Ankit The Accession of Junagadh

The accession of Junagadh, 1947–48:
Colonial sovereignty, state violence

and post-independence India
Rakesh Ankit
Jindal Global University, Haryana
By revisiting the events from July 1947 to February 1948 that comprised the accession of the
princely state of Junagadh to India, this article gives an insight into the newly independent
Dominion’s ‘mobilisation of violence’ in re-fashioning its sovereignty and authority. In doing
so, it adds to the growing historical literature on state formation in India that argues that
multiple crises of the period 1947–49—post-partition violence in Punjab and Delhi, rebellion,
accession and war in Kashmir and the so-called ‘police-action’ in Hyderabad—far from being
aberrations to the emerging Indian nation-state were, instead, affairs through which its new
sovereignty evolved. The mobilisation of Indian defence forces in the lead up to the accession of
Junagadh in November 1947 and the management of violence directed at Junagadh’s Muslims
afterwards are yet another instance of the forcible incorporation of Indian princely states and
Indian Muslims into the reconstructed post-colonial state. Present in this matrix were also the
‘sub-states’ within Junagadh and the attendant questions of their autonomy, an instrumentalist
alarmism about popular will and unrest and a hastily conducted referendum. These aspects
of this contested accession have remained overshadowed in the historical record and are here
revised to provide an alternative narrative.
Keywords: India, Pakistan, Junagadh, accession
Introduction
On 25 July 1947, when the last British Viceroy in India, Lord Mountbatten, con-
vened the Chamber of Princes, there existed 550-plus princely states in the Indian
subcontinent. This indirectly ruled princely India accounted for ‘two-fifths of the
area and a third of the population’ of the British Empire in India.1 Addressing the
Acknowledgements: I am thankful to the two anonymous reviewers of the IESHR for their kind
comments and suggestions that have enriched the article. Professor Ian Talbot read the first draft
and I am grateful for his constant encouragement and support. Many thanks to Salma Siddique, who
read an earlier version and made helpful observations on form and style.
1
Raghavan, War and Peace in Modern India, p. 26. On princely states, see Jeffrey, ed. People,
Princes and Paramount Power; and Ramusack, The Indian Princes and Their States.
The Indian Economic and Social History Review, 53, 3 (2016): 371–404
SAGE Los Angeles/London/New Delhi/Singapore/Washington DC/Melbourne
DOI: 10.1177/0019464616651167
372 / Rakesh Ankit
princes and their representatives, Mountbatten acquainted them with the imminent
end of British India and advised them to accede to either India or Pakistan keeping
in mind the geographical and communal compulsions which ‘cannot be evaded’.2
By the time of the transfer of power on 14–15 August 1947, all the princely states—
barring three—had joined either India or Pakistan.3 Among these, Junagadh was the
smallest: A ‘little-regarded’ and ‘over-looked patchwork quilt’ of 3,300 scattered
square miles and 700,000 people—of which 80 per cent were Hindus—in the intri-
cate Kathiawar region in Western India.4 The dispute over its accession was settled
the earliest and, compared to the other two—Kashmir and Hyderabad—the easiest.
Perhaps, that is why Junagadh has received less historical attention.5 Studies on
patrimonial and imperial politics in the endgame of empire do not extend to conflicts
like Junagadh, which came in the wake of empire.6 Then, Junagadh could be, and
was, understood as a ‘mirror-image’ of Kashmir or as ‘Hyderabad in miniature’,7
that is, it had a Muslim ruler and administration over a majority Hindu population.8
Above all, the crisis in Kashmir followed events in Junagadh within a month, soon
overlapping and eventually overtaking them.9 The understanding of Junagadh thus
became limited as a ‘curtain-raiser to a problem which was to find its climax’ in
Kashmir and Hyderabad.10 Even when recently rescued from being a mere ‘trivial
adjunct’ to Kashmir, it has been probed insofar as it ‘set the tone’ for India’s stance
on Kashmir and Hyderabad.11 Critical accounts, too, sum it up as, ‘[in] Junagadh,
whose prince opted for accession for Pakistan on August 15, [New Delhi] sent in
troops without further ado to secure the state for India’.12
2
University of Southampton (henceforth UoS), Hartley Library (henceforth HL), Mountbatten
Papers MB1/D204.
3
On integration of princely states in India and Pakistan, see Menon, The Integration of Indian
States; Corfield, The Princely India I Knew; Copland, The Princes of India in the Endgame of Empire
1917–1947; and Bangash, A Princely Affair: The Integration of the Princely States of Pakistan, 1947–55.
4
Hodson, The Great Divide, pp. 374–75; Campbell-Johnson, Mission with Mountbatten, p. 191.
5
Apart from participatory accounts like Menon, The Integration of Indian States; Campbell-Johnson,
Mission with Mountbatten, an early exception was Hodson, The Great Divide; a recent exception is
Raghavan, War and Peace.
6
For instance, see Ashton, British Policy towards the Indian States, 1905–1939; Ramusack, The
Princes of India in the Twilight of Empire; and Pernau, The Passing of Patrimonialism.
7
Lamb, Kashmir, p. 127; Campbell-Johnson, Mission with Mountbatten, p. 193.
8
On Hyderabad, for recent writings, see Benichou, From Autocracy to Integration; Sherman, ‘The
Integration of the Princely State of Hyderabad and the Making of the Post-colonial State in India,
1948–1956’; Noorani, The Destruction of Hyderabad; and Purushotham, ‘Internal Violence: The
“Police Action” in Hyderabad’ .
9
On Kashmir, see Zutshi, ‘Whither Kashmir Studies’; Snedden, The Untold Story; Whitehead,
A Mission in Kashmir; Rai, Hindu Rulers, Muslim Subjects; and Birdwood, Two Nations and Kashmir.
10
Ziegler, Mountbatten, p. 444; Moraes, Jawaharlal Nehru, p. 365.
11
Raghavan, War and Peace, pp. 3, 31, 63–64.
12
Anderson, The Indian Ideology, p. 67.
The accession of Junagadh, 1947–48/ 373
These treatments do no justice to the many complexities, characters and

concerns in Junagadh between July 1947 and March 1948. Relying on hitherto
unused primary material in India (Ministry of States and External Affairs’ Junagadh
files at National Archives) and Britain (Mountbatten Papers at Hartley Library,
Southampton), supplementing it with the published volumes of Jinnah Papers and
critically engaging with the existing literature, this article attempts to reconstruct
the facts of this period and present a more complex narrative than hitherto told.13
The aim, however, is not only to fill the gap and provide important, overlooked
details but also to probe the legal, moral and political aspects of Junagadh’s eventual
accession to India and to present an alternative interpretation of New Delhi’s aims,
claims and achievements. This reading presents Junagadh as the first example of the
‘“Internal Violence”, which was an engine of state formation in India in the period
just after independence’.14 If, as has been recently argued, the ‘police action’ in
Hyderabad in 1948 was the final sequence of a process of territorial reordering that
transformed ‘variegated spaces of colonial India into a single national territory’,15
then the contested accession of Junagadh to India in 1947 was perhaps the first
act of that process.
The crisis of Junagadh’s accession fell right in the middle of the period from
August to December 1947, which was one of post-partition uncertainty, migration
and violence in a large area from Punjab to Bengal and Kashmir to Bombay. Present-
ing it within this context, the article combines a narrative of state diplomacy, princely
politics and military preparation with a reflection on the manufacture of ‘public
will’ and its mobilisation as ‘public violence’ in and around Junagadh. Beginning
with the events of July–September 1947, when Junagadh resisted integration into
India and, instead, sought accession to Pakistan, the article examines the Indian
attitude to this unexpected and audacious step. An analysis then follows of events in
Junagadh after the outbreak of the conflict in Kashmir in end-October. Thereafter,
the international law and diplomacy around Junagadh is surveyed in contrast to the
changing social realities on ground, which fuelled Indian state’s fears and shaped
its responses. The article concludes by highlighting the complicated nature of
Junagadh’s political accession, India’s military action, consequent violence and
the conduct of referendum in February 1948. The latter represented an attempt
at legalism as there remained, at this time, limits on the force available and exer-
cised by the Indian state by the presence of British at all levels in its apparatus.
These four interconnected processes were in response to what Arjun Appadurai
describes as an ‘anxiety of incompleteness’,16 exacerbated by partition, problems of
13
Mountbatten Papers at HL (Southampton) contain material on Junagadh in considerably greater
detail than the Mountbatten collection held in the British Library (henceforth BL), which has served
as the major source for writings on Junagadh.
14
Purushotham, ‘Internal Violence: The “Police Action” in Hyderabad’, p. 436.
15
Ibid.
16
See Appadurai, Fear of Small Numbers.
374 / Rakesh Ankit
princely states’ accession and the scattered nature of Junagadh’s territory. Thus
on all three counts of territorial integrity, community cohesion and a united nation-
state, Junagadh presented the first post-partition test for the independent Indian
state. And, as the first Prime Minister of this state, Jawaharlal Nehru, put it:
Conflicts had the potential to unite ‘on an equal level, for a political fight, the entire
communal atmosphere in India’.17
Accession to Pakistan and Its Aftermath: July–September 1947
Junagadh was represented at the July 1947 conference of the Chamber of Princes
by Nabi Buksh, an advisor of its Nawab Mahabat Khan.18 In his conversations with
Buksh, Mountbatten read Junagadh’s ‘intention’ to accede to India. This appeared,
to the Viceroy, consistent with the statements made by the Diwan of Junagadh, Khan
Bahadur Abdul Qadir, in April and May.19 What Mountbatten overlooked was that
since then, a group of Muslim League politicians from the neighbouring province
of Sindh led by Sir Shah Nawaz Bhutto had joined the Junagadh executive council
and Bhutto had replaced Qadir. On 16 July, Bhutto had met Mohammad Ali Jinnah
in Delhi, who told him to ‘keep out [of India] under any circumstances until August
15’.20 Accordingly, 4 days before, the Nawab conveyed to Jinnah his decision to
‘federate’ with Pakistan and sent his Private Secretary Ismail Abrahani to Karachi
to negotiate the terms of accession.21 This ‘new, wholly unexpected’ crisis came as
a complete surprise to New Delhi where the Ministry of States reasoned that the
Nawab’s decision was not his own.22 For Vallabhbhai Patel, minister-in-charge, it
was simply an act of ‘perfidy’.23 He got it conveyed to Bhutto that the desire of
‘Hindu public’ and the decision of ‘majority of states and talukas’ in Kathiawar
to join the Indian Union could not be ignored.24 His ministry charged Bhutto
with executing a ‘coup d’état’.25 However, according to at least one overlooked
contemporary source, the-then American Vice-Consul in Bombay Albert Rabida,
Qadir too had not been chary about acceding to Pakistan.26 Similarly, Abrahani
and Abu Panch, the Nawab’s ADC (aide-de-camp), too ‘were the blighters that put
17
27 October 1947, Nehru to Hiralal Atal, quoted in Stanley Wolpert, Shameful Flight, p. 185 and
5 March 1948, speech in the Constituent Assembly, Jawaharlal Nehru’s Speeches, Volume One, p. 176.
18
Mahabat Khan’s absence from India at this time as well as his dog-loving proclivities has provided
much grist to the mill of accounts on Junagadh. See Guha, India After Gandhi, pp. 49–51.
19
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Aide-memoire by Mountbatten, 25 February 1948.
20
Zaidi, ed. Jinnah Papers, Bhutto to Jinnah, 11 August 1947, pp. 256–58.
21
Zaidi, ed. Jinnah Papers, Nawab–Jinnah correspondence, 11–12 August 1947, pp. 259–60.
22
Campbell-Johnson, Mission with Mountbatten, p. 191.
23
The title of Chapter X dealing with Junagadh in Das, ed. Sardar Patel’s Correspondence 1945–50
Volume VII is titled ‘Junagadh’s Perfidy’.
24
Das, ed. Sardar Patel’s Correspondence 1945–50, pp. 382–83.
25
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Memorandum dated 19 September 1947.
See Hodson, The Great Divide, p. 429.
26
Zaidi, ed. Jinnah Papers, Note by Albert Rabida, 15 October 1947, pp. 285–86.
Mahabat Khan in this mess’, as remembered by one of Mahabat Khan’s English

