Even as India gained independence, the Partition triggered a humanitarian catastrophe because of communal strife. In January 1948, Mahatma Gandhi undertook his last fast, for the minorities in India and Pakistan. India released Rs 55 crore for Pakistan.
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi’s last fast, in January 1948, is often remembered for a dramatic consequence. Gandhi’s fast made India release Rs 55 crore to Pakistan even as the two newly created nations remained locked in the bitterness of Partition and a looming war in Kashmir.
But the objective of Gandhi’s fast, which was also his last, was much wider.
He was fasting to stop communal hatred from tearing the country apart, to secure the rights and safety of Muslims in India, while also seeking peace for minorities — Hindus and Sikhs — in Pakistan.
The payment of Rs 55 crore was linked to a larger moral argument. For Gandhi, India could not demand justice and peace from Pakistan while withholding money that, according to him, was legally owed to it. To him, it was India’s obligation to its new neighbour.
The 78-year-old Freedom Fighter’s fast began on January 13, 1948, at Birla House (now Gandhi Smriti) in New Delhi. Gandhi, who was already physically weakened by an earlier fast in Calcutta (now Kolkata), announced that he would not eat until he was satisfied that “communal reconciliation” had genuinely taken place.
Historian and author Ramachandra Guha, in Gandhi: The Years That Changed the World 1914-1948, writes that Gandhi told a prayer meeting on January 12 that “the recent riots had been contained by police and military action, but there remained a storm within the breast that may burst forth any day. His fast would end only when he was satisfied that there is a reunion of the hearts of all communities brought about without any outside pressure, but from an awakened sense of duty.”
That distinction is crucial to understanding why Gandhi’s final fast was linked with the Rs 55 crore payment to Pakistan.
Today, as India celebrates its 80th Independence Day, its journey in terms of communal harmony has been a roller-coaster ride. Yet, even in difficult times, India has continued to stand for peace and harmony. This spirit was reflected not only during Gandhi’s 1948 fast and his insistence that Pakistan receive its due payment, but also in the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty, under which India paid Pakistan $174 million as part of the settlement, worth about $1.6 billion today after adjusting for inflation.
GANDHI’S LAST FAST WAS BORN OUT OF PARTITION’S HORROR
Partition had left India and Pakistan engulfed in violence and displacement of millions.
Delhi had itself become a city of refugees. Communal tension was everywhere. Gandhi had spent months trying to calm the situation, first in Bengal and later in Delhi. He envisioned an India where a person’s religious identity did not determine their rights.
In his newspaper Harijan, Gandhi wrote that “the Indian Union and Pakistan belong equally to all who call themselves and are, sons of the soil, irrespective of their creed or colour”. He urged, “Let the past be buried. Do not rake it up. Think of the future”.
Gandhi wanted India to assure liberty of religious profession to every single individual. For him, this was not a minor concession to minorities.
The January 1948 fast, therefore, emerged out of this communal crisis. Gandhi believed that military and police measures could suppress violence, but they could not produce genuine reconciliation.
The Hindustan Times, edited by Gandhi’s son Devadas in January 1948, reported that “the announcement had come as a complete surprise to his colleagues and the members of the Government”. Gandhi’s associates were anxious because his health remained fragile after the Calcutta fast.
“Gandhi had been deeply affected by the all-round misery and chaos, thousands of refugees streaming to him with tragic tales,” Guha wrote in his book.
Gandhi’s son Devadas himself pleaded with his father to stop and not hold fast.
“You and all the others should bear in mind that it is equally unimportant whether God ends my life or allows me to survive,” Gandhi wrote in response, according to Dominique Lapierre and Larry Collins’ Freedom at Midnight book.
The book also noted that Gandhi added in the letter, “I have only one prayer to offer: O God, keep me firm during the fast lest I should hastily break it in the temptation to live.”
