Concession and Repression (1857 – 1919) British Rule in India

Contributed by Dr Robert Carr

In 1882 Britain occupied and administered Egypt. In 1898 the British effectively did the same with the Sudan. Such colonialism was not so much a ‘Scramble for Africa’ but a means of protecting the Suez and Nile respectively. These waterways were thought crucial in securing access to, and control of, the Jewel in the Crown. Above all it was the Raj which captured the British imagination.

India had long excited both exotic and Romantic notions of the Orient – evidenced, not least, by Coleridge’s famed poem Kubla Khan. Tales of tigers and elephants and the works of Rudyard Kipling ensured the Raj had a special place in the British psyche. More than that, however, India offered newly industrialized Britain with valuable raw materials and was a lucrative export market. Besides its economic significance, India was of profound military importance. Indeed Lord Salisbury termed India as “an English barracks in the Oriental seas”. The sub-continent was a great source of manpower for wider British foreign policy.

In 1876 Prime Minister Disraeli exemplified the Raj’s place in British affections by declaring Queen Victoria as Empress of India. Less than a decade later, the Indian National Congress was set up, under British auspices, as a political forum for educated Indians. Similarly, 1892’s Indian Councils Act permitted local comment and criticism over provincial legislation. Although Indians had no decision-making role, they were not entirely excluded from the political sphere. In practical terms, British rule contributed modernization in the form of railways and irrigation projects. If the above bathe the late nineteenth century Raj in a light of kindness, it is certainly possible to present British rule as coercive and repressive.

Why, though, were the British in formal control of India? Like much of British imperial expansion, taking formal control of India was not intentional. Instead when British lives and trading interests (represented by the East India Co.) were threatened by violent reaction to encroaching westernization, London felt obligated to step in to take control of both the situation and the country. In Ahmed Ali’s Twilight in India a character relates events of September 1857 and how “ruthlessly Delhi had been looted by them at the time of the ‘Mutiny’, and then the Mussalmans [Muslims] had been turned out of their city, their houses demolished and destroyed and their property looted and usurped”.

Having quashed the Indian Mutiny, British rule was embodied by the new position of Viceroy. One such viceroy (1869-72) was General Mayo who informed his colonial colleagues: “teach your subordinates that we are all British gentlemen engaged in the magnificent work of governing an inferior race”.

At the very least there existed the feeling that Indian interests were being subordinated to those of Britain. 1895’s excise of 5% on Indian cotton goods was such a case in point; broader allegations included the apparent drain of money to Britain without adequate return and the failure to encourage Indian industry (instead resources fed Britain’s interests). Despite such causes for concern, the Indian National Congress cooperated with, rather than challenged, British rule. All this was to change from 1898 with the accession of George Curzon to Viceroy.

Curzon had an ambitious programme designed to keep the British in India ‘for at least another hundred years’. Two measures in particular riled sections of Indian society; namely Curzon’s Universities Act and his subsequent Partition of the Bengal province.

The 1904 Universities Act increased British controls over private colleges & university bodies. Higher education was something close to the heart of the new middle class; it had given them opportunities and they largely controlled it. His partition of Bengal, however, caused most offence. Out of Bengal he created a new, largely Muslim, province of East Bengal and Assam. In all certainty the Viceroy divided the Bengal people because of their political activity and raised the backward Muslims of East Bengal as a counterpoise. Curzon did not consult Indian opinion about the partition and his act blatantly ignored respect for regional loyalties. Congress led protests through demonstrations, a boycott of British manufactured goods and the burning of Lancashire cotton in particular.

Curzon had created something of a crisis in the Raj – not least because partition can be seen as turning Congress into a full-blown nationalist movement; furthermore, active opposition to British rule now had another outlet with the formation of the Muslim League.

Following the landslide elections of 1906, the new Liberal government sought to soothe Indian nerves. Curzon was quickly replaced: Gilbert Minto was appointed Viceroy and John Morley became Secretary of State for India. In an unprecedented move, Congress leader G.K. Gokale was brought into consultation with Morley and Minto. The result of such discussions was the Indian Councils Act of 1909 (the Morley-Minto reforms). The way was now open for Indian membership of the provincial executive councils (besides the Viceroy’s executive council as before); the Imperial Legislative Council was enlarged from 25 to 60 members and separate communal representation for Muslims was established (in response to recent Muslim political organization). Overall, the act was a clear step towards representative and responsible government.

Lord Hardinge succeeded Minto and in 1911 presided over the reversal of the Bengal partition and the removal of the capital to the centre – Delhi. The two Bengals were reunited. The transfer of the capital enraged Calcutta’s Europeans but pleased Indian sentiment as a whole. Hardinge secured Gokale’s appointment to the Islington Commission which recommended a larger Indian share in appointments to the services (civil and military). Such Anglo-Indian cooperation and progress were effectively pushed aside when World War I engulfed Europe. The war proved a profound turning point for the Raj: India was affected not only by the conflict itself but also by its international ramifications.

International events, in the form of the overthrow of Tsardom and the ascendancy of the USA, helped raise the ambitions of Indians. For India, the Russian Revolution signalled both the collapse of an autocratic European power and a population throwing off its reactionary rulers. The arrival of the Americans on the world stage meant a new, alternative international power which rejected colonialism. President Wilson’s famous Fourteen Points were a response to 5 years of world war: he demanded the right for national self-government.

Of more local significance was the fact that 36,000 Indians lost their lives fighting for Britain; thousands of others were wounded or maimed in action on the Western Front, in North Africa and the Middle East. Consider too that India donated £100 million outright to Britain’s war budget and provided a further £20-30 million annually. Besides those bereaved or maimed during the war, Muslim loyalties in India were strained by conflict with the Ottoman Sultan who served as a religious figurehead i.e. Islamic Caliph.

Perhaps what most hurt is the experience of returning soldiers: the 800,000 Indian combatants were no longer regarded as invaluable allies, instead they reverted immediately to the status of second class ‘natives’.

There was, however, some recognition that a debt was owed to India: in August 1917 the new Secretary of State for India, Edwin Montagu acknowledged the need for “the gradual development of self-governing institutions, with a view to the progressive realization of responsible government in India”. The government, then, envisaged India having ‘home rule’ as already enjoyed by the white dominions.

What emerged was 1919’s Government of India Act which was a move towards double government or ‘dyarchy’. The Act created 11 self-governing provinces of British India and Indian ministers were given ‘safe’ portfolios including control over public health, education and agriculture. Power was still firmly where it had always been: British ministers controlled justice, foreign policy and the economy; moreover, the Viceroy could veto legislation, suspend provincial councils and if necessary rule as an autocrat. While making apparent concessions, the British also applied coercion in the form of the Rowlatt Acts.

For many, self-government (or an end to the Raj at least) couldn’t come soon enough. World War I had brought India a shortage of goods, rising prices and even civil restrictions. Moreover, India expected self-government for its war-time assistance to Britain. As a consequence there was anti-British agitation across the country. The government appointed a committee, headed by Mr Justice Rowlatt, to find a solution.

The resulting legislation extended wartime emergency measures – judges could try political cases without juries and provincial governments could assert the power of internment without trial. The manner in which the Rowlatt Acts were passed caused further offence by ignoring the unanimous opposition of the Legislative Council’s Indian members.

Such repression constituted British treachery and heralded the emergence of a certain Congress member called Gandhi. He called upon his countrymen to disobey the acts and, instead, protest through inactivity (known as hartal). While Gandhi was an advocate of non-violence, agitation was evident in the Punjab in particular. When nationalist ‘troublemakers’ were deported from the region, rioting broke out in protest in Amritsar city – British banks were set ablaze and seven Englishmen killed. The local commander, General Dyer, took it upon himself to break up a prohibited (albeit peaceful) meeting at Jallianwallah Garden. Dyer’s modus operandi saw almost 2,000 rounds fired, without warning, on a crowd of 10,000 men, women and children. Three hundred and seventy-nine were killed and the 1,200 wounded were left without medical attention.

Rather than being a civilizing influence on India, the British were guilty of utter barbarism at Amritsar. The issue didn’t stop there however. Although General Dyer was retired by the military following the massacre, the Indians were appalled to learn of a vote in his favour in the House of Lords and the raising of a heavily subscribed fund in appreciation of his services.

Any positive steps intended by Viceroy Montagu or the India Act were utterly undone by the punitive and callous nature of Rowlatt’s legislation and Amritsar respectively. Undoubtedly, Britain had lost the moral authority to govern India. Any vestige of local support for the Raj was also surely lost. In August 1919 Gandhi carried the Congress with him in launching a non-cooperation movement. This included the boycott of impending council elections, resignation of government office and withdrawal from government schools and colleges. The movement caught the imagination of the country and gained a unique all-India character by drawing on both Hindu and Muslim support.

A year later, on the death of B.G. Tilak, Gandhi became undisputed head of the Congress movement. In seeking independence, Gandhi’s peaceful satyagraha (‘soul force’) contrasted sharply with British rule from 1857 to 1919 and, indeed, thereafter.

Just as the Mutiny of 1857 was a reaction to westernization, India had found, in Gandhi, a leader who rejected Western ideas. By spinning cotton and advocating the ashram, Gandhi promoted Indian traditions and institutions.

