The princely states and the national movement: The case of Kashmir (1931–39)

The British created an invisible wall between ‘British India’ and the ‘Princely India’ by governing the latter indirectly through hereditary princes, who were supposedly fully autonomous, but for British ‘paramountcy’. The Indian National Congress had from the beginning adopted a policy of non-interference in the states’ affairs, which Mahatma Gandhi too upheld. However, nationalism began to cast its influence in the states despite this policy of non-interference. In Kashmir the opposition to the Maharaja took, first, the form of a Muslim agitation against the ruler’s oppressive measures. But in time as the movement against the Dogra Raj obtained increasing support from the nationalist leaders, notably Jawaharlal Nehru, the Muslim Conference (later named National Conference) leadership headed by Sheikh Abdullah gravitated towards the All-India States Peoples Conference and its spiritual parent, the Congress. The Congress too abandoned its policy of non-interference fully by 1939. This shift ultimately caused a rift in the valley, with Ch. Ghulam Abbas forming the Muslim Conference in opposition to Sheikh Abdullah’s National Conference in 1941.