officers Captain Eric Markes.27
By the end of August 1947, a hopeful Junagadh and a perplexed New Delhi were
awaiting an early indication of Karachi’s policy.28 The former repeatedly requested
acceptance of its announced accession ‘as soon as possible’ given the difficulties
and criticisms that the latter was showering upon it.29 Among these was patrol-
ling of Junagadh’s port Veraval by the Indian Navy that included establishing the
identity of all boats approaching Veraval and examining and searching those
on Indian register. This order was passed on 28 August 1947 by Rear-Admiral
J.T.S. Hall, India’s naval chief, rather reluctantly, in the face of a request by Defence
Minister Baldev Singh and the Ministry of States ‘to take such action as was
possible [to stop] the possibility of ammunition being landed in Junagadh [from
Pakistan]’. Hall was reluctant because he held that it was ‘perfectly legitimate’
for Junagadh, in accordance with Commonwealth Conventions, International
Maritime Laws and Joint Defence Council agreements, to import arms from Pakistan
and ‘the only circumstances in which such importation could be checked [was]
if the arms were exported from India or carried in a ship on the Indian register’.30
When Hall’s note was shown to V.P. Menon, the impatient and influential Secretary
at the Ministry of States, he brushed aside Hall’s reservations and minuted the
following on 30 August 1947, giving ample indication of the feelings on Junagadh
in New Delhi:
Junagadh is a state which proposes to accede to Pakistan...Import into Junagadh

of large quantities of arms without the knowledge of [New Delhi] will be a direct
threat to the...whole Kathiawar...We may justifiably claim that the question of
self-preservation is involved in the proper restriction of arms traffic between
Junagadh and foreign countries. On the question of how best to take preventive
action, I would only emphasise that our measures should not be half-hearted.31
(emphasis added)
Finally, on 9 September, Pakistan announced that it had signed a standstill agree-

ment with Junagadh. Soon thereafter was declared its decision to accept Junagadh’s
request for accession.32 Three days later, Hastings Ismay, Mountbatten’s Chief
of Staff (Cos), carried a telegram from Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru for his
counterpart Liaquat Ali Khan in Karachi. In it, pointing to Junagadh’s ‘geographical
27
National Archives of India (henceforth NAI), Ministry of States (henceforth MoS), File No. 85
(3)-PR (47), Markes to his wife, 27 November 1947 and Panch’s statement in jail, 29 November 1947.
28
Zaidi, ed. Jinnah Papers, Nehru to Liaquat, 12 September 1947, pp. 269–70 and Bhutto to M.W.
Abbasi, 20 August 1947, p. 261.
29
Zaidi, ed. Jinnah Papers, Nawab to Jinnah, 19 and 31 August 1947, pp. 261–64.
30
NAI, MoS, File No. 32-IB/47, 28–29 August 1947.
31
NAI, MoS, File No. 32-IB/47, 30 August 1947.
32
Zaidi, ed. Jinnah Papers, Bhutto to Jinnah, 4 September 1947 and to Ismail Abrahani, 6 September
1947, pp. 264–68 and Jinnah to Bhutto, 8 September 1947, p. 266.
376 / Rakesh Ankit
contiguity’ and its overwhelming Hindu population, Nehru refused to ‘acquiesce’

in Junagadh’s accession to Pakistan and offered ‘to accept any democratic test’.33
Ismay himself told Jinnah that Junagadh’s accession to Pakistan was a ‘military
fantasy’ and a political–economic ‘liability’.34
It has been argued recently that Pakistan ‘clearly had an intrinsic territorial
interest in Junagadh’.35 If so, then Karachi was rather slow in its pursuit much like
the Muslim League’s attitude towards the princely states before partition.36 Jin-
nah and Liaquat took almost a month to accept Junagadh’s accession. The latter
admitted the ‘obvious difficulties’ but, as he later shared with Nehru, felt that he
could not turn down the Nawab’s request in light of the Muslim administration of
the state, its short distance from Pakistan and the connectivity between the ports of
Veraval and Karachi.37 As for Jinnah, he too felt that there was little sense in having
Junagadh but gave way to the Nawab and Bhutto.38 Moreover, Pakistan was not
exactly forthcoming, as it could not be, in meeting Junagadh’s pleas for military
and diplomatic support. On 14 September, Khan Bahadur H.S. Naqvi, Junagadh’s
police chief, informed K.R. Eates, formerly of the Indian Police Service and then
Superintendent, CID (criminal investigation department)—Karachi, that facing
three battalions of Kathiawar’s Indian Dominion States, Junagadh’s military and
police were ‘short of mortars, wireless sets, brens and light machine guns’ and to
suggest Karachi to send supplies.39
On 17 September, the Indian Cabinet met to discuss the implications of
Pakistan’s decision; as much for the communal climate and geographical solidarity
of Kathiawar as for New Delhi’s prestige.40 It decided to ‘suitably dispose’,
around Junagadh, Indian troops and the troops of neighbouring princely states that
had acceded to India. V.P. Menon was instructed to visit Junagadh, meet the
Nawab and the Diwan and explain to them the implications of their decision.
As a second pressure tactic, it also decided that ‘economic measures such as the
discontinuance of essential supplies from India and acceding states should be
taken’.41 All this naturally alarmed Bhutto who, fearing ‘an organised attack on
all sides’, appealed to Karachi.42 Ismay too immediately grasped the direction
in which these steps led and in a personal note warned Mountbatten about his
‘personal position’:
33
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Nehru to Liaquat, 12 September 1947.
34
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Memorandum dated 19 September 1947.
35
Raghavan, War and Peace, p. 35.
36
Copland, ‘The Princely States, the Muslim League, and the Partition of India in 1947’, pp. 38–69.
37
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D202/Folder 1, Mountbatten’s notes on Nehru–Liaquat
meeting, 1 October 1947.
38
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Mountbatten–Jinnah talks, 1 November 1947.
39
NAI, MoS, File No. 85 (3)-PR (47), DO No. 284/SB, Naqvi to Eates, 14 September 1947.
40
Menon, The Integration of Indian States, p. 127; Raghavan, War and Peace, p. 33.
41
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Notes of Cabinet Meeting, 17 September 1947.
42
Zaidi, ed. Jinnah Papers, Bhutto to Liaquat, 16 September 1947, pp. 270–73.
Great wars often grow out of very small incidents. It was therefore essential to
proceed in the most careful language, along certain recognised channels for the
government of India if it was to come off in a good light when history and con-
temporary world opinion searchingly examined the origins of war in Junagadh…
For the Governor-General of a British dominion to acquiesce in action which
may lead to war with another British dominion is completely unprecedented.43
Thus cautioned, Mountbatten asked his press attaché Alan Campbell-Johnson to
prepare a press communiqué, which stressed Junagadh’s geographical contiguity
with India, its dominant Hindu population and the Indian demand for a referendum.
Even as he produced the desired press communiqué, Campbell-Johnson wondered
whether the above assertions were enough to ‘outweigh the damaging impressions
that would be created…by pressing this issue to the point of military demonstration
at this particular time’.44 Given the Indian Cabinet’s aggressive decisions, protests
from Pakistan arrived soon. Jinnah sent a telegram to Mountbatten on 19 September
and, pointing to the ‘large troop concentrations along the borders of Junagadh’,
termed ‘any encroachment on Junagadh’s sovereignty or its territory…a hostile
act’.45 In Delhi, the same day, Liaquat discussed Junagadh with Ismay.46
While Liaquat was visiting Delhi, Menon was visiting Junagadh where he
could not meet the Nawab but met Bhutto. More importantly, on his way back,
Menon stopped at Rajkot where the Muslim (and not Hindu)47 Sheikh of Mangrol,
a state of 42 villages half of which were under Junagadh’s jurisdiction, had been
summoned to meet him. Menon lured the Sheikh with promises of autonomy and
rights even in regard to the villages under Junagadh and prevailed upon him to
sign an instrument of accession on 20 September. However, the Sheikh withdrew
it the very next day in a telegram to the Regional Commissioner of Rajkot, which
throws some light on Menon’s modus operandi vis-à-vis the small principalities:
offer ‘new prospects’ under pressure of ‘haste’, not to mention threat.48
On the same day that the Sheikh’s telegram reached New Delhi, Mountbatten
replied to Jinnah justifying his Cabinet’s decisions. Arguing that Junagadh’s
accession to Pakistan was in ‘utter violation of principles on which partition was
agreed upon’, Mountbatten claimed that Junagadh was making large-scale military
preparations leaving its neighbours apprehensive. Thus, ‘a small force as a very
natural precautionary counter-measure’ had been sent. Mountbatten urged Jinnah
43
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Ismay to Mountbatten, 17 September 1947.
44
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Campbell-Johnson to Mountbatten, 17 September
1947.
45
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Jinnah to Mountbatten, T. No. 251, 19 September
1947.
46
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Patel to Mountbatten, 19 September 1947 and
Ismay to Mountbatten, 20 September 1947.
47
Guha, India after Gandhi, p. 50.
48
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Sheikh to Buch, No. 11809, 21 September 1947.
378 / Rakesh Ankit
to consider plebiscite, otherwise ‘the responsibility of the consequences must rest

