to output, and included industrial and technical pieces.

Corsini retired when he sold his studio in 1975, then joined the faculty at Carnegie Mellon University, where he taught for nine years.

His photographic work is held, in addition to the Pittsburgh Photographic Library, by the University of Louisville Photographic Archives, the George Eastman House Photo Collection, and the Carnegie Museum of Art. The University of Pittsburgh houses the Harold Corsini archives.

He died on New Year's Day 2008, aged 88, following a stroke. He was survived by his wife, two children, and a brother.

Recent exhibitions (selection)
November 4, 2011 - March 25, 2012 "The Radical Camera: New York's Photo League, 1936-1951" at Jewish Museum (New York)
February - April 2004 "Iron & Steel" at Keith De Lellis Gallery
May 13 – July 3, 1983 "Roy Stryker: U.S.A., 1943–1950" at International Center of Photography

Books
 Carnegie Mellon: A Portrait, photographs (Pittsburgh: Carnegie Mellon University, 1986).

References

 Nicholas Lemann (2002). "Harold Corsini's Photographs of the Early Days of Aramco," The New Yorker, v. 78 no. 8 (April 15, 2002) p. 72-3.

External links
Harold Raymond Corsini at Find A Grave
The Harold Corsini Photograph Collection at the Archive Service Center, University of Pittsburgh

1919 births
2008 deaths
Carnegie Mellon University faculty
American people of Italian descent
Photographers from New York City
Artists from Pittsburgh

Harold Corsini


The  Chicago Bruisers season was the first season for the arena football franchise. The Bruisers took a chance with a young team that averaged 25 years of age. The Bruisers' lost their first game in franchise history, 44–52 in overtime, to the Denver Dynamite. The Bruisers struggled in their second game, giving up 45 points in the first half before losing 23–60 to the Pittsburgh Gladiators. Despite getting off to a 2–3 start, the Bruisers had an opportunity to make it to ArenaBowl I with a win in the final week of the season against the Dynamite. The Bruisers however would lose 35–52. They finished with a record of 2–4 and failed to qualify for the playoffs.

Schedule

Standings

y – clinched regular-season title

x – clinched playoff spot

Roster

Stats

Offense

Passing

Rushing

Receiving

Defense

Special teams

Kick return

Kicking

Awards

References

Chicago Bruisers
Chicago Bruisers seasons
Chicago Bruisers

1987 Chicago Bruisers season


Hōshun Yamaguchi (山口蓬春, Yamaguchi Hōshun) (1893-1971) was a Japanese Nihonga painter and designer.

He received a commission to paint a piece for the new Tokyo Imperial Palace. The piece titled "Kaede (maples)" is a large painting measuring 2.74x2.5 metres.
It is located on the cedar door of the east corridor of the Seiden hall. Opposite of it on the other side is "Sakura (cherry)" by Meiji Hashimoto.

The preparatory drawing for the panel at a 4:1 scale dating to 1967 is in the Yamatane Museum of Art in Tokyo.

The Yamaguchi Hōshun Memorial Hall exhibits many of his works.

See also
 Seison Maeda (1885–1977), one of the leading Nihonga painters
 List of Nihonga painters

References

External links
 Yamaguchi Hōshun Memorial Hall

1893 births
1971 deaths
Recipients of the Order of Culture
People from Hokkaido
20th-century Japanese painters

Hōshun Yamaguchi