The Most Important Leaders in World History

Sir Muhammad Iqbal (Urdu: محمد اقبال‎) (November 9, 1877 – April 21, 1938), also known as Allama Iqbal (علامہ اقبال), was a philosopher, poet andpolitician[1] in India who is widely regarded as having inspired the Pakistan Movement. He is considered one of the most important figures in Urdu literature,[2] with literary work in both the Urdu and Persian languages.[1][2]

Iqbal is admired as a prominent classical poet by Pakistani, Iranian, Indian and other international scholars of literature.[3][4] Though Iqbal is best known as an eminent poet, he is also a highly acclaimed "Muslim philosophical thinker of modern times".[1][4] His first poetry book, Asrar-e-Khudi, appeared in the Persian language in 1915, and other books of poetry include Rumuz-i-Bekhudi, Payam-i-Mashriq and Zabur-i-Ajam. Amongst these his best known Urdu works are Bang-i-Dara, Bal-i-Jibril, Zarb-i Kalim and a part of Armughan-e-Hijaz.[5] In Iran and Afghanistan, he is famous asIqbāl-e Lāhorī (اقبال لاهوری‎) (Iqbal of Lahore), and he is most appreciated for his Persian work.[6] Along with his Urdu and Persian poetry, his various Urdu and English lectures and letters have been very influential in cultural, social, religious and political disputes over the years.[5]

In 1922, he was knighted by King George V,[6][7] giving him the title "Sir".[8]

While studying law and philosophy in England, Iqbal became a member of the London branch of the All India Muslim League.[4][5] Later, in one of his most famous speeches, Iqbal pushed for the creation of a Muslim state in Northwest India. This took place in his presidential speech in the League's December 1930 session.[4][5] He was very close to the founder of Pakistan, Mohammad Ali Jinnah.[5] 

Ideologically separated from Congress Muslim leaders, Iqbal had also been disillusioned with the politicians of the Muslim League owing to the factional conflict that plagued the League in the 1920s. Discontent with factional leaders like Sir Muhammad Shafi and Sir Fazl-ur-Rahman, Iqbal came to believe that only Muhammad Ali Jinnah was a political leader capable of preserving this unity and fulfilling the League's objectives on Muslim political empowerment. Building a strong, personal correspondence with Jinnah, Iqbal was an influential force in convincing Jinnah to end his self-imposed exile in London, return to India and take charge of the League. Iqbal firmly believed that Jinnah was the only leader capable of drawing Indian Muslims to the League and maintaining party unity before the British and the Congress:

"I know you are a busy man but I do hope you won't mind my writing to you often, as you are the only Muslim in India today to whom the community has right to look up for safe guidance through the storm which is coming to North-West India and, perhaps, to the whole of India."[31]

While Iqbal espoused the idea of Muslim-majority provinces in 1930, Jinnah would continue to hold talks with the Congress through the decade and only officially embraced the goal of Pakistan in 1940. Some historians postulate that Jinnah always remained hopeful for an agreement with the Congress and never fully desired the partition of India.[32] Iqbal's close correspondence with Jinnah is speculated by some historians as having been responsible for Jinnah's embrace of the idea of Pakistan. Iqbal elucidated to Jinnah his vision of a separate Muslim state in a letter sent on 21 June 1937:

"A separate federation of Muslim Provinces, reformed on the lines I have suggested above, is the only course by which we can secure a peaceful India and save Muslims from the domination of Non-Muslims. Why should not the Muslims of North-West India and Bengal be considered as nations entitled to self-determination just as other nations in India and outside India are."[30]

Iqbal, serving as president of the Punjab Muslim League, criticised Jinnah's political actions, including a political agreement with Punjabi leader Sir Sikandar Hyat Khan, whom Iqbal saw as a representative of feudal classes and not committed to Islam as the core political philosophy. Nevertheless, Iqbal worked constantly to encourage Muslim leaders and masses to support Jinnah and the League. Speaking about the political future of Muslims in India, Iqbal said:

"There is only one way out. Muslims should strengthen Jinnah's hands. They should join the Muslim League. Indian question, as is now being solved, can be countered by our united front against both the Hindus and the English. Without it, our demands are not going to be accepted. People say our demands smack of communalism. This is sheer propaganda. These demands relate to the defense of our national existence.... The united front can be formed under the leadership of the Muslim League. And the Muslim League can succeed only on account of Jinnah. Now none but Jinnah is capable of leading the Muslims."[31]

Ahmad Shah Massoud was a political and military leader in Afghanistan. He was a central figure in the resistance against the Soviet occupation between 1979 and 1989 and in the following years of civil war. He was assassinated on September 9, 2001.

Massoud came from an ethnic Tajik, Sunni Muslim background from the Panjshir valley in northern Afghanistan. He studied engineering at Kabul University in the 1970s, where he became involved with Muslim anti-communist movements aroundBurhanuddin Rabbani. After the Soviet occupation of 1979, his role as an insurgence leader earned him the nickname of "Lion of Panjshir" (شیر پنجشیر). In 1992, he was appointed as the minister of defense through the Peshawar Accord, a peace and power-sharing agreement, in the post-communist Islamic State of Afghanistan - a position he held until 2001. He fought against an alliance of militias led by Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and eventually the Taliban, who started to lay siege to the capital in January 1995.

Following the rise of the Taliban in 1996, Massoud, who rejected the Taliban's fundamentalist interpretation of Islam,[1]returned to the armed opposition. He served as the military and political leader of the United Islamic Front (also known in the West as Northern Alliance). He was assassinated, probably at the instigation of al-Qaeda, in a suicide bombing on September 9, 2001, just two days before the September 11 attacks in the United States, which led to the US and NATO to intervene in Afghanistan, allying with Massoud's forces.

Massoud was posthumously named "National Hero" by the order of Afghan President Hamid Karzai. The date of his death, September 9, is observed as a national holiday known as "Massoud Day" in Afghanistan.[2] His followers call him Āmir Sāhib-e Shahīd ("Our Beloved Martyred Commander")