Begum Shaista Ikramullah: Cherished Encounters with Jinnah

Begum Shaista Ikramullah: A Muslim League View of Partition

[p. 574] Jinnah did not leave the kind of intimate record or account of the events leading to Partition and independence that several congressmen left. Among the few valuable Muslim League accounts is that of Begum Shaista Ikramullah (1915–2000) in From Purdah to Parliament. Writing some years after Partition, Begum Ikramullah presents the view of an active and intelligent Muslim Leaguer devoted to Jinnah. Her account may be compared with that of Azad.

Begum Ikramullah came from a distinguished Muslim family of Bengal; she was the only daughter of Sir Hassan Suhrawardy, doctor and politician, and was the niece of Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, chief minister of Bengal in the crucial years 1946–1947. Begum Ikramullah was prominent in the politics of Pakistan in the decade after independence. She was well educated, having earned a doctorate at London University with a thesis on the development of Urdu literature. Drawn into politics after her marriage to civil servant Mohammad Ikramullah in 1933, she worked with the Muslim League Women's Sub-Committee. She was closely associated with Fatima Jinnah in setting up the Muslim Women Students' Federation. Students and women were very active in the growth of Muslim League support among Indian Muslims in the 1940s. Begum Ikramullah was elected to the Constituent Assembly in 1946, and later served in the Pakistan Constituent Assembly.

Though from Bengal, she was an Urdu-speaking Muslim who tried to balance and understand the political demands from the eastern as well as western wings of Pakistan. After independence, her husband served as foreign secretary and as ambassador to several countries. She served in Pakistan's United Nations delegation, participated in the drawing up of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), and later was ambassador to Morocco. One of her daughters married into the Jordanian royal family and another, Salma, a barrister, married Rehman Sobhan, a leading economist of Bangladesh.

Cherished Encounters with Jinnah

The Muslim League had been reorganized in 1937 under the presidency of Mr. Mohammad Ali Jinnah but it was still weak. It had not captured sufficient seats even in the Muslim majority Provinces to form a 100 per cent Muslim League [p. 575] Government, but in each of the Provincial legislatures it was the largest Muslim party; yet when the Congress Ministries were formed in the seven Provinces not one League member found a place in any of them. A Muslim was taken here and there but the Muslims contended that the man thus chosen was a nominee of the Hindus and not their true representative. But weak though the Muslim League was in 1937 it was a mistake for the Congress to ignore it as completely as they did. Of course they did not know that the dynamic personality of Mohammad Ali Jinnah was going to transform that loosely organized ineffectual body into a well-knit, superbly disciplined, organization which in seven brief years was to formulate a demand, gain support for it and achieve what it set out to get. They cannot be blamed for not foreseeing this, one of the greatest miracles of modern times, but they were wrong to ignore the aspirations of the Muslims, because they were not then strong enough to present their case forcefully. In not a single province did Congress try to come to any understanding with the Muslim League Party. But that was not the only instance of their ignoring Muslim sentiments. The heady wine of power went to the head of the Congress Ministries. They passed laws forcing Muslim children to attend government schools which in their tone were completely Hindu, to salute the Congress flag, to sing the Bande Mataram. Petty Hindu officials harassed Muslims everywhere. A hundred and one small pin-pricks and irritations cropped up daily; unimportant in themselves, they were like the proverbial leaf which indicated the way the wind was blowing, and the indication in this case was that it was blowing toward Hindu imperialism and Hindu domination which would attempt to exterminate eight hundred years of Muslim influence and culture. Alarm and panic swept through the Muslims and resulted in the strengthening of the Muslim League. It also resulted in great bitterness, so that when the Congress Ministries resigned in September 1939, the Muslim League ordered a “Deliverance Day” to be celebrated throughout the length and breadth of India.

[…] Ikramullah returns to Delhi in 1940 and notices growing communal feeling.

But the event that was to change the course of my life was yet to occur. In October, 1941, my father came from England on leave and came to stay with me [p. 576] in my house in New Delhi. One morning he said to me, “I am going to see Mr. Jinnah. You come along with me.”

