(Asghar Ali Mubarak)
ISLAMABAD (TNS) Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif is committed to the development of the country and nation on the foundation day of the Muslim League under the vision of the founders of Pakistan,
Congratulating the Prime Minister on the foundation day of the Muslim League, he said that history is a witness that to save Pakistan, the Muslim League (N) sacrificed its politics and prioritized the country’s economy and national security.
As a result of the struggle of the Quaid-e-Azam and other leaders of the Pakistan Movement from the platform of the All India Muslim League, an independent homeland, Pakistan, was established. He said that after the establishment of the Muslim League 118 years ago, the desire of Muslims for a new and independent homeland was given impetus and through continuous struggle, the Muslims of the subcontinent were blessed with a separate and independent homeland.
According to a press release issued by the Prime Minister’s Office, Shehbaz Sharif said that keeping in mind the vision of the founders of Pakistan, we all have to work together for the development and prosperity of the country and nation.
Under the leadership of Pakistan Muslim League (N) leader Muhammad Nawaz Sharif, Pakistan has been engaged in the construction and development of Pakistan for the past three and a half decades.
The Prime Minister said that history is a witness that the Muslim League (N) and leader Nawaz Sharif have always prioritized public welfare while doing politics of principles.
Shehbaz Sharif said that he is grateful to the party workers and political leaders, thanks to whose support the party raised the slogan of justice in front of dictators, endured the hardships of imprisonment and confinement, but did not engage in politics of chaos and division of the people in the larger interest of Pakistan. The Prime Minister said that there were conspiracies to remove Leader Muhammad Nawaz Sharif from politics, but his political insight and spirit of sacrifice for the people made him rise.
He said that during the tenure of the Muslim League (N), industry, agriculture and economy developed in the country, adding that diplomatic relations with friendly countries improved and the common man became prosperous. The Prime Minister said that even today, the Muslim League (N) is engaged in the construction and development of the country under the patronage of its leader, representing the aspirations of the people, With the grace of God and the support of the people, it will continue to work hard for the construction and development of Pakistan. It endured the hardships of imprisonment and imprisonment, but in the larger interest of Pakistan, it did not engage in politics of chaos and division of the people.
The 118th founding anniversary of the Muslim League was celebrated on December 30. In this regard, various events were organized across the country under the auspices of the Muslim League-N. Muslims had established the All India Muslim League in Dhaka in 1906 to protect their rights. On December 30, 1906, the Muhammadan Educational Conference was held in Dhaka, which was attended by about three thousand people from all over India, in which a movement was presented to remove the ban on Muslims from participating in politics and to have a political party. During the same conference, Nawab Khwaja Salimullah Bahadur proposed to name the party ‘All India Muslim League’. The founding members of this party included Khwaja Salimullah, Waqar-ul-Mulk, Syed Amir Ali, Syed Nabiullah, Khan Bahadur and Mustafa Chaudhry. Sir Sultan Muhammad Shah Aga Khan III was elected the first honorary president of the All India Muslim League. The first session of the All India Muslim League was held in Karachi on 29 December 1907 under the presidency of Adamji Pirbhai. The British branch of the same party was founded in London on 6 May 1908. The All India Muslim League was the first representative party of Muslims in a united India and its aim was to achieve maximum political and civil rights for Muslims under British rule. The young lawyer from India, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, joined the Muslim League in 1913 and remained a part of the same party until the partition of India and the independence of Pakistan. Muhammad Ali Jinnah was a part of the Indian National Congress from 1906. He remained a part of the Congress until 1920 and played a key role in the agreement between the Congress and the Muslim League, known as the Lucknow Pact, in 1916. Thanks to his efforts, the Muslim League and the Congress began to hold their annual sessions jointly. In 1915, the two parties held a joint session in Bombay and then in 1916 in Lucknow, during which the Lucknow Pact was signed. Under this agreement, both parties jointly demanded constitutional reforms from the British government. After being a part of the Congress until 1920, Muhammad Ali Jinnah felt that it was no longer possible for him to remain in the Congress due to differences between him and Mohandas Gandhi, so he decided to leave the Congress. However, he continued to try for better relations between Hindus and Muslims until the 1930s, but during those years, due to the growing distance between the Congress and the Muslim League, violent incidents also occurred between the supporters of the two parties. In the 1940s, the differences between the two parties increased and reached the partition of India and Muhammad Ali Jinnah was appointed the first Governor-General of Pakistan and was officially given the title of ‘Quaid-e-Azam’. On August 14, 1947, the All India Muslim League was dissolved at Khaliq Dina Hall in Karachi and renamed it All Pakistan Muslim League. Immediately after the death of Quaid-e-Azam in September 1948, news of internal differences in the Muslim League began to come to light and senior Muslim League leader Hussain Shaheed Suhrawardy formed the All Pakistan Awami Muslim League. Founded the League. This was the first split in the Muslim League, which has since spawned dozens of parties in Pakistan under the name of Muslim League. In the same year, Punjab Chief Minister Iftikhar Mamdot announced the formation of a new party called Jinnah Muslim League. This was the first rift in the All India Muslim League. In 1949, the left-wing leader of the Muslim League, Mian Iftikharuddin, founded the Azad Pakistan Party, while in 1950, Iftikhar