Book review: Maulana Azad and the Making of India

Readers may form a misleading impression that this book is yet another biography of Maulana Azad. At the very outset, therefore, it needs to be clarified that it is less a biography of an individual (i.e. Maulana Azad), and more a story of the political processes of late colonial India underlining those aspects of the Congress politics which could gain only a limited success so far as enlisting the support of the Muslim communities to the cause of freedom was concerned. The book therefore highlights those under-explored aspects whereby large numbers of Muslim groups were resisting the communal separatist politics of the Muslim League, but the Congress was not able to lend adequate support and acknowledgement.

Maulana Azad was able to realize these inadequacies of the Congress, he was sharing it with all the bigwigs of the Congress, but somehow he was not able to garner enough support from his organization and its bigwigs. This was a major cause of the success of the Muslim League in getting India divided. The author arrives at a conclusion, “The role that Azad played in the years preceding Partition was that of a one-man army against Muslim alienation from the Congress, and the Congress’ indifference towards sensitive issues of identity, culture, and desire for power- sharing.” (p. 354). This bold exposition has been done only after delving deep into the primary sources, hitherto untapped. These sources include the AICC Papers, the bi-annual Urdu Press Review, the English newspapers like the Hindustan Times, Leader, S. A. Barelvi’s Bombay Chronicle, and the Urdu newspapers like Medina of Bijnour (UP), among many others. The author has also sifted through a large number of correspondences taking place among the top leaders and the administrators of the day.

In the recent decades few works have appeared which underline this particular aspect of majoritarian communal prejudices of the Congress politics causing alienation of the Muslim communities, e.g. Joya Chatterji on the Bengal, William Gould on the UP, Papiya Ghosh on Bihar; besides some essays, like the one by Mushirul Hasan on a half-hearted attempt of the Congress to reach out to the Muslims in 1937-38[1].

The book under review attempts to give an all India picture of this particular aspect of the modern Indian history.

The first chapter has been written in a manner which gives a sort of prelude to the Muslim response to the anti colonial nationalist political processes, and the second chapter explains how the ideology of Pan-Islamism was employed as powerful resource against the western imperialism. These two chapters make an extensive interrogation of the existing works on the theme including the hitherto published biographies of Maulana Azad. To validate his questions and to explain them, the author does not confine himself to polemics relying only on the secondary works. Rather, he substantiates his explanations from primary sources.

There has been an assertion that the participation of Muslims has been much less in the Civil Disobedience Movement, 193-34. This has been called into question by the author collating evidences of Muslim participation (pp. 143-44) but one is tempted to get details and the author has not gone in much detail.

Despite admirations of Maulana Azad, the author does not spare the Maulana from being criticized (p. 106, 170). The author clearly points out the self-contradictory and inconsistent stands taken by the Maulana on certain political issues.

Exploring some pertinent sources, he tells us the untold story of huge disconnects between the Muslims and the Maulana, particularly on the issue of Motilal Nehru Report (1928). The historians like Uma Kaura, David Page, Mushirul Hasan have explored this issue in great detail [2], but they have not been able to notice that the Maulana’s enthusiastic support to the Report impacted adversely on his political relationship with his own followers (Congress Muslims) in different parts of India. Rizwan Qaiser has succeeded in giving us great details pertaining to this aspect (pp. 120-130). Azad was persuading the Bengal Muslim League to extend its support to the Report (p. 130). But one wonders, why did not Azad do it through the agency of the Khilafat Committee? Did not it signify the diminishing influence and popularity of Maulana Azad? Was it because of Azad’s inability in allaying the misgivings of the Muslims with regard to the Report? Azad or any leader of the Congress would have failed to satisfy the Muslims as to how could the adult suffrage or unitary rather than federal form of government would have satisfied the Muslim demand of 1/3rd representation for the Muslims in the central legislature. In fact the author should have reproduced the relevant passages of arguments offered by Azad and his companion, A.R. Malihabadi. It would have made the picture clearer to the reader. It, therefore, still remains intriguing as to why did Azad fail in persuading some important Muslim ‘detractors’ of the Report, viz. Shaukat Ali, Shafi Daudi, and many regional, sub-regional leaders.

Shaukat Ali had probably become the tallest leader of the Khilafat Committee by this time, and he was among the ‘detractors’ of the Report (p. 131). It still remains under-explored as to what was the response of the better known Muslim leaders at regional and sub-regional level so far as the Motilal Nehru Report was concerned. In short, this was a concrete question of proportionate share in power structure. And only concrete assurances could have satisfied the concerned groups of people. Azad (and the Congress, largely under the majoritarian pressures) was not able to offer such a concrete assurance. The book attempts at clarifying that the dissatisfaction of certain Muslim groups with the Report was something those Muslim groups were trying to articulate their concerns on their own terms.

