BACKGROUND

When our principal political actors - leaders of Congress, Muslim League and

Hindu Mahasabha- met in UP around 1935, they had been served with afait accompli

in the form ofthe Government oflndia Act of 1935. Yet there was a lot they could do.

They could still try to strengthen themselves within the parameters set by the British

government. The British, by granting provincial autonomy, had taken a temporary

retirement from provincial politics to concentrate on the centre. Thus they assumed

the role of the audience in the provincial arena of politics. The 20th century had been

something of a battlefield for various political and ideological forces. In this

battlefield, apart from the British, Congress and Muslim League had emerged as the

major forces. How, and on what terms, to interact with each other, to cooperate or not

to cooperate, had been the major questions for both of them. In the first three decades

of the 20th century, the two organizations had interacted with each other several

times, imder circumstances sometimes happy (as in 1916 in Lucknow to sign the

Lucknow pact) and sometimes not so happy (as in 1928 at the all parties conference).

The two knew their questions. They also knew what to expect from the other, but little

else besides. They perhaps also did not know that in the years to come they would be

fighting the fiercest of battles with each other regarding the nature of each other, the

nature of Indian society, whether India was one nation or two nations, and plenty

more. But enough of the two. The Congress-League story has been narrated many

times, from different perspectives.

In all this, there also existed a third force, though not very visible, like the

other two. The forces of Hindu communalism had been struggling to arrive on the

scene and acquire a space that they thought was due to them. They were obviously
 handicapped by the fact that Congress had successfully reached out to Hindus,

established itself firmly, and acquired considerable prestige through Swadeshi and

non-cooperation movements. Hindu Mahasabha, the chief political organization of

Hindu communalism, could either liquidate itself into Congress; or wage a difficult

battle to wean away Hindus from Congress to bring them into its fold; or wait for a

suitable opportunity. It preferred to follow the third. option. Muslim League was not so

unlucky as Hindu Mahasabha. The Congress campaign had initially been successful

among Hindus only and had not, as yet, reached out to Muslims. (It will be argued

later that the Khilafat movement, as an attempt to bring Muslims into Congress on a

sustained basis, was not very successful.)

The big question is - How was it that, in the 20th century, Hindus and

Muslims were getting organized under different political formations? What was the

process through which the two communities got distanced from each other? The

theory of a permanent divide between Hindus and Muslims is no longer tenable. The

institution of separate electorates, as a great political divider between Hindus and

Muslims, came into being only at the beginning of the 20th century. So did the main

_communal organizations of Hindus and Muslims. What was it about the 19th century

that separated Hindus from Muslims?

A fairly standard explanation spoke of a time 'lag' between the sociO-

economic development of Hindus and Muslims. Over time it came to be accepted as

the lag theory. The argument was that Hindus and Muslims responded differently to .

the forces of modernization brought about by the British. Whereas Hindus used the

opportunities such as English education and new jobs, to their advantage, Muslims

tended to lag behind and remained largely backward. Thus wrote Louis Dumont, the

sociologist: "While the Muslims were thrown down (under the British rule) from their

2
 position of power and affluence, the Hindu merchants and moneymen were promoted

to a powerful position." He then summed up the 'lag' theory: "As the Hindus, with the

same flexibility as before, hastened to adapt themselves to the new political order, the

Muslims were outdistanced not only in economic pursuits, but also in administration

and professions." 1

The origins of the lag theory went back to the days of W.W.Hunter in the

1870s. Hunter, a British civil servant posted in Bengal, was investigating the causes of

'Muslim hostility' to British rule displayed during the revolt of 1857 and the spate of

violence during the Wahabi and the Faraizi movements. His conclusion in his report
'
(which was subsequently published as a book, The Indian Musalmans) was that

Muslims had suffered during the British rule whereas other communities had

prospered. Muslims had a near monopoly over the major sources of wealth and

prominence before the arrival of the British: military command, collection of the

revenue and a monopoly on the judicial services. The British rule drained them of all

the three. 2 As a result, according to Hunter, "One hundred and seventy years ago it

was almost impossible for a well born Muslim to become poor; at present it is almost

impossible for him to continue rich." 3 Hunter found that Hindus, who were not in any

position of advantage, were therefore able to adjust to a new regime and climate rather

well:

The truth is, that our system of public instruction, which has awakened
the Hindus from the sleep of centuries, and quickened their inert
masses with some of the noble impulses of a nation, is opposed to the
tradition, unsuited to the requirements, and hateful to the religion, of

