Q: How widely do you think Pakistan finally did catch on in the Punjab. In 1946 the League swept the polls. What was the driving forces?

The driving force, I think again at that time, was the attitude of the Hindu. You take the Cabinet Mission Plan, which the League accepted [this plan called for India remaining united, with a weak center and strong provinces and with a referendum in ten years where provinces could reevaluate which groups they belonged to.]

I remember very vividly going to a meeting of the All India Muslim League Board. Now the smaller body was the Working Committee of the Muslim League The Working Committee had ten or so members, while the Board had seventy or up to one hundred members. I was one of them. There was a meeting in New Delhi, in the Metropole Hotel, and the Quaid presided. He put forward that the Working Committee had accepted the Cabinet Mission Plan, because it was a step towards the ultimate goal of Pakistan and that we would get the majority in the Northern and Eastern side.

I remember Maulana Hasrat Mohani, he was a Congressite, and he jeered at the Quaid "Sir, where is your Pakistan, you have accepted this?" He was speaking in Urdu. We tried to pacify him. At every step, throughout the conflict, at every step, the Hindus were not ready to compromise.

Q: Did the Quaid want Pakistan as bargaining chip or as a reality?

In the beginning - I knew him fairly well and my brother knew him much better than I did, because we had business in Bombay and all over India, and he was for four or five years in Bombay and he used to see the Quaid every third day - the Quaid used to tell my brother that it was Gandhi who introduced Hindu politics in India. Before Gandhi's arrival there were nationalists, whether they were Muslims, Parsees, Hindus or Christians. He [Jinnah] said that Dadabhai Naoroji, and I am quoting here, "I sat at his feet and learned politics, and if people like Naoroji had been the leaders of India we would not have had this religious stance which was introduced by Gandhi when he came into politics."

Coming back to your question, you see, the Quaid throughout was a [an Indian] nationalist. For example, he opposed Simon Commission because he was a nationalist. The British did not want to give power to the Indians and the Quaid from the very beginning was a nationalist and he supported any national movement, which would give India power. I am sorry to say that some Muslims who charge that the Quaid was working with the British - that is simply not true.

Q: A man who could be so perceptive about Gandhi's introducing religion into politics brought the Muslim religion into politics too ...

Yes, because when he failed as a nationalist, he wanted an India in which the Muslims would play a role, and this could only be if the Muslims were given weightage [a fixed proportion of legislative seats and jobs] in those places where they were not a majority. At every step, whenever there was a question of constitutional reforms, Jinnah's main thrust was nationalism. He wanted India to remain one unit, an independent India. It was not in his mind to have a Pakistan, but an India in which the Muslims would play a role, and a role, which was an effective one. And an effective role could only come about if the Muslims were given weightage in those places where they were not in a majority, as it happened in the UP where the Muslims did play a role, where you people like Chatari and many others. Now this did not happen. When Gandhi came in, slowly the Indian National Congress, though its name remained the same as in the time of Dadabhai Naoroji, it slowly became Hinduized and whenever there was a question of protection or safeguards for minorities, the Congress always [went against them]. Now if you look at the Nehru Report, which was published before 1929, you will see that what the Muslims are offered is nowhere near protecting the Muslim interests.

Q: Why didn't the Hindus understand that, when they had so much to lose by not compromising?

I can only explain this in the Hindu psyche. If you go back into history you would find that when the Hindus were the dominant power, what did they do with this society? They created four classes. There were no Muslims at that time. The Brahmins, the Kshatriyas, Vaishiyas, and at the bottom the Shudras, the untouchables. An elite would rule in their social thinking, and that was the Brahmins before the Muslims came here. When the Muslims came here, they then ruled. When the British came here, they wanted to put the Muslims who had been the rulers in their place.

See how Mahatma Gandhi, how clever he was. When the Khilafat Movement started in India [in 1919] by Maulana Mohammed Ali, whom I knew, his brother Shaukat Ali, Maulana Shafi Daudi and others, Gandhi said yes, he joined them although this was a lost cause. What could the Muslims do to support the Khilafat - it was the Turks who had set aside the Khalifa. What pull did the Indian Muslims, or for that matter the Indian Congress have, on the Turks? Gandhi was a very shrewd person, and he knew that it was a lost cause. But to gain their support [he did so] - and then these [Mohammed Ali et. al] were the people who became front-ranking Congressites till they parted company.

The Quaid, by accepting the Cabinet Mission Plan, had made the last attempt to keep India together. If you read [Maulana Abul Kalam] Azad ['s biography, President of the Congress party at independence], these last ten pages which have now been published [around 1990], you will see how much Azad tried to keep India together. He was a true Indian nationalist, there is no doubt about that, but even he was looked at with suspicion by [Sardar Villabhai] Patel. I think it was the decision of Patel in the end, which forced partition. He wanted to get rid [of the Muslims] because he thought, they will always be a thorn in our flesh.