Partition of India
Map of India and Pakistan as envisaged in the Partition Plan 1947
The Partition of India led to the creation on
August 14,
1947 and
August 15,
1947, respectively, of two
sovereign states, upon the granting of independence to
British India by the
United Kingdom: the
Dominion of Pakistan (later
Islamic Republic of Pakistan); and the
Union of India (later
Republic of India). '
Partition' here refers also to the
division of the
Bengal province of British India into the Pakistani state of
East Bengal (later
East Pakistan, now
Bangladesh) and the Indian state of
West Bengal, as well as the similar partition of the
Punjab region of British India into the
Punjab province of
West Pakistan and the Indian state of
Punjab, in addition to the division of the
British Indian Army, the
Indian Civil Service and other administrative services, the
railways, and the central treasury, and other assets.
The secession of
Bangladesh from
Pakistan in the 1971
Bangladesh Liberation War is not covered by the term Partition of India, nor are the earlier separations of
Ceylon (
Sri Lanka) and
Burma (
Myanmar) from the administration of British India. Ceylon, part of the
Madras Presidency of British India from 1795 until 1798, became a separate
Crown Colony in 1798. Burma, gradually annexed by the British during 1826 – 86 and governed as a part of the British Indian administration until 1937, was directly administered thereafter.
[1] Burma was granted independence on
January 4,
1948 and Ceylon on
February 4,
1948. (See
History of Sri Lanka and
History of Burma.)
The remaining countries of present-day
South Asia include:
Nepal;
Bhutan; and the
Maldives. The first two, Nepal and Bhutan, having signed treaties with the British designating them as independent states, were never a part of British India, and therefore their borders were not affected by the partition. The Maldives, which became a
protectorate of the
British crown in 1887 and gained its independence in 1965, was also unaffected by the partition.
//
Pakistan and India
Two self governing
countries legally came into existence at the stroke of midnight on
15 August 1947. The ceremonies for the transfer of power were held a day earlier in
Karachi, at the time the capital of the new
state of Pakistan, to allow the last British
Viceroy,
Louis Mountbatten, to attend both the ceremony in Karachi and the ceremony in
Delhi. Pakistan celebrates Independence Day on
August 14, while India celebrates it on
August 15.
Background
Late 19th and early 20th century
1909 Prevailing Religions, Map of British Indian Empire, 1909, showing the prevailing majority religions of the population for different districts.
1909 Percentage of Muslims, Map of British Indian Empire, 1909, showing percentage of Muslims in different districts.
1909 Percentage of Hindus, Map of British Indian Empire, 1909, showing percentage of Hindus in different districts.
1909 Percentage of Buddhists, Sikhs, and Jains. Map of British Indian Empire, 1909, showing percentages in different districts.
1909 Prevailing Languages (Northern Region), Map of British Indian Empire, 1909, showing the prevailing (Aryan) languages of the population for different districts.
1901 Population Density, Map of British Indian Empire, 1909, showing the population density in 1901.
1920–1932
Train to Pakistan being given a warm send-off. New Delhi railway station, 1947
Train to Pakistan steaming out of New Delhi Railway Station, 1947.
The
All India Muslim League (AIML) was formed in
Dhaka in 1906 by Muslims who were suspicious of the mainstream, secular but Hindu-majority
Indian National Congress. A number of different scenarios were proposed at various times. Among the first to make the demand for a separate state was the writer/philosopher
Allama Iqbal, who, in his presidential address to the 1930 convention of the Muslim League said that he felt a separate nation for Muslims was essential in an otherwise
Hindu-dominated subcontinent. The Sindh Assembly passed a resolution making it a demand in 1935. Iqbal,
Jouhar and others then worked hard to draft
Mohammad Ali Jinnah, who had till then worked for Hindu-Muslim unity, to lead the movement for this new nation. By 1930, Jinnah had begun to despair of the fate of minority communities in a united India and had begun to argue that mainstream parties such as the Congress, of which he was once a member, were insensitive to Muslim interests. At the 1940 AIML conference in
Lahore, Jinnah made clear his commitment to two separate states, a position from which the League never again wavered:
“
The Hindus and the Muslims belong to two different religions, philosophies, social customs and literature… To yoke together two such nations under a single state, one as a numerical minority and the other as a majority, must lead to growing discontent and final destruction of any fabric that may be so built up for the government of such a state.
