Consultation and confrontation, 1930 - 1942

First Round Table Conference November 1930 - January 1931

Context

• The Simon Commission recommended a conference of all interested parties to discuss constitutional reforms 

Key features

• Opened by Lord Irwin and chaired by British PM and Labour Party Leader Ramsay MacDonald 

• The three British political parties were represented by sixteen delegates 

  • Conservative group led by Sir Samuel Hoare 

  • Liberal group led by Lord Reading (viceroy between 1921 and 1926) 

• 58 delegates represented most of Indian political opinion (all were the viceroy's nominees, men of eminence, although they had no formal mandate from the groups they were supposed to represent). Included Muslims, Sikhs, Christians and certain castes 

• Congress was denied representatives as it had demanded a commitment to dominion status as a precondition of its participation, which was rejected 

• The princes sent 16 representatives. Their provided evidence to strengthen the arguments put forward in the House of Commons by the minority Labour government 

Significance

• It was agreed that: 

  • India would be run as a type of dominion 

  • The dominion would take the form of a federation that would include princely states as well as the eleven British provinces 

  • There would be Indian participation in all levels of government 

Links to events after

• The Second Round Table Conference was held to build on these foundations 

Inauguration of New Delhi February 1931

• Calcutta had been the capital until 12th December 1911, when George V, during his Delhi durbar, announced the move to Delhi and laid the foundation stone for the viceroy's residence 

Key features

• In February 1931, the British formally inaugurated New Delhi as the administrative capital of the Raj amid formal celebrations led by the viceroy Lord Irwin 

Significance

• British architects planned and designed large new parts of the city, which grew southwards from 'old' Delhi that had been the political and financial centre of several ancient Indian empires 

• Among the wide streets, new housing and shopping arcades were the new administrative buildings (secretariat buildings and viceroy's residence) which flanked an acropolis consisting of four columns that represented the four dominions of Canada, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand, indicating India's promised dominion status 

• Each of these dominions comprised a federation of various provinces that had agreed to a single central government; to progressive British and moderate opinion, federation seemed a workable way forward. However, this was not a solution favoured by imperialists like Winston Churchill, who resisted any infringement of British sovereignty, and was not an acceptable way forward for Gandhi or Nehru 

Second Round Table Conference September - December 1931

Context

• In August 1931, the first Labour government resigned after splitting and was replaced by a Tory-dominated coalition (the National Government) facing a depression, unemployment and the collapse of the economy. The government was tackling huge problems that (to them) seemed more pressing than settling the Indian question 

• The new secretary of state for India, Sir Samuel Hoare, had more reservations about self-government for India than his predecessor, William Wedgwood Benn. These reservations were shared by many in the Conservative Party; indeed, Winston Churchill campaigned around Britain against Congress 

• Churchill set up the Indian Defence League, with support from around 50 Conservative MPs, and made no secret of the fact that he thought Indians were totally unsuited to democracy and should remain subordinate to the white British Empire forever 

Key features

• Gandhi-Irwin pact made it possible for Congress to be represented; Gandhi was its sole representative 

• Iqbal (the Agha Khan) and Jinnah represented the Muslim League 

• Master Tara Singh represented Sikhs 

• Dr Ambedkar represented Untouchables 

Significance

• Muslims, Sikhs and Untouchables wanted separate electorates for their communities; at this point the Conference began to unravel 

• Gandhi took particular exception to Untouchables being considered for a separate electorate; as they were Hindus he felt like he could speak for them 

• Arguments focusing on the desirability (or otherwise) of reserving seats for religious/racial minorities and how this would affect the balance of power 

• Jinnah often played one group against another as he sought to gain greater concessions for Muslims 

• The British government supported separate electorates, drawing them into contention with Gandhi 

• Gandhi worried about alliance between Muslims and princes that could outweigh any recommendations made by Congress 

