THE REMINISCENCES OF SIR MUHAMMAD ZAFRULLA KHAN INTERVIEWS CONDUCTED BY PROFESSORS WAYNE WILCOX AND AISLIE T. EMBREE FOR COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY PROF. DR. PERVEZ PERWAZI 2004 "Copyright in the underlying English-language oral history upon which this publication is based is owned by Columbia University in the City of New York. Columbia University has not reviewed this publication to determine whether it is an accurate translation of the interview. No material from this publication may be reprinted without obtaining the approval of the Columbia University. Requests to quote material from the publication should be submitted to the Oral History Research Office of Columbia University." First published by the Oriental Publishers in June 2004. Oriental Publishers, P.O. Box 96512, 2414 Major Mackenzie Drive, Maple, Ontario, L6A 1B0, Canada. Main entry under title: Reminiscences of Sir Muhammad Zafrulla Khan. Based on interviews by Prof. Wayne Wilcox and Prof. Aislie T. Embree of Columbia for Columbia University. (IX) 256p. includes index. Original Title in English: Reminiscences of Sir Muhammad Zafrulla Khan. ISBN — 0 973327 1 9 Notes=* 1 Khan Muhammad Zafrulla Sir, 1893-1985. 2. India - History 1917-1947. 3. Pakistan - History 1947-1985. 4. India. Politics and Government. 5. Pakistan Politics and Government. 6. Muslim-India History. 7. India History Partition. 8. Pakistan History Partition. 9. All India Muslim League History. 10. Pakistan Movement History. 11. United Nations 1947-1954. 12. Judge International Court of Justice 1954-1961 and 1964-1973. 13. United Nations 1962-1963. 14. Vice President International Court of Justice 1958-1961. President International Court of Justice 1970- 1973. I. Perwazi, Pervez, 1936-. II. Reminiscences of Sir Muhammad Zafrulla Khan. III. Based on interviews of Prof. Wayne Wilcox and Prof. Aislie T. Embree in 1962-1963. Cover Design by Nabeel Ahmad Rana Published by Oriental Publishers, P. O. Box 96512, 2414 Major Mackenzie Drive, Maple, Ontario L6A 1B0, Canada. Printed at the Fazl-i-Umar Press, Chauncey, OH 45719, USA. Dedication I dedicate this book to Mr. Kunwer Idrees, my revered teacher and a great admirer of Sir Zafrulla Khan. REMINISCENCES OF SIR MUHAMMAD ZAFRULLA KHAN CONTENTS Page Preface vii Acknowledgement ix Introduction xi INTERVIEW, MARCH 31, 1962 1 Biographical Sketch, The Khilafat Movement, Unionist Party, Sikander-Jinnah-Khizr, Cabinet Mission Plan, Two Muslim Leagues, Political Career, Simon Commission, Delhi Conspiracy, Round Table Conferences, President of All India Muslim League Session, Working of Viceroy's Executive Council, etc. etc. INTERVIEW, MAY 12, 1962 50 Third Round Table Conference, First Commonwealth Relations Conference, Membership of the Viceroy's Executive Council. INTERVIEW, MAY 19, 1962 73 Membership of the Viceroy's Executive Council. INTERVIEW, JUNE 2, 1962 89 Viceroy's Executive Council, The Coronation of King George The VI, Imperial Conference. INTERVIEW, JUNE 16, 1962 107 1937 Elections, War Supply, Supreme Court of India, Agent General to China, Dominion Minister's v REMINISCENCES OF SIR MUHAMMAD ZAFRULLA KHAN Conference, Last Session of League of Nations, Pacific Relations Conference at Mont Tremblant. INTERVIEW, JUNE 30, 1962 131 To England in 1943, Commonwealth Relations Conference, 1945, Chaudhry Rahmat Ali. INTERVIEW, JULY 7, 1962 141 Sir Khizr Hayat Khan, Partition and the Boundary Commission. INTERVIEW JULY 28, 1962 161 Advisory Role, to UN for Pakistan's Membership, Pakistan's Foreign Minister, on Liaqat Ali Khan and Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah, The Kashmir Dispute and the UN. INTERVIEW, SEPTEMBER 15, 1962 173 Kashmir, Sheikh Abdullah, UN and Pakistan's Role, 1948-1954, ICJ, Its Working and Jurisdiction, etc. INTERVIEW, SEPTEMBER 22, 1962 197 Again in the UN in 1962, Disarmament Issue, South African Issue. INTERVIEW, OCTOBER 26, 1963 213 President of the UN General Assembly, 17th Session and Particular Issues, Travels during Presidentship, Back to ICJ. INTERVIEW, NOVEMBER 17, 1963 232 Comparing the League of Nations and the UN, Munir Enquiry Commission etc. INDEX 247 vi REMINISCENCES OF SIR MUHAMMAD ZAFRULLA KHAN PREFACE This memoir is the result of a series of tape-recorded interviews conducted by Professors Wayne Wilcox and Aislie T. Embree with Sir Muhammad Zafrulla Khan in New York City during 1962. Only minor corrections and emendations have been made, and the reader is enjoined to bear in mind, therefore, that he is reading a transcript of the spoken, rather than the written, word. Columbia University vii REMINISCENCES OF SIR MUHAMMAD ZAFRULLA KHAN viii REMINISCENCES OF SIR MUHAMMAD ZAFRULLA KHAN ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am grateful to Jessica Weiderhorn of the Columbia University Oral History Department for her cooperation to get permission from