Reli~ion/Politics
1
Louis Dumont, "Nationalism and Communalism" in and History in India,
(Paris, 1970), p. 98 and 99.
2
W.W.Hunter, The Indian Musalmaos: Are They Bound in Conscience to Rebel A~ajnst the
~. (1871, reprint Lahore, 1968), pp. 134-42.
3
lb.id, p. 134.
3
 the Musalmans. Under Muhammedan rule the Hindus accepted their
fate exactly as they have done under our own. 4

This basic difference between the two religious communities, according to

Hunter, led to other kind of differences and so, around 1870, it was actually possible

to speak ofHindus and Muslims as two communities separated not just by religion but

also a variety of socio-economic and cultural factors. "During the last forty years they

(Muslims) have separated themselves from the Hindus by differences of dress, of

salutations and other exterior distinctions, such as they never deemed necessary in the

days of their supremacy."5

Although Hunter had prepared his report entirely on the basis of information

obtained from Bengal,6 he had proceeded to make, on the basis of his findings in

Bengal, all-India generalizations. It may not have been clear to him that the condition

of Muslims elsewhere, UP for instance, might be entirely different.

The lag theory was obviously problematic and in time was questioned and

.
dismissed by historians. 7 One obvious reason for its non-acceptance was that it could

not be uniformly applied to all the regions. Muslims may have suffered in Bengal

4
Ibid, p. 151.
s Ibid, p. 154.

6
Hunter was aware of the Bengal centred nature of his Enquiry: " ... my remarks apply only
to lower Bengal, the Province with which I am best acquainted and in which, as far as I can
learn, the Muhammedans have suffered most severely under British rule." P. 133. Yet he
ended up speaking for the country as a whole: "A great section of the Indian population,
some thirty million in number, finds itself decaying under British rule." p. 128.
7
See for instance Peter Hardy, The Muslims of British India, (Cambridge, 1972), p. 31 and
49. Hardy, writing in 1972, almost a hundred years after Hunter, showed an acute awareness
of the diversities among Indian Muslims separated by geography. It was therefore inevitable
that the British rule would affect Muslims of different regions differently. Hardy argued that
the British rule brought "security" to Punjabi Muslims, "wealth" to some Muslims in
Bombay, and "more land" to UP Muslims. See also Anil Seal, Emen~ence of Indian
nationalism: Competition and Collaboration in Later Nineteenth Centuzy, (Cambridge, 1968),
pp. 303-306. For a perspective on the 'lag' theory, see Bipan Chandra, Communalism in
Modem India, (New Delhi, 1984), pp. 180-83.

4
 under the British but they prospered in UP. 8 However, the strength of the lag theory is

that it has survived in spite of having been dismissed. Much like the proverbial 'old

wine in new bottles' it has continued in different forms. The traditional lag theory of

a time gap between Muslims and Hindus as a whole gave way to the Marxian notion

of a differentiated development between the Hindu middle class and Muslim middle

class.~ehru elaborated this aspect in a letter:

After the Indian mutiny of 1857, there was a period of intense

repression and both the Hindus and Muslims suffered from it but the
Muslims probably suffered more. Gradually people began to get over
this. suppression. The Hindus took to English education which led to
state services much more than the Muslims. The Hindus also took to
the professions and to industry in large numbers. Among the Muslims,
the reactionary elements prevented the spread of modem education as
well as industry. The Hindus developed a new middle class during this
period while the Muslims still continued to remain largely feudal. The
Hindu middle class laid the foundation of the nationalist movement,
but about a generation later the Muslims went the same way, took to
English education and state ·services and professions and developed a
new class also. A conflict developed between various middle class
elements for state services and this was the beginning of the communal
problem in its modem phase. 10

