A Theory On Partition

[Joe Shearer]

I agree Partition could have been done in a better way. The original date for transfer of power was June 1948. Perhaps @Joe Shearer can shed light as to why it was brought forward by nearly a year.

It required surgical precision but it was done with a butcher's knife.

The terrible mistake of making Dickie Mountbatten the Viceroy. There is a back story, and it is poignant; shows how family politics among European noble families impacted millions of men, women and children in south Asia.

Mountbatten, whose original name and style was Lord Louis Mountbatten, meaning he was a commoner holding a courtesy title of 'Lord Louis', was the son of Prince Louis of Battenberg, a title created for HIS mother, Countess Julia, who married the younger brother of the reigning Grand Duke (of Hesse-Darmstadt). A Countess was far too low in the nobility for her children to qualify for succession to the Grand Duchy, so the marriage was morganatic; children of the marriage would not qualify for succession. Her sympathetic brother-in-law created her an Illustrious Highness, one rung higher, and then Princess of Battenberg, and Serene Highness. Battenberg - Batten Mountain - was a little village in the state.

They were an Anglophile family (they were from Hesse anyway, and closely associated with George I, who started the line of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the proper name of the present Royal Family of the United Kingdom), and heavily involved in the United Kingdom from Princess Julia's children onwards.

The point is that another of Prince Louis Battenberg's children, Princess Alice, married into the Greek royal family, and her son, Philippos, married the daughter and heir apparent of George VI. So Lord Louis and George VI were related by marriage, nephew married to daughter. Although he was from the house of Oldenburg, Prince Philip, who gave up all his Greek titles to become the Duke of Edinburgh, chose the family name Mountbatten, his mother's family, due to the special kindness shown to him during a very lonely youth by his uncle Dickie.

Dickie Mountbatten was specially chosen for the Viceregal position to make the handling of the Indian princes easier; they all knew he was related to the King-Emperor, and that he spoke for the monarch, not just the ministry.

Unfortunately for India (and for Pakistan, yet unborn), Lord Louis had done rather well for himself in war; he became, first, an acclaimed naval commander, then, Supreme Allied Commander, SEAC, thanks to which he received the formal surrender of the Japanese forces in Singapore. He also got ennobled, as Viscount Mountbatten of Burma; all this while, he was a commoner with a courtesy title.

Mountbatten was simultaneously a favourite of Winston Churchill and with his reputed Labour sympathies, most acceptable to Clement Attlee, and had served in Delhi as Supreme Allied Commander, all this while being related to the royal family. However, what almost everybody overlooked was that by the end of the war, he had reached acting rank of full admiral, and permanent rank of rear admiral. He was in the running for higher positions in the Royal Navy, something particularly important for him, since his own father had been the head, the First Sea Lord, and had been forced out of office due to anti-German feeling. He wanted that job like nothing else on earth, and it is clear that the viceregalty was a side-show and a distraction for him.

Quite clearly, this personal agenda, and the pressure to return to the Royal Navy and ensure a position of strength in the inevitable competition among officers of flag rank, had a major influence in his most unexpected advancing of the date of separation to August 1947. It is significant that almost every British administrative officer, from ICS, IP, Indian Political Service, IFS - the lot - was caught flat-footed by this advancing of the date, and retired to Great Britain with hardly any preparation for a hugely premature retirement.

Louis, Lord Mountbatten, as he now was, on becoming Viscount, eventually did become First Sea Lord and Admiral of the Fleet (and Earl Mountbatten of Burma), but India and Pakistan paid the price.

There is no such thing as Islamic invaders. They were invaders who happened to be Muslims. Their invasions were mainly motivated by political and material realities of their time. They had little to no motivation to spread Islam or slay infidels. Much as Alexander had no intention of spreading Hellenic religion in the lands he invaded. Though group identifications did factor in at times for them they mostly plundered and killed indiscriminately, and so did the other side. If I am not mistaken, it was perhaps Babur who instructed Humayun that if he wanted to rule India he must keep out of India's religious matters. Sooner both India and Pakistan realise and accept this fact the better it is, perhaps for the whole world.

