 The Radcliffe Commission , dividing Bengal and Punjab , completed its work and reported to Mountbatten on 12 August ; the last Viceroy held the maps until the 17th , not wanting to spoil the independence celebrations in both nations . There had already been ethnically charged violence and movement of populations ; publication of the Radcliffe Line dividing the new nations sparked mass migration , murder , and ethnic cleansing . Many on the " wrong side " of the lines fled or were murdered , or murdered others , hoping to make facts on the ground which would reverse the commission 's verdict . Radcliffe wrote in his report that he knew that neither side would be happy with his award ; he declined his fee for the work . Christopher Beaumont , Radcliffe 's private secretary , later wrote that Mountbatten " must take the blame — though not the sole blame — for the massacres in the Punjab in which between 500 @,@ 000 to a million men , women and children perished " . As many as 14 @,@ 500 @,@ 000 people relocated between India and Pakistan during and after partition . Jinnah did what he could for the eight million people who migrated to Pakistan ; although by now over 70 and frail from lung ailments , he travelled across West Pakistan and personally supervised the provision of aid . According to Ahmed , " What Pakistan needed desperately in those early months was a symbol of the state , one that would unify people and give them the courage and resolve to succeed . " 
