Post on 04-Apr-2023
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AH 4308 India and its neighbours: Conflicts, Accommodations and Integration
Compare and contrast the formation of two Muslim countries of the Indian sub-continent
namely Pakistan and Bangladesh.
Lecturer: Dr BA Hussainmiya
Done By
Iqhwan Iskandar Hj Md Ceaser Suwardy 11B1081
Siti Nur Aqilah Binti Alias 11B1209
Nurul AlinaAtaillah Binti Emran 11B1022
Department of Historical Studies
Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences
University Brunei Darussalam
Semester Two 2014/2015
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Compare and contrast the formation of two Muslim countries of the Indian sub-continent
namely Pakistan and Bangladesh.
Introduction
The formation of two Muslim countries of the Indian sub-continent namely Pakistan and
Bangladesh is arguably not achieved by peaceful means. For this essay, the focus is to examine
the historical events such as the geo-political and social factors of these two countries in order to
explain why and how they have existed separately. The scope of this essay would only touch on
the historical events from 1920s to 1940s leading to the partition of India (for the formation of
Pakistan) as well as Bangladesh liberation war especially from 1947 until 1971 (for the
formation of Bangladesh).
General/Historical Background
Geo-political and Social factors
For Pakistan, the initial trigger was due to Muslim-Hindu relationship deteriorating, communal
clashes and the fear of Hindu-influenced government undermining Muslim rights. At the bigger
picture, Pakistan came to be when Jinnah, the leader for the Muslim League, advanced the idea
of a secular state for the Muslims in India. For Bangladesh, the geo-political factor could
possibly be the first reason that motivated their separation against Pakistan. Nonetheless, the
discriminating governance nature of the former is partly the blame - for example, adoption of
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Urdu as the official language and the unfair distribution of economic provision. The following
paragraphs will explain the reasons in details.
Pakistan
The creation of Pakistan is a combination of religious ideology (the fear of Muslims over Hindu-
influence government), the proposal for Pakistan made by Jinnah and the Muslim league in 1940
and the problem of communal clashes (between the Muslims and the Hindus) – which proved
how Gandhi's non-violent philosophy in the period of 1930’s and 1940s failed to solve the issue.
According to Spear (1965), the Pakistan movement has its early seed when the Indian National
Congress was created. This sent alarm for the Muslims when they perceived the creation of the
Congress as way to promote the concept of majority rule which “majority rule in India would
mean Hindu rule” (Spear, p.226, 1965). As a mean to safeguard the rights of the Muslims, the
Muslim League was created in 1906 (Spear, 1965).
The cause to safeguards the Muslim rights became the central issue in the following events
which occurred in 1920s until 1930s - which later also became the catalyst to further invoke the
idea of Pakistan movement. As noted by Spear (1965), the Muslim League’s proposal for
separate electorate was rejected by Motilal Nehru (who was part of the Indian National
Congress) in 1928. The work of the poet Sir Muhammad Iqbal in the 1930s also unconsciously
spread the idea of separate Muslim state (with the emphasis of independence and self-reliance)
when his work reached the public (Spear, 1965). When the British introduced the Government
India Act of 1935, this further created the tension between the Congress and the Muslim League.
Through this Act of 1935, its aim was to introduce federal government in India’s provinces by
electorate votes (Parkeh, 1997). The result of 1937 elections put the Muslim League in further
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difficult situations when the Congress won most votes from the provinces with Muslims majority
(Parkeh, 1997).
As mentioned earlier, one of the reasons for the formation of Pakistan was due to communal
clashes. For instance, the communal riot in 1921 – which occurred when Gandhi told the Hindus
to cooperate with the Muslims – while the Muslims, took advantage of the situation by attacking
the Hindus and the British at the same time. This was worsening in 1924 during the Kohat riot
where hundreds of Hindus were killed by the Muslims (Downing, 2002, p. 37). Due to the riots
that occurred, both Gandhi and Jinnah realised the communal issue that had arisen. Gandhi
wanted the Hindus and the Muslims to be united under India, so as Jinnah. He only changed his
mind when he realised the issue could not be solved through non-violence (which Gandhi tried to
practice), but through educating the Muslims hence having a separate region, Pakistan
(Downing, 2002, p. 45).
