Product Description

The last years of the British Raj and the partition of India and Pakistan were defining events in twentieth century world history, the ethnic, religious, political, and military consequences of which have continued to shape today's newspaper headlines. Standard historical interpretations have, on one hand, been shaped by interviews with Lord Mountbatten, the last viceroy, and the British who were involved in the events; on the other hand, there has been a rise in new scholarship by Indians and Pakistanis that has largely corrected the "great man" interpretations that have looked exclusively at Gandhi, Nehru, and Jinnah. In this work, Stanley Wolpert narrates the last half century of the British in India, framed by the surrender of Singapore in February 1942, the partition of South Asia in 1947, and the assassination of Gandhi in January 1948. Great Britain's mid-August transfer of power to new-born Dominions of India and Pakistan was immediately followed by the withdrawal of all British forces from India. As the shield of Imperial British troops collapsed, more than ten million terrified Hindus, Muslims, and Sikhs, fled from one side to the other of two new borders, ineptly drawn through the heartlands of multi-cultural Punjab and Bengal. Some one million refugees never reached their destinations. The most bitterly hard-fought legacy of Partition has been the Indo-Pak conflict over Kashmir, which has triggered at least three South Asian wars over the last half century. Wolpert's thesis is apparent from his title, drawn from Winston Churchill's judgment on Indian partition. While Wolpert does not believe the British could have ruled India indefinitely he argues that the disaster of partition was largely due to Lord Mountbatten's misguided decision to get Britain out of India as quickly as possible. This popular account of the last years of the Raj is accessible and features all the leading figures, including Winston Churchill, PM Clement Atlee, Lord Mountbatten and other viceroys, Gandhi, Nehru, Franklin Roosevelt, members of the Congress and Muslim League, as well as Sikhs, Hindus, and Muslims. This account of events will be controversial, especially among those who respect Mountbatten's actions, and among Indians and Pakistanis.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #183831 in Books
• Published on: 2006-10-26
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 272 pages

Tribune books, November 24, 2006
A brilliant, historical analysis

Review
A brilliant, historical analysis. (Tribune Books )

A powerful critique (Tribune Books )

About the Author
Stanley Wolpert is Professor of History Emeritus at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is the author of Gandhi's Passion, Nehru: A Tryst With Destiny, Jinnah of Pakistan, and A New History of India.

Customer Reviews

Amazing book
This is an amazing book about the episode in history which is a massive blot on the history of Britain - decisions and actions precipitously made and put in place which led to the biggest migration of humanity in peace time and a death toll in excess of 1 million people. It is simply and beautiffuly told in an evocative style that does lend justice the the gravity of that whole episode. The fact that it has subsequently led to 3 wars and many other episodes of conflict including both sides being nuclear armed and sighting each other, has led to a death toll that continues to rise and escalate. The latest Mumbai attacks are part and parcel of this single episode of shame and obfuscation that Lord Mountbatten (and the British Cabinet, in the name of the people of Britain) initiated. Summary: Read this if you want to be informed

Comments
This book makes a wonderful reading material to adorn bookshelves of people who know too little or nothing about the subcontinent. But if you actually do know about the regions or from the subcontinent itself, you would rather find it easy to see that the author is not truthful enough. One should note that Stanley Wolpert is also the author of "Jinnah of Pakistan" glorifying Jinnah. He very skilfully skips the parts where Jinnah's leadership would be shown in bad light. For example, Rahmat Ali's actual demand of Pakistan was never mentioned, but it is made to believe that Jinnah was the one who came up with the cause. Neither any criticism on Jinnah agreeing to lesser Pakistan is made. Moreover, it is rather astounding that someone who is an "expert" in history of South Asia would state that Congress party was an Hindu organisation when organisations such as "Hindu Mahasabha" and "RSS" which are Hindu rightwing parties had always (and still) crossed swords with the Congress party. Moreover, Wolpert repeatedly claims that Congress was a party of higher caste Hindus - something that is rather surprising to deduce since Gandhi himself was a Banya of lower strata of the caste system. There had been many books written about the partition supporting the Indian argument and making the readers think less of Pakistan. One would have expected that Wolpert, with his anti-Hindu bashing in several other books would have done justice to Pakistan or League side of the story. But what he leaves the reader to believe (if at all he convinces with the patchy read) that Muslims of India had no other leader other than Jinnah. Jinnah's call for direct action which led of death of so many Muslims and Hindus are conveniently mentioned in passing whereas the massacre that followed in Bihar (as a ripple effect from Bengal killings) is shown to the reader in better light as handiwork of the Congress. This book is for all who love to show a blind eye on Jinnah's transgressions as a leader and not for any other Pakistani or Indian. In his attempt to glorify Jinnah, Wolpert makes him sound like a weak person, rejected and made fool of by all quarters. In a desperate attempt to make Nehru and Mountbatten look like conmen, he makes Jinnah to be a drivel with simple mathematics - Muslims who made 25% of British India a separate nation but Hindus who made 40% of Bengal as part and parcel of an hypothetical Bengal nation. It is disdainful that Wolpert fails terribly in his pursuit and only makes himself and Jinnah look small. It makes a good reading material as part of a wider collection on this subject, but not as a sole source of information.