Emergence of Pakistan

Historical Background
The late nineteenth century marked the beginning of a seminal transformation in the
political evolution of South Asia with the penetration of modern ideas of nationalism
and self-rule. Until then, different parts of the vast geographical region inhabited by
indigenous people and settlers of diverse races and religions were ruled by whoever
conquered their lands. More often the region was an aggregation of kingdoms and
princely states, with kaleidoscopic boundaries expanding and contracting with the rise
and fall of dynasties.2 Over the millennia, the rulers were as often local as foreign. Some
came with waves of migrations, others as invaders, and most who came from Central
Asia settled in the land.

Following Alexander's invasion across the Sulaiman Range in 325 BC, Chadragupta
Maurya,3 conquered the Indus and Gangetic plains. His descendant, Asoka (273-232
BC), built a great empire that extended from Afghanistan to Kalinga (Orissa), and after
his conversion to Buddhism, spread the new religion throughout the land. In 200 BC,
Bactrians from their kingdom between the Hindu Kush range and Amu Darya
advanced to occupy the Upper Indus Valley. Two centuries later, they were supplanted
by Central Asian Kushans who ruled the region from Peshawar, as their capital, till the
fifth century. Kanishka (CE 120-162), the greatest of the Kushans, extended the Healm
from Kabul to Kashgar and Kashmir in the north, to Sindh in the south, and the
Gangetic plain in the east. The Gandhara region became a meeting place of Buddhist
and Hellenist arts and cultures, leaving a legacy of glorious sculptures. After the raiding
forays of White Huns in the fifth century, the region was conquered by the Gupta rulers
of central India, who unleashed a Brahminical reaction that wiped out Buddhism from
the land of its birth.

The Arabs penetrated South Asia via the Indus delta in the eighth century. After pirates
along the Sindh coast pillaged ships carrying Muslim pilgrims, the Governor of Basra
sent a force under Mohammad bin Qasim in 711 to Debul. Two years later Multan
became the first Muslim province in South Asia. In the late twelfth century Muhammad
Ghori, a Turkic ruler of Ghazni, extended his realm eastwards to Delhi. His successors,
Iltutmish and Balban, ruled the northern plains during the thirteenth century. The Delhi
Sultanate was taken over by Khilji and Tughlak dynasties until the end of the fourteenth
century. Amir Timur marched his army through Afghanistan into Punjab, and
plundered and sacked Delhi before returning to Samarkand in 1399. The Sayyids and
the Lodhi Afghans subsequently re-established the Delhi Sultanate. In 1526 Babar led
his army from Kabul to supplant
the last Lodhi Sultan.

Zaheeruddin Babar, a descendant of Amir Temur, and heir to the small fief of Ferghana,
aspired to revive the empire of his fourteenth century ancestor. He captured
Samarkand twice but was defeated and driven across the Hindukush to Kabul.
Receiving an invitation from the Governor of Punjab, he marched down the passes to
capture the Delhi Sultanate in 1526, and from his new capital at Agra he extended his
realm, laying the foundation of the great Mughal Empire that rose to its zenith under
Shah Jehan in the seventeenth century. After Aurangzeb the dynasty went into decline
in the eighteenth century. Its fall was hastened by European empire-builders who
scrambled to pick up the pieces. Defeating France and Portugal, Britain put the pieces
together to rule the expanding realm through the East India Company, before assuming
direct imperial rule after a coalition of the aggrieved local elite tried to wrest power
back from the company in the name of the Mughal titular emperor in 1857. Calling it
mutiny, the British suppressed the challenge in a savage manner. The last Mughal
emperor was exiled to Burma and Britain then assumed the reins of government
directly until 1947.

The Central Asian people who came with the waves of migrations over the centuries
mixed with local people and developed a syncretist culture with Persian as the court
language. Immigrant scholars preached the message of Islam and Sufi saints won a
cross-religious following by their exemplary piety, noble conduct and service to
humanity. The Muslim rulers did not impose their religion on local inhabitants nor did
they exclude local allies from positions in the army and administration, though like
others before them they gave preference to their kin and clansmen. After the British
took control, Muslims became suspect and were not only supplanted by loyal non-
Muslims but also subjected to suppression, exclusion and expropriation. They were
further marginalized, because of their refusal to reconcile and adjust to the loss of
power.