The period 1857-1919 in the British Raj can be seen as one of concession and repression. Arguably, the reforms highlighted above may well have disguised a determination to hang on to India for as long as possible. Just how could the British have remained a further generation following the events of 1919? For every Morley, Minto or Montagu, there was a Mayo, Curzon or Dyer. Certainly, the Raj was characterized by both reformists and reactionaries. Perhaps more than any other domain, foreign policy is victim to politicians’ personal attitudes, ambitions and arrogance.

http://www.britishempire.co.uk/article/concession.htm

Government of the Raj 1858-1914

As the Crown took over rule in India in 1858, so Parliament’s involvement in Indian affairs increased. The governance of India was often reviewed and the British Parliament passed a total of 196 Acts concerning the continent between 1858 and 1947.

Government of the Raj

The government of the Raj consisted wholly of British officials and was headed by the viceroy and the appointed members of his council. After the Indian Councils Act was passed in 1861 this executive council acted as a cabinet and also as part of an imperial legislative council.

Each of British India’s eleven provinces had its own governor, assisted by similar provincial legislative councils of appointed officials. There were also a small number of Indian council members who were part of the local elite, appointed solely for consultative purposes.

Empress of India

British rule over India was reinforced when in 1876 Parliament passed the Royal Titles Act, which formally endowed Queen Victoria with the title of Empress of India.

Indian nationalists

In 1885 a group of Indian nationalists founded the India National Congress and slowly Indians began to play an increasing role in politics in both India and the Empire.

In the 1890s both Dadabhai Naoroji, a founder of the Indian National Congress fiercely critical of British rule, and Sir Macherjee M. Bhownaggree, who supported the government of the Raj, sat in the Westminster Parliament as MPs for London constituencies.

Indian electors

Two Indian Councils Acts, of 1892 and 1909, allowed a small number of Indians –39 in 1892 rising to 135 in 1909 – to be elected to both the imperial legislative council and the provincial legislative councils.

The 1909 Act ensured that these representatives were chosen by small groups of Indian electors as representatives of specific religious and social groups, such as Muslims or landowners. These councils remained merely advisory and the governor was in no way responsible to these elected representatives.

Parliament’s legislation of 1892 and 1909 did not adequately address the wide-scale dissatisfaction with British rule. But it was events after the First World War that caused a crisis for the Raj.

http://www.parliament.uk/about/living-heritage/evolutionofparliament/legislativescrutiny/parliament-and-empire/parliament-and-the-american-colonies-before-1765/government-of-the-raj-1858-1914/

From Empire to Independence: The British Raj in India 1858-1947

By Dr Chandrika Kaul
Last updated 2011-03-03

1858: Beginning of the Raj

In 1858, British Crown rule was established in India, ending a century of control by the East India Company. The life and death struggle that preceded this formalisation of British control lasted nearly two years, cost £36 million, and is variously referred to as the ‘Great Rebellion’, the ‘Indian Mutiny’ or the ‘First War of Indian Independence’.

Inevitably, the consequences of this bloody rupture marked the nature of political, social and economic rule that the British established in its wake.

It is important to note that the Raj (in Hindi meaning ‘to rule’ or ‘kingdom’) never encompassed the entire land mass of the sub-continent.

Two-fifths of the sub-continent continued to be independently governed by over 560 large and small principalities, some of whose rulers had fought the British during the ‘Great Rebellion’, but with whom the Raj now entered into treaties of mutual cooperation.

The ‘Great Rebellion’ helped create a racial chasm between ordinary Indians and Britons.

Indeed the conservative elites of princely India and big landholders were to prove increasingly useful allies, who would lend critical monetary and military support during the two World Wars.

Hyderabad for example was the size of England and Wales combined, and its ruler, the Nizam, was the richest man in the world.

They would also serve as political bulwarks in the nationalist storms that gathered momentum from the late 19th century and broke with insistent ferocity over the first half of the 20th century.

But the ‘Great Rebellion’ did more to create a racial chasm between ordinary Indians and Britons. This was a social segregation which would endure until the end of the Raj, graphically captured in EM Forster’s ‘A Passage to India’.

While the British criticised the divisions of the Hindu caste system, they themselves lived a life ruled by precedence and class, deeply divided within itself. Rudyard Kipling reflected this position in his novels. His books also exposed the gulf between the ‘white’ community and the ‘Anglo-Indians’, whose mixed race caused them to be considered racially ‘impure’.

Government in India

While there was a consensus that Indian policy was above party politics, in practice it became embroiled in the vicissitudes of Westminster.

Successive viceroys in India and secretaries of state in London were appointed on a party basis, having little or no direct experience of Indian conditions and they strove to serve two masters. Edwin Montagu was the first serving secretary of state to visit India on a fact-finding mission in 1917-1918.

1,200 civil servants could not rule 300 to 350 million Indians without indigenous ‘collaborators’.

Broadly speaking, the Government of India combined a policy of co-operation and conciliation of different strata of Indian society with a policy of coercion and force.

The empire was nothing if not an engine of economic gain. Pragmatism dictated that to govern efficiently and remuneratively, 1,200 Indian civil servants could not rule 300 to 350 million Indians without the assistance of indigenous ‘collaborators’.

However, in true British tradition, they also chose to elaborate sophisticated and intellectual arguments to justify and explain their rule.

On the one hand, Whigs and Liberals expounded sentiments most iconically expressed by TB Macaulay in 1833: ‘that… by good government we may educate our subjects into a capacity for better government, that, having become instructed in European knowledge, they may, in some future age, demand European institutions. Whether such a day will ever come I know not. … Whenever it comes, it will be the proudest day in English history.’

On the other hand, James Fitzjames Stephen, writing in the 1880s, contended that empire had to be absolute because ‘its great and characteristic task is that of imposing on Indian ways of life and modes of thought which the population regards without sympathy, though they are essential to its personal well-being and to the credit of its rulers.’

What was less ambiguous was that it was the economic interests of Britain that were paramount, though as the 20th century progressed, the government in India was successful in imposing safeguards. For instance, tariff walls were raised to protect the Indian cotton industry against cheap British imports.

Financial gains and losses

There were two incontrovertible economic benefits provided by India. It was a captive market for British goods and services, and served defence needs by maintaining a large standing army at no cost to the British taxpayer.

However, the economic balance sheet of the empire remains a controversial topic and the debate has revolved around whether the British developed or retarded the Indian economy.

Controversy remains over whether Britain developed or retarded India’s economy.

Among the benefits bequeathed by the British connection were the large scale capital investments in infrastructure, in railways, canals and irrigation works, shipping and mining; the commercialisation of agriculture with the development of a cash nexus; the establishment of an education system in English and of law and order creating suitable conditions for the growth of industry and enterprise; and the integration of India into the world economy.

Conversely, the British are criticised for leaving Indians poorer and more prone to devastating famines; exhorting high taxation in cash from an inpecunious people; destabilising cropping patterns by forced commercial cropping; draining Indian revenues to pay for an expensive bureaucracy (including in London) and an army beyond India’s own defence needs; servicing a huge sterling debt, not ensuring that the returns from capital investment were reinvested to develop the Indian economy rather than reimbursed to London; and retaining the levers of economic power in British hands.

The Indian National Congress

The foundation of the Indian National Congress in 1885 as an all India, secular political party, is widely regarded as a key turning point in formalising opposition to the Raj.

It developed from its elite intellectual middle-class confines, and a moderate, loyalist agenda, to become by the inter-war years, a mass organisation.

It was an organisation which, despite the tremendous diversity of the sub-continent, was remarkable in achieving broad consensus over the decades.

Also split within Congress were those who advocated violence and those who stressed non-violence.

Yet it was not a homogenous organisation and was often dominated by factionalism and opposing political strategies. This was exemplified by its splintering in 1907 into the so-called ‘moderate’ and ‘extremist’ wings, which reunited 10 years later.

Another example were the ‘pro-changers’ (who believed working the constitutional structures to weaken it from within) and ‘no-changers’ (who wanted to distance themselves from the Raj) during the 1920s.

There was also a split within Congress between those who believed that violence was a justifiable weapon in the fight against imperial oppression (whose most iconic figure was Subhas Chandra Bose, who went on to form the Indian National Army), and those who stressed non-violence.

The towering figure in this latter group was Mahatma Gandhi, who introduced a seismic new idiom of opposition in the shape of non-violent non-cooperation or ‘satyagraha’ (meaning ‘truth’ or ‘soul’ force’).

Gandhi oversaw three major nationwide movements which achieved varying degrees of success in 1920-1922, 1930-1934 and in 1942. These mobilised the masses on the one hand, while provoking the authorities into draconian repression. Much to Gandhi’s distress, self-restraint among supporters often gave way to violence.

Reasons for independence

The British Raj unravelled quickly in the 1940s, perhaps surprising after the empire in the east had so recently survived its greatest challenge in the shape of Japanese expansionism.

The reasons for independence were multifaceted and the result of both long and short term factors.

The pressure from the rising tide of nationalism made running the empire politically and economically very challenging and increasingly not cost effective. This pressure was embodied as much in the activities of large pan-national organisations like the Congress as in pressure from below – from the ‘subalterns’ through the acts of peasant and tribal resistance and revolt, trade union strikes and individual acts of subversion and violence.

With US foreign policy pressurising the end of western imperialism, it seemed only a matter of time before India gained its freedom.

There were further symptoms of the disengagement from empire. European capital investment declined in the inter-war years and India went from a debtor country in World War One to a creditor in World War Two. Applications to the Indian Civil Service (ICS) declined dramatically from the end of the Great War.

