Analysis of information sources in references of the Wikipedia article "Muhammad Iqbal" in English language version.
"Iqbal it is true, is essentially a poet of Islam" (from the foreword by Rafiq Zakaria, p. 9)
Iqbal was elected to the Punjab Legislative Council in 1927 and held various posts both in the All-India Muslim League and the Punjab Provincial Muslim League.
Responding to this call, he published a collection of Urdu poems, Bal-e-Jibril (The Wings of Gabriel) in 1935 and Zarb-e Kalim (The Stroke of the Rod of Moses) in 1936. Through this, Iqbal achieved the status of the greatest Urdu poet in the twentieth century.
In India, the ghazal and mathnawi forms were adapted in Urdu to express new social and ideological concerns, beginning in the work of the poet Altaf Husayn Hali (1837–1914) and continuing in the poetry of Muhammad Iqbal (1877–1938). In the poetry of Iqbal, which he wrote in Persian, to speak to a wider Muslim audience, as well as Urdu, a memory of the past achievements of Islam is combined with a plea for reform. He is considered the greatest Urdu poet of the twentieth century.
In 1930, he presided over the meeting of the All-India Muslim League in Allahabad. It was here that he delivered his famous address in which he outlined his vision of a cultural and political framework that would ensure the fullest development of the Muslims of India.
Sir Syed Ahmed had brought rationalism and the desire for knowledge and progress to the Indian Muslims; Muhammad Iqbal brought them inspiration and philosophy. Next to the Quran, there is no single influence upon the consciousness of the Pakistani intelligentsia so powerful as Iqbal's poetry. In his own time, it kindled the enthusiasm of Muslim intellectuals for the values of Islam and rallied the Muslim community once again to the banner of their faith. For this reason, Iqbal is looked upon today as the spiritual founder of Pakistan.
A Muslim, an Indian and a Punjabi of Kashmiri ancestry, all at the same time, Iqbal's own individuality and sense of community was shaped in equal measure by these multiple affiliations.
Leg-pulling, innocent naughtiness and hearty laughter were the marks, and religion almost always the subject, of Iqbal's conversation, which was mostly in Punjabi or in an Urdu with a natural Punjabi accent.
He is considered the greatest poet in Urdu of the 20th century
Muhammad Iqbal, South Asian poet and ideological innovator, wrote poetry in Urdu and Persian and discursive prose, primarily in English, of particular significance in the formulation of a national ethos for Pakistan.