First, about the representative character of the assembly, Mr. Mazhar-ul-Haq remarked:
“Please accept my sincere and heartfelt thanks for the great honour you have done me by electing me the President of the All-India Muslim League this year. It is a proud privilege to preside over and guide the deliberations of this distinguished gathering, where representatives of seventy millions of his Britannic Majesty’s Indian Muslim subjects are assembled in conference for the betterment of their condition, and for counsel and consultation together on the affairs of their country.”
About the difficulties of the times he says:
“Times are most unpropitious for expressing views and convictions which, in normal times of peace, there would have been no harm in frankly and unreservedly putting before our community and our Government. The present terrible conflict of nations enjoins upon us the paramount duty of saying or doing nothing which would embarrass or weaken the hands of our Government by producing undesirable excitement in the people, or lead to any impression upon foreign nations that we are in any way inimical or even indifferent to the best interests of the Empire.”
As to how Islam established itself in India, how it spread and what is the present position of the Mohammedans of India, he speaks as follows:
“The first advent of the Muslims in India was along these very coasts[1] in the form of a naval expedition sent by the third Khalif in the year
- ↑ The Western Coast.