Syed Ahmad Khan, a social reformer and political visionary, discerned the dangers
confronting his community, and embarked on a campaign to awaken and inspire the
Muslim people to abandon the boycott of the foreign rulers and to acquire
contemporary' education. He also founded a school that grew into the Aligarh Muslim
University where learned academics, some of them from England, were employed to
teach modern subjects and prepare the youth for gainful opportunities in the
professions and participation in the expanding political and economic life and
institutions of the land.
As contemporary ideas of self-government and nationalism began to stimulate political
thought in the latter part of the nineteenth century, different ethnic and religious
communities projected their futures in terms of their interests. The Muslim
community, comprising a quarter of the population in British India, awoke to its
predicament, characterized by economic disparities and social exclusion. The future
looked bleak as they faced the prospect of a powerless 'permanent minority.' British
India, Syed Ahmad Khan argued in 1883, was 'a continent in itself inhabited by vast
populations of different races and different creeds' which lacked 'the community of
race and creed [that] make the English people one and the same nation.' 4 The idea of
nationhood captured the imagination of the Muslim community as its leaders
discerned the looming danger of political domination across the religious and social
fault line. At first they sought legal and constitutional safeguards to secure and ensure
an equitable share in social and political institutions.

The rift began to widen after the founding of the Indian National Congress in 1886 with
Allan Octavian Hume, a British ex-official, as its first secretary general for two decades.
Dominated by the Hindu elite, the Congress attracted few Muslims as their leaders
advised them to keep aloof from this nominally secular party that sought to supplant
the British in positions of power and influence. To protect and promote the rights of the
Muslim community, its leaders with modern education and political vision established
the Muslim League in 1906. The issues were joined in 1909 when the Congress opposed
the proposal for separate electorates that would ensure representation for Muslims in
the government. The two communities also clashed over the British governments
decision in 1905 to create the new province of East Bengal and Assam, which brought
some relief to the Muslim majority from the domination and exploitation by West
Bengal. To the consternation of the Muslim League, the Congress successfully pressured
the British government to annul the division in 1911. More enduring, and in the end
insoluble, were constitutional issues, as the League proposed, and Congress opposed,
safeguards for Muslims.

Mohammad Ali Jinnah, a brilliant barrister with impeccable anti colonial credentials,
successfully promoted a compromise package for the future constitution. The package
known as the Lucknow Pact, after its approval by both the Congress and the League in
1916, included separate electorates, provincial autonomy, a one-third share for
Muslims in the central assembly, and safeguards in respect of legislation affecting any
of the religious communities. The Indian National Congress, however, went back on its
commitment in 1928, when it adopted the Motilal Nehru Report, recommending
replacement of separate electorates with a joint electorate and the curtailment of
provincial autonomy, thus striking a fatal blow to any prospect of harmonious politics.
The Muslim Leagues struggle evolved through four stages. At first it sought an
equitable share in political and social life. During the second stage, the League's
emphasis was on constitutional safeguards for Muslims in provinces where they were
a minority. As political thought progressed, they sought autonomy for Muslim-majority
provinces and then finally raised their sights to an independent state. A profound grasp
of the history and aspirations of the Muslim people led the influential poet-philosopher
Muhammad Iqbal to conclude, as early as 1930, that the formation of a Muslim state
amalgamating the Punjab, North-West Frontier Province, Sindh and Balochistan,
'appears to me to be the final destiny of the Muslims.' 5 He also urged Mohammad Ali
Jinnah, then living in London, to return, as he was 'the only Muslim in India today to
whom the community has a right to ask for safe guidance.'6

The cleavage between the League and the Congress widened following the elections in
early 1937. The Congress exploited its triumph by excluding League members from
participation in governments in the provinces, adopting symbols of the Hindu raj and
promoting the replacement of Urdu with Hindi. Muslim leaders, realizing the
consequences of disunity and factional politics before the election, now closed ranks
under Jinnah's leadership. He galvanized Muslims by laying before them a lucid vision
of political salvation. Eminent Muslims and the Muslim media began to call him Quaid-
i-Azam, Great Leader.7 In 1938 he was authorized by the League to explore the
possibility of a suitable alternative political structure which would completely
safeguard the interests of Musalmans and other minorities in India.' 8 The Sindh Muslim
League recommended the devising of a scheme for Muslims to attain full
independence.