• Couldn't agree on a workable constitution 

Links to events after

• The failure of the Second Round Table Conference prompted a third one 

Third Round Table Conference November - December 1932

Context

• By the time of the third Round Table conference, PM Ramsey Macdonald had lost the support of his own Labour Party. He was able to continue in office only through a National Government, supported by his political opponents. The Labour Party, embroiled with their own internal problems, didn't send any representatives the third time round 

Key features

• Only 46 delegates attended 

• No delegates from British Labour Party or Congress 

Significance

• Discussed the franchise, finance and role of the princely states  

• Couldn't reach any definite conclusions and collapsed in confusion 

Willingdon as Viceroy April 1931

Context

• Willingdon was previously governor-general of Canada and had earlier experience in India a governor of Bombay and Madras 

• While governor of Bombay, and dealing with India's contribution to WW1, Willingdon got the impression of Gandhi as a dangerous Bolshevik. He despised the Gandhi-Irwin Pact as a weak document 

Key features

• With these preconceptions, as viceroy Willingdon adopted stricter measures against protestors, alienating nationalist opinion 

• Commissioned the Lloyd Barrage across the Indus River that provided work for thousands  

• Brought large areas of desert under cultivation 

• Established the Willingdon Sports Club in Bombay, open to Indians and British, as a direct result of being refused membership of the Royal Bombay Yacht Club because he was accompanied by Indian friends 

Significance

• Faced many threats on his life 

Links to events after

• Replaced by Lord Linlithgow in April 1936 

Civil disobedience 1932

Context

• Viceroy Willingdon decided to take a tough line 

• Lacking the temperament, or indeed the willingness to engage in discussions with Gandhi, he followed the British government's instructions that he should conciliate only those elements of Indian opinion that were prepared to work with the current administration 

Key features

• On 4 January, just one week after he returned from the Second Round Table Conference, Gandhi was arrested and imprisoned 

• Congress was outlawed 

• All members of the Congress Working Committee and Provincial Committees were rounded up and imprisoned 

• Youth organisations were banned 

Significance

• Within 4 months, over 80,000 Indians (mostly members of Congress) were in prison 

• Reaction on the part of the Indian population was swift but, in the absence of Congress leaders locally and nationally, and especially Gandhi, was uneven and disorganised 

• Boycotts of British goods were common, as was non-payment of taxes; youth organisations, although officially banned, became very popular; terrorist activity increased, with more women becoming involved 

• The United Provinces and the Northwest Frontier Province became little more than armed camps and troops in Peshawar and Meerut were kept on armed alert 

• By and large, authorities kept control of the situation and the police never lost control of the streets or rural areas for very long 

Communal Award August 1932

Key features

• On 16 August, Ramsay Macdonald, the British prime minister, announced the Communal Award, which was to be incorporated into any new Indian constitution 

• This designated Sikhs, Indian Christians, Anglo-Indians and Untouchables as separate classes, along with Muslims, which as such were entitled to separate electorates in any new Indian constitution  

Significance

• Gandhi was furious – he wasn't in favour of separate electorates anyway, but the inclusion of Untouchability was his final straw, as he had long campaigned to remove the stigma of Untouchability and all Untouchables were Hindus 

• He reasoned that the British government was further trying to weaken Congress by separating off Untouchables, and he feared that to separate Untouchables in this way would fragment Hindu society 

• Gandhi launched a fast-unto-death, believing he had no other course of action. The government faced the problem of giving into blackmail by withdrawing the Communal Award or allowing him to die and become a martyr, risking further unrest 

Links to events after

• Poona Pact

Yeravda/Poona Pact August 1932

Context

• Viceroy Willingdon didn't want to make Gandhi a martyr and consequently inflate the importance of his cause. He had plans in place to release Gandhi once he got to the point of no return so that at least he would not die in prison 

• Congress did not want to lose their iconic leader 

• Gandhi's fast exerted tremendous emotional and political pressure on Untouchables and other Hindus 

