1945-46 Elections and Pakistan: Punjab’s

Pivotal Role

Sharif al Mujahid

The 1945-46 elections were by far the most critical ones at

all levels in all the annals of subcontinental history. The first
Simla Conference had broken down on 14 July 1945 on the
controversial issue of the All India Muslim League (AIML)’s
representative character, and Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali
Jinnah (1876-1948) was quick to demand a reference to the
electorate to buttress his “demonstration of imperious strength at
… Simla”. This demonstration, to quote H. V. Hodson, former
Reforms Commissioner (1941-42) and author of the most
authoritative British account of the Great Divide, “was a shot in
the arm for the League and a serious blow to its Muslim
opponents, especially in the Punjab”.1

Clearly, Jinnah’s Simla strategy went extremely well with

Muslims. Indeed, Simla endowed the League with a tremendous
psychological boost overnight, perhaps as much as Lucknow
(1937) and Lahore (1940) had done earlier. Jinnah, a strategist
with an acute sense of timing, seized the moment to call for
general elections, so that the League’s claim to being Muslim
India’s authoritative body and his claim to being its sole
spokesman get validated, once and for all, at the hustings.
Fortuitously though, Sir Stafford Cripps (1889-1952), the India
expert in the new, postwar Labour government, also urged the
holding of fresh elections, if only “to expedite the means of
arriving at a permanent settlement”.2 General elections, thus,
came to be announced on 21 August 1945, and were scheduled
2 Pakistan Vision Vol. 11 No. 1

for winter 1945-46. Not inexplicably though, the two critical

issues at stake were: (i) whether the AIML was Muslim India’s
sole authoritative spokesman, and (ii) whether Muslims favoured
Pakistan or not.

Although every Muslim seat throughout the subcontinent

was important, more critical, however, were those in the Punjab
and Bengal, the most demographically dominant Muslim
provinces. After all, if Pakistan were to be established, it had to
be in the Muslim provinces. No wonder, Maulana Abul Kalam
Azad (1889-1958), the Congress Rastrapathi, wrote to Sardar
Vallabbhai Patel (1875-1950), the “Iron Man” of the Congress,
on 21 October that “the Punjab and Bengal hold the key position
in the present election”. And the indefatigable Patel, who, though
ailing, yet ran the Congress’s election campaign so determinedly
and so efficiently from his sick bed at Poona, on his part, gave
the utmost attention to Bengal and the Punjab. No wonder, he
immediately sent a cheque for Rs. 50,000/- to the Ahrars in the
Punjab, followed by other huge tranches to the Punjab Congress
leadership, while making it absolutely clear to one and all that he
would help out the provincial leadership “only in the matter of
Muslim constituencies”.3

Subsequently, Patel reminded Sachar that “The Punjab is

[not only] a prosperous and key province of Pakistan” but that
“the Punjab [also] holds the key to the future of India”, and, he
called on him to collect contributions from local industrial
magnates, big businessmen and landlords.4 That, above all,
underscores Punjab’s pre-eminent role in the electoral battle for
Pakistan, even from the Congress’s viewpoint.

Another major component of the Congress’s strategy was

spelled out by Azad after meeting Malik Sir Khizr Hayat Khan
Tiwana (1900-75), the Punjab Unionist Premier, when he told
reporters on 8 October at Faletti’s, Lahore, “We are ready to
enter into a pact with anyone [whatever their standing and
whatever their objectives,] excepting the League”.5 Hence the
Congress clobbered together a formidable string of anti-League
forces – the entrenched Unionists, the vociferous and agitation
oriented Ahrars, the militant Khaksars, the religion invoking
1945-46 Elections and Pakistan: Punjab’s Pivotal Role 3

Jamiat al Ulema-i-Hind and the much organized Congress – into

an almost impregnable opposition in the Punjab. Between these
disparate groups, Azad served as the Chief Coordinator, fuelling
them with the requisite funds through Sardar Patel. A third
component was that the Congress decided to approach the
Muslim masses through its client Muslim parties and the much
esteemed ulema, who were expected to explode the “myth”
concerning the League and Pakistan.

