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Fromthelate1930s,theLeaguebeganviewingtheMuslims “General”constituencies as a separate “nation” from the Hindus. In developing this Election districts with no notion, it may have been influenced by the history of tension reservations for any religious or other community between some Hindu and Muslim groups in the 1920s and 1930s. More importantly, the provincial elections of 1937 seemed to have convinced the League that Muslims were a minority, and they would always have to play second fiddle inanydemocraticstructure.ItfearedthatMuslimsmayeven go unrepresented. The Congress’s rejection of the League’s desire to form a joint Congress-League government in the United Provinces in 1937 also annoyed the League. The Congress’s failure to mobilise the Muslim masses in the 1930s allowed the League to widen its social support. It sought to enlarge its support in the early 1940s when most Congress leaders were in jail. At the end of the war in 1945, the British opened negotiations between the Congress, the LeagueandthemselvesfortheindependenceofIndia.Thetalks failed because the League saw itself as the sole spokesperson of India’s Muslims. The Congress could not accept this claim since a large number of Muslims still supported it. Fig. 21 – Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, the Pashtun leader from the Elections to the provinces were again held in 1946. The North West Frontier Province, with Congress did well in the “General” constituencies but his colleagues at a peace march the League’s success in the seats reserved for Muslims was through Bihar, March 1947 spectacular.Itpersistedwithitsdemandfor“Pakistan”.InMarch Also known as Badshah Khan, he was the founder of the Khudai 1946, the British cabinet sent a three-member mission to Khidmatgars, a powerful non- Delhi to examine this demand and to suggest a suitable violent movement among the political framework for a free India. This mission suggested Pathans of his province. Badshah that India should remain united and constitute itself as a Khan was strongly opposed to the Partition of India. He looseconfederationwithsomeautonomyforMuslim-majority for agreeing to the 1947 division. areas. But it could not get the Congress and the Muslim League to agree to specific details of the proposal. Partition now became more or less inevitable. After the failure of the Cabinet Mission, the Muslim League decided on mass agitation for winning its Pakistan demand. It announced 16 August 1946 as “Direct Action Day”. On this day riots broke out in Calcutta, lasting several days and resulting in the death of thousands of people. By March 1947, violence spread to different parts of northern India. Many hundred thousand people were killed and numerous women had to face untold brutalities during Fig. 22 – Refugees from riot-torn Punjab gather in New Delhi, in search of shelter and food the Partition. Millions of people were forced to flee their homes. Torn asunder from their homelands, they were reduced to being refugees in alien THE MAKING OF THE NATIONAL MOVEMENT: 1870s –1947 109 Reprint 2024-25