squarely on the government of Pakistan’.49 From Junagadh, however, the Indian
forces appeared as not a precautionary measure but a portent of attack as Bhutto
pleaded with Liaquat for help.50 Meanwhile, apart from Mangrol, another feudatory
of Junagadh had emerged as a bone of contention with New Delhi. Babariawad,
an area of 50 villages of ‘guaranteed’ landowners, declared itself independent of
Junagadh and proclaimed its desire to accede to India.
On 22 September, Mountbatten, Nehru and Patel met with their military chiefs
to decide the future course of action, given this new development. Before that,
Menon reported on his visit, in particular on the Sheikh of Mangrol’s about-turn
on accession. Unlike the understanding that ‘by the time this news of the Sheikh’s
volte face reached Delhi his accession had already been accepted’,51 it was in this
meeting that it was agreed upon deliberation that ‘no notice should be taken’ of the
Sheikh’s withdrawal.52 On Babariawad, Menon’s ‘rough and ready’ assessment was
that India’s position was ‘unassailable’ as with the lapse of British paramountcy,
Babariawad’s erstwhile attachment to Junagadh had lapsed too.53 Menon termed
it, like Mangrol, a ‘non-jurisdictional’ state, if at all, under Junagadh.
Nehru, however, was keen to straighten this constitutional conundrum involving
Junagadh, Babariawad and Mangrol. Only once it was established that Mangrol and
Babariawad were not under the suzerainty of Junagadh and could independently
accede to India notwithstanding Junagadh’s accession to Pakistan, the Indian
Prime Minister wanted to communicate this to the Nawab and ask him to with-
draw his troops from Babariawad. Only if no action was then taken by Junagadh
did he want to move militarily. Nehru also thought it desirable to send a copy
of all communications with Junagadh to Pakistan as well as to keep the British
Government informed. Indeed, Nehru’s External Affairs Department was until
then out of ‘intimate touch’ with the developments and he wrote to Patel to let
Secretary-General Girja Shankar Bajpai attend meetings and ask V.P. Menon to keep
Bajpai consulted.54 Patel was ‘not quite sure’ about especially ‘whether anything
needed to be said to [London]’.55
The military chiefs were then called upon to give their appreciation. R.M.M.
Lockhart, the army chief, began bleakly that no troops could be made available.56
49
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Mountbatten to Jinnah, 34-GG, 21 September
1947.
50
Zaidi, ed. Jinnah Papers, Bhutto to Liaquat, 16 September 1947, pp. 270–73.
51
52
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Minutes of Cabinet Meeting, 22 September 1947.
53
54
Singh, ed. Nehru–Patel, Nehru to Patel, 23 September 1947, p. 127.
55
Das, ed. Sardar Patel’s Correspondence 1945–1950, Patel to Nehru, 24 September 1947,
pp. 384–85.
56
The Southern Command had lost twenty battalions in the ‘reconstitution’ of the British Indian
army and in Bombay there were only three.
He was, however, confident that Pakistan too was in no position to take military
action. As for Junagadh, in sharp contrast to Mountbatten’s claim, Lockhart reported
that its forces had only two machine-guns neither of which was in working order.
J.T.S. Hall, the navy chief, said that three sloops and two sweepers could be made
available from Bombay. Menon, who claimed that Pakistan had sent a sloop to
Veraval, added that the neighbouring states of Nawanagar and Bhavnagar could
be relied upon to make forces available. It was decided that Lockhart and Hall
should prepare plans to occupy Babariawad, assist Mangrol and, if needed, to
occupy Junagadh.
Over the next couple of days, V.P. Menon dived into the Government of India
Act of 1935 and emerged with the confident claim that ‘the Crown had guaran-
teed and recognised the status of the Sheikh Sahib of Mangrol as similar to that
of a second-class Kathiawar state…Our legal position is unassailable.’57 This was
relayed to Mountbatten with the conclusion that Mangrol ‘is entitled to accede
separately from Junagadh’ as Sir Walter Monckton, the legal adviser of Mangrol,
had contested Junagadh’s suzerainty upon it. However, events in 1935–36 had not
been as cut and dry as presented by Menon then and accepted since. Though the-
then Secretary of State for India was inclined to agree with Mangrol and Monckton,
the Political Department in Delhi and the Viceroy had demurred. After protracted
correspondence, an amendment to the 1935 Act was made on the lines of
Junagadh’s submission. Then, in 1943, Mangrol, along with Babariawad and
Manavadar, was further ‘tied to Junagadh’ under an ‘attachment scheme’ prepared
by the Political Department.58 However, when the 1935 Act was adapted in 1947,
these amendments were not covered. It was this dodgy loophole that Menon
exploited to claim that Junagadh’s suzerainty over Mangrol had lapsed.59 As the
latest and the first-ever comprehensive account of the accession of princely states
to Pakistan puts it:
The Kathiawar region comprised 14 salute states, 17 non-salute states and 191
other jurisdictions. Under these circumstances, judging which states had sover-
eign rights to accede to either dominion was at best difficult, if not impossible…60
(emphasis added)
On 24 September, Mountbatten met Nehru, Patel, Ismay, Menon and the military
chiefs. Having conducted his own discussions with Monckton, Mountbatten averred
that there could be no objections to Indian troops being sent to Mangrol by sea, as
Mangrol had the right to accede to India separately from Junagadh’s accession to
Pakistan and it had exercised this right, notwithstanding the later renouncement.
Monckton had dismissed the Sheikh’s claim that he had signed the instrument
57
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Menon to Brockman, 24 September 1947.
58
Bangash, A Princely Affair, p. 113.
59
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, Brockman to Mountbatten, 25 September 1947.
60
Bangash, A Princely Affair, p. 113.
380 / Rakesh Ankit
of accession under duress. So far so good, but Monckton had also informed
Mountbatten that as Junagadh had signed an instrument of accession to Pakistan,
there was no military means of annulling this and Pakistan’s recognition of any
plebiscite that India may conduct had to be obtained. The military chiefs were now
asked to present their plans. Hall affirmed that the navy could be ready in Bombay
by 30 September. Roy Bucher, who was deputising for Lockhart, however said that
action in Junagadh would not be possible for another 18 days. In the meantime, he
proposed giving a warning to Junagadh by placing Indian troops along its railway
lines. Junagadh’s transport and communication links had remained under Indian
hands since 15 August. Mountbatten though was doubtful of the effectiveness
of this.61
Meanwhile, New Delhi had informed Karachi and Junagadh of Mangrol’s
enforced accession to India putting forward Menon’s reading of the constitutional
situation.62 Liaquat declared this, and Babariawad’s declaration of independence,
‘invalid’ and termed the ‘attitude of the Indian States Department tantamount to
invasion of Junagadh’, which, after all, was a part of Pakistan.63 Jinnah too wrote to
Mountbatten charging him with ‘trying to import totally misconceived and unten-
able fresh criteria into this matter’.64 On 25 September, New Delhi stepped up its
publicity offensive by sending to London, Washington and New York a copy of
the press communiqué published the next day.65 Claiming a wide public interest in
India in Junagadh, out of 671,000 citizens of which 543,000 were non-Muslims,
it provided the salient facts of Junagadh’s geographical contiguity to India, talked
about the solidarity of Kathiawar states jeopardised by the action of Junagadh,
charged the Nawab of evasive dealings and concluded that this matter had to be
settled by a referendum. While the government was laying out its case for the
benefit of the world opinion, the events on ground were gathering momentum. The
Bombay Area Commander of the Indian Army sent a telegram on 25 September to
the Army Headquarters in New Delhi reporting that 25 boxes of ammunition and
26,000 gallons of petrol had landed at Veraval from Karachi and Hindu evacuation
from Junagadh had begun.66 Next day, the Regional Commissioner of Rajkot, N.M.
Buch, reported to the States Ministry that the Sheikh of Mangrol had refused to
come to Rajkot and re-negotiate accession.67 Above all, a provisional government
for Junagadh was formed in Bombay on 25 September.
61
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Minutes of meeting, 24 September 1947.
62
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Karachi to Delhi, No. 276, 22 September 1947,
Delhi to Junagadh, No. 350, 22 September 1947 and Delhi to Karachi, No. 132-PS, 24 September 1947.
63
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Liaquat to Nehru, No. 88-PS, 24 September 1947.
64
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Jinnah to Mountbatten, No. 311, 87-PS, 25
September 1947.
65
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/1-24, Delhi to Washington, London and New York,
No. 7989, 25 September 1947.
66
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/25-63, Bombay to Delhi, 25 September 1947.
67
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/25-63, Buch to Menon, RC/19, 26 September 1947.
Suggested by Menon and sponsored by the All India States Peoples’ Conference’s
Praja Mandal movement,68 this self-styled government led by Samaldas Gandhi,
a nephew of the Mahatma, was seeking to move to Rajkot and other pockets
of Junagadh territory on the outskirts. It was supported by a ‘Gujarat States
Organisation’, led by the Maharaja of Lunawada, which too was based in Bombay.69
If this signalled a rise in the political stakes, then the next reports from the Bombay
Area Commander and Buch escalated the military stakes. The former claimed that
Harvey-Jones, the European member of Junagadh executive council, had gone to
issue instructions to state forces in Babariawad. Some form of Home Guard was
being formed in Junagadh villages. An armed Muslim force, 700-strong, was being
raised in Junagadh across five centres while the total strength of Junagadh’s regular
police force was now estimated at 2,000 after the inclusion of 300 newly recruited
Punjabis.70 Buch reported the ‘arrival of men of war [in Veraval] and departure of
two European officers for Junagadh’.71 In December 1947, it would be seen that
this much-vaunted Home Guard had all of 617 men with only 129 in Junagadh
city and 122 each in Keshod, Kutiyana and elsewhere. They would not put up even
a token resistance.72 Still later, in August 1948, it would be claimed that retired
personnel of Junagadh State Lancers were in Hyderabad fighting against Indian
troops, before D.S. Bakhle, Chief Civil Administrator of Hyderabad, set the record
straight that ‘none were in any way connected with the Razakars or have come
to adverse notice politically or otherwise’.73
Nehru, Patel and Gopalaswami Ayyangar, Minister without Portfolio, met with
Mountbatten on 27 September to discuss these developments. While Ayyangar
and Mountbatten concurred that Junagadh’s geographical contiguity could not
have ‘any standing in law’, that is, it was ‘strictly and legally correct’ for it to have
joined Pakistan, Patel retorted by arguing that people of a state should decide and
not its ruler. Moreover, if India did not support the popular demand of the people
of Junagadh now, then there was a danger that Hyderabad, with a similar demo-
graphy, would accede to Pakistan. Patel argued and Ayyangar agreed that Junagadh
had already committed an ‘act of war’ in sending troops into Babariawad. When
Mountbatten suggested the possibility of referring the matter to the United Nations
(UN), Patel strongly disagreed and said that there was a ‘grave disadvantage in
being the plaintiff in such cases…possession was nine cases of the law’. Nehru too
was ‘rather opposed to referring the issue to UN’ and ultimately it was agreed that
68
Raghavan, War and Peace, pp. 39–40.
69
Das, ed. Sardar Patel’s Correspondence 1945–50, p. 387.
70
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/25-63, Bombay to Delhi, 26 September 1947.
71
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/25-63, Rajkot to Delhi, RC/21, 26 September 1947.
72
NAI, MoS, File No. 85 (3)-PR (47), S.W. Shiveshwarkar to Buch, Adm/18, 11 December 1947.
73
NAI, MoS, File No. 118-H, 1948, VV Baxi to Narayanswamy, 17 August 1948; Bakhle’s note,
11 February 1949.
382 / Rakesh Ankit
even as conclusive legal advice should be obtained on Mangrol and Babariawad,

military operations should not be delayed.74
While their political masters had been agreeing on military operations, the
military chiefs were busy throwing ‘a spanner in works’.75 They submitted a paper
titled ‘Projected Operations in Kathiawar’ on 27 September to Baldev Singh.
Their major concern was that whatever plans were adopted, there was a ‘very real
danger of clash between our forces and those of Junagadh especially in Babariawad’,
which might lead to a clash with Pakistan. Lockhart, especially, made it clear
that the Indian Army was in ‘no position’ to conduct large-scale operations given
the communal situation prevailing in East Punjab and Delhi.76 Moreover, the ‘recon-
stitution’ of the old British Indian Army was still going on. There were Indian units
in Pakistan and Pakistani personnel in India. Finally, there loomed the awkward
position of the British officers of all three services in both the dominions. Hall and
Air Marshal Mukherjee endorsed these views. The chiefs ended by recommend-
ing that the dispute be settled by negotiation and the projected operations stopped.
To this extraordinary document, which has been well discussed,77 was lent
Mountbatten’s comparatively unremarked support next day. The Governor-General
would only agree to a ‘military column to proceed across Junagadh territory…
provided [it] moved under a white flag of truce and due notification was sent
to Junagadh, Pakistan, Commonwealth and the UN’.78 The Cabinet met on
28 September and discussed the military chiefs’ submission as well as
Mountbatten’s note with, what Nehru called, ‘considerable feeling’. The chiefs’
letter had ‘rather upset’ the ministers. Nehru elaborated to Mountbatten:
This letter seemed to us very extraordinary. In effect, it was an announcement

that they could not carry out government’s policy in case they did not agree with
it. That is a position which hardly any government can accept…The mention
of British officers as such also creates a difficulty if they are to function only
when they approve of the action taken by the government.79
Nehru now decided to have ‘a small, informal meeting’ with the military chiefs
along with Patel, Baldev Singh and Ayyangar on the evening of 29 September and
told Mountbatten that the four ministers wanted to meet him. However, before they
could do so, Mountbatten himself saw Hall, Mukherjee and Lockhart. Reading out
Nehru’s letter, he prevailed upon them to ‘withdraw’ their own. Lockhart wrote
to Nehru admitting that their submission, written in a ‘great hurry’, though actuated
74
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/25-63, Minutes of Meeting, 27 September 1947.
75
76
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/25-63, CoS to Baldev Singh, 27 September 1947.
77
Campbell-Johnson, Menon, Hodson, Guha and Raghavan—all mention this episode.
78
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/25-63, Mountbatten to Nehru, 28 September 1947.
79
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/25-63, Nehru to Mountbatten, 28 September 1947.
by a desire to do ‘the good of India’, lent itself to ‘misinterpretation’.80 To his

