Moulana Mohammad Ali Jowhar

MOULANA MOHAMMAD ALI JOWHAR

Date of Birth: 10^th December, 1878 and Date of Death: 4^th January, 1931

            Moulana Mohammad Ali Jowhar, who spearheaded the Khilafat Non-Cooperation Movement, was born on 10^th December, 1878.  Abdul Ali and Abadi Bano Begum were his parents.  Mohammad Ali obtained B.A. Degree, from Aligarh and B.A. (Hons) from Oxford University.  After returning to India, he took up many important jobs.  Finally he settled as a journalist.  He played an important role in laying the foundation of the All India Muslim League in 1906.  He started that we could active our goals only when Hindus and Muslims worked together in a friendly environment.  He started an English daily newspaper ‘The Comrade’ in 1911 and a Urdu daily ‘Humdard’ in 1913 to create political consciousness among the people against the British.  As both the dailies adopted staunch anti-British stand, they were banned by the British Government.  Moulana Ali and his brother Moulana Shaukat Ali were put under house arrest in 1915 at Chindanwada village.  Ali brothers maintained close relations with Mahatma Gandhi and took active role in the Khilafat and Non-Cooperation movements.  Mohammed Ali was adept in Islamic scriptures.  He influenced not only the common Muslims but also the religious scholars by his speeches against the British government, quoting the holy Quran’s tenets and Prophet Mohammad’s teachings.  He pioneered them towards the Indian National Movement.  He was arrested several times.  He presided over the Indian National Congress session in December, 1923 at Kakinada of Andhra Pradesh.  He got Mohammad Ali Jinnah’s Delhi proposal approved in the Madras Congress sessions in 1927, which were meant for Hindu-Muslim harmony.  On the issue of Nehru Report, his relations with Mahatma became strained in 1928.  He quit the Indian National Congress.  He took part in the First Round Table Conference held in London in 1903, despite his ill health.  On this occasion, he wrote a letter to the then British Prime Minister elaborating on the Hindu-Muslim conflict in India on 3^rd January, 1931.  In his letter, he declared: ‘I will step on my mother land only when the proclamation declaring freedom to my country reaches my hands.  They should give either independence to my country or two yards of land for my grave’.  Thus he fought for the freedom of the country of the country and Hindu-Muslim unity and harmony till the end of his life.  Moulana Mohammed Ali died on 4^th January, 1931 in London.