| RUPEES NEWS | My 27th, 2008 | Moin Ansari | ???? ??????? |

Nineteen forty Seven’s impact today: Radcliffs award of Ferozepur and Gurdaspur foretold the hidden scheme for Kashmir. There is new light on the subject shed by the 1971 interview of Lord Radcliffe with Kuldip Nayyar, and the unbiased study of Lucy Chester. We have updated this article with the new information as it become available.

Many say that there will be many wars around water. Some may have already started. The Kalabagh Dam in intricately linked to the distribution of water between India and Paksitan.

The next most serious choke was applied through the Indus Water Treaty (1960): Pakistan lost three Eastern Rivers. The World Bank solution violated the International Law which does not allow change of direction and the flow of the rivers anywhere in the world. River Ravi passing through Lahore was given to India. Subsequently Pakistan saw with open eyes India building dams and powerhouses on the three Western Rivers which were designed “for exclusive use of Pakistan.” The Indian Minister for Power and Water, Chakravarty, said openly in a formal meeting of the IWT council held at Delhi: “When we abrogate IWT, Pakistan will be in a state of draught and Pakistanis will cry for drops of water” (June 14, 2002).

The COAS of the Indian Army also said, “The rejection of Kalabagh Dam by elements in Pakistan enhances the insecurity of Pakistan. Salal Dam was completed without our knowledge” (2003).

Pakistani authorities raised a mild objection on Baglihar Dam (2005) when it was nearing completion. The World Bank mediator finally advised lowering of the dam by 2-ft. India had its way towards the final thrust to kill Pakistan.

The ground-breaking ceremony (February 9, 2008) of Kishanganga-Jhelum Hydel Project – vision 2030 – located at Muzffarabad, was held at Aiwan-e-Sadr Islamabad: India has challenged it. India is quite used to imposing its will on Pakistan.

We must have known that Kalabagh and Bhasha dams and other projects are the water-management schemes of local resources: they are not the replacement of the three Western Rivers being controlled by India. Why there was no challenge offered to the enemy? Even the governments were inclined to concede the rights to India to build Wullar-Barrage: the source of Mangla Dam which can be turned into 110 sq mile of sandy-patch. The groundwork of Wullar Barrage was destroyed by the mujahideen on April 7, 1990. Between 1947 and now who is or was responsible for the security of Pakistan and its water resources? I wish, I pray, we must know our enemy or enemies and must know how to stand against them. We are already in the minefield. The writer is a Retired Brigadier

The pact between India and Pakistan is called “The Indus Water Treaty“. That treaty is in tatters because India has repeatedly broken it, bent it, subverted it, and worked around it to reduce the amount of water to Pakistan and increase the amount of water to India.

Lt Gen (r) Hameed Gul has said that India has so far built 62 dams and hydro-electric units on Pakistani rivers to deprive Pakistan of water and render into a desert.

He said Pakistan was being deprived of water under an international conspiracy to conquer it. At this stage, some insane people were opposing construction of Kalabagh Dam in Pakistan, he added. He said that Shaukat Aziz’s influx in Pakistan was also part of the conspiracy as he formulated such policies, which put the country into crisis. He said that Shaukat Aziz created food shortage. He said the mujahideeen damaged Baglihar Dam and it could not be reconstructed.

Hameed Gul, however, warned that the mujahideen would damage all dams. Sindh Water Council Chairman Hafiz Zahoor-ul-Hassan Dahr said that when the dispute on water would not be resolved, there would be conflict between the two countries. He said, “India is not building dams under the Indus Water Treaty but on the Pakistani rivers.” He said that the food shortage would be forty per cent next year that would increase starvation in the country. He warned, “Pakistan can become Somalia and Ethopia,” he added.

According to many experts more than 40% of the Indus water flows into the ocean and is waster. If some of this was placed into a reservoir, this could be held of bad times. Some in Pakistan believe that some water has to flow into the ocean to keep the ocean taking away good land in Sindh. This totally condradicts facts on the ground.

ISLAMABAD: A single-member bench of the Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Thursday reprimanded the Cabinet Division (CD) for failing to submit a report on the disruption of river flow Pakistan by Indian dams and their impact on local agriculture.

