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I. A. Talbot
The status and character of the Unionist Party will under the agreement
undergo a radical transformation. The Unionist Party will consist of (1) the
Muslim League Party within the Legislature as constituted under the agree-
ment and subject to the full control of the All-India Muslim League and
bound by its rules and regulations and (2) the party of Sir Chhotu Ram or
any other party that agrees to form a coalition with the League Party. . . .
The allegiance of the Muslim League members will primarily be to the
All-India Muslim League and if ever a conflict arises between the funda-
mental policy and programme of the League and the coalescing group the
Muslim League Party will be bound by the mandate and orders of the parent
body.1'
Whatever its interpretation and the motivation of its signatories, the
effect of the Pact was to seal off the Punjab countryside from League
influence and to create a position of political dualism within the pro-
vince in which the Muslim elite could retain its loyalty to the Unionist
« See The Eastern Times (Lahore), 15 March 1946, for an assessment of their role
in the Muslim League's success.
" B. A. Dar (ed.), Letters and Writings of Iqbal (Lahore, 1967), pp. 105-11.
>• The Tribune (Ambala), 19 October 1937.
19
The Tribune (Ambala), 23 October 1937.
20 On his departure from Lahore after his failure to win Unionist Support for the
Muslim League Central Parliamentary Board, Jinnah had said: 'I shall never come
back to the Punjab again. It is such a hopeless place'. Azim Husain, Mian Fazl-i-
Husain. A Political Biography (London, 1966), p. 311.
21
Nawabzada Rashid AH Khan and a few other mainly urban-based League
activists had attempted to set up a Muslim League Workers' Board in 1943 to put life
into the provincial party. Jinnah's opposition to this independent venture, however
doomed it to failure.
22
This called for the establishment of a Muslim League Assembly Party to which
the Muslim MLA's would owe sole allegiance. It would, however, coalesce with other
parties in the legislature and thus constituted carry out the Unionist Party programme
under the Unionist Coalition name. Khizr as leader of the Muslim League Assembly
Party would select his ministerial colleagues from among those members of the
Assembly in whom he had confidence. The Punjab Provincial Muslim League
would not thereafter raise any matter about the working of the Muslim League
Assembly Party except with Khizr's permission or through the Assembly Party
itself. File 16, Khizr Papers, Chicago.
31
Translation of a pamphlet issued by the election board of the Punjab Muslim
Students' Federation. FMA.
52
Mao Tse-tung in the 1920s had declared that the key to peasant political mobil-
ization lay in providing them with immediate material aid. Ideological appeal on its
own would not be sufficient to achieve this.
'If we do no other work than simply mobilizing the people to carry out the war,
can we achieve the aim of defeating the enemy? Of course not. If we want to win, we
still have a great deal of work. Leading the peasants in agrarian struggles and dis-
tributing land to them; arousing their labour enthusiasm so as to increase agricultural
production; safeguarding the interests of the workers; establishing cooperatives;
developing trade with outside areas; solving the problems that face the masses,
problems of clothing, food, and shelter, of fuel, rice, cooking oil and salt, of health
and hygiene, and of marriage. In short, all problems facing the masses in their actual
life should claim our attention'. Mao Tse-tung, Mind the Living Conditions of the
Masses and Attend to the Methods of Work (Peking, 1953), p. 2.
» The Tribune (Ambala), 3 December 1944.
5<
In the Rawalpindi District, the leading recruiting area in the province, 1 man
in every 2 served during the war, 1,420 persons were recorded as having sent 3 or
more sons to the services. File 16, Khizr Papers.
Conclusion
' " Calculated from ig^i Census, Punjab, Pt 1, Table XIII, p. 42 (Lahore, 1941).
112
1931 Census, Punjab, Pt 2, Table XIII, pp. 233-47 (Lahore, 1933).
"3 Dependent as this is upon the existence of a socially mobilized community to
whom a sense of communal identification can be communicated.
1911
Provincial border