ministers, supported by Ismay, Mountbatten continued to urge ‘any method,
reference to some impartial tribunal, which could settle Mangrol and Babariawad’s
accession to India before Indian troops went in’.81 Patel baulked at arbitration
because, as he put it, one of its implication would be that ‘we accepted accession
of Mangrol without being quite sure as to the correct status of Mangrol’.82 As we
saw above, this indeed was the case. Patel’s refusal, the chiefs’ letter and diffe-
rences of emphasis on Junagadh combined to produce a most serious crisis between
Nehru and Patel at this time. While Mountbatten’s and Menon’s accounts have
been well dissected,83 what has gone unremarked is that the Mountbatten–Patel
exchanges show the extent of involvement that Menon had in the formation of
the provisional government of Junagadh. When Patel countered Mountbatten’s
argument of ‘international prestige’ by declaring that ‘a country that had lost its
national position need not bother about its international standing’, Mountbatten
suggested that New Delhi should ‘pin their hopes’ on the provisional government
of Junagadh, which ‘Menon had so ably formed’. Patel insisted that New Delhi
would be considered ‘dishonest’ by the Kathiawar states if it did not take a strong
line vis-à-vis Junagadh.84
Nehru, caught in the middle, now produced what has been variously called
‘a masterly paper’ and a ‘crucial document [which provides] a close insight into
Nehru’s approach to strategy’.85 Laying out India’s position, Nehru wrote that
New Delhi did not accept Junagadh’s accession, entirely disagreed on the con-
stitutional position of Mangrol and Babariawad and demanded a withdrawal of
Junagadh’s forces from the latter. As it did not appear likely to happen and in
response to requests from the Kathiawar states, he was sending Indian troops there.
He remained opposed to war and invited Pakistan to submit the Junagadh issue for a
referendum under impartial auspices.86 His note was discussed at the first meeting
of the provisional Defence Committee of the Indian Cabinet on 30 September. This
Defence Committee, with the Governor-General as its chairman, was the one
tangible product of the discordant note touched off by the military chiefs’ submis-
sion. By now, the Junagadh Palace in Rajkot was taken over by the provisional
government. Meanwhile, intelligence from Bombay and Rajkot continued to report
that there was still ‘indifferent precaution on [Junagadh’s] frontiers’.87
80
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/25-63, Lockhart to Nehru, 29 September 1947.
81
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/25-63, Mountbatten to Patel, 29 September 1947.
82
Das, ed. Sardar Patel’s Correspondence 1945–1950, Patel to Mountbatten, 1 October 1947, p. 388.
83
84
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/25-63, Mountbatten’s notes, 30 September 1947.
85
Hodson, The Great Divide, p, 434 and Raghavan, War and Peace, p. 47.
86
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/25-63, Nehru’s note on Junagadh, 29 September 1947.
87
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/25-63, Bombay Area Commander to Delhi Army HQ,
30 September 1947.
384 / Rakesh Ankit
The provisional Defence Committee in its first meeting did not merely direct ‘the
military chiefs to plan accordingly’,88 but, upping the ante considerably, decided that
a tank company was to proceed to the neighbouring Porbandar even though there
was doubt whether any part of Porbandar was contiguous to the disputed Mangrol.
Further, it authorised aerial reconnaissance of Junagadh troops and ordered that
their movements across the territory of states that had acceded to India be stopped.
Finally, New Delhi agreed to the provisional government taking over administration
in the outlying pockets of the state. Nehru was asked to intimate the above, bar-
ring the last, to Liaquat. The Defence Committee decided to meet again to discuss
concrete military plans on, ironically, 2 October 1947—Gandhi’s birthday.89
Indian Response: October 1947
On 1 October, Nehru informed the Cabinet that earlier that day he had met
Liaquat and, acquainting Liaquat with Monckton’s pro-India legal opinion on the
two disputed sub-states, requested him to get Junagadh to withdraw troops from
Babariawad. Liaquat did not commit himself but indicated that a withdrawal was
‘probable’. Explaining the decisions of the Defence Committee to the Cabinet,
Nehru said that ‘India had to take some action to honour its commitments [but]
it was necessary at the same time to do everything to avoid war’.90 The very next
day, however, this easing of tension was reversed. Apparently, Junagadh had sent
troops to Mangrol. Terming it ‘a further act of aggression’ in the light of which it
was ‘difficult for any conversation to be carried on’,91 Nehru forewarned Liaquat
about Indian troops’ movement to the neighbouring Porbandar. Karachi already
had inkling of it from Bhutto’s telegram of a day before which had simply read:
‘Situation very serious. Please send immediately aeroplane and suitable naval ship
to evacuate Royal Family.’92
The drums of war were now beating louder. The Bombay Area Commander
sent a new intelligence despatch for Lockhart and Baldev Singh, which detailed
troop movement in Junagadh, activity at its Keshod airport and Veraval port and
claimed that 80 per cent of the Hindus had left the big towns of the state though
farmers were staying behind to look after the winter harvest. Migration had begun
from Mangrol as well.93 The CoS now submitted an appreciation of the situation
and invited Cabinet’s approval for despatch of forces to Kathiawar under Brigadier
Gurdial Singh. The military objective was twofold: (i) ‘to assure those states
88
89
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D201/25-63, Minutes of the first meeting of the provisional
defence committee, 30 September 1947.
90
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D202/Folder 1, Minutes of Cabinet Meeting, 1 October 1947.
91
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D202/Folder 1, Nehru to Liaquat, PRIMIN 72, 2 October 1947.
92
Zaidi, ed. Jinnah Papers, Bhutto to Ikramullah, 1 October 1947, pp. 322–23.
93
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D202/Folder 1, Bombay to Delhi and Lockhart to Baldev,
3 October 1947.
in Kathiawar which have acceded to India that [it] is prepared to protect them
from aggression’ and (ii) ‘to be prepared to take action to protect the subjects of
Mangrol and Babariawad and other states in Junagadh territory as well as the non-
Muslim subjects of Junagadh’. However, this demonstration of strength was for
the moment to stop short of entering either Junagadh or Mangrol/Babariawad as
it could be regarded as a ‘casus belli’ by Pakistan.94 In New Delhi, Nehru justified
this to Ismay on the grounds that he had left Liaquat in no doubts in his recent talk
and communications that if Junagadh forces did not withdraw from Babariawad
and Mangrol,95 Indian troops would move to Porbandar.96 In Junagadh, this made
Bhutto desperate as he urged Karachi for help lest they be ‘overwhelmed by superior
forces hanging over us’.97
On 4 October, the Defence Committee discussed the CoS paper. A major fly
in the ointment, missing in the existing literature, was the unresolved question
whether Porbandar and Mangrol were contiguous. Menon insisted they were,
while the CoS claimed that they were 6 miles apart. In another important matter,
not stressed enough in the existing accounts, once again it was decided that while
the provisional government of Junagadh would not be recognised, it would not
be interfered with, either.98 Next day, Nehru wrote at length to Liaquat regretting
their continuing differences. Omitting Menon’s involvement in the setting up of the
provisional government, he called it ‘a spontaneous expression of popular resent-
ment against Junagadh’s accession’ and termed the entry in Mangrol of Junagadh’s
troops ‘a unilateral act of aggression’. He urged Liaquat to restore the ‘status quo
preceding Junagadh’s accession to Pakistan’, which was the ‘only basis for friendly
negotiations’ leading to a referendum and warned that otherwise the ‘situation
[was] fraught with dangerous possibilities’.99 The Pakistani Prime Minister replied
with his own conditions that if India did not send troops to Junagadh, Mangrol
or Babariawad and if independent legal opinion was sought on the constitutional
status of the latter two, then ‘we are prepared to ask Junagadh to withdraw troops
from Babariawad and not to send any troops to Mangrol.’100
By 7 October, Indian troops had disembarked at Porbandar and the landing was
hailed for having ‘raised morale of civilian population considerably’.101 This was
significant as intelligence reports about Mangrol had suggested that the Sheikh
of Mangrol’s ‘long-standing differences with Junagadh’ could be exploited by a
94
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D202/Folder 1, CoS 1/47, 3 October 1947.
95
Raghavan, War and Peace, p. 38, 51.
96
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D202/Folder 1, Nehru–Ismay talks, 3 October 1947.
97
Zaidi, ed. Jinnah Papers, Bhutto to Ikramullah, 3 October 1947, p. 327.
98
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D202/Folder 2, Minutes of Defence Committee meeting,
4 October 1947.
99
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D202/Folder 2, Nehru–Liaquat correspondence, No. 8093,
No. 411 and PRIMIN 90, 30 September, 2 and 5 October 1947.
100
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D202/Folder 2, Liaquat to Nehru, No. 442, 5 October 1947.
101
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D202/Folder 2, Hall to Nehru, 7 October 1947.
386 / Rakesh Ankit
show of strength.102 Over the next 10 days, Indian naval ships started their rounds
between Bombay and Porbandar, and other neighbouring states were approached
to cooperate even as differences persisted between the Ministry of States and the
military authorities over whether Porbandar was contiguous to Mangrol.103 On
the diplomatic front, Nehru, while welcoming Liaquat’s proposals on Mangrol
and Babariawad, reminded Liaquat that Mangrol and Babariawad were not the
main issue. It was essential to reach an agreement on the ‘fundamental issue [of]
Junagadh first’.104 In response, Karachi protested against New Delhi’s ‘indifference’
to the provisional government of Junagadh and its activities.105
On 15 October, the Indian Army Headquarters prepared a draft titled ‘Exercise
Peace’ that signalled the endgame for Junagadh. The new objectives were ‘to prevent
the administration of Junagadh functioning in Babariawad, the Sheikh function-
ing in Mangrol’ and ‘to enable [them] to be replaced by interim administration to
be set up by the Government of India’.106 The latest date for entering Babariawad
and Mangrol was to be 1 November 1947. Even though a telegram had arrived
from Karachi stating that the Sheikh of Mangrol had confirmed that there were
no Junagadh troops in Mangrol, the plan chose to disregard it. The operation was
to be followed by a civil interim administration that would conduct the plebiscite
immediately. On the same day, Nehru wrote a long letter to Mountbatten putting
the need for ‘Exercise Peace’ in perspective. Notwithstanding his discussion with
Liaquat on 1 October and the latter’s ‘more or less’ agreement to withdrawal of
Junagadh troops from Babariawad and Mangrol, Nehru had been informed that
its troops had crossed the territory of another state which had acceded to India,
Jetpur. This was ‘not only further acts of aggression but also in the circumstances…
deliberate flouting of [Indian] proposals’ and Nehru had concluded that India could
‘hardly sit by watching the developments. The smaller states of Kathiawar...have
appealed to us for help’.107
In the Cabinet meeting held the same day, it was also noted that Sardar Abdur
Rab Nishtar, Pakistan’s Communication Minister, was visiting Junagadh.108 Nehru
sent a terse telegram to Liaquat that his silence over the last fortnight combined
with further incursions had made New Delhi conclude that Pakistan did not
desire an amicable settlement.109 However, it seems that Liaquat did respond to
102
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D202/Folder 2, Naval Intelligence Summary No. 1,
7 October 1947.
103
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D202/Folder 2, MoS to Kathiawar States, 478-PR, 8 October
1947 and minutes of the 5th meeting of the Defence Committee, 15 October 1947.
104
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D202/Folder 2, Nehru to Liaquat, 6 October 1947.
105
Zaidi, ed. Jinnah Papers, Ikramullah to G.S. Bajpai, 11 October 1947, p. 349.
106
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, CoS-5/47, Instruction No. 2, 15–16 October 1947.
107
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, Nehru to Mountbatten, PM No. 76, 15 October 1947.
108
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, Minutes of Cabinet meeting, 15 October 1947.
109
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, Nehru to Liaquat, PRIMIN 62, 16 October 1947.
See Raghavan, War and Peace, p. 54.
Nehru’s message. He had sent a letter to Nehru on 6–7 October. Mountbatten

