ABSTRACT
This chapter throws light on early life and ideological background of Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah, the architect of political movement in the state. It examines the influences, both internal and external, which had shaped his political outlook. I have contested a general perception that Sheikh entered in to politics by an accident because he was denied a suitable job. With ample substantiation, I have shown that Abdullah had developed a taste for politics way before the events of 1931. Although conditions at home and around him had already revealed to him the true nature of the state, it was his exposure to higher education in Lahore and Aligarh, places where he exchanged ideas with people from different shades of opinion and where he came face to face with Indian national movement, which shaped his political outlook and trained him in the techniques of mass mobilization.