There was also a riot that occurred in 1946 called "Direct Action day" (Fsmitha, 2001) led by
Jinnah and the Muslim league aimed to politically pressure the government instead of trying to
win the majority Hindus into an agreement with the Muslim league. Mobs took charge and
killings occurred between the Hindus and the Muslims. The Muslims became overwhelmed by
the Hindus Backlash reinforced by the Sikhs. Later on, there was another violence that erupted in
the area of Punjab when the Muslim League was told to administer there but not agreed by the
Sikhs. This resulted in them to riot, which eventually led to the killings between the Muslims and
the Sikhs (Fsmitha, 2001). This violent phenomenon later spread to other areas such as Amritsar,
Lahore and Rawalpindi (Fsmitha, 2001). This event occurred from April until July 1947 which
was closely before the independence of India and separation of Pakistan.
Bangladesh
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Before 1971, both Bangladesh and Pakistan existed as one where the former was known as East
Pakistan while the latter was West Pakistan. Prior to the separation, the existence of both was
primarily based on having a common religion; Islam (Santos, 2007). The separation began with
the ignorance of Pakistan's government (Syed Atif Hussain, n .d, p. 2) towards the geographical
factor and this led to ethnic and cultural gap between the two territories. For instance, the
geographical distance within the region led to the formation of two wings (West Pakistan and
East Pakistan were separated approximately 1, 100 miles of Indian territory) (Choudhary, 2011,
p. 77), the issue of national language and the inequality towards representations in creating
constitution for Pakistan and national assembly (Syed Atif Hussain, n .d, p. 6).
The language of Urdu was made as a national language by the Pakistanis government. However,
this was done without considering the opinion of the Bengalis who mostly spoke Bengali
language. This was worsen when Jinnah came to East Pakistan in 1948 (Sisson & Rose, 1990)
and declared to the Bengalis that anyone who opposed the national language of Urdu would be
considered as traitor (Syed Atif Hussain, n .d, p. 3). The motion for this language policy was also
reaffirmed by the country’s second prime minister Khwaja Nazimuddin, himself a Bengali, thus,
ultimately causing the Bengalis to be angry and led to the formation of "language movement" in
February 1952 (Sisson & Rose, 1990). Moreover, for the Bengalis, if Urdu language were to be
adopted not only it hampers the chances for their people to enter administration services but also
it would harm their cultural identity (Sisson & Rose, 1990). On the other hand, Santos (p.24,
2007) notes that elites in the West Pakistan perceived the Urdu script resembles closely to the
Arabic script of the Koran while believing the Bengali script based on “Devnagari and with a
Sanskrit vocabulary” which is Hindu-heavy. This further motivated the central government of
Pakistan to adopt Urdu as the official language.
Hence, the demand from East Pakistan to West Pakistan was that it should recognise two
languages (Bengali and Urdu) existed since the independence of Pakistan. In an attempt to
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control the violence over language issue, the police fired on crowd of demonstrators and around
twenty students were killed (Syed Atif Hussain, n .d, p. 3).
There was also inequality in the creation of Pakistan's constitution in 1956. The 1956
constitution changed the name of the east Bengal to East Pakistan while four provinces of the
west wing were merged into West Pakistan (Syed Atif Hussain, n .d, p. 3). It should be noted that
East Pakistan was 56% (Syed Atif Hussain, n .d, p. 3) of the population but their representation
was less as compared to the representation of west Pakistan. This caused dissatisfaction among
the East Pakistanis as this would give bigger power to the West Pakistan in controlling the
economic policy of Pakistan which at the same time affected the economic situation in East
Pakistan.
From the economic grievances experienced in the East Pakistan, they were not happy with how
much of the resources and development being directed to West Pakistan. According to Santos
(p.25, 2007), among the discriminating economic practices imposed on the Bengalis by the
government in West Pakistan were the allocation of smaller amount of development expenditure
and the transferring much of Pakistan’s foreign exchanges earnings (although “mostly earned by
East Pakistan”) and foreign aid to West Pakistan. From these economic disparities, it resulted in
the slower growth of economic development in East Pakistan and the widening gap of per
income capita between the two (Santos, 2007). Such shortfalls were apparent when there was the
adoption of industrialization policy (called as The Pakistan Industrial Development Corporation)
in 1952 for West Pakistan by the central government as well as the issue on the Bengalis having
to pay more for food compared to their west counterparts (Santos, p.5, 2007).
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Comparison in the Formation Process of Pakistan and Bangladesh
The formation process of both Pakistan and Bangladesh saw the use of violent as well
democratic regime. Both definitely did not achieve independence based on peaceful means. Both
also had elements of radicalism and revivalism in the process. The use of elements such as
radicalism and revivalism is important to measure how changes can be achieved either through
violence (for the former) and peace or democracy (the latter) (Iik Ariffin Mansurnoor, 2009). By
applying these concepts in the formation of Pakistan and Bangladesh, this would provide the
explanation for comparison of the two and as well in identifying their differences and
similarities.
