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By:

Divyaa Advaani 

2 November 2024 at 3:28:38 am

Why Growth Feels Lonely

Success has a strange way of changing the atmosphere around a person. The climb is crowded, competitive, and loud — but the higher you rise, the quieter it becomes. Many founders who once dreamed of hitting big revenues and building powerful teams are surprised to find that the peak feels more isolating than they ever imagined. They have stability, scale, and status — yet they carry responsibilities, decisions, and pressures that very few people around them can fully understand. And that...

Why Growth Feels Lonely

Success has a strange way of changing the atmosphere around a person. The climb is crowded, competitive, and loud — but the higher you rise, the quieter it becomes. Many founders who once dreamed of hitting big revenues and building powerful teams are surprised to find that the peak feels more isolating than they ever imagined. They have stability, scale, and status — yet they carry responsibilities, decisions, and pressures that very few people around them can fully understand. And that isolation doesn’t come from weakness; it comes from leadership. People stay close to successful individuals, but often with expectations — a favour, an introduction, an opportunity, some hidden benefit. Wealth and influence attract attention, but rarely authenticity. And for many business owners, especially those running companies upward of Rs 90 crores, this is where the silent disconnect begins. They are surrounded by people but starved of genuine connection. Yet beneath this loneliness lies a deeper, more strategic issue that most leaders never pause to consider: the brand they project externally no longer matches the identity they need internally. Their success is visible — deals, achievements, awards, numbers. But personal branding isn’t just about visibility. It is about emotional resonance, relational depth, and the quality of the people who enter your space because of who you are, not what you have built. Here’s the truth most high-performing founders overlook: loneliness at the top doesn’t come from success — it comes from the absence of aligned relationships. And that gap is bridged only when leaders intentionally shape their personal brand. When a founder’s personal brand becomes clear, something shifts. People begin to see the human behind the entrepreneur. They understand the leader’s values, personality, and intentions. The communication becomes more meaningful. Teams speak more openly. Partnerships become smoother. Even day-to-day interactions feel less transactional and more genuine. A well-aligned personal brand acts as an emotional filter — drawing in people who resonate with your energy and quietly distancing the ones who don’t. For business owners managing large-scale operations, the need today is not popularity. It is positioning. Presence. Influence. Trust. Because once your personal brand reflects depth, clarity, confidence, and relatability, you stop attracting people who want to take something from you — and start attracting people who want to contribute, collaborate, and grow alongside you. With the right personal brand, authority no longer has to come with isolation. Leadership becomes magnetic rather than demanding. Teams align faster. Networks strengthen naturally. And the circle around you evolves from being crowded to being meaningful. The irony is that most founders think their next stage of growth requires new strategies, new hires, or new markets. But often, what they actually need is a stronger sense of identity — one that the world can see, feel, and connect with. Because expansion doesn’t only happen in revenue charts; it happens in relationships, and relationships are built on perception. The clearer your identity, the stronger your influence. And the stronger your influence, the easier it becomes for people to trust you, align with you, and open doors that were previously inaccessible. So if the world around you has gotten quieter as you’ve risen higher, perhaps it is not a sign of distance — but a sign that it’s time to realign how people experience you. Not just as the owner of a successful business, but as a leader whose presence carries credibility, warmth, and clarity. Success is fulfilling, growth is exciting, but connection is what gives leadership its depth. And only a well-aligned personal brand can create the kind of connection that feels genuine, nourishing, and empowering. If you’ve reached a stage where your achievements speak loudly but your identity feels misunderstood or unseen, then it may be time to reshape the way the world perceives you. Not to impress, not to sell, but to finally be experienced in the way you truly intend to be. If this resonates with your journey, you’re welcome to reach out for a conversation here: https://sprect.com/pro/divyaaadvaani Not for introductions. Not for transactions. For alignment — and perhaps for the first step toward a personal brand that grows with you, not away from you. (The author is a personal branding expert. She has clients from 14+ countries. Views personal.)

Jinnah’s Skewed Partition: The Bitter Legacy of a Divided Subcontinent

Updated: Jan 2

Jinnah’s Skewed Partition

On December 25, Pakistan celebrated the 148th birth anniversary of its founder, Muhammad Ali Jinnah. Widely regarded as the father of the nation, Jinnah’s vision for Pakistan as a homeland for Muslims of the subcontinent remains a contested and complex legacy. While his political acumen and role in the creation of Pakistan are lauded within the country, the ripple effects of his demand for Partition have led to lethal consequences that continue to shape the Indian subcontinent.