“Oh, I don’t think I will,” said I. “I believe he is very rude and snubs everybody.”

“Don't be silly,” said my father. “That is just Hindu propaganda. I want you to meet him.”

So I went rather reluctantly and apprehensively....

My father had certain proposals which he wanted to discuss. He felt that, as Adviser to the Secretary of State for India, he might be able to bring about some sort of understanding between the British Government and the Muslim League. Quaid listened to what Father had to say very attentively and began to explain his point of view. And then, before I knew what I was doing, I was asking Quaid questions and he was answering them!—not impatiently or brusquely but kindly and in great detail. Quaid-i-Azam, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, the President of the All India Muslim League, the leader of the majority of the Muslims of the Indian sub-continent, reported to be arrogant and dictatorial, was allowing a completely inexperienced, unimportant young person to argue with him and was taking the trouble of meeting her arguments! The wonder of it did not strike me for the moment as I was carried away [with] the fascination of listening to Quaid.

Now, after nearly twenty years, during which I have met some very great statesmen, I still maintain that to listen to Quaid and not be convinced was not possible. It was not that he overruled you, it was not that he did not reply to your argument, but that he was so thoroughly, so single-mindedly, so intensely convinced of the truth of his point of view that you could not help but be convinced also. You felt that if a man with an intellect so much superior to yours believed this, then it must be right. Call it hypnotism or what you will, that is the effect he had on me.... He had it on all who came in contact with him....

[…] Ikramullah notes how few women attended political meetings in February 1942.

The Conference lasted three days and followed the usual procedure. Subject committee meetings were held, resolutions passed, and speeches made.... None of us had really pushed the idea of Pakistan to its logical conclusion. The demand for Pakistan was an assertion of our separate, independent, religious, and cultural existence. We feared and objected to the assimilation being attempted, for we were proud of our culture and wanted to keep it intact. We wanted political power to enable us to preserve it. If we could have been assured that our religion, language and culture would be respected, that it would be possible for us to live our own way of life, then we would not have forged ahead [p. 577] and fought for political independence, which we did not originally seek.... We merely wanted safeguards....

But it was dawning on our leaders that if we wished to preserve our culture, then we must have a country of our own to enable us to do so. And that is why, after only three years as President of the Muslim League, Quaid-i-Azam had already put forward the resolution that the Muslim majority continuous areas should form a separate sovereign state of Pakistan. The Lahore Resolution, as this epoch-making resolution was called, had been passed in March, 1940, that is six months after the Second World War had begun, and it was now February '42.

However, to the majority of Muslims Pakistan was an idea rather than a reality, something they thought was their inviolable right but which they had not yet decided to exercise. The most ardent of Muslim leaders at this stage still hoped that it would be possible to come to a compromise which would enable Muslims to continue as a separate cultural entity within a wider political framework. Quaid-i-Azam himself favoured this. I definitely remember him telling me at that first meeting we had with him that the Canadian Constitution would probably be the best solution for us, and the fact that for seven years after the passing of the Pakistan Resolution he agreed to discuss and negotiate with the British and Congress and more than once almost came to agreement, is further proof. That an agreement was not reached is not because of Quaid-i-Azam's intransigence but because of the narrow-mindedness and bigotry of the Congress....

There was no doubt in our minds that we stood in danger of the annihilation of our culture and that if we wanted to preserve it and our separate entity we had to organize ourselves into an effective body. This the Muslim League was enabling us to do, and therefore was daily succeeding in getting more and more support.

[…] The League's 1943 session, and the Congress's 1942 movement against the British.

The Muslim League kept itself aloof from this movement and was criticized by Congress, and by the nationalist Muslims as well, for not taking part in what was, from their point of view, a war of liberation. Quaid-i-Azam kept the League aloof and prevented it from getting involved in violence because he did not think it was strong enough to withstand the repercussions that would have followed. Congress could and did; for it had been organized forty years ago. It was now sufficiently entrenched to risk taking direct action and its leaders being arrested without running the risk of completely going to pieces. But the League could not; it was still at the stage of being welded together. Had its leaders been put in gaol in 1942, or I should say its leader for it only had Quaid-i-Azam, it would have broken up. He realized that for the League to plunge into action before it was strong enough internally would be suicidal. The oft-flung accusation that he was frightened of going to gaol weighed nothing with him, for he was a man who was swayed by neither praise nor blame.... Had he not been such a man he could not have done what he did, that is—to quote his own words: “make a disorganized mob into a disciplined nation.”

