Should the 1947 partition be compared to the holocaust?

[Saj]

I had the pleasure today to chat with someone who survived the 1947 partition.

Listening to him was an eye-opener, interesting and rather sad if I'm being truthful.

Some of the details of what he saw and witnessed were brual and horrific and frankly shocking.

He is a Hindu and spoke of how he lost Muslim and Hindu friends and saw some of his friends brutally murdered in front of his own eyes. He described the partition as something that he would compare to the holocaust.

He spoke of how he has never recovered fully from the events of 1947 and how those days still haunt him.

Should the 1947 partition be compared with the holocaust?

Have you had the chance to speak with anyone who lived through partition, if so, what were their memories?

 

[Bhaijaan]

Partition of India has to me among the most foolish ideas ever.

The idea itself, the way it was done, what it cost us both and what it continues to cost this region all point in one direction. It was a blunder.

 

[Slog]

Partition of India has to me among the most foolish ideas ever.

The idea itself, the way it was done, what it cost us both and what it continues to cost this region all point in one direction. It was a blunder.

The consolidation of Indian subcontinent into one country for administrative purposes was the most foolish idea ever. Essentially British lumped different peoples and cultures together to make it easier for themselves to govern. Throughout history there was no considerable length of time (asides from a point in the Mauryan empire which cannot be fully proved) where India, Pakistan and Bangladesh were one entity.

British India was an unnatural entity which was rightly discarded. If anything the subcontinent should have had more countries rather than less.

 

[Banter]

In my opinion it was even worse than the holocaust. The trillions wasted in foolish conflict between the 2 partitioned countries, while so many human beings suffer from reduced quality of life, far outweigh the immediate deaths - that were terrible and tragic in their own right.

At this point, the 2 countries are what they are. Common sense would dictate that they need to move on to peaceful co-existence.

But there are certain NAMALOOM AFRAAD who benefit from continued hostility. And benefit MASSIVELY. They are not allowing things to move forward to their eventual logical outcomes.

After all, if one wants to keep grabbing land worth billions in the name of DHA etc, its hard to justify it unless one wears the sanctimonious garb of "NATION IS in DANGER".

 

[Banter]

The consolidation of Indian subcontinent into one country for administrative purposes was the most foolish idea ever. Essentially British lumped different peoples and cultures together to make it easier for themselves to govern. Throughout history there was no considerable length of time (asides from a point in the Mauryan empire which cannot be fully proved) where India, Pakistan and Bangladesh were one entity.

British India was an unnatural entity which was rightly discarded. If anything the subcontinent should have had more countries rather than less.

No need to get defensive. The question isn't whether it should be one country, 2 countries or even 6 or 7. The question is why does there exist an artificially created state of hostility that means that resources are wasted on conflict, instead of progress and development.

 

[Slog]

No need to get defensive. The question isn't whether it should be one country, 2 countries or even 6 or 7. The question is why does there exist an artificially created state of hostility that means that resources are wasted on conflict, instead of progress and development.

Whats there to be defensive about?

I am just responding to an opinion expressed in the thread

 

[Syed1]

There was plenty of loss of life which was very unfortunate but the creation of Pakistan was a God-send for majority of the Muslims of British India. If the British had not partitioned it would have led to civil war with the Hindu majority completely eliminating the Muslims.

 

[Banter]

Whats there to be defensive about?

I am just responding to an opinion expressed in the thread

Maybe I mis-interpreted your remark. There is a strong tendency in Pakistani "opinions" to deny the existence of India as a nation, to justify partition. To be blunt, 80 years after partition, it doesn't matter what the reasons were, or how valid they were. The 2 countries are separate entities and will remain as much for the forseeable future. Not every opinion that criticizes partition is an attack on the existence of Pakistan.

 

[Banter]

There was plenty of loss of life which was very unfortunate but the creation of Pakistan was a God-send for majority of the Muslims of British India. If the British had not partitioned it would have led to civil war with the Hindu majority completely eliminating the Muslims.

