Author: Prafull Goradia
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: February 5, 2002
Introduction: If Zakaria's frame
of mind is based on history, it would still not add up to the Muslims being
enslaved in India
As a follow-up of General Musharraf's
call for turning Pakistan into a secular state, requesting his fellow countrymen
to stay committed to the nation rather than the ummah, Dr Rafiq Zakaria's
thesis on who divided India has proved to be ill timed. Some of the references
made in course of his argument are particularly unfortunate, especially
if one remembers that Indian Muslims are likely to face unprecedented pressure
as a corollary of Musharraf's call for secularism in his January 12 television
speech. Some of Zakaria's observations are incredible. He asserts that
the Indian Muslims have been permanently enslaved, two-third of them to
the Hindus.
Before discussing Qaid-e-Azam Jinnah's
full vision of a separate homeland, it's relevant to ask Zakaria about
his notion of slavery. Has he forgotten our two important Presidents, Dr
Zakir Hussain and Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed, who happened to be Muslims? Not
to forget, our three Chief Justices, Messrs Beg, Hidayatullah and Ahmadi.
The Air Force too has had the privilege of having a Muslim chief. Apparently,
influence of Muslim vote bank during elections is proverbial.
The same Muslim League which was
responsible for Partition, is still flourishing with several MPs in the
Lok Sabha. Though this does not suggest an element of favour in these achievements,
it certainly indicates that Muslims are very much a part of our mainstream.
Our's is perhaps one of those few countries where Muslim Personal law is
still untempered.
One must note that even in Pakistan
it is much more difficult to marry a second time or to divorce the first
wife, than in our country. The fact that Zakaria can express such fanciful
views itself proves that he is no slave. It is true that Hindus were enslaved
by invaders, whether they came via the Hindukush or the Indian ocean. For
centuries, many Muslim rulers in fact treated their Hindu subjects with
contempt, calling them zimmis, levying jizya. Since the Shariat was in
force across large tracts, by and large, the subcontinent was considered
Dar-ul-Islam. It was only with the advent of the British and the defeat
of the Muslim rulers that there was a growing discontent amongst Hindus.
If Zakaria's frame of mind is based
on this history, it still would not add up to the Muslims being enslaved
in India. Zakaria himself has written on page 202 that Muslims of Bombay,
UP and Bihar, were the first to respond to the call for Partition, enthusiastically
supporting the demand for Pakistan.
The Qaid-e-Azam, a Gujarati speaking
Bombay man. Nawabzada Liaquat Ali Khan belonged to UP. According to both
of them, the smaller the minority, the more its insecurity. In Hindu majority
areas like the Punjab and Sindh, there was no insecurity amongst Muslims,
explaining their slow response to the call for Pakistan. The fault, however,
lay with the betrayal of Jinnah's vision of Pakistan. An integral part
of the Muslim League's demand for Partition was an exchange of population
between the two dominions. The Hindus were to shift to India and all Muslims
living on this side of the border were to migrate to the newly created
state of Pakistan. The well-known Karachi daily, Dawn, extensively covered
what the League leaders demanded throughout 1946. In turn, Justice GD Khosla
has quoted the newspaper repeatedly in his book titled Stern Reckon (New
Delhi, 1948). At a press conference on November 25, 1946, at Karachi, Jinnah
appealed to the Central as well as the provincial governments to take the
question of population exchange. Earlier that year, Sir Feroze Khan Noon,
while addressing the Muslim League legislators, had gone to the extent
of threatening the re-enactment of the murderous orgies of Chengiz Khan
and Halaqu Khan if non-Muslims did not agree to the proposal for population
transfer. Khan Iftikhar Hussain of Mamdot had said that the exchange of
population offered a practical solution for the problem of Muslims in Dawn
(December 3). Pir Ilahi Bur, the Sindh leader, observed that he welcomed
an exchange of population for the safety of the minorities, as it would
put an end to all communal disturbances. Ismail Chundrigar, who eventually
became the Prime Minister of Pakistan, had said that the British had no
right to hand over Muslims to a subject people, over whom they had ruled
for 500 years.
Mohammad Ismail, a Madras leader,
had declared that Muslims of India were in the midst of a jihad. Shaukat
Hayat Khan, son of the more famous Sir Sikander Hayat Khan, had threatened,
while the British were still present, a rehearsal of what the Muslims would
do to the Hindus eventually. The point that comes through clearly is that
the transfer of population was an integral part of the demand for Pakistan.
Unfortunately, for the Muslims, the Congress leaders, on the one hand,
conceded Partition, and on the other stood in the way of its total consummation,
that is with regard to hijrat of Muslims. As is well-known, migration is
neither novel, nor surprising to the devout Muslims. Prophet Mohammad had
undertaken hijrat from Mecca to Medina while founding Islam. Much more
recently and in India, hijrat was undertaken by 18,000 Muslims who migrated
to Afghanistan in 1920, in wake of their realisation that British would
not concede the Sultan of Turkey continuing on his throne and thus remaining
the khalifa of all Sunnis. For the Muslim League, Partition, as it turned
out, was a dividere interruptus.
It can however, be argued that despite
the obstinacy of the Congress leaders, many Muslims, if not most or all
of them, could have migrated, but they chose to stay. Surely Zakaria would
not like to blame the Hindus for this.