Britain’s strategy of a gradual devolution of power, its representation to Indians through successive constitutional acts and a deliberate ‘Indianisation’ of the administration, gathered a momentum of its own. As a result, India moved inexorably towards self-government.

The actual timing of independence owed a great deal to World War Two and the demands it put on the British government and people.

The Labour party had a tradition of supporting Indian claims for self-rule, and was elected to power in 1945 after a debilitating war which had reduced Britain to her knees.

Furthermore, with US foreign policy pressurising the end of western subjugation and imperialism, it seemed only a matter of time before India gained its freedom.

Partition and religion

The growth of Muslim separatism from the late 19th century and the rise of communal violence from the 1920s to the virulent outbreaks of 1946-1947, were major contributory factors in the timing and shape of independence.

However, it was only from the late 1930s that it became inevitable that independence could only be achieved if accompanied by a partition. This partition would take place along the subcontinent’s north-western and north-eastern boundaries, creating two sovereign nations of India and Pakistan.

The Muslim League failed to achieve the confidence of the majority of Muslims in the elections of 1937.

Muslims, as a religious community, comprised only 20% of the population and represented great diversity in economic, social and political terms.

From the late 19th century, some of its political elites in northern India felt increasingly threatened by British devolution of power, which by the logic of numbers would mean the dominance of the majority Hindu community.

Seeking power and a political voice in the imperial structure, they organised themselves into a party to represent their interests, founding the Muslim League in 1906.

They achieved something of a coup by persuading the British that they needed to safeguard the interests of the minorities, a demand that fed into British strategies of divide and rule. The inclusion of separate electorates along communal lines in the 1909 Act, subsequently enlarged in every successive constitutional act, enshrined a form of constitutional separatism.

While there is no denying that Islam and Hinduism were and are very different faiths, Muslims and Hindus continued to co-exist peaceably. There were, however, occasional violent outbursts which were driven more often than not by economic inequities.

Even politically, the Congress and the League cooperated successfully during the Khilafat and Non Cooperation movements in 1920-1922. And Muhammad Ali Jinnah (the eventual father of the Pakistani nation) was a Congress member till 1920.

Although Congress strove to stress its secular credentials with prominent Muslim members – for example, Maulana Azad served as its president through World War Two – it is criticised for failing to sufficiently recognise the importance of a conciliatory position towards the League in the inter-war years, and for its triumphant response to Congress’s 1937 election victory.

The Muslim League advocated the idea of Pakistan in its annual session in 1930, yet the idea did not achieve any political reality at the time. Furthermore, the League failed to achieve the confidence of the majority of the Muslim population in the elections of 1937.

Hasty transfer of power

The lack of confidence in the Muslim League among the Muslim population was to be dramatically reversed in the 1946 elections.

The intervening years saw the rise of Jinnah and the League to political prominence through the successful exploitation of the wartime insecurities of the British, and the political vacuum created when the Congress ministries (which had unanimously come to power in 1937) resigned en masse to protest at the government’s unilateral decision to enter India into the war without consultation.

The creation of Pakistan as a land for Muslims nevertheless left a sizeable number of Muslims in an independent India.

The rejuvenated League skilfully exploited the communal card. At its Lahore session in 1940, Jinnah made the demand for Pakistan into its rallying cry. The ensuing communal violence, especially after Jinnah declared ‘Direct Action Day’ in August 1946, put pressure on the British government and Congress to accede to his demands for a separate homeland for Muslims.

The arrival of Lord Louis Mountbatten as India’s last viceroy in March 1947, brought with it an agenda to transfer power as quickly and efficiently as possible. The resulting negotiations saw the deadline for British withdrawal brought forward from June 1948 to August 1947.

Contemporaries and subsequent historians have criticised this haste as a major contributory factor in the chaos that accompanied partition. Mass migration occurred across the new boundaries as well as an estimated loss of a million lives in the communal bloodbaths involving Hindus, Muslims and also Sikhs in the Punjab.

The final irony must remain that the creation of Pakistan as a land for Muslims nevertheless left a sizeable number of Muslims in an independent India making it the largest minority in a non-Muslim state.

Find out more

Books

Inventing Boundaries: gender, politics and the Partition of Indiaedited by Mushirul Hasan (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2000)

Pakistan as a peasant utopia: the communalization of class politics in East Bengal, 1920-1947 by Taj ul-Islam Hashmi (Boulder, Colorado; Oxford: Westview, 1992)

The Sole Spokesman: Jinnah, the Muslim League and the demand for Pakistan by Ayesha Jalal (Cambridge University Press, 1985)

The Partitions of Memory: the afterlife of the division of Indiaedited by S. Kaul (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001)

Borders & boundaries: women in India’s partition by Menon, Ritu & Bhasin, Kamla (New Delhi: Kali for Women, 1998)

Remembering Partition: violence, nationalism and history in India by Gyanendra Pandey (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001)

‘Reviews: The high politics of India’s Partition: the revisionist perspective’ by Asim Roy (Modern Asian Studies, 24, 2 (1990), pp. 385-415)

About the author

Chandrika Kaul is lecturer in Modern History at the University of St Andrews. Her research interests include British press and political culture (1850-1950), the British imperial experience in South Asia, the Indian press and communications in world history. She is author of the first detailed examination of British press coverage of Indian affairs, Reporting the Raj: The British Press and India (2003). Kaul has also edited a collection of essays, Media and the British Empire (2006). Her forthcoming research project is a new history of India titled The Indian experience of the Raj.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/modern/independence1947_01.shtml

East Pakistan would be given independence, Pak president told US in November 1971

By Ahmad Noorani

November 24, 2016

Former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger makes revelation in interview

ISLAMABAD: One of the world’s most famous and reputed diplomats Henry Kissinger has revealed in his latest interview to the magazine ‘The Atlantic’ that the then Pakistan’s president and its army chief had told United States President Richard Nixon in November 1971 that Pakistan would grant independence to East Pakistan.

This is stunning revelation as in November, 1971 India had not invaded East Pakistan, now Bangladesh. India invaded East Pakistan on December 3, 1971.

Henry Kissinger was 56th US Secretary of State and served from September 22, 1973 to January 20, 1977. Kissinger also served as US National Security Adviser from January 20, 1969 to November 3, 1975. Kissinger played a key role in United States foreign policy between 1969 and 1977.

In his latest interview with Jeffrey Goldberg, the Editor-in-Chief of ‘The Atlantic’, Kissinger has discussed many issues ahead of recent US elections.

While narrating events of 1971 in context of US’ opening to China and Pakistan-India Bangladesh issue, Kissinger said, “After the opening to China via Pakistan, America engaged in increasingly urging Pakistan to grant autonomy to Bangladesh. In November, the Pakistani president agreed with Nixon to grant independence the following March.”

The interview starts with the introductory para; “What follows is an extended transcript of several conversations on foreign policy I had with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger ahead of the 2016 US presidential election, which formed the basis of a story in the December issue of The Atlantic. That story, along with an interview on Kissinger’s reaction to the surprise electoral victory of Donald Trump, can be found here. The transcript below has been condensed and edited for clarity.”

The relevant question asked by The Atlantic’s Editor-In-Chief and the Kissinger response were as follows:

Goldberg: Was the opening to China worth the sacrifices, the deaths, experienced in the India-Pakistan Bangladesh crisis?

Henry Kissinger: Human rights are an essential goal of American policy. But so is national security. In some situations, no choice between them is required, making the moral issue relatively simple. But there are situations in which a conflict arises, specifically when a country important to American security or international order engages in conduct contrary to our values, requiring the president to make a series of judgments: about the magnitude of the conflict; the resources available to remedy it; the impact of our actions on its foreseeable evolution; and finally, if the president identifies a path forward, the willingness of the American public to maintain that effort. Emphasizing human rights led us into failed nation-building in Iraq; ignoring them permitted genocide in Rwanda. Contemporary policymakers face this challenge all over the world, especially all over the Middle East.

The statesman can usually only reach his goal in stages and, by definition, imperfectly. The art of policy is to move through imperfect stages towards ever-more fulfilling goals.

Your question on Bangladesh demonstrates how this issue has been confused in our public debate. There was never the choice between suffering in Bangladesh and the opening to China. It is impossible to go into detail in one far-ranging interview. However, allow me to outline some principles:

1- The opening to China began in 1969.

2- The Bangladesh crisis began in March 1971.

3- By then, we had conducted a number of highly secret exchanges with China and were on the verge of a breakthrough.

4- These exchanges were conducted through Pakistan, which emerged as the interlocutor most acceptable to Beijing and Washington.

5- The Bangladesh crisis, in its essence, was an attempt of the Bengali part of Pakistan to achieve independence. Pakistan resisted with extreme violence and gross human-rights violations.

6- To condemn these violations publicly would have destroyed the Pakistani channel, which would be needed for months to complete the opening to China, which indeed was launched from Pakistan. The Nixon administration considered the opening to China as essential to a potential diplomatic recasting towards the Soviet Union and the pursuit of peace. The US diplomats witnessing the Bangladesh tragedy were ignorant of the opening to China. Their descriptions were heartfelt and valid, but we could not respond publicly. But we made available vast quantities of food and undertook diplomatic efforts to resolve the situation.

7- After the opening to China via Pakistan, America engaged in increasingly urging Pakistan to grant autonomy to Bangladesh. In November, the Pakistani president agreed with Nixon to grant independence the following March.

8- The following December, India, after having made a treaty including military provisions with the Soviet Union, and in order to relieve the strain of refugees, invaded East Pakistan [which is today Bangladesh].

