From what I have read there was definitely a plan by the Sikh leadership to create Khalistan/Sikhistan in 1947. The reason why this is never highlighted is that after the plan failed the Sikhs had to prove that they were as loyal as the others as Indians and hence the constant refrain since 1947 about how Sikhs were at the forefront of the freedom movement. After 1947 the Sikhs had to prove their nationalist credentials especially as their struggle for Punjabi Suba was being portrayed as an attempt at creating a Sikh state. Sikhs activities aimed at creating Khalistan/Sikhistan in 1947 normally gets a couple of lines in the standard books on partition.
In the partition negotiations the only option the British have to the Sikhs was either to join Pakistan and thus the Punjab would not have to be partitioned or for it to be partitioned because the Sikhs wanted to join India. The Sikhs having experienced Muslim rule knew just what would be in store for the Sikhs in Pakistan so the Sikhs opted to join India and have the Punjab partitioned. The mistake the Sikh leadership made through Baldev Singh was the accept the Radcliffe award in ADVANCE as did the Congress and Muslim League. The Sikhs should have refused to accept the Radcliffe award in advance unless the 'other factors' in the terms of reference were defined ie Sikh historical Gurdwaras, Sikh land holdings etc The Sikh leadership could have derailed the whole British plan to leave India quickly by refusing to accept the Radcliffe award and then working with the Sikh states to derail Mountbatten's plan to force the Maharajas to join either India or Pakistan. The Sikhs could have played havoc with the carefully laid out British plans.
Having made the mistake of accepting the Radcliffe award in advance, the Sikhs were left with only one option and that was the ensure that East Punjab was cleared of Muslims so that Sikhs who were left in Pakistan by the Radcliffe award would be able to come over to East Punjab. The Sikh leadership did at least make common cause with the Sikh Maharajas to ensure that the Sikhs were ready and able to drive the Muslims out of East Punjab and the Sikh states.
The Sikh leadership knew that they could not start anything while the British were still in charge so the plan was to start after the Radcliffe award was announced. The Maharajas were to concentrate on taking over the districts adjoining their states. Faridkot was to take over Ferozpur district and Patiala was to take over districts to the east of the state. The Jathas reinforced by soldiers from the Sikh states and ex-soldiers from the Indian army were to take over Amritsar and Lahore and the canal colonies.
Why did it fail? There are a number of reasons for this.
At most the Jathas had 100,000 members split all over Punjab. Some Jathas were a few hundred in number and other were many thousands. The Jathas had a good strategy and the help of former soldiers as well as soldiers of the Sikh states made these Jathas very effective. They were also able to swell their numbers by getting help from Sikhs in the local area who were not members of these Jathas. According to a paper I read called The Master and the Maharajas, the Jathas had plans to evict the Muslims from areas of British Punjab that Sikhs wanted to be a part of Sikhistan but the East Punjab Muslims especially in the Sikh states were in an aggressive mood and started to congregate in large numbers at various places which became a security concern for the non-Muslim residents of these areas. Muslims also attacked Sikh and Hindu villages in these areas and therefore the Jathas had to operate in the Sikhs states to deal with these Muslims whereas in the initial estimation the Sikh states would have been considered as safe areas not requiring any Jatha activity until the main objectives had been achieved.
The Jathas also were not in a position to openly challenge the Punjab Boundary Force (PBF)which were the only military force to operate in the crucial central Punjab area. The PBF could call upon tanks to support them and in one clash they killed over 60 members of a Jatha that had clashed with them because of their having support from tanks. If the Jathas has been supplied with anti-Tank weapons then they would have had a much better chance of success against the PBF. Also not much action seems to have been taken to bring over the Sikh troops in the PBF force over to the side of the Jathas. The PBF devoid of the support of the Sikh troops would have become ineffective.
