Divisions, Subtractions

It is the revenge of history that today in India we have exactly that: strong states and an increasingly weak centre scrambling to keep together its supporters. There are, still, constant cries of “minority appeasement”. In Pakistan it is, as visualised, a strong centre, but without many of the democratic norms so close to Jinnah’s heart.

Khan examines Partition from a fresh perspective refusing to accept any of the popular concepts of an “orderly transition of power”. She points to the chaotic circumstances under which Radcliffe — a stranger to India — parachutes in with his Partition portfolio and within six weeks has divided up the country. Likewise, the Bengal Boundary Commission and the Punjab Boundary Commission are invited by various troubled states to look at the conditions, and they decline as they simply don’t have the time.

Khan talks of the tragic head count of Muslims (sometimes with a census six years out of date) in various tehsils of Punjab, pointing out how this disregarded centuries old bonds between families and reduced them to mere statistics to be moved around — and one is reminded of the recent headcounts of Muslims in India. The divisive lessons of history are not learnt because politicians believe in writing history not reading it.

The communalisation of politics which dominated the elections of 1946, in which many League and Congress leaders used overt symbolism, has not left our politics even today. Because once you divide a country on the basis of religion and over 12 million people lose their homes because of it, can religion ever be forgotten?

It would have been possible, of course, to control the situation if there had been any preparation for the migration of populations. As Khan notes, there was none. And Mountbatten said he did not foresee any mass transfer of population. Dismissing the problem, he said rather grandly that it would happen in a “natural way”, adding, “Perhaps government will transfer populations. Once more this is a matter not so much for the main parties as for the local authorities living in the border areas to decide.” Khan rightly rues that his “fuzzy” thinking led to fatal flaws in the Partition plan. It also led to the death of at least two million people. This begs the question: was Mountbatten never publicly berated in India because he had managed to win the confidence of both Gandhi and Nehru?

Importantly, as Khan points out that the Partition was not the euphoric culmination of a great struggle for swaraj or even for Pakistan, but it was a badly thought out, messy process. Yet it contains shibboleths of nationalisms that cannot be disturbed — as L.K. Advani tried to do with his visit to the Jinnah memorial in Karachi, and lost his presidency of the BJP.

It is this rigid mind-set that Khan would like to shift, as she asks for more work to be done on the subject, such as Urvashi Butalia’s wonderful On the Other Side of Silence. Perhaps that would deal with some of the demons which Partition released, and which have lived with us ever after.