W.C.Smith, writing in 1943, imparted some sophistication to this

understanding by advancing it further. It was no accident that Hindus developed a

middle class earlier than Muslims. It happened because "Economic development

8
Francis Robinson, going a step further, pointed out that even within UP there was a
differentiation. Whereas the Muslim landlords of western UP and Doab lost their land to
Hindu Banias, those in Oudh and eastern UP retained their dominance in land. Robinson,
"Municipal Government and Muslim Separatism in the United Provinces, 1883-1916" in
Modem Asain Studies (hereafter MAS), 7, 3, 1973, pp. 397-409. His article was
subsequently published in J.Gallaghar, G.Johnson and A. Seal (ed.), Locality. Province and
Nation: Essays on Indian Politics. 1870 to 1940, (Cambridge, 1973).
9
For a distinction between the middle and lower class Muslims, see W.C.Smith, Modern
Islam in India: A Social Analysis, (New York, 1974), p. 162, 163 and 169; and K.B.Krishna,
Problem of Minorities: History of Communal Representation in India, (London, 1939).
10
Letter to Ahmad, 8 December 1939, Selected Works of Jawaharlal Nehru (hereafter
SW.JN), Edited by S.Gopal (New Delhi, 1972-82), Vol. 10, pp. 388-89.

5
 within the British imperialist system benefited a group of Indians of whom a far larger

proportion were Hindus than Muslims." Smith elaborated further:

Rather than saying that the Muslim middle class was economically
more backward and more pro-British than the Hindu middle class, it
· would be more accurate to say that the economically backward, pro-
British middle class was more Muslim than was the older, stronger
now fault finding middle class. 11

Of late the form of the lag theory has been shifted to geographical territory

containing Hindus and Muslims. Christopher Bayly has recently talked about the pre-

. colonial structures of Qasbas with a dominant Islamic gentry and the Gun} with a

·dominant Hindu merchant class in the pre-colonial UP. The two forms of township

continued their parallel existence through· the 17th and the 18th centuries. In the 19th

century, however, the Qasbas went into decline whereas the Gun} prospered. And so

did the do~inant classes with them. 12 The lag theory has thus travelled from religious

communities, to classes, to eventually geographical territories. Further research would

certainly introduce more nuances into it.

The second major explanation was the growth of revivalism, or rather different

revivalisms for Hindus and Muslims, in the 19th century. Beni Prasad, writing in

1941, defined revivalism as an attempt, by the society, at the restoration of "self-

respect which had been deeply injured by political subjection" by going back to the

past and glorifying it, as a kind of compensation for the humiliation of the present.

Although revivalism in India solved some problems, it created some more. One major

problem associated with the 19th century revivalism was that of its "bifurcation" into

a glorious Hindu past and a glorious Muslim past. Beni Prasad wrote:

11
Smith, Modern Islam in India, p. 163 and 169.
12
C.A.Bayly, Rulers. Townsmen and Bazaars: North Indian Society in the age of British
Expansion. 1770-1870, (Oxford, 1992), pp. 449-57.

6
 The intellectual and emotional reaction of India to a very acute and
unprecedented crisis of transition was taking a complicated form; one
of its aspects was a return to different sources of inspiration. There was
a real difference between the India of the Vedic age and the Arabia of
the early Khilafat. Hindus and Musalmans were going beyond the last
thousand years back to distant and divergent traditions and heroes and,
therefore, further away from one another in certain departments of life.
In fact, the two revivalisms stimulated each other, competed with each
other and became more and more different in outlook. 13

· This bifurcation served to highlight different and distinct histories for Hindus

and Muslims, and thus added another point of distinction to the socio-economic ones.

To quote Beni Prasad again, revivalism "fosters a conscious retention and

accentuation of existing divergences and the invention of new ones in regard to diet

and dress, manners and etiquette and magnifies them all into profound 'cultural'

diversities. " 14

Yet another factor of some consequence was a prolonged process of social

reform among Hindus throughout the 19th century and its relative absence among

Muslims. Reformers from Rammohun Roy to Vivekanand to M.G.Ranade

endeavoured to question many of the religious practices among Hindus and thus

prepared them in some measure for political modernization. Nothing of that sort

happened among Muslims, at least till the emergence of Syed Ahmad Khan. Sir Syed

13
Beni Prasad, The Hindu-Muslim Questions, (Allahabad, 1941), p. 25, also pp. 18-28.
14
Ibid, p. 26. For Arya Samaj as a vehicle of Hindu revivalism, see Kenneth W.Jones,
"Communalism in the Punjab: The Arya Samaj Contribution", in The Journal of Asian
Studies, Vol. XXVIII, No. 1, November 1968, pp. 39-54. For trends in Muslim revivalism,
see Francis Robinson, "The Congress and the Muslims" in Paul Brass and Francis Robinson
(ed.), The Indian National Con2fess and the Indian Society. 1885-1985: Social Structure and
Political Dominance, (Delhi, 1987), pp. 168-71. Also see Peter Hardy, Muslims of British
India, pp. 50-60. Although it was a pure co-incidence that the Mohammedan-Anglo College
and the Arya Samaj were established in the same year, 1975.