Or maybe the bloody population exchange of 1947, and the death of millions of Bengalis would have been avoided? Reality is you don't know how it would have turned out.

I for one, believe that if partition hadn't happened, we would have seen military coups and communist type revolutions in the united India. Democracy in those early days was distinctly vulnerable, luckily the more 'aggressive' military officer corp got partitioned out of India - if not, one could easily see a scenario where military takeover could have happened after Nehru died. India would have also inherited the Durand line problem with Afghanistan etc.

maybe a lot more worse things could have happened. But we simply don't know.

 

[Slog]

Maybe I mis-interpreted your remark. There is a strong tendency in Pakistani "opinions" to deny the existence of India as a nation, to justify partition. To be blunt, 80 years after partition, it doesn't matter what the reasons were, or how valid they were. The 2 countries are separate entities and will remain as much for the forseeable future. Not every opinion that criticizes partition is an attack on the existence of Pakistan.

Ok

What i mean is that if the subcontinent had been divided into 7,8 countries along regional lines then you wouldnt have seen such a massacre. And maybe we would have been a europe like situation now.

However the alternate which is being referred to here and which is basically 'no partition' would have been terrible as well. Maybe not as much massacre in immediate term as was in 1947 but to act as if things were rosy and peaceful between Muslims and Hindus is disingenuous. There would have been weekly riots.

 

[Banter]

Ok

What i mean is that if the subcontinent had been divided into 7,8 countries along regional lines then you wouldnt have seen such a massacre. And maybe we would have been a europe like situation now.

Or maybe things would have been even worse - are you familiar with the word BALKANISATION? Western Europe went through multiple centuries of frequent conflict, ending with 2 world wars, before finally settling down into the "situation now". The Indian nation has massively benefited from having all the different ethnicities such as Gujaratis, Telugu, Kannadiga, Malayali, Biharis, etc under one national flag, so that instead of having country to country level conflicts, all those ethnic groups could have the luxury of focusing on progress. Now not all regions have taken advantage of that opportunity equally, but overall, EVERYBODY has benefited, some more, some less.

However the alternate which is being referred to here and which is basically 'no partition' would have been terrible as well. Maybe not as much massacre in immediate term as was in 1947 but to act as if things were rosy and peaceful between Muslims and Hindus is disingenuous. There would have been weekly riots.

Well Jinnah never wanted total separation anyway, he wanted a federal unit - that would have been the equivalent of having a bleeding open wound in perpetuity. For better or worse, partition is the reality in our timeline - I wish it had been less bloody in hindsight, but it is what it is.

I just want the present and future to improve for both our people - which I view as one people. Well, I am a humanist, so I view our entire planet as one people also.

There would have been weekly riots.

Uh, there are 200 million muslims in India. And we don't have "weekly" riots. Sure there are issues, but arguably Muslims in India are no worse off than in Pakistan. Maybe better, but definitely not worse.

 

[Robert]

I had the pleasure today to chat with someone who survived the 1947 partition.

Listening to him was an eye-opener, interesting and rather sad if I'm being truthful.
Should the 1947 partition be compared with the holocaust?

The Holocaust was a continent wide rail network to take millions to factories set up just to kill. In all the dark history of our species, it is unique.

On the othe4 hand the mutual genocide of Partition was worse that I thought. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/06/29/the-great-divide-books-dalrymple
I suppose it is more directly comparable to the madness that swept Rwanda in the mid-nineties.

 

[Pakistanian]

My grandma is Muslim and she had some horrific stories of partition, a lot of her relatives were slaughtered by Sardars on trains going to Pakistan. There was also a lot of bloodshed in jammu, trains of dead bodies were arriving in Pakistan.

 

[Banter]

The Holocaust was a continent wide rail network to take millions to factories set up just to kill. In all the dark history of our species, it is unique.

On the othe4 hand the mutual genocide of Partition was worse that I thought. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/06/29/the-great-divide-books-dalrymple
I suppose it is more directly comparable to the madness that swept Rwanda in the mid-nineties.