Jinnah’s insistence on the creation of a separate state was rooted in his Two-Nation Theory, a conviction that Hindus and Muslims were fundamentally different and could not coexist in a single nation. This ideological foundation resulted in the traumatic Partition of 1947, marked by mass migrations, communal violence, and the loss of millions of lives. While Pakistan was ostensibly created to safeguard the interests of Muslims, the outcomes of Partition have been anything but uniform, leaving in their wake questions about identity, governance and stability across the region.


As the subcontinent shed its colonial shackles in 1947, the flames of Partition engulfed Punjab, Bengal, Sindh, the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) and Balochistan. What had once been dismissed by many as an improbable scenario—the division of Mother India—became a devastating reality. The British departure redrew borders, carving ‘Akhand Bharat’ into two separate entities: the Republic of India and the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Blood stained the map as a unified nation was vivisected.


The human cost of Partition is staggering to recount. Historians estimate that between 1.2 and 1.5 million people were killed, and around 15 to 18 million were displaced—figures that rival or surpass the Holocaust in their sheer scale of tragedy. The violence was unprecedented, with communal hatred spiralling into massacres and mass migrations. My own grandparents bore witness to this horror, underscoring that these numbers are more than statistics; they reflect shattered families and irretrievable losses.


Punjab bore the brunt of Partition’s chaos, exposing its stark inequities. While East Punjab, with its Hindu-Sikh majority, joined India, and Muslim-majority West Punjab went to Pakistan, the division left deep scars. Communities in regions like Lahore and Amritsar, once intertwined, were torn apart amid mob violence and devastation. Hastily drawn borders by the British boundary commission ignored ground realities, severing villages, trade routes and lives. In India, refugees revitalized cities like Ludhiana and Jalandhar, but Partition’s wounds left a lasting communal divide, still evident in its politics today.


Pakistan’s trajectory, meanwhile, was marked by the centrality of Islam as its unifying identity, a necessity in a nation born out of the Two-Nation Theory. Yet, ethnic tensions among Punjabis, Sindhis, Baloch and Pashtuns exposed the fragility of this unity, leading to fissures like the secession of East Pakistan in 1971. The skewed borders of 1947, drawn to favour religious homogeneity, did little to address linguistic and cultural diversity within the new state.


Jinnah envisioned Pakistan as a secular state where Muslims could thrive free from Hindu domination, but the reality has diverged sharply. Within Pakistan itself, disparities in governance, ethnic tensions and economic inequalities have undermined the state. East Pakistan’s secession in 1971 to become Bangladesh is the starkest example of these internal fractures. Religious minorities such as Hindus, Christians and Sikhs face systemic discrimination, while intra-Muslim sectarian conflicts further complicate the national fabric.


India, on its side of the Radcliffe Line, faced its own trials. Jinnah’s demand for a separate homeland left behind the world’s third-largest Muslim population, challenging the Two-Nation Theory. Indian Muslims have largely embraced a secular framework, enriching the nation’s multicultural ethos. Yet, Partition’s scars endure, leaving them susceptible to communal tensions and political marginalization. The rise of Hindutva politics leverages Partition’s memory to push exclusionary narratives. For Indian Muslims, Jinnah’s shadow remains, even as they forge their identity within the Republic.


Bangladesh stands as an unintended rebuttal to Jinnah’s vision. His imposition of Urdu overlooked Bengali cultural pride, planting the seeds of discord. This oversight erupted into the 1971 civil war, birthing an independent Bangladesh and exposing the flaws in the original Partition blueprint.


Perhaps the most enduring conflict stemming from Jinnah’s legacy is Kashmir. Jinnah’s ambition to annex the princely state into Pakistan remains unfulfilled. For India, Kashmir is a symbol of its secular promise, a Muslim-majority region that rejected Jinnah’s call for Pakistan. For Pakistan, it is a reminder of incomplete Partition and a rallying cry for nationalism.


While Jinnah championed the rights of minorities in his famous speech of August 11, 1947, Pakistan’s subsequent history tells a story of majoritarianism and exclusion. Jinnah’s secular leanings, often cited by his admirers, stand at odds with the Islamist tilt Pakistan has taken over the decades. His dream of a modern, progressive state has been overshadowed by military coups, political instability and the rise of extremism.


Seventy-seven years after his death, Jinnah remains a polarizing figure. In Pakistan, he is revered as Qaid-e-Azam, the Great Leader who secured a homeland. In India and Bangladesh, his legacy is fraught. The Partition of 1947 was not just territorial but deeply divisive, fragmenting dreams and identities. Its skewed outcomes stand as a cautionary tale, highlighting the cost of ideological rigidity and division over unity.


(The author is a political commentator and global affairs observer with a keen eye on South Asia’s evolving dynamics. Views personal.)

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