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| Congress must take on Jinnahs of Jammu and Kashmir | | |
RUSTAM
EARLY TIMES REPORT
JAMMU, Apr 23: Jinnahs in British India vitiated the country's religio-political atmosphere, frightened the Muslim minority and ultimately succeeded in making London partition India on communal lines. The result was the formation of a Muslim state out of India and it is Pakistan. The Congress did try to oppose the communal politics of Mohammad Ali Jinnah's Muslim League, but nothing came out of its relentless efforts. The frustrated and desperate London, which had its own interests in this part of the world, defeated the noble intentions of the Congress and divided India before quitting it. Pakistan was formed out of those areas where the demand for Pakistan was very weak and still Punjab, Baluchistan, North West Frontier Province and Sindh formed together the new Pakistani state.
Those were the days when the Congress was not the only factor in the country's political situation. There were four important factors - the British Government, the Congress, the Muslim League and the Leftists. The politics that was indulged in by the Muslim league and the Indian Left was divisive in character and implications. The Muslim League wanted a separate country on the ground that the Muslims were a minority in India and they shall ever remain a minority. The Muslim League said that such a status was not acceptable to it and that the Muslims wanted to become master of their own destiny in an independent and sovereign Muslim dispensation.
The attitude of the Muslim League towards the Congress was highly hostile. It regarded Congress as a "Hindu party whose single-point agenda was to establish Hindu rule in the country and oppress and suppress the Muslim minority". The Muslim League was of the opinion that there were two distinct nations in India -- the Hindu nation and the Muslim nation - and they could not co-exist under one uniform political system.
The view of Indian Left was no different. It was of the view that Indian nation was a congregation of over 2o nations and each nation had the right to self-determination (Adhikari thesis). In effect, the view of the Indian Left was more perverted as compared to the Muslim League's. The Muslim League believed in two-nation theory. The Indian Left believed in 23-nation theory. It, like the Muslim League, worked against the Congress and what it stood for and flirted with the British imperialists. The Indian Left, which opposed the 1942 Quit India movement, had, in addition, wanted Jammu and Kashmir to become part of Pakistan.
The views of the Muslim League and the Indian Left suited the British Government, which constituted another important factor in the Indian political situation. The British never wanted to quit India, but the circumstances were such that made the imperialists believe that their policy of divide and rule in India had failed and that they had to quit India sooner than later. The impact of the Second World War on the British economy, the unwillingness of the tired British forces to take on the freedom fighters in India and the fast-changing situation in India all had lowered the morale of London and it thought it would be better if it quit India. It did quit India but before doing so it played the dirty and dangerous communal card, joined hands with the Muslim League and ensured the communal partition of India - an event that not only uprooted humanity and rendered millions and millions of people homeless but also culminated in the murder of millions of people, Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims included. Hapless women were also raped and murdered in cold-blood.
Thus, three of the four important factors worked in unison and the result was what it was. The Congress factor could not prevent the disaster and it was understandable. But today's Congress, which is ruling the country and also Jammu and Kashmir state, in collaboration with other formations, is not that weak Congress. It can play the role that it couldn't before 1947 because of the Muslim League and the British Government, as also because of the Indian Left. And, it can play that role if it is prepared to recognize what exactly the institution of state means and make optimum use of the state power to take on and defeat those who have been raising their ugly heads for quite sometime now and working for the separation of Jammu and Kashmir from India on the grounds that the state is a Muslim-majority area and that it cannot save its identity in the Hindu-majority India. (To be continued)
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