Dalrymple is a good writer, but his "summary" is historically incomplete. The British weren't overly interested in creating 2 independent countries and were in favor of some sort of federalist union, but once they learnt that Nehru would not allow military bases after Independence, the official british position very quickly shifted in favor of total partition.

 

[Slog]

Uh, there are 200 million muslims in India. And we don't have "weekly" riots. Sure there are issues, but arguably Muslims in India are no worse off than in Pakistan. Maybe better, but definitely not worse.

Because the Muslims there are neither politically or economically strong

The elite of the Indian Muslims from UP, bihar, punjab etc went to Pakistan. These were the ones who would have driven a sustained right for self determination.

Even now you cannot deny there are issues between Muslims and Hindus in India despite Muslims have 2 nations in the subcontinent.

As for riots. I am talking about the realities of the time. Often there would be small scale riots after every jumma with incidents like a pig's carcass being thrown into a mosque or a cow being butchered in public view to rile Hindus.

The simple fact is that there were major issues between Hindus and Muslims which were not a result of British acts. For centuries prior to British colonization Muslim empires were at loggerheads with retreating Hindu empires.

 

[Banter]

My grandma is Muslim and she had some horrific stories of partition, a lot of her relatives were slaughtered by Sardars on trains going to Pakistan. There was also a lot of bloodshed in jammu, trains of dead bodies were arriving in Pakistan.

I can't even imagine the horror of having to live as a survivor of such tragedy. Human beings are capable of a lot of horrible savagery particular when mobs take over. Even though I am 'lucky' in the sense that my family is from a region further away from the border, and don't have any personal connection to the violence of partition, as a 'desi' I feel that this tragic history of partition and violence is our collective shame to bear through history. Whatever the reason, the fact that our society and ancestors were not able to prevent a descent into such terrible mob violence is a shame.

 

[Slog]

Anyways as for topic.

It is not comparable

Firstly here it was from both sides. And importantly it was not top-down from a centralized authority like Nazis did with Jewish people

 

[ElRaja]

I had the pleasure today to chat with someone who survived the 1947 partition.

Listening to him was an eye-opener, interesting and rather sad if I'm being truthful.

Some of the details of what he saw and witnessed were brual and horrific and frankly shocking.

He is a Hindu and spoke of how he lost Muslim and Hindu friends and saw some of his friends brutally murdered in front of his own eyes. He described the partition as something that he would compare to the holocaust.

He spoke of how he has never recovered fully from the events of 1947 and how those days still haunt him.

Should the 1947 partition be compared with the holocaust?

Have you had the chance to speak with anyone who lived through partition, if so, what were their memories?

yes it should be, however there is one primary difference, no one defends naziism, so the history can be told with one narrative. the history of the partition of the subcontinent if told in truth will simply serve to horrify and offend everyone and any attempt to reconcile the twisting narratives cant occur until enmity that exists between both sides calms down.

an additional problem exists in the complexity of the issue at hand, if you want to tell the story of partition who do you focus on, the punjabis, the bengalis that were at the front end of the violence, or the flocks of migrants who travelled hundreds of miles in both directions to redraw the demographic and cultural landscape of both countries.

it was an extraordinary period, we cant try to justify or understand what was done in the context of contemporary morality. it is a story which needs to be told tho, however the fact that the second post in this thread turned into political point scoring is all you need to know why this is impossible in the current climate.

 

[Syed1]

Partition was inevitable but the Brits should not left in such haste and actually overseen a proper demarcation of boundaries and installation of new governments, but I guess the role of a colonizer is to loot, plunder, destroy and then leave.

 

[Banter]

Because the Muslims there are neither politically or economically strong

The elite of the Indian Muslims from UP, bihar, punjab etc went to Pakistan. These were the ones who would have driven a sustained right for self determination.

Well arguably, the muslim elites who did choose to stay back, have done pretty well. Azim Premji, Bollywood actors, writers, etc. In fact, you could argue that those elites who chose to stay, have ended up doing better than their counterparts who left!

