Punjab Boundary Commission (Radcliffe Commission), 1947

What it was: The Punjab Boundary Commission was one of two panels set up under the 3 June 1947 partition plan, the other for Bengal, both chaired by Sir Cyril Radcliffe. It was constituted on 30 June 1947 and told to demarcate the two parts of Punjab by the contiguous majority areas of Muslims and non-Muslims, taking account of "other factors". The Encyclopaedia of Sikhism says those factors were never defined and were understood to cover Sikh claims based on revenue paid, military service, land developed and holy places.

Who sat on it: Radcliffe in the chair with four High Court judges: Mehr Chand Mahajan and Teja Singh, nominated by Congress, and Din Muhammad and Muhammad Munir, nominated by the Muslim League. Wikipedia says Radcliffe reached India on 8 July 1947 and had about five weeks.

Hearings: The first meeting was on 14 July. Public sittings at Lahore ran from 21 to 31 July under Din Muhammad. Zafrullah Khan argued for the Muslim League, Chamanlal Setalvad for Congress and Harnam Singh for the Shiromani Akali Dal. The members could not agree and submitted separate reports between 3 and 6 August, so Radcliffe decided himself.

The award: It is dated 12 August 1947 and was announced on 16 August (the Encyclopaedia; Wikipedia says 17 August), after independence. East Punjab received the Ambala and Jalandhar divisions, Amritsar district, three Gurdaspur tahsils (Pathankot, Gurdaspur and Batala) and part of Kasur tahsil. Lahore went to Pakistan. Radcliffe later told the journalist Kuldip Nayar that he nearly gave Lahore to India, and that the time he had was too short to do a better job (Scroll).

What it did to the Sikhs: The Encyclopaedia says Sikhs, about 13 per cent of undivided Punjab, were the worst affected. The line split them "vertically into two halves", cut the canal-colony Sikhs of Montgomery, Multan, Lyallpur and Shahpur from their homes, and left holy places in Pakistan. It says Mountbatten said he could find no solution that kept the community together. Wikipedia reports that the 50,000-strong Punjab Boundary Force could not stop the killing and that refugees crossed the new border in large numbers. The Muslim League was also dissatisfied, at not receiving the Muslim-majority tahsils of Gurdaspur and Batala, or Fazilka, Ferozepur and Zira.

Where it stands: The commission ended with its award. Its line is the India-Pakistan border through Punjab today.