To achieve this end it was necessary not only to keep the Muslim League from precipitate action but also to restrain some of its prominent members from taking independent uncoordinated action. While he did not think the League was ready for direct action he was not in favour of whole-hearted co-operation in the war effort because he felt that the Muslim point of view was not receiving the consideration it deserved from the British. This involved him in direct conflict with prominent Muslim Leaguers among whom was Mr. Fazlul Haq, the Chief Minister of Bengal. His refusal to resign from the Defence Council when asked by the League to do so caused the first serious crisis in its ranks....

My husband had not seen Quaid for two years, when we had all lunched at his place. But at the end of the Simla Conference, when I went to say goodbye to Quaid, he came to pick me up and met Quaid again. He discussed the cause that had led to the failure of the Simla Conference, and I remember his looking very thoughtful and preoccupied as we stood at the door of the Hotel Cecil waiting for our rickshaw to be called. Then looking at the hills, remote and silent witnesses to human conflict and turmoil, he said: “You're right. He really means to have Pakistan.” “Of course, he does,” I said indignantly.

That was so but it was not because Quaid disregarded other people's points of view or forced his opinion on them, he did not.... He had what few people possess in this world, an absolutely single-minded conviction. It somehow had the effect of removing all one's doubts. To say that he was a dictator and forced Mussulmans to accept his idea of Pakistan is ridiculous because he had no arbitrary powers—only the force of his own personality....

[…] Ikramullah recounts 1945–47: Simla's failure, the Calcutta riots, independence and the refugee crisis.

What the world has not understood yet is why it came about. Why should one hundred million Muslims in India have decided to carve out a state for themselves at the cost of such terrible suffering? This has not yet been understood by the world at large, for no one has taken the trouble to understand the particular psychology of the Indian Muslims....

I have often heard people say: “Isn’t it remarkable that in the brief period of seven years, Jinnah put forward the idea of Pakistan, had it accepted by the people and sanctioned by the British?” but that is not so. It is true the demand for Pakistan was made only seven years before it was established, but this demand only gave concrete expression to the dream of the Indian Muslims to have “a local habitation and a name.” This dream they had cherished since 1857.... But I must go back farther than that in order to explain it all.

Muslims had come to India as conquerors and for eight hundred years had ruled the country. During this period, they had settled down and married and [p. 583] accepted many of the customs of the land of their adoption, but had never become absolutely one with the people of the country. The reason for this continued detachment lay in the religion these people followed. It baffles Westerners that it should be so.... Religion did make different people of them, influencing their way of life.... Hinduism had hitherto absorbed most other conquerors, but the clear-cut tenets of Islam defied amalgamation with any other creed.... The rigid caste system of the Hindus ... prevented any possibility of free social intercourse ... [and] there was also the gulf separating the rulers from the ruled.... Though in the case of the Muslims and Hindus, the gulf was not as great as between the British and the Indians, it still existed.

When the Muslim rule in India was succeeded by the British, the basic difference between the two peoples did not disappear. If anything, it grew stronger. The Muslims felt themselves threatened both by the supremacy of the British as rulers and by the numerical superiority of the Hindus.... They held more tenaciously to their own way of life[,] ... to every little thing that made their culture different from the Hindus. These differences may seem trivial ... but to the Muslims they were like sentinels guarding their separate existence in a sea of aliens.

[From Begum Shaista S. Ikramullah, From Purdah to Parliament (London: Crescent Press, 1963), 86–88, 89, 99–102, 103, 118–119, 135–136, 137–138, 139–140, 141, 142, 151, 152, 153, 154, 155–157, 158–161.]