Very well put. Thank you, dear Sir.

Without any genuinely impartial accounts from the time in question, we would simply be speculating over motives. It could easily be argued that the British were intent on provoking both parties in the subcontinent. The British may have perceived both these scenarios as a threat: (1) a strong independent Muslim majority nation that had no territorial disputes with and was peacefully trading with the republic of India. This would permit this potentially very powerful Muslim majority nation to engage actively in the middle east and threaten British interests there. (2) a unified republic of India which also pursued interests independently and antagonistically towards Britain. Congress actually ideologically opposed certain other colonial projects and a unified Congress led republic of India may have been perceived as equally threatening to Britain - I'm only speculating on this one as the first one is obvious. This second scenario is stretching things but British interests at the time were different to what they are now, China wasn't an issue for starters.

So the favourable solution for Britain may well have been clandestine encouragement of a violent hindutva movement and prolonged provocation of border disputes between Pakistan and India. The encouragement of hindutva would keep the "secular republic" in a tinder box status, while the border issues with Pakistan would keep Pakistan in check.

Stuff and nonsense. Read The Viceroy at Bay; from the scheming Linlithgow onwards, British policy was quite set and focussed. There is no point in foisting today's wishful thinking on the actions and manipulations of the British at that time.

the main reason was Jinah was not in limelight. He was a congress member till 1921 I guess. anyway ML didn't win seats till 1945 elections.
overall Quaid was a British qualified lawyer (barrister) who knew what to speak in British Raj. Unlike Gandhi and Nehru who were lawyers too from UK but their statements put them in Jail. Quaid not only was willing to take case of Bhagat Singh but also Bal Gangadhar... Still his stances didn't land him in jail. He was articulated. @Jackdaws

Also a man of tremendous self-respect. His run-ins with pretentious Brits were the stuff of legend. His brutal rebuff of a condescending (also perhaps jealous) Lady Willingdon in the incident at their dinner party is so soothing to every patriotic Indian (and Pakistani) breast.

Mr Jinnah always believed that the force of moral and ethical power would prevail over material and imperial strength. He confronted adversaries who vastly outnumbered his own supporters and resources with the pure, pristine power of concepts, facts, arguments, persuasive articulation and, most of all, sterling qualities of character and courage which did not need even an iota of physical force to press his case for Pakistan. So scrupulously did he believe in the sanctity of law, of the written texts that codify desirable and acceptable norms of behaviour that the colonial British Government simply could not find a legal basis to send him to jail!
The British were not the only ones who would have liked to see him fettered and restricted to prison. He had many ill-wishers in the Congress, the Hindu Mahasabha, RSS and elsewhere. Yet his unwavering reliance on the sublime strength of the mind alone, accompanied by his profound respect for the law prevented his incarceration. Without detracting from the sacrifices of personal freedom rendered by his opponents who were imprisoned by the British eg. Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru etc, the Quaid resisted the temptation to become a political martyr through temporary imprisonment because of his insightful observance of the law and his unwillingness to obtain an aura through an arrest.

I never thought I would find myself 'liking' a post by you.

Brilliant.

 

[Shahzaz ud din]

The Indian narrative calls it a partition. Very hard to change that vocabulary if you are educated in India.

I believe the British call it the same as well.

 

[Nilgiri]

Quite clearly, this personal agenda, and the pressure to return to the Royal Navy and ensure a position of strength in the inevitable competition among officers of flag rank, had a major influence in his most unexpected advancing of the date of separation to August 1947.

Thank you Joe, did not know this!

 

[Joe Shearer]

Thank you Joe, did not know this!

The trouble is, old sport, there are a myriad sub-plots running through the main plot. So when some mad scientist sits down in the middle of a six-lane freeway and starts putting his dolls in array, one's inevitable reaction is to try and be as far away from the outcome that is all too predictable.

Who will tell our infant historians about the Round Table Conferences, and the Aga Khan and what he and his friends decided to do first, and then stalled on next? Or the history of the accession document, and the reason for its wording being what it was?

