|
bthat was India, nearly 400 million people, was divided into bscores of languages, religions, and sects. But, in particular, it bwas the broad category of Hindus versus Muslims that made the boriginal British decision to grant the country independence im- bpossible. In 1942 the British had proposed freedom for India bwith a pledge by the new country “for the protection of social band religious minorities.” bThe Muslims adamantly refused to rely on this promise. bThey made up only some 22 percent of the total population and bdid not trust the 68 percent Hindu majority. The reason? Differ- bence; major and fundamental difference. Under Muhammad Ali Jin- bnah, they won the battle to partition the subcontinent into a bHindu “India” and a Muslim “Pakistan.” But that clear under- bstanding of the impossibility of living together in one state did bnot solve the problem of the minorities who would be living in a bsmaller version of an unpartitioned state. The nineteen million bHindus and Sikhs who would now become minority citizens in ba fiercely nationalist Islamic Pakistan began nervously to con- bsider the resentment that the Muslims, mostly poor farmers, had bborne against the Hindu merchants and storekeepers. bIn turn, Choudharry Rahmat Ali, founder of the Pakistan bnational movement, wrote: “To leave our minorities in Hindu blands is. . . to forget the tragic fate that overwhelmed our mi- bnorities which—in more favorable times—. . . we left in Sicily, bItaly, France, Portugal, Spain, Austria, and Hungary. Where bare they now?” bThe reality was not long in coming: massacres and com- bmunal riots. In the Punjab, where Muslims made up 57 percent bof the total population. In Lahore and Amritsar, mobs, knives, band fires swept the cities. By June 23, 1947, at least 3,200 people bhad been killed in the Punjab alone. The Hindus and Sikhs bbegan to flee. By July a quarter of a million Hindus had fled to bIndia. Panic spread to other parts of the subcontinent. bHindus began to flee in terror from East Bengal. By 1948, b100,000 had run from Pakistan’s capital of Karachi—the fear of bminority status, the fear of being strangers, the desire for sanc- btuary among their own people. The most horrible kind of bmurder and looting took place. It has been estimated that b200,000 people were killed in the Punjab alone. To quote one bobserver, “There was a positive lust for blood. . . . Casualties b
|
|