KBD added to uplift plan: ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan People’s Party-led (PPP) government has made the construction of controversial Kalabagh Dam (KBD) part of its development strategy and the project is likely to be completed by 2016, The Post learnt Sunday.

The uplift strategy is in opposition to a public announcement made by Federal Water and Minister Raja Perez Ashraf last month that the project had been shelved forever.

Moreover, the National Economic Council (NEC) held its meeting on June 2, 2008 with Prime Minister Syed Yousaf Raza Gillani in the chair and approved the development strategy.

The strategy was finalised by Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Salman Farooqui on May 30, 2008 in the Medium Term Development Framework 2005-10 (MTDF) and submitted to the government on June 2, 2008 for approval. The framework on page 80 states that the water sector strategy centres around three important elements i.e. water augmentation, water conservation and effective water use. In this context, a comprehensive set of measures for the development and management of water resources are to be formulated and effectively implemented. It includes the development of additional medium and large-size reservoirs, integrated resource use, the introduction of water efficient techniques, containment of environmental degradation, institutional strengthening, capacity building and human resource development, new priority water storage dams i.e. Akhori Dam, Basha-Diamer Dam, Kalabag: h Dam and Munda Dam to be completed by 2016 in addition to the on-going projects such as Raising of Mangla Dam, Gomal Zam Dam, Satpra Dam, Kurram Tangi Dam and Sabakzai dDam.”

Describing the MTDF objectives, the document says that the framework envisages enhancing water availability to the tune of 14.67 MAF, reclamation of 3 million acres of waterlogged and saline lands, bringing 3.2 million acres of additional land under irrigation, saving about 8.0 MAF water through improvement of 86,000 water course, and precise levelling of 202 thousand acres of agricultural land.

It is further aimed at catering the increasing demand for drinking water and industrial and commercial activities in a cost-effective manner. The other objectives, the MTDF says, include managing the quality and quantity of drainage effluent in a environmentally safe manner; managing groundwater (both quantitative and qualitative) through tube well transition, implementing integrated food control programme; promoting beneficiary participation in development initiatives; and enhancing the performance of water sector institutions, including effective O&M mechanism, through institutional reforms creation of PIDAs, AWB, and FO’s, private sector participation and capacity building.

Salman Farooqui has said that the aim of the Mid-Term Review is to evaluate the performance of the MTDF against its objectives and targets as well as to identify needed adjustments. “The overall results of the evaluation are mixed. While the progress has been made in important areas, at the same time shortcomings have emerged especially on the implementation front.”

“These have caused a set-back to the economy but more importantly hardship to the lives of ordinary citizens of the country. These need to be tackled and rectified on an urgent basis. The strategy of the MTDF can help tackle the challenge to combine knowledge based growth with inclusive and equitable development,” he concludes. PPP BOWS TO PRESSURE: BUILDING KBD Mohsin Babbar

ISLAMABAD HIGH COURT REQUIRES INFORMAITON ON DAMS

In 1947, Kashmir was a princely state, whose ruler was entitled to choose for himself between India and Pakistan; Radcliffe had no direct responsibility for the Kashmir question. However, there are a number of interesting links between Kashmir and the Radcliffe award. Those links include the fact that the water feeding the Punjabi irrigation system originates in Kashmiri rivers, as well as allegations that Radcliffe awarded India certain areas of northern Punjab as a strategic corridor to Kashmir. One of the most intriguing connections between the Radcliffe award and the Kashmir problem involves not the substance of the award but the possibility that Mountbatten, the last Viceroy of British India, who delayed the announcement of the Radcliffe award until two days after independence, may have done so in an effort to coerce the Maharajah of Kashmir into acceding to India rather than Pakistan. Indo-Pakistani boundary Lucy Chester

I nearly gave you [India] Lahore.” Lord Cyril Radcliffe, Chairman of the Boundary Commission, told me. “But then I realised that Pakistan would not have any large city. I had already earmarked Calcutta for India.

