An Overview of the Partition of India & Communist Party
Partition of India took place on 15th Aug 1947. The British Prime Minister Mr Clement Atlee on Feb 20, 1947, declared the intention of the British government to transfer power by June 1948. So, the declaration of Clement Atlee on Feb 20, 1947, and the transfer of power by June 1948 had a time period of around 16 months. So, this period of 16 months was sufficient to smoothly transfer the power from the British hand to the Indian hand.
But in hurry, the British government had handed over the power to congress in August 1947 and left India. So, here, the time period between Clement Atlee declaration and getting independence on 15 Aug 1947 was just 6 months. The 6 month period was too short a time to transfer the power to Indian hands or Congress. Because of this very short period of time, Hindu-Muslim riots took place and bloodshed occurred.
The question is raised: Why did the British government hand over power to congress on 15 Aug 1947 instead of June 1948 as declared by PM Clement Atlee? The answer to the above question may have many reasons. But there may be one reason which is grossly ignored by historians. The answer is related to the Communist Party of India.
The Communist Party of India was founded in 1925. The Communist Party’s ideology was based on communism. The ideology of communism was just opposite to the ideology of capitalism which was represented by the British government. So, CPI was the natural enemy of capitalist Britain.
Similarly, during this period CPI was growing very rapidly. The Tebhaga movement of 1946 and the Telangana movement led by the CPI was demonstrating the strength of the CPI organization. So, the British government feared that if the CPI grew rapidly and if, accidentally the power was shifted to the hand of the CPI, that would affect the economic interest of the British government in India. In the last 200 years, the British government had made huge investments in coal mining, steel, railways etc.
If CPI came to power then British interest in India would be in danger. That was the fear of the British government regarding CPI. So, to keep away the CPI to acquire power, the British government had speedily made the arrangement to transfer power to congress.
To conclude, to protect the economic interest of the British empire, humanity had paid a huge price.
