I became interested in the life of Chaudhary Rahmat Ali when I got married to my wife Rizwana, who comes from Pakistan, and found that he had been a member of the same Emmanuel College, Cambridge, where I had been undergraduate, research student, and finally, research fellow. Rahmat Ali conceived the name, Pakistan while on top of a London bus. The name means the land of the Paks. The word Pak stands for all that is noble and sacred in the life of a Muslim. At the same time, it is composed from letters taken from the names of its components: Punjab, North West Frontier of which the inhabitants are mainly Afghan, Kashmir, Sindh and Baluchistan. I discovered not only his contribution to the birth of a nation, but also the contribution made by two Cambridge women, one, Miss Watson, who was his landlady, and the other, Miss Frost, who was his secretary. They were both very old ladies when I managed to interview them, but they remembered him vividly and gave a unique insight on what the great man was really like.
One of Chaudhary Rahmat's Ali's pamphlets: INDIA The Continent of DINIA or The Country of DOOM
Obituary of Chaudhary Rahmat Ali published in the Emmanuel College magazine
BOOK ON RAHMAT ALI:
Rahmat Ali : a biography / by Kursheed Kamal
Aziz. - 1987. XXXIII, 576 p.
ISBN 3-515-05051-5
Index pp. 543-576, list of illustrations [pp. 577-578],
illustrations [pp. 579 to 592].
Rahmat Ali, who coined the term "Pakistan" and
propagated this idea from Cambridge since 1933, has been almost
forgotten in his own country. His work and his motives remained
obscure as no adequate study of his life and times was available,
so far. Kursheed Kamal Aziz has written the first detailed
political biography of Rahmat Ali which throws new light on the
genesis of Pakistan. This book is based on the study of a great
deal of source material and is a major contribution to modern
historiography.
Appendices:
1. Important dates in Rahmat Ali's life pp. 491-494.
2. Now or never : are we to live or perish for ever? pp. 495-501.
3. What does the Pakistan National Movement stand for? pp.
502-510.
4. Pakistan and Pakish nationalism by Muhammad Yusuf Khan
pp. 511-524.
Bibliography :
1. Archival material p. 525.
2. Unpublished material pp. 525-526.
3. Works by Rahmat Ali pp. 526-528.
4. Other works pp. 528-538.
5. Articles pp. 528-540.
6. Magazines and newspapers pp. 540-541.
LINKS TO OTHER SITES WHICH MENTION RAHMAT ALI AND HIS TIMES
http://www.brain.net.pk/~wisetech/50/bio/rehmat.html
www.unigroup.com/PTIC/body_history.html
http://grove.ufl.edu/~emran/RahmatAli.html
www.historytoday.com/today/0997/feature/muslim.stm
www.xiber.net/~amir/pakistan/forces/Pakistan_Today.html
www.paknews.org/art1feb-17.html
www.paknews.com.pk/articles/1999/jan/art1jan-29.html
www.paknews.com.pk/articles/1999/feb/art1feb-02.html
http://publish.uwo.ca/~aakarimu/pak.html