Punjab was the land of Hindus for centuries. In the census of AD 1881, the total population of Punjab was 1.76 crore, out of which 43.8 percent were Hindus, 8.2 percent Sikhs, 47.6 percent Muslims, 0.1 percent Christians and the rest were people of other religions.
In the Census of 1941, the total population of Punjab was 3.43 crore, out of which Hindus were found only 29.1 percent. Muslims were found to be 53.2 percent, Sikhs 14.9 percent, Christians 1.9 percent and the remaining 1.3 percent.
Thus the number of Hindus declined by 14.7 percent in 60 years, while that of Muslims had increased by 5.6 percent, that of Sikhs by 6.7 percent and that of Christians by 1.8 percent.
The Ghori government had no account of where lakhs of Hindus of Punjab had gone during this period.
If anyone could have right over the land of Punjab, it could have been shared by Hindus and Sikhs, but now that Punjab was going to be partitioned, the Muslim League wanted to take possession of Punjab by doing hooliganism so that Hindus and Sikhs would be given Punjab. Entire Punjab can be merged with Pakistan by evicting it.
The brave caste of Sikhs could not tolerate this. Their leader Master Tarasingh demanded a separate Sikhistan and called upon all the common Sikhs to abolish the Muslim League. On the call of Master Tara Singh, the Sikhs organized a massive demonstration against the Muslim League and Pakistan in Lahore on 4 March 1947. Muslim League goons attacked this procession which created a ruckus.
Massacres took place in almost all the major cities of Punjab including Lahore, Amritsar, Taxila and Rawalpindi. According to government figures 2,049 people were killed, more than 1000 people were badly injured. According to press reports, machine guns and rifles were also used by the Muslim League in these riots. That is, the Muslim League government of Punjab had opened the mouths of the police and military arsenals to the goons of the Muslim League.
Since January 1947, secret rallies were organized by the Muslim League throughout Punjab. Skulls and photographs of the victims of Hindu treachery and cruelty would be displayed in those rallies. Occasionally, people alive and wounded were also driven from one rally to another, showing their wounds in front of everyone and narrating how they were caused by sly and ruthless Hindus.
These rallies were sometimes secret and sometimes public, devouring the religious liberality of that region. The combined state government of Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs, which had ruled successfully for ten years, had to resign abruptly, due to the cracks in religious liberalism.
The first wave of violence came in March when a Sikh leader (Master Tarasingh) raised the Muslim League flag 'Pakistan Murdabad' Knocked down with the slogan of. 3000 people, most of them Sikhs, were killed in these riots, which broke out in city-town, country-country, as the Muslims took up arms to avenge the humiliation of the League.
About 1 lakh persons fled from Lahore. People come out of their homes only for very important work. Whether a person who has gone out of the house will come back or not is never believed. As a police officer wrote- 'Death would have come like lightning in Lahore. It came like this, went like this. Before anyone can shout, save! The corpse would have fallen. Every door closed, every street deserted, it is not known who the murderer was and where he went.' Both Hindus and Muslims were committing more violence than each other.
In response to the massacre of the Sikhs of Punjab by the Muslims in March 1947, the Sikhs should have immediately left with arms. When this did not happen, it was a big surprise for security officials and politicians. He understood that a brave and war-loving community like the Sikhs had lost its warmth. Wealth has made them comfortable. But this assessment of the mind of the Sikhs was completely wrong.
In early June, a secret meeting of Sikh leaders took place at a hotel in Lahore. These leaders wanted to decide what should be the Sikh garrison if partition really took place.
In that meeting, Master Tarasingh said- 'Just as the Japanese and the Nazis made self-sacrifice, we should also be ready for self-sacrifice. The day is not far when our earth will be invaded and the honor of our women will be at stake. get up! Destroy these Mughal invaders once again. Our native land is asking for blood. We will surely quench the thirst of Mother Earth - with our own blood and the blood of our enemies.'
It cannot be said from what source Larry Collins and Dominic Lapierre have taken the above excerpts from Tarasimha's speech! Because he didn't give any source. He writes- 'Fifty lakh out of six million Sikhs of India were settled in Punjab alone in those days. Even though they were only 13 percent of the total population of Punjab, but 40 percent of the land was in their possession. Two-thirds of Punjab's unique crops were produced by the Sikhs. His fascination for weapons can be estimated from the fact that one-third of the Indian Armed Forces were Sikhs and half of the medals won by the Indian Army in both world wars were due to Sikhs.'