9- The US had to navigate between Soviet pressures; Indian objectives; Chinese suspicions; and Pakistani nationalism. Adjustments had to be made—and would require a book to cover—but the results require no apology. By March 1972—within less than a year of the commencement of the crisis—Bangladesh was independent; the India-Pakistan War ended; and the opening to China completed at a summit in Beijing in February 1972. A summit in Moscow in May 1972 resulted in a major nuclear arms control agreement [SALT I]. Relations with India were restored by 1974 with the creation of a US-Indian Joint Commission [the Indo-US Joint Commission on Economic, Commercial, Scientific, Technological, Educational and Cultural Cooperation], which remains part of the basis of contemporary US-India relations. Compared with Syria, Libya, Egypt, Iraq, and Afghanistan, the sacrifices made in 1971 have had a far more clear-cut end.

https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/167331-East-Pakistan-would-be-given-independence-Pak-president-told-US-in-November-1971

1942 Quit India Movement

Date:

08 Aug 1942

Event location:

Gowalia Tank Maidan, Bombay, India

About:

On 8 August 1942 at the All-India Congress Committee session in Bombay, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhilaunched the ‘Quit India’ movement. The next day, Gandhi, Nehru and many other leaders of the Indian National Congress were arrested by the British Government. Disorderly and non-violent demonstrations took place throughout the country in the following days.

By the middle of 1942, Japanese troops were approaching the borders of India. Pressure was mounting from China, the United States and  Britain to solve the issue of  the future status of India before the end of the war. In March 1942, the Prime Minister dispatched Sir Stafford Cripps, a member of the War Cabinet, to India to discuss the British Government’s Draft Declaration. The draft granted India Dominion status after the war but otherwise conceded few changes to the British Government Act of 1935. The draft was unacceptable to the Congress Working Committee who rejected it. The failure of the Cripps Mission further estranged the Congressand the British Government.

Gandhi seized upon the failure of the Cripps Mission, the advances of the Japanese in South-East Asia and the general frustration with the British in India. He called for a voluntary British withdrawal from India. From 29 April to 1 May 1942, the All India Congress Committee assembled in Allahabad to discuss the resolution of the Working Committee. Although Gandhi was absent from the meeting, many of his points were admitted into the resolution: the most significant of them being the commitment to non-violence. On 14 July 1942, the Congress Working Committee met again at Wardha and resolved that it would authorise Gandhi to take charge of the non-violent mass movement. The Resolution, generally referred to as the ‘Quit India’ resolution, was to be approved by the All India Congress Committee meeting in Bombay in August.

On 7 to 8 August 1942, the All India Congress Committee met in Bombay and ratified the ‘Quit India’ resolution. Gandhi called for ‘Do or Die’. The next day, on 9 August 1942, Gandhi, members of the Congress Working Committee and other Congress leaders were arrested by the British Government under the Defence of India Rules. The Working Committee, the All India Congress Committee and the four Provincial Congress Committees were declared unlawful associations under the Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1908. The assembly of public meetings were prohibited under rule 56 of the Defence of India Rules. The arrest of Gandhi and the Congress leaders led to mass demonstrations  throughout India. Thousands were killed and injured in the wake of the ‘Quit India’ movement. Strikes were called in many places. The British swiftly suppressed many of these demonstrations by mass detentions; more than 100,000 people were imprisoned.

The ‘Quit India’ movement, more than anything, united the Indian people against British rule. Although most demonstrations had been suppressed by 1944, upon his release in 1944 Gandhi continued his resistance and went on a 21-day fast. By the end of the Second World War, Britain’s place in the world had changed dramatically and the demand for independence could no longer be ignored.

Organizer:

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi

People involved:

Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Subhas Chandra Bose, Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Mohammed Ali Jinnah, Asoka Mehta, Jaya Prakas Narayan, Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Dr Rajendra Prasad, Chakravarti Rajgopalachari.

http://www.open.ac.uk/researchprojects/makingbritain/content/1942-quit-india-movement

Quit India Movement

Procession view at Bangalore

The Quit India Movement (Bharat Chhodo Andolan or the August Movement) was a civil disobedience movement in India launched in August 1942, in response to Mahatma Gandhi‘s call for the immediate independence of India. Its aim was to bring the British government to the negotiating table through determined, but passive resistance. Unilaterally and without consultation, the British had entered India into World War II, arousing the indignation of large numbers of Indian people. On July 14, 1942, the Indian National Congresspassed a resolution demanding complete independence from Britain and massive civil disobedience. On August 8, 1942, the Quit India Resolution was passed at the Bombay session of the All India Congress Committee (AICC). In a speech entitled, “Do or Die,” given on August 8, 1942, Gandhi urged the masses to act as an independent nation and not to follow the orders of the British. His call found support among a large number of Indians, including revolutionaries who were not necessarily party to Gandhi’s philosophy of non-violence.

Almost the entire Congress leadership, both at the national and local levels, was put into confinement less than twenty-four hours after Gandhi’s speech, and the greater number of the Congress leaders spent the rest of the war in jail. Despite lack of direct leadership, large-scale protests and demonstrations were held all over the country. The British responded with mass detentions, making over 100,000 arrests. Within a few months the Movement had died down, and when the British granted independence on August 15, 1947, they cited revolts and growing dissatisfaction among Royal Indian Armed Forces during and after the war as the driving force behind Britain’s decision to leave India. However, the political experience gained by the Indian people through activities such as the Quit India movement laid the foundation for the strongest enduring tradition of democracy and freedom in post-colonial Africa and Asia.

World War II and Indian Involvement

In 1942, the British, unilaterally and without consultation, entered India into World War II. The response in India was divided; some Indians wanted to support the British during the Battle of Britain, hoping for eventual independence through this effort. Others were enraged by the British disregard for Indian intelligence and civil rights, and were unsympathetic to the travails of the British people, which they saw as rightful punishment for their subjugation of Indians.

Public lecture at Basavanagudi, Bangalore with Late C.F.Andrews*

Opinions on the War

At the outbreak of war, during the Wardha meeting of the working-committee in September, 1939, the Congress Party had passed a resolution conditionally supporting the fight against fascism ^[1], but were rebuffed when they asked for independence in return. Gandhi, a committed believer in non-violent resistance, had not supported this initiative, because he could not support an endorsement of war; he advocated nonviolent resistance even against the tyranny of Hitler, Mussolini, and Tojo). At the height of the Battle of Britain, however, Gandhi expressed his support for the fight against fascism and the British War effort, stating he did not seek to raise a free India from the ashes of Britain. However, opinions remained divided.

After the onset of the war, only a group led by Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose took any decisive action. Bose organized the Indian National Army with the help of the Japanese, and, solicited help from the Axis Powers. The INA fought hard in the forests of Assam, Bengal and Burma, but ultimately failed owing to disrupted logistic, inadequate arms and supplies from the Japanese, and a lack of support and training. ^[2] Bose’s audacious actions and radical initiative energized a new generation of Indians. The Quit India Movement tapped into this energy, channeling it into a united, cohesive action.

Cripps’ Mission

In March, 1942, faced with an increasingly dissatisfied Indian sub-continent which participated in the war only with reluctance; with deterioration in the war situation in Europe and South East Asia; and with growing dissatisfaction among Indian troops in Europe, and among the civilian population in India, the British government sent a delegation to India under Stafford Cripps, in what came to be known as the Cripps’ Mission. The purpose of the mission was to negotiate with the Indian National Congress to obtain total co-operation during the war, in return for progressive devolution and distribution of power from the Crown and the Viceroy to an elected Indian legislature. However, the talks failed to address the key demands of a time frame for self-government, and of a clear definition of the powers to be relinquished, essentially portraying an offer of limited dominion-status that was wholly unacceptable to the Indian movement.^[3]

Resolution for Immediate Independence

On July 14, 1942, the Indian National Congress passed a resolution demanding complete independence from Britain. The draft proposed that if the British did not accede to the demands, massive civil disobedience would be launched.

However, it proved to be controversial within the party. A prominent Congress national leader, Chakravarti Rajgopalachari, quit the Congress over this decision, and so did some local and regional level organizers. Jawaharlal Nehru and Maulana Azad were apprehensive and critical of the call, but backed it and followed Gandhi’s leadership until the end. Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel and Dr. Rajendra Prasad were openly and enthusiastically in favor of such a disobedience movement, as were many veteran Gandhians and socialists like Asoka Mehta and Jaya Prakash Narayan.

The Congress had less success in rallying other political forces under a single flag. Smaller parties like the Communist Party of India and the Hindu Mahasabha opposed the call. Muhammad Ali Jinnah’s opposition to the call led to large numbers of Muslims cooperating with the British, and the Muslim League obtaining power in the Imperial provincial governments.

On August 8, 1942, the Quit India Resolution was passed at the Bombay session of the All India Congress Committee (AICC). At the Gowalia Tank Maidan in Bombay, since re-named August Kranti Maidan (August Revolution Ground), Gandhi gave a speech urging Indians to follow non-violent civil disobedience. He told the masses to act as an independent nation and not to follow the orders of the British. His call found support among a large number of Indians. It also found support among Indian revolutionaries who were not necessarily party to Gandhi’s philosophy of non-violence.