HOW RS 55 CRORE BECAME PART OF GANDHI’S LAST FAST DEMANDS
India’s decision to withhold Pakistan’s share of the financial assets inherited from British India was another issue which was troubling Gandhi.
During Partition, the division of the assets of undivided India included the sterling balances owed by Britain. Pakistan was entitled to Rs 75 crore from India. Of this, Rs 20 crore had already been paid, leaving Rs 55 crore.
But relations between the two newly born countries had deteriorated dramatically. Pakistan-backed forces had invaded Kashmir, and the Indian government delayed the transfer of the remaining amount.
For India’s leaders, the decision to withhold the money was rooted in security concerns. But for Gandhi, the principle was different.
Guha writes in his book that although the stated reason for Gandhi’s fast was the deteriorating communal situation, “it seems Gandhi was also upset with the Government’s decision to withhold from Pakistan its share of the sterling balances owed by Britain to (undivided) India after the War.”
His position was rooted in a broader moral principle that a financial obligation did not cease to exist because relations between the parties had turned hostile.
Freedom at Midnight highlights the episode more starkly. “The Cabinet came to Gandhi’s bedside because of his demand for the payment of Pakistan’s 550 million rupees (Rs 55 crore).”
The demand had angered many in the government, particularly Deputy Prime Minister Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. Nehru and Patel attempted to explain why the money had been withheld. Gandhi listened to them. Then came one of the most dramatic moments of Gandhi’s fast.
The fast was rapidly deteriorating Gandhi’s body.
“Slowly, painfully tears in his eyes, Gandhi raised himself on his elbows and looked at the man who had stood by his side during so many bitter struggles,” Lapierre and Collins wrote in their book.
“You are not the Sardar I once knew,” Gandhi told Patel, according to Freedom at midnight.
GANDHI’S FAST NOT ONLY ATTRACTED ADMIRATION, BUT ALSO ANGER
The fast held by Gandhi was not welcomed by all. Hindu and Sikh refugees who had suffered during Partition increasingly viewed Gandhi’s position with anger. Some believed that he was putting the “interests of Muslims” ahead of those who had fled Pakistan.
“When will that old man stop bothering us?” was the reaction of some in Delhi’s markets and refugee neighbourhoods, according to Lapierre and Collins’ book.
At one point, refugees demonstrated outside Birla House. Gandhi heard the slogans. “What are they doing?” he asked. “Chanting slogans,” Gandhi’s aide Pyarelal replied.
When asked about what were they chanting, Pyarelal told Gandhi “They are chanting, ‘Let Gandhi die’.”
After all, Gandhi was asking people who had experienced immense suffering to show compassion towards members of the community they associated with that suffering.
But Gandhi insisted that his fast was not a political bargain. At his prayer meeting on January 17, he said, “My fast was not a political move in any sense of the term. It is in obedience to the peremptory call of conscience and duty”, Guha recorded in his book.
Rs 55 CRORE TO PAK AND GANDHI’S OTHER DEMANDS TO END FAST
The government’s decision to release Rs 55 crore to Pakistan became a key outcome of Gandhi’s fast. Guha, in his book, records that the payment was made as a contribution “to the non-violent and noble effort made by Gandhiji… for peace and goodwill”.
Gandhi opposed withholding it despite the Kashmir conflict because, in his view, a debt had to be honoured regardless of whether the other side was a friend or an enemy.
But the money was only part of Gandhi’s demands. On January 17, as his health deteriorated, he laid down seven conditions for ending the fast which also included restoring occupied mosques, ensuring Muslims could move freely and return to their homes, protecting them from economic boycotts and allowing the Mehrauli Urs to proceed peacefully.
The conditions like communal harmony, security for Delhi’s Muslims after the horrors of Partition reflected the real purpose of Gandhi’s fast.
Two lakh people signed a peace pledge affirming that Muslims should be “as free as the rest of us to live in Delhi in peace and security and with self-respect,” according to the book Freedom at Midnight.