Stanley Wolpert (born 1927) is an American Indologist, author, and academic. He is considered one of the world's foremost authorities on the political and intellectual history of modern India and Pakistan and has written fiction and nonfiction books on the topics. He taught at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) from 1959-2002.

Stanley Albert Wolpert was born on 23 December 1927 in Brooklyn, New York to Russian Jewish parents. While serving as an engineer aboard a U.S. Merchant Marine ship he arrived in Bombay, India for the first time on 12 February 1948. Upon arriving, he was both fascinated and overwhelmed by the extraordinary outpouring of grief over the death of Mahatma Gandhi—who he then knew very little about—just two weeks earlier. Atop a hill, he witnessed numerous mourning Indians who were rushing to touch the ashes of Gandhi as the ship on which the urn was placed weighed anchor to scatter a portion of his ashes into the water below. On returning home, he abandoned his career in marine engineering for the study of Indian history. He received a B.A. from City College in 1953, and an A.M. and Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1955 and 1959. with a dissertation (published as Tilak and Gokhale) on the revolutionary and reform wings of the Indian National Congress.

Muhammad Ali Jinnah (Urdu: محمد علی جناح,  Audio (help·info); 25 December 1876 – 11 September 1948) was a lawyer, politician and statesman who is known as being the founder of Pakistan. He is popularly and officially known in Pakistan as 'Quaid-e-Azam' (lit. Great Leader) and 'Baba-e-Qaum' (lit. Father of the Nation).

Jinnah served as leader of the All-India Muslim League from 1913 until Pakistan's independence on 14 August 1947, and as Pakistan's first Governor-General from 15 August 1947 until his death on 11 September 1948. Jinnah rose to prominence in the Indian National Congress initially expounding ideas of Hindu-Muslim unity and helping shape the 1916 Lucknow Pact between the Muslim League and the Indian National Congress; he also became a key leader in the All India Home Rule League. He proposed a fourteen-point constitutional reform plan to safeguard the political rights of Muslims in a self-governing India.

Muhammad Ali (born Cassius Marcellus Clay, Jr.; January 17, 1942) is an American former professional boxer, philanthropist and social activist. Considered a cultural icon, Ali was both idolized and vilified.

Originally known as Cassius Clay, Ali changed his name after joining the Nation of Islam in 1964, subsequently converting to Sunni Islam in 1975, and more recently practicing Sufism.^{[clarification needed]} In 1967, three years after Ali had won the World Heavyweight Championship, he was publicly vilified for his refusal to be conscripted into the U.S. military, based on his religious beliefs and opposition to the Vietnam War. Ali stated, "I ain't got no quarrel with them Viet Cong... No Viet Cong ever called me nigger" – one of the more telling remarks of the era.

Widespread protests against the Vietnam War had not yet begun, but with that one phrase, Ali articulated the reason to oppose the war for a generation of young Americans, and his words served as a touchstone for the racial and antiwar upheavals that would rock the 1960s. Ali's example inspired Martin Luther King Jr. – who had been reluctant to alienate the Johnson Administration and its support of the civil rights agenda – to voice his own opposition to the war for the first time.

Jaswant Singh (born January 3, 1938) is an Indian politician and Member of Parliament from Darjeeling parliamentary constituency. He is a Rajput from Jodhpur in the Indian State of Rajasthan and was an officer in the Indian Army in the 1960s and is an alumnus of Mayo College and the National Defence Academy (India), Khadakwasla. He served as Finance minister in the short-lived government of Atal Bihari Vajpayee, which lasted just from May 16, 1996, to June 1, 1996. After Vajpayee became Prime Minister again two years later, he became Minister for External Affairs of India, serving from December 5, 1998 until July 1, 2002. Responsible for foreign policy, he dealt with high tensions between India and Pakistan. In July 2002 he became Finance Minister again, switching posts with Yashwant Sinha. He served as Finance Minister until the defeat of the Vajpayee government in May 2004 and was instrumental in defining and pushing through the market-friendly reforms of the government. Known for his moderate political views, he is a self-described liberal democrat even though the Bharatiya Janata Party is often described as a right-wing nationalist organization. He was conferred the Outstanding Parliamentarian Award for the year 2001. On 19 August 2009, he was expelled from BJP after criticism over his remarks in his book which allegedly praised the founder of Pakistan in his book Jinnah - India, Partition, Independence. His last major position was as Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha from 2009 to 2010.