The Muslim League annual session held at Lahore on March 22-24, 1940, was an event of far reaching consequences in British India. On March 23, a resolution was moved in the session which discarded the federal system for British India and proposed the establishment of separate homeland for the Muslims.
The Muslim League leaders from all parts of British India delivered speeches in favour of the resolution which was approved in the last session on March 24.
Though the word "Pakistan" does not appear in the text of the resolution, it began to be described as the Pakistan Resolution soon after the end of the Muslim League session. It proposed that "geographically contiguous units" should be delineated into regions with necessary territorial adjustments so that "the areas in which the Muslims are numerically in a majority, as in the North-Western and Eastern zones of India, should be grouped to constitute independent states in which the constituent units shall be autonomous and sovereign."
1. Rejection of the federal system as set out in the Government of India Act, 1935, describing it as "totally unsuited to and unworkable in the peculiar conditions of this country" and it was "totally unacceptable to Muslim India."
2. The resolution underlined the need of revising the existing constitutional arrangements and declared that "no revised plan would be acceptable to the Muslims" unless it was framed "with their approval and consent."
3. The resolution said that "no constitutional plan would be workable in this country or acceptable to the Muslims" unless it was based on the principles outlined in this resolution.
4. The resolution also called for protection of the rights and interests of religious minorities. It demanded that "adequate, effective and mandatory safeguards should be specifically provided in the constitution for minorities.... for the protection of their religious, cultural, economic, political, administrative and other rights and interests in consultation with them."
The resolution invoked the right of self determination for the Muslims on the ground that they were a separate nation. The Muslim Leaguers firmly believed that the establishment of a separate homeland protected and promoted the rights and interests of the Muslims. It also saved them from being overwhelmed by an unsympathetic majority. In April 1941 the Muslim League in its annual session held at Madras incorporated this resolution in its objectives.
The resolution was a shift from the Muslim League demand for constitutional safeguards and a federal system with provincial autonomy to partition of India for ensuring a secure future for the Muslims of British India. The mistreatment of the Muslim community by the Congress ministries at the provincial level (1937-39) led the Muslim League leadership to the conclusion that a federal system would not offer a secure future to them. They began to ponder over alternatives.
The Sindh Provincial Muslim League, in its conference at Karachi in October 1938, criticised the Congress refusal to share power with the Muslims in provinces. It asked the All India Muslim League to prepare a constitutional scheme "under which [the] Muslims may attain full independence." In September-October 1939 the All India Muslim League expressed strong dissatisfaction with the working of the federal system in British India, arguing that federalism enabled a permanent majority to rule over a permanent minority.
It maintained that no constitution would be acceptable to the Muslims unless it "completely scrapped the 1935 federal constitution and met the approval of the Muslim League." The Lahore session of the Muslim League offered an alternative to the federal system.
The Lahore Resolution laid down the principle of partition of British India and homeland for the Muslims whose details were worked out later. Its text cannot be isolated from the political development before and after the passing of the resolution and used for making demands for restructuring the Pakistani state. No constituent units of a state or states can be "autonomous and sovereign" at the same time.
Furthermore, the resolution does not name the provinces to be affected by the proposal; it presents the idea in general terms. Similarly, the boundaries of the new state have also not been identified. These issues were settled during 1940-47 and Pakistan was established on the basis of the June 3, 1947 plan and the Indian Independence Act, 1947, rather than the Lahore Resolution. However, the Lahore Resolution gave a new direction to the independence struggle which ultimately resulted in the establishment of Pakistan.
The passing of the Lahore resolution was an important stage in the evolution of the Muslim struggle for nationhood and statehood which began long before March 1940 and continued till August 14, 1947.
The Muslim League transformed itself into a genuinely popular party of the Muslims of British India during 1040-47. It also articulated the Pakistan demand in definite terms during these years.
The Muslim struggle for protection and advancement of their identity, rights and interest passed through various stages. Sir Syed Ahmad Khan and his colleagues advised the Muslim to concentrate on acquiring modern education and avoid active politics.
The strategy of avoiding active involvement in politics was revised in the beginning of the 20 th Century. In October 1906, a group of prominent Muslims asked the Viceroy to grant separate electorate to the Muslims so that they could elect their representatives. On December 30, 1906 the Muslim elite established All India Muslim League as a forum for projecting Muslim political demands and interests. It worked for the Muslims within the framework of the British rule in India.
The Muslim League demanded safeguards and guarantee for the protection of Muslim identity, rights and interests. In 1916 it evolved a framework of co-operation with the Congress Party on the basis of a set of political and constitutional proposals that included safeguards for their rights.
The fourteen points of Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah (1929) were a charter of the political demands of the Muslims. He sought safeguards for their political, economic and cultural rights within a federal system with provincial autonomy. The Muslim supported federalism with autonomy for the provinces in the Roundtable Conferences (1930-32). The Muslim League changed its strategy in 1940 from federal option to the partition of India for creating a Muslim homeland.
Therefore, the Lahore Resolution is an important stage in the Muslim political transition to nationhood. It must also be examined against the backdrop of various proposals for division of India which were floated from time to time. In 1939-40, several partition proposals existed. The Muslim League offered a new proposal in March 1940 which attracted more attention because it was presented by the leading Muslim political party which was headed by Muhammad Ali Jinnah who enjoyed respect even among non-Muslim League political circles and the media.
The idea of a separate homeland was articulated during 1940-47. The resolution of the Muslim League Working Committee (April 11, 1942) on the British Government's Draft Declaration on the Future of India stated, among other things: "So far as the Muslim League is concerned, it has finally decided that the only solution of India's constitutional problem is the partition of India into independent zones, and it will, therefore, be unfair to the Musalmans to compel them to enter such a constitution-making body, whose main object is the creation of a new Indian Union."
The correspondence between Mahatama Gandh and Quaid-i-Azam Jinnah offers useful insights on the Lahore Resolution.
GANDHI WROTE TO JINNAH IN HIS LETTER DATED SEPTEMBER 15, 1944: "Are the constituents in the two zones to constitute 'independent states', an undefined number in each zone?"
Jinnah replied in his letter dated September 17, 1944: "No, they will form units of Pakistan." By 1943-44, the Muslim League leadership was talking about Pakistan which was to comprise the Muslim majority provinces/regions.
The notion of a sovereign and independent state was fully articulated in the convention of the elected Muslim League legislatures in Delhi on April 9, 1946. THE RESOLUTION STATED: "Whereas the Muslims are convinced that with a view to save Muslim India from the domination of Hindus and in order to afford them full scope to develop themselves according to their genius, it is necessary to constitute a sovereign independent state, comprising Bengal and Assam in the north-east zone and the Punjab, north-west Frontier Province, Sindh and Balochistan in the north-west zone." The resolution also demanded that "two separate constitution-making bodies" should be established "by the peoples of Pakistan and Hindustan for the purpose of framing their respective constitutions." It assured the minorities that they would be given safeguards as outlined in the Muslim League Resolution of March 23, 1940.
The ultimate territorial shape of Pakistan was determined by the June 3, 1947 Plan and Indian Independence Act, July 1947. The British transferred power to the Pakistani state which acquired sovereign status on August 15, 1947. The provinces that constituted Pakistan had the option to join India or Pakistan. There was no third option.
They exercised their option in favour of Pakistan before the new state came into existence. Thus, sovereign Pakistan represented a forward movement on the Lahore Resolution and it is not possible to understand the establishment of Pakistan without taking into account this forward movement during 1940-47. One cannot therefore ignore these developments and return to the text of the Lahore Resolution for making political demands in the present-day Pakistan.