- Lord Mountbatten advanced British withdrawal to August 1947 due to communal violence
- British rule ended on August 15, 1947, per the Indian Independence Act passed on July 4
- Pakistan's independence ceremony in Karachi took place on August 14, 1947
India is not the only country that celebrates its independence from British rule in August. While India commemorates independence on August 15, Pakistan, born out of the 1947 Partition, celebrates its Independence Day on August 14.
History and circumstances are the reasons for the difference.
The date of the Independence Day celebration was not always set in stone. Early in 1947, the Labour government of Britain appointed Lord Louis Mountbatten as the last Viceroy of India. He was charged with the responsibility of overseeing the transfer of power from British control to Indian hands.
The transition was initially fixed for not later than June 1948. But increasing communal violence and worsening law and order compelled Mountbatten to advance the date to August 1947 with a view to hastening the British withdrawal.
The British Parliament legislated on July 4, 1947, the Indian Independence Act, and it ordered that British rule would end on August 15, 1947. Two new nations, India and Pakistan, were born on this day. However, the exact borders between these two countries were not disclosed until August 17 to avoid unrest.
Mountbatten later revealed that he selected August 15 in part simply because it happened to be the second anniversary of Japan's surrender at the end of World War II, a date which represented the conclusion of imperial conflict and not nationalist jubilation.
Why, then, does Pakistan hold its celebrations on August 14? Pakistan's official papers and its founding father, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, originally used the date August 15 to refer to the day of independence. But by 1948, Pakistan had moved its celebrations to August 14 for practical and symbolic reasons.
The primary reason was based on the timing of the formal transfer of power ceremonies. In Karachi, the transfer occurred during the day on August 14, 1947. Mountbatten officiated the ceremony there before proceeding to New Delhi to officiate over the midnight ritual commemorating India's independence on August 15.
Another rationale is that August 14, 1947, also coincided with the 27th day of Ramadan, a holy time in the Islamic calendar, and thus gave religious importance to Pakistan's selection. Pakistan has since celebrated August 14 as its Independence Day, though India retains August 15 as the date of freedom.
