Kings & Pawns

LOOKING back 50 years, the haste and self-delusion of Congress and Muslim Leagueleaders that contributed to the bloodiest religious cleansing in history emerges withdistributing clarity. They found it convenient to believe that communal discord would fadeonce the political objectives for fanning it were achieved. They were so blinded by thedesire to inherit power that they overlooked the transformatory aims of the freedommovement. Gandhi was keen to wage a final struggle and discuss Partition after the Britishquit, but was isolated. The records show the last viceroy, Lord Mountbatten, dominatingdiscussions and persuading leaders to retain the apparatus of colonial administration withclose links with Britain.

More was at stake than the smoother ride to power preferred by Jawaharlal Nehru,Vallabhbhai Patel and other Congress leaders. With the focus on securing centralisedcontrol, Gandhi's vision of decentralised polity, village-based economy and non-elitisteducation became peripheral. The Westminster style of democracy was perpetuated, as wasthe colonial top-down ICS style of administration. The abrupt acceleration of transferprocedures put a premium on continuity under threat of mounting violence.

As late as May 15, 1947, uncertainty reigned. Whether the subcontinent would bepartitioned or not; where the line would be drawn if it was; what would happen to theminorities--mounting speculation sparked fear and unrest. June 1948 had been announced asthe latest date for transfer of power by British prime minister Clement Attlee. Britainofficially favoured the loose federation of Muslim-majority and non-Muslim majoritygroupings of provinces, with a weak Centre, proposed by its Cabinet Mission. Nobody knewhow soon the schedule would change.

Uncertainty intensified communal conflict, principally in undivided Punjab. TheCongress and Muslim League were at loggerheads. British officers lost interest inpreserving peace. But the joint Congress-League interim government set up under theCabinet Mission plan was still in office in New Delhi. The Constituent Assembly,established on December 9, 1946, was in session. The Muslim League kept out. Even so,alternative ways to keep the country united were mooted. There was much wishful thinking;pitiably little contingency planning by Indian leaders.

Yet the principal actors responsible for Partition were outstanding personalities.Jinnah converted Pakistan from a slogan into reality in seven years. A brilliant, vain,solitary figure, he fell out with the Congress because he preferred a constitutionalapproach to Independence rather than Gandhi's mobilisation of mass sentiment. He turnedhis talents to securing recognition of a separate Muslim identity. In 1940, the campaigndeveloped into the Muslim League's demand for a separate homeland under his leadership.

Jinnah played upon the fears of his community to achieve power but was far from afundamentalist. He kept a distance from his followers, refusing to conform to rigidpractices. He spoke in English and affected the manners of a British aristocrat, completewith Savile Row suit, tie and monocle (in his youth he had yearned to be a Shakespeareanactor). When Pakistan was achieved, he embarrassed fundamentalists by advising its newcitizens to forget religious differences. This was the theme of his first address asgovernor-general. It was blacked out by his successors.

Jawaharlal Nehru wore Indian dress in India but his thinking was set in Fabian England.When the transfer of power neared, he was easily persuaded to retain links with Britain hehad sworn to sever earlier. Together with Patel, he changed the meaning of Independencefrom the Gandhian version of a non-violent break with the past to a phased transfer ofpower from British to Indian hands. The process had already begun. Nine months earlier,Congress and League leaders had accepted office in the Viceroy's Executive Council,flatteringly renamed interim government. Now they were considering Dominion Status underthe British Crown, a halfway house they had sworn to reject.

Nehru's lack of touch with grassroots reality was evident in his justification forPartition: that it was the only way to reduce violence. His self-delusion went further inmaintaining that Pakistan would be compelled by its limitations to return to the greaterIndian fold. Though not stated publicly, this assumption was a factor in the negotiationsand was expressed to the viceroy and in letters to friends.

Nehru wrote to K.P.S. Menon on April 29: "I have no doubt whatever that sooner orlater India will have to function as a united country. Perhaps the best way to reach thatstage is to go through some kind of partition now." This typified the inherent airof superiority, more obvious in Patel, that infuriated Jinnah, and stiffened Pakistan.

Sardar Patel, the pragmatic ironman of Congress, became the strongest proponent ofDominion Status and Partition. His link with Mountbatten was V.P. Menon, the viceroy'sconstitutional adviser. The first step towards Partition was taken in March '47 when theCongress Working Committee asked the League to cooperate in "making a Constitutionfor an Indian Union" and proposed "a division of Punjab into two, so that thepredominantly Muslim part may be separated from the predominantly non-Muslim part."