Even now you cannot deny there are issues between Muslims and Hindus in India despite Muslims have 2 nations in the subcontinent.

As for riots. I am talking about the realities of the time. Often there would be small scale riots after every jumma with incidents like a pig's carcass being thrown into a mosque or a cow being butchered in public view to rile Hindus.

The simple fact is that there were major issues between Hindus and Muslims which were not a result of British acts. For centuries prior to British colonization Muslim empires were at loggerheads with retreating Hindu empires.

Well those kind of incidents don't define communities - they are the exceptions not the norm. I grew up having muslim neighbors in Bombay. And my grandparents had muslim neighbors as well in gujarat - I spent all my summers there - For me, those folks are almost as much family as my grandparents were. All over India, you will find literally millions of such people. Sure there are idiots also, but just because the idiots are louder, doesn't mean they are the majority.

But anyway, I know that you are not going to take my word for it. And that's ok. You are entitled to your opinion and can believe what you want.

 

[barah_admi]

I had the pleasure today to chat with someone who survived the 1947 partition.

Listening to him was an eye-opener, interesting and rather sad if I'm being truthful.

Some of the details of what he saw and witnessed were brual and horrific and frankly shocking.

He is a Hindu and spoke of how he lost Muslim and Hindu friends and saw some of his friends brutally murdered in front of his own eyes. He described the partition as something that he would compare to the holocaust.

He spoke of how he has never recovered fully from the events of 1947 and how those days still haunt him.

Should the 1947 partition be compared with the holocaust?

Have you had the chance to speak with anyone who lived through partition, if so, what were their memories?

Who carried out the majority of the killings? Which group made up the majority of the victims? And who facilitated the massacres?

 

[troodon]

I am glad that partition happened. Imagine 60 crore Muslims and 80 crore Hindus living in one country. It will be a disaster.

Hinduism and Islam are not compatible with each other when their numbers are almost equal. Thank you Jinnah.

 

[JaDed]

Yes, my grandmother lost her daughter and my father wasn't born then but its also about how uprooting occured , tbf My paternal grandparents were foolish and started much later, maternal ones were smarter and knew they had to move so decided accordingly, but also matters village and town , towns were easier to move as per the ones i spoke to.

Whole of Delhi will have these stories but tbf it also made Delhites very strong ,they really made it big imo.

 

[Cpt. Rishwat]

I am glad that partition happened. Imagine 60 crore Muslims and 80 crore Hindus living in one country. It will be a disaster.

Hinduism and Islam are not compatible with each other when their numbers are almost equal. Thank you Jinnah.

On the contrary, I think when you have a closer parity of numbers then each will tread more carefully knowing the other side has strength in numbers too. That said, the subcontinent is too large to manage as one country, it would have made more sense to split it up into the independent states of Punjab, Kashmir, Sindh, Bengal and so on.

 

[Pakistanian]

I am glad that partition happened. Imagine 60 crore Muslims and 80 crore Hindus living in one country. It will be a disaster.

Hinduism and Islam are not compatible with each other when their numbers are almost equal. Thank you Jinnah.

I don't think it' a religion thing, India would have split along ethnic lines anyways like the Soviet Union did. It was/probably still is too big to function as one unit.

 

[troodon]

I don't think it' a religion thing, India would have split along ethnic lines anyways like the Soviet Union did. It was/probably still is too big to function as one unit.

Current India would not have split. The common rope that binds Indians is Hinduism. As long as that is there, the states will always be together. Not to forget, Most South Indians bought into Gandhi's united India dream.

 

[Pakistanian]

Current India would not have split. The common rope that binds Indians is Hinduism. As long as that is there, the states will always be together. Not to forget, Most South Indians bought into Gandhi's united India dream.

Then how is India a secular country if Hinduism is the "binding rope".

 

[Markhor]

Mountbatten had blood on his hands. He shifted the withdrawal date from June 1948 to August 1947, ensuring a disorderly transition that led to the deaths of over a million people. Whilst bloodshed was inevitable, would it have occurred on the scale it did had the proper contingencies been in place ? Britain had a Border Security Force which was totally inadequate to control the violence.