Pakistan
From the events such as the Act of 1935 and election of 1937 as well as communal clashes of
1946-47, it provided further reasons for radicalism to occur for the formation of Pakistan.
Originally, Jinnah wanted to unite the Hindus and Muslims under United India but was also
trying to promote Muslim rights to the Congress. As an example, he tried to resort to democratic
form of negotiations with the Congress by asking for coalition in 1937. With the continuous
rejection and ignorance by the Congress, this led to Jinnah adopting radical political practices.
According to Parekh (p. 24, 1997), the elections of 1937 showed that the Muslim provinces were
not behind or in the Muslim League and hence, this prompted the Congress to win them over
through “mass contact” - with a view to reassuring them that it posed no threat to their religious
and other interest" (Parekh, p.24, 1997). This made the Muslim League suspicious and thus,
made a "rather vicious campaign of its own, aimed at arousing Muslim fears and sense of
insecurity" (Parekh, p.24, 1997).
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Whereas for Gandhi, being a philosophical anarchist, although aims to promote non-violent
campaigns against the British, he fails to take account the radical nature of communal clashes
between the Hindus and Muslims. Using philosophical approaches, as a form of revivalist
measure, to manage these communal clashes proved to be ineffective as it did not prevented
further rampage between the two groups. From the communal clash of 1946, the death toll was
staggering, with reports stating that it reached 5000 people and around 20,000 people were
injured (Fsmitha, 2001). In places where Hindus were the majority, many Muslims were killed.
The riot soon spun out of control and and despite the British intervention, the killings still
continued. The riot also spread to other major areas such as Dakha, Bihar, Bombay, Ahmadabad
and Lahore (Fsmitha, 2001). In addition, when riots occurred in 1947, Gandhi was at East
Bengal to preach non-violence when violence caused thousands dead in that area. When another
fighting occurred in Bihar where Muslims were many killed by the Hindus, he tried to gain
respect for the Muslims by reading the Quran at public meetings. This however led to him being
called a traitor and "Jinnah's slave" by the Hindus (Fsmitha, 2001).
Gandhi, although, proved to be more of people’s leader than Jinnah (because Gandhi advocated
for both India’s independence and the welfare of the Indians as a whole), his should have given
more attention to the nature of communal clashes. In fact, according to Padhy (2011), Gandhi
behaves as a philosophical anarchist and because of this; Gandhi did not trust the use of authority
(such as the police force) on the people. From this reason, Gandhi can also be considered to act
out as a radical during events pertaining to Pakistan’s creation. If he had chosen to handle the
communal clashes more effectively (without coercive), it would have created social order for
both the Hindus and the Muslims.
From the events in the creation of Pakistan, the process of radicalism and revivalism occurred at
various levels such among the national leaders like Jinnah and Gandhi as well as the Hindus and
the Muslims. To say it was because of Jinnah’s radicalism that idea of Pakistan movement
existed would be half-true. The idea of Pakistan has already floated even before Jinnah came into
the picture especially when the Congress and later, the Muslim League were created. Before
Jinnah succumbed to violent tactics in achieving changes, he actually tried to negotiate with the
Congress to safeguards Muslim rights. However, through the Congress’s continuous rejections
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on his plans and also the Muslim League, this opened reasons for radicalism to occur. Whereas
for Gandhi, although at the surface, he seems like a revivalist who uses democratic regime to
achieve change, his actions of handling communal clashes have contributed to radical uprisings
between the Hindus and the Muslims.
Bangladesh
With the realisation of discriminating policy imposed on the Bengalis at various aspects, this
prompted the East Pakistan, through Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, to draw up the the Six Points plan.
The original aim of this plan was not to gain independence but regional autonomy for East
Pakistan from the central government of Pakistan (Santos, 2007). Being mistaken as an attempt
to achieve independence, the military from the west responded to this issue radically by
organizing preventive war in East Pakistan (Santos, 2007). When millions of Bengalis were
slaughtered in the systematic genocide, this led to the formation of guerilla military in East
Pakistan known as Mukti Fauj (later called Mukti Bahani) as a counter force and an alliance with
external power (India) to defeat the military of West Pakistan (Santos, 2007). Hence, when the
original intention of East Pakistan to achieve regional autonomy shifted towards the call for
independence, it demonstrated the processes of radicalism and revivalism to obtain changes for
both West and East Pakistan.
