India's War

by Srinath Raghavan

  The viceroy, however, asked the cabinet to place the proposal on ice.45 The only firm offer of ‘unconditional cooperation’ he had received was from the Independent Labour Party, whose leader, Ambedkar, had agreed to serve on the Executive Council.46 In any case, rejection by both the Congress and the Muslim League gave the Raj the perfect excuse to cling to the status quo during the war.

  Faced with this impasse and yet disinclined to launch full-fledged civil disobedience, Gandhi desperately cast about for a solution. The Congress leadership realized that torpidity was no longer an option: it would sap the morale of Congressmen and could unhinge the party’s organizational framework. At the same time, they wished to refrain from embarrassing Britain when it was being bombed by the Luftwaffe. Gandhi’s mind harked back to the idea of individual civil disobedience which he had used in the past, and which was now advocated by Patel. Gradually, he came round to the idea that such a campaign should be fought on the grounds of civil liberties.

  Meeting the viceroy towards the end of September 1940, Gandhi demanded that Indians should be able to air to their views about the war, as long as such expression was not violent. Linlithgow pointed out that in Britain conscientious objectors were exempt from conscription and were allowed to profess their views in public, but they were not permitted to persuade others – soldiers or civilian workers – to discontinue their efforts. Gandhi insisted that under India’s condition of servitude, the Indian objector should be untrammelled in the expression of his views. The viceroy cautioned him that this would be tantamount to the ‘inhibition of India’s war effort’. Gandhi replied that while India did not want to embarrass Britain, it was ‘impossible for the Congress to make of the policy a fetish by denying its creed’.47

  Two weeks later, Gandhi presented his plan of individual civil disobedience, starting with just one volunteer, to the Working Committee. The discussion, by Gandhi’s own account, was tempestuous; there was ‘stubborn dissent’ from at least two of the members.48 But Gandhi carried the meeting. After the recent rapprochement, there was not much appetite among the Congressmen for another wrenching debate with Gandhi. Moreover, the radicals in Congress were effectively neutralized. Bose’s Forward Bloc had already launched a civil disobedience campaign, which had been supported by Congressmen in Bengal. But Bose himself had been taken into custody on 3 July 1940, and the leaders of the CPI were cooped up in a prison compound near the princely state of Kota.

  Ironically, the radicals who were still free to criticize Gandhi’s moves now called for complete co-operation with the British war effort. The Marxist-humanist M. N. Roy had, since late 1939, advocated that the Congress adopt a neutral stance. By so doing, he sought to square his anti-fascist outlook with opposition to the Raj’s rigid posture. Roy’s political judgement was capsized by the fall of France. He was now convinced that the forward march of fascism could only be thwarted by global mass mobilization in a ‘genuine anti-Fascist struggle’. India should actively participate in this struggle, for its own freedom was bound up with the larger fight for human freedom. What was more, this participation ‘cannot be made conditional upon any declaration of Indian independence to be made by the British Government’.49

  This was indeed a radical departure from the Congress’s stance. Even Roy’s colleagues in the League of Radical Congressmen were dubious. Roy retorted that they underestimated the dangers of fascism, ‘the old saying, that adversity brings strange bed fellows, is not altogether meaningless’. Then he played his trump card: if the Soviet Union could align itself with Nazi Germany, why should India not stand with Britain?50 When the Congress decided to offer civil resistance, Roy observed that it ‘will only please Berlin and Rome’. He called on ‘more realist politicians’ to form coalition ministries and assist the war effort. For his temerity, Roy was stripped of the Congress’s primary membership for a year.51

  Gandhi’s choice for flagging off the civil disobedience campaign was a little known but devout follower: Vinoba Bhave. Following Gandhi’s death in 1948, Bhave would rise to prominence as the spiritual heir to the Mahatma. Later still, he would disgrace himself in the eyes of many as a supporter of the high-handed daughter of the Mahatma’s political heir: Indira Gandhi. On 21 October 1940, Bhave stated in public the seditious sentence: ‘It is wrong to help the British war effort with men or money.’ He was promptly arrested. Nehru offered himself as the next volunteer, but was taken into custody before he uttered the unlawful phrase – the Raj judged that he had already made seditious statements aplenty and sentenced him to four years. Others followed: Patel and Rajagopalachari; Azad and Prasad. Gandhi alone refrained from offering civil resistance, for it was felt that his imprisonment would cause more embarrassment to the government than anything done by the Congress. By the end of the year almost seven hundred Congressmen had courted arrest.

