The Presidency of the Indian National Congress was not a particularly important post. Yet, in 1946, it suddenly became so. Why?
The answer is that elections had been held in January of that year. The Muslim League had won the majority of Muslim seats. Congress's contention that it too represented Muslims was weakened. Indeed, the collapse of the Hindu Mahasabha showed that it was seen by Hindus as a Hindu party. Furthermore, Jinnah's contention that Scheduled castes and other religious minorities would support this Hindu party seemed justified.
In this context, the Congress President, Maulana Azad, clearly had to go because his presence was a red-rag to Jinnah who considered him a 'show-boy' of the Hindus. Thus Azad could not have been the chief negotiator for Congress unless they wanted to show themselves as intransigent as Jinnah and thus equally responsible for the threatened partition of the country.
Of course, this necessity was highly unfair to the Maulana who had been President for 6 years and, after the death of Dr. Ansari, was the sole representative of a grand tradition of Muslim Nationalistic anti-Imperialism in India.
It is noteworthy that the Muslim League's electoral triumph had relied heavily on recruiting religious leaders and pandering to 'biradari' (caste/tribe) networks. Jinnah's followers had shown they could master 'machine politics' as shrewdly as Congress. It may be that, if Azad had been a free agent, he could have countered these machinations of the League with his own oratory, erudition, and many long standing admirers in Islamist groupings.
The other reason the Presidency of Congress suddenly became important was because it seemed likely that the post would be stepping stone to the Prime Minister-ship, since Congress was the most popular party.
In this context, the Regional Congress Committees, who, legally, were the only bodies empowered to decide the issue, favoured Sardar Vallabh Patel- a good organiser and conduit of funds from the industrialists and businessmen- and 12 out of 15 nominated him with the other 3 expressing no preference.
Mahatma Gandhi saw that Nehru would not serve under Patel and that if he went over to the Socialists then, sooner rather than later, Congress would come a cropper at the polls. Thus Gandhi instructed Patel to withdraw in Nehru's favour. Patel had no choice but to agree. His own political position depended wholly upon Gandhi's complaisance, financial support from mainly Hindu business men, and the support of the machine politicians within the Pradesh Committees. All of these would leave him in the lurch if Nehru joined the younger generation of popular, leftist, leaders- thus splitting the party and depriving it of legitimacy. In this scenario, Gandhi himself would soon become irrelevant. The financiers would cut off money for his stupid schemes. The machine politics of the Congress Pradesh Committees would be disrupted because their ability to get candidates elected would be questioned.
Why could Patel not take on Nehru as a 'vote catcher' in his own right? Why was it a foregone conclusion that, if Nehru wouldn't play second fiddle to him, he must do so to Nehru?
The answer is that Patel could not get elected C.M of Bombay Presidency- forget P.M of India. Even if Gujerat had been a separate state, Patel couldn't have been elected as its C.M.
By contrast, Nehru could be elected CM in the most populous province of India. As a native Hindi speaker- and Brahman to boot (Brahmans are a numerically large class in U.P & Bihar) - he could represent the largest single language area in India. He was popular with the young and, thanks to people like Rafi Ahmed Kidwai, even appealed to Muslims. After all, the Nehru family had come up a little under the Mughals. They had no ancestral chip on their shoulder with respect to Islam.
Dalits, like Jagjivan Ram, might have a problem with old fashioned High Caste leaders like Rajendra Prasad, but they felt Nehru, though oblivious to their problems, presented no similar stumbling block. Recall, that Dalit leaders knew the truth about Champaran and Prasad's role there. Only the high caste tenants benefited from Gandhi's campaign there. The Dalits ended up worse off. A man with the name 'Patel'- i.e. one from a dominant farming caste- would be bound to squeeze the Dalits so that they would receive even less pay as agricultural labourers. The Bhoodan swindle, in which J.P Narayan (a Kayastha like Rajendra Prasad and, Narayan's father in law, Brajkishore Prasad) was involved, was about fooling Dalits to stay on as a captive labour force on the pretence of giving them some nebulous and non-fungible title to little strips of marginal land.
Interestingly, the industrialists would have been prepared to switch to financing Nehru because he was not personally corrupt or greedy and wasn't constantly badgering them to pay for stupid schemes or trying to squeeze money out of them in return for permits or contracts. It is entirely feasible that, had Nehru broken with the Congress machine, a less corrupt type of indicative planning might have resulted in rapid technological progress of a 'zaibatsu' type- i.e. there might have been a 'Bombay plan' on steroids enabling indigenous Business Houses to catch up technologically with those in the West.
Patel, a farmer's son, had excellent moral and intellectual qualities- though, it must be said, this is quite usual amongst people of his background. His problem was that his elder brother, Vittalbhai, had somewhat queered the pitch for him. In particular, Vittalbhai had given a bequest to Netaji Bose and, very foolishly, Patel had disputed the will in court. Though he won, he had alienated the Left and shown filial impiety in a financial matter. This episode exposed the hypocritical aspect of Gandhi-giri. It seemed the Mahatma only sponsored a boycott of British courts when it was other people's money which was involved. When it came to paying out a bequest for a patriotic purpose to some person from a different part of India, with somewhat different views, it was perfectly proper to go to Court and show that one's elder brother was so incompetent a barrister that he could not even draft his own will properly.
Nehru's getting the Presidency of Congress did not clinch his victory in the race to be the first Head of Government of independent India. As I have said, the post was unimportant and soon palmed off on Kripalani- who being a Sindhi, had no grass roots constituency whatsoever.
If this still seems unfair, consider the manner in which, almost immediately, Patel showed why he was unworthy of the top job. This happened when he took the Home portfolio, under the Cabinet Mission Plan, thinking he could run circles round Liaquat Ali Khan who had taken the Finance Portfolio. Khan completely outfoxed Patel by using Muslim civil servants to paralyse the administration. Then came his stroke of genius, he outflanked Congress on the Left by proposing to tax the Hindu bania out of existence. Nehru, who was genuinely Socialist, could have called his bluff by extending the measure to big land-lords (like Liaquat himself). Patel could not do so. At this moment, Congress's financial supporters made up their minds that Partition was preferable to their own liquidation as a class. It was fortunate for them that the Communists too supported the demand for Pakistan in line with Stalin's 'Nationalities' policy- which also led to Arab Communists having to support the creation of Israel and thus losing their chance to gain power.
Patel showed grit by accepting his second-class status and serving loyally under Nehru. He shielded his boss when taking on the Mahatma and showing the new State could stand up to its Bapuji (Venerable Father).
Nehru was the ideal first Prime Minister for India, not because he went to Harrow, but because he was a Hindi speaking Socialist whom the Congress party machine needed more than he needed them. Thankfully, he was sceptical about Land Reform and thus his Socialism could be of an armchair, Agency Captured variety, mainly financed by foreign aid.
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