(Re)visit to the alleys of contestation, narratives, and memories that the Partition left behind
Revisiting Partition: Contestation, Narratives and Memories reflects on the experiences of the people whose lives changed forever after the Radcliffe Line was drawn, and on the ongoing influence of the Partition on national, provincial, regional, and local undercurrents.
Following the Partition of India in 1947 and the creation of Pakistan, those living on partitioned territories, especially those residing around the borders, faced multiple challenges. This book attempts to trace the dilemmas of these displaced people who were suddenly declared as refugees on official documents. The book discusses the lack of sensitivity among policymakers in acknowledging the distinct socio-cultural differences and linguistic and community identities of the refugees that often got merged. It explores how different categories of refugees received different treatments.
For all latest news, follow The Daily Star's Google News channel. The book contains 17 essays and one interview, divided into five sections. The first section of five essays deal with the politics of identity and categorisation of refugees in the aftermath of the Partition and of the 1971 Liberation War of Bangladesh, and shows the gap in opportunities available to the refugees according to their refugee status. Thus, refugeehood is not a homogenous block with a unilinear pattern of mobility and struggle. Also, the section shows a sense of connectedness among the displaced, with a nostalgia regarding their past. This collective recollection is often passed on as a family heirloom to the next generation who have no physical connection with the land but inherit the memory of loss and pain, which create a loosely bound cultural entity.
The second section containing four essays focuses on how Partition changed geographical realities and led to further marginalisation and ghettoisation of particular minority groups, including tribal clans in the northeast. The essays use diverse source materials to challenge the dominant perspective of Partition and establish it as a continuing process that regulates the State practices and the psyche of the postcolonial communities at large.
The third section of four essays shows how the dream of a land of one's own turned into disillusionment for the refugees in Pakistan and Bangladesh, when many of them were uprooted multiple times between 1947 and 1971. The articles deal with the Bengali and non-Bengali Muslim returnees, the Bihari refugees, and the fate of the muhajirs, which has not been settled even after all these years of Partition. The political movements organised by refugees and others living in "Adverse Possessions", particularly in West Bengal, are the topic of the four essays of the fourth section.
The last section is Anindita Ghoshal's intimate interview with the renowned Bangladeshi author and filmmaker Tanvir Mokammel who points out that the meaning of marginality changes with time. Hence, it is pointless to classify someone in a particular framework because neither society nor its institutions are static.
How class in an unequal agrarian relationship facilitated the communalisation of peasants, who aided the Muslim League's Pakistan movement, or the contribution to and present condition of "Bihari Muslims" in Pakistan, seem missing in this otherwise excellent volume, however. Also, a discussion on the role of Hindu extremists of Bengal in its Partition, alongside their Muslim counterparts, would help us to understand how, irrespective of religious orientation, fanaticism aids establishing boundaries—both physical and mental.
However, this volume is immensely important for reading the Partition as a continuing phenomenon. It takes a new approach to Partition, fusing memory with text and incorporating oral sources into official narratives, combining songs, stories, and films with vernacular newspaper reports and journals. Sekhar Bandyopadhyay's essay demonstrates how Bengal's Partition affected the social and cultural relations between communities divided by class, caste, and regional identity. Binayak Dutta shows how the history of the Sylhet Referendum of 1947 accommodated the cultural aspects of the event through the narratives of popular and subaltern slogans, songs, poems, and graffiti. Ghoshal explores how the Bengali nationalism emerging from the language movement inspired the East Pakistanis to formulate their own narratives and a sense of shared feeling of historical, intellectual, and cultural superiority, leading to the creation of Bangladesh. Debdatta Chowdhury argues that the Partition's ethno-religious demands became a constant presence in stories about national identity, citizenship, and belonging, and traces the ideological structure of organisations (Amra Bangali, Banga Sena, etc.) demanding a separate homeland for the Bengalis, consisting of both West Bengal and East Pakistan. The religious extremism of these organisations can be connected with the nationalist agenda as well as the current right-wing politics and border management mindset in India.
The book discusses Pakistan, Bangladesh, and India, including the less discussed north-eastern India. It depicts the story of loss, the dream of reunification, and the conflicts between diverse ideological stances by focusing on how the phenomenon of Partition is alluded to in the rhetorical and social remembrance of the population most affected by it. It revisits the alleys of contestation, narratives, and memories that the Partition has left behind.
Debasree Sarkar is a Doctoral Fellow, Department of History, Diamond Harbour Women's University, Kolkata, India. She has her M.Phil. from the School of Women's Studies, Jadavpur University.
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