On #JawaharlalNehru death anniversary,
I'm bringing out posterboy of secularism and
Bharat's First Education Minister
#AbulKalamAzad and his Mind blowing book
"INDIA WINS FREEDOM".

Seriously, I had tears in my eyes when I finished reading it.

Nehru Planned Partition in 1937?

Abul Kalam Azad, in his book India Wins Freedom
holds Nehru's naivety and gullibility responsible for the Partition of the country.
Azad firmly castigates Nehru for his "blunders" and repeatedly blames him for giving the Muslim League a handle with which to force Partition.

Worse, he calls Nehru "impulsive and very amenable to personal influences" - specifically of the Mountbattens and Krishna Menon.

(Shocking is FOE Champion Nehru himself
suppressed these pages for 30 years until Azad's grand son found out the truth in 1988)

Azad further claims
"I have regretted no action of mine so much, The turn that events had taken made it almost impossible to expect a peaceful solution between the Congress & the Muslim League (and) a large part of the responsibility for this development rests with Jawaharlal.

My second mistake was that when I decided not to stand myself, I did not support Sardar Patel. We differed on many issues but I am convinced that if he had succeeded me as Congress President he would have seen that the Cabinet Mission Plan was successfully implemented. He would

have never committed the mistake of Jawaharlal which gave Mr Jinnah the opportunity of sabotaging the plan. I can never forgive myself when I think that if I had not committed these mistakes, perhaps the history of the last ten years would have been different.

I have nevertheless to say with regret that this was not the first time that he did immense harm to the national cause. He had committed an almost equal blunder in 1937 when the first elections were held under the Government of India Act 1935. In these elections, the

Muslim League had suffered a great setback throughout the country except in Bombay and the UP, I personally requested them for their cooperation with Congress & assured them with 2 ministries.
I found to my great regret that Jawaharlal had written to Chaudhari Khaliquzzaman and

Nawab Ismail Khan that only one of them could be taken into the ministry..
This was a most unfortunate development. If the League's offer of cooperation had been accepted, the Muslim League party would for all practical purposes merge in the Congress. Jawaharlal's action gave

the Muslim League in the UP a new lease of life. All students of Indian politics know that it was from the UP that the League was re-organised. Mr Jinnah took full advantage of the situation and started an offensive which ultimately led to Pakistan.

We were becoming greater

supporters of partition than Jinnah. I warned Jawaharlal that. the verdict would be that India was divided not by the Muslim League but by the Congress & even Vallabhai was happy with the outcome as He was convinced that he could not work with the Muslim League. He was prepared

to have a part of India if only he could get rid of the Muslim League.

We all like our admirers but perhaps Jawaharlal likes them a little more than others. In the early 1930s, the Labour Party sent a delegation to India & Krishna Menon was attached to it, During this period

his contacts were mainly with people who were regarded as communists or fellow-travellers & he and reiterated his loyalty for Jawaharlal.

When the interim Govt was formed, Jawaharlal wanted to appoint Krishna Menon as the High Commissioner in London. Lord Wavell did not agree.

Soon after Wavell left, Menon came to India & stayed with Jawaharlal. Mountbatten immediately perceived that Jawaharlal had a weakness for Krishna Menon and could be influenced by him. Lord Mountbatten decided to become his patron, Krishna Menon had communist tendencies but when

he saw that Mountbatten might help him to get a position, he became proBritish overnight.
Mountbatten felt that Menon would be useful in persuading Jawaharlal to accept his scheme of partition of India. It is my belief that Menon did influence Jawaharlal's mind on this question.

I was not surprised when sometime later I learnt that Mountbatten offered to support Jawaharlal if he wanted to appoint Menon as the High Commissioner in London.

#VandeMataram