May 1998 Edition
by Asghar Ali Engineer
We have entered the 50th year of independence - an independence won at the cost of division of our country. Why was India divided? Who is to blame and where does the responsibility lie for partition? The popular view is that Muslims were responsible for the creation of Pakistan. A more extreme and harsher view is taken by the RSS ideologues who think that it was Muslim fanaticism which divided Akhand Bharat.
Both these, to say the least, are simplistic views. Neither Islam, nor Muslims, were responsible for the creation of Pakistan. Pakistan was the result of a very complex interplay of forces. If we can say anything with certainty it is that vested interests on both ides played a crucial role in bringing about vivisection of the country. Communalism is not the product of religion as many people think, but the product of misuse of religion by vested interests.
Modernists' Creation
Pakistan was not a creation of religious bigotry; it was a creation of the modernists among Muslims. The demand for Pakistan was raised by a highly westernised Muslim, Mohammad Ali Jinnah. Jinnah did not have even an elementary knowledge of Islam and was hardly a believer or a practising Muslim. He had strongly opposed Mahatma Gandhi when he took up the Khilafat cause and vehemently resisted the entry of mullahs in politics.
It is interesting to recall that the great scholars of Islam and the highly orthodox Muslims had vehemently opposed the very idea of Pakistan. Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, who translated the holy Koran into Urdu, called Tarjuman al-Qur'an, was a resolute opponent of the idea of Pakistan. He had theological objections to the word, 'Pakistan' (holy land.) He believed that the whole universe has been created by Allah; how could only a small part of land then be described as holy?
Although Azad's opposition to the creation of Pakistan is well-known the opposition by the other ulema is not so well publicised. It is known only to the experts and scholars of the freedom movement. In fact, the whole organisation of Muslim divines called Jami'at-ul-'Ulema-i-Hind was a supporter of the Indian National Congress and never budged from its position even in the heyday of the clamour for Pakistan. Maulana Husain Ahmad Madani, one of the most eminent alim from India, was another well-known opponent of the idea of Pakistan.
As soon as the two-nation theory resolution was passed on March 23, 1940, Maulana Husain Ahmad Madani undertook a whirlwind tour of India appealing to the Muslims not to be misled by the Muslim League's propaganda. The Maulana was attacked by the League hooligans who threw garbage on him.
Maulana Madam, Maulana Hifzur Rahman and other ulema fully supported the concept of muttahida qaumiyyat (composite nationalism.) Moreover, they fully justified it on religious grounds. In this they emulated the sunnah practice of the Holy Prophet. When the Prophet migrated from Mecca to Madina there were various religious communities like the Jews, pagans and Muslims. Also, these religious communities were divided into various tribes and clans. These tribes had their distinctive identities and traditions. The Prophet, therefore, drew up a pact (mu'ahidah) with the representatives of the religious communities and tribes and gave them full freedom to practise their own religion.
The ulema, therefore, argued that when the Holy Prophet himself had set up a composite city state in Madina why cannot we in India along with the Hindus and others accept the concept of composite nationalism. All that the ulema wanted was an assurance from the Indian National Congress that the Muslims would be free to practise their religion in independent India and such an assurance had been readily given.
Koran Quoted
Maulana Madani, who wrote a book, Muttahida Qaumiyat Aur Islam, persuasively argued in favour of composite nationalism by profusely quoting from the Koran. The Maulana's main argument was that qaumiyat was a territorial concept and not a religious one. It is millat which has a religious connotation. He argued that according to the Holy Koran the prophets shared the same territory with unbelievers and hence their qaumiyat was not different from those who did not believe in their message.
In the last chapter of his book Maulana Madani cites various historical examples to show that common nationality is not against the precepts of Islam. He says that when a person can perform several roles at the same time as a father, a son, a son-in-law, a teacher, a student, a ruler, why can he not combine different identities and functions as a citizen of a country, a Muslim, a speaker of a certain language, etc. In short, the Muslims of India can live as Indian nationals with other non-Muslim communities and follow their own religion, personal law, speak their language etc.
He suggests that different measures could be adopted to protect their rights in these respects, and be free to establish relations with other parts of the Islamic world, be it Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Asia Minor, Central Asia, Africa, Europe or America.
Maulana Madam wrote all this while opposing the two- nation theory. In fact, according to him the very spirit of the Koran is to encourage harmonious coexistence in a multi-cultural, multi-racial and multi-religious world. The Koran says, "For every one of you we appointed a law and a way. And if Allah had pleased He would have made you a single people, but that He might try you in what He gave you. So vie one with another in virtuous deeds". (5:48)
No Justification
The ulema like Maulana Madani knew better than Jinnah did that there is no justification for the two-nation theory in the holy scripture of Islam. It is, therefore, obvious that the genesis of the two-nation theory was purely political. The movement for Pakistan came into existence not because Muslims could not live with the Hindus and others in India but because a section of modern educated Muslims felt that they would not get their due share of political and economic power in independent India, and that they would be dominated by the Hindu elite.
This is also proved by the fact that Jinnah, a modernist, did not conceive of Pakistan as a theocratic state but a modern secular state. As the late chief justice of the Lahore high court, Mr Muhammad Munir, said in his book, 'From Jinnah to Zia': "There can be no doubt that Jinnah was a secularist and against theocracy. In his speech to the Constituent Assembly on August 11, 1947, he had given a picture of Pakistan which was nothing short of a secular state in which Muslims and non-Muslims could live together and be its citizens, with equal rights of citizenship, and that religion would be a private affair of the individual, having nothing to do with the administration of the state".
The two-nation theory stands belied not because Bengali Muslims could not live with the Punjabi and other Muslims and that Urdu-speaking Mohajirs are finding it difficult to co-exist peacefully with Sindhis and others in Pakistan, but because more Muslims live in India than in Pakistan, coexisting with Hindus. Is this not the ultimate falsification of the two-nation theory?
Also see The 2-Nation Theory and Partition for a more detailed and historical perspective on this subject.
For other selections relating to the history of India and the sub-continent, also visit South Asian History .
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