The fourth and fifth chapters give more powerful description of the theme than any other part of the book. These two chapters figure out the Muslim concern of proportionate share in the structures of power. It narrates how Azad was battling hard that ‘Muslims should view the Congress as a party willing to share power with them’ (p. 172), whereas other ‘Congress leaders did not share his concern’. The author has culled out evidences where tall Congress leaders (like Sardar Patel, Sampurnanand, P.D. Tandon etc. in their correspondences with Gandhi, Rajendra Prasad, Nehru etc.) expressed their dislikes for the Maulana, the President of the Congress. “In Gandhiji’s perception even before Azad relinquished his presidentship, he was reduced to a position where he did not enjoy the authority of an elected president of the Congress (p. 251). From 1937 onwards the participation of the Congress workers in the anti-Muslim riots, the propensity of the Congress in favour of Nagri rather than Hindustani in both Nagri and Perso-Arabic scripts were the two better known issues of bitterness, causing alienation of the Muslims from the Congress and offering decisive dose of fodder to the separatist politics of the League[3]. Yet, there were enough voices of Muslim communities/ groups offering valiant fight against the communal separatist politics.

One of the most significant things to be explored by Rizwan Qaiser is the story of the ‘Azad Muslim Conference’, ‘a conglomerate of several Muslim political formations…consistently challenging the Muslim League’ (p. 245), since its Lahore resolution of 23 March 1940. Why was the story of this pertinent Muslim opposition to communal separatism ignored by all the players, and glossed over by the historians? The Mansergh’s series of thick volumes of Transfer of Power mentions it as an insignificant marginal force. Even Maulana Azad’s India Wins Freedom, and other writings, speeches, correspondences don’t mention it. The huge support base of the ‘Azad Muslim Conference’ can be gauged by the fact that its meetings in 1940, 1942, 1944 … were attended by 10,000 to 75,000 people. Its support base kept expanding, with each mass rallies organized on various venues across India. “…unlike the Muslim League, the Conference did not raise the bogey of Hindu domination and therefore seeking the support to the British government. The Conference was seeking a solution of the communal problem within the framework of India’s unity with a sovereign constitution.” (p. 231). Yet, the Congress did not capitalize on the strength of the ever-widening support base of the Azad Muslim Conference. This is really intriguing. With such path-breaking details, the book seems to kind of implore the readers that simply because India’s Partition could not be averted even by the resistance of the Muslim groups, it does not mean that their resistance should stand omitted from the books of history. From this particular perspective of underlining the history of Muslim resistance to the bi-national separatist religious nationalism, the chapter 5, “Towards a United and Federated India, 1940-47”, of the book is a wonderful addition to the existing historiography of India’s partition. It asserts that mere separate electorate of 1909, or the reservations of certain Muslim groups on the Motilal Nehru Report (1928), did not make the Partition inevitable. It seems that the new narratives of both of the new nations (India, as well as Pakistan) tended to ignore the story of Muslim resistance to the two-nation theory. Rizwan Qaiser has largely succeeded in filling this gap.

The narrative proceeds in a very engaging lucid prose with powerful and insightful analysis. Adding sub-headings within each chapter would have made the book even more reader friendly. The last chapter on Azad’s contributions in the capacity of the Education Minister of India is highly informative, and this has come to us in such a great detail probably for the first time. The efforts made for the foundation of the premier educational and cultural institutions like the IIT Kharagpur, the UGC, the Sahitya Academy, and giving status of Central University to the Vishvabharti Shantiniketan etc testify that Azad was a much visionary leader, and performing administrator. This way, the author has done a remarkable job. But unlike the other chapters, this chapter’s narrative appears to have been written in a completely different style. It gives a feel to the readers that this part of the story is being told in an entirely different way, a little bit of disjunction with the rest of the volume. A probable reason for this kind of ‘disjunction’ in the narrative and style emanates from the fact that the subject of this chapter does not require much political engagements with various contending groups. The minister, understandably, had his ways largely with consensus within the cabinet, within the Party as well as with the opposition. Having gone through this chapter of Rizwan Qaiser, one may get an unpleasant surprise at omission of the formidable name of Azad from Ramchandra Guha’s recently published [‘list’ of the] Makers of Modern India.

Overall, it is a valuable addition in the historical literature on Muslim situation in the politics of India’s independence and their resistance to the politics of partition. Thus, it offers significantly new things to the readers. One hopes it would be appreciated in academic as well as popular circles.

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Mohammad Sajjad is Asstt. Prof. at Centre of Advanced Study in History, Aligarh Muslim University. This review was first published in The Book Review, vol. 36, No. 3, March 2012.

Notes:

1. Joya Chatterji, Bengal Divided: Hindu Communalism and Partition, 1932-47, Cambridge, 1995; William Gould, Hindu Nationalism and the Language of Politics in Late Colonial India, Cambridge, 2005; Papiya Ghosh, Community and Nation: Essays on Identity and Politics in Eastern India, Oxford University Press, Delhi, 2008; Mushirul Hasan, “The Muslim Mass Contact Campaign: Analysis of a Strategy of Political Mobilization”, in his, ed. India’s Partition: Process, Strategy and Mobilization, OUP, Delhi, 1993.

2. David Page, Prelude to Partition: The Indian Muslims and the Imperial System of Control, 1920-32, OUP, Delhi, 1982; Uma Kaura, Muslims and Indian Nationalism: The Emergence of the Demand for Patition of India, 1928-40, Manohar, Delhi, 1977; Mushirul Hasan, Nationalism and Communal Politics in India, 1885-1930, Manohar, Delhi, 1991.

3. Sucheta Mahajan (Independence and Partition: Erosion of Colonial Power in India, Sage, Delhi, 2000) has tried to mention such infirmities of the Congress but could not get into the evidences of Muslim resistance to separatism.