ABSTRACT
The astonishing electoral success of the Muslim League in 1946 and the division of India in August 1947 have led to the abiding assumption among academics and laymen that the overwhelming majority of the Muslim masses were in favour of the two-nation theory. This assumption is based largely on the studies of the Punjab, the Bengal and UP, while the other regions remain relatively less explored. This chapter argues that, as far as Bihar is concerned and unlike the areas just mentioned, strong voices were raised by Muslim communities against the separatist politics of the Muslim League. The Muslims in Bihar displayed far more affi nity for mushtareka wataniyat, that is, common/ composite nationalism — the expression used by one of the Muslim leaders of the Bihar Congress, Shah Mohammad Umair (1894-1978), in his Urdu autobiography (1967), Talaash-e-Manzil (In Search of a Destination), as also for muttahidah qaumiyat, that is, united/composite nationalism — the expression used by the Jamiat-ul-Ulema-e-Hind, the organization representing the clerics of the Deobandi school.
