What was pakistan originally called

The protest resulted in the worst few days of communal rioting British India had ever seen. Although the majority of the Indian population under the British Raj were Hindus, some provinces now called states had Muslim majorities. Some were given the right to choose, while others were divided up — the provinces of Assam, Bengal and Punjab were each split in half, with one half going to India and the other to the new Pakistan.

The remaining princely states could pick a side. Gandhi, who remained the strongest advocate for a unified country, was shot by a Hindu religious fanatic in , just a month before the last of the British troops finally left India.

A British lawyer named Cyril Radcliffe, who had never set foot in Asia, was called upon to draw up the borders between the two countries. Arriving in India just days before the partition, Radcliffe drew up a quick plan that was kept secret for fear that the British would be blamed for the violence that would surely ensue. India and the new state of Pakistan were granted independence on 14 August , but were only made aware of the new borders two days after.

The weeks and months leading up to and following the partition saw unprecedented levels of rioting, violence, loss of property, rape, abduction and murder. The violence was worse in the two halves of Punjab, as Hindus headed in one direction and Muslims in another, with Sikhs and other minorities caught inthe middle. The British had given the princely states the choice of joining India, joining Pakistan or becoming independent and, in the majority of cases, the respective geographic location became a determining factor.

States with a Hindu-majority population, surrounded by India on all sides, almost naturally became part of India, but Kashmir, in the far north, was located between India and Pakistan. Although the ruler was Hindu, most Kashmiris were Muslims.

In October , civil unrest had spread around Kashmir, and Pashtun tribespeople from the northwest of Pakistan were recruited to invade and attack it. Hari Singh fled to India and appealed to the Indian government for help.

India referred the conflict to the United Nations, which asked the Pakistanis to remove their troops from Kashmir, after which India would do the same. Pakistan refused. A ceasefire was agreed in , with a Line of Control LoC separating the 65 percent of Kashmir under Indian control from the 35 percent under Pakistani control.

The LoC was only meant to be temporary, but it remains the de facto border today. Tensions between India and Pakistan over Kashmir have risen and fallen since , but no settlement has ever been reached.

Pakistan was then divided into two parts, with India between the two sides. Although West and East Pakistan were Muslim-majority areas, they were culturally, ethnically and linguistically very different places. In , East Pakistan fought for independence and was backed by Indira Gandhi, who was then the Indian prime minister. The two-week Indo-Pakistani War was fought in early December and on 16 December about nine months after the conflict in East Pakistan had begun , the West Pakistanis surrendered to India.

Madhuri Chowdhury contributed additional reporting to this article. Rajendra Prasad says the division of the Punjab and Bengal was in terms of that resolution. According to that resolution, the League cannot demand any areas to be included into Muslim zones which are not contiguous and in which Muslims are not numerically in a majority. Jinnah to accuse them and abuse them. He cannot have it both ways. Referring to Mr. This website uses cookies We place some essential cookies on your device to make this website work.

Set cookie preferences. Skip to Main Content. Volunteers could be seen marching along the major roads on their way to join the battle in the summer of Some wore uniforms, were armed with swords, spears and muzzle-loading guns. One gang intercepted on their return from fighting even had an armoured elephant.

The militias also worked hand in glove with the local leaders of princely states who channelled funds and arms. They answered to local power brokers and sometimes to the prompts of politicians. This helps explain the scale of the violence. In the main, people were whipped up by demonisation of the other, encouraged by the rhetoric of politicians and a feverish media. The British government had repeatedly delayed granting freedom in the s, when it might have been more amicably achieved.

After waiting decades for freedom, this was a moment of intense anxiety and fear. Propaganda had built up during the preceding war years, especially while Gandhi and the Indian National Congress leaders were shut in prison in the s; Jinnah saw the second world war as a blessing in disguise for this very reason. Ultimately, became a perfect storm as many contingencies collided.

On the British side, the planning was shoddy and the date was rushed forward by a whole year; the original plan was for a British departure in mid And the British bungled the details: there was a sweeping idea behind partition but almost nothing in place to deal with how this unparalleled division would be achieved on the ground.

The limited military force put in place in July, the Punjab Boundary Force, was understaffed and spread over a vast distance. This was a textbook case of a power vacuum.

Where did the power lie as the British left and the new states formed? The British come out of the story looking ill-prepared, naive and even callous.

But could the British have settled the competing nationalist visions in south Asia in the s, and could they have created a constitution to please everybody? This is the great hypothetical question. Endless rounds of previous negotiations had ended in disappointment and overlaying new nation states over the grid of messy, large, complex empires was a challenge all over the world. Many Muslim Leaguers would have accepted power within a federal, decentralised and unified India in , while many members of the Indian National Congress resisted power-sharing schemes.

But, ultimately, we just do not know how the alternatives would have worked. In the event, Jinnah pushed for Pakistan, and the final compromise was to create two states by drawing borders across Punjab and Bengal.

All the key leaders — including Jinnah, Nehru and Mountbatten — agreed to this plan, and with some relief: they hoped it might actually bring an end to violence and herald a new beginning. The tragedy of partition is that the stories of extreme violence in have provided fodder to opposing perspectives ever since, and myths have crystallised around the origins of India and Pakistan.

This sweeps aside any appreciation of the hybrid, Indo-Islamic world that flourished before the British began their conquest in the 18th century. The land in which vernacular Sanskrit-based languages were cross-pollinated with Turkish, Persian, and Arabic, in which Rajput princesses married Mughal rulers, and musical and artistic styles had thrived on the fusion of influences from central Asia and local courtly cultures.

This world of more fluid identities and cultures was gradually dismantled throughout the 19th century under British rule and then smashed by partition. It becomes ever harder, today, to imagine the pre-partitioned Indian subcontinent. In the south Asian case, the historical conflict is now acted out on a different, international stage.