z:\ ambedkar\vol-02\vol2-05.indd MK SJ+YS 21-9-2013/YS-8-11-2013 319
REDISTRIBUTION OF THE AREA OF THE PROVINCE 319
the same footing as other provinces and (3) that in the Punjab and Bengal the proportion of Muslim representation should be in accordance with their population. A glance at the above proposals is sufficient to indicate that the object of the scheme is to carve out as many Provinces with a Mohamedan majority as possible out of the existing arrangement. At present Punjab and Bengal are two Provinces with a bare Muslim majority. The proposals by demanding that in those provinces representation should be proportionate to population seeks to make the communal majority of the Muslims a political majority so that a Mohamedan Government will be assured in those provinces. Baluchistan and N. W. F. Province have an overwhelming Muslim majority. But they are as yet out of the pale of responsible Government with the result that the Mohamedan majority is not a ruling majority. The aim of the proposals is to rectify this anomaly so that they will make four Provinces with a Muslim majority with sure chances of forming a Muslim Government. The demand for the formation of Sindh which is predominently Muslim in numbers into a separate Province is to add a fifth to the list of Muslim provinces contemplated by the scheme. Now what is the purpose behind the formation of these Mohamedan Provinces ? In the eyes of the Mohamedans themselves it has the same purpose as communal electorates. For the authors of the scheme say that they are prepared to give up communal electorates and agree to joint electorates in all provincial legislatures and in the Central Legislature provided their proposal of Mohamedan Provinces was agreed to. By parity of reasoning it follows that the object of carving out Mohamedan Provinces is to protect the Muslim minorities ; since that was the object of communal electorates. The scheme on the surface does not show how the creation of Muslim provinces is going to protect the Muslim minorities against Hindu majorities in Provinces in which the Hindus predominate. Indeed the scheme seems to weaken the position of the Muslim minorities by taking away the protection they receive or believed to receive from communal electorates. But if we probe into it we can see that the scheme is neither so innocent nor so bootless as it appears on the surface. At bottom it is an ingenious contrivance for the protection of Muslim minorities. For if the Hindu majority tyrannized the Muslim minority in the Hindu Provinces the scheme provides a remedy whereby the Mohamedan majorities get a field to tyrannize the Hindu minorities in the five Mohamedan Provinces. It is a system of protection by counterblast against blast; terror against terror and eventually tyranny against tyranny. That is the purpose behind the whole scheme and also behind the demand for the separation of Sindh. Lest there should be any doubt on this point I wish to remove it by directing attention to the Report of the Nehru Committee in which they say : “we agree that the Muslim demand for the separation of Sindh was not put forward in the happiest way. It was based on communalism and tacked on irrelevently to certain other matters with which it had no concern whatever.” That the Nehru Committee should have fought shy of