Who will tell them about Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, and the Khudai Khidmatgars, and the most incredible act of courage, the massacre of the Kissa Kawani Bazaar in Peshawar? And why there was a referendum in NWFP?

I could go on and on, dragging in Feranghi Mahal, and the role of the Kashmiri rug-sellers who became Nawabs of Dhaka, and helped to start the Muslim League, or Sikandar Hayat Khan and his disappearance, or the Ali Brothers, or a dozen others.

Who's listening?

 

[Death Professor]

every additional year

Was that a conscious statement? I sensed a bit of jealousy in that one, but thats only me. May we live long. Ahhh..

I shall never forget their support, nor I hope the majority provinces in Pakistan will fail to appreciate that they were the pioneers in the vanguard of our historic and heroic struggle for the achievement of Pakistan, which today is an accomplished fact.

This isn't/wasn't meant for eternity. They had ample time to consider their options and in the end they chose to stay. They don't get to choose now, when the things are getting harder. Even in Islam if there is a murtud, his following un-born generations don't automatically become murtud, they become non-muslim. There is death penalty for a murtad but not for a non-muslim. Crude example, but was necessary because it's the same concept. Those who supported Pakistan but stayed in India had the full right to come to Pakistan when they could but the current or the coming generations have no say in this claim.

 

[Nilgiri]

Who's listening?

How many times can a man turn his head, and pretend that he just doesn't see?

The answer my friend, is blowin in the wind.

The answer is blowin in the wind.

 

[Joe Shearer]

Was that a conscious statement? I sensed a bit of jealousy in that one, but thats only me. May we live long. Ahhh..

That's only you.

I have done my years, my quarters, my months, my days; it all started with being gifted Bill Slim's 'Defeat into Victory', most unexpectedly, instead of the follow-up to the John Carters I had got so far. 1964, Sainik School.

 

[Pan-Islamic-Pakistan]

I have always wondered about this. Was it because the British viewed the Congress as the larger threat? Maybe secretly encouraged the Muslim League in their divide and rule policy?

Can some knowledgeable Pakistani poster elucidate more on this? @masterchief_mirza?

The British actually could not handle the repercussions of what Quaid e Azam and ML threatened if they refused the Muslims' demand for Pakistan.

The idea that the whole Muslim population from Afghan borderland to Bengal would go into open revolt was unpalatable to them. Furthermore the promises of outside Muslim powers to aid in the Muslims' quest for freedom, should the British not acquiesce.

The British stalled, reneged on promises, changed their minds, and then went back into discussions again and again. In short, they and Congress tried every method to dissuade Quaid e Azam from Pakistan. He was given many false promises, incentives, and threatened, but he did not desist from Pakistan.

May Allah swt bless him, he was truly a Wali of Allah swt.

When Pakistan was made, the British moved the date closer by 8 months to cause panic and disarray for Pakistanis. The borders were drown to favor India and to lead the way towards India's forceful occupation of Kashmir. 7 regions of East Punjab with Muslim majorities were given to India. Then they allowed, under their watch, Hindutva and Sikh militias to engage in mass slaughter of Muslims to fix that demographic 'problem.' After 1 million dead and 14 million refugees, East Punjab was free of Muslims.

To drive another nail, the poor fate of Kashmiris was held by a ruthless tyrant, the self-styled Maharaja of Kashmir whose forebears had purchased Kashmir and its inhabitants from the British. Jammu was ethnically cleansed of Muslims to form a forward base of loyal Hindus and Sikh immigrants. When Kashmiris rose in rebellion against this illegitimate state, they were crushed (much like they are today.) Pakistan entered the situation to prevent another Muslim majority, with all rights to be part of Pakistan, going to a warmongering and tyrannical Indian state.

Nehru promised after the war, to solve the dispute in accordance with the wishes of Kashmiris, we are still waiting...

So your contempt for Indian Muslims arises from the fact that they may have differing thoughts on Pakistan? So much for the concept of Muslim brotherhood.

Tolerance for a differing view doesn't seem to exist in your vocabulary.

Dear brother, if you have not seen already, we Pakistanis believe in absolute unity of Muslims and absolute loyalty to the Islamic cause.