”
1932–1942
However, Hindu organisations such as the
Hindu Mahasabha, though against the division of the country, were also insisting on the same chasm between Hindus and Muslims. In 1937 at the 19th session of the Hindu Mahasabha held at
Ahmedabad, Veer
Savarkar in his presidential address asserted:
[2]“
India cannot be assumed today to be Unitarian and homogeneous nation, but on the contrary there are two nations in the main — the Hindus and the Muslims.
”
Rural Sikhs in a long ox-cart train headed towards India. 1947. Margaret Bourke-White.
Most of the Congress leaders were
secularists and resolutely opposed the division of India on the lines of religion.
Mohandas Gandhi was both religious and
irenic, believing that Hindus and Muslims could and should live in amity. He opposed the partition, saying,
“
My whole soul rebels against the idea that Hinduism and Islam represent two antagonistic cultures and doctrines. To assent to such a doctrine is for me a denial of God.
”
An old Sikh man carrying his wife. Over 10 million people were uprooted from their homeland and travelled on foot, bullock carts and trains to their promised new home.
For years, Gandhi and his adherents struggled to keep Muslims in the Congress Party (a major exit of many Muslim activists began in the 1930s), in the process enraging both Hindu Nationalists and Indian Muslim Nationalists. (Gandhi was assassinated soon after Partition by Hindu Nationalist
Nathuram Godse, who believed that Gandhi was appeasing Muslims at the cost of Hindus.) Politicians and community leaders on both sides whipped up mutual suspicion and fear, culminating in dreadful events such as the riots during the Muslim League's
Direct Action Day of August 1946 in Calcutta, in which more than 5,000 people were killed and many more injured. As public order broke down all across northern India and Bengal, the pressure increased to seek a political partition of territories as a way to avoid a full-scale civil war.
1942–1946
Viceroy Louis Mountbatten with a countdown calendar to the Transfer of Power in the background
Until 1946, the definition of Pakistan as demanded by the League was so flexible that it could have been interpreted as a sovereign nation
Pakistan, or as a member of a confederated India.
Some historians believe Jinnah (whose catch-phrase was that India would be "divided or destroyed") intended to use the threat of partition as a bargaining chip in order to gain more independence for the Muslim dominated provinces in the west from the Hindu dominated center.
[3]Other historians claim that Jinnah's real vision was for a Pakistan that extended into Hindu-majority areas of India, by demanding the inclusion of the East of
Punjab and West of
Bengal, including
Assam, all Hindu-majority country. Jinnah also fought hard for the annexation of
Kashmir, a Muslim majority state with Hindu ruler; and the accession of
Hyderabad and
Junagadh, Hindu-majority states with Muslim rulers.[
citation needed]
The British colonial administration did not directly rule all of "India". There were several different political arrangements in existence: Provinces were ruled directly and the
Princely States with varying legal arrangements, like
paramountcy.
The
British Colonial Administration consisted of
Secretary of State for India, the
India Office, the
Governor-General of India, and the
Indian Civil Service.
The Indian Political Parties were (alphabetically)
All India Muslim League,
Communist Party of India,
Hindu Mahasabha,
Indian National Congress, and the
Unionist Muslim League (mainly in the Punjab).
The Partition: 1947
Mountbatten Plan
TIME Magazine October 27, 1947 cover depicting the partition of India. The caption says: “INDIA: Liberty and death.”
The actual division between the two new dominions was done according to what has come to be known as the 3rd June Plan or
Mountbatten Plan.