Suppression of the Movement

Picketing in front of Medical School at Bangalore

The British, already alarmed by the advance of the Japanese army to the India/Burmaborder, responded the next day by imprisoning Gandhi at the Aga Khan Palace in Pune. All the members of the Congress Party’s Working Committee (national leadership) were arrested and imprisoned at the Ahmednagar Fort. Due to the arrest of major leaders, a young and till then relatively unknown Aruna Asaf Ali presided over the AICC session on August 9, and hoisted the flag. Later, the Congress party was banned. These actions only created sympathy for the cause among the population. Despite lack of direct leadership, large-scale protests and demonstrations were held all over the country. Workers remained absent en masse and strikes were called. Not all the demonstrations were peaceful. At some places bombs exploded, government buildings were set on fire, electricity was cut, and transport and communication lines were severed.

The British swiftly responded with mass detentions. A total of over 100,000 arrests were made nationwide, mass fines were levied, and demonstrators were subjected to public flogging^[4]. Hundreds of resisters and innocent people were killed by police and army fire. Many national leaders went underground and continued their struggle by broadcasting messages over clandestine radio stations, distributing pamphlets, and establishing parallel governments. The British sense of crisis was strong enough that a battleship was specifically set aside to take Gandhi and the Congress leaders out of India, possibly to South Africa or Yemen, but such a step was ultimately not taken, out of fear of intensifying the revolt^[5].

The entire Congress leadership was cut off from the rest of the world for over three years. Gandhi’s wife, Kasturbai Gandhi, and his personal secretary, Mahadev Desai, died in a short space of months, and Gandhi’s own health was failing. Despite this, Gandhi went on a 21-day fast and maintained a superhuman resolve to continue his resistance. Although the British released Gandhi on account of his failing health in 1944, Gandhi kept up the resistance, demanding the complete release of the Congress leadership.

By early 1944, India was mostly peaceful again, while the entire Congress leadership was incarcerated. A sense that the movement had failed depressed many nationalists, while Jinnah and the Muslim League, as well as Congress opponents like the Communists and Hindu extremists, sought to gain political mileage, criticizing Gandhi and the Congress Party.

Contributions Towards Indian Independence

The successes and failures of the Movement are debated. Some historians claim that it failed.^[6] By March 1943, the movement had petered out.^[7] Even the Congress, at the time saw it as failure.^[8] Analysis of the campaign obtained by Military Intelligence in 1943 came to the conclusion that it had failed in its aim of paralyzing the government. It did, however, cause enough trouble and panic among the War administration for General Lockhart to describe India as an “occupied and hostile country.”^[9] However much it might have disconcerted the Raj, the movement may be deemed to have ultimately failed in its aim of bringing the Raj to its knees and to the negotiating table for immediate transfer of power.

Within five months of its inception, the Movement had almost come to a close, and was nowhere near achieving its grandiose aim of toppling the Raj. The primary underlying reason, it appears, was the loyalty of the army, even in places where the local and native police came out in sympathy.^[10] This certainly was also the view of the British Prime Minister, Clement Atlee, at the time of transfer of power. Atlee deemed the contribution of “Quit India” movement as minimal, ascribing greater importance to the revolts and growing dissatisfaction among Royal Indian Armed Forces during and after the war as the driving force behind Britain’s decision to leave India.^[11]

Which phase of our freedom struggle won for us Independence? Mahatma Gandhi’s 1942 Quit India movement or the INA army launched by Netaji Bose to free India, or the Royal Indian Navy Mutiny of 1946? According to the British Prime Minister Clement Attlee, during whose regime India became free, it was the INA and the RIN Mutiny of February 18-23, 1946, that made the British realize that their time was up in India.

An extract from a letter written by P.V. Chuckraborty, former Chief Justice of Calcutta High Court, on March 30, 1976, reads:

“When I was acting as Governor of West Bengal in 1956, Lord Clement Attlee, who as the British Prime Minister in postwar years was responsible for India’s freedom, visited India and stayed in Raj Bhavan Calcutta for two days`85 I put it straight to him like this: ‘The Quit India Movement of Gandhi practically died out long before 1947 and there was nothing in the Indian situation at that time, which made it necessary for the British to leave India in a hurry. Why then did they do so?’ In reply Attlee cited several reasons, the most important of which were the INA activities of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, which weakened the very foundation of the British Empire in India, and the RIN Mutiny which made the British realize that the Indian armed forces could no longer be trusted to prop up the British. When asked about the extent to which the British decision to quit India was influenced by Mahatma Gandhi’s 1942 movement, Attlee’s lips widened in smile of disdain and he uttered, slowly, ‘Minimal’.”

^[12]

Some Indian historians, however, argue that, in fact, the movement had succeeded. The rebellion definitely put a strain on the economic and military resources of the British Empire at a time when they were heavily engaged I World War II. Although at the national level, the ability to galvanize rebellion was limited, the movement is notable for regional success especially at Satara, Talcher, and Midnapore.^[13]In the Tamluk and Contai subdivisions of Midnapore, the local populace were successful in establishing parallel governments, which continued to function, until Gandhi personally requested the leaders to disband in 1944.^[14] At the time, from intelligence reports, the Azad Hind Government under Netaji Subhash Bose in Berlin deemed these an early indication of success of their strategy of fomenting public rebellion.^[15]

It may ultimately be a fruitless question whether it was the powerful common call for resistance among Indians that shattered the spirit and will of the British Raj to continue ruling India, or whether it was the foment of rebellion and resentment among the British Indian Armed Forces.^[16][17] What is beyond doubt, however, is that a population of millions had been motivated, as it never had been before, to say ultimately that independence was a non-negotiable goal, and every act of defiance only increased this sentiment. In addition, the British people and the British Army showed unwillingness to back a policy of repression in India and other parts of the Empire, even as their own country lay shattered by the war’s ravages.

The INA trials in 1945, the resulting militant movements, and the Bombay mutiny had already shaken the pillar of the Raj in India.^[18] By early 1946, all political prisoners had been released. Britain openly adopted a political dialogue with the Indian National Congress to prepare for the eventual transfer of power. On August 15, 1947, India was declared independent.

A young, new generation responded to Gandhi’s call. Indians who lived through Quit India formed the first generation of independent Indians, whose trials and tribulations sowed the seeds of the strongest enduring tradition of democracy and freedom in post-colonial Africa and Asia. When considered in the light of the turbulence and sectarianism which surfaced during the Partition of India, this can be termed one of the greatest examples of prudence of humanity.

http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Quit_India_Movement

Jinnah – Gandhi Talks (1944)

The passing of the Resolution on 23rd March by the All India Muslim League at its Lahore session created a serious situation for the Congress leadership. Mohan Das Karam Chand Gandhi wrote in Harijan on 6th April 1940, “I admit that the step taken by the Muslim League at Lahore creates a baffling situation…the Two Nations theory is an untruth. The vast majority of Muslims of India are converts to Islam or are the descendants of converts. They did not become a separate nation, as soon as they converted. C. Rajagapalachari, a liberal congress leader, who had to resign from the Congress because of his views, however, realised the necessity for Hindu-Muslim reconciliation as a pre-requisite for the attainment of independence. On 23rd April 1942, Rajagapalachari addressed a small gathering of his old Congress supporters in the Madras legislature and had a resolution passed for submission to the All India Congress committee, recommending the acceptance of partition in principle.

On 2nd May 1942, he mooted his proposal on Pakistan in the AICC at Allahabad, which stated, “…it has become necessary to choose the lesser evil and acknowledge the Muslim League’s claim for separation.” The proposal was rejected by 120 to 15 votes. Rajaji did not give up hope, but kept on negotiating with Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad All Jinnah during April 1944, when Gandhi and other Congress leaders were in jail. The correspondence was released to the press on 9th July 1944, and contained what came to be known as the “Rajaji Formula”. It was intended to form the basis of the talks between Jinnah and Gandhi for a settlement of the Hindu-Muslim problem. Rajaji declared that he had already obtained Gandhi’s approval for the formula.

Jinnah placed the formula before the Working Committee of the Muslim League on 30th July 1944, but personally considered it unsatisfactory. He told the committee that Mr. Gandhi is offering a “shadow and a husk, a maimed, mutilated and moth-eaten Pakistan.” Though, in his private capacity Jinnah expressed his pleasure at Gandhi’s acceptance at least of “the principle of Pakistan.”

Meanwhile Allama Inayatullah Khan Mashriqi, leader of the Khaksar Movement also addressed letters to Jinnah and Gandhi urging them to meet to discuss the Hindu-Muslim problem. Gandhi took the initiative and wrote to Jinnah, “Let us meet whenever you wish, do not disappoint me.” The Muslim League Council meeting at Lahore invested Jinnah with full powers to negotiate with Gandhi on its behalf Jinnah accepted the offer and suggested a meeting between the two and offering his residence at Bombay as venue for discussion.

It is worthwhile noting that while Jinnah had full powers to negotiate on behalf of the Muslim League, Gandhi was undertaking this enterprise on his own behalf without the official sanction of the Congress. Many members of the Congress expressed disapproval at Gandhi’s move. The Mahasabha young men shouted anti-Pakistan slogans at Gandhi’s prayer meeting at Panchgani. The meeting took place between the two leaders at Bombay from 9th September to 27th September. They met almost daily, and sometimes even twice in a day. On 27th September, Jinnah announced the termination of talks after the failure of the two leaders to reach an agreement saying, “We trust that this is not the final end of our effort.” While Gandhi commented,”the breakdown is only so- called. It is an adjournment sine die.” In the course of the seventeen day discussions, they exchanged 24 letters which were later on made public.

