In 1947, the Hindu king of Jodhpur was so tempted to join Pakistan that Muhammad Ali Jinnah handed him a signed, blank sheet of paper and told him to write his own terms.
When the British partitioned India, the over 500 princely states had to choose between acceding to India or Pakistan. Jodhpur was a massive, Hindu-majority desert state sharing a long border with Pakistan. Its young ruler, Maharaja Hanwant Singh, saw a rare opportunity for leverage. Jinnah, hoping to drive a wedge into India's western frontier, was prepared to give the Maharaja whatever he wanted. The offers on the table included free access to the Karachi port, arms manufacturing rights, and independent jurisdiction over the regional railway system.
Indian leaders Lord Mountbatten and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel quickly learned of the secret negotiations. Patel recognized that losing Jodhpur would be disastrous for the territorial integrity of independent India. He stepped in with a counter-offer, guaranteeing Jodhpur the continuation of its railway jurisdiction and offering robust famine relief. More importantly, Mountbatten warned Hanwant Singh that his Hindu subjects would almost certainly revolt if he aligned a Hindu-majority state with a Muslim nation during a time of intense communal violence.
The pressure from both sides brought Hanwant Singh to a breaking point. During a tense meeting in Delhi to finalize the Instrument of Accession with V.P. Menon, the Secretary of the Ministry of States, the Maharaja finally agreed to sign his state over to India. As soon as Mountbatten left the room, however, the young king snapped. In a sudden fit of rage, Hanwant Singh pulled out a .22 caliber pistol hidden inside a specialized pen, pointed it directly at Menon's head, and shouted, "I refuse to accept your dictation!"
Mountbatten rushed back in upon hearing the commotion and managed to defuse the situation. Hanwant Singh calmed down, the accession papers went through, and Jodhpur officially became part of India. The Maharaja’s flirtation with Pakistan ended up being a brief diplomatic crisis, but his blank-check offer from Jinnah remains one of the most remarkable near-misses of the partition.