Table of contentsThe early yearsThe Nehru Report and its impactWorld War II and its impact on IndiaPakistan and IndiaOne of the most important developments after World War II was the partition of the Indian subcontinent into the states now known as Pakistan and India. The financial toll of the war had been too much for the British to bear and they were now rapidly leaving their colonies. But it wasn't always thought of that way. The British, as well as the Hindus, always sought a unified India and vehemently refused any talk of partition. But it was the Muslims, under the leadership of their leader, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, who struggled, fought, burned and died so that India was divided and a new country appeared on the world map: Pakistan. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay The Early Years In his early years, Jinnah, like Nehru and Gandhi, had been part of the Indian National Congress. A famous lawyer and a stern and confident personality, Jinnah was adamant that Muslims should join and support the Congress. Nehru and Gandhi also joined the Congress in their early years after returning from abroad to advance the transfer of certain rights to Indians. Gandhi had campaigned in South Africa regarding the treatment of Indians there and Nehru had studied at Cambridge. The rights demanded by Congress included greater political representation of Indians in the running of their country, granting of certain fundamental rights to the Indian masses, and overall a step in the right direction for Indians who were hitherto considered second-class citizens. British. Nehru and Gandhi, both Hindus, saw India as belonging to the Hindus, where Hindus should form the central government due to their growing numbers. As India was ruled for 1000 years by Muslim rulers, there was also resentment among Hindus because of this factor. Nehru and Gandhi also sought to transform the Indian National Congress, envisioned as a platform for all religious groups in India, into one that championed only the rights and aspirations of Hindus. When Jinnah called for reform, he was sidelined. This led to further disillusionment on the part of Jinnah, who now believed that the Hindus could no longer be trusted once the British left. Jinnah had worked to bring Muslims and Hindus closer together, to overcome their differences and unite against the British. At one time he was even a member of both the Muslim League and the Congress. One of his greatest achievements for the unity of Hindu Muslims was the Lucknow Pact, signed at the residence of Jawaharlal Nehru, in which Hindus recognized separate representation in legislative bodies for Muslims, separate electorates for Muslims and the unity agreement between Hindus and Muslims when they spoke. to the British. By now, violence across the subcontinent had increased. There was the Amritsar killings incident of 1919, in which the British murdered around 400 people in cold blood. These unrest angered the British who introduced radical new measures to control the violence. First, the Defense of India Act in World War I and then the Rowlett Act in 1919 were introduced, which caused an uproar among Indians. In August 1920, the Hijrat movement and in August 1921, theMoplah's uprising caused even more unrest and dissidence. Gandhi started the Non-Cooperation Movement to upset the British. Demonstrations, strikes, boycotts and other forms of non-violent resistance marked the era. Nehru led the movement in the central provinces and was arrested. But Jinnah did not share Gandhi's enthusiasm and did not agree with him on this point. Although peaceful, the movement gave rise to violence and Muslims were always the first victims of such incidents. This time, Motilal Nehru, the father of Jawaharlal Nehru, organized his own Swaaraj festival. But Jawaharlal stood by Nehru and continued to support him. The Nehru report and its impact In order to take into account the demands of the Indians, the British sent a commission under the leadership of Viscount Simon, a liberal member of the House of Lords, to find out the demands of the Indians. But the Congress and the Muslim League boycotted the Commission and instead sought to formulate their demands by setting up a joint committee. The result of this committee was the Nehru Report (1928). The Muslim League and Jinnah were devastated. Although it was a joint committee, the demands of Muslims, including an increase in political representation of Muslims in Muslim-majority regions like Sindh, Bengal and the North-West Frontier, were completely ignored. put aside. This made further cooperation between Hindus and Muslims impossible and further disappointed Jinnah in his dream of Muslims and Hindus working together for a united India. Motilal Nehru had been a staunch advocate of one India with no political distinction between the two. According to him, separate electorates and representation would have further divided the people of India. He also did not want to risk criticism from his Congressional colleagues