ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the UP Congress party’s relationship with Muslims particularly after the announcement of June 3 plan to partition India. This caused a round of Hindu counter-mobilization in the state with growing demands to send disloyal Muslims to Pakistan, their dismissal from state services and polices, compulsory retirement of Muslims as well as return of Hindu religious sites ‘usurped’ by Muslim conquerors. The practicalities of electoral politics, however, made Muslims because of their population and concentration in urban centres to become a coveted constituency which no political party including the Congress could ignore. The Congress capitalized on Muslim insecurities after partition violence to cement their vote but soon Muslim as a community became disenchanted with the Congress for their failure to provide them social and economic security, jobs, failure to make Urdu a secondary language and declining representation in police and party posts. The Aligarh riots of 1961 and controversy surrounding AMU minority character added to tensions between Muslims and UP Congress over the latter’s failure to provide assurances to minorities and fears of a resurgence of Muslim communalism in 1960s.
