The Mess that was Indias Independence -- Tiberman Sajiwan Ramyead
All nations love to glorify the epic struggles of their Independence, both out of a sense of duty and for the distractions the celebrations provide. The programmes are steered by the reigning government of course. Vibrant homage is paid to the freedom fighters and to the father of the nation; there is always one. The pomp is all sprinkled with loving memories of the commoners sacrifice. Politicians brandish names that suit them, leaving out politically incorrect characters. And post-independence generations end up believing the stories as the whole truth and nothing but the truth, and generally also end up with some grudge for the oppressors and colonialists. Today England, the land of the scheming oppressor, swarms with first, second and third generation immigrants from the oppressed lands and it is still the dream of a good many to migrate to British green grass! As Mauritius Times celebrated its first anniversary in August 1955, Bhupendra Naths first page article, Independence of India, reminded Mauritians of the sublime epic struggle of the Indian people to regain their independence Through peaceful constitutional methods 350 million people had won their freedom. Todays speeches resound of the same stereotype. But in actual fact the periods before, during and after her Independence were Indias worst ones in her long history; far from peaceful. Never had so much ingloriousness sprung from both sides in the context of freedom struggles. On the Indian side and as usual there had never been such a thing as one India, the shames ranged from marked weaknesses to dishonour, ingratitude, treachery and age-old communal hatred. The disunity had rendered Mahatma Gandhi nearly insane as he evolved from truth to truth. During the crucial moments of final political settlements he could only advance the unreasonable suggestions of a child. A few well-researched history books that have emerged years after the events spell out those inglorious acts with stark objectivity (Reference). They serve the reader usefully if only as reminders that the people of ones country were not exactly devoid of the gross mistakes, injustice, tyrannies and monstrosities attributed to the colonial oppressors. Often, a good many discourse and history books present the truth, the whole truth and anything but the truth, as it were, hiding away machinations. Maurice: Une île et son passé Antoine Chelin (1989) 15 August 1947 (events in Mauritius) obtains the shortest entry for that year: Célébration de lIndépendance de lInde. The longest for that year is around 50 words about a lawyer, Raymond Hein (knighted later) receiving some special gratitude Britain had transmitted to Mauritius. Authors note: a few years later this same lawyer would fight for his clients in Savanne for the opening of new taverns and sale of more liquor. Upon the refusal of the District Council to issue new permits, he appealed to the Governor. Indias Congress Party In 1883 (1885 according to Bhattacherge), when Indians were years away from anything resembling a structured political party, the Indian National congress, then known as the Indian National Union, was founded by Allan Octavian Hume, a civil servant of Scottish nationality. With the blessings of the then Viceroy, Hume had sought to create, in good faith, an organisation which would canalise the protests of Indians into a responsible body that would dialogue with the English rulers. Such was the start of Indias National Congress party, later the focal point of mass agitation against British rule. Poor forgotten Hume! And when Gandhi joined the political scene he simply took on from where that party stood; of course shifting his countrys history in the bargain. Upon his return from India in the early 1900s, Winston Churchill, who was wholeheartedly for a British Empire for those lesser breeds without the law, sent out two pounds every month to the Indian who had been his bearer. He was still sending the money in 1947. A year later he would write in his two-volume Gathering Storm: I felt sure we should lose India in the final result and that measureless disasters would come upon the Indian peoples. And the disasters did rain down on India, caused by the most legendary infightings and communal riots, at a time when that country could have done with even some semblance of national unity. But national unity was, and still is, most unIndian a quality handed down to the children in her Diasporas. Mauritius and India, 1946 It is interesting to note the recourse that a few Indians in Mauritius took during that year with regard to their plight in the island. Through Pundit Krishna Dutt Paliwal, Member of the interim Indian Legislative Assembly, Parliamentary Questions were directed to Nehru, also Member for Commonwealth Relations: Will the Member please state whether it is a fact that Indians in Mauritius are not able to enjoy their legal rights due to the racial favouritism . Nehru: The Government of India are not aware The Government have no definite information on this point Nearly one dozen such questions and memoranda pertaining to Mauritius would subsequently be tabled in the Indian Assembly. They finally drove Nehru to exclaim: I am very greatly ashamed. But India was embarking on the gloom and doom of its history. Atul Dev put it mildly in his article Celebrating 60 Years of Indias Independence (Mauritius Times, 10 August 2007). The euphoria of Swaraj and Jai Hind served as mild anaesthetics. The last Viceroy of the empire, Louis Mountbatten, who would later be personally supplicated by Gandhi and Nehru, amongst others, to stay on as the first Governor General, cruelly receives no mention on the occasion of Indias Independence anniversaries. 