By 1940, Muslim public opinion throughout the subcontinent had strongly veered towards the idea of a separate Muslim state as a corollary to the concept of Muslim nationhood. During the period 193739, the organisational work of the Muslim League had been carried out with great vigour and enthusiasm. At the same time, the Muslim intelligentsia had realised the futility of the socalled minority safeguards in any scheme for a united India, and was seriously deliberating on the problem of what future constitutional arrangements would fully safeguard the Muslim position. The idea of a separate federation of Muslim majority provinces was therefore rapidly gaining popularity.

In January 1940, QuaidiAzam contributed an article to a British newspaper Time and Tide in which, after giving a graphic review of the working of the provincial part of the Government of India Act of 1935, and the injustice and suffering it imposed on the Muslims and other minorities, he laid down two propositions: that the British people must realise that unqualified Western democracy was totally unsuitable for India and attempts to impose it must cease, and that in India, it must be accepted that ‘party’ government was not suitable and all governments, central or provincial, must be governments that represent all sections of the people. In conclusion, he demanded that a constitution must be evolved that recognised there were in India two nations and that both must share in its governance. In this connection, the remarks of an independent British observer, Sir Reginald Coupland, who had made a special study of Indian constitutional problems, are noteworthy. He made two comments, to the effect that the doubts so persistently expressed by British statesmen in the past as to the possibility of successfully transplanting the British system of parliamentary government in India had been justified, and that the chief reason why the domestic political situation in India had deteriorated by 1940 to a point which would have seemed almost inconceivable a few years earlier was the manifest purpose of the Congress to take over the heritage of the British Raj.

An analysis of the All-India Muslim League’s role in the developments leading up to 1947

This was the psychological background of the annual session of the Muslim League scheduled for March 2224, 1940, in Lahore. Muslim India was looking forward to it. The Punjab government, however, took an illadvised step, creating a tense situation. It imposed a ban on all paramilitary volunteer organisations, whereupon the Khaksar leader ordered his followers to defy the ban resulting in a bloody clash with armed Punjab police, whose brutality caused several Khaksar casualties, in turn resulting in public frenzy. The Punjab government of Sikandar Hayat desired to take advantage of the disturbed situation to get the Muslim League session indefinitely postponed. According to the testimony of Mian Bashir Ahmad, Secretary Reception Committee, he and Nawab Shah Nawaz Khan of Mamdot, Chairman of the Committee, were called to the Secretariat where tremendous pressure was applied to make them agree to postponement:

We suggested that the whole matter be referred to the Quaidi-Azam in Delhi on the telephone. When the telephone call came, Sir Sikandar, wisely seeing the trend of public opinion, told the Quaid that he and the League organisers had, despite the obviously uncertain political situation, decided that the session of the League should be held according to the schedule, and that a befitting reception should be given to him at the Lahore Railway Station as the presidentelect of the session. On more than one occasion during this session Sir Sikander, unlike his successors, bowed before the will of the QuaidiAzam at the last moment, thus recognising the undisputed popularity of the great Muslim leader.

The QuaidiAzam’s decision to go ahead with the League Session, despite the recent disturbance, heartened the Muslims, and they responded magnificently to his appeal for disciplined behaviour. His trust in them proved justified.

On his arrival in Lahore on 21 March 1940 by special train, QuaidiAzam was accorded a rousing reception, but cancelled the planned procession, deciding to go first to the hospital and console the injured Khaksars, and then busying himself with the preliminaries of the session. Almost all prominent leaders had decided to move and approve a resolution for partition in this session of the All-India Muslim League (AIML).