The Holocaust was a state sanctioned genocide unlike Partition, but there's been much greater effort to memorialise the Holocaust through museums and remembrance events. In contrast, how many Partition museums are there ?

 

[PakLFC]

Absolutely not! 1947 was all about liberation where as the holocaust was killing innocent people. Most Pakistanis have no regrets over 1947 at all rather it is the Indians who can't get over it. We wanted Pakistan and were willing to pay any price for it where as the holocaust was blind hatred for Jewish people by a demented man. Even if India was one country today I would still vote for a Pakistan no doubt about it and so would millions of other Muslims. There are plenty of freedom movements in India today proving Jinnah saheb was absolutely correct. If India were to grant these oppressed people self determination there would be nothing left of them. We are talking about two very different events here where one was about liberation where as in the other the Jews were not demanding freedom or anything like that.

 

[Cpt. Rishwat]

Current India would not have split. The common rope that binds Indians is Hinduism. As long as that is there, the states will always be together. Not to forget, Most South Indians bought into Gandhi's united India dream.

South Indians don't even share the same language as the north, northerners probably have more in common with Pakistanis than with their south Indian brethren. In any case you yourself have said that Indians should copy western thought as the east has given nothing to the west for 500 years, so the binding rope of Hinduism is nothing more than a quaint notion ( by your logic).

India could have stayed unified as a large confederate similar to the United States where each state could reflect their own unique characteristics and culture. This is probably going to be the way forward for Pakistan in the long run, although of course that can have it's disadvantages too as we have seen with the FATA areas.

 

[princeuk]

In my opinion there are a lot of similarities, a lot of people died and for what? A lot of families had to uproot where tehy stayed and move altogether, move away from their families, thier neighbours, their friends? Its no doubt that this was an incredibly stressful time for many many people, it would have been interesting to see back then how events developed during this time.

 

[Robert]

[MENTION=53290]Markhor[/MENTION], a recent episode of Doctor Who addressed Partition violence.

Rather than the traditional DW Eurocentric story where a white patrician techno-liberal leftist sorts out a local squabble between more primitive civilisations, we are now seeing other voices from other traditions coming to the fore in this series.

 

[MenInG]

Not all partition stories were bloody - but yes people made sacrifices to move for sure.

 

[Stewie]

The Brits planned it this way to keep the two nations at each others throats.. there was no amicable division of land, resources and the transitions was just sprung up, it was utter chaos.

But yeah.. there was death and destruction and there are more reasons behind it than just communal hatred.

It was planned as such!

 

[KB]

Mountbatten had blood on his hands. He shifted the withdrawal date from June 1948 to August 1947, ensuring a disorderly transition that led to the deaths of over a million people. Whilst bloodshed was inevitable, would it have occurred on the scale it did had the proper contingencies been in place ? Britain had a Border Security Force which was totally inadequate to control the violence.

The Holocaust was a state sanctioned genocide unlike Partition, but there's been much greater effort to memorialise the Holocaust through museums and remembrance events. In contrast, how many Partition museums are there ?

Although there is much truth in this, the picture needs some refinement.

First we should note that violence was of a differentiated nature across the subcontinent. In the Punjab, the brutality and intensity of the violence which occurred over a short time span particularly stands out. Far from being acts of temporary madness, there is in fact much evidence that the violence was highly organised and carried out with military precision. Colonial recruitment practices led to a large number of demobilised soldiers in Punjab and that is likely to have shaped some of the intensity of the violence. Certain Princely states (Kashmir, Alwar and Bharatpur as well as certain Punjab states) also witnessed significant levels of violence.In Bengal, in contrast, violence was more contained but spread over a greater number of years. In Bengal a sense of unfinished business persisted for many years after the event.

