The British could have done a lot more for us

Amit Kushari (IAS Retd)
The British ruled over us for a few centuries and we owe a lot to them. Although they exploited India fully to raise revenues for the British Empire, their contribution to India in the field of education, science and technology cannot be forgotten. They taught us English, which is the global lingua franca and that has given the Indians a tremendous advantage over other non English speaking nations. We feel perfectly at home in the whole of North America, Australia, Britain and other former British colonies. They connected one corner of India with the other through railway lines and that helped in the unification of diverse territories of the subcontinent. When we became independent from the British we framed all our laws on the British model. We adopted the British parliamentary system of democracy. We looked up to the British as our “mai baap” to such an extent that initially we were not sure as to whether we should have a president elected by our MPs and MLAs or whether the benevolent Queen of England should continue to be the titular head of India. Our grandparents and great grand parents had almost a blind faith in the Queen of England. Before departing the British realised that the Muslims and Hindus of India will not be able to co exist peacefully in one sovereign nation and therefore, British India was divided into two sovereign nations…..which later on further broke up into three nations. Perhaps whatever the British did in 1947 was the right decision to take, in view of the demand from the Muslim League. The fact that India and Pakistan had to fight wars so frequently, in 1948, 1965, 1971, 1999 shows that the British decision was right. India also has a lot of problems with the 170 million Muslims left in India even after losing roughly 240 million Muslims to Pakistan and Bangladesh. Being a huge nation of 1300 million people India is unable to digest easily 7 million Kashmiri Muslims. If partition had not taken place, I shudder to think how India would have digested 410 million Muslims within its boundaries. There would have been riots and upheavals every day and governance would have been impossible in India. Absurd situations would have arisen on the political front as Indian parties like BJP and Congress would have been forced to form coalitions with parties like, Muslim League or Pak Peoples Party for the sake of government formation in Delhi. If parties with contradictory ideologies form a government, such a government cannot last long and cannot deliver. There would have been total chaos and ultimately Pakistan and Bangladesh would have been created, 5/6 years later even if the British had not created them in 1947. A small example of such chaos and confusion has been witnessed in J& K also in our times when a Hindu nationalist party like BJP was forced to join hands with a Kashmiri Muslim oriented party like the PDP, just for the sake of giving the state a government. The handicapped government of J&K is having serious problems in governance and half of the state is under curfew for more than 100 days. This gives us a clear indication that the combination of Kashmir with Jammu/Ladakh (where people are nationalists of the Indian blend) is highly impractical and unacceptable. The state of J&K also has to be reorganised in three parts, just in the same way as British India had to be reorganised into three parts, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.
The misfortune in J&K arose because the British could not sort out the issue peacefully before their departure. They were fully capable of doing it, but could not do it because the state was being ruled by a Hindu Maharaja and was not strictly a part of British India. The British solved the problems of Punjab and Bengal by separating the Hindu and Muslim parts, but did not have enough time to amicably separate the Hindu and Muslim parts of J&K. That is why we witnessed the absurdities of NC Congress coalitions and PDP/BJP coalitions. The J& K problem has been bleeding independent India and Pakistan both through a thousand cuts. Neither the government of Pakistan nor the government of India can sort out this issue—-in view of the great surge of public emotions nursed on false slogans like, ” Kashmir banega Pakistan”, or “Doodh maango toh kheer dengey, Kashmir maango toh cheer dengey “(If you want milk we will give you cream , but if you want Kashmir we will tear you into pieces). The first one is a Pakistani slogan, the second one is Indian. Both the slogans smack of bigotry and intolerance. That is why I wish that the British had annexed J&K as part of their territory much before 1947. I also wish that the Maharaja of Jammu had never purchased the Kashmir valley from the King of Persia. The monarch of Jammu did not know at that time that he was wasting 70 lakh rupees to buy a big fat trouble not only for himself but for the entire Indian nation.
The British did a lot for the caste ridden idolatrous Hindus by giving them liberal English education. They tried to help the Hindu women also who were often burnt to death forcibly, after their husbands’ death although there was a lot of opposition from the fundamentalist Hindu elements. They could not, however, stop polygamy among Hindus or desertion of Hindu women by their husbands in the absence of any divorce law for Hindus. After independence the Indian parliament came forward in a big way to help the Hindu women. Polygamy was banned and the Hindu women could also seek divorce. Earlier, the unfortunate Hindu woman had no way to escape from a tyrant husband except by mixing poison in his rice. The Muslim women were doubly unlucky. The British never tried to help them by stopping barbaric practices like triple Talaq and Muslim polygamy. The Indian parliament also did nothing for the Muslim women. Even today, Muslim women are being thrown out of their homes by the inhuman triple Talaq system and a tyrannical husband can still bring in another woman in the house quietly by doing a second or third Nikaah. The Indian parliament is unable to do anything for fear of losing Muslim male votes in a democracy. The Muslim women are not strong and confident enough to rebel against their fathers, husbands and brothers. They still get half the share in their father’s property compared to their brothers whereas Hindu women inherit equally with their brothers (unless, of course, the Hindu father has made a clear will depriving the daughters). The Indian Supreme court is looking into the matter currently but I  do not know if ultimately the Muslim women will get any relief. In a democratic system the government is often handicapped. I wish the British had helped the Muslim women in the same way they had helped the Hindu widows.
(The author is former Financial Commissioner, J&K
Feedback to the author at 09748635185 or amitkus@hotmail.com)
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