met Liaquat in Lahore on 16 October and the latter informed him about this letter.
Liaquat also offered to Mountbatten that he was prepared to ask Junagadh to with-
draw its troops from Babariawad and Mangrol on condition that India disbanded its
concentration of troops in Porbandar. When Mountbatten instead urged plebiscite,
Liaquat replied that he might consider that ‘if the same general principle was to
apply in other cases’ as well.110 Liaquat also wrote directly to Nehru on 19 October
mentioning his earlier letter and reproduced its text. It had repeated his request to
India to withdraw troops from Porbandar in lieu of a simultaneous withdrawal of
Junagadh’s troops from the disputed sub-states, subsequent referral of Mangrol’s
and Babariawad’s status to an independent legal counsel and then discussions on
plebiscite. It also asked India to not occupy any areas from where Junagadh would
withdraw its forces.111 Nehru replied the next day and, from his reply too, it appears
that Liaquat’s letter of the first week of October had been received in Delhi, and
replied to on 7 October.112 This means that, at the very least, Nehru’s claim that
Liaquat had been silent for 15 days was not quite true.
V.P. Menon and C.C. Desai at the Ministry of States now produced an impas-
sioned nine-page long memorandum on Junagadh, which has escaped scrutiny.
Prepared before the crucial Defence Committee meeting, it essentially laid out
the Indian case on Junagadh since before partition and fine-tuned it to justify the
upcoming military action. After giving the salient facts of the location, population
and administration of the state, the memo totted up its pitiable forces as compris-
ing one battalion, 1,000 men, two horse companies, 700 armed police and 300
forest guards bolstered by the non-Hindu population of the state. As against this
motley crowd, apart from the Indian Army, Menon also listed the troop position of
Junagadh’s neighbouring states. Baroda, Porbandar and Nawanagar were all eager
and able to take action against Junagadh. The Jam Saheb of Nawanagar especially,
as the most strident advocate of action, could be counted upon ‘cent per cent’.
With a coal and petroleum embargo in place and Junagadh’s post, telegraph and
railways in India’s hands, all seemed satisfactory to Menon by way of preparation.
The memorandum ended on an alarmist and rousing note:
A reign of terrorism akin to martial law prevails…Hindus were panicky and

fleeing…Business was at a standstill…Communal conversions were being
resorted to…Dacoits were being released and supplied with arms…Temples
were desecrated, Islamic slogans raised…Deeply resented by rulers of adjoin-
ing states…If Junagadh was not checked in time, we shall have a repetition of
Punjab situation in Kathiawar, Gujarat and Bombay.113
110
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, Mountbatten to Nehru, 18 October 1947.
111
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, Liaquat to Nehru, No. 601 227-PS, 19 October 1947.
112
113
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, 19–20 October 1947.
388 / Rakesh Ankit
Given this passionate tone, Mountbatten sought to enlist Lockhart’s help to

restrain Patel and Menon. Warning Lockhart that Patel and Menon were press-
ing very strongly for Indian forces to enter Babariawad and Mangrol ‘forthwith’,
Mountbatten wanted him to prepare a military plan so as to deter Junagadh from
fighting.114 It was at the sixth meeting of the Defence Committee on 21 October
1947 in which decks were cleared for action in Junagadh.115 The meeting opened
with an overlooked discussion of the legal position of Mangrol and Babariawad.116
The reason was that Mountbatten told everyone that Monckton and Charles
Brunyate, legal adviser of Junagadh, had now cautioned him that the legal position
with regard to Babariawad was ‘very nebulous’ and with regard to Mangrol it had
‘a degree of uncertainty’. When Menon persisted otherwise, Mountbatten told him
that the legal position in both cases ‘was not absolutely water-tight’. Monckton
had told him that it would be better to base India’s case before world opinion on
the ‘will of people’.
Patel now took over and said that delay in taking any action in Babariawad and
Mangrol was causing serious difficulties. Certain Kathiawar states were now say-
ing that unless they were protected, they would withdraw their accession to India.
A general impression of ‘weakness’ on the part of New Delhi was going out to
them. In any case, force was being used merely to enable plebiscite. Menon added
that even if Junagadh withdrew its troops from Mangrol and Babariawad, its civil
authority would continue and unless action was taken by 10 November, the whole
winter harvest would be removed by Junagadh state officials. Nehru agreed that
delay in settling the question was to Pakistan’s advantage and that if forces went
in then the governmental apparatus of Junagadh would have to be withdrawn
completely from Mangrol and Babariawad, but he also felt that local officials of
Junagadh state could be allowed to return in any joint scheme of administration.
It was agreed that action in Babariawad was more urgently necessary than in
Mangrol. Mountbatten intervened with his view that if forces entered Babariawad,
they should go with such superiority in numbers and of equipment that efforts
to resist them would not be considered worthwhile by Junagadh and, moreover, they
must go in with a white flag of truce, loud hailers and prominent press statements.
Lockhart was then called upon to give an account of the military plans. He
reported that troops could be ready by 28 October. The Jam Saheb of Nawanagar
had been quite keen to involve himself in the action but it was decided that it would
be preferable to use Indian and not state forces. Along with Hall, Lockhart continued
to remind the Committee that Porbandar and Mangrol were not contiguous to each
other in the face of opposition from Patel and Menon. Mountbatten finally said
that if they were not contiguous then landing craft tanks should be used to carry
114
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, Brockman to Lockhart, 19–20 October 1947.
115
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, Minutes of the 6th meeting of Defence Committee,
21 October 1947.
116
See Raghavan, War and Peace, p. 56.
troops. Menon also claimed that Pakistan air force planes were engaged in recon-
naissance in the area but Air Marshal Elmhirst disagreed and said that these were
civilian aircrafts. The Committee instructed Elmhirst to start a discreet reconnais-
sance of Junagadh by the Indian air force. It was decided to hold an operation
meeting next day to fix up the D-day. Nehru was asked to convey to Liaquat
the salient conclusions as well as to propose that, in view of Liaquat’s ill health,
Menon could be sent to Lahore for discussion. In his telegram, Nehru explained
New Delhi’s decisions thus:
It is impossible for us to tolerate any longer such acts of aggression and

oppressive action and we have been urgently asked by the chiefs and people of
Babariawad to protect them. We are honour-bound to give this protection by
such action as may be considered necessary.117
On 22 October, in another little-remarked episode, the Pakistan High-Commissioner

in India approached his British counterpart with a request to permit his officials
to inspect the records of the former Political Department dealing with Junagadh’s
relations with Mangrol in order to prepare Pakistan’s case. The British High-
Commissioner, however, recommended to the Commonwealth Relations Office
(London) that in view of Menon’s similar requests made verbally earlier, it was
better to express ‘regret’ that records concerned could not be made available but
a memorandum based on them, which was being prepared, could be.118 While
Pakistan was still seeking diplomatic ammunition, India was forcing the pace.
On the same day that this request was made, an appreciation was submitted by
Hall to the Defence Committee on the level and scope of the naval support that
could be afforded to operations in Kathiawar.119 Preparations now moved swiftly in
New Delhi. A draft directive was prepared for the Kathiawar Defence Force setting
out the political background and again increasing the scope of its objectives: ‘protec-
tion of states within and around Junagadh which have acceded with India without
entering Junagadh territory except as necessary for passage and with minimum
force’. The Regional Commissioner at Rajkot was instructed to send a representa-
tive or accompany himself the forces to Babariawad and Mangrol and take over the
civil administration in these areas pending plebiscite. He was to invite Junagadh
to nominate an observer or two to watch over their interests but the responsibility
for law and order was not to be shared.
At the Defence Committee meeting on 23 October, Menon suggested that
Babariawad and Mangrol should be entered in simultaneously for, as he rea-
soned, ‘if we go to Babariawad first, there is a possibility that the government of
Pakistan may send a sloop to Mangrol to prevent a possible landing there by our
117
118
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, Shone to CRO, No. 1062, 22 October 1947.
119
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, Hall to Baldev Singh, PL/0703, 22 October 1947.
390 / Rakesh Ankit
troops creating an awkward situation’.120 This was not only agreed to but, unlike
the previously held view, it was also decided that if not together then it was to be
Mangrol, which was to be entered first so as to ensure that Pakistan was unable
to respond. The landlocked Babariawad could then be easily approached. It was
decided that 1 November was to be the D-day. The tricky question of Mangrol’s
contiguity to Porbandar was also swept aside as the Committee decided to ‘accept
and act [on Porbandar’s] assurances’ that it was contiguous to Mangrol. In any
case, the overland movement of troops was to be reinforced by a naval landing
from Bombay. The political objective had by now morphed into a simple and all-
encompassing ‘uprooting’ of the entire civil administrative apparatus that Junagadh
had in Babariawad and Mangrol.
Lockhart and his aides then reported on the troop composition and concentra-
tion, which was to be completed by 28 October. Nawanagar (three companies),
Porbandar and Bhavnagar (one company each) and Baroda had contributed men.
The state of communication was discussed, as was the availability of air recon-
naissance. Establishing a direct chain of command between New Delhi and
Kathiawar Defence Force was considered. All this was to combat, as Menon
reported, Junagadh’s total force of 1,500, having received 500 policemen from
Pakistan. Finally, in a last assertive touch, it was decided that Junagadh would
not be invited to nominate observers; only the existing local officials were to be
offered by Buch a chance to take part in the interim administration. This deep belief
of Junagadh recruiting Baluchis, Punjabis and Sindhis through 1947 went back
to pre-independence times. In May, even before the partition plan was unveiled,
B.L. Mitter of the Baroda princely state had complained to L.G. Coke Wallis,
British Resident there, that several hundred Baluchis with arms and ammunition
had descended upon Junagadh and were harassing Hindus there. Wallis’ reply is
quite enlightening of the ‘less reputable and much exaggerated reportage’ in this
matter. Junagadh had done no more than sought to strengthen their police like other
states and like they did every year. Wallis had no information of any untoward
incidents and concluded presciently that ‘Junagadh being the only Muslim state
in Kathiawar is very open to vilification by the Hindu Press...The state feels this
acutely’.121 Similarly, in December, while an Indian official in Pakistan reported
alarmingly that a ‘large number of tribesmen’ were being sent to Junagadh,
despatches from army commanders on ground disproved it by relaying messages
of ‘no trouble from across Junagadh’.122
Meanwhile, word had been received from Karachi that it had no objection to
Menon visiting Lahore for discussions at the secretary level about plebiscite in not
120
CB 6 (7) 47, 23 October 1947.
121
NAI, MoS, File No. 154-P/47, Mitter–Wallis correspondence, 18–26 May 1947.
122
Das, ed., Sardar Patel’s Correspondence 1945–50, p. 393.
just Junagadh but ‘any state or all states’.123 The Committee decided that ‘it would
be a waste of time for him to go as no decisions could be reached on that level’.124
Instead, on 25 October, a go-ahead order was given to Brigadier Gurdial Singh and
Regional Commissioner N.M. Buch.
In Relation to Kashmir: November–December 1947
By the time Junagadh was discussed at the Defence Committee next, at its tenth
meeting on 28 October, Indian troops had been airlifted to Kashmir and a far bigger
crisis had overlain events in Junagadh. Junagadh now assumed ‘relation to the wider
context of events in Kashmir’.125 Henceforth, it would be discussed thus by policy-
makers in 1947–48 and historians subsequently.126 The lead in this was taken by
Mountbatten who urged a ‘reconsideration’ of the decision to take military action
in Babariawad and Mangrol in light of the Kashmir situation. As New Delhi had
declared for plebiscite in Kashmir, Mountbatten reasoned, Pakistan would have to
reciprocate in Junagadh. Moreover, the Sheikh of Mangrol had declared that there
were no Junagadh troops in his state thus taking away the reason for the Indian
action.127 Menon, immediately, contested the Sheikh’s claim and responded to it
by one of his own that Mangrol had ‘goondas from Karachi’.
Nehru was of the opinion that normally there would be no reason why the
decision already taken about Junagadh should be varied in any respect because of
Kashmir, but he agreed that action in Babariawad and Mangrol must be judged by
the effect it was likely to have on Kashmir. There were four aspects to this effect:
military, psychological, world opinion and legal opinion. For the Prime Minister,
the military aspect was the ‘most important’. If Junagadh affected Kashmir mili-
tarily then, of course, it had to be reconsidered as it was better to deal with the
‘major problem—Kashmir’ first. Psychologically, the main factor was the impact
on princely states as a whole and especially those in Kathiawar. Here too, Nehru
felt that ‘if things go well in Kashmir, it would improve the situation enormously’.
Patel, expectedly, was against any change in the plans for Junagadh. To begin with,
India was in the right there. Then, other princely states were expecting action. Third,
the longer the problem dragged, the bigger it would become and ‘more insoluble
vis-à-vis world opinion’. Above all, he was convinced that ‘not a shot would be
fired’. R.K. Shanmukham Chetty, the Finance Minister, said that world opinion
usually ended up on the side of the victorious party. He did concede that it was
possible that India’s action in Junagadh might give Pakistan ‘a handle’ in Kashmir
123
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, Iengar to Brockman, D/S/620, 23 October 1947.
124
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, G.H. Nicholls to Mountbatten, 23 October 1947.
125
126
28 October 1947.
127
Zaidi, ed. Jinnah Papers, Ikramullah to Bajpai, 22 October 1947, pp. 362–63.
392 / Rakesh Ankit
but held that India had much more justification in Kashmir than Pakistan had in
Junagadh and that New Delhi should not change its aggressive attitude.
Girja Shankar Bajpai and Gopalaswami Ayyangar spoke next. Bajpai too favour-
ably compared the political advantages that India enjoyed in Kashmir with those
for Pakistan in Junagadh but cautioned against ‘military forces being scattered
and engaged simultaneously’ at two fronts. Ayyangar simply said that India’s case
at both places was very strong. Action in Junagadh should not be stopped unless
it jeopardised the military position in Kashmir, which he held ‘inconceivable’
because action in Junagadh would turn out to be so ‘insignificant’. On this last
point, Lockhart was not so sanguine. He pointed to the strain of two operations
on the army, which ‘though big was not mobilised’. However, as he saw it, while
Kashmir might develop into a very big commitment, in comparison Junagadh
was nothing and in any case troops, having being just concentrated, could not be
moved away from there just yet. So might as well carry on with the job begun.
Mountbatten once again suggested an approach to either London or New York for
help with plebiscite at both Kashmir and Junagadh but Menon was insistent that
‘the two were not identical problems’. Patel proposed and the Committee agreed
that if Pakistan did not agree to plebiscite in Junagadh, the proposed military action
as planned should go ahead on 1 November. This was because Mountbatten was
going to meet Jinnah in Lahore and if the latter reconciled to plebiscite, then troops
could be pulled back. After the meeting, Mountbatten tried another tack to delay
action in Junagadh. He sought to convince Nehru and Patel unsuccessfully that in
view of the Kashmir contingency, Central Reserve Police Force and not the army
should be used in Junagadh. Lockhart was tasked to ‘fix this up’ with Menon.128
This would have inevitably meant revision of plan and postponement of the D-day.
The Kathiawar Defence Force started getting together on 29 October 1947. Over
the next 2 weeks, the Bombay Area Commander furnished 13 summary reports
to the Army Headquarters, New Delhi, about the progress of the operation. These
have not seen the light of the day. The first two reports focussed on the mobilisation
of Indian troops, reported 400 Baluchis in Junagadh from Karachi, withdrawal of
Junagadh forces and arms from outlying frontiers and their concentration around
the towns. They also reported ‘lawlessness’ in the state following the departure of
the Nawab for Karachi and the beginnings of an anti-Nawab movement within the
state.129 Discussing these reports at the Defence Committee meeting on 30 October,
Mountbatten again stressed the desirability of action by the Central Reserve Police
Force rather than regular soldiers but Patel was quick to shoot down the proposal.
Opposed to any further delay, he carried the Committee with him as the consensus
was that whether police or army was used it would make little difference to the
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, Brockman to Lockhart, 29 October 1947.

