The other day I asked a bunch of college students – What is your view about Jinnah? Is it right on our part to blame him entirely for the partition?? The answers I got were - ‘That we really don’t know’…how does it matter now…But the most interesting answer out of all of them was ‘History is a boring subject and we all hated it in school’.
History is a funny subject. It not only gives an understanding about geographies but also creates social & political characters which ironically shape the future our polity. But the problem is that in more than one case, it is ultimately ‘one act’ which ‘makes’ or ‘breaks’ the image of historical characters. Little know Mangal Pandey became a hero after 1857 mutiny, Bhagat Singh became an icon of the freedom struggle after he was hanged by the British. ‘I Have a Dream’, the famous speech of Martin Luther King, Jnr, made his legacy immortal. Historians have always preferred to paint history in black & white. There are glorified heroes & evil ‘villains’ with no place for humans with grey shades. So if Mahatma Gandhi is the hero of independent India’s history, the one who steered us to freedom, history had to find a villain for this story as well!!! And that is Mohd Ali Jinnah, the man who is considered the mastermind for the partition.
History can never be accurate because selective facts are used by the author to supplement his/her interpretation of history. So if the history we studied in school considered ‘Jinnah’ the main culprit for the partition, our peers in Pakistan have been fed with history stating that Nehru- Gandhi were not concerned about Muslims and they would have suffered at the hands of the majority Hindus.
So let’s not get fooled by history which changes color from region to region. There is no harm in seeking the truth, but what is important is to realize that all protagonists of history were human beings. They also possessed grey shades & made mistakes at various stages. The partition was also a result of mistakes committed by leaders on both sides. Jinnah, Nehru, Patel were all humans and possessed grey shades. Their greatness cannot be undermined based on one incident. The fact still remains that all of them fought for the same cause and that was freedom. Had they all not stood together probably we (including Pakistan) would still be saying ‘hail the queen’. So the years of turmoil they all went through, including ‘Jinnah’ prior to independence cannot be discounted by India. Similarly Pakistan cannot discount Nehru’s role, who was instrumental in India’s freedom struggle
History is the best text to draw lessons & ensure not to commit mistakes in the future again. But alas, politicians still like digging the past to reap electoral benefits for power. They don’t understand nor do they want to understand history. It all depends as to which segment of the society are they catering to- Ambedkar for Dalits, Sarvarkar for RSS, Shivaji for Shiv Sena, etc.
So when Jaswant Singh not only tried to undo the ‘history’ of the BJP but the history of India, there was bound to be fireworks. Politicians normally enjoy most privileges but one of the few things that they are not entitled to do is to ‘retrace’ history because the ramifications are severe unless one is a LK Advani. It took Jaswant Singh’s one book to turn his political career upside down and create a havoc in the BJP. Seeking the truth is strictly prohibited for politicians because that can actually disturb the balance of our politics. Their history is determined by vote bank politics. But on the brighter side, as long as intellects including politicians like Jaswant Singh do remarkable scholarly work by exploring the possible realities hidden by many historians, the subject of history could become interesting for at least a few if not all in schools & colleges.
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