Some months ago, news about "Degree Fake or Real is after all a Degree" was very much on the TV screens and headlines of different news channels and news papers. But the sad part or tragedy was that.. it ended up with Mr. Muhammad Ali Jinnah [Reh. A]. Mr. Jinnah was being insinuated with a charge of Non-Graduate Founder of Pakistan.
Shame on us and our systems!! Because, we have crossed all borders of the limits of ethics, respect and morality. Mr. Jinnah was a very successful Barrister and he lived his life with utmost success, dignity, honor and principles. What Mr. Jinnah did single-handedly...? We frustrated, confused, and emasculated people of Pakistan could not do even our numbers would reach beyond 170 million in the span of more than 60 years. He gave us Pakistan and what we did to his nation in his name, religion, cast and creed?? So much so, arguments amongst various columnist and journalist was very much confined with someone who has done matriculation in a good way, the crown of respect & power belongs to this someone. The education beyond matriculation is obsolete and absurd??? What type of people we are?? and what are we thinking??? If we had literate columnist and journalist their conclusion on projected education would be different with reference to any context.
As Mr. Zufiqar Ali Bhutto said "It is nothing short of a national tragedy that so much rancour was needed to force the changes. Neither intelligence nor imagination were required to detect the barbarism in the Ordinance. Nowhere in the world, not even in Hitler's Third Reich, have university degrees been forfeited."
Source: Awakening The People By Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto; Copyright © 2006
Therefore, its time to wake up and repent!! Otherwise our ignorance will invite our destruction some day, and to avoid this destruction we need to get back to education very seriously.
Source: Quaid Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah as a young lawyer, An album of photographs, published by Ministry of Information & Broadcasting, Government of Pakistan.I wrote to Mrs. Frances Bellis a very senior representative of Lincoln's Inn Library and seek her consent to give me some information about Mr. Muhammad Ali Jinnah for this particular write up straight from the records of Lincoln's Inn Libarary. She was very supportive and kind to provide me this "precious record" which I think every Pakistani should memorize it by heart so as to avoid such types of messes in future. I feel proud to present you the authentic record which explains everything about the education of my Honorable founder of Pakistan Mr. Muhammad Ali Jinnah [Reh. A].
Born: 25 December 1876 in Karachi
There has always been a discrepancy between the date (above) officially recognized in Pakistan and the age of 19 he gives in the Admissions Register which would put his birth year as 1874. This is due to there being no system of registration of births then and parents tended to be rather lax about such things. This official date would have made him 16 on admission and aged 19 at call. Though the Inns have never had formal age requirements for admission, it has long been the case that you had to be 21 to be called to the bar but in the eyes of the Inn he was certainly 21 when called. (see Pirzada, pp 1-7)
Admission: 5 June 1893
Admissions Register: published: vol. 2 p. 44
[original: 1882-94 p. 254 (B1a27)]
Admitted under name of Jinnahbhai which he petitioned to Council in 1896 to change to Jinnah [Bluejackets 1896 April item 2 (A1b/1896)]
Reason he chose Lincoln’s Inn above the others was that Watts’ fresco, in the Great Hall included the prophet Mohammed among the great law-givers of the world.
Petition of 25 April 1893 for dispensation from test in Latin. [Bluejackets 1893 April item 15 (A1b/1893]
Passed preliminary examination on 25 May 1893 [Aziz p. 21]
On life as a student see Aziz pp. 20-30 and Dani, pp.36-38
Bar: 29 April 1896
Black Book vol. 5 p. 428 [Bar Book 1893-1905 p. 55 (B2a8)]
(note: Black Book is the Inn’s principle record)
Youngest Indian to be called to the bar.
Bar Book details:
Proposed by Gareth Hastings
Published by the Treasurer, Edward Henry Pember
In presence of following Benchers:
John Westlake
George Wirkgman Hemmming
Frank Whittaker Bush
Edward Parker Wolstenholme
William Phipson Beale
David Lindo Alexander
Black Book details:
The following were called at the same time:
Richard Bacon
Richard Kaikhusroo Sorabji
Thomas Arthur Gilbert
Hector Archibald Josephs
Gerald Clare Maberly
Thomas Hughes Jackson
John Frederick Badger Moody
Syed Ali Ausat
Note: Richard Sorabji was brother of Cornelia Sorabji, another Lincoln’s Inn member who was one of the first women to be called to the English bar.
NB All Lincoln’s Inn documents reproduced in Quershi’s book.
Legal career in England:
1930-1935 specialised in Indian appeals before the Privy Council. [Aziz pp.50-58, Pirzada pp.40-41, Ahmad pp.407-409, listed and reported PC cases]
Chambers: 11 King’s Bench Walk
Admitted ad eundem to Inner Temple on 5 May 1931 (joined because he had chambers there)
Biographical works we hold:
AHMED, Riaz Quaid-I-Azam as an advocate (Rawalpindi: Alvi Publishers, 1987)
AZIZ, Qutubuddin Quaid-I-Azam Jinnah and the battle for Pakistan (Karachi: Islamic Media Corporation, [1997]
DANI, Ahmad Hasan (ed) Quaid-I-Azam and Pakistan (Islamabad: Quaid-I-Azam University, 1981
OXFORD Dictionary of National Biography
PIRZADA, Syed Sharifuddin Some aspects of Quaid-I-Azam’s life (Islamabad: National Commission on Historical and Cultural Research, 1978
QURESHI, Saleem (comp.) Jinnah: the founder of Pakistan in the eyes of his contempories and his documentary records at Lincoln’s Inn (Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1998 ISBN 0 19 577851 0
WHO WAS WHO Vol 4
Portraiture:
Oil painting by Howard Barron [LI no 16]. Presented by the High Commissioner of Pakistan on 11 October 1965. Hanging in stair well south end of Hall vestibule.
Frances Bellis
September 2005
I am sure you all will be benefited from the above quoted information. I thank Mrs. Frances Bellis once again for her help in this connection. In the end, I would like to suggest you to make a habit, whenever someone says something and someone quotes something, make notes of that and when you come home, check it up!! It will make your life easy.
There is an old saying "It is very dangerous to follow blindly."
