WBCS Preliminary Examination 2019 — General Studies · Question 54 of 200

Answer: (A) Muhammad Iqbal

In his 1930 presidential address to the Muslim League at Allahabad, the poet-philosopher Muhammad Iqbal first articulated the broad idea of consolidating India's north-western Muslim-majority provinces into a separate, self-governing entity. Note the companion Q12 in this section, where Choudhury Rahmat Ali is credited with coining the actual name "Pakistan" and detailing the scheme a few years later, in 1933 — the two men's contributions are often (and confusingly) both described as "conceiving the idea of Pakistan".