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Cabinet Mission (1946)

In order to find out solution to the problem, the British Government sent in March 1946, three Cabinet Ministers, namely Lord Pethic Lawrence, Secretary of State for India, Sir Stafford Cripps, President of the Board of Trade and Mr. A.V. Alexander, First Lord of the Admiralty, for negotiations with Indian leaders. The most active member of the Cabinet Mission was Sir Stafford Cripps, and he was in pronounced sympathy with the Congress. The Mission conducted individual negotiations with the top leaders Gandhi, Quaid-i-Azam and others and early in May, 1946, arranged a Joint Conference in Simla.

The Cabinet Mission Plan recommended that there should be a union of India consisting of the British India and the Indian States, dealing with the subjects of foreign affairs, defense and communications. All subjects other than the union subjects and all residuary powers shall rest in Provinces. Provinces shall be free to form groups with Executives and Legislatures and each group could determine the Provincial subjects to be taken in common. It was also recommended that the Union and the groups should contain a provision whereby any Province could, by a majority vote of its Legislative Assembly, call for a reconsideration of the terms of the constitution, after an initial period of ten years.

On April 9, 1946 a convention of Muslim League Legislators – Central and Provincial - in Delhi had passed resolution demanding that the six Provinces of Bengal and Assam in the northeast, and the Punjab, North-West Frontier Province, Sind and Baluchistan in the northwest be constituted into a sovereign independent state of Pakistan, and that two separate constitution making bodies be set up by the peoples of Pakistan and Hindustan for the purpose of framing their respective constitution. In keeping with this resolution, the Muslim League, in its negotiations with the Cabinet Mission, proposed two constitution - making bodies, one for the six Provinces in the Pakistan group and the other for the group of six Hindu Provinces.

On May 16, the Cabinet Mission and the Viceroy Published a statement containing their own solution of the constitutional problem. The focal point of their plan was the preservation of the Single State, which the British had labored to build up. The Mission could see no justification for including with a sovereign Pakistan, those districts of the Punjab, Bengal and Assam in which the population was predominantly non-Muslim. Then the Mission discussed the Muslim apprehensions and solution offered by the Congress and expressed the opinion that such a scheme would present considerable constitutional disadvantages and anomalies. After that it presented its own formula given as under:-

  1. The All-India Union to control Defence, Communications and Foreign Affairs only;
  2. Each province to have autonomy more or less on the same basis as under the Government of India Act, 1935;
  3. Three groups of provinces to be made in the following manner:
    1. Six Hindu majority provinces
    2. Punjab, Sind, N.W.F.P. and Baluchistan
    3. Bengal and Assasm
  4. After ten years, any province or group of provinces could re-consider her association with the All India Union;
  5. The actual distribution of powers between the authorities of the three tiers to be determined by a Constituent Assembly to be elected by the Electoral College comprising members of the provincial assemblies in accordance with the proportional representation;
  6. First the Whole Constituent Assembly shall meet. After that it will meet in 3 groups separately;
  7. The second part of the Mission plan related to the setting up of a representative government at the centre to tide over the period of transition;
  8. The whole plan was to be accepted or rejected in toto".

Party Position On The Plan

The Muslim League accepted the plan in toto and expressed its willingness to enter the Central Government. It hoped to convert the two groups of Muslim provinces into an independent state within a decade by invoking the enabling provision of the schemes. The Congress accepted the plan but refused to enter the government. It announced its intention to turn the Constituent Assembly into a sovereign body competent to sweep away the appointed limits to its authority and begin by striking out the grouping plan.

How the Cabinet Mission Plan came to an end, is an interesting story. After acceptance of the Plan, Pandit Nehru issued statements after statements virtually repudiating all Congress commitments. On July 7, 1946 he said: “We are not bound by a single thing except that we have decided for the moment to go into the Constituent Assembly.” On July 10, he said: “What we do there, we are entirely and absolutely free to determine. We have committed ourselves on no single matter to any body.” Maulana Azad said that the Constituent Assembly would have “unfettered right to make a constitution and it would be sovereign and would legislate for a united, not divided India”.

Such irresponsible utterances convinced the League that the Congress did not mean proper business. The Quaid-i-Azam declared that the Congress leaders’ interpretation of the role of the Constitution Assembly was a complete repudiation of the long-term scheme of the Cabinet Mission. On July 27, 1946 the League Council reversed its acceptance of the Plan and decided to take “Direct Action” for the achievement of Pakistan. August 16, was declared to be the ‘Direct Action Day’ on which an India-wide general strike was to be observed. The Quaid-i-Azam said: “Today we bid good-bye to constitutional methods. Today we have also forged a pistol and are in a position to use it.”

The Muslim League observed the Direct Action Day peacefully but the militant Hindu forces came forward to disrupt it. The result was the causalities.