Key features

• A wide spectrum of Hindu leaders met in Bombay, including representatives of the Untouchables. Together, they hammered out a set of proposals that they took by train to Poona, where Gandhi was fasting in the Yeravda jail, having refused Willingdon's offer to move him to a more comfortable private house 

• Although weak and in danger of physical and mental collapse, Gandhi discussed the proposals with the delegation for several days until they reached an agreement: 

  • The British government Communal Award proposal was for an allocation of 71 seats on the provincial legislatures to the Untouchables; Gandhi and the delegation settled on a total of 148, elected by a system of primary and secondary elections for seats allocated to Untouchables, with only Untouchables being able to vote in the relevant primary elections 

  • Untouchables would be allocated 18% of the Central Assembly, as long as they stood for election by the votes of the general electorate (essentially meaning the abandonment of separate electorates) 

  • A specific sum of money should be set aside by every provincial assembly for the education of Untouchables 

Significance

• The British government accepted the Poona Pact and made the necessary amendments to the Communal Award 

  • However, agreement between Hindus and Untouchables was not enough 

  • The Round Table Conferences had demonstrated the wide divergence in long-term aspirations, short-term aims and tactics of Muslims, Sikhs, Christians and the princes 

  • Believing Indians unable to reach agreement on their own constitution, the British politicians decided to create one for them with the Government of India Act 

Links to events after

• 1935 Government of India Act 

Government of India Act 1935

Context

• The India Defence League (composed of conservatives, ex-generals and former civil servants) fought the Government of India Bill every inch of the way 

  • Rudyard Kipling was a vice president 

  • Winston Churchill was a vociferous supporter, having formed his views on India when he was stationed there as an army subaltern in 1897 

  • Having problems with accepting equality between races, he refused to accept that Indians were capable of running their own affairs 

• Media support for the IDL came from the Daily Mail 

  • The proprietor, Lord Rothermere, wrote a series of articles under the general heading 'If We Lose India' 

    • These contained erroneous facts (e.g. Congress were an insignificant group of semi-educated Hindus) and fake photographs of British troops quelling riots with lorries piled high with corpses 

    • This promoted the message that Indians were unfit to govern themselves and if the British were to leave, carnage would follow 

  • The Daily Mail also warned that India was essential to the British economy and to lose India's trade at a time when every economy in the Western world was struggling, would be foolish 

• Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin steered the bill through the Commons with quiet determination, sticking to the position he had taken up when he supported the Irwin Declaration 

  • He managed to convince the majority of his party that the British Empire was an organic organisation that had to change and develop or die 

Key features

• In the Commons, the bill was attacked by Winston Churchill and Clement Attlee (for different reasons) 

• In the event, fewer than 50 MPs followed Churchill into the 'No' lobby and the bill became law in August 1935 

• Secretary of state Sir Samuel Hoare, while acknowledging the furore created by the bill, countered it by arguing that no one in India had been able to produce a workable alternative 

• Main features 

  • India was divided into 11 provinces, each of which had a legislative assembly and a provincial government. The provinces would control almost everything, except defence and foreign affairs 

  • Each provinces would have a governor, who retained the power to act in an emergency 

  • Dyarchy, the system in which provincial government was divided between appointed officials and elected representatives, was abolished 

  • Separate electorates were to continue as before 

  • Burma was separated from India and given its own government 

  • Two new states, Sindh and Orissa, were created 

  • The viceroy would still be appointed by the British government and would be in control of defence and foreign affairs; however, he would have to follow the advice of an Executive Committee made up mostly of Indians 

  • A Federation of India was proposed but never put into effect 

Significance

• Congress objected to the Act because: 

  • They wanted purna swaraj and members weren't interested in what they saw as a half-way house 

  • They wanted India to have a strong central government, which would inevitably be strongly Hindu; they could not support strong provincial governments as laid down in the Government of India Act because some provincial governments might end up being Muslim-dominated or controlled 

