Chapter 26
Famous First Words
NOW let us consider the various aspects of Quaid-I-azam’s address to
the Pakistan constituent assembly of august 11, 1947.
The first point is that Mr. Jinnah used the words “communities”
instead of “nations” for Hindus and Muslims-‘majority community’ and
‘minority community’ and ‘Hindu community’ and ‘Muslim community.’
This seems to me the central point of the speech. The rest is only a
paraphrasing and amplification of it.
An other notable point is, when he mentions Muslims’ he also goes on
to refer to Shias and Sunnis and Punjabis and Pushtoons; similarly
‘Hindus’ are said to include apart from Brahmins, Shudar and
Khatris, Bengalis and Madrasis also. In other words, people are
identified not only by their beliefs and sects but also by their
cultural environs and geographical locations. Thus Mr. Jinnah
negates his own earlier argument that a religious body of people
needs a separate place for themselves. He also eliminates the
distinctions of castes and creeds.
He sums up the essence of his postulate at the end in the words that
“Hindus would cease to be Hindus and Muslims would cease to be
Muslims, not in the religious sense…. But in the political sense”.
He lays this down as a principle, as an ideal. This exactly points
to the basic difference that had existed between the Khudai
Khidmatgars and the congress on the one hand and the Muslim League
on the other. That was just what we used to say-that religious
status and personal belief was an individual’s concern; politically
all the inhabitants of India stood on the same plane. Only after
Pakistan was made on the basis of the Muslim League contention that
Hindus and Muslims were two nations, here was Mr. Jinnah telling the
members of Pakistan’s constituent assembly with the fullest sense of
responsibility that Hindus and Muslims were not two nations but only
two communities and that the state made no distinction between them.
The question is, if in deed that was Mr. Jinnah’s view, why then all
this bloodshed and rioting, this despoliation of hundred of
thousands of homes, this creation of communal hatred and insanity,
which had involved such a mass of people and had left such lasting
scares that mere speeches could make no amends for?
It proves only one thing. As Mountbatten had said, the frenzy
created in the country by the Muslim League showed that the latter
had not stopped to consider the many aspects of its demand for
Pakistan. It was not even prepared to listen to anyone else who drew
its attention to the implications.
However, now that Pakistan was made and its government handed over
to the Muslim League, these people felt compelled to take the issue
of nation and nationality, state and statehood seriously. And
thinking seriously, they saw the contradiction of their politics. If
religion was to remain the basis of statehood then there was no
justification for the various Muslim states to maintain their
separate entities. Secondly, the non-Muslim population of a Muslim
state had then to seek its home elsewhere.
Such anomalies made Mr. Jinnah think of a logical way out. He saw
that Pakistan, especially its eastern wing, had a vast non-Muslim
population. With the emergence of Pakistan all these people also had
to be considered Pakistanis and part of the same one nation of the
country, since it was not possible that only the Muslim citizens
were counted as Pakistani and the others as constituting another
nation. This showed up the stark inadequacy of the former concept.
So the easy solution was, whereas, according to the Muslim League’s
earlier contention, Muslims and Hindus were the once two separate
nations and they could not live together on the common soil of
India, now in the land called Pakistan, were the numerical strength
was reversed and Muslims were now in a majority, the two nations had
become one and they could all be designated as Pakistanis, and to
distinguish them on religious grounds they could now only be
referred to as communities.’ The odd thing was this Pakistan was
formed on part of the same land of India, only the name had been
changed. And just this had caused all the contradictions between the
Hindus and the Muslims to be ended, the argument that their
different beliefs did not permit their living in the same country no
longer applied!
In the discussion on ideology and other basic flaw has to be pointed
out. With all its drum-beating about Pakistan ideology the Muslim
league sought to create the impression that a country needed to have
its own ideology. The fact is, a state, a country, a territory as
such has no ideology. Land has nothing to do with any ideology; only
individuals, organization parties do. And the latter’s ideology
applies to a land only so long as they reign over it. For instance,
the landmass of Russia has had no fixed, ingrained ideology. It was
once ruled by the czars. When a revolution swept them away and power
came into the hands of the Bolsheviks a socialist order came to
established there. Similarly in India, the crores (Million) of its
population had been the slave of the British. That order ended with
the leaving of the British and the independence and partition of the
country.
Pakistan as such too had no ideology; it was the Muslim league
ideology that applied to the country. It will continue to apply as
long as the Muslim League continues to hold sway here. When ever
another organisation with a different ideology replaces the league
it will apply its ideology here, and Pakistan’s ideology will become
that of its new rulers’.
