Khizr Tiwana, the Punjab Unionist Party and the Partition of India

This work is the first biography of Khizr Tiwana, the Unionist Premier of the Punjab during the climacteric period 1942-1947. The Punjab formed the heartland of a future Pakistan State, and for this reason the subcontinent's destiny rested on the clash between Khizr and Jinnah, the Muslim League leader, over the issue of the region's unity versus Muslim separatism. The Pakistan demand eventually triumphed, although Unionist rule survived until shortly before the traumatic upheavals of the August 1947 Partition. Pakistan's creation consigned Khizr's career to the dustbin of history. Mounting communal and ethnic conflict in contemporary India and Pakistan provides, however, a timely basis for its re-examination. Khizr's attachment to the ideals of cross communal political cooperation and decentralization of power are likely to become of increasing interest in a critical reappraisal of the partition era.