Mamdot and Hussain Shaheed Suhrawardy merged their parties to form the Jinnah Awami Muslim League. In 1953, Hussain Shaheed Suhrawardy removed the word Muslim from the name of his party and renamed it Jinnah Awami League. After winning the elections in East Pakistan in 1954, the Jinnah Awami League changed its name to ‘Awami League’ in 1956. This party later became the founding party of Bangladesh. In 1954, Ayub Khuhro, the first Chief Minister of Sindh, founded a new party called the Sindh Muslim League. In 1955, another senior leader of the Muslim League, Iskander Mirza, founded a new party called the Republican Party, which was soon joined by a few other senior leaders of the Muslim League. In 1958, when Iskander Mirza and the army chief General Ayub Khan imposed martial law in the country, all political parties were declared illegal, which also affected the Muslim League and all its sub-parties. When the ban on political parties was lifted in 1962, Ayub Khan decided to reactivate the Muslim League and he decided to form a new Muslim League, Pakistan Muslim League, during a convention with the help of key leaders of the Muslim League and the Republican Party. But some of these leaders refused to become part of this party and formed a new party called the ‘Pakistan Muslim League Convention’. President Ayub Khan was elected as the head of this party and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was elected as its first Secretary General. After President Ayub’s announcement of the Muslim League, two senior leaders of the Muslim League, Sardar Abdul Qayyum Khan and Mumtaz Daulatana, formed a new party called the Pakistan Muslim League Council. When presidential elections were held in Pakistan in 1965, Mrs. Fatima Jinnah contested the elections as a presidential candidate on behalf of the same party at the request of the leaders of the Council Muslim League. In 1967, after differences with Ayub Khan, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto entered politics with a new party called the Pakistan People’s Party. Sometime later, Sardar Qayyum Khan, the leader of the Muslim League Council, founded the ‘Qayyum Muslim League’. After the 1970 elections, Bangladesh was formed in 1971, and the Awami League emerged as the largest party in the former East Pakistan, i.e. Bangladesh, while the Pakistan People’s Party emerged as the largest party in West Pakistan. In 1973, Pir Pagara, a major political figure of Sindh, united the two major factions of the Muslim League, the Convention and the Council, and founded the ‘Pakistan Muslim League Functional’. It is still active today. In 1977, when General Zia-ul-Haq imposed martial law in Pakistan, the Functional League welcomed it, after which the party’s General Secretary Malik Qasim announced the establishment of a new party named ‘Pakistan Muslim League Qasim’. In 1985, when General Zia-ul-Haq held general elections in the country on a non-partisan basis, the opposition parties boycotted these elections. After these elections, Muhammad Khan Junejo, a leader of the Muslim League Functional, formed a political alliance called ‘Pakistan Muslim League’, which won a majority in parliament. This alliance elected him as the Prime Minister of Pakistan.
Mian Nawaz Sharif was also part of the Pakistan Muslim League in 1985. When the elections were held in 1988, the Muslim League was part of the Islamic Democratic Alliance formed against the Pakistan People’s Party. The PPP won these elections, but two years later, when new elections were held in the country, the Islamic Democratic Alliance came to power. The Pakistan Muslim League remained in power until 1993, after which the supporters of Muhammad Khan Junejo formed a new faction, which was named Pakistan Muslim League Junejo. The head of this faction was Hamid Nasir Chatta. While the name of the remaining party was changed to ‘Muslim League-N’, headed by Mian Nawaz Sharif. The leading leaders of this party included Nawaz Sharif and many other personalities, including Raja Zafarul Haq, Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, Shahbaz Sharif. The Junejo League supported the PPP in the 1993 elections and after the elections, the leader of the same party, Manzoor Wattoo, was made the Chief Minister of Punjab. In 1995, after internal differences in the Junejo League, Manzoor Ahmed Wattoo formed a new party called ‘Pakistan Muslim League Jinnah’. In 1999, General Musharraf overthrew the government of Nawaz Sharif, and for three years he remained a non-ruler in the country without participating. Then in 2002, when elections were held in Pakistan, the lot fell in the name of a new Muslim League ‘Quaid-e-Azam Muslim League’ (Q-League). Important leaders of the PML-N, Mian Muhammad Azhar, Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi, Mushahid Hussain Syed and Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, decided to support General Musharraf after these elections. In 2002, former PML-N leader and son of General Zia-ul-Haq, Ijaz-ul-Haq, formed the ‘Muslim League Jinnah’. Zia’. In 2008, former leader of the Muslim League-N and Muslim League-Q, Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, founded a new party called the ‘Awami Muslim League’. Another party formed in the name of the Muslim League is the ‘All Pakistan Muslim League’, which was founded by former military chief General Musharraf in 2010. Out of the dozens of leagues formed from the establishment of Pakistan to 2024, the Muslim League-N is now active. According to the list released by the Election Commission of Pakistan for the 2024 general elections, there are currently 175 parties active in Pakistan. According to this list, there are still 21 parties that use the word ‘League’ in their names, while 19 parties are using the word ‘Muslim’ or something similar in their names. The Pakistan Muslim League-N is the largest party among them, which has formed the government in Pakistan once with the Islamic Democratic Alliance in 1990 and with the PDM alliance in 2022. While in the 1997 and 2013 elections, this party also ruled Pakistan on the basis of its majority. Currently, the head of the PML-N is former Prime Minister of Pakistan Mian Shehbaz Sharif, while the post of Secretary General of the party is held by Ahsan Iqbal. Before Shehbaz Sharif, Nawaz Sharif, his wife Begum Kulsoom Nawaz and Makhdoom Javed Hashmi have presided over the PML-N.