Like G. M. Syed (1904-1995) in Sind, Premier Malik Khizr

Hayat Khan Tiwana as well tried to confuse the ordinary, almost
gullible voters, asserting that he and other Muslim Unionist
members were “firm and uncompromising supporters of …
Pakistan”,6 but the gimmick failed to work. And this chiefly
because, as against the Provincial Muslim Leagues (PMLs) in
Sind and the North-West Frontier Province, the Punjab PML had
become much more organized, much more disciplined and much
more buoyant, if only because of its break-up with the Unionists
in April 1944. It was also the least troublesome in terms of feud
and faction. Thus, the Punjab team was able to remain intact
under Nawab Iftikhar Husain Khan of Mamdot (1906-69), the
Punjab PML President. And he was able to infuse the team spirit
among his colleagues, chiefly because he was a self effacing, but
confident leader, who, backed by Jinnah all he way, worked
silently, sans ambition, sans rhetoric and sans fanfare.7 All said
and done, however, it was Jinnah alone who, like Vladimir Ilich
Ulyanove Lenin (1870-1920), the architect of the Russian
Revolution (1917),8 had provided the critical linkage between the
top, disparate Punjab leadership.9

Soon after the HMG’s announcement of the general

elections, the adhesion of some topmost Congressites and
Unionists – most notably Mian Iftikharuddin (1907-62),
President, Punjab Provincial Congress Committee (PCC), and
Sir Feroze Khan Noon(1893-1970), Member, Viceroy’s
Executive Council, Premier Tiwana’s cousin and Unionist
Party’s founding member, followed by Begum Jahan Ara Shah
Nawaz (1896-1979), former Unionist Parliamentary Secretary,
and several other Unionist stalwarts – served notice on both the
4 Pakistan Vision Vol. 11 No. 1

Congress and the Unionist Party that their respective citadels

were fast in the process of crumbling down.

The ulema and the mashaiks (including the Sajjada Nashins),

inspired and motivated by the much esteemed Deoband alim and
Principal, Allama Shabbir Ahmad Usmani (1885-1949), got
activized and mobilized, almost overnight. In perspective,
Allama Usmani had fortuitiously provided since mid-October
1945 the direly needed theological weight in Pakistan’s favour
against the pervasive and persuasive anti-League influence of the
ubiquitous and much esteemed Congress ulema at the grass-root
level.10

At another level, student leaders like Abdul Sattar Khan

Niyazi (1915-2000s) founder of the Punjab Muslim Students
Federation (MSF) (f. 1938) and Hameed Nizami (1915-1962),
third elected President of the Punjab MSF and later, Editor,
Nawa-i-Waqt (Lahore), played a leading role in organizing and
mobilizing students and young workers, and leading them in
small groups to visit small towns and their hinterland, organize
mini gatherings of village folk at various places, listen to their
pressing problems, in order to solve them or find solutions to
them. Inter alia, they sought to educate and explain to them the
League’s policies and programme in general terms and in the
context of the pressures and problems that had held rural Punjab
hostage, and its politics and ultimate goals.11 And even as the
elections approached, thousands of student volunteers from
Aligarh University, Islamia College and other institutions fanned
out throughout the sprawling province to educate, mobilize and
motivate the ordinary voters to brace for total defiance, both
against official pressure and the mighty Unionist oriented
zamindars’ dire threats and influence.

Meantime, for a year or more, numerous Primary Leagues

had sprung up or come to be established where there was none,
and the Muslim League National Guards (MLNG) was duly
reorganized as never before. In tandem were several women
activist groups organized in several cities, besides the Muslim
Women Students’ Federation, founded earlier in 1941, having
been spruced up and streamlined – both targeted to ensuring
1945-46 Elections and Pakistan: Punjab’s Pivotal Role 5

increasing women awareness, motivation and participation in the

League’s campaign.12 Thus, women comprised almost one-third
of the audiences in the election meetings, reminisced Mian
Mumtaz Khan Daulatana (1916-95) later.13

Additionally, authored by Daulatana, Punjab PML’s General

Secretary, with the assistance of noted leftist, Danial Latifi, the
Acting Office Secretary of the Punjab PML since July 1944, a
radical manifesto (1945) came to be crafted. By all accounts, it
was a big leap forward. It helped to endow the Punjab League
election campaign with the direly needed progressive streak.
And all the while, the leading Urdu papers, especially the Nawa-
i-Waqt, Zamindar, Ihsan and The Eastern Times, carried on a
blitz undeterred, despite the Unionists’ sword over their uneasy
heads.