128
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, KDF and Bombay Area Reports, No. 4706/JUN/
129
DMO&I/CI (ii), 29–30 October 1947.
world or legal opinions, while more opposition could be expected to the police, a
‘weakened force’, from the Junagadh troops compared to the two infantry battalions
and one tank squadron that were amassed at the frontier. Patel had no objections
to Mountbatten informing Jinnah about the particulars of India’s intended action
to forestall any ‘accusations of bad faith’.130
As Mountbatten made the trip to Lahore to salvage the worsening situation in
Kashmir and Junagadh, reports from the ground show the military machine already
in motion. Indian intelligence noted movement at the Keshod airport, noticed
small groups of Junagadh troops and reported rumours that prominent Muslims
and officers of the state were flying to Karachi including the Diwan and the Police
Chief.131 Proceeding according to the plan and pre-empting the Mountbatten–
Jinnah meeting, Indian troops entered the territory of Babariawad at Nagasari on
1 November at 6:30 am and, disarming the local police, took over the administra-
tion. They reported a firming up of defences of Junagadh town. Air reconnaissance
noted the presence of two Pakistan merchant ships at Veraval on 31 October, one
ship at Mangrol on 1 November and activity at the Keshod airfield.132
Mountbatten and Ismay met Jinnah on 1 November 1947 in Lahore for more than
3 hours, bulk of which was taken up by Kashmir. When Mountbatten asked Jinnah
about Junagadh, the latter admitted that there was ‘no sense’ in having Junagadh in
Pakistan and claimed that he had been ‘most averse’ from accepting this accession.
He had in fact ‘demurred’ for a long time but had finally given way to the ‘insistent
appeals’ of the Nawab and his Diwan. Nevertheless, when Mountbatten brought
up Babariawad and Mangrol, Jinnah angrily remarked that Mangrol’s accession
to India was forced on him and withdrawn ‘almost before the ink was dry’. When
Mountbatten informed Jinnah about Indian troops’ entry into Babariawad that
very day, Jinnah protested that India ‘had not invited the cooperation’ of Pakistan
before undertaking this operation.133 The operation in Mangrol was not as smooth
as was projected then and accepted since.134 The summary report of 2 November
confirmed troops’ entrance into Mangrol where the Sheikh was proving ‘unhelpful’
and the Muslim population ‘very unfriendly and suspicious’. Junagadh city fort
had been garrisoned and Keshod airport too continued to see hectic albeit civilian
activity.135 On 3 November, Indian troops entered more villages of Babariawad
130
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, Minutes of the 11th Defence Committee meeting,
30 October 1947.
131
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, KDF and Bombay Area Report, No. 4706/JUN/
DMO&I/CI (ii), 31 October 1947.
132
DMO&I/CI (ii), 1 November 1947.
133
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Mountbatten–Jinnah talks, 1 November 1947.
134
Hodson, The Great Divide, p. 440; Raghavan, War and Peace, p. 61.
135
394 / Rakesh Ankit
and Mangrol with Buch following in their wake taking over the civil administration.
Naval forces patrolling Junagadh coast did not report any untoward naval activities
by Pakistan barring a couple of merchant ships. Karachi–Keshod air traffic would
cease soon too.136
At the Defence Committee meeting on 3 November 1947, Indian takeover
of Mangrol, and Babariawad was officially reported.137 With their occupation,
Junagadh forces had withdrawn to a 10-mile radius from the main city from where
reports came of civilians being trained for defence.138 With Indian troops poised for
the final push, a summary was sent on 5 November dealing in some detail about
the state of the Junagadh state forces. It makes for a tragic reading and renders
farce New Delhi’s elaborate preparations. Junagadh had less than 5,000 personnel
in their various forces, less than 4,200 guns of all types and less than 400 boxes
of ammunition for these guns. The state produced seven cartridges a day and had
60 countrymade canons, half of which were not serviceable. Even after taking
into account the six Pakistan army officers who were alleged to be helping the
state troops in organising the defence of the city, four Pakistan navy officers and
P.C. Hailey, the European ex-political agent managing the state’s finances, it was
this puny army that had been held to be making ‘large-scale military preparations
threatening the neighbouring states’ by Mountbatten, Patel and Menon.139
Naturally, ‘great resentment’ prevailed among these personnel at the heavy-
handed Indian response and soon reports came of arms being distributed among
the Muslim population in Junagadh, all civilian traffic being stopped and arrival
of two to three cargo ships at Veraval from Karachi. On 7 November, the post and
telegraph installations at Kutiyana were threatened and the Indian forces decided
to regroup in order to ready themselves for a final move into Junagadh.140 However,
the invasion of Junagadh became an invitation to Junagadh over 8–9 November.
Bhutto sent a telegram to Mountbatten on 9 November, which conveyed his deci-
sion to request Buch ‘to assist Junagadh in preservation of law and order without
prejudice to honourable understanding that may be arrived at by all concerned’.141
A day earlier, Bhutto had sent Harvey-Jones to Buch with the above request and
in response, the Government of India took over the administration of Junagadh on
136
137
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Minutes of the 12th Defence Committee meeting,
3 November 1947.
138
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, KDF and Bombay Area Report No. 7, No. 4706/
JUN/DMO&I/CI (ii), 4 November 1947.
139
140
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, KDF and Bombay Area Reports, No. 4706/JUN/
DMO&I/CI (ii), 7–8 November 1947.
141
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Bhutto to Mountbatten, DY No. 912-ECR,
9 November 1947.
9 November.142 An ordinance was later promulgated, on 24 December 1947, vesting