The Second World War accelerated the political evolution. 'The British wanted to win
the war first and transfer power afterwards; the Congress demanded power at once,
and a Hindu-Muslim settlement afterwards; the Muslims insisted on a Hindu-Muslim
settlement first.9 On 23 March 1940, a historic resolution was proposed at the Lahore
session of the Muslim League demanding, 'that the areas in which Muslims are
numerically in a majority, as in the North-Western and Eastern zones of India, should
be grouped to constitute Independent States in which the constituent units shall be
autonomous and sovereign.10 It was to go down in history as the 'Pakistan Resolution.' 11
Muslim students in England had first suggested the name in 1932.12

Enfeebled by the war, the British announced their intention to depart. The Congress
demanded transfer of power, claiming the right of succession as the largest political
party. The Muslim League reiterated its 'divide-and-quit' demand, asking the British
to first agree to the creation of Pakistan in regions where Muslims constituted a
majority. In a last attempt to realize their dream of preserving the unity of their
Indian empire, the British Cabinet Mission, in 1946, proposed a constitutional plan
based on the division of British India into three autonomous zones with the powers
of the centre to be limited to foreign affairs, defence and communications. The
League first accepted the plan but later rejected it, because the Congress leader,
Jawaharlal Nehru, asserted his party 'regarded itself free to change or modify the
Cabinet Mission plan as it thought best.'13 With the plan thus undermined by the
Congress refusal to guarantee the autonomy of the zones, the League reverted to the
demand for the partition of British India into sovereign states.

The British government then proposed the Partition Plan. After hectic consultations and
negotiations, it was accepted by the leaders of the Muslim League as well as the Indian
National Congress, and announced on 3 June 1947. Pursuant to the agreement, Pakistan
was established through the exercise of self-determination by the people of the Muslim-
majority provinces and parts of provinces of the British Indian Empire, either in
popular referenda or by the votes of the elected representatives of the people.

The Congress grudgingly agreed to the partition, and some of its leaders projected the
economic collapse of Pakistan. No one epitomized the contradictions in the Congress
more strikingly than its spiritual leader Mahatma Gandhi. He agreed that partition was
'inevitable' but also declared, 'So long as I am alive, I will never agree to the partition of
India'.14 The Congress leadership accepted the June 3 plan but the highest organ of
the party, the All-India Congress Committee, quibbled in endorsing the decision. Its
resolution professed that the Congress cannot think in terms of compelling the
people in any territorial unit to remain in the Indian Union' but in another sentence
harked back to its view that 'the unity of India must be maintained.'15 In another
contradiction, the Congress emphasized the 'unity of India' but tried to undermine the
unity of Pakistan by suggesting that 'the referendum in the North-West Frontier
Province should provide for the people voting for independence.'16

Apart from the difficult and divisive legacy of pre-independence political rivalry,
adversarial perceptions of history, differences of religions and cultures and the clash
of political ideologies, deep bitterness was engendered by communal rioting. This led
to the massacre of hundreds of thousands of innocent people and the exodus of some
fifteen million people who moved from the country of their residence to seek refuge
in the other. Further worsening of relations, and the perpetuation of tension, was
owed, in particular, to the failure to resolve the disputes that arose after
Independence.

The 3rd June Plan gave only seventy-two days for transition to independence. Within
this period three provinces had to be divided, referenda organized in North-West
Frontier Province and the Sylhet division of Assam, civil and armed services
personnel given the opportunity to decide which country they would serve, and
assets apportioned. The telescoped timetable prepared at the behest of Governor
General Mountbatten seemed tailor-made to create formidable problems for
Pakistan, which, unlike India, inherited neither a capital with a functioning
secretariat nor the resources to establish and equip the administrative, economic
and military institutions of the new state. More daunting problems soon arose in the
wake of Partition.