The History of British Diplomacy in Pakistan

Ian Talbot

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781000326703
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: British History
• Index: History

This book is the first account of the British diplomatic mission in Pakistan from its foundation at the end of the Raj in 1947 to the 'War on Terror'.

Drawing on original documents and interviews with participants, this book highlights key events and personalities as well as the influence and perspectives of individual diplomats previously not explored. The book demonstrates that the period witnessed immense changes in Britain's standing in the world and in the international history of South Asia to show that Britain maintained a diplomatic influence out of proportion to its economic and military strength. The author suggests that Britain's impact stemmed from colonial-era ties of influence with bureaucrats, politicians and army heads which were sustained by the growth of a Pakistani Diaspora in Britain. Additionally, the book illustrates that America's relationship with Pakistan was transactional as opposed to Britain's, which was based on ties of sentiment as, from the mid-1950s, the United States was more able than Britain to give Pakistan the financial, military and diplomatic support it desired.

A unique and timely analysis of the British diplomatic mission in Pakistan in the decades after independence, this book will be of interest to academics working in the fields of South Asian History and Politics, International Relations, British and American Diplomacy and Security Studies, Cold War Politics and History and Area Studies.

Part I
The Formative Phase

1 Partition and the Establishment of a British Diplomatic Mission in Karachi

John Cotton booked into the Palace Hotel, at Club Road Karachi, on a humid morning at the beginning of July 1947.¹ While he was still settling into his room, ominous clouds deposited large rain droplets that imprinted themselves in the sandy soil outside. He had only recently said farewell to his wife Mary and their three children in the cool of Simla. Still only 38, Cotton had held a string of postings as a ‘Political’ in the Indian Princely States, after being commissioned in March 1930 in the Indian 8th Light cavalry.² The Cotton family’s connections with India stretched back to the 1770s.³ Now just six weeks before the British departure, John Cotton had journeyed to Karachi to set up a United Kingdom High Commission in preparation for the creation of Pakistan. He noted in his journal:

The instructions as to how I was to proceed … were of the sketchiest … I was merely

told that a bank account had been opened in my name in Karachi and I was to locate

and rent suitable office accommodation and residential family accommodation …

But no one could provide me with any detailed idea of the size of the new post in

terms of the number of officials who would eventually become the regular staff of

what amounted to the equivalent of an Embassy at the Capital of the new state.⁴

In this chapter, we examine Cotton’s efforts to establish an overseas mission from scratch. The creation of foreign embassies and high commissions is a neglected aspect of Karachi’s early post-colonial development. Narratives have focused instead either on the large scale refugee rehabilitation, and its resultant social and political tensions,⁵ or on the ‘heroic’ improvisation of a Pakistani administrative structure which in its early days saw ministries working from barracks, and officials using packing cases as desks and thorns as paper clips.⁶

The legacies of Partition understandably shaped the work of the nascent High Commission. They form the second and third sections of the chapter. The High Commission’s consular tasks included the repatriation of ‘distressed’ British residents and the unfamiliar role, after April 1948, of oversight for the maintenance of European cemeteries. Political reporting was taken up with concerns over the stability of the Pakistan Government as it struggled with refugee rehabilitation and factional infighting. We will see in a subsequent chapter how the input from the diplomatic outposts crucially informed Karachi’s despatches to London.

Searching for a Diplomatic Home

Cotton’s task would have been easy if British diplomats could have simply moved into Karachi’s Government House. The R.T. Russel designed building, which had been constructed less than a decade earlier, occupied the site of the first Governor of Sind’s (Sir Charles Napier) residence. It was, however, earmarked as the Residence of Pakistan’s founder and first Governor-General, Mohammad Ali Jinnah. Revered as the Quaid-i-Azam (Great Leader) by his Muslim League followers, he had achieved Pakistan against the odds.⁷ Although Jinnah had been educated in Karachi until the age of 15 at Sindh Madrassahtul Islam, and the Christian Missionary High School, he had spent most of his career as a lawyer and later politician in Bombay and Delhi. On the eve of independence, the transformed city of Karachi was nearly as unfamiliar to him as it was to Cotton.

Karachi’s acute housing shortage further complicated Cotton’s task. The expansion of the once sleepy port city during the 1920s and 1930s had been followed by rapid wartime growth. By the 1940s, Karachi had overtaken Bombay as the main port for exporting raw cotton. It was also developing fast as an air-transportation hub.⁸ Growth came at a cost. Accommodation was scarce. Local landlords anticipated a further bonanza with the post-independence influx of government officials as well as foreign diplomats.

Cotton regarded it a ‘major triumph’ that he was able to acquire the Sind Collector’s house as the High Commission Residency, ‘thanks to the cooperation of a number of well- disposed British officials in the Sind Government.⁹ The house was located in one of the best residential areas of the city, opposite the cricket ground of the Gymkhana Club. He also used his contacts with the Sind Government to rent a modern house (230 Somerset Street) that was subdivided into two semi-detached units for the use of the next two most senior officials in the embryo High Commission, namely the Deputy High Commissioner (Colonel R.R. Burnett) and the Trade Commissioner (W. Godfrey). Burnett had served like Cotton in the Princely States, most recently as the Resident of Rajputana.

