The Pakistan Movement emerged within the colonial framework to safeguard the interests of Muslim elites, middle and professional classes in the Muslim-minority regions of India, with the salariat providing its leadership. It gained momentum after the introduction of electoral politics under the Indian Councils Act of 1909 (Morley–Minto Reforms). By the 1940s, its focus shifted towards the Muslim-majority provinces and agriculturalist classes as communalism intensified and partition became increasingly foreseeable, while Britain, weakened by mass movements, militant struggles, and the revolt of the Indian Navy and Air Force, prepared to withdraw from India—the “Jewel in the Crown” as the sun was about to set on British imperialism in the aftermath of the Second World War.

In the face of strong progressive nationalist movements and mounting economic and political pressures, the vulnerable Muslim League leadership in the newly established country in 1947 turned to suppress them, seeking shelter in the ideological invocation of Pakistani nationalism and Islam. The challenge from the Bengali middle classes was formidable, along with the Pashtun, Baloch, and Sindhi middle-class nationalist movements. Under the direction of Governor-General M.A. Jinnah, the Chief Minister of NWFP, Dr Khan Sahib, was dismissed on August 22, 1947, while the Chief Minister of Sindh, Muhammad Ayub Khuhro, who had assumed office on August 23, 1947, was dismissed on April 26, 1948. The dismissal of the Khan Sahib ministry, despite its majority in the provincial assembly, and the subsequent dismissal of Khuhro reflected the early centralization of political power at the expense of provincial autonomy.

However, earth-shaking moments occurred in NWFP and Bengal in the coming years. Following the arrest of Bacha Khan and other leaders of the Khudai Khidmatgar Movement and the dismissal of the majority-elected provincial government of Dr Khan Sahib, thousands of unarmed Khudai Khidmatgar supporters organized a peaceful protest march at Babrra Ground, Charsadda, on August 12, 1948. The police and Frontier Constabulary opened fire on the unarmed protesters. Contemporary and later accounts have reported hundreds killed and many more wounded, with some accounts putting the death toll at around 600 and the number of wounded at around 1,000 or more. Since December 1947, the language movement in Bengal had become a formidable challenge to the central government, culminating in the massacre of February 21, 1952, when several students were killed during protests demanding recognition of Bengali as one of Pakistan’s state languages. Very soon, the........

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