the property of the state in the India-appointed administrator. This promulgation
was an act of expediency. A note by Ministry of Law made it clear that Junagadh’s
accession to Pakistan had not been nullified by referendum and the state had not
acceded to India yet. However, New Delhi went ahead because ‘it was almost likely
that the referendum will be in our favour’.143
Nehru informed Liaquat that Indian troops entered Junagadh ‘without any inci-
dent and disarmed state troops’. Barring Kutiyana, where the Sindhis were holding
out and troops had been despatched, there seemed no other cloud on horizon.144
However, this invasion-turned-invitation was only one aspect of the nature of
Junagadh accession, for there followed a ‘democratization and internalization of
violence for a new state formation’, like in Hyderabad a year later.145 Kutiyana’s
ordeals were not to be over anytime soon. In August 1948, Buch would ask for
`6 lakhs from New Delhi for the 7,500 Muslim refugees at Kutiyana. Almost
3 months later, in November, New Delhi sanctioned `10 lakhs.146 Between August
and November 1948, multiple complaints were made by S.W. Shiveshwarkar,
Chief Administrator (Junagadh), about irregular, inadequate and uneatable supply
of foodgrains to refugee camps there and in Bantwa.147 However, all this was in
future and for the moment, an emergency meeting of the Cabinet was called on
10 November, where this military triumph overshadowed Nehru’s earlier commit-
ment to plebiscite under ‘impartial auspices’, and it was decided that India would
not agree to a joint India–Pakistan plebiscite, could agree to a UN-plebiscite but
‘it was desirable to go ahead with the plebiscite in Junagadh expeditiously’.148
The early reactions in Junagadh were quiet. Harvey-Jones who had led the Indian
forces into the city was proving ‘cooperative’ but the Muslims were reported to be
‘sullen’.149 With the military dust having settled, thoughts turned to the subsequent
diplomacy. Ismay wrote to Mountbatten, who was in London, that Patel was visit-
ing Junagadh soon and wanted Mountbatten to ‘emphasise’ the point at home that
‘India had not taken over Junagadh but had merely taken over administration thereof
as a temporary measure.’150 Rajagopalachari had asked Ismay to have a ‘private
talk’ with Patel with a view to hold his aggressive hand. Even as Bucher confi-
dently stated that ‘all was peaceful’ in Junagadh and dispersal of Indian troops
142
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Nehru to Liaquat, 9 November 1947.
143
NAI, MoS, File No. 188-P/48 and File No. 85 (10)-PR/47, 14 January 1948.
144
145
Purushotham, ‘Internal Violence’, p. 441.
146
NAI, MoS, File No. 45-G (R)/48.
147
NAI, MoS, File No. F.46 (3)-G (R)/48.
148
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Minutes of the Cabinet Meeting, 10 November 1947.
149
150
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Ismay to Mountbatten, No. 1237, 12 November 1947.
396 / Rakesh Ankit
would shortly begin as he had no fear that Pakistan troops might land in Junagadh,151
a close reading of Buch’s and the Chief Administrator’s reports, hitherto not perused,
gives a different reality of the situation in Junagadh.
Two rounds of disturbances plagued Keshod in November. On both occasions,
Muslim houses and shops were looted and Shiveshwarkar expressed his helpless-
ness to Buch in the face of ‘paucity of policemen [and] no intelligence system’.
He had to send five military patrols as the complacent ‘local police [was] found
to be taking the situation easy’.152 In December, it was Kutiyana’s turn. Situation
reports from there for five successive days from 27 to 31 December 1947 show
that 50 Muslim houses and shops were looted there, in retaliation police stations
were raided by Sindhis and, in all, 280 people were arrested.153 Daily reports from
12 to 25 January 1948 confirm that Muslim families were leaving Junagadh in
considerable numbers with most embarking from Veraval for Karachi.154 This
violence, once again like that in Hyderabad, ‘can be read in terms of incorporation
and the wider process of transforming India’s Muslims from a national community
into a religious minority after August 1947’.155 Above all, Buch–Shiveshwarkar’s
correspondence nails New Delhi’s lies about the calm aftermath in Junagadh, instead
revealing the communal air. On 2 January 1948, Buch wrote to Shiveshwarkar:
From various reports from Junagadh, I feel that there is a kind of demoralisa-
tion setting in. In Kutiyana and elsewhere, our officers seem to be afraid of
unpopularity in dealing with Hindus. There is naturally considerable exodus of
Muslims and people seem to be taking the law into their hands...Our officers
are not sure whether they are expected to check this and even if they are, they
probably feel that it is not in their interest to do so. Incendiarism is still going
on in Veraval...There is also a feeling that indirectly troops and police encourage
certain harassments...156 (emphasis added)
Two days later, Shiveshwarkar replied:
I share the feeling you have that there is a kind of demoralisation setting in...
Some of the foujdars are no doubt afraid of unpopularity with in dealing with
Hindus. Biggest of these examples is Kutiyana where loot of Muslims has been
considerable on the 26th of December. Hijrat of Memons has begun. Poorer
classes of Muslim will no doubt remain in Kutiyana but the rich classes will go
away. We have told the Hindus that in resorting to loot [they] were only bringing
151
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Minutes of the 14th meeting of the Defence Committee,
14 November 1947.
152
NAI, MoS, File No. 85 (3)-PR (47), Shiveshwarkar to Buch, 29 November 1947.
153
NAI, MoS, File No. 85 (3)-PR (47), Rajkot to Delhi, C/26-3, 5 January 1948.
154
NAI, MoS, File No. 85 (3)-PR (47), Daily Reports, CLO/73, 12–13 January 1948.
155
Purushotham ‘Internal Violence’, p. 437.
156
NAI, MoS, File No. 85 (3)-PR (47), Buch to Shiveshwarkar, 2 January 1948.
down the name of Indian Union which was their own Raj. We also told them how
demoralising it is to their dharma. I hope this would have the desired effect...
My primary need just now is of a Police Commissioner.157 (emphasis added)
This ‘incorporative violence’, which ‘constructed the Muslims as, not the irre-
concilable other, but inextricably part of the nation’, privately acknowledged here,
would be replayed at a much bloodier scale in Hyderabad in 1948 as revealed by
the-then suppressed and now resurfaced Pandit Sunderlal Report.158 There were
at least four kinds of representative voices that were raised against it. These were
disregarded then and have remained unacknowledged since. W. Tudor Owen,
who had served Junagadh for 15 years as the tutor and guardian of the Nawab
and his two sons, represented the first kind. In a personal letter to Mountbatten
written ‘from a sense of duty [and] loyalty’, Owen heroically rose to paint a very
different picture of Mahabat Khan than the dog-loving caricature in Indian accounts.
Claiming that the Nawab attended ‘regularly to state business’, Owen remembered
that Sir Cyril Hancock, former Resident of Western States, had a ‘high opinion of
his personal qualities’.159 Indeed, in his tours of the state in January 1946, Hancock
had noted that the easy-to-ridicule Nawab was ‘well-loved by his people and his
state [was] well-administered’.160 Captain Eric Markes, who followed Mahabat
Khan to Karachi, felt that the ‘royal family want[ed] to return to Junagadh even at
the cost of being a prisoner [and] if His Highness is given a chance, this time he
will be one of the best constitutional rulers’.161 The views of an English couple,
the Tatlocks, who were asked by Indian authorities to leave Junagadh in late-1947,
complement Owen and Markes. Mrs Tatlock wrote to her brother on the aftermath
of the whole affair thus: ‘[Hindus] going to Mahomedan shops, buying things and
saying “send the bill to your Jinnah in Pakistan”...crowds of wretched Mahomedans
are being pushed out of their jobs...’162 Here was another example of what has been
called the ‘retaliatory instinct of the Hindus in post-partition India.163
A group of Muslims from Junagadh represented the second type of voices in
protest and far more important than Owen because their account puts an unflattering
light on the secular claims of the early Indian state. They wrote to Mountbatten and
Nehru on 30 November 1947 complaining about the loot, plunder, rape and murder
in the state especially at Kutiyana following the entrance of the Indian troops not-
withstanding the assurances given by Patel in his visit to Junagadh. Giving a dismal
157
NAI, MoS, File No. 85 (3)-PR (47), Shiveshwarkar to Buch, 4 January 1948.
158
Frontline, Vol. 18 (05), 03–16 March 2001; Noorani, The Destruction of Hyderabad; Purushotham,
‘Internal Violence’, pp. 451–62.
159
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Owen to Mountbatten, 21 November 1947.
160
BL, India Office Records (IOR), L/PS/13/1475, DO No. C/5-12, 1 January 1946.
161
NAI, MoS, File No. 85 (3)-PR (47), Markes to his wife, 27 November 1947.
162
NAI, MoS, File No. 85 (3)-PR (47), Buch to New Delhi, (C/21-1), 2 January 1948.
163
398 / Rakesh Ankit
picture of a communal military, this group appealed to the Prime Minister and the
Governor-General to visit Junagadh and redress a situation in which the Muslims’
loyalty was being questioned and their life was made intolerable.164 These were
joined by Muslims from Kutiyana in Ceylon, who had made representations to the
Indian High-Commission in Colombo expressing their deep anxiety at the loot and
lawlessness indulged by Indian troops. There were members of about 500 Muslim
families from Kutiyana in Ceylon and they had received distressing information
regarding threats to their families and properties back home. Ceylon Daily News
had headlines such as that on 25 November 1947: ‘Indian’s [Muslims’] flight from
riot-torn Kathiawar’.165 This was a ‘dispersal of violence into the body politic in a
form that affirm[ed] rather than subvert[ed] state sovereignty’ and operated along
the trope of a sacrificial community leading to societal solidarity and enhancing
post-colonial sovereignty.166
The Nawab of Palanpur, Taley Mohammad Khan Bahadur, represented the third
set of unhappy voices. His ‘confidential’ intervention with Mountbatten made with
‘great hesitation’ betrayed his and the smaller princely states’ vulnerability vis-à-vis
New Delhi. It was restricted to his hope that Mountbatten would see to it that the
‘dynasty [in Junagadh] will not be wiped out’. The Nawab was at pains to clarify
that he was writing neither because Junagadh was a Muslim state nor because
he had any relations there but because Mahabat Khan’s fate affected ‘the whole
princely order’.167 Mountbatten delayed his reply until the first week of January
1948 ‘hoping that events might have resolved themselves’. But matters had not
settled and the position was that accession would be first settled by a plebiscite
and ‘until that is decided nothing could be said about the future of the dynasty’.168
Here was another illustration of an understanding operating within the ‘partition
paradigm’ eventually leading to internalising, victimising and depoliticising the
Muslim as a political category and binding the community’s relationship with the
new nation-state into a binary of ‘persecution and protection’.169 Moreover, this
question of what was to be done with the Nawab and chiefs of other states and,
consequently, whether the administration of Junagadh and other states was to be
handed over to the emerging United State of Kathiawar was also one where sheer
political chicanery triumphed over the rule of law. This can be amply seen, finally,
from two extraordinary comprehensive notes by S. Narayanswamy, dated 20 March
1948, and M.K. Kripalani, dated 31 March 1948, at the Ministry of States, which
raised such delicate issues and advised such heavy-handed treatment, respectively,
that another official K.K. Sundaram minuted on 3 April 1948 that ‘it would be
164
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, DY No. 1081/ECR, 30 November 1947.
165
NAI, Ministry of External Affairs (henceforth MEA), File Number F 90-67/47 OS II (MEA, CAP).
166
167
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Palanpur to Delhi, 10 December 1947.
168
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Delhi to Palanpur, 4 January 1948.
169
Purushotham, ‘Internal Violence’, p. 439, 463.
better to discuss personally than to note on the file as to the next step to be taken in
Junagadh, Mangrol etc.’ (emphasis added).170 In his note, Narayanswamy made it
clear that despite the plebiscite, it remained a question whether Junagadh could be
merged in the United State of Kathiawar. This was because New Delhi was carrying
on the administration of Junagadh since 9 November ‘technically and formally in
the name and on behalf of the Nawab’. The significant second paragraph of Bhutto’s
letter of 8 November, handing over the administration, stated that
In order to avoid bloodshed, hardship, loss of life and property and to preserve
the dynasty, [India] should be approached to give your assistance to the admin-
istration particularly with a view to preserve law and order, which is threatened
by aggressive elements from outside. This arrangement is sought pending an
honourable settlement of the several issues involved in Junagadh’s accession.
It was clear to Narayanswamy from this that first, New Delhi had to carry on the
administration of the state pending a settlement on the question of accession and
second, it was precluded from handing over the administration to the United State
of Kathiawar, ‘as otherwise the identity of the state would be lost’. Moreover,
the covenant for the formation of the United State of Kathiawar, as well the
Government of India Act 1935, emphasised ‘execution of an agreement for
merger by a person who is exercising the power of ruler in the normal way’. In
Junagadh, Commissioner Buch and Administrator Shiveshwarkar were appointed
by New Delhi and, thus, could not hand over the administration of the state to the
United State of Kathiawar, since neither was acting for the Nawab. Buch’s solu-
tion was to have a second referendum but Narayanswamy argued that even that
would not help since according to the covenant, any agreement was ‘to be signed
by a person exercising the powers of the ruler and it has not so far been conceded
that the powers of the Nawab are exercisable by the people of the state or their
representative’.
In the cases of Manvadar, Mangrol, Bantwa and Sardargarh, India’s position
was even more suspect as, in Narayanswamy’s words, ‘there is no formal authority
under which we are occupying these states’. Even in these cases, it could not hand
over their administration to the United State of Kathiawar, as the Sheikh of Mangrol
as the legitimate ruler and the Talukdars of these areas were available. The Sheikh
was at Porbandar, the chief of Manvadar was at Jamnagar and other chiefs were
also in Kathiawar. The dilemma was elementary: ‘While therefore we have to meet
the wishes of the people, we have also to comply with legal requirements’. The
crux of the problem was the future of the Nawab of Junagadh and the chiefs and,
as Narayanswamy put it, ‘we cannot afford to ignore this condition and proceed
as though the Nawab had ceased to exist’. Yet, this is precisely what the Ministry
170
NAI, MoS, File No. 45-P/1948.
400 / Rakesh Ankit
of States did and the rationale was provided by M.K. Kripalani, who rebutted
Narayanswamy’s marshalling of Bhutto’s letter and the consequent ‘provisional’
nature of Indian takeover of Junagadh by pointing out that
Since then, there have been big changes. We have taken over the entire admin-
istration; the Nawab shows no signs of returning; the United State of Kathiawar
has come into existence; the Gujarat states are proposed to be merged in the
Bombay province and Junagadh has declared by a referendum in favour of
accession to the Indian Dominion.
The choice for Kripalani was simple for notwithstanding an adverse reaction at the
UN or an unfavourable result at a second referendum, ‘we could not let Junagadh
stand by itself after the Gujarat states have merged into Bombay.’ So why bother to
either wait for a decision from New York or conduct a second referendum whose
result was anyway ‘foretold’. Accordingly, Kripalani suggested that
The administration of Junagadh may be handed over without any referendum

