Mawdudi believed politics was "an integral, inseparable part of the Islamic faith, and that the Islamic state that Muslim political action seeks to build" would not only be an act of piety but would also solve the many (seemingly non-religious) social and economic problems that Muslims faced. He supported what he called "Islamization from above", through an Islamic state in which sovereignty would be exercised in the name of Allah and Islamic law ( sharia) would be implemented. His thought was influenced by many factors including the Khilafat Movement Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's ascension at the end of the Ottoman Caliphate and the impact of Indian Nationalism, the Indian National Congress and Hinduism on Muslims in India. Jamaat-e-Islami's founder and leader until 1972 was Abul A'la Maududi, a widely read Islamist philosopher and political commentator, who wrote about the role of Islam in South Asia. SOURCE: Encyclopedia of Islam & the Muslim World (2004) 1.6 Successful long march against Bhutto's government.Since the early 1980s, it has also developed close links with Jamaat-e-Islami Kashmir. However, in 1975, it established Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh with Abbas Ali Khan ( Joypurhat) as the first ameer. In 1971, during the Bangladesh Liberation War, JI opposed the independence of Bangladesh. In order to provide a complete set of facts to the readers, It must be mentioned here that the ministers belonging to Jamaat soon resigned from their positions. But, during the early years of the regime of General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, it served as the "regime's ideological and political arm", with party members holding cabinet portfolios of information and broadcasting, production, and water, power and natural resources. Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan came under severe government repression in 1948, 1953, and 1963. Other wings of Jamaat include Jamaat-e-Islami Kashmir, founded in 1953, and Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami, founded in 1975. In 1947, following the partition of India, the Jamaat split into two organisations, Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan and Jamaat-e-Islami Hind (the Indian wing). At the time of the Indian independence movement, Maududi and the Jamaat-e-Islami actively worked to oppose the partition of India. Jamaat-e-Islami was founded in Lahore, British India in 1941 by the Muslim theologian and socio-political philosopher, Abul Ala Maududi, who was widely influenced by the Sharia based reign of the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb. : 70 Although it does not have a large popular following, the party is quite influential and considered one of the major Islamic movements in Pakistan, along with Deobandi and Barelvi (represented by Jamiat Ulema-e Islam and Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan respectively). JI is a vanguard party: its members form an elite with "affiliates" and then "sympathizers" beneath them.
JI strongly opposes capitalism, communism, liberalism, socialism and secularism as well as economic practices such as offering bank interest.
Its objective is the transformation of Pakistan into an Islamic state, governed by Sharia law, through a gradual legal, and political process. Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), ( Urdu: جماعتِ اسلامی, "Islamic Congress"), or Jamaat as it is simply known, is an Islamist political party which is based in Pakistan and it is the Pakistani successor to Jamaat-e-Islami, which was founded in colonial India in 1941.