z:\ ambedkar\vol 08\vol8 05.indd MK SJ+YS 28 9 2013/YS 13 11 2013 405
EPILOGUE
Here I propose to stop. For I feel that I have said all that I can say about the subject. To use legal language I have drawn the pleadings. This I may claim to have done at sufficient length. In doing so, I have adopted that prolix style so dear to the Victorian lawyers, under which the two sides plied one another with plea and replication, rejoinder and rebutter, surrejoinder and surrebutter and so on. I have done this deliberately with the object that a full statement of the case for and against Pakistan may be made. The foregoing pages contain the pleadings. The facts contained therein are true to the best of my knowledge and belief. I have also given my findings. It is now for Hindus and Muslims to give theirs.
To help them in their task it might be well to set out the issues. On the pleadings the following issues seem to be necessary issues:
(1) is Hindu-Muslim unity necessary for India’s political advancement ? If necessary, is it still possible of realization notwithstanding the new ideology of the Hindus and the Muslims being two different nations ?
(2) If Hindu-Muslim unity is possible, should it be reached by appeasement or by settlement ?
(3) If it is to be achieved by appeasement, what are the new concessions that can be offered to the Muslims to obtain their willing co-operation, without prejudice to other interests ?
(4) If it is to be achieved by a settlement, what are the terms of that settlement? If there are only two alternatives, (i) Division of India into Pakistan and Hindustan, or (ii) Fifty-fifty share in Legislature, Executive and the Services, which alternative is preferable ?
(5) Whether India, if she remained one integral whole, can rely upon both Hindus and Musalmans to defend her independence, assuming it is won from the British ?
(6) Having regard to the prevailing antagonism between Hindus and Musalmans and having regard to the new ideology demarcating them as two distinct nations and postulating an opposition in their ultimate destinies, whether a single constitution for these two nations can be built in the hope that they will show an intention to work it and not to stop it ?