11 August: The Speech Pakistan Quotes Every 14 August

What happened on 11 August 1947

The Constituent Assembly of Pakistan first convened on 10 August 1947 at the Sindh Assembly building in Karachi. The following day, 11 August, Jinnah was elected its president and delivered his presidential address to the House.

The same sitting took up the country’s flag. Liaquat Ali Khan moved the resolution, describing a dark green rectangular flag with a white vertical bar at the mast, a white crescent in the centre and a five-pointed star. The design is generally credited to Syed Amir-uddin Kedwaii and was based on the Muslim League banner. The Assembly adopted it that day — three days before the state it would fly over formally came into being.

So 11 August is the date on which Pakistan’s founding legislature seated itself, chose its flag, and heard its founder set out how he saw the new state governing itself. It is a dense day, historically. It just happens to sit in the shadow of the one that follows it.

The address itself

Jinnah’s speech ranged over bribery, corruption, black-marketing and nepotism as the problems the new state would have to confront. But the passage that has outlived everything else in it is the one on the position of citizens of different faiths.

Speaking to the Assembly, he told members that people were free to go to their temples, their mosques or any other place of worship in the state of Pakistan, and that a citizen’s religion, caste or creed had nothing to do with the business of the state. He went on to describe a founding principle in which all were citizens, and equal citizens, of one state.

(Presidential address to the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan, 11 August 1947.)

That passage has been read into the record countless times since. It appears in presidential and prime ministerial messages, in textbook chapters, on 14 August banners, and in the opening minutes of school assemblies. What it means, and how far practice has matched it, has been argued over by historians, jurists and commentators for decades — that debate is well documented and beyond the scope of this piece.

Why 11 August became Minorities Day

In 2009, the government designated 11 August as National Minorities Day, tying the observance directly to the 1947 address. The Catholic federal minister for minorities, Shahbaz Bhatti, campaigned for the designation; he was assassinated in March 2011.

The day is now marked annually with seminars, gatherings and official messages, organised nationwide by minority communities and with involvement from the Ministry of Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony. Presidential and prime ministerial messages on the day routinely return to the 11 August 1947 speech as their reference point.

Read also: 14 August 2026 Long Weekend: Who Gets 3 Days Off

The gap worth noticing

Pakistan quotes 11 August constantly. It observes it quietly.

Search interest, media coverage and public programming around 14 August dwarf anything on the 11th, even though the 11th is when the flag was adopted and the speech was given. The lines everyone repeats on Independence Day were spoken on a date most people could not place.

If you are putting together a 14 August assembly, a workplace event or a school programme this week, there is an easy fix: when the speech gets quoted — and it will — say the date it was given, and say what else happened on it. It takes one sentence, and it is accurate.

Quick reference

• 10 August 1947 — Constituent Assembly of Pakistan first convenes, Karachi
• 11 August 1947 — Jinnah elected president of the Assembly; delivers presidential address; Assembly adopts the national flag
• 14 August 1947 — Independence; Jinnah sworn in as first Governor-General
• 11 August 2009 — Date designated National Minorities Day