The Truth Behind Mini Pakistan Part - 1

Disclaimer: This is an attempt to understand the truth. Truth maybe different. This post is in Indian Context. I understand many of you are here on this site from Pakistan and I apologize if I hurt your sentiments in some sense through this post. This post is based on my understanding and may not represent opinion of masses in India

I am a Hindu by religion and belief. I have been told many times, by many people, with a sense of hatred against the Muslims, that there exists a mini Pakistan in almost every city of India. People support Pakistan for all India Pakistan cricket matches and at some places they celebrate their independence day on 14th August instead of 15th August. I think this is a serious issue. I have Muslim friends as well, and they seem as Indian as I am to me. So, lets scratch the thick dust.

To understand the truth one needs to understand the history of Radcliffe Line first.

The Indian Independence Act was passed in the Parliament of United Kingdom on 15th July 1947, which contained basically three points:

1. Britain will withdraw all administrative control in one month, that was by 15th August 1947
2. British Ruled India will be divided into two dominions ( autonomous political entities within British Empire )
3. The Union Of India will be a secular state while Pakistan was intended to be a Muslim state

The division was on British Agenda since forever due to their policy of Divide and Rule coupled by the internal crisis after world war 2. And hence the Britishers had started the preparations for the division even before the Act was passed. On 8th July, Sir Cyril Radcliffe arrived in India. He was appointed to head the Border Commission which was to equally divide the British India into two parts.

Before independence 40 percent of India was ruled by the princely states which accepted British Dominance but were still free. They did not fall under Radcliffe commission. However, most of them joined India just after Independence by the efforts of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vallabhbhai_Patel ) . The provinces of Baluchistan and Sindh had a very clear Muslim majority and hence were included in Pakistan. The main problem was with the province of Bengal and Punjab. Both had a very mixed population.

The Radcliffe commission comprised of two sub-committee, one for Bengal and one for Punjab. Each committee had five members. One was Radcliffe himself while two were from Indian National Congress and two from Muslim League in each committee. All of them were judge by profession. Radcliffe was given a time of 5 weeks to give his final judgement. British government, Nehru and Jinnah all were in hurry. Initially Radcliffe complained about this ridiculously short timeline but soon he was more eager to leave India as the climate did not suit him much. Already ill-equipped, the committee members from opposite parties could not talk among themselves due to sheer tension going on ground between Hindus and Muslims. That left just the Radcliffe to finalize important decisions. This haste led to the drawing of a line which cut the villages and even homes into two. The line went through thickly populated areas in Punjab and Bengal.

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Wikipedia quoted text below :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radcliffe_Line#cite_ref-27

Radcliffe justified such casual division with the truism that no matter what he did, people would suffer. The thinking behind this justification may never be known since Radcliffe "destroyed all his papers before he left India". He departed on Independence Day itself, before even the boundary awards were distributed. By his own admission, Radcliffe was heavily influenced by his lack of fitness for the Indian climate and his eagerness to depart India.

The implementation was no less hasty than the process of drawing the border. On 16 August 1947 at 5:00pm, the Indian and Pakistani representatives were given two hours to study copies, before the Radcliffe award was published on the 17th.

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The final decision of Radcliffe Commission was completed three days before independence but it was made public on 17th August very purposefully to avoid responsibility of the chaos that was bound to happen with the announcement. This delay of 2 days played a very crucial role in the history.

(Image of Radcliffe with Nehru and Jinnah, source: specials.rediff.com/news/2006/nov/20sld2.jpg )

Muslim community had both supporters and non-supporters of division. The common man never wanted to leave their homes( and livelihood) and go somewhere else to start a new struggle for survival. Even the supporters of Pakistan who had little political interests wanted to stay at the same place. It was projected by the political leaders of Muslim League that their area will be a part of Pakistan. Muslims living in the Hindu majority areas understood that this was not possible for them but the Muslim majority areas believed very strongly that they will be in Pakistan. Without their support Jinnah would never be a Prime Minister( there would be no division ) and hence the propaganda.

When Britishers withdrew their control on 15th August, few ( probably many ) of the Muslim majority areas celebrated Independence of Pakistan. It was only after two days, they realized that they were still in India, when the Radcliffe line was made public. At some places like Malda, even the administration was confused to see itself on the other side of line and the administrative controls were exchanged on 17th August.

Uttar Pradesh was the source of greatest support for the independent state for Muslims but were betrayed by the Muslim League and UP was left in India.

The truth about mini Pakistan is still far but with this post will mark the foundation of the understanding that am trying to build. Let me know if I stated a wrong fact. I would correct it. I would also ask everyone to dig deeper and study more and let me know if I can include some important or interesting fact in my next post.

to be continued ...