ABSTRACT
The immediate and declared objective of the Cripps mission was to evolve a scheme to resolve the political deadlock, which would make it possible to induct political leaders into government and organize public resistance against the Japanese if they invaded India. The Muslim League and the British Government had benefited from the Cripps mission, while the Congress had suffered a setback. The understanding of the Congress of the implications of the Cripps mission plan, as Azad told Cripps, was the same: that his plan had prejudiced any more favourable solution to the problem and had made it more difficult for any agreement between the Congress and the Muslim League. Viewed in the long-term strategy of the campaign for Pakistan, the Gandhi-Jinnah talks were another milestone, marking further progress from the offer of Lord Linlithgow in August 1940 and the Cripps Mission in 1942.