7
 too, after initially launching into social and educational reforms among Muslims,

backed out and gave up the effort. 15

The beginning of the 20th century thus did not exactly see two well structured

communities of Hindus and Muslims which had sorted out their internal differences.

But it did see the narrowing down of the diversity/ plurality/ variety of direction into

which politics among Hindus and Muslims could go. Anti-imperialism became the

dominant, though by no means the only, form of politics among Hindus. The

Swadeshi movement virtually ensured this.

The prospects for 'Muslim politics' were a little more complex. The British·

policy of promoting Muslims specially from 1885 as a counterpoise and the loyalist

moorings of the Aligarh movement initiated by Syed Ahmad Khan introduced

loyalism as a strong element in Muslims politics. But it is doubtful whether Aligarh

movement travelled very much beyond the frontiers of UP. Muslims of Bengal, in

particular, consisting largely of poor peasants, could not have been a part of the

Aligarh movement.

The two dominant political trends that emerged among Muslims could well be

represented by two prominent Muslim leaders in the 19th century, Syed Ahmad Khan

and Badruddin Tyabji, both keen on preserving a Muslim identity in politics but in

ways fundamentally different from each other. Tyabji, a Congressman from Bombay,

strove to uphold Muslim identity in politics through Congress and in association with

other non-Muslims. Syed Ahmad, on the other hand, was wary of this combination
•
and thought that Hindus and Muslims together,. in an era of representative

15
For a general survey of the process of social reforms in the 19th century, see "An
Overview" by K.N.Panikkar in his Culture, IdeolojO', He~emony: Intellectuals and Social
Consciousness in Colonial India, (New Delhi, 1995), pp. 1-33.

8
 government, could only result in a permanent subordination of Muslims to Hindus.

Badruddin Tyabji wrote in a letter to Syed Ahmad:

My policy, therefore would be to act from within rather than from

without. I would say to all Mussalmans 'act with your Hindu fellow
subjects in all matters in which you are agreed but oppose them as
strongly as you can if they bring forward any proposition that you may
deem prejudicial to yourselves'. We should thus advance the general
progress of India, and at the same time safeguard our own interests. 16

Syed Ahmad's response to the prospects for Muslims under representative form of

government is now well known: "It would be like a game of dice in which one man
'
17
had four dice and the other only one."

These models of political alternatives for Muslims remained in a constant

contest with each other in the 20th century. One consisted of greatercooperation with

other non-Muslim communities in a struggle against the British rule, while retaining

focus on the question of constitutional and other forms of safeguards for Muslims.

According to the other model Muslims were to make good use of the British

connection for weightage and safeguards and maintain a safe distance from the forces

of anti-imperialist nationalism.

In the 1920s yet another trend established roots which drew elements from

both the above mentioned models. This was a shade of 'Muslim' politics which got

distanced from the forces of Indian nationalism but did not go over to British

imperialism; in fact it remained quite anti-imperialist. The representative specimen of

this trend was Shaukat Ali, Gandhi's political ally during the Khilafat movement and

a confirmed anti-imperialist. He got estranged from the nationalist fold but, unlike

many others, remained a keen advocate of anti-imperialism. In a long and acrimonious

16
Quoted in Peter Hardy, The Muslims of British India, p. 129.
17
Ibid, p. 130.
9
 debate with Gandhi after the collapse of the Khilafat movement, Shaukat Ali poured

out venom against Congress and Hindus and yet added: " ... I have got to save my

Muslim brethren from going to the English fold which means death to them and a

great deal of harm to Islam." 18 In the next decade

.
this was to become the dominant'

theme in 'Muslim politics'.

