[2][3] It followed the fall of a coalition government of the Punjab Unionists, Indian National Congress and Akali Dal, achieved through a six-week campaign by the Muslim League.

[15] After withdrawing from the Cabinet Mission plan in July 1946, Muslim League leader Muhammad Ali Jinnah called for "Direct Action" in August.

[18] The neighbouring Rawalpindi Division received thousands of Hindu and Sikh refugees who had been driven out from the Hazara district of NWFP.

On 2 March 1947, Khizar Hayat Tiwana resigned as premier in light of the Muslim League agitations and campaign against his ministry, and the official announcement of the imminent end of British rule.

[24][e] Akali Dal leader Master Tara Singh notoriously made a public spectacle of his disapproval of the Pakistan demand outside the Punjab Assembly on 3 March.

[25][26] Communal clashes erupted in Lahore and Amritsar on 4 March after Hindus and Sikhs began demonstrations against the Pakistan demand.

Faced with resistance from the Hindus and Sikhs in the divisional headquarters of Rawalpindi, Muslim mobs banded together and turned to the countryside.

[31][18][32][f] The mobs went on a rampage, engaging in arson, looting, massacres and rape, one village after the other in the districts of Rawalpindi, Jhelum and Cambellpur (present-day Attock).

[34] Houses in the Sikh and Hindu quarters of the village of Kahuta were torched with their occupants present inside, while women were abducted to be raped.

An armed Muslim mob laid siege to the village, asking the Sikh residents to convert to Islam.

[44] Villages in the Gujar Khan and Cambellpur districts were decimated, dead bodies of children were found hanging from trees and girls as young as eleven had been gang-raped.

– discuss]First of all minorities were disarmed with the help of local police and by giving assurances by oaths on holy Quran of peaceful intentions.

On their resistance having collapsed, lock breakers and looters came into action with their transport corps of mules, donkeys and camels.

[50] Muslim policemen aided and abetted the violence at many places throughout West Punjab, and at times responded inordinately late to appeals for help.

[57] The official death toll for non-Muslims killed in the Rawalpindi district alone stood at 2,263,[j] however, this number was considered inaccurate due to "the widespread nature of disturbances" and a collapse of "normal administrative machinery".

[62] The massacres triggered a mass-migration of Sikhs and Hindus from the Rawalpindi Division to central and eastern Punjab, Sikh-ruled princely states, Jammu and Kashmir, Delhi and the United Provinces.

[63][64][65] The massacres had a deep impact on the Sikhs and Hindus of the Punjab, who planned to avenge them later by unleashing similar violence on the Muslims of the eastern portions of the province, to make way for the settlement of the refugees who had been driven out from the west.

[74] Despite identification by fact-finding committees, few of the perpetrators were ever brought to justice, partly because of communal polarisation of the legal system.

[59][m] The events, in particular the massacre and mass suicide at Thoha Khalsa, were depicted in the 1988 television film Tamas, directed by Govind Nihalani.

[82] A Punjabi novel based on the events called Khoon de Sohille written by Nanak Singh was published in 1948.