In the case of radicalism, the central government of Pakistan from the west took the major role in
being the perpetrator. For instance, they were involved in the killings of East Pakistan protesters
although these protesters were only involved in a peaceful demonstration in 1952. This was an
act to suppress violence over the language issue. Moreover, when Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the
leader of the Awami league demanded changes regarding East Pakistan under the Six Points Plan
(Syed Atif Hussain, n .d, p. 5), it was met with harsh response from the west. The government of
Pakistan from the west could not agree with this proposal as they saw this as an attempt to
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achieve independence (Santos, 2007). Thus, Mujib and his supporters were imprisoned and
charged with treason (Syed Atif Hussain, n .d, p. 5). Another proposal was then made by
Pakistan’s President, Yahya who was trying to sideline Mujib (Syed Atif Hussain, n .d, p. 5). The
negotiations however did not work and this led to an event in March 1971 where the army
moved in and attacked the University in Dhaka, causing 35, 000 people killed and Pakistan’s
army was only stopped when the Indian army interfered (Syed Atif Hussain, n .d, p. 6).
For the East Pakistan, prior to the Bengali movement for independence, the action of Sheikh
Mujibur Rahman in drawing up the Six Points Plan as well as the Awami League winning
elections in 1970 (Santos, 2007) could be seen as revivalist approach to obtain democratic
changes from the central government of Pakistan. Under the Six Points Plan, it contain the aims
of East Pakistan where “It demanded, among other things, that control over foreign aid
allocation, taxation, and foreign trade be transferred to the provinces in order to end the
disproportionate control of the central government over resource allocation.” (Santos, p.27,
2007). During the election in 1970, even though the United Front (coalition of Awami League
and Krishak Samaj party) won in the Constituent assembly election, Pakistan government could
not accept the results and ended up arresting the political leaders instead (Choudhary, 2011, p.
82). Although East Pakistan originally resorted to revivalist approach for changes, she eventually
succumbed to radicalism when the Mukti Fauj (a guerrilla army) was founded and also when she
asked India for military assistance. This counterforce employed the element of military where
arm weapons were used to take down the West Pakistan military (Santos, 2007).
Hence from the events, it illustrates how both West and East Pakistan were involved in the
radical and revivalist processes of Bangladesh’s independence in 1971. Radicalism is more
apparent when Pakistan’s government from the west acted based on violence by killing the
people of East over an attempt to control the protest demonstrators. Pakistan’s government from
the west also opted for radicalism when they decided to attack East Pakistan when the
negotiations with East Pakistan did not work. East Pakistan, however, demonstrated the use of
revivalist approaches where they opted for peaceful demonstrations and negotiations (despite
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failing and being rejected many times by the government of Pakistan) in trying to achieve
regional autonomy. However, when the counterforce like the Mukti Fauj was created and
coupled with the establishment of an alliance between East Pakistan and India, this shows
radicalism is also embraced by the East Pakistan in order to respond back to West Pakistan’s
atrocities.
The creation of Pakistan and Bangladesh is not achieved without the use radicalism. Despite
some parties are making efforts to use revivalist approach, for instances, Gandhi and his role in
United India and the East Pakistan through the Awami League, violence still persisting. Often in
the case for the creation of Pakistan, radicalism occurred as long as there were communal
clashes. This even continued during the process of migration of the Hindus to India and the
Muslims to Pakistan. Similarly in East Pakistan, radical approach existed when the West
Pakistan government decided to use it against East Pakistan in the preventive war. Even though
East Pakistan had used revivalist approach (through negotiations and elections) to reach an
agreement from the central government, they were treated with harshly!
Perhaps the sharp contrast found in the process of Pakistan and the Bangladesh is that the former
had gone through turmoil during the British colonialism as well as the experience of being a
minority in a Hindu-dominated India. Yet, when Pakistan existed as West and East Pakistan, she
was unable to perform her duties faithfully in taking care of its people. The cries of the Bengalis
in East Pakistan for freedom show how the central government of Pakistan (which consisted the
same people who for fought for their rights and freedom in 1947) practice injustice and create
suffering.
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Personal Views
Pakistan
In the case of Pakistan, the process of independence was slow because of its complex nature. At
the political level, national leaders possess different philosophical ideals on how and what they
wish to implement. For instance, Gandhi wanted a united India without any separation and while
Jinnah, thinking otherwise, wanted Pakistan (Fsmitha, 2001). According to Fsmitha (2001), the
difference of views upheld by both Gandhi and Jinnah subsequently affected the political parties.
