Muhammad Ali Jinnah Way (Brooklyn)
Present name:Coney Island Avenue
Location:Between Avenue C and Avenue H
Honoree: Muhammad Ali Jinnah (1876-1948) was the founder and first Governor-General of Pakistan. He studied at Bombay University and at Lincoln's Inn in London. He had a successful legal practice in Bombay and was a member of the Indian National Congress, which was working for autonomy from British rule, when he joined the Muslim League in 1913. In 1916, he was elected president of the Muslim League, which represented the interests of Indian Muslims in a predominantly Hindu country. He resigned from the Indian National Congress in 1920, when the congress launched a movement to boycott all aspects of British rule. After provincial elections in 1937, the congress refused to form coalition administrations with the Muslim League in mixed areas, and relations between Hindus and Muslims began to deteriorate. In 1940, at a Muslim League session in Lahore, the first official demand was made for the partition of India and the creation of a Muslim state of Pakistan. While he had always believed that Hindu-Muslim unity was possible, he reluctantly came to the view that partition was necessary to safeguard the rights of Indian Muslims. His negotiations with the British government, resulted in the partition of India and the formation of the state of Pakistan on August 14, 1947. (Williams)
LL:2019/24