  The Raj was more than ready to come down on the Congress. In the summer of 1940, the government had finalized a Revolutionary Movement Ordinance (RMO), which was to be proclaimed with a statement accusing the Congress of seeking to overthrow the government. Reginald Maxwell, the home member and author of the ordinance, was clear that they must aim not merely to reduce the party to submission, but to ‘crush the Congress finally as a political organization’. The RMO not only gave the government sweeping powers of arrest and seizure, but declared the Congress as a whole an unlawful organization. On 8 August 1940 – the same day that he made the August offer – Linlithgow wrote to the provincial governors: ‘I feel very strongly that the only possible answer to a “declaration of war” by any section of Congress in present circumstances must be a declared determination to crush the organization as a whole.’52

  On 17 November 1940, Linlithgow cabled Secretary of State Amery that they were swiftly reaching the point when the RMO would have to be proclaimed. The viceroy added that he must be free to take decisions without reference to London. Amery refused to be hustled. Discussing this at the war cabinet, Amery said that he was unable to understand how the situation could have deteriorated so rapidly. The almost leisurely course of the Congress’s campaign did not suggest an impending crisis. Indeed, the resolution adopted by the Congress was ‘colourless’. Was it essential, he asked, to proclaim the Congress illegal, thus making ‘every member of the Congress party in India guilty of an offence?’ Would it not suffice merely to arrest members of the Working Committee? Amery’s colleagues were inclined to agree with him. Even the usually obdurate Churchill conceded that he did not expect any serious trouble. He thought that the Congress was probably trying to ‘keep itself alive by a demonstration’. Churchill instructed that the viceroy should be told that there would be ‘an infinity of trouble’ if the Congress as a whole were banned, and asked for any new facts that justified anything more than the arrest of the Working Committee.53

  In the event, the RMO was substantially whittled down. Instead of banning the Congress as a whole, only specific parts of the organization would be targeted. The text of the announcement was also edited to remove incendiary phrases such as ‘total extinction’ of the Congress. To top it all, the viceroy was denied blanket prior approval to issue the ordinance. Amery insisted that the RMO was suitable only for dealing with a ‘sustained emergency’ and that they had to be mindful of ‘public opinion’.54 The Congress, for its part, carefully refused to hand the Raj a pretext to announce its oblivion. And the political stalemate persisted until the end of 1941.

  By the end of May 1941, Linlithgow had decided both to enlarge the Executive Council, by inducting non-political Indians, and to create a War Advisory Council – moves that had been suspended owing to the opposition of both the Congress and the Muslim League. The viceroy was clear that this was ‘well within the four walls of the declaration of August [1940]’. Nor was he under any illusion that they amounted to ‘even a temporary solution of the political problem’.55

  The decision was underpinned by three considerations. Owing to the expansion of the war, the Raj was digging ever d
eeper into India’s manpower and resources. In consequence, the government was subject to competing imperatives. While efficiency required experienced officials at the helm, the increasing extraction of societal resources underscored the need for greater Indian presence in, and association with, the government. Further, much as Linlithgow wished to perpetuate the status quo, he was aware of a rising ‘muted resentment’ in India – even among moderates who had been supportive of the war – because of the prolonged and complete gridlock in politics. Lastly, following the launch of the civil disobedience campaign, developments in India were under increased scrutiny abroad. Public opinion in the United States as well as Britain had to be placated.56