and without the need for any formal document to the United State of Kathiawar.
After this handing over, the entity of the Junagadh state is likely progressively
to be lost, but this cannot be helped under the circumstances. This course of
action is based on political grounds and expediency and the Ministry of Law
may not be called upon to advice. (emphasis added)
At the United Nations: January–February 1948
Meanwhile, on 15 January 1948, New Delhi had issued a press communiqué that
a referendum was to be held in Junagadh and its feudatories in the third week of
February. On the same day, on the floor of the UN Security Council, Sir Zafrulla
Khan, Pakistan’s delegate, responded to this unilateral declaration by launching
a broadside on India’s behaviour towards Pakistan since partition on a number of
issues giving Junagadh a prominent place in the list. Replying to India’s complaint
against Pakistan on Kashmir, Zafrulla completely altered the scope of the debate
by alleging ‘genocide’ in Punjab and ‘invasion’ in Junagadh.171 India’s representa-
tive, Ayyangar, sought material from New Delhi to counter Zafrulla’s allegations.
New Delhi’s telegram of 17 January trod over familiar territory as it laid out India’s
case. It began by arguing that Junagadh’s accession was in violation to the principles
of partition and moved on to charge Junagadh with making ‘military preparations’.
Glossing over Menon’s involvement, it claimed that the provisional government
formed in Bombay was neither recognised nor helped by New Delhi. Omitting
171
Zaidi, ed. Jinnah Papers, Ikramullah–Bajpai correspondence, 30 December 1947–46 January
1948, pp. 393–95.
any mention of Babariawad and Mangrol, the telegram to Ayyangar moved to the
‘discontent of people, demoralisation of administration, breakdown of rule’ and
the Diwan’s ‘invitation to New Delhi to take up administration in full knowledge
and concurrence of the government of Pakistan’. It also denied any subsequent
‘lawlessness’ in the state since the assumption of administration by Buch and instead
highlighted the ‘oppression of Hindus’ before India moved in.172
In early February, New Delhi sent more material to Ayyangar.173 This time
Nehru did mention Mangrol, stressing its separate status and its Sheikh’s signing
of accession, omitting the later withdrawal. He insisted again that Junagadh was
taken without firing a shot; not quite true. In yet another shift from his earlier posi-
tion, Nehru now felt it ‘quite unnecessary to hold the plebiscite under the authority
of the UN but if the UN thinks it desirable, it may send one or two observers’.
Under no circumstances, however, would India agree to the postponement of the
plebiscite to enable UN and Pakistan to send their observers.174 This missive of
Nehru’s crossed with Ayyangar’s of 7–8 February in which Ayyangar had sug-
gested that Zafrulla’s request for postponement of plebiscite ‘should be agreed to
as the matter is in effect sub-judice before the Security Council’. Ayyangar had in
fact told Zafrulla that personally he saw ‘no difficulty in New Delhi agreeing to
the postponement’.175 However, this was before Ayyangar saw Nehru’s telegram
and now the Indian Prime Minister immediately wrote back that as ‘polling had
actually started’, it was ‘impossible to stop’ now.176
By the time Zafrulla brought up Junagadh again at the Security Council on
18 February 1948, Ayyangar had returned to India leaving M.K. Vellodi in charge.
In a speech lasting 80 minutes, Zafrulla called India’s invasion of Junagadh and
the proposed plebiscite ‘a fait accompli’ and called upon the Security Council to
ask India to withdraw forces from Junagadh, restore the Nawab to his position
and then conduct a plebiscite under UN auspices.177 Vellodi’s prepared reply to
Zafrulla, after going over the familiar terrain of legal accession, geographical
contiguity and people’s wish, charged the Nawab of disregarding the latter and
focussed on Mangrol and Babariawad. It continued to claim that New Delhi had
given ‘no support at all to the so-called provisional government’ and even denied
stopping supplies to Junagadh.178 Ayyangar reminded to Vellodi on 24 February the
need ‘as far as possible to avoid being drawn into legalistic arguments as regards
validity of Junagadh’s accession to Pakistan’ for its impact on Kashmir. Asking
Vellodi to highlight the ‘spontaneous’ reaction of Junagadh’s accession, Ayyangar
172
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, New Delhi to New York, No. 500, 17 January 1948.
173
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, New York to New Delhi, 58/S, 31 January 1948.
174
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Nehru to Ayyangar, PRIMIN 745, 5 February 1948.
175
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Ayyangar to Nehru, 76/S, 7–8 February 1948, 76/S.
176
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Nehru to Ayyangar, PRIMIN 812, 10 February 1948.
177
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, New York to New Delhi, 18–19 February 1948.
178
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, No. 114/S and 115/S, 21–22 February 1948.
402 / Rakesh Ankit
enclosed the plebiscite results. Out of a total population of 720,000 in Junagadh

and its feudatories, India had polled 222,184 votes and Pakistan 130. Finally, he
emphasised that while there was no objection to the Nawab’s return, equally there
was no question of his restoration.179
On 26 February, New Delhi again wrote to Vellodi; this time to deny the Pakistani
newspaper Dawn’s allegations about impropriety in the plebiscite.180 However, not
just the Pakistani paper but Douglas Brown of the Daily Telegraph too had held
adverse opinions ‘of the manner in which the plebiscite had been arranged’.181 On
the same day, Zafrulla termed India’s action in proceeding with the plebiscite, in
spite of assurances to the contrary given by Ayyangar, as a ‘discourtesy to Pakistan
and the Security Council’.182 Finally, on 27 February, Vellodi laid out India’s reply
to Zafrulla along the lines agreed with Ayyangar. This and Zafrulla’s subsequent
response were the last skirmishes on Junagadh at the UN as focus completely shifted
to Kashmir hence.183 However, a so-far unnoticed appreciation of the plebiscite by
Shiveshwarkar makes it clear that it was a hollow victory for India.184 In the 1941
census of Junagadh, its total population was 670,719 (534,321 Hindus; 127,814
Muslims and 8,584 non-Hindus/Muslims). A reasonable extrapolation would have
made it in 1948 as 140,595 Muslims and 597,195 non-Muslims. Out of this, only
21,606 Muslims voted, that is, 15 per cent of Muslim population and 179,851
non-Muslims voted, that is, 30 per cent of non-Muslim population. Total voters
on electoral rolls were 200,569 and less than 10,000 Muslims voted for India.
In Manvadar, 276 out of 520 Muslims voted for India, in Bantwa (Chota) 19 out
of 39 and in Sardargarh, 79 out of 231. On the other hand, in Bantwa (Bara) and
Babariawad, the number of voters who cast their votes for India was less than the
total number of non-Muslim voters there, which means that even some Hindus/
others did not vote for India.
Conclusion
The Junagadh affair was neither a ‘fantasy’ nor a ‘farce’ and certainly not a ‘comedy’
it has been variously called.185 Predominantly understood as ‘a pawn in the Indo-
Pakistani struggle over Kashmir’,186 important ‘for the precedents it set’,187 it has
179
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, Ayyangar to Vellodi, No. 1677/63 and No. 1706, 24
February 1948.
180
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, New Delhi to New York, No. 1790, 26 February 1948.
181
Zaidi, ed. Jinnah Papers, A.S.B. Shah to S.M. Yusuf, 24 February 1948, pp. 399–402.
182
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, New York to New Delhi, No. 124/S, 26–27 February
1948.
183
UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D204, New York to New Delhi, No. 126/S and No. 2370,
28–29 February 1948.
184
NAI, MoS, File No. 45-P/1948.
185
Hodson, The Great Divide, pp. 428–29.
186
Brecher, Nehru, p. 404.
187
its own significance. And that is not only, as the most recent account offers that
the Nehru government was ‘alert to domestic opinions and constraints’, worried
about the ‘vulnerabilities of Muslims in India’ and had a ‘desire to adhere to
the norms of international politics’.188 This focus on Junagadh only from legal–
constitutional and strategic–territorial perspectives overlooks the fact that ‘state
violence’ was a ‘highly visible enactment of state sovereignty’ there, as elsewhere
in India in 1947–48.189 In at least three instances in the case of Junagadh during
the period under consideration, New Delhi took liberties with facts on ground and
laws on paper, instances which have been either overlooked or explained since but
not questioned. First, the question of Mangrol’s accession to India which provided
the all-important thin end of the wedge for Patel and Menon to apply pressure on
Junagadh. The existence of ‘sub-states’ within Junagadh was critical to the entire
dynamic of the controversy and their ‘rough and ready’ treatment by the Indian
state is exemplary of the manner in which the thicket of colonial complexities was
cut through for post-colonial state reconstruction. Second, the alarmist claims about
Junagadh’s military capability and help from Pakistan and third, the haste with
which a plebiscite was arranged making India the judge, jury and executioner of the
whole case. Events of the period January–February 1948 both in Junagadh and at the
UN in relation to Junagadh exemplify the tenuous relationship between formal
appeals to international law and international bodies and the ground realities of a
fluid situation that explain but do not justify this haste. Events in Junagadh between
August 1947 and February 1948 thus aided and abetted in the production of a
majoritarian ‘state and sovereignty’ that re-signified social basis for the independent
nation-state through violence—‘constitutive or foundational of a new institutional
and political order, [producing] conversion, co-option and consent [for it]’.190
Junagadh’s accession helps explore, in another way, how the contested accession
of princely states shaped the ways in which the independent Indian state came to
redraw and redefine its authority in the immediate aftermath of independence and
partition. In this process, its attempt to expand the parameters of this authority amidst
uncertain times is especially illuminated by the Junagadh affair, as a complex and
layered colonial sovereignty resided in the princely state and its ‘sub-states’. ‘State
violence’, the tool employed to provide a context for democracy, helped cement
a reconfigured social space in Junagadh. A claim of ‘popular will’ was made to
justify this ‘state violence’, even as it remained limited by the constraints on avail-
able force as well as on the new state’s ability to use it, not least by the continuing
presence of influential Britons in India at this time, and this fusion of the two
determined the dynamics that defined the foundations of the newly authoritative
nation-state.
188
Raghavan, War and Peace, pp. 63–64.
189
190
Ibid., p. 465.
404 / Rakesh Ankit
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The accession of Junagadh, 1947–48:

Colonial sovereignty, state violence

Keywords: India, Pakistan, Junagadh, accession

These treatments do no justice to the many complexities, characters and

Accession to Pakistan and Its Aftermath: July–September 1947

Mahabat Khan in this mess’, as remembered by one of Mahabat Khan’s English

Junagadh is a state which proposes to accede to Pakistan...Import into Junagadh

Finally, on 9 September, Pakistan announced that it had signed a standstill agree-

contiguity’ and its overwhelming Hindu population, Nehru refused to ‘acquiesce’

to consider plebiscite, otherwise ‘the responsibility of the consequences must rest

even as conclusive legal advice should be obtained on Mangrol and Babariawad,

This letter seemed to us very extraordinary. In effect, it was an announcement

by a desire to do ‘the good of India’, lent itself to ‘misinterpretation’.80 To his

Indian Response: October 1947

Nehru’s message. He had sent a letter to Nehru on 6–7 October. Mountbatten

A reign of terrorism akin to martial law prevails…Hindus were panicky and

Given this passionate tone, Mountbatten sought to enlist Lockhart’s help to

It is impossible for us to tolerate any longer such acts of aggression and

On 22 October, in another little-remarked episode, the Pakistan High-Commissioner

In Relation to Kashmir: November–December 1947

UoS, HL, Mountbatten Papers, MB1/D203, Brockman to Lockhart, 29 October 1947.

DMO&I/CI (ii), 29–30 October 1947.

9 November.142 An ordinance was later promulgated, on 24 December 1947, vesting

Two days later, Shiveshwarkar replied:

The administration of Junagadh may be handed over without any referendum

At the United Nations: January–February 1948

enclosed the plebiscite results. Out of a total population of 720,000 in Junagadh

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