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| The border had already been roughly drawn up by ], the ], but the final version was set out by Sir ]. Radcliffe had never visited India and didn't know anybody in India before his arrival. Thus, he was considered to be unbiased. However, he was ignorant of realities on the ground and this caused avoidable gaffes in the division. For example, there were instances where the border was drawn leaving some parts of a village in India and some in Pakistan. There were even instances where the dividing line passed through a single house with some rooms in one country and others in the other. Radcliffe's justification for such a casual division was that no matter what he did, people would suffer. He also had to work in a very short time period so there was little point in being careful where exactly the border lay. He made no real attempt to ensure that the border skirted villages or was drawn between thickly populated areas instead of right through them. Radcliffe has been accused of being completely unconcerned about the sufferings of the Indians. The division was done in secret, and the British government allowed no Indians to review it, since disputes were bound to have arisen then and it would delay the Partition. | The border had already been roughly drawn up by ], the ], but the final version was set out by Sir ]. Radcliffe had never visited India and didn't know anybody in India before his arrival. Thus, he was considered to be unbiased. However, he was ignorant of realities on the ground and this caused avoidable gaffes in the division. For example, there were instances where the border was drawn leaving some parts of a village in India and some in Pakistan. There were even instances where the dividing line passed through a single house with some rooms in one country and others in the other. Radcliffe's justification for such a casual division was that no matter what he did, people would suffer. He also had to work in a very short time period so there was little point in being careful where exactly the border lay. He made no real attempt to ensure that the border skirted villages or was drawn between thickly populated areas instead of right through them. Radcliffe has been accused of being completely unconcerned about the sufferings of the Indians. The division was done in secret, and the British government allowed no Indians to review it, since disputes were bound to have arisen then and it would delay the Partition. | ||
| There were two major disputes regarding the Radcliffe Line, the ] and the ] District. Chittagong Hill Tracts had a majority non-] population, but was given to Pakistan while Gurdaspur, with a Muslim majority was given to India. The rationale of giving Chittagong Hill Tracts to Pakistan was to provide some buffer area to ] (now in ]) a major city and port. |
There were two major disputes regarding the Radcliffe Line, the ] and the ] District. Chittagong Hill Tracts had a majority non-] population of 97% most of them ], but was given to Pakistan while Gurdaspur, with a Muslim majority of 51% was given to India. The rationale of giving Chittagong Hill Tracts to Pakistan was to provide some buffer area to ] (now in ]) a major city and port and also it was argued that its only approach was through Chittagong. Gurdaspur District had a slight muslim majority, because ] were counted as muslims even though they had been declared non-muslims by muslim clergy(their spiritual centre ] is located in Gurdaspur district). The proportion of muslim to non-muslim population in the district as a whole was 50.6 and 49.4 respectively with ] and ] tehsils with a slight muslim majority of 1% each while Batala tehsil had a Muslim majority of 53% and Pathankot tehsil had an overwhelming majority of non-muslims at 67%. In the end only Shakargarh tehsil which was seperated from the rest of the district by the ] river was awarded to ] leaving the rest of the district with a slight majority of non-muslims, but it was speculated that at the insistence of ] it was awarded as such to ], so that if the kingdom of ] wanted to integrate with the Indian Union, it would be accessible to ]. In any case ] tehsil would have gone to India and it had a direct rail road link with the adjoining areas of ] and ] districts of ]. Another point was that Batala and Gurdaspur would provide buffer to the ] holy city of ] which otherwise would be surrounded by Muslim territory. The last point that was argued before the boundary comission by Mountbatten and others was that if the area east of Ravi river was considered as one block consisting of Amritsar and most of Gurdaspur district(excluding Shakargarh), it would have a slight non-muslim majority. Also, by doing so majority of Sikh population(58%) would fall in East Punjab, by doing the opposite a slight majority will be left in Pakistan which would exponentially increase the number of Sikh refugees. This was an attempt to pacify the sikhs for they lost major tracts of lands in ]. An attempt was made by ] to transfer ] and ] tehsils to Pakistan instead. This was opposed by the Maharaja of ] because ] headworks on the confluence of ] and ] rivers, from where a canal, the only source of water for his desert state originated. It was only after he threatened ], that he would acceed his state to ] if ] was awarded to ] that the award was changed at the last minute. | ||
| ] | ] | ||
Revision as of 19:54, 24 September 2006
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The Radcliffe Line became the border between India and Pakistan in 1947. The partition of the British Indian Empire required that the territories to be assigned to the two new countries, generally had to have a population matching the majority. Pakistan was set up as a Muslim state while India was predominantly Hindu.
