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Jinnah Often Came to Our House
Indian literature (English)
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Jinnah Often Came to Our House by Kiran Doshi - BR in Nov 2020
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Mod
There are references of his turning faith towards Shia vs Sunni during his last days.... he was religious for sure towards his end.,...
Mod
I didn't know he had a wife before Ruttie.
@Gorab A look up on “Rangila Rasool controversy” got me a news article - Jinnah actually defended the murderer in 1929 too. This is before his “communal turn” in the late 1930s.Also, this is in addition to his attending the funeral and eulogising along with Allama Iqbal.
Gorab wrote: "split personality lagta hai.... Jinnah before 1915's in stark contrast to Jinnah in 40's. jaise beech raaste mein kuch short circuit ho gaya ho.There are references of his turning faith towards S..."
@Gorab even his end days are not clear :) His famous independence day speech of Pakistan
"...in course of time Hindus would cease to be Hindus and Muslims would cease to be Muslims, not in the religious sense, because that is the personal faith of each individual, but in the political sense as citizens of the (Pakistani) State."
Having read a lot on India's independence movement and partition, I can explain why it occured. But I still cannot decipher Jinnah. It will perhaps be a mystery always, since the man left behind no memoirs. To top it he neither had any friends nor any colleagues who had his close confidence. As the author quoted Francis Bacon in the acknowledgements section - Truth is so hard to tell, it sometimes needs fiction to make it palatable.
Perhaps Jinnah can be discussed only subjectively and tangentially. And this was a fiction that did so exceedingly well IMHO.
Mod
Reading his biographies could be fun - though each may have their own share of speculations.
digging on it, realised the case of Jaswant Singh... who got expelled from BJP because of his book on Jinnah Jinnah: India-Partition-Independence
Mod
Somehow not connecting much with the fiction part of this fiction :|
All that Sultan accident, hand injury, split out between them felt a bit dull... mostly because i wanted to read more on Jinnah.
So the protagonist story feels like a deviation to me :D LOL!
Mod
Made me think, Empire Softwares ka bhi pehle kuch aur naam tha kya :P :P :P
Gorab wrote: "Joshi publishing house was renamed as Empire publishing... and that brought Dorab out of jail.Made me think, Empire Softwares ka bhi pehle kuch aur naam tha kya :P :P :P"
Pehle ka pata nahi abhi Empire Technocom hai :P
If you are looking for a Jinnah biographical novel, you will be disappointed even more in the last 25%. This is the story of Sultan and Rehana :)
BTW, Age of Empires kheli hai ? Software ka icon bhi maine usi se uthaaya tha :)
Mod
I am still playing those games with college friends - thanks to the lockdown :)
Back in the college, used to play Age of Empires occasionally... that was a pirated version but.
Do you also play AOE? interested to try a friendly match? :P
Mod
badi badi sarkaar bhi kuch samay pehle naam change karne mein lagi thhi.
I have such a superb collection of PC games. Havent played much in the past decade or so.More into books and foreign TV series which I started watching after late 2017.
Mod
thought you were married for more than a decade :D
for me too, marriage was game over card. but then came Corona!
Mod
that Sultan Rehana split was on the cards... somehow didn't think it would be for this reason. Their political thoughts (and Jinnah affinity) had a rift from day1.
Mod
@Gorab - Most loved - Age of Empires, Commandos, Call of Duty, NFS, Caesar III, Rollercoaster Tycoon (wife’s fav) and the last great game I played - Company of Heroes. BTW, dont like PS or mobile gaming.Son was born in 2010. That should solve the mystery for you :) :P
Used to wake up at 5 sometimes to get in a couple of hrs of gaming of Company of Heroes but lacked motivation :)
Mod
Call of Duty, Medal of Honour, Killzone (and a few others FPS) i loved playing on PS2.
never heard about Company of Heroes. Maybe bcoz i was never much into PC gaming. And absolute no to mobile gaming.
Good to know your wife loved them too! Never heard aout Rollercoaster Tycoon also.
