Mohammed Ali Jinnah did not win Pakistan as Congress leaders Jawaharlal Nehru and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel "conceded" Pakistan to the Quaid-e-Azam with the British acting as an ever helpful midwife, says senior BJP leader Jaswant Singh.
In his new book Jinnah - India, Partition, Independence, which will hit the stands on August 17, he recalls the events leading to Partition as well as the "epic journey of Jinnah from being the ambassador of Hindu-Muslim unity, the liberal constitutionalist and Indian nationalist to the Quaid-e-Azam of Pakistan".
Singh raises several questions on partition. "...How did you divide a geographic (also geo-political) unity? Through a 'surgical operation', Mountbatten (the last British viceroy) had said, and tragically Nehru and Patel and the Congress party had assented, Jinnah, in any event having demanded adopting to just a recourse," he writes in the book, excerpts from which have been reproduced by India Today magazine.
"...Jinnah did not win Pakistan, as the Congress leaders - Nehru and Patel finally conceded Pakistan to Jinnah, with the British acting as an ever helpful midwife," Singh says in his 669-page book.