The discussion as well as the correspondence can be divided into three distinct stages. The first stage when Jinnah asked Gandhi for clarification of various points in the Rajaji formula. The second stage started when Gandhi, on account of obvious difficulties, shunted the Rajaji formula, and attempted to apply his mind to the Lahore Resolution. Eventually Gandhi made some new proposals and after this the final breakdown took place.

An analysis of the correspondence dearly shows that the talk failed because Gandhi simply refused to accept the Lahore Resolution as interpreted by Jinnah. He did not believe in the two nation theory which was the fundamental basis of the Muslims’ demand, and totally rejected the Muslims right of self- determination. On 4th October Jinnah in a press conference at Bombay said, “In one breath Gandhi agrees to the principle of division and in the next he makes proposals which go to destroy the very foundation on which the division is claimed by Muslim India.”

On one hand Gandhi wanted a League-Congress agreement, and on the other denied the League’s representative character and authority to speak on behalf of the Mussalmans of India. In his letter of 25th September 1944, Jinnah summed up Gandhi’s attitude to the Lahore Resolution, thus “You have already rejected the basis and fundamental principles of Lahore Resolution: 1) You did not accept that the Muslims of India are a nation. 2) You do not accept that the Muslims have an inherent right of self-determination. 3) You do not accept that they alone are entitled to exercise this right. 4) You do not accept that Pakistan is composed of two zones, north-west and north-east, comprising six provinces, namely, Sindh, Baluchistan, the North-West Frontier provinces, the Punjab, Bengal and Assam subject to territorial adjustments.”

Gandhi wanted that first the people of India should oust the British with their joint action. When India was free then by mutual settlement and agreement two separate states could be created. Jinnah was not prepared to trust the words of Gandhi or the Congress. He said separation must come first and then matters of common interest between the two states would be settled by a treaty.

Lord Wavell expressed his disappointment at the failure of the talks. He stated that “Gandhi-Jinnah talks ended on a note of complete futility. I must say I expected something better. The two great mountains have met and not even a ridiculous mouse has emerged. This surely must blast Gandhi’s reputation as a leader. Jinnah had an easy task, he merely had to keep on telling Gandhi he was talking nonsense, which was true, and he did so rather rudely, without having to disclose any of the weakness of his own position, or define his Pakistan in any way. I suppose it may increase his prestige with his followers.”

The majority of the Hindus, especially the Mahasabhaits received the news of the breakdown of these talks with utmost relief and joy, for they were anxious lest their leader should commit himself to the ‘vivisection of Mother India’. It was the Muslims who were most bitterly disappointed when the talks failed.

Matlubul Hasan Saiyid has stated, ‘Gandhi’s circuitous argumentation, shifting from Rajagopalacharia’s formula to Lahore Resolution of the League and then back again and then over again to League Resolution, punctuating the discussions by his own suggestions and those of others whom he did not claim to represent, had made the breakdown of the these talks inevitable.

Jinnah had called this breakdown unfortunate, ‘Dr. Tara Chand gives the following reason for the break down, ‘A perusal of the letters exchanged shows that the two parties came very near to one another. What prevented them from concluding a settlement was not the apparent differences between their standpoints, but the distrust and fear which, lay behind the spoken and written word.

Gandhi’s apparent purpose in holding these talks seemed to be to discredit the Muslim League and to appear before the Muslims as a friend doing all he could to concede to their demands, while in fact he was merely weaving a deceptive web of words to fool the public and to impose upon the Lahore Resolution a meaning quite different to what was intended by the framers of the resolution.- The failure of these talks, on the other hand, enhanced the prestige of the Quaid and he was able to consolidate his position as the leader of the Indian Muslims.

Jinnah – Gandhi Talks (1944)

Gandhi-Jinnah Talks

The Gandhi-Jinnah Talks have eminent significance with regard to the political problems of India and the Pakistan Movement. The talks between the two great leaders of the Sub-continent began in response to the general public’s desire for a settlement of Hindu-Muslim differences.

On July 17, 1944, Gandhi wrote a letter to Quaid-i-Azam in which he expressed his desire to meet him. Quaid-i-Azam asked the Muslim League for permission for this meeting. The League readily acquiesced.

The Gandhi-Jinnah talks began in Bombay on September 19, 1944, and lasted till the 24th of the month. The talks were held directly and via correspondence. Gandhi told Quaid-i-Azam that he had come in his personal capacity and was representing neither the Hindus nor the Congress.

Gandhi’s real purpose behind these talks was to extract from Jinnah an admission that the whole proposition of Pakistan was absurd.

Quaid-i-Azam painstakingly explained the basis of the demand of Pakistan. “We maintain”, he wrote to Gandhi, “that Muslims and Hindus are two major nations by any definition or test of a nation. We are a nation of a 100 million. We have our distinctive outlook on life and of life. By all the cannons of international law, we are a nation”. He added that he was “convinced that the true welfare not only of the Muslims but of the rest of India lies in the division of India as proposed in the Lahore Resolution”.

Gandhi on the other hand maintained that India was one nation and saw in the Pakistan Resolution “Nothing but ruin for the whole of India”. “If, however, Pakistan had to be conceded, the areas in which the Muslims are in an absolute majority should be demarcated by a commission approved by both the Congress and the Muslim League. The wishes of the people of these areas will be obtained through referendum. These areas shall form a separate state as soon as possible after India is free from foreign domination. There shall be a treaty of separation which should also provide for the efficient and satisfactory administration of foreign affairs, defense, internal communication, custom and the like which must necessarily continue to be the matters of common interest between the contracting countries”.

This meant, in effect, that power over the whole of India should first be transferred to Congress, which thereafter would allow Muslim majority areas that voted for separation to be constituted, not as independent sovereign state but as part of an Indian federation.

Gandhi contended that his offer gave the substance of the Lahore Resolution. Quaid-i-Azam did not agree to the proposal and the talks ended.

Gandhi-Jinnah Talks

Cripps Mission (1942)

The British were alarmed at the successive victories of Japan during 1940s. When Burma was turned into a battle field and the war reached the Indian boarders, the British started feeling more concerned about the future of India. Situation in the country was further complicated as the Congress wanted to take advantage of the situation by accelerating their efforts in their struggle for independence. Moreover the differences between the Congress and the Muslim League were widening fast and visibly there was no chance to bring both the parties on a common agenda. In these circumstances, the British Government sent a mission to India in 1942 under Sir Stafford Cripps, the Lord Privy Seal, in order to achieve Hindu-Muslim consensus on some constitutional arrangement and to convince the Indians to postpone their struggle till the end of the Second World War.
Cripps arrived in Delhi on March 22, 1942 and had series of meetings with the leading Indian politicians including Jawaharlal Nehru, Abul Kalam Azad, Quaid-i-Azam, Sir Sikandar Hayat Khan, A. K. Fazlul Haq, Dr. Ambedkar, V.D. Savarkar and Tej Bhadur Sappru etc. In the meetings Cripps tried to plead his case before these political leaders and tried to convince them to accept his following proposals:

1. During the course of the war, the British would retain their hold on India. Once the war finished, India would be granted dominion status with complete external and internal autonomy. It would however, be associated with the United Kingdom and other Dominions by a common allegiance to the Crown.
2. At the end of the war, a Constituent Assembly would be set up with the power to frame the future constitution of India. The members of the assembly were to be elected on the basis of proportional representation by the provincial assemblies. Princely States would also be given representation in the Constituent Assembly.
3. The provinces not agreeing to the new constitution would have the right to keep itself out of the proposed Union. Such provinces would also be entitled to create their own separate Union. The British government would also invite them to join the commonwealth.
4. During the war an interim government comprising of different parties of India would be constituted. However, defence and external affairs would be the sole responsibility of the viceroy.

Quaid-i-Azam considered these proposals as “unsatisfactory” and was of the view that the acceptance of the Cripps proposals would “take the Muslims to the gallows.” He said that the proposals have “aroused our deepest anxieties and grave apprehensions, specially with reference to Pakistan Scheme which is a matter of life and death for Muslim India. We will, therefore, endeavour that the principle of Pakistan which finds only veiled recognition in the Document should be conceded in unequivocal terms.” The Quaid, however, was happy to know that in the Cripps proposals, at least the British Government had agreed in principle to the Muslim League’s demand of the partition of India. Yet, Quaid-i-Azam wanted the British Government and Cripps to thoroughly amend the proposals to make them acceptable for the Muslim League.

Actually Quaid-i-Azam and other Muslim League leaders were convinced that Cripps was a traditional supporter of Congress and thus could not present an objective solution to the problem. On the arrival of Cripps, Quaid-i-Azam made it clear that he was a friend of Congress and would only support the Congress’ interests. Congress leaders themselves accepted that Cripps was their man. On his first visit to India, Cripps in fact attended the meetings of the Congress Working Committee. He also visited Gandhi and was so much impressed by him that he wore white khadi suit. He openly ridiculed the Muslim League’s demand for Pakistan when he said, “we cannot deny 25 carore Hindus desire of United India only because 9 carore Muslims oppose it.” In fact the proposals Cripps presented were mainly consisted of the ideas which were discussed in a meeting between Nehru and Cripps in 1938.

Cripps Mission (1942)

Cripps Mission

The British government wanted to get the cooperation of the Indian people in order to deal with the war situation. The divergence between the two major representative parties of the country harassed the British government. It found it difficult to make the war a success without the cooperation of both the Hindus and the Muslims.

On March 22, 1942, Britain sent Sir Stafford Cripps with constitutional proposals.