To create a viable Sikhistan, the Sikhs would have had to take areas allocated to Pakistan in the Radcliffe award such as Lahore, Nankana Sahib and the canal colonies of Lyallpur and Montgomery. In Lahore city the Sikhs were only 5% while the Muslims were 64% and the Hindus 26%. By the time of the Radcliffe award a majority of the Hindus and Sikhs had already left the city as the Muslims had burnt the Hindus out of their main base Shahalmi area, so to gain the city would have entailed a siege without much support from inside the city. Had the Hindus held out like the Sikhs had in Amritsar then the city could have been an objective for the Jathas. As the Jathas also now had to deal prematurely with the Muslims in East Punjab and the Sikh states there would have been no manpower to spare to take Lahore. The same was with the case canal colonies, the Sikhs there stayed put and were well organised but with no help coming from the Jathas from East Punjab, these Sikhs would have not be able to take the offensive against the Muslims in their areas. The only thing that was provided in the end was an order to move to India and some men to escort the Sikh caravans to East Punjab.
The Sikhistan plan also envisaged that the Indian would be strong and may even assist the Sikhs with regular troops with which to take back the Sikh areas of West Punjab. Nehru was weak and it was felt that Sardar Patel might either take over the government and assist the Sikhs or that he might bully Nehru into doing so. It was also felt that the Pakistan govt would be weak and being a being far from Punjab in Karachi would not be able to take control of West Punjab. The Indian government was weak for more than six months and in West Punjab the Pakistan government was never put to the test due to the factors outlines above.
The main drawbacks of the Sikhistan plan was that it relied on too many variables such as support from Indian govt, a weak Pakistan and a passive Muslim population in East Punjab and the Sikh states. Also the Sikhs were caught in a catch 22 situation. If they revolted before the Radcliffe award then they would have faced British troops and a unified British Indian army but if they revolted after Radcliffe award they would be fighting against an agreed upon border to which they had already accepted in advance. Also the plan needed to be better thought out. Sikhs troops should have been ordered to leave their barracks and make for Punjab and join the Jathas. Sikh troops of the PBF should have been won over and thus the PBF neutralised. Like the Jews did exactly a year later, the Sikhs should have aimed to arm the Jathas with more modern weapons and turned them into regular units. The Jews were even able to set up a small Air Force in Palestine just as the British left so something similar could also have been attempted by the Sikhs. There were a lot of Sikh soldiers who had experience in fighting in tank units and the Sikh states should have arranged for the supply of these types of weapons which would have turned the tide against the Muslims in West Punjab. Had this been done then it is likely that given what the Jathas had achieved in East Punjab then these units of paramilitaries could have taken over areas of West Punjab as well.
Another drawback of the Sikhistan plan was that the Sikh states did not fight to become independent after the end of the British paramountcy over them ended in 1947. They meekly accepted a change of masters and had they held out against Mountbatten and with the support of the Sikhs in British areas threatening violence they could have forced Mountbatten to allow them to become independent or merge into an Independent Sikh state. With their eastern front defended by the Sikh state thus preventing any Indian intervention in Punjab, the Sikhs had they been better armed and formed into regular army units could have had a free hand in West Punjab against a weak Pakistan government. The Sikhs would have had to take West Punjab up to a river boundary so that it would have been easily defensible. The Ravi would have been a good boundary but it would have meant that Nankana Sahib would still be left out so it would probably have been the Chenab as a frontier and this ironically would have been same boundary as demanded by the Sikhs in their representations to the Radcliife commission. The repercussions of what was happening in Punjab would have been felt in other areas of India as well. It is likely that the Rajputana states would have held out for independence as well becoming a headache for India. Seeing what the Sikhs achieving in Punjab, the Dogras may have attempted for an Independent Kashmir and driving out the Muslims from Kashmir making more problems for the Pakistan government. Hyderabad would also have gone for Independence and this would have kept India busy in this area.
When you think about it, had the Sikh leadership both in the British areas and in the Sikh states been better prepared the map of South Asia would have been unrecognisible from what it is today.
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