Thus on March 21, a committee was appointed to draft the resolution on the constitutional problem or Partition Plan for Muslims. It met the same day at the residence of the Nawab of Mamdot to do so, with the assistance of Nawab Muhammad Ismail. The committee members were: Mr M.A. Jinnah, Mr Liaquat Ali Khan, Sir Sikandar Hayat Khan, Khawaja Sir Nazimuddin, Mr Abdur Rehman Siddiqui, Mr M. Ashiq Warsi, Nawab M. Ismail Khan, Begum Mohammad Ali, Malik Barkat Ali, Sardar Aurangzeb Khan, Mr Sa’adullah Khan, Sir Abdullah Haroon, Syed Abdur Rauf Shah, and Haji Abdus Sattar Ishaq Seth. First a balanced resolution with reference to the Khaksars was drafted, but no one, it seemed, had the courage to assume responsibility for moving it in the open session the next day. The QuaidiAzam rose to the occasion. He explained to the vast gathering the delicate nature of the resolution and the reason why no discussion on it should take place in open session, and asked for permission to move it from the Chair. The gathering having willingly signified its consent to this unusual procedure he proceeded, explaining the resolution’s terms in a closely reasoned speech. It expressed sympathy for the Khaksars and called for an impartial judicial inquiry into the whole incident. Sir Sikandar Hayat Khan agreed to include in the inquiry committee a nominee of the QuaidiAzam, namely the late Mr Justice Nematullah of Allahabad High Court. The resolution was unanimously adopted amidst acclaim — a happy finale to an explosive situation which, but for the QuaidiAzam’s tact and patience, would have led to greater complications and disaster.

The committee resumed its deliberations on the night of Friday March 22, 1940 and the morning of March 23, eventually passing a resolution after seven hours’ discussion.

The annual session of the AllIndia Muslim League was held at Lahore on March 2224, 1940. Never before in the history of Lahore had there been such enthusiasm. In spite of the restrictions imposed by the railway authorities, every vantage point on the platform and the adjoining buildings was occupied by the crowds eager to have a look at the QuaidiAzam.On March 22, hundreds of thousands of people gathered to listen to the Quaid, who asked that the Lahore session of the League be a landmark in the history of Muslim India.

On the first day of the session, QuaidiAzam in his speech explaining the position of the Muslims said that before the War “the greatest danger to Muslim India was the possible inauguration of a federal scheme by Central Government,” and the AIML was “stoutly resisting” such machinations.After the war had started, the viceroy, however, now wanted help from the president of the AIML. He found that the Muslims were “between the devil and the deep sea.” And, therefore, its prospect of the other solutions were real since the Quaid asserted that the problem of India was not of an intercommunal but of an international nature and must be treated as such. To him, the Quaid explained, the differences between Hindus and Muslims were so great and so sharp that their union under one central government was full of serious risk. Since they belonged to two separate and distinct nations and therefore the only chance open was to allow them to have separate states. He said:

The problem in India is not of an inter-communal character, but manifestly of an international one and it must be treated as such. So long as this basis and fundamental truth is not realised, any constitution that may be built will result in disaster and will prove destructive and harmful not only to Muslims, but to the British and Hindus also. If the British government is really in earnest and is sincere in their desire to secure the peace and happiness of the people of this subcontinent, the only course open to us all is to allow the major nations separate homelands by dividing India into autonomous national states.

He also appealed to the Muslims to unite themselves and depend only on themselves:

To organise yourselves in such a way that you may depend upon none except your own inherent strength. That is your only safeguard and the best safeguard. Depend upon yourselves.

The British, for reasons partly of policy and partly of pride, were intent on maintaining the unity of India, which had been described as: perhaps the greatest gift which British rule has conferred on India. Behind that attractive phrase, however, lay the ugly reality of Hindu domination and exploitation. The Muslims saw no reason why they should sacrifice themselves for a British geopolitical concept. The use of the word “nation” to describe the Indian Muslims brought their viewpoint nearer to the understanding of the British whose own life had been organised for centuries around national concepts.

While the TwoNation Theory succeeded brilliantly in proving the need for a separate state for the Muslims, it did not solve wholly the minority problem in India.

The above excerpt has been taken from the chapter ‘Consolidation of AIML and Demand for the Creation of Pakistan 1939-1940’.

Excerpted with permission from
Politics of the All-India Muslim League 1924-1940
By Kishwar Sultana
Oxford University Press, Karachi
ISBN 978-0199402908
364pp.