The border between India and Pakistan was determined by a British Government-commissioned report usually referred to as the
Radcliffe Award after the
London lawyer, Sir
Cyril Radcliffe, who wrote it. Pakistan came into being with two non-contiguous enclaves,
East Pakistan (today Bangladesh) and
West Pakistan, separated geographically by India. India was formed out of the majority
Hindu regions of the colony, and Pakistan from the majority
Muslim areas.
Countries of Modern
Indian subcontinentOn
July 18,
1947, the
British Parliament passed the
Indian Independence Act that finalized the partition arrangement. The
Government of India Act 1935 was adapted to provide a legal framework for the two new dominions. Following partition, Pakistan was added as a new member of the
United Nations, The union formed from the combination of the
Hindu states assumed the name India which automatically granted it the seat of British India as a
successor state.
[4]The 565
Princely States were given a choice of which country to join.
Geography of the partition: the Radcliffe Line
An aged and abandoned Muslim couple and their grand children sitting by the roadside on this arduous journey. "The old man is dying of exhaustion. The caravan has gone on," wrote Bourke-White.
The Punjab — the region of the five rivers east of
Indus:
Jhelum,
Chenab,
Ravi,
Beas, and
Sutlej — consists of interfluvial
doabs, or tracts of land lying between two confluent rivers. These are the Sind-Sagar doab (between Indus and Jhelum), the Jech doab (Jhelum/Chenab), the Rechna doab (Chenab/Ravi), the Bari doab (Ravi/Beas), and the Bist doab (Beas/Sutlej) (see map). In early 1947, in the months leading up to the deliberations of the Punjab Boundary Commission, the main disputed areas appeared to be in the Bari and Bist doabs, although some areas in the Rechna doab were claimed by the Congress and Sikhs. In the Bari doab, the districts of Gurdaspur, Amritsar, Lahore, and Montgomery were all disputed.
[5] All districts (other than Amritsar, which was 46.5% Muslim) had Muslim majorities; albeit, in Gurdaspur, the Muslim majority, at 51.1%, was slender. At a smaller area-scale, only three
tehsils (sub-units of a district) in the Bari doab had non-Muslim majorities. These were: Pathankot (in the extreme north of Gurdaspur, which was not in dispute), and Amritsar and Tarn Taran in Amritsar district. In addition, there were four Muslim-majority tehsils east of Beas-Sutlej (with two where Muslims outnumbered Hindus and Sikhs together).
[5]Two Muslim men (in a rural refugee train headed towards Pakistan) carrying an old woman in a makeshift doli or palanquin. 1947.
A map of the Punjab region from 1947
The claims (Congress/Sikh and Muslim) and the Bounday Commission Award in the Punjab in relation to Muslim percentage by Tehsils. The unshaded regions are the princely states.
Before the Boundary Commission began formal hearings, governments were set up for the East and the West Punjab regions. Their territories were provisionally divided by "notional division" based on simple district majorities. In both the Punjab and Bengal, the Boundary Commission consisted of two Muslim and two non-Muslim judges with Sir
Cyril Radcliffe as a common chairman.
[5] The mission of the Punjab commission was worded generally as: "To demarcate the boundaries of the two parts of the Punjab, on the basis of ascertaining the contiguous majority areas of Muslims and non-Muslims. In doing so, it will take into account other factors." Each side (the Muslims and the Congress/Sikhs) presented its claim through counsel with no liberty to bargain. The judges too had no mandate to compromise and on all major issues they "divided two and two, leaving Sir Cyril Radcliffe the invidious task of making the actual decisions."
[5]The communities in the disputed regions of the Upper Bari Doab in 1947.
