Formation and Evolution of Pakistan : The Real Story

[ramana]

There is a book on Hyderabadi diaspora titled

Locating Home: India's Hyderabadis Abroad
By Karen Isaksen Leonard

Try to read it.

Basically, after Operation Polo many people settled in Pakistan, the UK, Australia, Canada, and the US.

and these are both Muslims and Anglo-Indians

[Rony]

OT for this thread but it looks like Karen associates "Hyderabadi diaspora" only with Muslims and their Indo-Islamic culture. Not a word on Hyderabadi Hindu diaspora (Andhras, Telanganites ) which is many times larger and more successful. Just like how Hyderabad's symbol among national and international media is always the Charminar ghetto in old city and never more happening Birla Temple or Buddha purnima .

[ramana]

And the stupid Biryani and double ka meetha.
The worst is ZeeTV show Pickles which had a Muslim lady make less heat pickles!!!

[Peregrine]

And the stupid Biryani and double ka meetha.
The worst is ZeeTV show Pickles which had a Muslim lady make less heat pickles!!!

ramana Ji:

The "Less Heat Pickles" ensure that the Diners do not start Moaning in Japanese the next morning!

Cheers

[ramana]

Madhu can you xpost here your post from.Books thread?

[madhu]

xpost from "Books Folder - 2008 onwards!!!"

Also, the British had decided in 1916 they have to partition India for imperial reasons and the rest was all a charade.
Will find the references to this.

raman ji, I had also come across this from the book "Pakistan: Courting the Abyss" by Tilak Devasher. he stated “There is a body of literature that has put forward the argument that it was Viceroy Linlithgow who in March 1940 instructed Zafarullah Khan, a member of the Viceroy’s Executive Council, to convey to the League leadership that the government wanted it to demand a separate state. This could be as a result of pique for the Congress resignations from the ministries on the outbreak of WWII. According to Ishtiaq Ahmed, the idea of a separate state for Muslims was born in the viceroy’s office.” (Loc:472-476)
concluding that it was British that created Pakistan, indirectly giving clean chit to Jinna of Muslim league and Gandhi of Congress who were equally responsible not only for partition but also the bloodshed that happened for it. The question that I think on reading this is, if British did conspire to break “British India” to “Pakistan” and “India” for its long term strategic interest, then how come it is so badly imagined?

to know how badly pakistan was imagined we need to read "Reimagining Pakistan: Transforming a Dysfunctional Nuclear State" by Husain Haqqani where he writes,

The country found itself beset with problems from the moment of its birth. ‘The partition plan of 3 June 1947 gave only seventy-two days for transition to independence’, Sattar writes, adding, ‘Within this brief period, three provinces had to be divided, referendums organized, civil and armed services bifurcated, and assets apportioned. The telescoped timetable created seemingly impossible problems for Pakistan, which, unlike India, inherited neither a capital nor government nor the financial resources to establish and equip the administrative, economic and military institutions of the new state. Even more daunting problems arose in the wake of the partition. Communal rioting led to the killing of hundreds of thousands of innocent people. A tidal wave of millions of refugees entered Pakistan, confronting the new state with an awesome burden of rehabilitation.’92 This account makes no mention of the general air of cooperation between advocates of Pakistan and the British rulers of India, nor does it answer the question as to why, after asking for Pakistan, the Muslim League leaders had not prepared for India’s division. (Reimagining Pakistan; Husain Haqqani; Loc: 649-657 )

in the same book we also find that

The British started discussing the eventual independence of India in 1942 and the process culminated in 1947. Official records of British discussions with Indian leaders, along with other documents pertaining to the sunset of British rule in India from 1942 to 1947, have been edited by Commonwealth historian Nicholas Mansergh and published in twelve volumes. In the 13,295 pages comprising thousands of official documents, one thing stands out. While the Congress leaders often discussed with the British their plans for what India would need after Independence, the Muslim League offered no plans for how it would run Pakistan and did not discuss what arrangements might be needed before Independence to enable the smooth functioning of a new country. (Reimagining Pakistan; Husain Haqqani; Loc: 922-927 )

so I do not think British was entirely onboard of dividing India from 1940s. partition of Bengal was to divide Hindus and Muslim so as to decelerate freedom movement, but I doubt it was thought very deep till partition of British India to Pak and India.

