I don't know much about what happened during the partition but Gandhi and the Congress monumental blunder was to cave in to Jinnah's demands too early. The colonial military/police forces of the day should have stepped in to stop the violence at the time at any cost. Their agreement to the partition didn't end the violence but instead it only got worse. A Gandhi who led his people defiantly against the British should have more fervently battled the violent campaigns which were specifically to make partition work. If he could have got the British on his side to end the violence and force free elections to chose the party and its chosen independance plan, Congress would have won and a united India would have been more likely.(An example is Malaysia which had nationwide elections in 1955 and a multi party winning coalition led it to independance in 1957). The ordinary man in the street wanted freedom...a few bad hats fuelled communal hatred in these naive, illiterate and desperately poor individuals. The country would have avoided half of the problems it has today without Pakistan and given Pakistanis a decent democratic society to live in, free from military and religious anarchy.