  The prime minister doggedly opposed the idea. Churchill believed that it was very important not to antagonize Jinnah and Sikandar Hayat Khan, the premier of the Punjab. The support of Muslims and, more broadly, of the Punjab was too important for the war effort. In any case, Gandhi and the Congress would denounce the move – and so spark a debate on India at a most undesirable time. The expansion of the war, Churchill believed, might bring the Wehrmacht to the gates of India. Only then would it be essential to draw in all political forces. Meanwhile, they should continue with the policy of doing nothing and count every quiet month in India as a notable success.57 When Amery pointed out that the viceroy’s plan was the least they could do to parry criticism of the government’s India policy in the Commons, Churchill reluctantly gave in. The war cabinet gave its go-ahead on 9 June.58

  On 21 July 1941, the viceroy announced the implementation of these steps. Of the twelve members of the expanded Executive Council, eight were Indians. But the key portfolios of defence, finance, home and communications remained safely in British hands. The appointment only of non-political figures drew the ire of Indian political parties that had supported the war. Ambedkar charged, for instance, that the exclusion of any representative from the depressed classes was ‘an outrage and a breach of faith’ – not least because the Muslims were almost on a par with the Hindus in the Council. ‘Adding one [member] cannot hurt’, he cabled Amery.59

  Ironically it was the less significant National Defence Council (NDC) – as the putative War Advisory Council was now named – that created most trouble for the viceroy. The council numbered thirty, with representatives of the princely states and the provinces, industry and labour, commerce and agriculture garnished with members of political parties. Its functioning was intended to be entirely innocuous. Each meeting would open with a review of the war, then of the supply situation, and finally of civil defence measures such as air raid precautions. The problem arose from Linlithgow’s keenness to include the premiers of Punjab, Bengal and Assam – all Muslim Leaguers – in the council. By this time, the Indian army had a sizeable presence in the Middle East and in North and East Africa, and the viceroy was eager to secure the loyalties of the Muslim-majority provinces. Linlithgow deliberately chose not to consult Jinnah. He assumed that Jinnah would ‘climb down’ and allow the premiers to serve. If he didn’t, the low Muslim representation in the NDC could be blamed on the League.60

  Jinnah, however, was in no mood to allow the Raj to undermine his control over the provincial Muslim Leagues. At his direction, the League Working Committee passed a resolution demanding, on the threat of punishment, the resignation of the Muslim League premiers from the NDC. Sikandar complied with the diktat, mainly to keep Jinnah from interfering in the war effort in the Punjab. Premier Fazlul Haq of Bengal was more truculent. Despite facing a rebellion in the ranks, he denounced Jinnah’s ‘arbitrary use of powers’ and stayed in office by stitching up – with the governor of Bengal’s help – a coalition with the Hindu Mahasabha.61

  Meanwhile, the Raj had some respite on the Congress front. The individual civil disobedience campaign was spluttering to a halt. By mid-March 1941 over 7,000 individuals had been convicted and 4,400 were serving sentences. Six months later, the numbers in prison stood at 5,000; most of them were from United Provinces and Madras.62 Gandhi met the viceroy many times during these months. Although Linlithgow was all along unyielding, Gandhi refused to sanction a mass civil disobedience movement. Moreover, he was importuned by senior Congressmen who had served their sentences – especially Rajagopalachari – to reconsider his strategy.

  Simultaneously, the viceroy was being petitioned by the Indian members of his Executive Council to release the Congressmen held in prison. Their unanimous stance forced the viceroy’s hand. Linlithgow wrote to Amery that if their demand were spurned, it might become ‘extremely difficult, if not impossible’, to keep the Council together. Amery himself favoured a ‘contemptuous act of clemency’. Churchill thought that Amery was ‘overpersuaded’ and argued that they would be ill-advised to take an immediate decision.63 It took a week and two more meetings for the cabinet to wring out of Churchill his reluctant consent. On 3 December 1941, the Raj announced the immediate release of all Congressmen, including Azad and Nehru.

  Four days later, Japanese planes struck Pearl Harbor.

  4

  Mobilizing India

  In March 1943, the chief of the general staff of the Indian army wrote a candid letter to the army commanders. Prior to the war, he observed, the Indian army was a ‘mercenary army with its morale and loyalty based on four factors’. First, recruitment was confined to ‘classes with long-standing martial and professional traditions which have long been centred on loyalty to the “Sarkar” and to the King Emperor’. Second, the army was officered all but exclusively by ‘experienced British officers’ who could command the ‘respect and affection’ of these classes. Third, pay and conditions of service contrasted favourably with opportunities in civilian employment. Finally, the size of the army was small enough to ensure competition for vacancies. In almost all these respects, he noted, the situation had now ‘radically changed’.