The Muslim League supports Muslims with separate India and India's Congress supports
Muslims and Hindus under United India. However, there were also Muslims and Hindus who
opposed to the idea of the separation. All of this led to clashes in opinions and agreements
causing slow progress in achieving independence. This is further supported by the British who
was at first opposed to the separation (due to communal clashes) but later supported it with a
belief that agreement would hardly be made with the Muslim League and the Congress Party
(Ravoof, 1947, p. 32). Hence it is fair to conclude that, due to the arguments between the two
parties and also the Muslims and Hindus, the British was reluctant to give them Independence
causing a slow progress and more riots.
At social level, clashes between the Muslims and the Hindus are other factors which slow down
the process of independence. The causes of these communal clashes could happen, for example,
when the two groups misunderstood their national leaders’ ideas and actions. For instance, in the
Kohat riot of 1921, instead of cooperating with the Hindus, the Muslims took the opportunity to
attack them as well as the British. Moreover, as noted by Parekh (1997), Jinnah actually initiated
the vicious campaigns against the Congress in 1937 by arousing fear among the Muslims. This
led to further suspicions of the Muslims against their Hindu counterparts and thus, created
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clashes between the two groups. Judging from these two incidents, the Hindus and the Muslims
were not able to prevent themselves from falling under political pressure and hence, this also
shows how they are easily influenced to act without much thinking.
Bangladesh
When Pakistan achieved its independence, Jinnah’s deteriorating health forced him to rely on
bureaucratic officials who were mostly West Pakistanis (Choudhary, 2011, p. 81). According to
1955 statistics, the civil services comprised of 51 officials from East Pakistan and none were in
the rank of secretary (Choudhary, 2011, p. 82). There were however 690 West Pakistan officials
that occupied the key positions in administration (Choudhary, 2011, p. 82). Hence this shows
how the government practised bureaucracy which also led to their oppressive tendency towards
East Pakistan. This can be seen when west Pakistanis dominated east Pakistanis in political
leaderships.
Apart from that, the central Pakistan government was also unfair in administering East Pakistan.
For instance, the government did not allow the emergence of East Pakistan and its
democratisation. This can be seen in 1954 when elections were held to the constituent assembly
in East Pakistan. The Muslim League lost with the United Font (consisted of Awami League and
Krishak samaj party) won 224 out of 227 seats (Choudhary, 2011, p. 82). The results were
however not accepted by West Pakistan and the government formed was dismissed while the
political leaders of East Pakistan were arrested. This was furthered when Iskander Mirza was
appointed the governor of East Pakistan to take charge of the administration and he suppressed
all attempts any attempts to establish democracy in East Pakistan (Choudhary, 2011, p. 83). It
was also due to their oppressive nature that finally led to a war in 1971.
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In the case of Bangladesh’s formation, it could be said that the nationalist aspiration of the
people is the main trigger for its independence. According to Santos (2007), the cultural
discriminating policy imposed on the Bengalis such as to introduce Urdu as the official language,
created a strong resentment by the Bengali students in February 1952. This historical event
shows how much the Bengalis appreciate their distinct cultural identities and thus, they are
willing to preserve them against any attempts or intervention to abolish it. Furthermore, when the
West Pakistan military declared preventive war in East Pakistan, as an attempt to ‘silent’
democratic regime, the Bengalis united and form a guerilla army as a counter force.
Conclusion
In the aftermath on the formation of Pakistan and Bangladesh, both did not achieve
independence peacefully. In the case for Pakistan, communal issues had existed even before the
plan for independence started. However, solutions provided by political leaders such as Jinnah
and Gandhi did not work so much on both Hindus and Muslims causing violence to erupt
between them. This was added in by the British who were slow in giving independence to India
causing the communal issue to become worse and led to massive killings and fights between the
Hindus and the Muslims. Due to this, Jinnah who at first aimed for a Unite India changed his
mind as the communal issue got worst (choosing for separate region instead). Hence, it might be
possible to avoid violence if the British were early in giving India independence. In
Bangladesh’s case, if the government of Pakistan was considerate towards the geographical
location of East Pakistan before the separation of Pakistan from India, clashes might be possible
to avoid as it was the geographical location that caused the huge gap of socio-cultural and
economic conditions between East and West Pakistan. Violence could also be avoided if the
central government of Pakistan was to deal with East Pakistan in a peaceful way instead of
starting a fight (by arresting political leaders of East Pakistan and attacking the people) when
negotiations did not work.
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By understanding the history of conflicts in South Asia, this could provide the pathways for
empathic and sympathetic efforts in promoting peace among regions.
(4, 157 words)
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