The important points of the declaration were as follows:

• General elections in the provinces would be arranged as soon as the war ended.
• A new Indian dominion, associated with the United Kingdom would be created.
• Those provinces not joining the dominion could form their own separate union.
• Minorities were to be protected.

However, both the Congress and the Muslim League rejected these proposals. Jinnah opposed the plan, as it did not concede Pakistan. Thus the plan came to nothing.

This article was last updated on Sunday, June 01, 2003

Cripps Mission

The Cabinet Mission Plan: Pakistan and India

In the context of the history of Pakistan and India, there is still a moot point: if the Indian National Congress (INC) had accepted the Cabinet Mission Plan of 1946, what would have been the contours of both Pakistan and India today?

In the ‘long term’ part of the plan, the provinces of united India were to be divided into three groups: Group A consisting of six provinces (Madras, Bombay, Utter Pradesh, Bihar, Central Province and Orissa); Group B consisting of four provinces (Punjab, North Western Frontier Province, Sindh and Balochistan); and Group C consisting of two provinces (Bengal and Assam). In a way, when All India Muslim League (AIML) accepted the plan, it postponed the demand of a separate Muslim state raised in the Lahore Resolution on August 14, 1940.

In the acceptance of the plan, there were two gains for the AIML: first, the future state of Pakistan would be based on the provinces having Muslim majority population such as the provinces in the Group B and C of the plan; and second, the British government had acceded to the Muslim dream of Pakistan that the Muslims saw in 1940. However, in the acceptance of the plan, there were two losses to the AIML: first, the Muslims living in the Hindu majority provinces such as the provinces in the Group A of the plan were excluded from living with other Muslims; and second, the Muslims did not immediately gain Pakistan.

The plan also said: “The constitution of the Union and of the Groups would contain a provision whereby any province could, by a majority vote of its Legislative Assembly, call for a reconsideration of the terms of the constitution after an initial period of ten years and at ten yearly intervals thereafter… Provinces would be free to form Groups with executives and legislatures, and each Group could determine the Provincial subjects to be taken in common.” The language of this part of the plan showed that the British government wanted a consensus based division (or unity) and not an unplanned and enforced one. Secondly, the British government wanted a smooth transition of power.

Earlier, the Lahore Resolution had said: “Resolved that it is the considered view of this session of the All-India Muslim League that no constitutional plan would be workable in this country or acceptable to the Muslims unless it is designed on the following basic principles viz., that geographically contiguous units are demarcated into regions which should be so constituted, with such territorial readjustments as may be necessary, that the areas in which the 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.” In this paragraph of the Resolution, a point is clear: the Muslims of India thought that the constitutional protection of their rights was not possible without the division of united India (and having a separate homeland, whether it consisted of one state or multiple states).

After the Resolution, the AIML strived to remove the ambiguity surrounding the word ‘Independent States’ contained in the resolution. In 1941, at the Madras session of the AIML, a resolution was passed which stated, “Everyone should clearly understand that we are striving for one independent and sovereign Muslim state.” However, in a way, the Cabinet Mission Plan disagreed with this explanation and remained focused on translating the meaning of the Northwestern and Eastern Zones of India in the context of Muslim majority provinces. The plan used the word ‘province’ and not ‘unit’ or ‘area’ (and the word ‘group’ and not ‘zones) as written in the Lahore Resolution. Hence was the existence of the Group B and C in the plan. This point also shows that not only the Muslims in 1940 but also the British government in 1946 understood the reality of geographical remoteness in defining the borders of the future state of Pakistan. In that way, (like the Lahore Resolution) the Cabinet Mission Plan (also) envisaged two Pakistan and not one. By accepting the plan, the AIML also endorsed the same. Perhaps, the AIML preferred one or two conglomeration(s) of Muslim majority provinces to a combination of Muslim majority ‘units’ or ‘areas’ and to achieve that the AIML was ready to wait for another 10 years.

In the Cabinet Mission Plan, there was a low risk of the denial of Pakistan (whether one or two). The division of India into two or three (independent) states was ingrained in the plan. The risk of division was after every 10 years. The plan also showed that both the AIML and the British government were convinced that the solution to the ills of united India lay in its division. The 10-year formula, which was enshrined in the plan, was also to edify the INC to rethink its politico-economic strategy towards the Muslims before another 10 years lapsed. Hence, the 10-year provision would have been a Damocles’ sword hanging over the head of the INC.

By not accepting (one provision or another of) the Cabinet Mission Plan, the INC might have thought of obviating the division of united India. Even the Lahore Resolution and the Cabinet Mission Plan could not convince the INC that both the Muslims and the British government were thinking in terms of the division of India, owing to their own separate reasons. Though the division took place in 1947 but the hasty and enforced division of united India was a loss to both the Hindus and Muslims. The next community that was at loss was the Sikhs, as most of them had to take refuge in the Indian part of the province of Punjab. The hasty and enforced division was materialised through the Radcliffe Award of 1947, which sowed the seeds of permanent hatred between the newly founded states of Pakistan and India.

The writer is a freelance columnist and can be reached at qaisarrashid@yahoo.com

http://dailytimes.com.pk/opinion/14-Aug-13/the-cabinet-mission-plan-pakistan-and-india

A new language policy

By Asif Ezdi

July 27, 2015

On July 10, the government informed the Supreme Court that it had issued an executive order for the replacement of English with Urdu as the country’s official language in stages. The decision had been taken, the court was told, in fulfilment of the government’s obligation under Article 251 of the constitution, which makes it mandatory that arrangements should be made for the use of Urdu for official and other purposes within fifteen years from 1973.

The 15-year grace period for English ended 27 years ago in 1988 but Pakistan is no nearer the goal of replacing it with Urdu as the official language. The truth is that none of the governments, whether civilian or military, which have been in power during this period, has shown any discard English in favour of Urdu. As a result, English has become further entrenched as official language, while the use of Urdu in government offices has been declining despite the fact that its nation-wide use as the language of communication between people speaking different mother tongues has been growing constantly and the language has gained acceptance even in the far-flung parts of the country as its lingua franca.

The Nawaz government’s announcement to make Urdu the official language was not made of its own accord but in response to strictures passed by a Supreme Court bench during the hearing of a case brought by a civic-minded citizen on the government’s failure to implement Article 251. It remains to be seen whether the government possesses the will to take the necessary policy steps to fulfil its commitment.

Scepticism about the government’s resolve has been heightened by the fact that it has still not officially published its new policy on Urdu, and neither the prime minister nor a government minister has cared to speak on the issue in public. Nevertheless, some of the initial steps announced by the government are highly welcome even when they might appear to be largely of symbolic importance. It is to be hoped that the spectacle of government ministers and senior officials speaking in English within the country even when their command of the language is very shaky will become a thing of the past.

But these early steps are the easy part. The real test is whether they will be followed up with the more difficult ones like translating laws, policies and documents into Urdu and training government personnel in the use of Urdu terminology and whether the government has the will to overcome determined resistance from the vested interests which favour the continuation of English as the official language. A lot of hard work and leadership from the top will be needed. The circular issued by the federal government directing the different ministries and departments to start using Urdu is a typical bureaucratic quick fix. Everyone expects that it will be largely ignored.

Opposition to the new policy is coming from the expected quarters: the tiny English-speaking ‘elite’ of the country which is a legacy of British colonial rule, and the upper echelons of the bureaucracy. These are groups which owe their power and privileges largely to their knowledge of English. They have also become the backbone of the present unjust class structure. The government will have to show a lot of determination to break their resistance.

Most important, the introduction of Urdu as official language must be part of a broader language policy in which the use of regional languages is also promoted. In particular, every province should be free to adopt its own language for official purposes in addition to Urdu, and to promote the mother tongue as the language of instruction in the schools. The Supreme Court itself has underlined the importance of regional languages in its hearing of the case and pointed to clause (1) of Article 251 which says that “without prejudice to the status of the national language, a Provincial Assembly may by law prescribe measures for the teaching, promotion and use of a provincial language in addition to the national language.”

But the promotion of regional languages should not be left to the provinces alone. Pakistan is a multi-lingual country and the languages spoken in its different parts are a national treasure. They all go to enrich the cultural mosaic of the country. Their preservation, development and promotion should therefore be made a priority at the federal level as well. In fact, it must go hand in hand with the promotion of Urdu.

In its manifesto for the parliamentary elections of 2013, the PML-N had promised the setting up of a National Language Commission to develop criteria for giving the status of national language to all major languages of the country. Two years into its tenure, the government has done nothing so far to fulfil this promise. In fact, it opposed a private bill introduced by a member of its own party in July last year for an amendment in the constitution to declare the major regional languages as national languages in addition to Urdu.

The PMLN-led government should not delay any further the fulfilment of its pre-election pledge to give the status of national language to the major languages of the country. This would require a constitutional amendment and this step should be taken in parallel with moves to make Urdu the official language. The setting up of a commission for this purpose, as proposed in the PML-N manifesto, would not be advisable as the matter is essentially political. The task of recommending which languages are to be given national status should instead be left to a parliamentary committee which should give a hearing to experts and to civil society representatives.

Once the constitution grants the status of national language to the major regional languages of the country, it follows logically that their promotion should also be a federal responsibility, but without restricting the authority of the respective provincial government for their advancement. At the federal level, this task should be given to the National Language Promotion Board (NLPB), which has replaced the National Language Authority.

