Pakistan and Partition

Pakistan Partition

Prior to independence in August 1947, Pakistan was the western provinces of the British Empire, or Raj, of India. Because of its geographic proximity to Afghanistan and the wild tribes of the Northwest Frontier, it always formed more of a military enclave than the rest of the country. This became the Republic of India when the great Indian Empire was partitioned into the two nations. Indeed, future Pakistani cities like Quetta began life more as garrison towns than as civilian settlements like the cities of Bombay and Calcutta in what would be India (Ballance, 2008). This military factor, as far as the pervasive influence of Islam, would contribute to the more conservative, rightist mien of Pakistan after independence.

At first, tremendous celebrations erupted across the subcontinent as both Muslims and Hindus embraced their newfound freedom. However, religious tensions, suppressed by more than a century of British control, soon erupted. Riots broke out across the Punjab, India's western region, soon after independence (Bose, 2006). Between August and November 1947, nearly 1 million people, mostly Muslim, were slaughtered, and more than 10 million refugees crossed over the new border, Hindus fleeing into India and Muslims retreating into Pakistan.

Even after this exodus, the region remained volatile because the British had made another crucial error when they divided the region. After partition, however, these various kingdoms were placed under Pakistani or Indian control. In most cases, the former kingdoms readily joined one of the two new nations. However, the situation in the border kingdom of Jammu and Kashmir remained unresolved.

The man who justly deserves the name given to him, the “Father of the Country,” Quaid-i-Azam, was Mohammed Ali Jinnah. He was born in 1876, 18 years after the British Indian dominion passed from the rule of the British East India Company to the ...