SECTION-1: Dr Mookerjee's Quest for a Political Platform

Dr Mookerjee's resignation created a stir in the country. The Congress circles felt uneasy and the press they controlled tried to minimise the importance of the event. But the people hailed it as a brave act. The citizens of Delhi demonstrated their appreciation for Dr Mookerjee's stand by hosting a grand reception to congratulate him on his bold decision which was attended by more than a thousand representative citizens drawn from all walks of life. Some of the independent-minded Congressmen like H.V. Kamath, Member of Parliament, also hailed his exit from the Cabinet as the beginning of a healthy opposition within the Parliament. But the tragedy of the situation was that no organised opposition then existed within or without Parliament, which was also the Constituent Assembly and was elected indirectly by the Provincial Legislature in 1946 when the main problem before the country was the demand for partition of the country. The Congress then captured all the Hindu seats by presenting itself as the champion of united India, while Muslims, returned by the Muslim League, constituted the main opposition for some time. The Partition converted the Muslim League opposition into the sovereign Parliament of Pakistan. So in the parliamentary debates, the role of opposition had to be played by a few outspoken Congressmen and liberals like Pandit Hriday Nath Kunzru who, however, all belonged to the Congress party for voting purposes. Therefore, after his resignation, Dr Mookerjee found himself a solitary member in the opposition. Although after sometime his erstwhile Cabinet colleagues, K.C. Neogy and John Mathai, also joined him, they soon withdrew from the Parliament altogether thereby leaving Dr Mookerjee to fight the opposition battles single-handedly against a steamroller majority.

Meanwhile, the division between the Hindu traditionalists and the liberal secularists within the Congress was widened by their divergent reactions to the outbreaks of communal violence which occurred in East Bengal and West Bengal during the winter of 1949–1950. The intense public feeling aroused by Gandhi's assassination on 30 January 1948 had caused a reaction against Hindu nationalism and moved the balance of advantage within the Congress party towards the liberals.