Partition and the Sikh community: Sardar Baldev Singh writes to Lord Mountbatten, 2 June 1947
A division of India along religious lines, creating a Muslim Pakistan and a largely Hindu India, had to contend with areas where there were significant parties of a third creed, especially the Sikh community in the Punjab, or substantial minorities of a second creed. In agreeing to the plan for partition, Sardar Baldev Singh, the Sikh leader, sought ways in which the Sikhs, ‘as a community, are not subjected to irreparable injury ... Special note should also be taken of the religious and cultural institutions of the Sikhs and the historic role played by them in the Punjab.’