It was along these lines that politics among Hindus and Muslims flowed in the

initial decades of the 20th century. Although strong currents of unity existed, so did

the forces of division. The national movement, with a strong focus on Hiridu-Muslim

unity, strove to bring them together. Certain other forces worked equally hard to

prevent these efforts for unity from becoming successful. One crucial element in all

this was the introduction of separate electorates for Muslims, a.S a part of the

constitutional development initiated with the Government of India Act (popularly

known as Morley-Minto reforms) of 1909. Although initially it may not have seemed

significant with only 6000 voters throughout the country, gradually this number

increased and by 1935, 14% of the population had been enfranchised. 19

This democratization, however partial, under separate electorates had vital

implications for communal politics. Separate electorates, as a concept, was

qualitatively different from mere reservation, or even weightage, of seats. It meant a

division of elected representatives, constituencies and, much more significantly, the

18
Shaukat Ali's letter to Gandhi, 23 October 1928, Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi
(hereafter CWMG), Vol. 38, p. 436.
19
This may seen like a small number, but we will do well to remember that even under
universal adult franchise, it is only half the population that actually gets enfranchised.
According to the Act of 1935, voting right had been extended only to people over 21 years of
age. A closer examination of the Census of 1931 would indicate that almost one third of
adult male population had been enfranchised by 1935. This figure has been obtained after
having eliminated the population up to 21 years of age, women (because very few women
were enfranchised), people above 70 years of age (assuming that very few of them would
actually vote) and categories like blind, physically handicapped and lepers. If analyzed thus,
the figure of 14% would appear much more substantial in practice.
10
 voters along religious lines. In practical terms it implied that a Hindu and a Muslim

neighbour, under this arrangement, would live together and share the same locality,

but form a part of different electoral constituencies. For instance, all the Muslim

voters, living in different towns and localities of Bundelkhand division, would form

one constituency called Jhansi-Jalaon-Hamirpur Mohammedan constituency. Hindu

voters of the same area would be voting elsewhere, in a general constituency. Under

this arrangement, the same city or locality would be exposed to different election

campaigns. If a Hindu candidate came for his election campaign, a Muslim voter

would have no reason to listen to him; and vice-versa. Election meetings would also

be held keeping in mind the fact that members of only one religious community were

the audience. Election meetings could actually be designated as Hindu meetings or

Muslim meetings.

The implications of separate electorates for the society, in terms of creating a

segregation of the political process along religious lines, have generally not been

realized. In a context in which elections came to acquire increasing importance, this

was nothing short of creating a vertical divide between people on grounds of religion,

creating political constituencies of religious communities.

It should thus be clear that the practice of separate electorates would offer no

hindrances to those not terribly keen on the political unity of Hindus and Muslims.

But how exactly did this affect the leaders of the national movement, with their

agenda of achieving national unity? Why didn't the leaders of Indian National

Congress firmly oppose and reject the separate electorates, as they had done the

Partition of Bengal? Why did they agree to contest elections under such an obviously

divisive and communal arrangement? To rephrase the question in a manner which

II
 sounds more sympathetic to them: What were the constraints under which the

nationalist leaders were compelled to accept the separate electorates?

II

The principle of separate representation for 'class', 'community' and

'interests' had been formally laid down for the first time in the Indian Council Act of

1892. 20 The separate electorates for Muslims in the legislative councils were formally

declared in 1909, and Congress and Muslim League accepted the principle in 1916 in

the Lucknow Pact. The Nehru Report attempted to do away with separate electorates,

but the Report lapsed, not having been accepted unanimously by all the major

political parties. Congress declared in 1929 at its session at Lahore that it would not

accept any solution to the constitutional problem which "did not give full satisfaction

to all the parties concemed."21 The Lahore resolution became for Congress the

reference point for all subsequent attempts at the settlement of the constitutional

problem, involving the fate of separate electorates. In 1931, Congress proclaimed that

it had, from the very beginning, set up pure nationalism as its ideal, but confessed,

"however much it may have failed in the realisation.'m

The vulnerability of the Congress position was evident. If the absence of a

consensus restricted the political choices for the Congress leaders, it became an

instrument of political advantage for the British government to try and impose their

own settlement. This became clear at the end of the second Round Table Conference

20
·M.N.Dalal, Whither Minorities, p. 71.
21
A.M.Zaidi and S.G.Zaidi (ed.), The Encyclopaedia of the Indian National Congress, Vol. 9,
1925-29, (New Delhi, 1980), p. 672.
22
Congress Working Committee's resolution passed in July 1931, ibid, Vol. 10, 1930-35, pp.
191-92.