In keeping with its enhanced responsibilities, the NLPB should be renamed the National Languages Promotion Board and its governing body should be expanded to include representatives of provincial governments. It would also help if the composition and mandate of the NLPB are specified in the constitution to rescue it from its present position in the backwater of the federal bureaucracy.

The resources and the capacity of the NLPB would also need to be enhanced to make it better equipped to carry out its added responsibilities, especially to translate words and expressions from foreign languages into Urdu and to coin new Urdu terms in the realms of government and administration, law, science and technology, and business and commerce.

It is a shame that we have no Urdu words for even such high constitutional institutions and offices as Senate, Assembly (as in National Assembly), Governor, Supreme Court and the Election Commission and still use the English words transcribed phonetically into Urdu. We should of course be ready to borrow words from Arabic and Persian and exceptionally even from English. To assist the NLPB in coining new words or adopting foreign words, the government should also hire the services of people from the academia, the civil society and the practitioners of various specialised professions.

In promoting Urdu, the main focus in the Supreme Court hearings and in the government’s executive order has been on its use as official language. But the government’s constitutional responsibility is not confined to that. Article 251 states that arrangements must be made also for its use for “other purposes” within 15 years from 1973. Regrettably, our governments have also failed completely in implementing this provision of the article and no serious effort has been made to promote the use of Urdu as a language of education and learning, of science and technology and of business and commerce. To give just one example, no bank in the country issues a cheque book in Urdu. It is hoped that the Supreme Court orders in the ongoing case on Article 251 will address this aspect of the matter as well.

The writer is a former member of the Pakistan Foreign Service.

https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/53125-a-new-language-policy

Sheikh Mujib’s Six Point Programme

Introduction

Sheikh Mujib-ur-Rehman, the president of East Pakistan Awami League, presented Six Point Programme for provincial autonomy in an atmosphere which was least friendly for such ‘extreme’ demands. The programme was announced immediately after the 1965 war with India. During the 1965 war Pakistan had only half a division of soldiers stationed in the East Pakistan, a region surrounded by the’ enemy country’ from three sides. The East Bengalis were terrified by the thought that India could run over them any time and this fear made them feel more neglected than ever before.

Six Points Programme

The position of the Awami League on provincial autonomy and the constitutional structure was embodied in the now famous Six Points.

In summary the points were:

1. The Government shall be parliamentary in form, at the centre and in the provinces, governed by a directly elected legislature chosen on the basis of population by universal adult franchise.
2. The central government shall be responsible only for defence and foreign affairs and, under certain conditions, currency.
3. There shall be separate but freely convertible currencies for each wing, or, should a single currency be used there shall be means to prevent the transfer of resources from one wing to the other.
4. Fiscal policy will be vested in the provinces which, in turn, will provide “requisite resources” to the central government for it to carry out its responsibilities in the defence and foreign affairs areas.
5. Separate accounts will be maintained for the foreign exchange earnings of each province and the provinces will provide foreign exchange as necessary to the central government in a similar manner as internal revenues are to be provided under point 4.
6. Each province shall be permitted to maintain a militia.

The 2^nd, 4^th and 5^th of the ‘Six Point Programme’ purely dealt with the economic issues of East Pakistan.

There was nothing wrong with this demand, because independent economists acknowledge that there had been a massive transfer of resources from East Pakistan to West Pakistan which was one of the causes of ill will between the two wings. Asking for a separate currency did not mean to a call for secessionist movement. It was only intended to get guarantee that the non-transfer of resources from an under-developed region to one that was developed. All the people of the East Pakistan had a full legal right on their own resources. They were also entitled to get subsidies on the basis of being more economically violated and exploited than the West Pakistan.

 Ayub and Six Point Programme

Ayub’s immediate reaction was very hostile towards Six Point Programme. He was already dubious regarding the Bengalis character as he viewed them conspirers in the hands of traditional enemy of Pakistan (India). He adopted several coercive measures against Awami League leaders in order to keep them away from the politics of agitation on the basis of Six Point Programme.

Ayub called the formula a ‘secessionist move’ which would disintegrate Pakistan. The government took Six Point as a programme to divide Pakistan, the implementation of which would destroy the integrity and stability of Pakistan.

Yahya and Six Point Programme

General Yahya followed the policy of his predecessor regarding Six Point Programme and did not give a primary importance to this burning issue. In a very desperate bid to retain power and to validate his unprovoked attack on the East Pakistanis, he made his speech on 26 March, but all he could blame Mujib of was ‘obstinacy, obduracy and refusal to talk sense’.

Here are some insights from Hamood-ur Rahman Commission Report about the Yahya casual attitude towards Six Point Programme. A retired Chief Justice of Pakistan who also served as a constitutional expert in Yahya’s military regime, Justice A.R Cornelius, told the Hamood-ur-Rahman Commission, that he (Yahya) was familiar with them (Six Points) and he used to talk about them from time to time but he never asked for an analysis of these but according to my mind, I think that about four of them were quite easily acceptable and I said in a meeting of the cabinet that it would be easily possible to amend the Constitution so as to give effect to most of the Six Points and that would perhaps ease the political situation.

The failure on the part of Gen. Yahya Khan and his advisers to critically examine the Six Point of Sheikh Mujib ur Rahman and to permit the latter to campaign on the basis of his said Six Point Programme, declaring that the elections were actually a referendum on the Six Points, seems to suggest that neither the General nor any one of his advisers was ever bothered about what the result of the election would be.

Were the Six Points negotiable?

The Commission concluded that the government’s approach to Mujib’s Six Points was off-hand. It also examined that Yahya was totally unprepared for talks with Mujib. On the other hand, Mujib was ready to negotiate as once he said that ‘Six Points are not the words of God’. Privately, before election, Mujib was assuring Yahya that Six Points were his bargaining position’, however, Yahya regime tried its level best to fan propaganda and to create an impression in both West and East Pakistan that the Six Point Programme was nothing, but an unjust plan to divide the country.

 Bhutto and Six Point Programme

Bhutto told in a conversation that he had with one of Yahya’s top advisors months before the negotiations; when this gentleman asked Bhutto what he thought Mujib’s intentions were, Bhutto’s unhesitating response came in one word ‘separation’.

In the Six-point Programme itself, Bhutto saw India’s conspiring hand. Throughout the negotiations, Bhutto believed that the Awami League was moving in fact toward independence’.

Bhutto criticized the Six- points Programme on the following grounds:

Firstly, Provincial control of aid and trade, in addition to the Awami League’s idea of separate currencies for the two provinces, would have meant separate and exclusive economies for the two Wings and would have turned Pakistan into a hotbed of ‘imperialist intrigues’.

Secondly, aid and trade are so bound up with Foreign Policy and Defence that the central government’s control over those areas would have been undoubtedly impaired.

Thirdly, new constitution cannot be unilaterally imposed by any one of the federating units, as Mujib wished to do with his draft based on the Six-points, but has to be acceptable to all the units in the federation, irrespective of their relative size.

On the burning issue of Six Point Programme, there were held some meetings between Bhutto and Mujib. On 27 January, 1971 Bhutto flew to Dacca with the following constitutional formula in order to find some common grounds regarding East Pakistan’s economic grievances.

Firstly, no separate currency for East Pakistan. Oppressive measures for checking the flight of capital from East to West Pakistan may be ensured.

Secondly, foreign trade being inextricably linked with foreign policy would be a core central subject. However, export earnings of each province may be deposited into the accounts of respective government to be opened in state Bank after deducting an agreed percentage for the central government.

In a closed door meeting on January 27, 1971, Mujib insisted on the full taxation power for the provinces and he also made clear that East Pakistan would contribute to defense budget in proportion to her representation in the armed forces. On the other hand, Bhutto opposed this idea and argued that it would not be acceptable to the army. Bhutto opined that the central government without these subjects would not be able to keep the two regions together. But, Mujib suggested the creation of a ‘Revenue Allocation Committee’ for determining the revenue share of the centre after it was raised by the provinces. Bhutto suggested the postponement of further discussion on this subject and the creation of two separate State Banks with one currency. Consequently, their meeting turned into fiasco because of their basic differences on international trade (foreign exchange), taxation, and international aid.

 Conclusion

The critics of the Six Point Programme more concerned with its political than its economic implications. Mujib’s proposal for substantial control of the economy by the provinces gave birth to an irrational fear in West Pakistanis that the six-point plan would lead to the dismemberment of Pakistan by encouraging dissident tribal and linguistic groups in the west.

In reality, Six Point Programme reflected some genuine East Bengali grievances and which were long standing demands of the East Pakistanis who were waiting for these fulfilments for decades. Mujib’s movement proved to be a radical departure from the simple autonomy demand of the past.

The Six Point Programme aimed towards a confederation*, instead of a federation. The demand of full control on rising taxes and expenditure along with the freely convertible currencies and the power to enter into foreign trade relationships, keeping foreign exchange earning separate, was too much for the central government to accommodate.

Neither any political party nor the central government of Pakistan gave any detailed explanation why they were opposed to the Six Points Programme.

[*A confederation (also known as a confederacy or league) is a union of sovereign states, united for purposes of common action often in relation to other states. Usually created by a treaty, confederations of states tend to be established for dealing with critical issues, such as defence, foreign relations, internal trade or currency, with the general government being required to provide support for all its members.

Since the member states of a confederation retain their sovereignty, they have an implicit right of secession.

Example: Switzerland]

Extract from http://pu.edu.pk/images/journal/HistoryPStudies/PDF-FILES/6%20Ayyaz%20Gul_v27No1june2014.pdf