The Partition of India and the British Mandate of Palestine: The Controversial History of Great Britain’s Post-War Partition Plans and the Aftermath by Charles River Editors

Author:Charles River Editors
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Charles River Editors
Published: 2018-05-11T00:00:00+00:00

The Partition of India

“We have undoubtedly achieved Pakistan, and that too without bloody war, practically peacefully, by moral and intellectual force, and with the power of the pen, which is no less mighty than that of the sword and so our righteous cause has triumphed.” - Jinnah

In 1933, Muslim nationalist Choudhry Rahmat Ali created the hybrid name “Pakistan”, further drawing a circle around the northern provinces of India. The name was created by taking “P” from Punjab, “A” from Afghanistan (which was then the North West Frontier Province), “K” from Kashmir, “S” from Sind and “tan” from Baluchistan — no clearer articulation that this was required to illustrate the scope of the future autonomous Muslim territory.

To a large extent, the widening gap between the two Indian nationalist parties was the product of the difference in personalities between Gandhi, Nehru, and Jinnah. Gandhi resigned from Congress in 1934, for reasons he explained as an unwillingness to be associated with certain Congress policies and for what he saw as indiscipline in the ranks of the party. Others have suggested that his eccentric style of politics and activism was simply no longer compatible with a party preparing practical strategies for an exchange of power. It is also perhaps true that Gandhi’s growing popularity and charisma competed uncomfortably with the public profiles of more than one influential leader of Congress. One such was Jawaharlal Nehru, who was perhaps closest to the British insofar as his father was a Privy Counsellor, and he himself was very much a product of the British establishment. His father had conditioned him for rule, and he was certainly first in line for the Indian nationalist throne.

In this regard, Indian partition has increasingly in recent years been portrayed as a dual between two individuals fixated on personal power. Gandhi had no interest in power, and so the other individual was Jinnah. Due to his actions as a spoiler, he is often cast as the villain. Jinnah certainly did take an enigmatic position, championing first Indian unity and then distorting that position increasingly to a point when he would consider or hear nothing but partition. Jinnah would achieve partition, but he would never gain the same political heights enjoyed by Nehru and would, perhaps justly, carry the burden of blame for the disaster that followed.

The journey toward the goal of partition continued on March 23, 1940, with the Muslim League announcement of the Lahore Resolution, known also as the Pakistan Resolution. This would prove to be the final, definitive statement of Muslim League intention to pursue the two-state solution. A day before the resolution was published, Jinnah delivered a detailed address to an assembled audience of Muslim League members, clear in its implications and which stated in part, “Musalmans are a nation according to any definition of a nation, and they must have their homeland, their territory and their state.”

Jinnah then went on to add, “It is extremely difficult to appreciate why our Hindu friends fail to understand the real nature of Islam and Hinduism.

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