[ramana]

Even Muslim League was unprepared for Partition though they demanded it.
The British gave them 1/3 land and ran away.

[madhu]

Is there a possibility that Muslim League was unprepared for Partition because they wanted to take over full India and convert it to Dar-ul-islam from Dar-ul-hurb?

Already based on years of bias requitement to army based on marshal race theory, Muslims were more in number and Jinna thought after getting the army will take over complete India? was this the reason that Muslim league is more bothered about army division then population or asset/liability division.

Between April and August of 1947 the one issue that received relatively serious attention of the Muslim League leaders was the division of the British Indian armed forces. Liaquat Ali Khan, who would become Pakistan’s first prime minister, as well as Jinnah, discussed detailed proposals for the division of the armed forces22 but not for other matters. Jinnah told the British he would like to see the armed forces divided before June 1948—the original date set for British withdrawal—and if that was impossible, he wanted the British to lay down the principles of division.23 On subjects such as maintaining continuity in civilian administration, Mountbatten complained at the end of June 1947—less than two months before Independence—that ‘for the last three weeks we have been trying to get an answer out of Jinnah and he has always put off an answer’. (Reimagining Pakistan; Husain Haqqani; Loc: 927-934 )

so was there a sinister plot of following the sunnah where Muslim league will do a hijrat to new medina just like hijrat of Mohammad to medina which provided a base for the eventual victory of Islam in Arabia, similerly ML (new ghair), would start from Pakistan (new medina) to pave the way for the triumphal return of Islam as the ruling power over the entire subcontinent, thus fulfilling the prophesy of gazaw-a-hind “It was narrated that Abu Hurairah said: "The Messenger of Allah promised us (a) battle expedition (in) India. If I live to see that, I will expend myself and my wealth in it. If I am killed, I will be one of the best of the martyrs, and if I come back, I will be Abu Hurairah Al-Muharrar." (Grade Daif) Sunan an-Nasa'i 3173?

[ramana]

Link: https://asianreviewofbooks.com/content/ ... nal-verma/

Francis P Sempa 17 December 2021 Non-Fiction
“1965: A Western Sunrise” by Shiv Kunal Verma

Shiv Kunal Verma, an acclaimed historian and filmmaker, has written an encyclopedic history of the 1965 India-Pakistan War, which began when Pakistan attacked Indian forces in the Rann of Kutch in April 1965, stalled as a result of a temporary ceasefire brokered by the British, and restarted in August when Pakistan launched Operation Gibraltar by crossing the Ceasefire Line (CFL) into Indian Kashmir, and formally ended on 10 January 1966, when the Soviet Union mediated a peace agreement in Tashkent.

The immediate dispute centered on Jammu and Kashmir, but Verma traces its genesis to British colonial misrule, religious differences, and Cold War geopolitics. “The fate of India—and that of Kashmir—had been sealed back in 1919”, Verma writes, when Britain’s India Office, the Colonial Office and the Admiralty prepared a plan to partition the subcontinent into Hindustan, Pakistan, and Princestan. Although officially rejected at that time by the House of Commons,


The blueprint for the creation of Pakistan primarily to serve British interests in West Asia and to counter the Russian threat from the direction of the Pamir Mountains had been created, and … it influenced events thereafter.


Britain’s plan to subdivide the Indian subcontinent between Hindus and Muslims, Verma believes, was in part, therefore, a legacy of the 19th century’s “Great Game” between Britain and Russia for control of central and south Asia. After independence and partition, the region became part of the larger Cold War struggle between the United States and the Soviet Union. The United States armed Pakistan, while the Soviet Union armed India.

Indian forces successfully resisted Pakistan’s August 1965 offensive into Kashmir, but Pakistan followed-up with Operation Grand Slam on 1 September, which pushed Indian forces back to Akhnoor and involved the air forces of both countries. Five days later, Indian troops crossed into Pakistani territory, finally turning from defense to offense. This was a decision made at the highest level of the Indian government by Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri. For the next two weeks, the armies and air forces of both sides fought in Phillora, Khem Karan, Chawinda, and other places. The United Nations negotiated a ceasefire on 22 September, with the formal peace agreement signed four months later. The number of casualties on each side is disputed to this day, as is the war’s outcome. Both sides claimed victory, but Verma rightly calls it a draw.