25 years later he would recall: I did not realise how utterly impossible my task in India was going to be until I met Mohamed Ali Jinnah for the first time. Some little known facts on Indias 1947 episode Two men worked on the gigantic partition settlements of goods and chattel, amazingly undisturbed and uninfluenced, in their bungalows in Delhi they were seasoned British civil servants too Chaudhuri Mohammed Ali, a Moslem, and H.M. Patel, a Hindu. History does not seem to record any emotional bickering between the two men. They received reports from a score of committees and regularly submitted their recommendations to the Partition Council, chaired by the Viceroy. Sir Cyril Radcliffe, an eminent London lawyer chosen because he had never been to India and would therefore stick to objectivity, arrived in Delhi to handle the boundaries commission aspects. He did the job in record time and Indias 400 million souls seemed to have been hardly aware of the existence of Mohammed Ali, Patel and Radcliffe. The Moslems wanted the Taj Mahal broken up and shipped to Pakistan because it had been built by a Moghul. Hindu saddhus insisted that the Indus River, flowing through the heart of Moslem India, should somehow be theirs because their sacred Vedas had been written on its banks 25 centuries before. In the stable yards of the Viceroys House, another most remarkable division took place at issue were twelve horse-drawn viceregal carriages that had conveyed Viceroys, visiting sovereigns and other royal dignitaries; six were trimmed in gold and the other six in silver. It was decided to toss a coin. The gold went to India and the silver to Pakistan. After dividing the harnesses, whips, wigs and coachmens uniforms a last indivisible item remained a horn. The young naval officer handling the handouts decided to keep it for himself. And thus the books, bank notes and bureaucrats chairs of the British Empire were divided between India and Pakistan. Dictionaries were ripped in half, with A to K going to India, the rest to Pakistan. In Lahore a bitter quarrel ensued as to which dominion would get a trombone, after other equipment had been divided up. As the authors put it in Freedom at Midnight: The meanness, the petty mindedness those divisions (Indian soldiers) sometimes produced were staggering. The legendary Indian Army of 1.2 million superb soldiers was also divided up. It was proposed to maintain it intact as a security measure for both India and Pakistan. Jinnah flatly refused. The number of dead during the partition massacres, a cataclysm without precedent and totally unforeseen, will never be known. They ran into millions. The authors of Freedom at Midnight describe the Sikhs, in the most infamous Punjab killings, as the best organised, most vicious killers of all. And British officers who had stayed on to serve in the Indian or Pakistan armies after 15 August 1947 summed it up: It was far worse than anything we saw in World War II. The partition, its human exodus and mass killings, both in millions, are unparalleled in history. Conclusions? What conclusions can be derived on the 60th year of Indias independence? Atul Dev has put it well: But the pain that partition inflicted on Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims, is the real, albeit invisible, story of that time India and Pakistan continue to be inimical to each other, resulting in a series of wars it has fortunately not resulted in any major conflict lately. It is impossible to draw a series of clear-cut conclusions from Indias chaotic Independence episode, but it certainly stands out as the most painful in history. Our younger readers may now begin to understand what Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam meant when he said that our independence was obtained without bloodshed. Mountbatten and Independent India (Reference, bought at Nalanda Bookshop), a selection of personal interviews with Lord Louis Mountbatten, sheds unprecedented light on the untold stories. The photograph is revelatory of the mess, communal and political that India has, and is still going through. It shows Gandhis assassins posing before their murder trial. Front row, left to right: N. Apte, 34, the brain of the plot: hanged; V. Savarkar, 65, homosexual: acquitted; Nathuram Godse, 39, the killer, woman-hating: hanged; V. Karkare, 34, anti-Moslem: life imprisonment; D.Badge, 37, arms peddler, state witness: released. Rear row: S. Kistaya, Badges servant: acquitted; Gopal Godse, 29, the killers brother: life imprisonment; M. Pahwa, 20, Punjabi refugee who had sworn to avenge his mutilated father: life imprisonment. But I shall always love India, my legitimate, cherished second home. [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.mauritiustimes.com/310807ramyead.htm --------------------------------- Be a better Heartthrob. Get better relationship answers from someone who knows. Yahoo! Answers - Check it out.
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