12
 when Ramsay Macdonald, the British prime minister, declared that if the various

communities represented at the Conference did not reach an agreement, the

government would introduce a scheme of their own. The result was the declaration of

the Communal Award (hereafter CA) in August 1932, containing separate electorates

with a reservation of seats not only for Muslims but also Sikhs, Anglo-Indians,

Christians and Europeans. Although separate electorates were not provided for

Hindus, it was implicit that the remaining 'general' votes and constituencies were

only for Hindus. The text of the CA stated: "All qualified electors who are not voters

either in the Muslim, Sikh, Indian Christian, Anglo-Indian or European community,

will be entitled to vote in a general constituency."23 The justification given for

imposing theCA was that the Indian representatives had failed to evolve a satisfactory

formula "even after being pressed again and again." The defence provided for the

separate electorates was an old one: the minorities wanted it as a safeguard to

compensate against the disadvantages of being a minority. "However much the

Government may have preferred a uniform system of joint electorate they found it

impossible to abolish the safeguard to which the minorities still attach vital

importance. " 24

In any electoral arrangement based on separate electorates and oth~r

safeguards for the minorities, the provinces of Punjab and Bengal had a special

importance. This was because Muslims, though a minority at the all India level,

formed a majority in these provinces. And yet these provinces were different from

other Muslim majority provinces (such as North West Frontiers Provinces and the

23
'The Text of the Communal Award", in A.M.Zaidi (ed.), The Evolution of Muslim
Political Thoua;ht. Vol. IV, p. 328. For the entire text see pp. 326-33.
24
Thi.d, pp. 325-26, 323.
13
 proposed Sind) because ofthe presence of numerically strong non-Muslim minorities.

In Punjab, for instance, Muslims formed 55.3% of the total population with Hindus

and Sikhs constituting 31.8% and 11.1 %, respectively. Likewise in Bengal, Muslims

and Hindus were 54% and 43.3% of the population, respectively.

It had been a major demand of Muslim League, throughout the 1920s, that m

these two provinces, Muslim seats should be reserved according to their share in the

population. This demand was very nearly conceded by the government· by retaining a

majority of Muslim seats. At the same time seats were reserved for Indian Christians,

Sikhs (in Punjab), Anglo-Indians and Europeans well in excess to their population.

This meant that the proportion of general (Hindu) seats fell well below their share in

the population of these two provinces. In Bengal, out of a total of 250 seats, 119 were

reserved for Muslims, 17 for Indian Christians, Anglo-Indians and Europeans and the

number of general seats was 80. In Punjab, there were a total of 173 seats: 86 were

reserved for Muslims, 32 for Sikhs, and the general seats were 43. Hindu minorities of

these provinces got a share of seats smaller than the proportion of their percentage in

the population, 31% against a population of 43.3% in Bengal and 25% against a

population of 31.8% in Punjab. It w~ almost inevitable that Hindus of these

provinces would oppose the introduction of the CA. Since Hindus formed a majori~y

in Congress, it was also inevitable that they would put pressure on the leadership to

oppose and reject it. But the Congress organization had decided to go by unanimity on

constitutional matters. It was therefore crucial how other organizations would respond

to it. .

14
 Predictably enough, All India Hindu Mahasabha vehemently condemned the

Award, calling it anti-national and "inimical to the interests of the Hindus." 25 Its

Muslim counterpart, Muslim League, though expressing unhappiness with the Award

for being "inadequate and falling short ofthe minimum Muslim demands", considered

it morally binding on all the parties and advocated its acceptance "till a substitute is

found." 26

Congress, to begin with, condemned the Award as "anti-national and

intrinsically bad" but did not reject it outrightly for fear of alienating Muslims and

instead adopted an attitude of neutrality towards it. It maintained this non-committal

stand till 1934, the year of the elections to the Central Legislative Assembly. In 1934,

however, the organization found itself ridden by a variety of pressures urging a strong

denunciation or persisting with the non acceptance- non rejection approach. The most

decisive pressures were exercised by M.A.Ansari, leading Swarajist leader 7, on the

one hand, and Madan Mohan Malaviya and M.S.Aney, members of Congress

Parliamentary Board, on the other.

Swaraj party's position on theCA was that of neither acceptance nor rejection.