The chink in the armour was, however, the League’s meagre

resources. As against the Unionists’ four million (forty lakhs)
election chest, not to speak of the Birla and Dalmia funded
millions at the Congress’s disposal, the League could possibly
collect only a meagre sum of Rs. 800,000. Jinnah, of course,
came to the PML’s rescue, helping it out to the tune of Rs.
300,000 out of the Central League funds;14 but still the
Provincial League’s resources were far too limited, obviously
constraining the spread and intensity of its election campaign.

Yet the greatest problem confronting the rejuvenated League

was that not only were the Unionists in power, but that the
Glancy-Khizr axis had as well “conspired” to utilize brazently
the bureaucracy, the most powerful and the most ubiquitous in
the entire subcontinent, to get a verdict in their favour, whatever
be the means, whatever the cost. “The entire bureaucracy –
Hindu, Muslim, Sikh and the British – was against us”, recalled
Daulatana years later.15 Indeed ever since the general elections
were announced, the greatest headache for the Punjab leaders
was how to ensure the “complete neutrality of the state
apparatus” and several leaders wrote to Jinnah, stressing its
imperative need. “There have been”, admitted Lord Wavell
(1883-1950), the Viceroy, “a lot of allegations against the
Unionist Ministry… to the effect that they are abusing their
6 Pakistan Vision Vol. 11 No. 1

position to gain advantage in the elections.”16 Jinnah himself had

to take cognizance of the gravity of these complaints: “voters
and … workers… are being coerced, threatened, intimidated and
persecuted”, he charged. And since both the Viceroy and the
Governor (Bertrand Glancy) had turned a “deaf ear” to all those
“shameful and criminal tactics”, he told his beleaguered
followers that there was “no door” to knock at and no alternative
left but “to fight” to the bitter end.17

Earlier, in the central assembly elections, held in late

November-December 1945, at stake were six Muslim seats, and
the League made a complete sweep of them. Three seats were
bagged without a contest, a record for any province; and the
Independents (mostly Unionists) and a Khaksar, who contested
on the other three seats, secured a total of mere 2,788 (19.04%)
out of 16,358 votes cast. This meant that the League could surge
forward, making a shambles of the Unionists. And it did in the
provincial elections held in February 1946.

The Muslim League contested all the eighty-six Muslim

seats (nine urban, seventy five rural and two women), and two of
its candidates returned unopposed. The Unionists contested
seventy-six seats, the Ahrars sixteen, the Congress eight and the
Khaksars three. Additionally, there were eighty-two
Independents in the field. The League’s score was 87.2 per cent
of the Muslim seats and 65.3 per cent of the total Muslim vote;
the Unionists secured 27.26 per cent votes while the rest 7.44 per
cent.18 In view of the Congress’s dire prognostications the
League’s success may well be termed astounding. Patel, the
“lodestar” of the Congress, conceded, albeit grudgingly, “The
League has scored better than expected…”19

In the battle for Pakistan, Punjab was considered the “key”

province; hence the Punjab results sent a wave of joy throughout
Muslim India. An enthralled Jinnah lauded the Punjab results,
saying, “The Muslims played a magnificent part in conclusively
proving that Punjab is the cornerstone of Pakistan. Ninety per
cent fighting against all odds is a splendid achievement of which
you, Muslim India and myself should be proud”, he wired
Mamdot, the Punjab PML President.20
1945-46 Elections and Pakistan: Punjab’s Pivotal Role 7