We do not respect the position many Indian Muslims, BDs, and others take in relation to Pakistan and Kashmir.

This is the rationale we have developed after 1947 and further in 1971, and it is now being renewed again in Afghan-Pakistan ties today.

 

[IMARV]

There is no such thing as Islamic invaders. They were invaders who happened to be Muslims. Their invasions were mainly motivated by political and material realities of their time. They had little to no motivation to spread Islam or slay infidels. Much as Alexander had no intention of spreading Hellenic religion in the lands he invaded. Though group identifications did factor in at times for them they mostly plundered and killed indiscriminately, and so did the other side. If I am not mistaken, it was perhaps Babur who instructed Humayun that if he wanted to rule India he must keep out of India's religious matters. Sooner both India and Pakistan realise and accept this fact the better it is, perhaps for the whole world.

My post was strictly in context of language used by poster I responded to who just wanted to make a snide remark on how Gangetic plane was repeatedly "invaded". And I agree to most part of your post, in fact than you for a polite and educated remark.

His post below:

Never again would the high riders from Islamic highlands invade Ganges plains.

 

[SABRE]

My post was strictly in context of language used by poster I responded to who just wanted to make a snide remark on how Gangetic plane was repeatedly "invaded". And I agree to most part of your post, in fact than you for a polite and educated remark.

His post below:

Never again would the high riders from Islamic highlands invade Ganges plains.

Understood. But it is sometimes - rather most of the time - better to let the snide remark slide. We are reacting to constructs of our perceptions, not the rational history. Choice of words to defend or oppose these constructs can only make things worse.

Very well put. Thank you, dear Sir.

Thanks. Seeing you here after a long time.

 

[Joe Shearer]

Don't forget harami godse the father of today's India who used to write letters to British to beg for his life

Just a correction: it wasn't the harami Godse but his even more harami mentor, Savarkar - who wrote an anonymous biography glorifying himself - who wrote letters, many letters, begging for release from jail, swearing never to get involved in anti-British activities ever again. Even while in jail in the Andamans, he stayed scrupulously away from prisoner agitations for better treatment, on the grounds that he was working for a full release, and getting into any such agitation would jeopardise his chances.

He is the author of the Two Nation Theory among the Hindutva camp, and was member of all the right organisations, the Hindu Mahasabha of Godse and Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, the RSS of Golwalkar, all.

 

[Goenitz]

He is the author of the Two Nation Theory among the Hindutva camp

I mean did he support partition or cleansing? in what spirit he advocated the theory

 

[Joe Shearer]

I mean did he support partition or cleansing? in what spirit he advocated the theory

It was too early to discuss implementation. His theorem was simple; those with no extra-territorial loyalties were 'Hindus', a term he used without religious inflection, including Sikhs, Buddhists and Jains in that category. Those with extra-territorial loyalties - Christians, Muslims - were not. The two could not live together as equals; those who were not 'Hindus' (in his sense of the term) should live as subordinates to the Hindus.

This is precisely the agenda followed by the RSS and the Sangh Parivar today: one state, but non-Hindu communities subordinate to the Hindus within that. No partition, no cleansing; retention as a minority with less than complete citizenship.

PS: An afterthought - it is significant that one of his greatest followers resigned as Vice-President and left the Hindu Mahasabha due to his policy of Akhand Bharat - no partition. It was this former follower, Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, who had formed an alliance with Sher-e-Bangal Fazlul Haque's Krishak Praja Party when the Congress ministries resigned. It was the same Shyama Prasad who torpedoed the proposal by Sarat Bose, Netaji's brother, Kiron Shankar Roy and Suhrawardy to keep a united Bengal out of both India and Pakistan. Jinnah reluctantly consented, more in exasperation than anything else, but Shyama Prasad demanded of the Congress leadership - largely Nehru and Patel at that point - that Hindu-majority western Bengal should be allowed to separate out and stay within India, rather like Punjab's bifurcation, and got his demand.

Savarkar was insistent on Akhand Bharat. So today we have weather forecasts leading the charge, not to mention a blob of lard stating that there are war plans for taking over Pakistan Administered Kashmir when the time goes.

