Iqbal, Muhammad

Related Category: South Asian History: Biographies

(məhăm´ĭd ĭkhbäl´), 1877–1938, Indian Muslim poet, philosopher, and political leader. He studied at Government College, Lahore, Cambridge, and the Univ. of Munich, and then he taught philosophy at Government College and practiced law. He was elected (1927) to the Punjab provincial legislature and served (1930) as president of the Muslim League. A staunch advocate of Indian nationalism, he became a supporter of an independent homeland for India's Muslims, though within an Indian federation and not as a separate nation. He is regarded by many as the spiritual founder of Pakistan, and the anniversary of his death (Apr. 21) is a national holiday. Iqbal was the foremost Muslim thinker of his period, and in his many volumes of poetry (written in Urdu and Persian) and essays, he urged a regeneration of Islam through the love of God and the active development of the self. He was a firm believer in freedom and the creative force that freedom can exert on men. He was knighted in 1922. His works include The Secrets of the Self (1915, tr. 1940), and Javid-nama (1934, tr. 1966).

See biographical studies by A. A. Beg (1961), A. Schimmel (1963), H. Malik, ed. (1971), and S. M. Burney (1987).