The border had already been roughly drawn up by Lord Wavell, the Viceroy of India, but the final version was set out by Sir Cyril Radcliffe. Radcliffe had never visited India and didn't know anybody in India before his arrival. Thus, he was considered to be unbiased. However, he was ignorant of realities on the ground and this caused avoidable gaffes in the division. For example, there were instances where the border was drawn leaving some parts of a village in India and some in Pakistan. There were even instances where the dividing line passed through a single house with some rooms in one country and others in the other. Radcliffe's justification for such a casual division was that no matter what he did, people would suffer. He also had to work in a very short time period so there was little point in being careful where exactly the border lay. He made no real attempt to ensure that the border skirted villages or was drawn between thickly populated areas instead of right through them. Radcliffe has been accused of being completely unconcerned about the sufferings of the Indians. The division was done in secret, and the British government allowed no Indians to review it, since disputes were bound to have arisen then and it would delay the Partition.
There were two major disputes regarding the Radcliffe Line, the Chittagong Hill Tracts and the Gurdaspur District. Chittagong Hill Tracts had a majority non-Muslim population of 97% most of them Buddhists, but was given to Pakistan while Gurdaspur, with a Muslim majority of 51% was given to India. The rationale of giving Chittagong Hill Tracts to Pakistan was to provide some buffer area to Chittagong (now in Bangladesh) a major city and port and also it was argued that its only approach was through Chittagong. Gurdaspur District had a slight muslim majority, because Amadiyas were counted as muslims even though they had been declared non-muslims by muslim clergy(their spiritual centre Qadiyan is located in Gurdaspur district). The proportion of muslim to non-muslim population in the district as a whole was 50.6 and 49.4 respectively with Shakargarh and Gurdaspur tehsils with a slight muslim majority of 1% each while Batala tehsil had a Muslim majority of 53% and Pathankot tehsil had an overwhelming majority of non-muslims at 67%. In the end only Shakargarh tehsil which was seperated from the rest of the district by the Ravi river was awarded to Pakistan leaving the rest of the district with a slight majority of non-muslims, but it was speculated that at the insistence of Lord Mountbatten it was awarded as such to East Punjab, so that if the kingdom of Kashmir wanted to integrate with the Indian Union, it would be accessible to India. In any case Pathankot tehsil would have gone to India and it had a direct rail road link with the adjoining areas of Hoshiarpur and Kangra districts of East Punjab. Another point was that Batala and Gurdaspur would provide buffer to the Sikh holy city of Amritsar which otherwise would be surrounded by Muslim territory. The last point that was argued before the boundary comission by Mountbatten and others was that if the area east of Ravi river was considered as one block consisting of Amritsar and most of Gurdaspur district(excluding Shakargarh), it would have a slight non-muslim majority. Also, by doing so majority of Sikh population(58%) would fall in East Punjab, by doing the opposite a slight majority will be left in Pakistan which would exponentially increase the number of Sikh refugees. This was an attempt to pacify the sikhs for they lost major tracts of lands in West Punjab. An attempt was made by Radcliffe to transfer Ferozepore and Zira tehsils to Pakistan instead. This was opposed by the Maharaja of Bikaner because Harike headworks on the confluence of Satluj and Beas rivers, from where a canal, the only source of water for his desert state originated. It was only after he threatened Mountbatten, that he would acceed his state to Pakistan if Ferozepur was awarded to West Punjab that the award was changed at the last minute.
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