 

[xeuss]

The terrible mistake of making Dickie Mountbatten the Viceroy. There is a back story, and it is poignant; shows how family politics among European noble families impacted millions of men, women and children in south Asia.

Mountbatten, whose original name and style was Lord Louis Mountbatten, meaning he was a commoner holding a courtesy title of 'Lord Louis', was the son of Prince Louis of Battenberg, a title created for HIS mother, Countess Julia, who married the younger brother of the reigning Grand Duke (of Hesse-Darmstadt). A Countess was far too low in the nobility for her children to qualify for succession to the Grand Duchy, so the marriage was morganatic; children of the marriage would not qualify for succession. Her sympathetic brother-in-law created her an Illustrious Highness, one rung higher, and then Princess of Battenberg, and Serene Highness. Battenberg - Batten Mountain - was a little village in the state.

They were an Anglophile family (they were from Hesse anyway, and closely associated with George I, who started the line of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the proper name of the present Royal Family of the United Kingdom), and heavily involved in the United Kingdom from Princess Julia's children onwards.

The point is that another of Prince Louis Battenberg's children, Princess Alice, married into the Greek royal family, and her son, Philippos, married the daughter and heir apparent of George VI. So Lord Louis and George VI were related by marriage, nephew married to daughter. Although he was from the house of Oldenburg, Prince Philip, who gave up all his Greek titles to become the Duke of Edinburgh, chose the family name Mountbatten, his mother's family, due to the special kindness shown to him during a very lonely youth by his uncle Dickie.

Dickie Mountbatten was specially chosen for the Viceregal position to make the handling of the Indian princes easier; they all knew he was related to the King-Emperor, and that he spoke for the monarch, not just the ministry.

Unfortunately for India (and for Pakistan, yet unborn), Lord Louis had done rather well for himself in war; he became, first, an acclaimed naval commander, then, Supreme Allied Commander, SEAC, thanks to which he received the formal surrender of the Japanese forces in Singapore. He also got ennobled, as Viscount Mountbatten of Burma; all this while, he was a commoner with a courtesy title.

Mountbatten was simultaneously a favourite of Winston Churchill and with his reputed Labour sympathies, most acceptable to Clement Attlee, and had served in Delhi as Supreme Allied Commander, all this while being related to the royal family. However, what almost everybody overlooked was that by the end of the war, he had reached acting rank of full admiral, and permanent rank of rear admiral. He was in the running for higher positions in the Royal Navy, something particularly important for him, since his own father had been the head, the First Sea Lord, and had been forced out of office due to anti-German feeling. He wanted that job like nothing else on earth, and it is clear that the viceregalty was a side-show and a distraction for him.

Quite clearly, this personal agenda, and the pressure to return to the Royal Navy and ensure a position of strength in the inevitable competition among officers of flag rank, had a major influence in his most unexpected advancing of the date of separation to August 1947. It is significant that almost every British administrative officer, from ICS, IP, Indian Political Service, IFS - the lot - was caught flat-footed by this advancing of the date, and retired to Great Britain with hardly any preparation for a hugely premature retirement.

Louis, Lord Mountbatten, as he now was, on becoming Viscount, eventually did become First Sea Lord and Admiral of the Fleet (and Earl Mountbatten of Burma), but India and Pakistan paid the price.



Very well put. Thank you, dear Sir.



Stuff and nonsense. Read The Viceroy at Bay; from the scheming Linlithgow onwards, British policy was quite set and focussed. There is no point in foisting today's wishful thinking on the actions and manipulations of the British at that time.



Also a man of tremendous self-respect. His run-ins with pretentious Brits were the stuff of legend. His brutal rebuff of a condescending (also perhaps jealous) Lady Willingdon in the incident at their dinner party is so soothing to every patriotic Indian (and Pakistani) breast.



I never thought I would find myself 'liking' a post by you.

Brilliant.

Good info. Thanks.

 

[Joe Shearer]

Good info. Thanks.

You're welcome.

The more you ask, the more you'll get.