“The Muslims in Pakistan have a grievance that you favoured India”, I told Radcliffe. His reply was: “They should be thankful to me because I went out of the way to give them Lahore which deserved to go to India. Even otherwise, I favoured the Muslims more than the Hindus.” Lord Radcliffe to Kuldip Nayyer in 1971. Tribune India

“I had no alternative; the time at my disposal was so short that I could not do a better job. Given the same period I would do the same thing. However, if I had two to three years, I might have improved on what I did”.
— Sir Cyril Radcliffe

INDIA CONTINUE TO BUILD DAMS India plans three power projects in four years.

The Kalabagh Dam in also linked to the Radcliff Boundry Commission which awarded Muslim majority areas of the Punjab to India–and hence allowed Indian troops access to Kashmir.

The Kalabagh Dam dropped without discussion in parliament

The Kalabagh dam is essential in eliminating the power gap in Pakistan.

Water dispute between India and Pakistan created the need for Pakistan to build many new dams:

A seminal reason behind the dispute over Kashmir is water. Kashmir is the origin point for many rivers and tributaries of the Indus River basin. They include Jhelum and Chenab which primarily flow into Pakistan while other branches – the Ravi, Beas and the Sutlej irrigate northern India. Pakistan has been apprehensive that in a dire need India under whose portion of Kashmir lies the origins and passage of the said rivers, would use its strategic advantage and withhold the flow and thus choke the agrarian economy of Pakistan. The Boundary Award of 1947 meant that the headworks of the chief irrigation systems of Pakistan were left located in Indian Territory.

The Indus Waters Treaty of 1960, which governs the sharing of the Himalayan rivers that are common to the two countries is a singular achievement in the area of India-Pakistan relations. Brokered by the World Bank in the 1950s, it took almost nine years before negotiators could agree on a deal. That both India and Pakistan needed development assistance from the World Bank created powerful incentives for a deal to be concluded. Pakistan won the exclusive use of the Indus and its eastern tributaries, while India retained the use of the western tributaries, and — this is where it gets interesting — restricted use of the eastern tributaries. Pakistan received a huge dollop of funding from the international community, including a not inconsequential sum from India, to develop its own irrigation system.

Besides helping lubricate and broker the deal, the World Bank signed a subset of the treaty and resolved to provide neutral umpiring when the treaty’s institutional bilateral mechanism failed to resolve disputes. In the sort of language that international diplomats use, the escalation process started with a question, to be discussed by the bilateral Permanent Indus Commission; which became a difference if the bilateral process failed, requiring the appointment of a ‘neutral expert’; and ultimately became a dispute to be resolved by a ‘court of arbitration’ Foreign Affairs Sharing the Indus

Allegations of Bias

Throughout the difficult process of partition, accusations of official partiality towards one group or another were leveled on all sides, not only in the popular press but also by the leaders themselves. For example, Justice Munir of the Punjab Commission accused Radcliffe’s top aide, Christopher Beaumont, of pro-Hindus bias. Munir claimed that Beaumont intentionally misled Radcliffe in order to achieve a result favorable to India.17 Beaumont rejects these charges as ludicrous. The most contentious point was the Ferozepore border and the nearby headworks. On August 8, Mountbatten’s private secretary, George Abell, sent a letter with a preliminary description of the Punjab boundary to Evan Jenkins, the provincial governor. This draft showed the Ferozepore area and its headworks going to Pakistan. When the final award was released, Ferozepore was assigned to India. Infuriated Pakistanis were sure that Nehru and Mountbatten had pressured Radcliffe to change his line. After partition, each side leveled accusations in the vernacular press that their opponents had successfully bribed Radcliffe to take their part.18

Many were convinced that the Commissions were a sham and that Mountbatten himself had simply dictated the new divisions. In his final report as Viceroy, Mountbatten admitted, “I am afraid that there is still a large section of public opinion in this country which is firmly convinced that I will settle the matter finally.”19 In 1992, Christopher Beaumont added his voice to the chorus of accusations against Mountbatten.20 This circumstantial evidence indicates that Mountbatten may well have influenced the final shape of the boundary award. Drawing the Indo-Pakistani boundary. Lucy Chester

Furthermore, the British commission in charge of Partition handed Gurdaspur district over to India, despite being a Muslim majority district of Punjab, as they thought India to be more favourable for most. The British claims were that if India did not control Gurdaspur, then Pakistan could simply cut off water supplies to Amritsar, though they could not justify just the opposite happening. The result was of many Muslims unexpectedly forced to migrate under harsh conditions, with Hindus and Sikhs killing, raping and mutilating many. However, Gurdaspur is the district in which all roads from India in Kashmir run, and thus, Pakistan alleges that the British effectively decided the fate of Kashmir by giving India a lifeline in Kashmir.