by acceding to the Muslims' demands. Whatever the reason, this incident was extremely damaging to Hindu-Muslim relations and a united India. In response to the Nehru Report, Jinnah issued his famous Fourteen Points in March 1929. He demanded equal rights, opportunities and political representation for Muslims compared to Hindus. . He also sought to protect Muslims from further legislative attacks from Congress by demanding several changes to the legislative framework. The Muslim League united in support of these demands while the Congress stood firm on the idea of ​​one India. Both parties wanted to end British rule, but there was no common ground on what should replace it. When Gandhi launched another civil disobedience movement in 1930, it was criticized by the Muslim League not only as a movement for independence, but also as a movement to establish domination over Muslims. This lack of unity among the Indians made it difficult for the British to know what to do. following. When a series of round tables convened by the British failed, things became more complicated. Gandhi did not participate in the first conference and continued his movement of non-cooperation which led him to prison. In the second conference, he stood by the Nehru report and refused to provide grants to minorities. This led to the failure of the conferences. In 1935, the British introduced the Government of India Act which granted extensive rights to Indians. But the Muslim League and the Congress opposed the law because it did not give India the independence they sought. The 1937 elections further proved the divide between Hindus and Muslims. The Congress won a large majority and established government throughout India, including theMuslim-majority regions. The elections were fair, but it was the Congress's treatment of Muslims that made them realize what would happen to them if Hindus remained in charge once the British left. Politically, the Congress completely ignored the Muslim League and refused to add Muslims to the government unless they joined the Congress. Congress flags flew from public buildings and a Hindu nationalist song, the ram Bande Mata, became the new national anthem. This anthem encouraged the expulsion of Muslims from the subcontinent. A basic education program, introduced by Gandhi, removed religious education and replaced Urdu with Hindi as the medium of instruction. A local council in the central provinces asked students, including Muslim boys, to prostrate themselves before the portrait of Gandhi. Muslims living under Hindu rule felt harassed. They considered these steps as an attempt by Hindus to deny their culture and identity. This is proof that, even with legal guarantees, Muslims could not trust Congress to safeguard their rights. The arrogant and harsh attitude of the Congress after the 1937 elections convinced more Muslims that Quaid e Azam, as Jinnah was now popularly called, was not wrong in his judgment on the threats to them during the regime of Congress. World War II and its impact on India. 2 broke out, the difference between the Congress and the Muslim League became more evident. In reaction to Britain's failure to consult Indians before urging India to join the war effort, Congress resigned from the government and continued to oppose the effort British war. The league, for its part, was satisfied with this development and declared this day “Deliverance Day”. He gave limited support to the British during the war, saying they did not want Nazi Germany to win. The British then sent Sir Stafford Cripps with a promise of independence once the war was over. But this offer came too late. The Muslim League saw Cripps' proposals lead to a Hindu majority imposing a new Indian Union and denying Muslim rights when Gandhi wanted immediate power. Both parties rejected the proposals. Gandhi started the Quit India movement, which Jinnah saw as a ploy by the Congress to take full control once the British left. This movement is causing serious outbursts of violence unprecedented in India in the last twenty years. In 1944, Gandhi and Jinnah met several times to discuss what would happen once the British left. The talks ended in an impasse because Gandhi still claimed to represent all Indians, including Muslims, and wanted independence first and then consider partition. He argued that Muslims could not be called a nation in any way and were not at all distinct from the rest of India. MA Jinnah knew that the Congress could never be trusted to keep its promise once the British left and wanted the issue of partition to be resolved before the British left. He argued that, by any canon of international law, Muslims constituted a nation because they had a completely different way of life from that of Hindus. The Quaid had called for a separate Muslim homeland called Pakistan earlier during the Lahore Resolution of March 23, 1940. The Wavell to Simla plan proposed an executive council with equal number of Muslim and Hindu ministers. But since Sikhs and other scheduled castes would most certainly vote..