Explained : Badshah Khan and the Moral Bankruptcy of Religious Politics and Its Impact

January 20, 2026 marks the 38th anniversary of Badshah Khan’s departure from this world.

During India’s freedom struggle, he endured more imprisonment and torture under British rule than any citizen of present-day Pakistan. Although his political journey began with attending the Muslim League session in Agra in 1913, Badshah Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan later emerged as one of the foremost opponents of the Muslim League’s Lahore Resolution of March 23, 1940, which demanded a separate country for Muslims on religious grounds. He paid the price for this opposition until his last breath, long after August 15, 1947. (He passed away on January 20, 1988.)

Speaking or writing against Pakistan while living in India is very different from doing so while living in Pakistan. Badshah Khan lived for nearly a hundred years, and the best part of his life—about a quarter of it—was spent in jail: first resisting British colonial rule and later opposing the creation of Pakistan. He never accepted Pakistan’s existence until his death.

History’s irony is stark. Barrister Muhammad Ali Jinnah and Barrister Vinayak Damodar Savarkar—neither particularly religious—played decisive roles in partitioning the subcontinent on religious lines. In his book Hindutva, Savarkar explicitly argued that Hindus and Muslims constituted two separate nations, while Jinnah succeeded in creating Pakistan on that very premise. In contrast, Badshah Khan, perhaps one of the most deeply religious public figures of his time—comparable to Mahatma Gandhi—stood firmly against religious politics and partition.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced three years ago, on Independence Day, that August 14 would be observed as Partition Horrors Remembrance Day. Pakistan’s undeclared national leader, Field Marshal Asim Munir, has similarly declared that Pakistani children must be taught from an early age why partition was “inevitable.” The intention behind both narratives is the same: to perpetuate communal polarisation. This disease now appears rampant even in neighbouring Bangladesh. The poisonous seeds sown by Savarkar and Jinnah continue to bear fruit across the subcontinent. Communal forces in all three countries have succeeded in keeping religious politics alive generation after generation. This is why the partition occurred—and why, looking at the present condition of these societies, Badshah Khan inevitably comes to mind.

About thirteen months after partition, Jinnah passed away. Savarkar lived for another twenty years. Badshah Khan lived for forty-one more years, reaching the age of one hundred. Much of that time was spent in prison for opposing Pakistan’s creation. With the help of his Red Shirts, the Khudai Khidmatgars, he waged a non-violent struggle against successive Pakistani governments. After the North-West Frontier government banned the Khudai Khidmatgar organisation on July 8, 1948, more than a thousand of its members were imprisoned.

On August 12, 1948—just two days short of the first anniversary of Pakistan’s creation—Pakistani soldiers opened fire on a gathering of Khudai Khidmatgars inside a mosque in Babra village near Charsadda. The massacre, more horrific than Jallianwala Bagh, claimed over two thousand lives, including women and children. The mass grave still exists today, the largest in the area. The Pakistani state tried desperately to suppress news of the atrocity, which occurred within a year of Pakistan’s birth. Around the same time, the Pakistani army also bombed Pashtun areas from the air.

This episode stands as a living test of non-violence. Declaring that “non-violence is the highest dharma” is easy; adhering to it in the face of such brutality is something else entirely. That a Pashtun society—historically associated with armed struggle—embraced non-violence under Badshah Khan’s leadership is perhaps one of the most remarkable experiments in modern history. The title “Frontier Gandhi” was not bestowed lightly.

Under Mahatma Gandhi’s influence, Badshah Khan continued to inspire his followers to remain steadfastly non-violent even after mass killings. The power of non-violence is evident in the fact that peace largely prevailed after the Babra massacre. Living an ordinary life and speaking about non-violence is easy; remaining committed to it amid carnage is the true test. At Babra, this principle was put into practice.

D. G. Tendulkar, author of the six-volume Mahatma, compares Babra to Jallianwala Bagh in his book Abdul Gaffar Khan, writing that the incident was “more barbaric than the Jallianwala massacre.”

This is the fundamental difference between Badshah Khan and many other followers of Gandhi. I know several Gandhians who can deliver eloquent lectures on non-violence, but Badshah Khan alone embodied it in practice. That is what sets him apart from all other opponents of partition. If anyone truly exemplified resistance to partition, it was Badshah Khan—especially while living in Pakistan and rejecting its very legitimacy.

On one side were those who wrote books like Hindutva and merely voiced rhetorical opposition to partition. History records no concrete action taken by them against it—except the assassination of the unarmed, eighty-year-old Mahatma Gandhi. That remains their sole “achievement.”

In truth, it was communal politicians on both sides—Hindutva and Islamist—who partitioned India for selfish ends. Jinnah himself reportedly asked close associates, “Am I creating Pakistan for these ignorant people?”—a revealing admission that ambition, not principle, drove the project. Hindutva forces aided this process. When Congress ministries resigned in protest against the British, the Muslim League and Hindu Mahasabha formed coalition governments in their place—even after the Lahore Resolution. This gave legitimacy to the demand for Pakistan. Yet, whom did they blame and assassinate? Gandhi, who opposed partition until the very end.

Today, there is even a race to glorify Gandhi’s murder—calling it a “slaying,” circulating videos of gunfire at his statues, and openly spewing venom against minorities and Gandhi himself, often with tacit approval from those in power.

I have visited Pakistan twice. During one journey through Punjab, Sindh, and Balochistan toward Iran, I witnessed deep internal hatred within Pakistan. A Punjabi driver accompanying us casually referred to Baloch and Sindhis as “traitors.” Later, security concerns prevented us from travelling by road through Balochistan, and we were flown instead. At Quetta airport, the overwhelming military presence revealed the reality: an unresolved struggle for freedom that continues round the clock.

I learned that tens of thousands of Baloch are missing, and that marches demanding their release are routinely suppressed. It became clear that even after seventy-five years, Pakistan has failed to achieve genuine unity. This is a warning for India as well. Enforcing one language, one religion, or one culture leads to disintegration—as seen not only in Pakistan but also in the collapse of the Soviet Union after seventy years.

During another visit, people from Swat Valley, PoK, and elsewhere tearfully narrated their suffering. The creation of Bangladesh fifty-five years ago stands as another stark reminder of where religious politics leads.

On the 38th remembrance day of Badshah Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan Sahib, there can be no greater tribute than to recall his life and his unwavering commitment to non-violence and human unity.

Dr. Suresh Khairnar is the ex-president of Rashtra Seva Dal