In perspective, however, despite the temporary setback to

assume power after the elections, the Punjab vote was the most
critical one since, to Patel, among others, the Punjab held “the
key to the future of India” – an assessment, which was also
generally shared by British officials and non-officials. For
instance, Governor Sir Hugh Dow of Sind,21 Governor Sir Henry
Joseph Twynam of C. P. and Berar,22 and Sir Francis Low,23
Editor, The Times of India (Bombay), the foremost Anglo-Indian
daily, told Wavell that the Punjab held “the key to the Pakistan
problem”. Likewise, U. S. officials and diplomats in Delhi
regarded Punjab as “the keystone of Pakistan”.24

Hence despite what Ayesha Jalal, herself a fullblooded

Punjabi, says about the Punjabi “opportunists” in her much
acclaimed work,25 Punjab did play a critical role in securing
Pakistan. And once Punjab was firmly secured, the Pakistan
issue could not be shelved any more. Nor Pakistan’s emergence
could long be thwarted. And it came eighteen months later.

Notes and References

1 H. V. Hodson, The Great Divide (Karachi: OUP,

1969), pp. 127, 126.

2 Maurice Gwyer and A. Appodorai, Speeches and

Documents on the Indian Constitution (London:
OUP, 1957), II: 566, TP, VI: 21, note 7.

3 Azad to Patel, 21 Oct. 1945, Durga Das (ed.),

Sardar Patel’s Correspondence [hereafter SPC]
(Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, 1972),
II: 24-25. the funds allocated by Patel were only for
the Muslim candidates and Muslim constituencies;
“For the non-Muslim candidates”, “the province
must make its own arrangements”, he told the local
leaders. Patel to Prakasam (Madras), 5 March 1946,
ibid., II: 248. See also Prasad to Patel, 19 Oct. 1945,
8 Pakistan Vision Vol. 11 No. 1

ibid., II: 95; Patel to Azad, 06 March 1946, ibid., II:

64. Azad to Patel, 16 Oct. 1945 and Patel to Azad,
21 Dec. 1945, ibid., II: 27 & 47.

4 30 Dec. 1945, ibid., II: 281; 08 Jan. 1946, ibid., II:

283-84.

5 The Deccan Times, (Madras) 04 Nov. 1945. See N.

K. Krishnan, “A Patriot’s Note book”, The Peoples
War (Bombay), Communist Party’s organ, Shamsul
Hasan Collection [hereafter SHC], Punjab, V: 75.
Patel also asked the Congress leaders in the
provinces to collaborate fully with the anti-League
forces to defeat the League at the hustings.

6 E. W. R. Lumby, The Transfer of Power in India

1945-47 (London: Allen & Unwin, 1954), p. 64;
Morning News, 29 Oct. 1945, p. 6; Civil & Military
Gazette (Lahore), 30 Oct. 1945, p. 5, and 04 Nov.
1945. An exasperated Patel asked Bhargava, “Why
has Khizr come out with that statement? What does
that statement mean?” “It is difficult to rely upon
such people”, he confided Nehru. Patel to Bhargava,
09 Nov. 1945; Patel to Nehru, 07 Nov. 1945, SPC,
II: 145, 71; see also p. 136. However, Khizr had
reportedly given “secret assurances to the Sikhs and
[Governor] Glancy that they will forget all about it
as soon as the elections were over”. Vicky Noon to
Jinnah, 10 Oct. 1945, SHC, Punjab, IV: 19.

7 On Mamdot, see Sharif al Mujahid, “Jinnah’s Team:

The Top Ten”, The Historian (Lahore), vol. 4: 1 &
2, Jan. – Dec. 2004, p. 102.

8 About Lenin, see Sidney Hook, The Hero in

History: A Study in Limitation and Possibility
(Boston: Beacon Press, 1956), pp. 221, 224-25.
1945-46 Elections and Pakistan: Punjab’s Pivotal Role 9

9 See Sharif al Mujahid, Quaid-i-Azam Jinnah:

Studies in Interpretation (Karachi: Quaid-i-Azam
Academy, 1981), pp. 407-08.

10 See Mujahid, “Jinnah’s Team: the Top Ten”, loc.

cit., pp. 97-98.

11 For details, see Archives of Freedom Movement

(AFM), University of Karachi, File Box, Elections
1945-46: Punjab, now deposited in the National
Archives of Pakistan [NAP], Islamabad; and Riaz
Ahmad (ed.), The Punjab Muslim League, 1906-
1947: Secret Police Abstracts (Islamabad: National
Institute of Historical and Cultural Research, 2008),
for the years, 1943-45, pp. 124-254.

