3. The Partition of India – 10,000,000 People Displaced
By the twentieth century, the Hindu and Muslim populations of India had lived side by side for twelve hundred years. While the majority of the Indian subcontinent had been under the control of the Muslim Mughal Empire from 1526 until the colonization of India by the British in the mid-eighteenth century, Muslims still made up only about twenty percent of the total population. The divisions between the Hindu and Muslim populations in India would become accentuated with the development of Indian nationalism in opposition to British rule in the late nineteenth century.
1885 saw the creation of the Indian National Congress by a group of primarily Hindu Indian nationalists dedicated to gaining independence for the country. Still, the Indian National Congress had little purchase amongst the Muslim population. In 1906 Muslims in India established the All India Muslim League, dedicated to ensuring the rights of Muslims and India. The All-Indian Muslim League also dreamt of removing the British, but they envisioned a future in which an independent India would be separated into two countries: a Hindu state of India and a Muslim state of Pakistan.
Between the First and Second World War, the drive for Indian independence gained traction under the guidance of Mahatma Gandhi, who for a time managed to bring the Hindu and Muslim populations together in non-violent resistance. Near the end of the Second World War, the British imprisoned Gandhi and the independence movement spun out of control. Opposition to the British turned violent, and sectarian violence between Hindus and Muslims increased dramatically.
Intercommunal violence persuaded the British to accept the All India Muslim League’s partition plan, and in August 1947 the independent states of India and Pakistan came into being. Hindus in Pakistan were expelled to India, while Muslims in India met a similar fate. In all 10,000,000 people would be driven from their homes.