{"product_id":"punjab-book-charles-river-9781791717797","title":"The Punjab","description":"*Includes pictures\u003cbr\u003e*Includes contemporary accounts\u003cbr\u003e*Includes online resources and a bibliography for further reading\u003cbr\u003eBritish India ultimately covered some 54 percent of the landmass and 77 percent of the population. By the time the British began to contemplate a withdrawal from India, 565 princely states were officially recognized, in addition to thousands of zamindaris and jagirs, which were in effect feudal estates. The stature of each Princely State was defined by the number of guns fired in salute upon a ceremonial occasion honoring one or other of the princes. These ranged from nine-gun to twenty-one-gun salutes and, in a great many cases, no salute at all.\u003cbr\u003eThe Princely States were reasonably evenly spread between ancient Muslim and Hindu dynasties, but bearing in mind the minority status of Muslims in India, Muslims were disproportionately represented. This tended to grant Muslims an equally disproportionate share of what power was devolved to local leaderships, and it positioned powerful Muslim leaders to exert a similarly unequal influence on British policy. \u003cbr\u003eIt stands to reason, therefore, as India began the countdown to independence after World War I, that the Indian Muslim leadership would begin to express anxiety over the prospect of universal suffrage and majority rule. At less than 20 percent of the population, Indian Muslims would inevitably find themselves overwhelmed by the Hindu majority, and as the British prepared to divest themselves of India, ancient enmities between Hindu and Muslim, long papered over by the secular and remote government of Britain, began once again to surface.\u003cbr\u003eWhile the conflict between India and Pakistan is multi-faceted, there has always been great division over the Punjab. The word","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50390944612625,"sku":"CIN1791717799G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"EUR","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ NEW \/ INGRAM","offer_id":51050516152593,"sku":"NIN9781791717797","price":0.0,"currency_code":"EUR","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1791717799.jpg?v=1750994524","url":"https:\/\/www.worldofbooks.com\/de-de\/products\/punjab-buch-charles-river-9781791717797","provider":"World of Books ","version":"1.0","type":"link"}