‘The Congress aroused a passion for Muslim separatism’
Till today, many Indians have not reconciled to the creation of Pakistan. For them, the borders between the two countries are ‘artificial’ and ‘unnatural’. Moreover, they believe that ‘Mother India’ was ‘indivisible’ and all people inhabiting it irrespective of race, language, religion, culture, etc were one nation.
This was the idea of nationalism propounded by the Indian National Congress at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century. Parallel to this grew the idea of Muslim nationalism articulated by the All- India Muslim League arguing that the Muslims of the subcontinent were a different nation from the rest of the Indians on the bases of language, religion, culture, etc. Initially, the League only demanded constitutional safeguards for the Muslim community within the Indian Union, however, when their demands were not accommodated by the Hindu majority dominating the Congress, the League demanded the partition of India and the formation of a separate state for the Muslims at its annual session in Lahore in 1940. This was an ‘alarming’ demand and should have ‘woken up’ Congress but the latter was overconfident that its ‘tyrannical majority’ could easily bulldoze the aspirations of the Muslim minority.
Ideally, the ‘wise men’ of the Congress should have huddled together on an emergency basis to look into the likely consequences of the demand for Pakistan; yet they kept sleeping! While the Congress snored in its dream land of ‘one India, one nation’; a more thoughtful party decided to investigate what this ‘Pakistan’ project was all about. This was the Independent Labour Party (ILP) of the Bombay province, whose Executive Committee tasked a six-member committee (all non-Muslims) under Dr Bhim Rao Ambedkar to prepare a report on the demand of Pakistan, which it did in December 1940, and the same was published in the form of a book in 1941. I think all those Hindus that shed tears over partition have not bothered to read this document. Dr Ambedkar was not an ordinary politician. His findings on Pakistan become all the more significant keeping in view the fact that in addition to being a barrister with a doctorate to his credit, he was the head of the commission that drafted the constitution of independent India and in a recent nationwide public survey conducted by the Indian ‘Outlook’ magazine was adjudged “the greatest Indian after Gandhi”; well over the heads of the political stalwarts such as Nehru, Patel, Prasad, Azad, etc. His findings are as relevant today as these were in 1940.
Let’s take up the Hindu arguments that negate the idea of Muslim nationhood in India. Firstly, it is said that there was no difference of race between the Hindus and the Muslims. Well! It may be stated that race should not be confounded with one nation as human history, unlike other species is a different zoology and the fact is that there is no pure race. Secondly, it is argued that there was a linguistic affinity between the two communities as the Hindus and the Muslims of a province say Punjab or Bengal spoke the same language. True! Common language is a factor that pulls people together but it cannot be used as an instrument to compel people to live together. Ironically, it was the Congress which used the ‘Linguistic Principle’ and caused divisions in India by separating Bihar from Orissa during the Congress rule (1937-39). Similarly, Andhra demanded separation from Madras and Karnatak from Maharashtra. Ambedkar argued that linguistic difference was just another name for cultural difference and if the Congress was not averse to the separation of Andhra and Karnatak then why was it shocked over the demand for the separation of Pakistan?
Thirdly, the Indian nationalists while presenting a holistic view aver that the subcontinent was inhabited by the two communities for centuries and as a result their social life was honeycombed to the extent that some Muslim pirs had Hindu disciples while Hindu yogis had Muslim ‘chelas’. This may be undeniable but Ambedkar thoughtfully pointed out that these commonalities were ‘accidental’ and ‘superficial’ whereas the divisive aspects were ‘essential’ and ‘fundamental’, and thus far more vital than the aspects that united the two communities. To elaborate the point, he wrote that while the Hindus drew religious inspirations from the Ramayan, Geeta, etc; the Muslims from the Quran and Hadees. He quoted Bhai Parmanand’s pamphlet “The Hindu national movement’ which clearly highlighted that the Hindus revered Prithvi Raj, Rana Partap, Shivaji and Beragi Bir whereas the Muslims looked up to Mohammad bin Qasim and Aurangzeb. Can anyone disagree with Ambedkar when he states that not only was there an “absence of common historical antecedents” but the past of these two communities was also imbedded in their religions. To expect either of the two communities to forget its past was like asking it to give up its religion, and “to hope for this is to hope in vain”.
What was then inherently wrong with the concept of nationalism touted by the Indian nationalists? Well! They just kept ‘calling’ all Indians one nation without ever realizing the fact whether all the Indians ever actually ‘felt’ as being one nation. This difference between ‘calling’ and ‘feeling’ as a nation has not been understood by the Indians, even today. Despite all the commonalities being found between the two communities, the Muslims and the Hindus never longed to belong to each other. In other words, the Muslims never ‘felt’ to be a part of the Indian nation. The persistent Hindu rejection of the separate Muslim identity eventually gave rise to a ‘passion’ and a ‘will’ among the Muslims to live as a separate nation. This ‘will’ is the most superior of all the factors that determine a nation.
Ambedkar gives several examples to prove the importance of the sovereignty of the will of a people. Once the people ‘will’ for something then that ‘will’ in itself becomes the determining factor to justify their demand. He quoted the example of Switzerland. The Swiss spoke three or four different languages; in spite of this, they created a state because they ‘felt’ and ‘willed’ to be one nation. On the contrary, the Americans and the Englishmen speak the same language yet they ‘willed’ to remain separate nations.
There can be another interesting scenario whereby a nation may be aware of its separate identity yet it does not ask for a separate country. Ambedkar citied the examples of the French living in Canada and the British in South Africa but added that this did not mean that the Indian Muslims could be denied separate nationhood even if they insisted on it. The critics of Muslim nationalism object that the birth of Muslim nationalism was a relatively more recent phenomenon and if the Indian Muslims were conscious of their separate identity then why didn’t they ask for it much earlier. This charge is valid but Ambedkar has explained it quite philosophically. He states that nations can exist for centuries in ‘unreflective silence’ i.e. without being ignited with the passion of nationalism. In other words, it can be said that the Muslims of India were conscious of their unique separate status but didn’t ‘feel’ the passion to press for this feeling. They might have continued to live in united India, as the Indian nationalists wished, had the Congress not pushed them to the wall. In conclusion, Ambedkar blames the shortsighted policies of the Congress which aroused a passion for Muslim separatism, which, by each passing day, matured into the ‘will’ of the Muslim masses to settle for nothing short of a homeland of their own.
The writer is an academic and journalist. He can be reached at qizilbash2000@yahoo.com