Pakistan also alleges that the British reasoning for handing over Gurdaspur was extremely biased, corrupted, flawed and unfair because while Pakistan was denied Gurdaspur district on the grounds of Indian water security, India maintained control over Pakistani water by retaining all the districts of Punjab in which major Pakistani rivers had their headwaters. Since Pakistan has always been an agriculture based country, it was in danger. Essentially this is seen as a veto power held by India over Pakistan agriculture. The Indus Waters Treaty signed in 1960 resolved most of these disputes over the sharing of water, calling for mutual cooperation in this regard. This treaty faced issues raised by Pakistan over the illegal construction of dams on the Indian side which limit water to the Pakistani side.

BAGHALIER DAM

SRINAGAR: Indian-held Kashmir’s controversial Baglihar hydroelectric project will start partial operations by next June, supplying much needed power, the troubled region’s chief minister said.

“Sex Pollution” Book Review: Shabnum Qayoom sheds light on Lord Cyril Radcliffe’s affair with Nehru’s sister Vijaya Lakshmi. There is a charge that Lord Radcliff was given a bribe of 6 corore rupees by the Indian National Congress supporters to unfairly and “illegally” award  Ferozepur and Gurdaspur to India. Ferozepur was the only arsenal that was supposed to be given to Pakistan. Gurdaspur was a Muslim majority area and was awarded to India. The boundary line was along the river and Radcliff unnaturally digressed it away from the river to give away Gurdaspur (the only link of India to Kashmir) to India.

The implication of the loss of Ferozepur to India was not only traumatic in human terms, but it was devastating to Pakistan in military terms. The reality behind the conspiracy to award  Gurdaspur became evident a year later when Indian troops arrived in Srinagar and then Mahara Sing signed over the article of accession to India. The article of accession was never presented to the UN, and according to Alister Lamb has serious discrepancies about dates. The original article of accession has since been lost, if it ever existed.

“Alastair Lamb, Incomplete Partition (OUP, 1998) comes to the conclusion that the instrument of accession was not signed on the date claimed by the Indian government to legitimise its sending of troops into Kashmir. American scholar Stanley Wolpert relates the accession story in his 1996 book, Nehru: A tryst with Destiny, basing it on the lack of concordance between versions of the accession. Wolpert writes that Menon returned from Srinagar on 26 October ‘with no Instrument of Accession’ to report on the perilous condition in Kashmir to the Defence Committee. Only after Mountbatten had allowed the airlift of Indian troops on 27 October, did Menon and Mahajan set out for Jammu ‘to get the Instrument of Accession’. The Maharaja signed the Instrument after the Indian troops had assumed control of the state of Jammu and Kashmir’s summer capital, Srinagar. If Wolpert’s version is accepted then the ‘conspiracy’ of legalising the airlift becomes acceptable. Lamb thinks that it is possible that ‘certainly Menon, perhaps Mountbatten, perhaps Nehru and perhaps Patel’ were involved in this conspiracy. Lamb also claims that the document of accession does not exist.”

Map issues: As with other disputed territories, each government issues maps depicting their claims in Kashmir as part of their territory

The border had already been roughly drawn up by Lord Wavell, the Viceroy of India, but the final version was set out by Sir Cyril Radcliffe. Radcliffe had never visited India and didn’t know anybody in India before his arrival. Thus, he was considered to be unbiased. However, he was ignorant of realities on the ground and this caused avoidable gaffes in the division. For example, there were instances where the border was drawn leaving some parts of a village in India and some in Pakistan. There were even instances where the dividing line passed through a single house with some rooms in one country and others in the other. Radcliffe’s justification for such a casual division was that no matter what he did, people would suffer.

