Jaswant Singh’s book on Jinnah: An avoidable controversy

The current controversy of Jaswant Singh’s book on Jinnah- which is avoidable - has made me put down my views in the form of a blog. Two quotations from the British – who were our rulers for two centuries till 1947- ironically but appropriately, describe the situation during India’s glorious freedom struggle:

1) “Bliss was it to be alive in that dawn
To be young was very heaven”
(William Wordsworth on French Revolution)

2)“It was the best of times
It was the worst of times”
(Charles Dickens, Hard Times)

The culmination of the intense struggle for freedom made by both well known and unknown leaders and followers of the entire Indian subcontinent – irrespective of caste and creed – was the decision of the British rulers to quit India.
First of all, it is wrong to attribute the success – the success of attaining freedom for the Jewel of the crown to a handful of leaders like Mohammad Ali Jinnah, Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Patel or even Mahatma Gandhi.

Further, the reasons for the partition of India cannot be understood without analyzing some of the unnerving and chaotic happenings as in the 1930’s and 40’s throughout Europe and Asia, the emergence of strong nationalistic fervor and the sequel of minority problem. To start with, M.A Jinnah was a “diehard liberal and a staunch Indian nationalist” as Qaid –e- Azam‘s biographer Ayesha Jalal puts it. But, in course of time his unweaning ambition and petty differences with leaders like Jawaharlal Nehru made Jinnah quit the Congress Party and join the Muslim League, and subsequently, fan the fires of communalism among the Muslim community. The subsequent history of India demonstrates how the Muslim League “fuelled the movement for a separate state of Pakistan” (Ramachandra Guha, India After Gandhi, P.9)
Jinnah- who was a secularist in the 1920’s – transformed himself so much that he became obsessed with his antagonism of Hinduism. The following anecdotes illustrate the crucial change in Jinnah.

1) “There can be no controversy in the face of death, “Gandhi’s principal political rival Mohammed Ali Jinnah wrote in the message of condolence”.” He was one of the greatest men produced by the Hindu community. When one of Jinnah’s assistants reviewing the text with him, suggested that Gandhi’s dimensions were greater than his own community, Jinnah demurred. Gandhiji had risked his life a fortnight before for India’s Muslims and to save India’s Islamic state from bankruptcy, but the Qaid-e-Azam was inflexible as ever. “No” he said, “That’s what he was – a great Hindu”(Dominique Lapierre and Larry Collins, Freedom at Midnight)

2) In the early 1940’s, on the train from Delhi to Lucknow, Jinnah told Dr S. Radhakrishnan, the renowned philosopher: “Radhakrishnan! You are my enemy No.1; You have brought recognition to Hinduism” (S. Gopal, A biography of S. Radhakrishnan)
Further, we should not ignore the human follies and frailties of the stalwarts involved in India’s freedom struggle however great they might otherwise be. The individuals in the vanguard of freedom struggle were not Sanyasis; for most of them, the partition of their motherland alone ensured absolute power.

Discerning persons should understand and condone the human follies and foibles.
To conclude, The Congress party rather than the BJP, reacted in a wise and mature manner: “We reject the book (I.e Jaswant Singh’s) and repudiate its contents. The congress does not consider Mr Singh’s exertions as an academic endeavour but rather as an attempt at political repositioning by taking a selectively myopic view of established and exhaustively researched historical canons. Also, they keep in view Shashi Tharoor’s criticism of some of the Congress leaders including Rajiv Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi in his book, “From Midnight to Millennium and Beyond” a Jaswant – Shashi comparison would show Congress to be far more accommodating than BJP.