Partition 1947 - Braided Essay

 

Week 4 – Hema 722 Words Oct 4, 2025

Partition – 1947

British India Viceroy Curzon sowed the seeds of Partition in 1905 by dividing the Bengal province along religious lines. This burgeoned into a strong divisive force as the Quit India movement picked up steam. With Jinnah holding firm to the belief that Muslims would only be safe in a Muslim state, and Gandhi unwilling to see a divided India, it ened up becoming Mountbatten’s job to execute Britain’s exit from India. Radcliffe, the man commissioned to divide up the country and all of two months, drew a line across the Punjab and Bengal, leaving millions of people on the wrong side of the border. This triggered a mass exodus of Hindus from various parts of Pakistan into India, and the reverse migration of Muslims from India to Pakistan. It was a massive, bloody, uprooting of millions of lives on both sides of the border.

*

Karim woke up long before the muezzin’s call to prayer echoed through the makeshift tents of the Walton Camp in Lahore.  He wasn’t the only one. Several other, hungry and restless souls were up and about. Perhaps a shipment of food would come in later today; perhaps some medicine; perhaps today he would be able to find transport to Faisalabad.

He had sent his wife and children on as soon as it seemed like British India would be divided into the Muslim country of Pakistan, and India. Like many of his friends in Delhi’s Chandni Chowk, he had hoped that he could continue to live on in a secular India and be allowed to continue to operate the business his ancestors had built up over generations.

But the messages from his wife’s family had continued to grow increasingly urgent. Once the border had been published, hundreds of thousands of Muslims had left for Pakistan. His wife sent an urgent plea asking him to cross over. Reluctantly, he turned over his assets to his cousins and caught one of the immigration trains to Lahore. He hoped he would be able to return in a few months.

The city was in absolute chaos. You could barely get around the city, and there was no way to get to Faisalabad to his family almost 200 kilometres west. He had been lucky to find a spot in Walton Camp where he camped with a group of people who had travelled north on the same train from Delhi.

*

In India. the once pure, and still considered holy, Yamuna river now looked like a cess pool. The site, just outside Delhi was home to a massive camp for refugees who had just arrived from Pakistan. With hundreds of thousands of refugees dipping into the river to wash, the Yamuna was now more deadly threat than a vital life source.

Rajeshkumar, the owner of a food stall nearby, looked on with sadness. He knew as a Hindu in India, he was among the fortunate ones. He was not forced to abandon his life and home.  Yes, his business had shut down. His equipment along with those of the other stores on the street, had been pressed into service to cook food for the refugees. And yes, he had sent his wife and children to the safety of her father’s home in a village 200 kilometers away. They were safe there. In a few weeks this would all settle down. It would take him some time to recover, but they would be ok.

*

Karim joined the He joined the rest of the camp in morning prayers, performing them as best they could. They did not have water for the ritual washing, nor clean clothes. But they had clean intentions, and they prayed with fervour. He prayed this madness would end soon. He prayed for food, prayed that his family was safe and that soon he would be with them.

Rajeshkumar completed his prayers  without clean water and incense, precious commodities at a time like this. He applied the ritualistic grey ash to his forehead, invoking the mercy and grace of the various Gods that managed different aspects of his universe. He prayed that the trucks with food supplies would arrive early this morning, so that they could try to feed the starving. He prayed that the madness would end soon and he could be reunited with his family.