My all time fav game is God of War on Playstation. Loved it for its amazing plot... fictional twist to Greek mythology.
Never tried God of War :)Some fan hacked Commandos and added even more dogs in a patch in some scenarios. Was super tough and super fun.
Commandos 3D was unplayable :(
Mod
Might be able to finish this in the coming week.
That sterility report of Sultan causing so much of Hungama... and then Girffith's revelation that it was planted to cut of Rehana's wings!! felt pretentious and unbelievable.
Mod
‘Gandhiji er . . . suggests that you and Dhondav should wait for twelve months. During these twelve months you should not meet each other, nor communicate with each other in any way.’
I won't be surprised if this would have happened in reality!
Mod
This book is a good read from historical point ( though we never can say whether things really happen in the way described , as one lesson that I learnt as an adult is History lies) but not that so good if one just follows story development without the historical background
Mod
Mod
"Most Muslims of India became Muslim through conversion. How can conversion to another faith make a man belong to another nation? Mr Gandhi’s son got converted some years back. Does that mean that he and his father belong to separate nations? Why, Mr Jinnah’s own grandfather was a Hindu . . ."
interesting! had no clue about one of Gandhiji's son's conversion. To Muslim? Christian? Will have to check.
Mod
In May 1936, at the age of 48, Harilal publicly converted to Islam and named himself Abdulla Gandhi. However, later in 1936, on his mother Kasturba Gandhi's request he converted back to Hinduism through the Arya Samaj and adopted a new name, Hiralal.
Mod
‘Gandhiji er . . . suggests that you and Dhondav should wait for twelve months. During these twelve mont..."
Regarding Gandhiji's suggestion in comment 72, THAT really happened in real life! To his own son! Only much harsher!
"Devdas Mohandas Gandhi (22 May 1900 – 3 August 1957) was the fourth and youngest son of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi.
Devdas fell in love with Lakshmi, the daughter of C. Rajagopalachari, Devdas's father's associate in the Indian independence struggle. Due to Lakshmi's age at that time, she was only 15 and Devdas was 28 years, both Devdas's father and Rajaji asked the couple to wait for five years without seeing each other. After five years had passed, they were married with their fathers' permissions in 1933.
Gandhi virrudh Gandhi is an iconic book (and play+movie) in Gujarati by Dinkar Joshi on this subject. Watched the movie starring Akshay Khanna earlier.
Mod
Gandhi My Father was the Akshay Kumar movie right?
Gorab wrote: "coincidentally i bought its English translated paperback just 2 days back!Gandhi My Father was the Akshay Kumar movie right?"
Yes. I watched the movie. I skipped the book as didnt like the English translation much and it felt a little slow and unfortunately Hindi translation was not avail. It must have been better as a 2-hour play with the shock value of its story for unsuspecting viewers.
Why do some books gain such massive popularity and why do some like Kiran Doshi and Sujit Saraf barely make it even to avid readers ? Dont understand !
Mod
No idea how marketing houses work... word of mouth is what common readers like us can contribute.
Mod
though the middle part was a drag, the last 3-4 chapters (esp Afterword) won me over.
5 stars.
the best part was the revelation that it was full on mon fiction! Sultan is probably the authors father in law, who was a lawyer and peer of Jinnah.
Dhondav and Hina could be the author and his wife... Hindu Muslim marriage in those times.
the coughing of Jinnah and clarifying it in his speech - "I'm not well... mostly because of hectic work" is verbatim from real life.
Mod
it started when Gandhiji entered the scene. maybe he was hungry for power and going communal was the only way left with him.
Mod
will be reading more stuff related to these families.
Indian Readers
Books mentioned in this topic
Jinnah: India-Partition-Independence (other topics)Asura: Tale Of The Vanquished, The Story of Ravana and His People (other topics)
He attended the funeral of a murderer who killed a person mocking the Islamic prophet and eulogised the guy. Akin to attending funeral of guys who carried out Charlie Hebdo murders.