12 For details, see, ibid. For a succinct account of the

Punjab PML’s mobilization campaign and Jinnah’s
role in it, see Amarjit Sindh, “M. A. Jinnah and
Punjab Politics: A Study of the Shamsul Hasan
Collection”, International Conference [on] History,
Politics and Society. The Punjab, December 29th-
31st 2008, (Lahore, 2008), Abstracts, pp. 68-70.

13 Interview, Lahore, 25 July 1984.

14 Punjab Fortnightly Reports, 1945, para 106 (1-15

Dec. 1945), S. 426, National Documentation Centre
(NDC). The Deccan Times, 20 Jan. 1946.
Interestingly, Patel had likewise told Sachar, “It
should not be difficult for the Congress to raise any
money for this all-important issue, which affects the
Punjab most”, and reminded him later that “the
Punjab is a prosperous province and a key province
of Pakistan”. Patel to Sachar, 30 Dec. 1945 and 08
Jan. 1946, SPC, II: 281, 284. Also see Patel to Dila
Ram, 02 Jan. 1946, ibid., II: 290. Daulatana to
Jinnah, 17 Jan. 1946 and Jinnah to Daulatana, 17
10 Pakistan Vision Vol. 11 No. 1

Jan. 1946, Quaid-i-Azam Papers (QAP), F. 67: 7, 8;

F. 588: 151-52; F. 257: 9.

15 Interview, Lahore, 25 July 1984.

16 Wavell to Pethick-Lawrence, 25 Dec. 1945, N.

Mansergh, E. W. R. Lumby and Penderal Moon
(eds.) Constitutional Relations Between Britain and
India [hereafter TP], (London: HMSO, 1970-82),
VI: 683.

17 The Deccan Times, 27 Jan. 1946, Jinnah’s statement,

Lahore, 18 Jan. 1946, SHC, Punjab I.

18 For details, see Return Showing the Results of

Election to the Central and Provincial Legislatures
in 1945-46 (New Delhi, 1948) and Abdul Wahid
Qureshi (ed.), Tarikhi faisala (Delhi: Maktaba-i-
Siyasiyah, 1946). Also Richard Symonds, The
Making of Pakistan (London: Faber and Faber,
1950), p. 67; Khalid Bin Sayeed, Pakistan: The
Formative Phase (Karachi: Pakistan Publishing
House, 1960), p. 193; and Ram Gopal, Indian
Muslims: A Political History (1858-1947) (Bombay:
Asia Publishing House, 1959), p. 305.

19 Azad to Patel, 16 Oct. 1945, SPC, II: 27. Nehru to

Krishna Menon, ? Oct. 1945, Selected Works of
Jawaharlal Nehru (Delhi: Orient, 1980s), 14: 96;
Sachar to Patel, 2 Jan. 1946, SPC, II: 282-83; and
Patel to Sachar, 20 Feb. 1946, ibid., II: 305. ‘General
Appreciation’ of the Punjab results, enclosure to
Menon to Gibson, 22 March 1946, TP, VI: 1232.

20 Jinnah to Mamdot, tel., ? Feb. 1946, QAP, F. 372:

33.

21 Governor’s Conference, 1 Aug. 1945, TP, VI: 14.

1945-46 Elections and Pakistan: Punjab’s Pivotal Role 11

22 Sir. H. Twynam (Governor, c. P. & Berar) to

Wavell, 9 Feb. 1946, TP, VI: 929.

23 Earlier, in Nov. 1944, Sir Francis Low after meeting

Glancy, Khizr, Chottu Ram and others in Lahore,
had told Wavell, ‘If the Punjab fall for Jinnah … it
would be hard to avoid Pakistan’. Wavell to Amery,
08 Nov. 1944, ibid., V: 187.

24 Merrel to U. S. Secretary of State, 06 May 1944, F.

845.00/2268, Department of Archives, Washington
D.C.

25 Ayesha Jalal, The Sole Spokesman (Cambridge:

CUP, 1985).