  • They objected to the reservation of seats for minority groups 

• The Muslim League objected to the Act primarily because it did not offer enough power to Muslims in either central or provincial legislatures. No guarantees were offered for the protection of the rights of Muslims 

• The Government of India Act proposed an all-India federation that would inevitably result in a diminution of the power of the princes and they were prepared to bargain hard to prevent their fiscal rights 

  • The London government warned Delhi not to push the princes too hard, fearing they would refuse to cooperate altogether and the Act would crumble 

  • Lord Zetland, the Conservative government's secretary of state for India, was afraid that the princes would join with Tory die-hards to prevent the complete implementation of the Government of India Act. This potential alliance would also cause severe embarrassment for the government in Westminster 

  • These fears hampered any negotiations that Lord Linlithgow and Lord Zetland were conducting with representatives of the princely states, Congress and the Muslim League 

• By 1939, only 2/5 of the states had agreed to the form of federation required by the Act 

  • There was an increasing pressure for reform and greater representative government before any federal agreement was reached and confirmed the autocracy of the princes 

  • Unrest and some limited rioting broke out in states like Hyderabad and Khasi 

  • Congress was officially opposed to the idea of the princes' nomination to any federal legislature and wanted to end their autocracy. However, the central Congress leadership was afraid that splinter groups of Congress supporters would use the agitation in the princely states to build up a power base of their own and challenge the central Congress leaders 

Links to events after

• The Government of India Act was only partially implemented by the time the Second World War broke out in 1939 

• During this time, the Raj experienced a brief period of popularity: 

  • As the 1930s progressed and the Raj seemed less and less like the natural government of India, no obvious alternative was accepted by Indians 

  • Vague promises of nationalism that had previously welded diverse peoples together were now seen to be inadequate as a structure for the government of the subcontinent 

  • More and more people, in particular Congress chief ministers, looked to the administrative structures of the Raj for practical guidance and professional help 

• The new structure of provincial governance in India had little impact on British recruitment to the Indian Civil Service 

  • Recruitment boomed in the 1930s 

  • This boom did not make up for earlier shortfalls. The ICS struggled at a time when the Service needed its greatest political and personal flexibility and skill in managing the demands of the new provincial assemblies 

  • Many ICS men formed strong working and personal relationships with Indian politicians; their problem was their workload, which was heavy at the best of times and became intolerable as WW2 loomed 

1937 elections

Context

• Congress and the Muslim League were faced with an immediate dilemma of whether or not to participate in the provincial elections 

  • Not to participate would be consistent with their rejection of the Government of India Act, but the elections were going ahead anyway  

  • A further boycott would cut them off from government 

  • To participate might give them the opportunity to work within the system to create change 

• Both Congress and the Muslim League decided to take part 

Key features

• Congress: 

  • Congress gained overall control of the United and Central Provinces, Orissa, Bombay and Madras, and became the largest single party in Assam and the North-West Frontier, although a combination of opponents could outvote them 

  • Only in Bengal, Punjab and Sind were Congress outvoted 

  • Though less than half of the 1585 provincial legislative seats contested throughout India were open to the general electorate, Congress won them all, together with 59 more from the separate electorate contests, ending up with 716 legislative members 

• Muslim League: 

  • The Muslim League fared badly. This was largely because it had no strong leadership until 1935 when Jinnah returned to India 

  • To attempt to rally coordinated and focused support for the Muslim League was a very big task, and Jinnah worked hard before the elections to build up a power base, but in the limited time available to him, he wasn't even able to find enough candidates to contest all the reserved Muslim seats 

  • An analysis of polling figures shows that Muslims gave little support to Congress candidates, even though they had to be Muslim to stand for the restricted seats 

  • The only overwhelmingly Muslim province that voted strongly for Congress was the North-West Frontier 

• Non-Congress ministries were formed in Assam, Bengal, Punjab and Sind, and here governance worked as well as it did in the provinces with Congress ministries 