He also had to work in a very short time period so there was little point in being careful where exactly the border lay. He made no real attempt to ensure that the border skirted villages or was drawn between thickly populated areas instead of right through them. Radcliffe has been accused of being completely unconcerned about the sufferings of the Indians. The division was done in secret, and the British government allowed no Indians to review it, since disputes were bound to have arisen then and it would delay the Partition.

There were a major disputes regarding the Radcliffe Line .

Gurdaspur District had a slight Muslim majority.  The proportion of Muslim to non-Muslim population in the district as a whole was 50.6 and 49.4 respectively with Shakargarh and Gurdaspur tehsils with a slight Muslim majority of 1% each while Batala tehsil had a Muslim majority of 53% and Pathankot tehsil had an overwhelming majority of non-Muslims at 67%. In the end only Shakargarh tehsil which was separated from the rest of the district by the Ravi river was awarded to Pakistan leaving the rest of the district with a slight majority of non-Muslims, but it was speculated that at the insistence of Lord Mountbatten it was awarded as such to East Punjab, so that if the kingdom of Kashmir wanted to integrate with the Indian Union, it would be accessible to India. In any case Pathankot tehsil would have gone to India and it had a direct rail road link with the adjoining areas of Hoshiarpur and Kangra districts of East Punjab.

Another point was that Batala and Gurdaspur would provide buffer to the Sikh holy city of Amritsar which otherwise would be surrounded by Muslim territory of Pakistan. The last point that was argued before the boundary commission by Mountbatten and others was that if the area east of the Ravi river was considered as one block consisting of Amritsar and most of Gurdaspur district (excluding Shakargarh), it would have a slight non-Muslim majority. Also, by doing so majority of Sikh population (58%) would fall in East Punjab, by doing the opposite a slight majority will be left in Pakistan which would exponentially increase the number of Sikh refugees. This was an attempt to pacify the Sikhs for they lost major tracts of lands in West Punjab. An attempt was made by Radcliffe to transfer Ferozepore and Zira tehsils to Pakistan instead. This was opposed by the Maharaja of Bikaner because Harike headworks on the confluence of Satluj and Beas rivers, from where a canal, the only source of water for his desert state originated, was in Ferozepore. It was only after he threatened Mountbatten, that he would accede his state to Pakistan if Ferozepur was awarded to West Punjab, that the award was changed at the last minute and all of Ferozepur district was awarded to India.

Another disputed decision made by Radcliffe was inclusion of Malda district of Bengal, a Muslim majority area into India. The district remained under East Pakistan administration for 3-4 days after 15th August, 1947.It was only when the award was made public, the Pakistan flag was replaced by the Indian one in Malda.

Though the entire Sylhet district of Assam decided to join Pakistan through plebiscite, the sub-division of Karimganj was severed from Sylhet and given to India without any apparent reason and raised question about the rationality of Radcliffe line.

Kashmir and Junagarh is Pakistani territory

Pakistan also claims that Indian forces were in Kashmir before the Instrument of Accession was signed with India (Kashmir: Does the article of accession exist?), thus, Indian troops were in Kashmir in violation of the Standstill Agreement which was designed to maintain the status quo in Kashmir. This view is also echoed by many Western experts on the Kashmir conflict. [10][11]. Nehru’s commitment to the people of Kashmir

US resolutions, and Nehru speeches on disputed nature of Kashmir. Further, Pakistan as well as human rights groups across the world have alleged that Indian Armed Forces, its paramilitary groups, and counter-insurgent militias have been responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of Kashmiri civilians and gang-rapes of hundreds of women.[12][13].

Azad Kashmir

In short, Pakistan holds that

The popular Kashmiri insurgency demonstrates that the Kashmiri people no longer wish to remain within India. Pakistan suggests that this means that either Kashmir wants to be with Pakistan or independent.
Indian counterinsurgency tactics merit international monitoring of the Kashmir conflict, and the Indian Army has carried out human rights violations – including torture, rape and extrajudicial killings – against the Kashmiri people. Nehru’s Commitement to people of Kashmir and various un-implemented UN resolutions on Kashmir

Northern Areas are part of Pakistan and were never part of Kashmir. According to the two-nation theory by which Pakistan was formed, Kashmir should have been with Pakistan, because it has a Muslim majority. THE GEOGRAPHIC TWO NATION THEORY: “Pakistan” existed 5000 years ago. IVC thrives as Pakistan today . The “K” in Pakistan stands for Kashmir. The Quaid answers 3 questions in 1940 Kashmir. India has shown disregard to the resolutions of the UN (by not holding a plebiscite). THERE WAS NO “PARTITION”: For Britain ” ‘Indian’ Empire” included Somalia, Iraq, Burma, Singapore etc. For the French “India” included Vietnam (Indo-China). For the Dutch “India” included “Indo-n-asia”.