Independence and population exchanges
Massive population exchanges occurred between the two newly-formed states in the months immediately following Partition. Once the lines were established, about 14.5 million people crossed the borders to what they hoped was the relative safety of religious majority. Based on 1951 Census of displaced persons, 7,226,000
Muslims went to Pakistan from India while 7,249,000
Hindus and
Sikhs moved to India from Pakistan immediately after partition. About 11.2 million or 78% of the population transfer took place in the west, with
Punjab accounting for most of it; 5.3 million Muslims moved from India to West Punjab in Pakistan, 3.4 million Hindus and Sikhs moved from Pakistan to East Punjab in India; elsewhere in the west 1.2 million moved in each direction to and from Sind.[
citation needed]
"With the tragic legacy of an uncertain future, a young refugee sits on the walls of Purana Qila, transformed into a vast refugee camp in Delhi." Margaret Bourke-White, 1947
A crowd of Muslims at the Old Fort (Purana Qila) in Delhi, which had been converted into a vast camp for Muslim refugees waiting to be transported to Pakistan. Manchester Guardian, 27 September 1947.
The newly formed governments were completely unequipped to deal with migrations of such staggering magnitude, and massive violence and slaughter occurred on both sides of the border. Estimates of the number of deaths range around roughly 500,000, with low estimates at 200,000 and high estimates at 1,000,000.
[6]Punjab
The Indian state of Punjab was created in 1947, when the Partition of India split the former Raj province of Punjab between India and Pakistan. The mostly Muslim western part of the province became Pakistan's Punjab Province; the mostly Sikh and Hindu eastern part became India's Punjab state. Many Hindus and Sikhs lived in the west, and many Muslims lived in the east, and so the partition saw many people displaced and much intercommunal violence.
Lahore and
Amritsar were at the center of the problem, the British were not sure where to place them - make them part of India or Pakistan. The British did make a decision to hand both cities to Pakistan, however, due to lack of control and regulation for the border
Amritsar became part of India whilst
Lahore became part of Pakistan.
Bengal
The province of
Bengal was divided into the two separate entities of
West Bengal belonging to India, and
East Bengal belonging to Pakistan. East Bengal was renamed
East Pakistan in 1955, and later became the independent nation of
Bangladesh after the
Bangladesh Liberation War of 1971.
Sindh
At the time of Partition there were 1,400,000 Hindu Sindhis; in a space of less than a year approximately 1,200,000 of them had left for India, leaving their property behind[
citation needed].
Perspectives
A refugee train on its way to Punjab, Pakistan
The Partition was a highly controversial arrangement, and remains a cause of much tension on the subcontinent today. British
Viceroy Louis Mountbatten has not only been accused of rushing the process through, but also is alleged to have influenced the
Radcliffe Awards in India's favor since everyone agreed India would be a more desirable country for most.
[7] [8] However, the commission took so long to decide on a final boundary that the two nations were granted their independence even before there was a defined boundary between them. Even then, the members were so distraught at their handiwork (and its results) that they refused compensation for their time on the commission.
Some critics allege that British haste led to the cruelties of the Partition.
[9] Because independence was declared prior to the actual Partition, it was up to the new governments of India and Pakistan to keep public order. No large population movements were contemplated; the plan called for safeguards for minorities on both sides of the new state line. It was an impossible task, at which both states failed. There was a complete breakdown of law and order; many died in riots, massacre, or just from the hardships of their flight to safety. What ensued was one of the largest population movements in recorded history. According to Richard Symonds
[10]“
at the lowest estimate, half a million people perished and twelve million became homeless
”
However, some argue that the British were forced to expedite the Partition by events on the ground.
[11], Law and order had broken down many times before Partition, with much bloodshed on both sides. A massive civil war was looming by the time Mountbatten became Viceroy. After World War II, Britain had limited resources
[12], perhaps insufficient to the task of keeping order. Another view point is that while Mountbatten may have been too hasty he had no real options left and he achieved the best he could under difficult circumstances
[13]. Historian Lawrence James concurs that in 1947 Mounbatten was left with no option but to cut and run. The alternative being getting involved in a potentially bloody civil war from which it would be difficult to get out
[14]Some have argued that much of the blame for the massacres lies with Indian nationalists such as Gandhi
[15] and/or Jinnah
[16].