  These radical changes, he might have added, had been thrust upon a conservative military top brass by the exigencies of the war. In October 1939, the total size of the Indian army was 194,373 troops. At the end of the war, in August 1945, the army stood at 2,065,554. Over the same period, the Indian air force was transformed from a miniscule entity of barely one squadron, with 285 officers and men, to one of nine squadrons with 29,201 officers and men. And the Royal Indian Navy had risen from 1,846 men to 30,748, along with a considerable increase in kind and quality of vessels.1 Such an enormous expansion, especially the ten-fold increase in the size of the army, was only achieved by setting aside some of the cherished principles that underpinned military policy in the past. Even so, the Raj sought to manage the expansion in ways that would not entirely undermine the foundational features of the Indian army.

  The wartime growth of the Indian army fell into three distinct phases, though not by design. In the first eight months of the war expansion was slow. Only some 50,000 troops were added to the pre-war number – and this included Indian territorial battalions raised for internal security duties. This sluggish start stemmed partly from the absence of a previously agreed plan for expansion. A plan had, in fact, been hastily drawn up as war approached but it had never been formally adopted. This was perhaps just as well – the proposed plan envisaged expansion on an even smaller scale and slower pace. The idea of raising only one division every six months was risible in the light of the subsequent events. Part of the problem was also that, even after the war began, there was no directive from the British government on possible troop demands from India. Only one thing was clear: the timetable of modernization drawn up by the Chatfield committee would have to be binned.

  Source: Sri Nandan Prasad, Expansion of the Armed Forces and Defence Organization, 1939–45 (New Delhi, Ministry of Defence, Government of India, 2012), Appendix I

  Figure 1. Expansion of Indian armed forces

  After idling many months away, the general staff in India proposed a major plan of expansion in May 1940. This marked the beginning of the second stage of wartime enlargement. The plan had been advanced in the light of
London’s desire to offer a guarantee to Afghanistan against a Russian attack (see Chapter 2). Although the general staff knew that their operational plan would not be approved by the British chiefs of staff – on account of the demands it would place on British forces – it was felt that the time was propitious for undertaking an expansion of the army. For one thing, the general staff believed that India would be called upon at some point to contribute to the defence of the Middle East. For another, the fall of the Low Countries and the invasion of France had made Indian opinion more sympathetic to the Allied cause than at any time since the start of the war. Even the Congress was expressing its willingness to co-operate in the war effort. In this context, the Indian government felt that the ‘Russian menace and India’s apprehensions regarding it … provide a most favourable opportunity for initiating these efforts with minimum political opposition’.2

  The general staff proposed augmenting the army by raising eighteen infantry battalions and three field artillery regiments, as well as supporting services such as engineers and signals, organizational and logistical units for six army divisions. These divisions would be available for deployment elsewhere, if the situation in Afghanistan remained quiescent. Simultaneously, India would raise an equal number of units to replace the ones that might be sent out of the country. Whitehall’s permission was sought to immediately embark on this plan. Implementing these measures, the general staff emphasized, would absorb their ‘entire energies’ for at least a year and would be the ‘maximum’ that India could contribute to the war effort.3 The secretary of state for India was naturally keen to give the go ahead. The plan, he advised the war cabinet, was ‘a valuable step forward towards enabling India to pull her weight yet more fully in the present struggle’.4

  Weeks after the plan was approved in London, Italy entered the war. Linlithgow promptly offered to despatch to the Middle East eight infantry brigades (three with mechanized transport), one motorized cavalry brigade and one field artillery regiment as well as supporting units – in all nearly 90,000 men. These troops would be sent out in phases from July 1940 to April 1941. The chiefs of staff welcomed the viceroy’s offer, but pointedly added that these forces from India should not be ‘regarded as the total which will eventually be required from her’.5 Indeed, India would thenceforth have to stand ready to meet an insatiable demand for troops.