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Britain's Lord Mountbatten reveals partition plan to the Indian nationalist leader Nehru (l) and Muslim League President Jinnah (r); Refugees depart
Credit: Reuters, AP |
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Heavily taxed by World War I, the British in 1919 granted India greater control over government and civil service functions. But in the same year, the so-called "Black Acts" triggered nationwide protest by re-confirming that non-white British subjects were entitled only to limited civil rights. During these protests, the London-trained lawyer Mohandas Gandhi emerged as a major political figure. Leading frequent strikes and non-violent protests, Gandhi by 1935 pressured Britain to pass the Government of India Act, which would have provided India with a democratic federal government. This act never went into effect, however, and with the start of World War II, Gandhi and other nationalist leaders -- who now demanded that Britain leave India entirely -- were jailed.
After the war, a bankrupted Britain was anxious to leave India, but Hindu and Muslim representatives could agree to neither a single, multi-ethnic state, nor to the borders between a Hindu state and a Muslim one. The British prepared to leave anyway. Finally, in June 1947, against Gandhi's wishes, the Indian National Congress and the Muslim League agreed to partition India, placing predominately Hindu areas in India and predominately Muslim ones in Pakistan. In the world's largest ever migration, 3.5 million Hindus and Sikhs fled to India, while Pakistan received 5 million Muslim refugees. Many thousands died. Gandhi managed to curtail riots in Calcutta through a hunger strike. His efforts to further pacify Hindu-Muslim relations in India ended on January 30, 1948, with his assassination by a Hindu zealot.
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