Partition of India The partition of British India and the independence of the new dominions of India and Pakistan was the result of the Indian Independence Act 1947. Article 2 (4) of the Act provided for the termination of British suzerainty over the princely states with effect from 15 August 1947, and recognised the right of the states to choose whether to accede to India or to Pakistan or to remain outside them. Before and after the withdrawal of the British from India, the ruler of the princely state of Kashmir and Jammu came under pressure from both India and Pakistan to agree to accede to one of the newly independent countries. Faced with painful choices, the Maharaja of Kashmir, Hari Singh, decided to avoid accession to either country. Following a Muslim revolution in the Poonch and Mirpur area and an allegedly Pakistani backed Pashtun tribal intervention from the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa aimed at supporting the revolution, the Maharaja asked for Indian military assistance. India set a condition that Kashmir must accede to India for it to receive assistance. The Maharaja complied, and the Government of India recognised the accession of the princely state to India. Indian troops were sent to the state to defend it. The Jammu & Kashmir National Conference volunteers aided the Indian Army in its campaign to drive out the Pathan invaders. Pakistan was of the view that the Maharaja of Kashmir had no right to call in the Indian Army, because it held that the Maharaja of Kashmir was not a hereditary ruler and was merely a British appointee, after the British defeated Ranjit Singh who ruled the area before the British conquest. There had been no such position as the Maharaja of Kashmir before that. Hence, Pakistan decided to take action, but the Army Chief of Pakistan General Sir Douglas Gracey, would not send troops to the Kashmir front, refusing to obey the order to do so given by Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Governor-General of Pakistan. Gracey justified his insubordination by arguing that Indian forces occupying Kashmir, like those of Pakistan, had taken an Oath of Allegiance to King George VI —in his roles of King of India and King of Pakistan— and hence he could not engage in a military conflict with Indian forces. Pakistan finally did manage to send troops to Kashmir, but by then the Indian forces had taken control of approximately two thirds of the former principality. The Gilgit and Baltistan territories were secured for Pakistan by the Gilgit Scouts and the Chitral Scouts of the state of Chitral, one of the princely states of Pakistan, which had acceded to Pakistan on 6 October 1947.
Posted on: Sun, 09 Mar 2014 05:02:13 +0000
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