Jinnah had one-point agenda, can be compared to Amit Shah: historian Ramachandra Guha

Describing Muhammad Ali Jinnah as a "straightforward figure", historian and author Ramachandra Guha says the Pakistan founder was at best an "astute politician" driven by a single-point agenda.

Guha admits that his narrative of Jinnah in his new book, "Gandhi: The Years That Changed The World, 1914-1948", is "not sympathetic".

Among all the political leaders of that era, the shades of grey in Jinnah's personality may have escaped Guha.

"Jinnah, from the early 1930s, had one-point agenda -- build Pakistan with me as a leader," Guha told PTI in an interview.

So in that sense he is "relatively straightforward figure from the 1930s onward" when he was consumed by his "new desire" to create a new country of which he would be leader, he added.

"I would say he is a straightforward figure and my narrative (of Jinnah) is not sympathetic unlike Ambedkar or some other leaders where I can see the inner-struggles of a man," said the author of best-selling book "India After Gandhi".

He went on to compare Pakistan's Quaid-e-Azam (the great leader) to BJP president Amit Shah.

"In some ways you can even compare him (Jinnah) to Amit Shah as he says, 'I will win election whatever happens' and Jinnah said, 'I will get Pakistan whatever happens, even at the cost of dead bodies'," he added.

Asked what if another scholar finds his opinion about Jinnah rather too simplistic or wrong of sorts, the 60-year-old scholar was quick to reply, "Well, they are free to do that. But they need to document more than what I have done in the book and my works."