Partition and Independence

The war ended in 1945, and an exhausted Britain finally looked for a way to hand over power. Around the world, the era of decolonisation (colonies becoming free) had begun.

Two events in early 1946 made the position plain: a mutiny in the Royal Indian Air Force involving thousands, and then a mutiny in the Royal Indian Navy at Bombay that spread across India. The British could no longer rely on the Indian military to hold their empire.

The Cabinet Mission of 1946 proposed three groups of provinces with self-rule except in defence, foreign affairs and communications. Talks got stuck over divisions between the Congress and the Muslim League.

Jinnah then turned away from constitutional methods and called 'Direct Action Day' on 16 August 1946, saying "We will either have a divided India or a destroyed India." Brutal communal violence swept Calcutta, with thousands dead and thousands more forced from their homes, and fear made living together peacefully seem impossible.

The chapter is careful here. The British had for decades encouraged Hindu–Muslim differences to grow; the partition plan was widely opposed, even by the Congress; there was no national agreement; and whether it was the only way forward has been debated ever since.

In July 1947 Mountbatten chose Cyril Radcliffe, a British lawyer who did not know India, and gave him five weeks to draw the new borders. The Radcliffe Line split Punjab and Bengal almost overnight, and millions found themselves on the 'wrong' side, their homes and sacred places now across a border.

Partition unleashed terrible chaos: mass migration, horrific massacres, with women especially targeted. Gandhi lamented that "the attitude of violence we have secretly harboured comes back on us".

Sardar Patel brought over 560 princely states into India through persuasion and firmness, becoming the 'Iron Man of India'. And historians now credit Britain's exit not to one cause but many: popular uprisings, revolutionaries, the mutinies, Britain's weakened position, and worldwide decolonisation. Ninety years, from 1857 to 1947, and a shared victory.