• There was legislative reform and much was done to protect tenants, relieve peasant poverty and control the activities of money-lenders 

• The only observable difference was that, in the Congress-led provinces, due to the influence of Gandhi, basic education centred on crafts was given a high priority 

Significance

• Jinnah realised that the Muslim League would either have to attract mass support in order to win control in some provinces (especially the Punjab and Sind, where Muslims were in a majority) or it would have to enter some kind of power-sharing agreement with Congress (which Congress refused to contemplate) 

• Many of the new Congress provincial council ministers were power-hungry: 

  • They took advantage of their new offices and appointed relatives and fellow caste members to jobs they controlled 

  • They ignored minorities and often behaved spitefully to their enemies 

  • In some provinces, fiscal policies were drawn up to hurt Muslim landowners 

  • In Bihar, cow-slaughter was banned 

  • Congress flags were hoisted on public buildings where there was a substantial Muslim minority 

  • Now, as never before, many Muslims believed they needed the electoral safeguards that Jinnah and the Muslim League had long been demanding 

• Jinnah rose to the occasion, beginning a series of carefully orchestrated personal appearances, mass rallies and press interviews: 

  • The rallies and processions deliberately harked back to the glory days of the Mughal Empire 

  • 'Tipu Sultan Day' was inaugurated in honour of a Muslim sultan who defeated the British 

  • He deliberately targeted university students, persuading them that success in their future careers would only come about if they supported the Muslim League, with its promise of protection for Muslims via separate electorates 

  • Jinnah became the embodiment of Muslim identity, hopes and dreams 

• In 1938, the year Bose was elected president, Jinnah met briefly with Gandhi, Nehru and Bose, but talks broke down because of Jinnah's insistence that the Muslim League be recognised by Congress as the sole party of India's Muslims 

Congress presidency controversy 1938

Context

• Congress was, on the surface, in partnership with the Raj, although this was not an easy one. Congress' central leadership was uncertain as to how much control it could exercise over the provincial leaders, even though they nominally supported Congress 

  • Some ranged behind Gandhi, who favoured using parliamentary tactics even though it might mean temporarily cooperating with the Raj and the princes to achieve swaraj 

  • Others backed Jawaharlal Nehru, hating working within a constitution they disliked and having to accept that ultimate power still lay with the British 

  • In the end, Gandhi negotiated with the British and gained an assurance that provincial governors would not interfere with normal administration 

  • This worked to a considerable extent, although in some provinces there was a clear refusal to accept not only the Raj but also Muslims rights 

Key features

• At the end of 1938, Congress was torn apart by in-fighting over its presidency 

  • There was considerable pressure on Bose to quit: Gandhi didn't trust him and neither did the old guard 

  • However, Jawaharlal Nehru refused to stand in his place and Bose himself refused to step aside for the Gandhi faction's nominee, Pattabhi Sitaramayya  

• Bose knew he had the support of student, worker and peasant delegates and, in the first contested election for the presidency of Congress, won 

Significance

• Twelve members of the Gandhi faction resigned immediately from the Working Committee in protest against the democratic election of their own president 

• Bose was left as president of a party that could not function because of the huge rift in its senior echelons 

• Gandhi ignored Bose' pleas for help and Nehru's attempts at mediation failed. Finally, Bose was forced to resign and was replaced by Rajendra Prasad, 'elected' by the Working Committee 

Links to events after

• Bose and his brother, Sarat Chandra, left Congress altogether and, in their homeland of Bengal, formed the Forward Bloc Party 

Forward Bloc founded 1939

Context

• In 1939, Subhas Chandra Bose left the Congress Party 

Key features

• Bose formed the Forward Bloc Party, dedicated to the revolutionary overthrow of the Raj 

  • Initially, the aim of the Forward Bloc was to rally all the left-wing sections within Congress to develop an alternative leadership of Congress, but it quickly developed into a strong anti-British organisation, particularly after the outbreak of war 

