Divergent Concepts of Nationhood in India-Pakistan Relations

When India and Pakistan emerged from the same colonial map in August 1947, they inherited a shared geography, intertwined histories, and overlapping cultures. Yet within years, they developed strikingly different ideas about what a nation should be. India built itself around pluralism and a secular constitution that embraced many religions and languages. Pakistan was founded on the idea that religion could be the basis of statehood. These contrasting visions of nationhood are not just academic distinctions. They sit at the very root of the mistrust and conflict that have defined the relationship between the two countries for over seven decades.

Two answers to one question 🔗

The central question both countries had to answer after independence was simple to ask but hard to resolve: what holds a nation together? The freedom movement produced two competing answers. One was the idea of composite nationalism, which held that a shared anti-colonial struggle, common land, and centuries of cultural mixing could bind diverse communities into a single nation. The other was the two-nation theory, which argued that Hindus and Muslims were separate nations with distinct ways of life that could not coexist within one state.

The two-nation theory provided the ideological foundation for Partition and for the creation of Pakistan as a homeland for the subcontinent’s Muslims. Its logic was that religious identity, rather than territory or shared history, defined nationhood. This single divergence in how the two states understood themselves would go on to shape almost everything about their later relationship.

A theory with deep consequences 🔗

It is worth noting that the two-nation theory faced criticism even at the time of Partition. About one-third of the subcontinent’s Muslims continued to live in post-Partition India as citizens alongside a much larger Hindu majority, which complicated the claim that the two communities could not live together. The presence of a large Muslim population in India after 1947 demonstrated a continuing faith in a pluralistic vision, even as Partition itself left deep scars.

India’s choice: a constitution for many 🔗

India responded to the trauma of Partition by deliberately rejecting the idea that religion should define the nation. Rather than assimilating its differences into a single mould, the framers of the Constitution chose to institutionalize diversity through rights, federalism, and secular governance. The challenge they faced was enormous: governing a population divided by religion, language, caste, and colonial legacy.

The Preamble laid the philosophical foundation. It promised to secure liberty of thought, expression, belief, faith, and worship, and to promote fraternity while assuring the dignity of the individual and the unity of the nation. These were not empty declarations. The framers, led by Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, understood that legal and institutional mechanisms were needed to actually protect pluralistic values, not just statements of good intent.

What secularism means here 🔗

Indian secularism is a distinctive model. Unlike the Western idea, which emphasises a strict wall between religion and the state, the Indian version adopts a more inclusive approach. It recognises the importance of religion in citizens’ lives while ensuring the state does not favour or discriminate against any faith. This is sometimes described as a principle of equal respect and “principled distance” from all religions.

A striking fact captures the spirit of this choice. When the country was partitioned in the name of religion, India chose to be secular in a Constituent Assembly where an overwhelming majority of members were Hindus. The word “secular” was formally added to the Preamble later, by the 42nd Amendment in 1976, but the secular character was present from the start. The Supreme Court has since recognised both secularism and pluralism as part of the Constitution’s unamendable basic structure, meaning these principles cannot be dismantled even by a parliamentary majority.

Pakistan’s path: a vacuum and the military 🔗

Pakistan’s story took a sharply different turn, and much of it traces back to a single tragic event. Its founder, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, became the country’s first Governor-General in 1947. But he died the following year, leaving a power vacuum that the new state was not equipped to fill. The Constituent Assembly, tasked with writing a constitution, rapidly lost its legitimacy.

The damage compounded quickly. The country’s first prime minister, Liaquat Ali Khan, was assassinated in 1951, removing the next obvious leader. After Jinnah’s death, the Muslim League failed to transform itself from a nationalist movement into a functioning national party capable of governing a diverse population. Pakistan started out with extremely weak political institutions and a small, disorganised bureaucracy.

The army steps in 🔗

Here lies a crucial contrast with India. The one state institution Pakistan inherited intact and functioning was its armed forces. With civilian institutions floundering and provinces asserting their own identities against the centre, the army was the strongest and most organised body available to step into the void. Less than a decade after independence, in 1958, General Ayub Khan launched the country’s first military coup.

The pattern repeated across the decades. Military rule returned under General Zia-ul-Haq in 1977 and again under General Pervez Musharraf in 1999. India, by contrast, had relatively cohesive institutions and a political leadership determined to keep the military out of politics. This difference in civil-military balance is one of the most important divergences between the two nations, and it flowed directly from how each handled the early years of statehood.

Religion fills the identity gap 🔗

Because Pakistan was founded on religious identity rather than a shared territorial or cultural nationalism, it struggled to develop a unifying national identity after Jinnah. Civilian and military rulers, lacking a clear forward-looking vision, imposed their own competing visions on the state. Over time, religion as interpreted by the state came to play a significant role in politics and governance. This opened the door to sectarian tensions, including violence against minority sects and the use of blasphemy laws.

How divergent nationhood shapes relations 🔗

These contrasting foundations did not stay confined within each country’s borders. They actively shaped how the two states approached each other. The military establishment in Pakistan has often portrayed India as a threat to Pakistan’s Islamic identity, framing the rivalry in religious and ideological terms. The two-nation theory remains tied to Pakistan’s political discourse and has fuelled its territorial claims.

Kashmir is where these divergent ideas of nationhood collide most directly. For Pakistan, a Muslim-majority region joining a secular India challenges the logic of the two-nation theory itself, so the Kashmir issue is often framed as a struggle for self-determination for a Muslim population. For India, retaining a Muslim-majority state validates its secular, pluralistic vision and is viewed through the lens of territorial integrity. The same piece of land carries opposite meanings for each national identity.

Repeated attempts, repeated obstacles 🔗

The relationship has not been one of unbroken hostility. There have been genuine moments of hope, including the 1999 Lahore Declaration and later rounds of composite dialogue. The 1972 Simla Agreement, signed after the war that created Bangladesh, established the Line of Control and committed both sides to resolving disputes peacefully.

Yet these efforts have repeatedly been thwarted by deep-seated mistrust rooted in contrasting national identities. India has generally emphasised dialogue, while tensions have frequently flared through cross-border incidents and disputes over Kashmir. As recently as 2025, a militant attack in Pahalgam triggered a sharp military escalation between the two nuclear-armed neighbours, a reminder of how unresolved these foundational tensions remain.

The shared challenge of holding together 🔗

One often-overlooked point is that both nations have faced the challenge of managing internal diversity, just with different starting principles. India institutionalised its diversity through federalism and constitutional rights, treating internal variation as something to be accommodated rather than erased. Pakistan, lacking a strong civilian framework after Jinnah, saw its provinces assert competing identities against the centre, with the army repeatedly stepping in as the unifying force.

The lesson that emerges is that the architecture a nation chooses at its founding has lasting consequences. India’s decision to build legal protections for pluralism gave it a framework, however imperfect and contested, for holding a diverse society together. Pakistan’s reliance on religious identity, combined with the early loss of its founder and weak institutions, left a gap that the military and religious forces filled. These are not just historical curiosities. They continue to shape how the two countries see themselves and each other today.

What do you think? If Pakistan had not lost Jinnah so early, do you believe its concept of nationhood would have developed along more pluralistic lines? And to what extent do you think a nation’s founding ideas can be revised by later generations, or are they locked in by the choices made at birth?

References

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