Meaning
A people, nation or community.
How Iqbal uses it
The collective whose life or death hangs on hard choices. To fear new ways while clinging to the old, he warns, is “the difficult stage in the life of nations” — and love, not force, is what cures an ailing qaum.
See it in the verse
Qaum in Iqbal’s couplets
Aaeen-e-naw se darna, tarz-e-kuhan pe arna
Manzil yahi kathin hai qaumon ki zindagi mein
Manzil yahi kathin hai qaumon ki zindagi mein
To fear the new order, and to dig in stubbornly on the old way — this is the hardest pass in the life of a people.
Awakening · Courage
Mohabbat hi se payi hai shifa beemar qaumon ne
Kiya hai apne bakht-e-khufta ko bedar qaumon ne
Kiya hai apne bakht-e-khufta ko bedar qaumon ne
It is by love that ailing peoples have found their cure — by love that peoples have woken their sleeping fortune.
Love · Unity · Hope