The first U.K. High Commissioner to Pakistan, Laurence Grafftey-Smith in his autobiography paints a rather rose-tinted account of the Karachi Residency which was named Fairfield.¹⁰ He recalls its wide lawn, fringed with ‘hibiscus, zinnias and sweet sultans’ that enabled, ‘His Majesty’s Birthday celebrations and other hospitable exercises’.¹¹ Cotton’s journal provides a more modest picture of a building that was ‘reasonably presentable’, ‘though probably too small for its purpose’.¹² It was certainly not a diplomatic residence that exuded power. Even Grafftey-Smith admitted that the dining-room’s furniture, ‘betrayed symptoms of a bad joke’.¹³ At one level, the Residency’s modest surroundings seem nothing more than a trivial historical detail. However, its contrast with the newer and larger Government House symbolised Britain’s diminished position following the transfer of power. Similarly, Fairfield’s disparity with the palatial residence of the U.K. High Commissioner in New Delhi eloquently testified to India’s and Pakistan’s differing roles as the successor state to the British Raj and a seceding state.¹⁴

The acquisition of Fairfield was just Cotton’s first task. He still had to busy himself with procuring office premises and accommodation for junior officials. He managed to lease office space from the British Chamber of Commerce which ‘owned outright a large and handsome building’. This was conveniently located in Wood Street in the centre of the city. ‘It was in fact somewhat larger than the Chamber really needed so much so that they had let out the rear portion of one wing to the Indian Post and Telegraph Department’. Nonetheless, it was once again modest in comparison with its counterpart chancery in New Delhi at Six Albuquerque Road which stood in seven acres of grounds and contained over 20 rooms, including a billiard room and library.¹⁵ This building which dated from the early 1930s served as both an office and a residence for the U.K. Deputy High Commissioner.

‘Little by little’, Cotton’s memoir continues, ‘We signed up other accommodation- a large rambling house divisible into 3 for married First Secretaries … on Mary Road and another rather run-down edifice for the Military Advisor in Clifton where the Pakistan Government finally located their Foreign Office’.¹⁶ Accommodation was the most pressing, but not the only aspect of Cotton’s job. In the absence of any office equipment supplies from either London or New Delhi, he went about purchasing typewriters and even stationery. He also recruited temporary secretaries and clerical officers, ‘from amongst the British ladies of Karachi’. Finally, he bought some cars and hired ex-Indian Army men as chauffeurs.

Cotton in the space of a few short weeks laid the groundwork for the infrastructure of a British Diplomatic Mission in Karachi which was to remain the headquarters until the move to Rawalpindi/Islamabad in the mid-1960s. There were of course later additions to the building estate. The Military Services Section was officially opened on 5 February 1948 in Karachi House on McLeod Road and worked from there until it was wound up 14 months later.¹⁷ Further accommodation was required for the growing number of staff, including a rented bungalow for security officers at 5-B Cosmopolitan Colony.¹⁸ The increasingly busy passport office was situated on the third floor of Finlay House, in McLeod Road, a short distance from the Chamber of Commerce Building. The British Information Services were housed at El Markaz. Little progress was made however on the Port Trust Estate at Clifton before the move to Rawalpindi/Islamabad. The 15 acres Estate had been purchased in 1950 to build new offices and hostels. The Chairman’s bungalow, Runneymede, was earmarked as a new Residence for the High Commissioner. In contrast, York Place (the Chief Engineer’s bungalow) was similarly seen as accommodation for his deputy Burnett and Acton House (the Traffic Manager’s bungalow) for the Senior Trade Commissioner. In the event, no new buildings were erected on the estate and the three existing bungalows were divided into staff quarters for 18 U.K. based staff.¹⁹ With the movement of staff, north to the new capital, York Place was converted into the offices of the Deputy High Commission at Karachi.

Cotton had excellently exploited contacts with the Sind Government. Nonetheless, his improvisations indicated the haste surrounding Pakistan’s creation. Diplomatic property and personnel were already in place in New Delhi before the Indian leaders agreed to Partition in the hope that it would end the mounting communal violence. Partition was agreed on 3 June, and the British were to transfer power to India/Pakistan on 14/15 August. The British as the outgoing rulers were ahead of the scramble for diplomatic properties. Many foreign diplomats endured uncomfortable months in the Palace Hotel, which provided makeshift office and residential space. The French only announced the appointment of an Ambassador to Paki...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of Figures
• Foreword
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• Part I: The Formative Phase
• Part II: From High Commission to Embassy
• Part III: The Contemporary High Commission
• Conclusion: The History of British Diplomacy in Pakistan
• Appendix Heads of the UK Diplomatic Mission in Pakistan
• Index