Verma, whose father served in India’s military and who discussed the minutiae of combat plans and actions with Indian military officers, has an eye for detail. The book is replete with tales of company-level skirmishes, air combat dogfights, tank battles, paratroop drops, friendly-fire incidents, missed opportunities, inter-service rivalries, and intelligence failures. It is told from an Indian perspective, but Verma casts his critical eye on India’s senior military and political leadership during the conflict.

Verma is most critical of India’s Army Chief General Jayanto Nath Chaudhuri, blaming him for the failure to integrate the Indian Air Force and Navy into his war plans. He believes that General Chaudhuri should have been relieved of command after India’s disastrous failure in the war with China in 1962, and accuses Indian Defense Minister Yashwantrao Balwantrao Chavan of being more concerned with protecting then-Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru’s reputation than reorganizing the Indian military’s higher command. The hard lessons of India’s defeat in 1962 (the subject of Verma’s 1962 The War That Wasn’t) were simply ignored by India’s leaders—both military and political. Indeed, throughout the book, Verma repeatedly criticizes senior Indian military leaders, but couples that with effusive praise for the junior officers and combat troops who enabled India to resist multiple Pakistani offensives.

Most of Pakistan’s military and political leadership fare no better in Verma’s book. Pakistan was better equipped (mostly by the United States) and had the advantage of often choosing the times and places of battles, but frittered away those advantages due to incompetence, the fog of war, and stubborn resistance by Indian troops.

In the end, the war settled nothing. Six years later, India and Pakistan would clash again, and that war, too, resolved nothing. The enmity between India and Pakistan continues, but now both sides are armed with nuclear weapons and are caught up in a competition for Indo-Pacific primacy between the United States and China.

Francis P Sempa is the author of Geopolitics: From the Cold War to the 21st Century and America’s Global Role: Essays and Reviews on National Security, Geopolitics and War. His writings appear in The Diplomat, Joint Force Quarterly, the University Bookman and other publications. He is an attorney and an adjunct professor of political science at Wilkes University.

[ramana]

If the British plan was decided in 1919 then all that Jinnah, Gandhi et al did was kabuki theatrics.

It was Subash Bose with INA that precipitated the British exit and they implemented the 1919 plan.

[madhu]

ramana ji, i do agree with the statement “The fate of India—and that of Kashmir—had been sealed back in 1919”, because the plan got executed as we lost Kashmir. In the book Forgotten Kashmir: The Other Side of the Line of Control" Dinkar P. Srivastava he writes British helped Pakistan to get Kashmir.

"Even though the population of the area was overwhelmingly Muslim, there was no uprising. Had there been a genuine uprising, there would have been no need for the British to risk exposing their complicity by using a British officer to carry out the operation. Having delivered the Northern Areas to Pakistan, Maj. Brown was withdrawn since, as Cunningham explained, British officers could not stay in the disputed territory. Thereafter: In July 1948 William Brown was awarded the MBE (Military) with a citation so unspecific that it was not clear what lay behind this acknowledgment of his merits. He assumed that somewhere within the British military establishment there were those who approved of what he had done in Gilgit to ensure that this region went to Pakistan rather than to India. Major Brown’s action in leading the Gilgit Scouts to rebellion against the maharaja was a violation of the Independence of India Act of the British Parliament, which had given the rulers of princely states the right to decide the issue of accession. The British government had retroceded the area to the maharaja just before Independence."
(Forgotten Kashmir ; Dinkar Srivastava; Loc:485-493)

how can a major carryout such a big task without the blessing of higher ups? more over the double standard of british has been exposed in the book where he writes

The UK’s stand, rejecting the application of the principle of self-determination to the Question of Cyprus, on the ground that this amounted to interference in the internal affairs of Cyprus, was directly opposite to its enthusiastic support for plebiscite in J&K.(Forgotten Kashmir ; Dinkar Srivastava; Loc:839-840)

but planning the whole of Pakistan is tough for me to get. my feeling is Jinna and ML wanted Pakistan and after 1940's British felt it will be advantage for them to have it. But, never think through a lot.

[sanman]

[chetak]

If the British plan was decided in 1919 then all that Jinnah, Gandhi et al did was kabuki theatrics.

It was Subash Bose with INA that precipitated the British exit and they implemented the 1919 plan.

