Cripps Mission 1942

Also called: Cripps Mission · Topic: The National Movement: Gandhian Era · NCERT: Class 10, Ch 2 "Nationalism in India"; Class 12, Ch 3 "Mahatma Gandhi and the Nationalist Movement"

Meaning

The Cripps Mission was a British offer brought to India by Sir Stafford Cripps in March–April 1942. It promised dominion status after the Second World War (India would rule itself but stay linked to the British Crown) in return for Indian support for the war. [4] Its failure left Congress believing Britain would not share real power during the war. This was one of the direct sparks of the Quit India Movement of August 1942. [2]

Explanation

Background: why Britain sent Cripps

• September 1939: Britain declared India at war with Germany without asking any Indian leader.
• Congress offered to support the war if Britain promised independence after it. Britain refused.
• So the Congress ministries resigned in October 1939.

• Congress then ran individual satyagrahas (1940–41). Chosen persons, one at a time, spoke against the war and courted arrest.

• Lahore Resolution, March 1940: the Muslim League asked for autonomy for the Muslim-majority areas. From then on the struggle was three-way, between Congress, the League and the British.

• Spring 1942: Japan was advancing in South-East Asia. Britain needed Indian help urgently, so it sent Cripps to win Indian support for the war.

What Cripps offered

• Dominion status after the war, not immediate freedom. [4]
• A constitution-making body after the war. Its members would be elected by the provincial legislatures. The princely states would send nominees (members chosen by the rulers, not elected by the people).
• Right of provinces to stay out. A province that did not accept the new constitution could keep out of the Indian Union and make its own arrangement with Britain.
• Congress saw this as an open door to breaking up India.

• It came close to accepting the League's idea of separate Muslim areas without naming it.

• During the war, defence would stay under British control.

How the talks broke down

• The mission sat in Delhi from 22 March to 12 April 1942. [4]
• The hard point was defence.
• Congress demanded an Indian Defence Member in the Viceroy's council, meaning an Indian in charge of defence.

• Britain would not give it.

• Congress rejected the offer. It wanted real power now, not a promise for after the war. It also opposed the provincial opt-out.

• The Muslim League also rejected it, because the offer did not clearly accept Pakistan.
• Gandhi is popularly said to have called the offer "a post-dated cheque", meaning a promise that could only be cashed later, if at all.

Results

• No deal. Indians stayed out of power for the whole war.
• Push to Quit India. The failure of Cripps, the Japanese victories in South-East Asia and anger at British rule led straight to the Quit India resolution. [2]
• 14 July 1942: the Congress Working Committee at Wardha passed the resolution.

• 8 August 1942: the AICC in Bombay adopted it ("Do or Die"). [2][3]

• A pattern was set. No British offer could satisfy Congress and the League together. The same problem wrecked the Cabinet Mission in 1946. [5]

Time, place and evidence

• When: 22 March – 12 April 1942, during the Second World War. [4]
• Where: Delhi. [4]
• Key people:
• Sir Stafford Cripps, the British envoy. He later drafted the Cabinet Mission Plan of 1946. [5]
• Congress, which demanded an Indian Defence Member.
• Gandhi, who soon after gave the Quit India call.

• Jinnah and the Muslim League, the third party to any deal.

• How we know:

• Britannica's entry on the Cripps Mission gives the dates and the dominion status offer. [4]
• Official Indian sources such as PIB link the failure of Cripps to the start of Quit India. [2]
• NCERT Class 12, Ch 3, and Class 10, Ch 2, cover the wider wartime politics.

Don't confuse with

• Cabinet Mission (1946): Cripps took part in both missions. The 1942 mission offered dominion status after the war and broke down over the Defence Member. The 1946 plan proposed a three-tier federation with a weak centre. It collapsed over whether the constituent assembly was bound by a pre-set formula. [5]
• August Offer (1940): this was the Viceroy's earlier wartime offer, made from India. The Cripps Mission was the first time the British cabinet sent its own envoy. It was also the first offer to promise an Indian-made constitution after the war.
• Lahore Resolution (March 1940): this was the League's own demand for autonomy of Muslim-majority areas. Cripps's provincial opt-out clause was a British proposal that only indirectly made room for that demand.
• Quit India Resolution (8 August 1942): this was Congress's answer to the failure of Cripps. It was a demand that British rule end. It was not part of the Cripps offer. [2]

Prelims Hooks

• The Cripps Mission sat in Delhi, 22 March – 12 April 1942. [4]
• It offered dominion status after the war, not immediate independence. [4]
• The talks broke down over the Congress demand for an Indian Defence Member in the Viceroy's council.
• Trap: the Congress and the Muslim League both rejected the offer, for different reasons. Congress objected to the delay, the lack of real power and the provincial opt-out. The League objected that Pakistan was not clearly accepted.
• Chronology: Congress ministries resign (Oct 1939) → Lahore Resolution (Mar 1940) → Cripps Mission (Mar–Apr 1942) → CWC Wardha (14 July 1942) → AICC Bombay "Do or Die" (8 Aug 1942). [2]
• Cripps also drafted the Cabinet Mission Plan (1946): a three-tier federation whose centre kept only defence, foreign affairs and communications. [5]

Mains Points

• A sign of British weakness, not British goodwill. The offer came only because Japan was advancing in South-East Asia. Promising dominion status "after the war" while keeping defence in British hands showed that Britain wanted Indian help without sharing power. The rejection exposed this. It turned Congress from bargaining to the open defiance of Quit India. [2][4]
• Seeds of Partition. The right of provinces to stay out of the Union was the first British offer to accept, in principle, that India could be divided. Read with the Lahore Resolution (1940), it shows how the three-way struggle was already moving towards Partition. In that struggle, no plan could satisfy Congress and the League at once.
• Continuity from 1942 to 1946. Cripps (1942) failed over the Defence Member, and the Cabinet Mission (1946) failed over whether the constituent assembly was bound by a pre-set formula. [4][5] In a GS-I answer, use the two missions together: each British offer failed, and that is why Partition became the British exit route.

Related concepts

• Provincial elections of 1937
• Congress ministries 1937-39
• Wardha scheme of basic education
• Congress Socialist Party
• Haripura session 1938
• Tripuri crisis 1939
• Forward Bloc
• Second World War
• Lord Linlithgow
• Resignation of Congress ministries

Read more

• War, Quit India, Partition and the last heroic days, 1935–48