Ethnic Cleansing

On Tuesday, April 11, Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi while addressing a public meeting organized by the United Democratic Front (UDF) workers in Kerala’s Wayanad made several assertions regarding India’s freedom struggle, one such being that India was built on the foundation of ‘non-violence’. 

“Our nation was built on the foundation of truth, non-violence, equality, and justice,” Priyanka Gandhi said as she asserted that “when the institutions are failing to be checks and balances for the government, It is the job of the people of India’s job to be checks and balances for the government.”  

Contrary to the Congress leader’s assertions, the foundation of independent India was laid on anything but non-violence. Even our school textbooks taught us that ‘Baapu’ got us freedom from the British colonialists through his non-violent movement. However, it has been a bloody history of ours which is not often talked about. It anyways does not make sense that a country that fought two world wars would be deterred by non-violence and let go of its treasure-India. 

While the true history and horrors of Direct Action Day, the Khilafat Movement, and many such pertinent episodes related to the Indian freedom struggle may not have found a place in the mainstream discussion as the emphasis was laid on the ‘Ganga Jamuni Tehzeeb’ and other imaginary notions. Our school history books drastically watered down the Indian Independence struggle and painted a romantic picture that a man with a stick in his hand singlehandedly brought us freedom.

Here are some of the chapters of our Independence history which were carefully watered down.

Two-Nation Theory

The proponents of the ‘Two-Nation Theory’ were the original ‘Tukde-Tukde Gang’. Two Nation Theory was first touted by Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, the founder of the Aligarh Muslim University. Khan had in 1876 said that he was convinced that Hindus and Muslims could never be one nation owing to the distinctiveness of their way of living and religion.

Years later, in 1888, Khan had asserted that if the British leave India with all their canons and weapons, who would rule this country as he argued that both Hindus and Muslims cannot sit on the same throne, adding that one must conquer the other. “It is necessary that one of them should conquer the other. To hope that both could remain equal is to desire the impossible and the inconceivable. But until one nation has conquered the other and made it obedient, peace cannot reign in the land.”

Other than Sir Syed Ahmed Khan, Allama Mohammad Iqbal who is widely known for writing ‘Saare Jahan Se Accha, Hindustan Hamara’ had years later contradicted himself only to push for a separate ‘Muslim’ country. 

In 1910, the poet happened to write Tarana-e-Milli for children to contradict own words he had written six years before. The Islamic fundamentalist nature of Muhammad Iqbal became entirely evident as he wrote, “Cīn o-ʿArab hamārā, Hindūstāṉ hamārā, Muslim haiṉ ham, wat̤an hai sārā jahāṉ hamārā” in the Tarana-e-Milli, which was composed in the same meter and rhyme scheme as ‘Sare Jaha Se Achcha’. 

With Ambedkar Jayanti around the corner, it is also the right time to recall that architect of the constitution was in favour of a complete population exchange at the time of partition. 

When someone asserts that the foundation of India was laid on non-violence, they are lying to the Indian people and blatantly covering up the horrors the people of this country endured. Such assertions also belittle the sacrifices of freedom fighters like Bhagat Singh, Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose, and countless others.

To call Indian Independence history as ‘non-violent’ is a disgrace and disservice to thousands who were killed in the various massacres leading to 15th August 1947 and even beyond.