  • Their newspaper, Forward Bloc, was first published in the month war was declared and Bose travelled India, rallying support 

  • The party's first all-India conference was held the following year in Nagpur. Declaring themselves to be a socialist party, the conference passed a resolution urging militant action against British rule 

Significance

• Suspecting treason and fearing uprisings, on 2 July the authorities arrested Bose, holding him first in the Presidency Jail in Calcutta and then under house arrest 

  • In January 1941, Bose escaped, travelling to the Soviet Union via Afghanistan 

  • His attempt to persuade Stalin to support the Indian independence struggle failed, as Stalin was coping with the first stages of the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union 

• Back in India, the British authorities banned the Forward Bloc and its publications 

  • The party's offices around the country were ransacked in an attempt to destroy seditious material and obtain membership lists 

  • Anti-British activities continued, but intermittently and without central direction (e.g. in Bihar, Forward Bloc members were involved with underground resistance groups and distributed anti-British propaganda) 

• Bose turned to Britain's enemies and travelled to Berlin, where he met a lukewarm reception 

  • Hitler feared that any collapse of the British Raj in India would lead to Russia moving into the power vacuum created in the subcontinent 

  • Bose was encouraged to broadcast propaganda urging Indians to rise up against British tyranny 

Links to events after

• Having no more use for him, the Nazis agreed that he could work with the Japanese on a possible land invasion into India. Here, he formed the Indian National Army (INA) 

Declaration of war September 1939

Key features

• On 3 September 1939, PM Neville Chamberlain declared war on Nazi Germany 

• Lord Linlithgow followed suit, committing over 300 million Indians to war without consulting a single one of them 

Significance

• Congress was shocked at the lack of consultation, especially considering the powersharing promised by the 1935 Government of India Act 

  • This reaction was complicated by a feeling of sympathy with Britain in its struggle with European fascism 

• Gandhi urged the British government to negotiate with Hitler using peaceful means – Nehru knew this was futile 

• Gandhi gave his support to the British people, but Congress were unwilling to support a government that hadn't consulted them prior to the declaration of war. They were unprepared to fight unless they were granted immediate swaraj 

Links to events afterwards

• Congress withdrawal from provincial governments 

Congress withdrawal from provincial governments Autumn 1939 - Spring 1940

Context

• In the early months of WW2, British politicians were preoccupied and demands for purna swaraj fell on deaf ears 

Key features

• Congress' leaders ordered all Congress members to resign from provincial ministries throughout India 

  • This removed hundreds of Indians from official positions where they had been able to ease the effects of war for their people and, to an extent, influence events internal to India, reverting India's provinces to a form of direct British government unknown since 1919 

Significance

• The way now lay open for the Muslim League to strengthen its position 

• Jinnah designated the day that the last Congress ministry abandoned its post (22 December 1939) as Muslim India's Day of Deliverance  

  • He suggested that Muslim League branches all over India should hold public meetings and offer prayers of thanksgiving for deliverance from the Congress regime 

  • Most Muslims heeded Jinnah's request that they cause no offence to ordinary Hindus 

• Privately, it seemed that Jinnah and Nehru were looking for the possibility of some sort of rapprochement 

  • Nehru wrote to Jinnah in early December expressing sadness that their political objectives seemed to differ so greatly and expressing the hope that common ground could be found 

  • Jinnah's reply emphasised the need for Congress to treat the Muslim league as the authoritative representative organisation in India before any reconciliation could occur 

Links to events after

• With Congress out of the political picture, it was left to the Muslim League to work with the Raj and the British government to support the war effort and to strengthen their own position within India 

Lahore 1940

Context

• Freed from the necessity of coping with Congress, Jinnah focused on the Muslim League and the challenging problems of formulating the League's constitutional goals 

  • In March 1940, he called a meeting in Lahore that was attended by 100,000 Muslims 

