In this article, we discuss the C Rajagopalachari formula. The formula was given by Congress's big leader Chakravarti Rajagopalachari.
People also knew C Rajagopalachari by the name of Rajaji. C Rajagopalachari formula is also known as the Rajaji formula.
In August 1917, Secretary of State Edwin Montagu gave a declaration, also known as the August Declaration.
After this declaration, the British Government was putting a lot of effort into the Constitutional Advancement.
But whenever the British government brought a proposal for Constitutional Advancement, the political parties of India used to fight and all the proposals were failed.
The differences between the two big parties of India, the Congress, and the Muslim League, had increased so much that the British government was unable to resolve them.
The differences between the two parties were because the Muslim League wanted a separate country for the Muslim people and the Congress did not want to partition the country.
There was no solution to this problem, so C Rajagopalachari gave a formula in 1944.
C Rajagopalachari formula was a set of proposals in which the following proposals were given -
1. After the end of World War II, a commission will be formed whose responsibility will be to conduct plebiscites in Muslim majority areas.
2. In Plebiscite, all persons living in Muslim majority area i.e. Muslims and Non-Muslims by means of voting decides whether they should want a separate country or not.
3. The commission will first identify in which areas Muslim people are in the majority and after that, a referendum will be conducted in those areas.
4. If there is a partition on the basis of the plebiscite, then both will secure defense, communication, and commerce through a joint agreement.
Congress had to some extent accepted this proposal of the Rajagopalachari formula so that the Muslim League would also support him in the Indian Freedom Struggle.
It was also said in this formula that this forum would be implemented when the British government would completely transfer power to India.
In 1944, Gandhiji also started talking to Jinha on the basis of the C Rajagopalachari Formula but this conversation failed.
Jinha did not accept the following things in the C Rajagopalachari formula -
1. In the Rajagopalachari formula regarding plebiscite, it was being said that in Muslim majority areas, all the people living in those areas would vote whether they want Pakistan or not. This thing did not feel right to Jinha.
2. Jinha said that the names of all non-Muslim people will have to be cut from the voting list. Only the Muslim population should be included in the plebiscite.
3. Jinha had no interest in making the common center of defense, communication, and commerce.
Sikh community and Hindu Mahasabha also opposed the C R formula.
The problem of the Sikh community was that the NWFP was a Muslim majority area and Sikhs are not in majority in this area.
In such a situation, the result of Plebiscite was going to come of becoming a new country. So the Sikh community will become a part of the new country even without wanting to. This was not acceptable to the Sikh community.
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