WHY WE CREATED PAKISTAN? The Pakistan Ideology. ONT vs TNT . The Kashmiri people have now been forced by the circumstances to rise against the alleged repression of the Indian army and uphold their right of self-determination through militancy. 100,000 Kashmiris died for “Tehrik e ilhaq e Pakistan”. Pakistan claims to give the Kashmiri insurgents moral, ethical and military support (see 1999 Kargil Conflict: Kargil facts). Kashmir: What was liberated in 1948? What remains?

The idea of becoming subservient to India is abhorrent and that of cooperation with India, with the object of promoting tension with China, equally repugnant.” Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto

On June 3, 1947, under the pressure of the All India Muslim League, the British government announced transfer of power, subject to the appointment of Boundary Commissions. This was to evaluate and award the decision concerning division of the province of Punjab and the province of Bengal between Pakistan and Bharat. In a way, the Muslim majority districts (tehsils) would form part of Pakistan and non-Muslim areas part of Bharat. English lawyer Sir Radcliffe headed the Commissions along with the nominated members of the Muslim League and the Congress to evaluate the claim of both Muslims and Hindus.

The two commissions, one for Punjab and the other for Bengal along with their members from the Muslim League and the Congress held sessions to determine the fate of the following districts. The district of Gurdaspur had four tehsils out of which tehsil Shakargarh, Batala, Gurdaspur Muslim majority population and should have been awarded to Pakistan and Pathankot which was a Muslim non-majority area should have been given to Bharat. However, Radcliffe keeping justice aside awarded only one tehsil of Shakargarh to Pakistan. The remaining three tehsils Gurdaspur, Batala and Pathankot were awarded to Bharat. Similarly, the Muslim majority tehsils of Ajnala, Jullundur and Firozpur were also awarded to Bharat. As a result of this the land route access to the state of Jammu and Kashmir was given to Bharat. However, the fate of Kashmir would have been different than that of today had the partition been based on the principles of justice and equity.

As stated earlier Sir Radcliffe, who headed the Boundary Commissions also ignored the ground realities requiring just solutions to the problem of Kashmir.

The Radcliffe award favoured Bharat by providing an access to Kashmir through the land route from the tehsils of Batala and Gurdaspur. Both of the Muslim majority tehsils were denied their right to be part of Pakistan.

In October 1947, Kashmir acceded to Bharat without the knowledge of Pakistan. At this point, Indian forces moved into the state of Jammu and Kashmir. However, the forces of Azad Kashmir backed by Pakistan resisted the accession of Kashmir to India. At this stage, the it was difficult for Bharat to hold on to the state of Jammu and Kashmir. Therefore, at the first available opportunity, Bharat made a complaint against Pakistan to the United Nations in January 1949. Resultantly, both the countries agreed to follow the UN resolution and adopted a ceasefire on the line of control. Finally, the UN passed a resolution in January 1949 to conduct a free and impartial plebiscite under its supervision. However, till to-date, the plebiscite could not take place. Furthermore Bharat refuses to hold any arbitration or mediation and even refuses to talk on the matter of Kashmir which is a disputed territory. The United Nations and other world powers have to take a serious view of the situation to resolve the issue on a priority bases to avoid unnecessary nuclear confrontation in the region. Keeping in view, the overall stated facts, give reasons and suggestions how to resolve the dispute of Kashmir in a peaceful manner.

The uncertain situation created by the last Viceroy, about the partition of British India and uncertain division of the provinces of Punjab, Bengal and Assam came as a surprise, which created a sense of fear and insecurity among the local population. The border of Pakistan and India had yet to be determined and the fate of the population particularly living in undivided Punjab, Bengal and Assam was uncertain. It remained a dilemma how; when and where the dividing line will pass across the continent. These anxious movements of uncertainty charged the atmosphere to its peak for the Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs.

