The Reminiscences of Zafrulla Khan — Page 157
141 REMINISCENCES OF SIR MUHAMMAD ZAFRULLA KHAN He was very enthusiastic and was a very devoted type of person. He was so enamoured of his idea that he could brook no criticism of or opposition to it. I did not speak in opposition to his idea, because at that time the whole thing was so academic, and we treated it as something with which these young undergraduates amused themselves during their leisure hours. None of us, at least in the Roundtable Conference, was at that time disposed to attach much importance to it or to treat it as a practical proposition. But so much was Mr. Rahmat Ali devoted to this idea of exchange of populations and that Pakistan, whether confined only to the northwest or also comprising the northeast, should accommodate within its borders the total Muslim population of the whole of India, that when Pakistan was achieved and put into effect, he was greatly disappointed. He used to apply all sorts of opprobrious epithets to the Qaid-i-Azam lamenting that he had destroyed the whole concept with which Mr. Rahmat Ali had started. He had settled down in Cambridge, but when he visited Pakistan he was not taken much notice of. Besides furnishing the name he did not play any active part in the promotion or the setting-up of Pakistan. He died soon after partition, a very disappointed man. R R R R R INTERVIEW - JULY 7, 1962 Question : Would you like to say a few words today, Sir, about your relations with Sir Khizr Hayat in the summer of 1947 and before that ? Khan : I had known Sir Khizr Hayat Khan for a number of years and had admired him and his great qualities. He came into particular prominence in connection with the events we are now approaching in the spring of 1947. After the final failure of the Cabinet Mission Plan in December, 1946, the Labour Government in England, and the Prime Minister, Mr. Attlee, were faced with the problem what to do about India's progress towards independence. Mr. Attlee came to the conclusion that after the failure of this last effort, directed towards the maintenance of the political unity of the subcontinent, there was no choice left but to agree to partition and to carry it out. So, in February, 1947, he announced his decision on partition in principle. The central point of the announcement was that His Majesty's Government would transfer power to the provincial governments that