It concentrated its attack on the White Paper Proposal, of which the CA was a part,

and remained silent on the Award. Malaviya and Aney insisted that Congress take.a

firm stand against the Award. M.Satyamurti, another Swarajist leader, explained their

reason for not attacking the Award in spite of being annoyed by it: "Powerful

25
Statement to the press by Bhai Parmanand, president All India Hindu Mahasabha, The
Hindustan Times, 18 January 1934.
26
A.M.Zaidi (ed.) Evolution ofMuslim Political thouiht, Vol. IV, p. 125; and the statement
by the general secretary, All India Muslim League, The Hindustan Times, 24 May 1934.
27
Formed in 1923 by Chittaranjan Das and Motilal Nehru, Swaraj party had advocated the
politics of entering the legislatures to practice non-cooperation there. It continued to function
within Congress and got revived around 1934 at the prospects of contesting the elections to
the Central Legislative Assembly.
15
 denunciation ofthe Communal Award by one community and enthusiastic support by

the other is the surest means of perpetuating the Award." 28 The official Congress

position, as included in the election manifesto, was closer to the position taken by the

Swarajists.

Malaviya and Aney reiterated their stand for a rejection of the Award. Ansari

threatened to resign from the parliamentary board, of which he was the president, if

the Congress stand was changed even slightly. Congress stuck to Ansari's terms.

Malaviya and Aney, as a result, resigned from the parliamentary board (Aney from the

Congress Working Committee as well) and formed the Nationalist Party to contest the

elections on a programme based on a complete rejection of the CA.

The inability of Congress to reject the Award was explained in a long article

by Rajendra Prasad. He emphasized that Congress was not neutral or indifferent to the

CA. The Working Committee was also aware of the dangerous implications of the

Award. But having claimed to represent all the religious communities, Congress could

not afford to -do anything which would take away from it its essential representative

character. Moreover, Congress proposed to follow the method of persuasion,

propaganda and service, and not an arbitrary super-imposition of the truth. "It is

irrelevant whether there are many Mussalmans in the Congress or whether th~s

decision (of the Congress) satisfies them or not. Even if there was not a single

Mussalman in it, it would still be its duty perhaps more imperative in their absence to

represent their views also." .

The stand taken by Congress came m for heavy criticism from vanous

quarters, communal as well as non-communal. Hindu Mahasabha accused Congress of

trying to "dehinduise" India and selling their legitimate rights. Muslim League, on the

28
Statement to the press, The Hindustan Times, 6 May 1934.
16
 other hand, thought that Congress was being "unfriendly" to Muslims and trying to

placate Hindu Mahasabha. The Hindustan Times carried the news that the opposition

to Congress was growing both among Hindu and Muslim communalists. 29 In fact the

Congress leadership tried to derive a certain negative satisfaction from this communal

opposition. Satyamurti said: " ... the fact that our solution satisfied neither Mr. Jinnah

nor Bhai Parmanand, two extremes on either side, ought to satisfy reasonable

nationalists on either side."30

But it did not, mainly because the criticism was not confined only to

communal quarters. The newspapers were full of letters, not all of them communal,

showing disapproval of the Congress stand. The general opinion expressed was that

Congress was paying too high a price and compromising its nationalist principles in

order to buy Muslim support. Nehru wrote something similar in his Autobiography:

"The Congress attitude to the Communal Award was extraordinary, and yetunder the

circumstances it could hardly have been very different. It was the inevitable outcome

of their past neutral and rather feeble policy. A strong line adopted at an earlier stage

and followed regardless of immediate consequences would have been more dignified

and correct."31

If the Congress sympathizers expressed their reservations and Nehru offered

principled opposition, Congressmen in Bengal rebelled. The CA had been particularly

disadvantageous to Hindus of Bengal and they appeared determined to resist it. A

number of meetings were held by Congressmen at places like Calcutta, Murshidabad,

Jessore, Birbhum, Bogra, and many others. Public demonstrations were organized

29
J.hid, 30 May 1934.
30
Statement to the press, ibid, 29 May 1934.
31
Jawaharlal Nehru, An Autobiography, pp. 575-76.

17
 against what they called a "surrender to communalism" and the "lowering of the true

image of the Congress" by the Congress Working Committee. These are only a few

examples. The files of the All India Congress Committee are full of letters, telegrams

and resolutions expressing dissatisfaction, indignation and hostility over the Congress

stand on the CA. 32 Sometime later, before the provincial elections of 1937, the entire

Provincial Congress Committee in Bengal, under the leadership of Sarat Chandra

Bose, rose in a virtual 'rebellion' against the parent body on this question. 33

All this demonstrated the fragility of the Congress position on the CA. The

priorities that the organization had set for itself came into a direct confrontation with

the pressures that were generated from within. Thus maintaining the organizational

cohesion, making the . Congress more acceptable to Muslims and winning their

support, retaining focus on nationalism, and combining various political opinions

became impossible tasks to pursue simultaneously.