the University to publish the Reminiscences of Sir Zafrulla Khan. I am also indebted to my teacher, Mr. Kunwer Idrees of Karachi, for extending a helpful hand to make this publication possible. The following friends helped me in various ways: Mr. Naseem Mahdi, Dr. I.U. Mangla, Dr. Safee Chaudhry, Col. Raja Aslam, Mr. Hidayatullah Hadi, Mr. Nabeel Ahmad Rana, Ch. Ehsan Elahi, Mr. Farhan Khokhar, Professor Dr. Basharat Munir Mirza, Prof. Mubarak Ahmad Ansari, and Ms. Amatur Rafique Rahat. Last, and not the least, Mr. Abdool Hamid Abdool Rahman for editing the transcript and crossing the "T"s and dotting the "I"s, and Mr. Muhammad Ismat Pasha for his help in the word processing of the text in various stages of preparation of the book. Pervez Perwazi ix REMINISCENCES OF SIR MUHAMMAD ZAFRULLA KHAN REMINISCENCES OF SIR MUHAMMAD ZAFRULLA KHAN INTRODUCTION The incident took place at the concluding session of the International Writer’s Conference at Stockholm in 1994. As soon as I left the stage, after having presented a paper on Pakistan’s literature, a Morrocan writer came running to me and introduced himself, “I am Zafrulla - Zafrulla Alejabi. I am so pleased to meet a Pakistani writer. You know my name is very unusual for that of a Morrocan, but my parents named me after some famous Pakistani diplomat who was our only supporter at the UN in the late forties and early fifties. We owe our independence to his efforts. Many boys were named after him. I am one of those proud boys and I have for the first time met a Pakistani. I wanted to express my gratitude, so I came running to you. Can you please tell me something about that famous Zafrulla, because we don’t know much about our benefactor, our hero, after whom I was named.” He was too sentimental. We sat together after the session was over and talked about his hero and my fellow Ahmadi compatriot. He was pleased to know that I knew Zafrulla and had had the chance to meet him personally and that I had shaken his hand many times. He grabbed my hand and held it in esteem as long as we were there. Now that I have the task of writing an introduction to the Reminiscences of a famous man - the man, mere mention of whose name generates awe and respect. Mothers name their children after him to express their gratitude, and here I am, an unknown, unfamiliar person, venturing to introduce Sir Zafrulla. Obviously, this is an “adventure in self expression.” Sir Zafrulla began his political career in 1917, when he was appointed head of the Ahmadiyya delegation to present the point of view of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community before the Montague-Chelmsford Commission. He was elected to the Punjab Legislative Assembly in 1926. He joined the Unionist Party of the Punjab and worked his way up under the able guidance of Sir Fazle Hussain. He was a member of the Round Table Conferences on India’s future Constitution which were held in the years 1930-32. He proved his mark and won respest of all and sundry. Mr. Musarrat Hussain Zuberi, ICS, in his autobiography, “Voyage Through History” has recorded xi REMINISCENCES OF SIR MUHAMMAD ZAFRULLA KHAN a conversation he had with Sir Samuel Hoare as follows: “Sir Samuel, in the perfect English way, was “pleased” to meet me. When his lead in the poll during counting was reported, he relaxed and took some personal interest in me, asking personal questions. He was keen to know whether allottment to the province had been done and where I was to be posted. When he heard I was going to the Punjab, he smiled his big ... smile and said, “You are lucky.” “Why it is so lucky?” I asked. His remark astonished me and does even today: “Because Sir Zafrulla comes from that province and you are lucky to go to that province,” and then added: “You know, Sir Zafrulla was here for the Round Table Conference and we still write to each other.” My reaction was not very polite. “There were so many others better known and more experienced like Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru, Mr. Jinnah, Sir Srivnivas Shastri.” He cut me out: “Oh, as for that, there was the Aga Khan too; but no one made such tremendous impression as Sir Zafrulla did.” I could not afford to further contradict the Secretary of State for India and changed the topic.”1 By the time of the Second Round Table Conference, he had become so eminent that he was appointed to the Viceroy’s Executive Council to officiate for Sir Fazle Hussain during the latter’s absence on leave for four months. Later, he was appointed, at a relatively very young age, as a member of the Viceroy’s Executive Council for a full term of five years. He was re-appointed for anther term of five years after the expiry of the first term. Shortly after the beginning of the second term, he chose to quit the political arena and, apparently, to shut himself in the backwaters of the Federal Court of India.