Conservative elements in
England consider the partition of India to be the moment that the
British Empire ceased to be a world power, following
Curzon's dictum that "While we hold on to India, we are a first-rate power. If we lose India, we will decline to a third-rate power." The 'flick' of the pen with which
Clement Atlee signed the independence treaty is, where remembered, considered sadly; not for the loss of India, but for the loss of what holding India meant.
Delhi Punjabi refugees
An estimated 20 million people - Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs - crossed the newly carved borders to reach their new homelands. These estimates are based on comparisons of decadal censuses from 1941 and 1951 with adjustments for normal population growth in the areas of migration. In northern India - undivided Punjab and North Western Frontier Province (NWFP) - nearly 12 million were forced to move from as early as March 1947 following the Rawalpindi violence. Delhi received the highest number of refugees for a single city - the population of Delhi grew rapidly in 1947 from under 1 million (917.939) to a little less than 2 million (1.744.072) between the period 1941-1951.(Census of India, 1941 and 1951). The refugees were housed in various historical and military locations such as the Old Fort Purana Qila), Red Fort (Red Fort), and military barracks in Kingsway (around the present Delhi university). The latter became the site of one of the largest refugee camps in northern India with more than 35,000 refugees at any given time besides Kurukshetra camp near Panipat. The camp sites were later converted into permanent housing through extensive building projects undertaken by the Government of India from 1948 onwards. A number of housing colonies in Delhi came up around this period like Lajpat Nagar, Rajinder Nagar, Nizamuddin, Punjabi Bagh, Rehgar Pura, Jungpura and Kingsway. A number of schemes such as provision of education, employment opportunities, easy loans to start businesses etc. were provided for the refugees at all-India level. The Delhi refugees, however, able to make use of these facilities much better than their counterparts elsewhere.
[17]Refugees settled in India
Many Sikhs and Hindu Punjabis settled in the Indian parts of Punjab and Delhi. Hindus migrating from East Pakistan (now
Bangladesh) settled across
Eastern India and
Northeastern India, many ending up in close-by states like
West Bengal,
Assam, and
Tripura. Some migrants were sent to the
Andaman islands.
Hindu Sindhis found themselves without a homeland. The responsibility of rehabilitating them was borne by their government. Refugee camps were set up for Hindu Sindhis. However non sindhi Hindus had very little help from the Government of India and many never received compensation of any sort from the Indian Government.
Photo of a railway station in Punjab. Many people abandoned their fixed assets and crossed newly formed borders.
Many refugees overcame the trauma of poverty. The loss of a homeland has had a deeper and lasting effect on their Sindhi culture,it may be in decline in India.
In late 2004, the
Sindhi diaspora vociferously opposed a
Public Interest Litigation in the
Supreme Court of India which asked the
government of India to delete the word "
Sindh" from the
Indian National Anthem (written by
Rabindranath Tagore prior the partition) on the grounds that it infringed upon the sovereignty of Pakistan.
Refugees settled in Pakistan
Refugees or
Muhajirs in Pakistan came from various parts of India. There was a large influx of Punjabi Muslims from East Punjab fleeing the riots. Despite severe physical and economic hardships, East
Punjabi refugees to Pakistan did not face problems of cultural and linguistic assimilation after partition. However, there were many Muslim refugees who migrated to Pakistan from other Indian states. These
refugees came from many different ethnic groups and regions in India, including
Uttar Pradesh (then known as "United Provinces of Agra and Awadh", or UP),
Madhya Pradesh (then Central Province or "CP"),
Gujarat,
Bihar, what was then the
princely state of
Hyderabad and so on. The descendants of these non-Punjabi refugees in Pakistan often refer to themselves as
Muhajir whereas the assimilated Punjabi refugees no longer make that political distinction. Large numbers of non-Punjabi refugees settled in Sindh, particularly in the cities of
Karachi and
Hyderabad. They are united by their refugee status and their native
Urdu language and are a strong political force in Sindh.