Key features

• The resolution set out what the Muslim League considered to be basic principles of any new constitution for India: 

  • That those areas of the subcontinent where Muslims were in the majority should be grouped to form separate independent states 

  • That minorities had to be protected, whether those concerned were living in Muslim or Hindu-dominated states 

  • A working party was to be set up to frame the constitution based on these two principles 

• The concept of separateness was emphasised relentlessly at Lahore 

  • It is uncertain that the Muslim League at this point envisaged that two separate states of East and West Pakistan would eventually emerge 

  • It is also uncertain whether Jinnah himself wanted this – he may have been using the idea of separate states as a bargaining tactic to gain separate representation within a united India 

  • The involvement of the eminent Bengali politician and strong proponent of a separate Pakistan, Fazul Huq, in the drafting of the Lahore Resolution, makes it more likely that this was a possibility in the minds of the drafters 

Significance

• Gandhi maintained that the Lahore Resolution was tantamount to the vivisection of India and appealed over the head of Jinnah to the common sense of Muslims to draw back from the obvious suicide that partition would mean for India 

• Mini satyagraha campaigns broke out, protesting against the Lahore Resolution. The Raj acted swiftly and the perpetrators were jailed 

• Nehru denounced the idea of a separate Muslim state as a mad scheme and toured India trying to strengthen the will of Congress supporters 

  • The young were already drilling and wearing pseudo uniforms, ready for the supposed conflict with Muslims 

  • Nehru inspected one such body, carrying an imitation Field Marshal's baton, and was subsequently imprisoned 

Links to events after

• Linlithgow makes the August Offer 

August Offer 1940

Context

• In May 1940, two months after the Lahore Resolution, Linlithgow invited Jinnah to Simla, with the aim of discussing with him a range of issues relating to India and the war 

Key features

• Jinnah submitted a list of proposals to Linlithgow, which were welcomed 

• Linlithgow made these proposals the basis of his 1940 August Offer: 

  • 'Representative' Indians would join his Executive Council 

  • A War Advisory Council would be established that would include the princes and other interested parties 

  • There was an assurance that the government would not adopt any new constitution without the prior approval of Muslim India 

• The viceroy accompanied this offer with a statement that seemed to place the Muslim League at the centre of any decision making about India's future 

  • He made it clear that the wishes and needs of the Muslim community would have to be taken into account in any post-war settlement 

Significance

• It was obvious that the vital role played by Muslims in the Indian army at home and abroad greatly strengthened Jinnah's hand, particularly when compared to what was perceived by the British government as being the obstructive attitude of Congress 

• The secretary of state for India, Leo Amery, told the House of Commons how much easier the situation would be if Congress spoke for all the main elements in India's national life 

  • Here was recognition of the fact that Congress did not speak for the whole of India and an understanding that the millions of Muslims had to have their interests safeguarded 

  • The problem that remained for the British powers was not so much whether power should be transferred, but to whom? 

INA Invasion of India Spring 1944

Context

• In Japan, Bose formed the Indian National Army (INA) from Indian prisoners of war 

• Initially, the Japanese used the INA as a source of agents for behind-the-lines sabotage and spying in mainland India 

  • Most of these agents were picked up by the Indian authorities 

  • Many became double agents 

  • Some simply took the train home 

Key features

• While Bose still planned for a full-scale invasion of India, the Japanese had more limited objectives, centring on taking Imphal, the capital city of the Indian state of Manipur, situated on the frontier with Burma (which had fallen to Japan in 1942) 

• In the spring of 1944, 6000 INA soldiers went into action with Japanese troops 

  • 600 deserted to the British 

  • 400 were killed 

  • 1500 died from dysentery and malaria 

  • 1400 were invalided of the war zone 

  • The rest surrendered 

Significance

• The operation was unsuccessful 

• Bose died on 18 August 1945 from third-degree burns after his over-loaded Japanese plane crashed