Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-skm99 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-29T13:46:29.865Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Planning for Pakistan: The Planning Committee of the All-India Muslism League 1943–46

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 November 2008

Ian Talbot
Ian Talbot
Affiliation:
Coventry University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Most studies have concentrated on the Muslim League's political activities and objectives. It is generally believed that it lacked a distinctive economic programme and unequivocally favoured private enterprise. The radical economic ideas produced by its Punjab and Bengal branches are attributed to a handful of activists who received short shrift from the High Command. The League's stance is thus contrasted with the Congress which addressed economic issues from a largely Socialist perpective.

Type
Articles
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 28 , Issue 4 , October 1994 , pp. 875 - 889
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1994

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 See, for example, Papanek, H., ‘Pakistan's Big Businessmen: Muslim Separatism, Entrepreneurship and Partial Modernization’, Economic Development and Cultural Change, 21 (1972–1973), pp. 8ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Sayeed, K. B., Pakistan: The Formative Phase 1857–1948 (London, 1968), p. 225.Google Scholar

3 Markovits, C., Indian Business and Nationalist Polities 1931–9. The Indigenous Capitalist Class and the Rise of the Congress Party (Cambridge, 1985), pp. 141–9, 178–89.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

4 Chandra, B., Imperialism and Nationalism in India (Delhi, 1979), pp. 144–70.Google Scholar

5 Chattopadhyay, R., «An early British Government Initiative in the Genesis of Indian Planning’ Economic and Political Weekly, XXII, 5 (31 01 1987), PE-19–PE-27.Google Scholar

6 Chaudhri, K. N., ‘Economic Problems and Indian Independence’ in Philips, C. H. and Wainwright, M. D., The Partition of India: Policies and Perspectives 1935–1947 (London, 1970), pp. 311ff.Google Scholar

7 Ibid., p. 311. For full details consult L/E.8/2637 OIOR.

8 Hasan, Khalid Shamsul, Quaid-I-Azam's Unrealized Dream (Karachi, 1991), p. 18.Google Scholar

9 Ibid., p. 19.

10 Ibid., p. 17.

11 Jinnah to Hasham Premji 23 May 1944, All-Indian Muslim League Economic Planning Committee 42, Shamsul Hasan Collection (hereafter SHC).Google Scholar

12 Jinnah wrote to Ismail Ibrahim Chundrigar on 12 April 1944 asking him to see Mahomed Ali Habib personally concerning this matter. The Bombay Muslim League leader finally admitted to the Quaid in a letter of 29 May that his ‘ further attempts' to persuade the banker to sit on the Planning Committee ‘have not borne fruit’. Ismail Ibrahim Chundrigar to Jinnah, 29 May 1944, All-India Muslim League Economic Planning Committee 46, SHC.Google Scholar

13 Hasan, , Quaid, pp. 100–2.Google Scholar

14 Khan Bahadur Ghazanfurullah to Jinnah, 18 April 1944, All-India Muslim League Economic Planning Committee 20, SHC.Google Scholar

15 G. Allana was a member of a prominent Karachi based business family. Yusuf Haroon was the eldest son of the prominent Memon sugar merchant of Karachi, Abdullah Haroon, who became President of the Sind Muslim League in November 1938. Maratib Ali Shah came from the Syed business family headed by Wazar AliShah which had its headquarters in Lahore.Google Scholar

16 He was coopted to serve on the Finance Subcommittee which was chaired by Nawab Ali Nawaz Jung.

17 This held its first annual meeting in Delhi in 1945.Google ScholarPapanek, , ‘Businessmen’, p. 12.Google Scholar

18 Speech of Jinnah to the All-Indian Muslim League Economic Planning Committee 5 November 1944, All-India Muslim League Economic Planning Committee 95 (I), SHC.Google Scholar

19 Hasan, , Quaid, p. 102.Google Scholar

20 Ibid., p. 109.

21 Ibid., p. 99.

22 Ibid., p. 103.

23 Ibid., p. 107.

24 All-India Muslim League Economic Planning Committee 83(I), SHC.

25 A complte list of all the fifteen subcommittees including the names of their members will be found in Hasan, Quaid, pp. 24–6.Google Scholar

26 Ibid., p. 26.

27 Minutes of the First Meeting of the All-India Muslim League Economic Planning Committee 3 September 1944, All-India Muslim League Economic Planning Committee 84, SHC.Google Scholar

28 Hasan, , Quaid, p. 29.Google Scholar

29 Speech of Jinnah to the All-India Muslim League Economic Planning Committee 5 November 1944, All-India Muslim League Economic Planning Committee 95(I), SHC.Google Scholar

30 The Eastern Times, however, sprang to his defence. Hasan, , Quaid, p. 34.Google Scholar

31 Chaudhri, , Economic Problems, p. 306.Google Scholar

32 Agenda of the Second Meeting of the Planning Committee 5 November 1944, All-India Muslim League Economic Planning Committee 92 (1–4), SHC.Google Scholar

33 Ibid.

34 Hasan, , Quaid, p. 27.Google Scholar

35 All-India Muslim League Economic Planning Committee 98–100, SHC.

36 These included Statistical Assistants, an Office Superintendent, a Stenographer, and typist at both Aligarh and Delhi, and of course the obligatory peon. Their total salaries for the year 1944–45 came to the princely sum of Rs4,481–11–9. Expenditure of the All-India Muslim League Planning Committee August 1944–September 1945, All-India Muslim League Economic Planning Committee 108, SHC.

37 Hasan, , Quaid, p. 36.Google Scholar

38 Ibid., p. 38.

39 Ibid., p. 37.

40 The full text of the Report (henceforth PR) is contained in File 115 of the All-India Muslim League Economic Planning Committee, SHC.

41 PR, p. 3 para. 6.

42 PR, p. 50 para. 86. This compared with the Bombay Plan's proposed expenditure of Rs10,000 crores over a fiften year period.

43 PR, p. 52 para. 88.

44 L/E/8/2637, OIOR.

45 PR, p. 10 para. 21.

46 This term was used most imprecisely and was never defined.

47 PR, P. 11 Para. 22.

48 PR, P. 51 Para. 88.

49 PR, p. 1 para. 2.

50 PR, P. 3 para. 5.

51 Chaudhri, , Economic Problems, p. 301.Google Scholar

52 PR, p. 10 para. 21.

53 PR, p. 8 para. 17.

54 ibid.

55 PR, P. 15 para. 28.

56 For a brief description of its impact on the Muslims consult, Hardy, P., The Muslims of British India (Cambridge, 1972), pp. 43ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

57 PR, p. 21 para. 35.

58 PR, p. 22 para. 37.

59 PR, p. 6 para. 13.

60 PR, p. 7 para. 15.

61 PR, p. 18 para. 31.

62 PR, p. 17 para. 31.

63 Ibid.

64 Ibid.

65 Chaudhri, , Economic Problems, p. 301.Google Scholar

66 PR, p. 17 para. 31.

67 PR, p. 48 para 81.

68 PR, p. 46 para. 76.

69 Speech in reply to the Address presented by the Karachi Chamber of Commerce 27 April 1948. Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Jinnah, Ali, Speeches and Statements (Karachi, 1989), p. 255.Google Scholar

70 These included defence related industries and those concerned with the generation of hydro-electric power and the manufacture of railway wagons, telephone, telegraph and wireless apparatus. The private sector remained unchallenged until the extensive nationalization programme of the PPP Government of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.

71 For details see, Waterston, A., Planning in Pakistan (Baltimore, 1963), pp. 13ff.Google Scholar