Mountbatten versus the Mahatma
By K.R.N. Swamy

IN THE five decades after India’s independence, many official files of the British rule have been made public and we are able to get a glimpse of the days when Lord Mountbatten as the cousin of the King-Emperor succeeded in dissolving the Empire. We find that the greatest apprehension he had for his task as Governor-General was how to deal with Mahatma Gandhi.

Prior to his departure to India, Mountbatten during his informal discussions with British statesmen Lord Listowel, found that as the Viceroy of India he would have to take permission from the British Government to meet the Mahatma informally. This protocol had been maintained by Lord Wavell his predecessor. The shocked Mountbatten said to Lord Listowel, "Why did not Wavell first talk to Gandhi and then inform the British Governmen?" but Wavell had little say in the matter and Mountbatten knew that he would have to get the help of the Mahatma if he was to succeed in his task.

Just prior to Mountbatten’s arrival in India and in view of the great expectations India had of the Viceroy, Mahatma Gandhi had said in one of his prayer meetings, "Why should we look to Mountbatten? Should we wait to see what he brings for us from England! Our newspapers are full of predictions as to what Mountbatten is likely to bring from London. But why should we not look to our own strength?"

Mountbatten decided that he would spend ten hours with the Mahatma if necessary. Soon after the Viceroy’s arrival in New Delhi, the Indian leader called on him on March 31, 1947. He stayed on for two and a quarter hours the first day for two hours on the second day and again met Mountbatten for long sessions on April 2 and 3.

There was real warmth on both sides. On his first meeting with the Viceroy, the Mahatma brought his "grand daughter" Manu and asked if she could ramble round the garden. "Certainly", said Mountbatten, turning to Manu, "All this is yours. We are only the trustees. I have come to make it over to you". In the words of Philip Ziegler, Mountbatten’s official biographer, "The answer enchanted Gandhi, but he remained skepitical about the underlying intentions of the British Government. The dawn of freedom had appeared", he would say pensively, "but we do not feel the glow of its sun rise. We are trembling between hope and fear". He was not able to explain in his prayer meetings the full scope of the negotiations.

"The Viceroy is very intelligent" said the Mahatma at his May 27, 1947, prayer meeting, "he will displease no party. And still will have his own way". Very early in the negotiations, Mountbatten found that the Mahatma was committed to the concept of an undivided India and would oppose any move towards Partition. As such, on April 1 itself Gandhi put forth the proposal, that the Muslim League represented by Jinnah be asked to form the interim central government and that the Congress must be prepared to accept it if by doing so they could ensure the unity of India. Mountbatten felt the plan was not rooted in reality. In the words of one of Mountbatten’s biographers, "It was outrageous and remotely feasible".

In fact in his personal papers, the last Viceroy had recorded Gandhi’s plan as "mad" but for the fact that it was proposed by the Mahatma. Later the word "mad" was changed to "wild" in the Mountbatten diaries. All the British advisers of the Viceroy told him that such a proposal was unworkable and to Mountbatten’s great relief, the Congress leadership rejected it with alacrity.

The Mahatma felt betrayed when his proposal was not accepted officially. He withdrew from the negotiations and went to Bihar during the critical period, when the final negotiations were being conducted.

After the partition of India was announced, Mountbatten realised that the Mahatma could still upset this fragile settlement. V.K. Krishna Menon, one of the Congress stalwarts, had informed the Viceroy that the Mahatma was unhappy. It was even reported to Mountbatten that at a prayer meeting on June 4, the Mahatma would denounce Partition. As such the Viceroy requested the Mahatma to meet him and entreated with the Indian leader that it was the people of India who had decided their own destiny. His efforts were successful and during his next prayer meeting, Gandhi told the audience that the Viceroy had no hand in the partition of India. Both Hindus and Muslims could not agree on anything and the Viceroy was left with no choice. Partition was tragic but inevitable and had to be carried out.

Before the Mahatma left for the riot-torn Bengal, he had had another meeting with the Viceroy. It so happened that the day he chose to see the Viceroy was a Monday, his day of silence.

In fact one of Mahatma’s assistants reveals in his memoirs that Mountbatten preferred to meet him on Mondays, when the Indian leader had to take recourse to writing down his messages to the Viceroy in bits of paper and the Viceroy found that as against spoken words, these papers (now kept in Mountbatten archives in the U.K.) ensured that there could be no different interpretations than what was written!

Therefore, when the meeting (so anxiously awaited by the Viceroy) took place, Mahatma Gandhi wrote on a scrap of paper that it was his day of silence, he had nothing to say and added, "You do not really want me to say anything ... do you?"

The Viceroy of India, Lord Mountbatten of Burma, the former Allied Commander in South East Asia during World War II, the hero of many battles, breathed freely and knew that he had won the greatest victory of his life.