But here, the curious thing was Mr. Jinnah did not even wait for the
coming to power of other party. On august 11, 1947, Muslim league
abandoned its two-nation theory and virtually adopted the
non-communal concept of state which in political terminology is
called secularism. Muslim League leaders might be asked about the
ideology they subscribed to following this speech of Mr. Jinnah, who
now, at the start of the new country’s journey, specifically urged
the League leaders to break away from the past and said that there
would now be a new concept of the state. It is only logical that
whoever considers Mr. Jinnah as his leader, pledges faith in his
political acumen, his wisdom and perception, should also accept what
he says. He should recognise that the Muslim League’s two-nation
concept was no longer that of Mr. Jinnah’s Pakistan, but that after
that declaration, he had committed the country to secularism or
non-communalism. It should in fact be recognised that India was
divided following the communal politics promoted by the British, and
once the British left, their politics also came to end. The whole
situation however is a true illustration of the Persian line.
“A stupid man will do what the wise man does, but only after a lot
of damage has been done”.
One point to note is that the British had adopted the policy,
accepted by the Muslim League, that when the Indians would exercise
their right of vote it would be on the communal basis of separate
electorate- that is, Hindus would vote for Hindus and Muslims for
Muslims. The Congress on the other hand had favoured joint
electorate. Following Mr. Jinnah’s clear declaration that in
Pakistan there would be no distinction between the citizens on the
basis of castes and creeds, it was logical that the Muslim League
too should have adopted the principle of joint electorate.
Freedom from the British bondage was drawing close. But the country
was in flames on all sides. People were out in hunt of one another.
None was safe from the savagery of fellow humans-neither the old nor
the infant; neither men nor women. The entire population was out to
cut throats, suck blood. Homes were being looted; refugee camps were
spilling over with people; children and young daughters, used to
treading on carpets, were now rolling in blood and dust. Indeed all
human values, all decency and compassion lay ground in the earth.
The irony and the pity was that pity was that this sudden descent to
inhuman depths occurred at the moment of the nation’s victory in its
freedom struggle. The leaping flames, the overflowing streams of
blood and the screams of resounding anguish were accompanied by
drumbeats, military parades and guards of honour, by singing and
dancing and illuminations to celebrate independence. In the city of
Karachi, on the one side was the blood and dust- covered caravans of
refugees dragging themselves after a journey through fire and blood,
and the roadsides and open spaces teeming with people who once
didn’t often even walk on the ground. On the other side were the
rejoicings of in dependence, the declaration of the day as the
historic day of the nation’s independence.
Lord Mountbatten along with his wife arrived in Karachi. As the
representative of the British crown he was to administer oath to Mr.
Jinnah as the governor general of Pakistan and to formally announce
the end of the British Raj.
Surprisingly, neither Mr. Jinnah nor even Mr. Liaquat Ali Khan, who
had been designated as the country’s prim minister, went to receive
him. The person who went on behalf of the government of Pakistan was
the governor of Sind, Ghulam Hussain Hidayatullah. The Muslim League
leaders were afflicted with a curious mentality. They made only
minor details a matter of their prestige. They saw their bigness
only in the belittling of others.
There was another interesting episode. Mr. Jinnah said that since he
was Pakistan’s governor general and the president of the constituent
assembly, he should sit on the highest chair and Mountbatten should
have a lower one. But the British were one better at the game. They
said that Mr. Jinnah would become the governor general only after he
had been administered the oath and the powers transferred to him.
Until then he was like any other person. To drive the point further
home, they added that even a governor general Mr. Jinnah’s position
would remain lower then the viceroy’s
After the issue of the size of the chair was resolved, another
problem cropped up. It was rumoured that some Sikhs has planned to
throw a bomb at Mr. Jinnah’s car while he would be on his way for
the oath-taking. Soon on his arrival Mountbatten was asked whet her
in view of these reports he would like the programme, to go ahead as
planned. Mountbatten said that that was up to the Pakistan
authorities; it was entirely their show and their responsibility. He
was told that Mr. Jinnah had left the decision to him. He replied
that in the case his view was that since he would also be with Mr.
Jinnah in the motorcade it was unlikely that the Sikhs would carry
out their scheme, since that way they would not just blow up the
governor general of Pakistan but also the governor general of India.
The procession was thus taken out as panned and when after the
ceremonies the two dignitaries arrived back Mr. Jinnah remarked to
Mountbatten, “Thank God I have got you back alive”. Mountbatten
immediately rejoined, “Thank God I have got you back alive”. It was
in these circumstances that the country got its independence, all
state power were assumed, the British were made to wind up, and the
union Jack was brought own after 200 years and the Pakistan flag
hoisted in its place.
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