Partition became inevitable. Rumours were strong enough to believe the unbelievable. This chaotic situation was the result of advancing the date of independence from June 3, 1948 to August 14, 1947, not announcing boundary award prior to August 15, 1947, not compelling Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru to honour the pledge to hold plebiscite in Jammu and Kashmir and ignoring the wrong interpretation of Radcliffe. This created big confusion as both the nations — the Muslims and Hindus — did not know the vital components of their frontiers. A holocaust was created by Lord Mountbatten the last viceroy of the colonized India resulting in the murder of 10 lakh people and uprooted around two crores of them at the time of partition. Discuss how the well established British administration failed to maintain law and order, safety and security of the local population. Fortune Geographic Society, Pakistan.

Lucy Chester has done a good job in analyzing the boundary commissions failures and she has done this in an unbiased manner.

The most significant error, for which all parties must share responsibility, was misguided reliance on a best-case result, combined with consistent refusal even to acknowledge the possibility of a worst-case outcome. Mountbatten and the rest of the interim Government of India ignored repeated warnings from Sir Evan Jenkins, the highly respected Governor of the Punjab, that the division would result in large-scale violence.

In addition, the architects of partition refused to provide a sufficiently prolonged timetable to allow for

1) the necessary geographic surveys and other information gathering, for

2) boundary demarcation (the process of fixing boundary markers on the ground), for

3) public announcement of the new line, and for

4) transfer of populations, if necessary.

If they had provided more time for government institutions and local communities to absorb and adapt to the implications of the Radcliffe award, the level of violence might have been lower—and the authorities’ abilities to impose law and order higher.

In their rush to achieve their own political goals, British India’s most powerful parties decided not to complete territorial partition before final political separation. This decision left Indian and Pakistani citizens in the peculiar predicament of not knowing which country they were in on August 15 or 16. Additionally, Mountbatten’s delay in announcing the Radcliffe Line meant effectively that India and Pakistan had no boundaries for the first two days of their existence. Even if the award had been announced a few days earlier, provincial and local officials would not have had enough time—particularly in the demanding circumstances they faced—to make the necessary administrative arrangements.

Finally, they did not define cooperative procedures for resource sharing or, failing that, clear and complete division of linked infrastructure systems. The result was severe infrastructure disruptions, with consequences not only for communications and transportation, but also for the food supply of millions of people. Future partitions must include these elements in order to avoid the failures that so tragically limited the effectiveness of the South Asian partition. The daunting nature of this task, particularly the intricate problem of linked infrastructures, makes it clear that partition must be a last resort. Further work on the conditions under which partition is likely to be more or less successful is also required to understand the full nature of this diplomatic option.

CONCLUSIONS

The story of the creation of the Indo-Pakistani boundary remains a neglected, yet crucial, element of partition history. Further research is required to place the boundary question within the larger historical context of partition and of British and South Asian politics in the 1940s. In addition, the precise nature of links between the boundary commission’s work and the violence of partition remains to be explored. Instead of resolving tension by clearly separating religious groups, the Boundary Commission may actually have contributed to the upheaval, albeit without malicious intent. The surge in violence that began shortly before the Radcliffe award was announced can be traced in part to rumors and uncertainty over where the Line would fall.41 A lengthier and more transparent boundary-making process might have averted this situation. The lack of a methodologically sound boundary-making process must be counted prominently among the failures of the South Asian division, and present-day policy-makers should consider this and the other flaws identified above when appraising the value of partition as a tool for conflict resolution.

Finally, this project challenges the notion that partition can be appraised in absolute terms, as a flawed approach that merely aggravates violence.42 In reality, it often both limits and exacerbates tension; one of the paradoxes of the 1947 partition is that it stimulated new violence even as it resolved political conflict on some levels. I hope this analysis will contribute to a more nuanced and practical understanding of the ways that partition can contribute to containing violence, the steps and conditions required for effective divisions, and the limits of this particular tool for peace http://www.unc.edu/depts/diplomat/archives_roll/2002_01-03/chester_partition/chester_partition.html#Anchor_bio