The Muslims, if contented and satisfied, would become the greatest bulwark of British power in India was written by WW Hunter (Sir William Wilson Hunter, 15 July 1840 - 6 February 1900)

One suspects that the pakis got their moth eaten lands because of such sentiments upheld and ultimately enforced by the britshits in their shameful and panicked flight from India. The abject fear of the 1857 uprising that resulted in the slaughter of many britshits had deeply scarred the britshits, both here in India and most importantly, the britshits back home, and they never really overcame this nemesis that continually haunted and dogged them all through their brutal sojourn in India and this was the main reason for their panic stricken flight in 1947, because they abjectly feared another slaughter

The centuries of britshit focused ji hazoori by the jihadis did not pay off as well as expected by their elites and dashed their their fond and hopeful expectations that the britshits would anoint these jihadis as their natural successors in India and leave them ruling over the vast lands and peoples in accordance with their grandiose ghazwa dreams

djinna had a longstanding understanding with the britshits and his conduit was our dear friend churchill and that understanding has never been made public, but ishtiaq ahmed (swedish political scientist and author of pakistani descent), has openly said that djinna's aim was the complete destruction of Hindu India and he has the credibility to make this assertion

The britshits had strategic interests to protect in the region and needed military bases in India to replenish, repair, and rest, their naval fleets. They knew that the Indian nationalists wouldn't allow such amenities for their former rulers. The pakis were the only other option open to them. They knew all this even before the start of the WWI. They also knew by then that they would be leaving India but the dates were not decided because the events that followed, events like WWII and and the ensuing collaterals that could not be foretold at the time. The posters here already know this

when they hastily partitioned India, the port that they chose and also one closest to their primary areas of geopolitical interest was karachi and that would have influenced them deeply. They may have already had some facilities available to them in the port of Aden

The jihadis of India, fully well expected the britshits to hand over power to them when they left India, because the jihadis claimed, nay believed, that they were the legitimate rulers of India when the britshits arrived and thus they were the legitimate successors, the entitled, and natural inheritors of sovereign power over India after the departure of the britshits, in short, it was the caliphate that the wanted to establish

They had so slyly forgotten that the Marathas has displaced them over vast stretches of what was to become independent India and with the rampaging Marathas in charge, the conquered jihadis were like backyard hens scratching in the dirt and looking for insects and scraps to feed on.

The vanquished jihadis were not looking to regroup nor were they even in the position to unite and collectively fight off the Marathas.

The delhi sultanate was another myth that was created to foster the illusion that the jihadis ruled the vast Indian hinterlands from a clearly defined power center when in fact the actual power of this rather amorphous sultanate was limited to some short distance from delhi and it was never as powerful as is being portrayed today by some colonially minded clowns and bigoted appeasers who seem to be hell bent on depicting the BIF line in selective historical amnesia to push their agenda

Their vassals and other such entities actually controlled the lands. The sultanate, during a lot of its existence, did not often have the power to actually enforce their writ and so depended on some goodwill to get the job done

By 1947, the britshits were not really in power over much of India. And it was not just because of the war.

The britshit rule over the Indians was always dependent on the acceptance of Indian elites. There was no way a tiny country sitting 8,000 km away could rule India. It was the Indian elites - the small rulers, zamindars, civil servants, rich merchants, land lords and administrators who made the Raj possible.

How could anyone forget that India was always controlled through these elites and the chains held by them. Whether the bloke ruling in delhi was a central asian or a gora, the ultimate person who enforced the laws and extracted taxes was always an Indian in the local village. The ones who controlled those guys ultimately controlled India.

By 1930s, Indian nationalists became assertive enough and the landmark Government of India Act, 1935 devolved a lot of power to the Indians. Elections were held [Indian provincial elections, 1937] and the local leaders had a sizable influence over the administration [even though the foreign policy and the military was tightly controlled from london].

In the 1940s, things began spinning out of control. In the years leading up to the Simla Conference in 1945, the britshits were willing to provide India with self-rule, somewhat on par with canada/australia, but that was not acceptable to the Indians and riots marred the last days of the raj.

The britshits wilfully sidelined the rest of the Hindu patriots and nationalists but gave undue prominence to the congis led by their ever faithful and trusted favorites, one bald and the other randy, both of whom continued to aid and abet the britshits long after they ran away.