C.Rajagopalachari, a prominent Congress leader from Madras, tried to

reconcile the various aspects of the problem, in a statement to the press:

It is common knowledge that the Hindu community as a whole is

opposed to the principle of separate electorate and therefore to the
Award. The Congress does not deny or seek to hide or suppress this
fact. Malaviya's party is merely an articulation of this' well known
feeling. We cannot force joint electorate on Mussalmans, if they as a
community, finally and definitely, refuse at present to accept that
method of recording their votes. 34

G-24 (I)/ 1936, All India· Con~ss Committee Papers (hereafter AICC), Nehru Memorial
32

Museum and Library, New Delhi.

33
For the nature of the 'rebellion' and its handling by the high command, see the Amrita
Bazaar Patrika, 3 September 1937, Nehru's letter to Sarat Bose, 4 October 1936, Sarat Bose's
reply, 9 October 1936, and Patel's letter to Dr. Bidhan Roy, 9 October 1936, G-24 (I)/ 1936,
AICC Papers.
34
The Hindustan Times, 5 August 1934.

18
 And the editorial of the Hindustan Times retaliated the same day: "If joint

electorate cannot be forced on Mussalmans, how can separate electorate be forced on

Hindus either?"35 However, in yet another editorial of the newspaper, the dilemma of

Congress was grasped somewhat sympathetically:

The Congress cannot accept the Award without forswearing all that for
which it has stood before the people's eyes all these years but at the
same time it cannot afford to throw overboard the nationalist Muslims
who have so loyally stood by it, and who stand between it and the
Muslims community, as the only hope for the establishment of
communal unity. 36

This was an important consideration. The nationalist Muslims, or, to use a

more acceptable expression, Congress Muslims, had been a great source of strength to

· Congress, their small number notwithstanding. They had, by their presence in the

Congress, curbed the British government's temptation to declare Congress a Hindu

body. At the same time, they l).ad also acted as a potential bridge to bring Congress

closer to Muslims. Exposing them to joint electorates would certainly have

diminished both the possibilities. These 'Muslim leaders', M.A.Ansari and Maulana

Azad being very prominent among them, had clearly declared themselves against

separate electorates. But they were faced with a situation where it was only through

separate electorates that they could make an entry into the legislatures. Asaf Ali,

another prominent Congress Muslim, made this point quite clear: "If the Congress

Parliamentary Board announced definite rejection of the Award, not one nationalist

Muslim would be returned to the Assembly by Muslim electorates and if there was

35 .Ibid.
36
!hid, 26 July 1934.
19
 not a single Muslim in the Congress Parliamentary Party, it could be taunted by our

enemies that the Congress had no support from the Muslims as a whole."37

This was how things stood in 1935. Separate electorates had, for all practical

pwposes, come to stay. With the expansion in franchise, it was likely to reach out to

larger sections of the population. There was a near unanimity within Congress about

the disadvantage of separate electorates. Yet it was also certain that Congress, for

reasons mentioned above, would not be able to reject it. The only way it could reject it

was by abandoning electoral politics altogether. Not rejecting meant accepting it.

Accepting it contained the risk of antagonizing Hindus, who formed a great majority

in the organization. Condemning it was likely to jeopardize prospects, of bringing

Muslims into Congress. Whether it was a master stroke by the British government or

merely an acknowledgment of the existing reality, is an open question, subject to

conflicting interpretations. What is however not so contentious is that its relation with

separatism was that of fuel to fire. To quote Peter Hardy:

Whether separatist politics bred separate electorates or separate

electorates bred separatist politics is a version of the question about the
chicken or the egg, but separate politics at provincial level did enable
leading Muslims to behave as the plenipotentiaries of a separate
political community when they wished to do so. 3 ~

The period about to unfold after the declaration of the Government of India

Act of 1935 thus carried a variety of handicaps and incentives, constants and

variables, dilemmas and opportunities to the major political parties. In all, the period

seemed full of possibilities. A comparison between the periods just prior to provincial

37
Statement to the press, ibid, 17 June 1934.
38
Peter Hardy, The Muslims ofBritish India, p. 148.

20
elections and the resignation of the Congress ministries in 1939 should, therefore, be

quite enlightening not only in itself but also for subsequent developments.

THESIS
302. 1409542
M6911 Co

111/lll/1111111// II/IIIII
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