Such equivocation was typical of the two-faced Congress posture. Behind its policy wasthe assumption that with Punjab and Bengal divided, Jinnah would reject what he describedas a 'motheaten Pakistan'; and even if he accepted it, an unviable Pakistan would beforced to return to India. In fact, violence escalated after the Congress resolution.Minorities were attacked and forced out of their homes. Those who survived initiated thegreatest mass migration in history. Their bitter memories cemented the walls of Partition.

GANDHI was not consulted; he read about the Congress resolution in the papers whiletrying to douse communal flames in Bihar. On March 20, he wrote in anguish to Nehru andPatel that he opposed Partition's communal logic. Nehru replied that it represented"the only answer to Partition as demanded by Jinnah". Patel's irritated replyspeaks for itself: "It is difficult to explain to you the resolution about thePunjab. It was adopted after the deepest deliberation. Nothing has been done in a hurry orwithout full thought. That you had expressed your views against it, we learnt only fromthe papers. But you are, of course, entitled to say what you feel right."

Even more frustrated than Gandhi was Maulana Abul Kalam Azad. As Congress presidentduring talks with the Cabinet Mission, he believed that the British federal plan was thebest solution. Azad remained loyal to the Congress, though isolated. His agony was akin toGandhi's as he saw his dream of a united India slipping away. Unlike Gandhi, hisbitterness spilled over into criticism of colleagues, particularly Patel.

Congress impotence can be traced to June 1945, when the leaders emerged from nearlythree years' detention. They were facing a Britain exhausted by World War II. It could nolonger rule a global empire and sought to replace imperial dominance with mutuallyacceptable political associations. Gandhi urged another push, if necessary, to gainindependence, followed by discussions on the terms of Partition with the Muslim League,which had been strengthened by siding with the imperial government during the war. He waswilling to risk disorder. But Congress leaders preferred the safer route to power. Theywaited on the viceroy, who dangled the prospect of early access to office before them. Ina dispatch to London on March 29, Mountbatten "emphasised that the psychologicaleffect of coming to the right decision very quickly would be great, including thepossibility of establishing some form of Dominion Status for India."

Years later, a British author, Leonard Mosley, recounted a conversation with Nehru thatrings true. The prime minister told him in 1960: "The truth is that we were tiredmen, and we were getting on in years too. Few of us could stand the prospect of going toprison again--and if we had stood out for a united India as we wished it, prison obviouslyawaited us. We saw the fires burning in the Punjab and heard of the killings. The plan forPartition offered a way out and we took it... We expected that Partition would betemporary, that Pakistan was bound to come back to us."

The last viceroy was suited to the part. Cousin to King George V, Mountbatten came tothe scene after a distinguished naval career that saw him heading the South-East AsiaCommand. When Nehru visited Singapore, Mountbatten cultivated him. He may not have knownthat he would be appointed viceroy, but he did know that Nehru was slated to be primeminister of India, divided or undivided.

When Mountbatten was chosen to replace Field Marshal Archibald Wavell as Britain's lastviceroy on February 20,'47, his friendship with Nehru was a consideration. But he was nomere show-boy. He had a reputation for meticulous planning. The only Indian grudginglyincluded in his staff was V.P. Menon who had risen from a clerk; but his advice to theviceroy played a greater part in shaping procedures for the transfer of power than anyIndian politician.

Gandhi, for all his rapport with the people, could not counter the lust for easy accessto power that his proteges developed. On June 21, 1946, during the discussions with theCabinet Mission, he had warned the Congress that they "would gain nothing by enteringon their new venture on bended knees." But his approach was rejected when two dayslater, as aptly described by Pyarelal, his secretary and biographer, "they droppedthe pilot." Gandhi distanced himself from Congress leaders, while they moved into theCentral Secretariat.

Unlike Congress leaders, Gandhi had premonitions of disaster. Unable to influence thenegotiations, he turned to stemming the violence of Partition. On November 6, 1946, hebegan a peace mission through riot-stricken Noakhali (now in Banglaadesh). In four months, he walked from village to village checking Muslim fanatics. He could not stay as long ashe intended. On March 2, 1947, he left for Bihar where Muslims were threatened by Hinducommunalists.

Gandhi repeated this miracle in Delhi and Calcutta. yet his mission was also an escapefrom failure. At times, he seemed confused, even bewildered. He had not been well sincehis detention for the Quit India Movement; he was further strained by Noakhali. He keptbusy, but faced by the defeat of his dreams, the agony occasionally came through.

Gandhi was in Noakhali in early 1947. On January 2, he wrote in his diary what was tobecome a refrain: "Have been awake since 2am. God's grace alone is sustaining me,cause of all this. All around me is utter darkness. When will God take me out of thisdarkness into His light?"