Nehru: The Invention of India

by Shashi Tharoor

The Congress had in fact hoped for a joint approach on the war issue with the League. Jinnah was invited to the Working Committee meeting of September, but refused to attend. Jawaharlal nonetheless met with him, the second time together with Gandhi, and a convergence of views seemed to be emerging. The Viceroy’s statement in October 1939 emphatically rejecting the Congress position, however, prompted the Working Committee, with Jawaharlal in the lead, to order all its provincial ministries to resign rather than continue to serve a war effort in which they had been denied an honourable role. The decision was taken on a point of principle, but politically it proved a monumental blunder. It deprived the Congress of their only leverage with the British Government, cast aside the fruits of their electoral success, and presented Jinnah with a golden opportunity. He broke off talks with the Congress—declaring the day of the Congress resignations a ‘day of deliverance’—and turned to the Viceroy instead. Two years in the political wilderness after the electoral setbacks of 1937 had already transformed the League. Congress rule in many provinces had unwittingly increased Muslim concern, even alarm, about the implications of democratic majoritarian rule in a country so overwhelmingly Hindu. Many Muslims began to see themselves as a political and economic minority, and the League spoke to their insecurities. Jinnah had begun to come to the conclusion that the only effective answer to ...