Secondly, it is true that violence was not sanctioned by a central state authority. In fact a strong case could be made that violence was made possible by the breakdown of state authority which enabled perpetrators to act with impunity. This point is best understood by looking at the UP in 1947, which did not see, a repeat of the violence that happened in Garhmukteshwar in 1946. The reasons seemed to be: a police shoot to kill policy for curfew breakers; severe punishment for acts of forced conversion and marriage; deployment of troops to quell disturbances in Meerut; control of the press to limit rumour; officials disciplined if they did not deter violence. In the end this points to the importance of a functioning state authority and political will to extinguish any chaos, which was absent in many parts of Punjab.

State agents were often involved in the violence in the Punjab. Policemen were either slow to respond or they participated in violence themselves. Soldiers were at times implicated. Railway officials divulged running time for trains, which helped perpetrators carry out attacks. Finally, the role of princely rulers within the Punjab has been highlighted . There is clear evidence that some aided and abetted in attacks and provided weapons and a sanctuary to perpetrators. In the princely states, troops and police also participated in attacks. If we were to include the events surrounding the so called ‘police action’ in Hyderabad in 1948, this would further complicate our understanding of state involvement.

Third, while Mountbatten has been excoriated by some (notably Stanley Wolpert and Andrew Roberts) , some have questioned this by suggesting he was merely executing British policy. Patrick French has indicated that Clement Attlee set the agenda and bears greater responsibility. Whatever the case, as Lucy Chester has argued, “British leaders were content to focus on maintaining an appearance of order” as opposed to “making real preparations to reduce conflict” and therefore “contributed to the mass killing that erupted during partition.” Yet the British cannot stand in the dock alone. Politicians had ratcheted up communal tensions during the 1940s. Like the British they had contributed to the lack of clarity, the failure to get more military protection and were negligent in defining what citizenship would like after independence. The desire for an earlier independence was also pushed by Congress interests. Fearing social breakdown and potential balkanisation, they indicated to Mountbatten that they would be willing to countenance dominion status and a presence within the Commonwealth, but at a price of the independence date being moved forward from July 1948.

 

[Yossarian]

Should the 1947 partition be compared with the holocaust?

Yes

Have you had the chance to speak with anyone who lived through partition, if so, what were their memories?

Yes, my Nani (maternal grandmother). I remember her telling me of her experiences during my visit to see her in Pakistan when I was in my early teens. She herself was in her mid teens at the time of Partition, so she remembered everything she said.

She told me their villagers had a roughly half hours warning to grab what jewelry and small valuables they could carry, along with some food, and run, as rampaging gangs were already in the next village a couple of miles away, killing the men and(in her words to a young grandson) 'doing bad things to women', and burning the houses. They were told that if any of the womenfolk became injured and unable to keep up, they were to be killed so they wouldn't captured and 'have bad things done to them'

My Nani said they split up into small groups and headed towards Pakistan. They hid in the fields during the day and traveled at night. Fortunately everyone in my Nani's family made it to the village in Punjab where my paternal grandfather's family lived. But Nani's family lost their house, farmlands, livestock, and everything else they could not carry. Before the Partition the family was quite wealthy by local standards considering they owned around 2 marabba ( approx 25 acres in a marabba I think) of rich farmland , but after having lost everything, they suffered from acute poverty for a long time. Nani's father, from being a wealthy landowner, was reduced to pleading for work on other's farms in order to feed his family.

 

[a_tahir]

Yes

Yes, my Nani (maternal grandmother). I remember her telling me of her experiences during my visit to see her in Pakistan when I was in my early teens. She herself was in her mid teens at the time of Partition, so she remembered everything she said.

She told me their villagers had a roughly half hours warning to grab what jewelry and small valuables they could carry, along with some food, and run, as rampaging gangs were already in the next village a couple of miles away, killing the men and(in her words to a young grandson) 'doing bad things to women', and burning the houses. They were told that if any of the womenfolk became injured and unable to keep up, they were to be killed so they wouldn't captured and 'have bad things done to them'

My Nani said they split up into small groups and headed towards Pakistan. They hid in the fields during the day and traveled at night. Fortunately everyone in my Nani's family made it to the village in Punjab where my paternal grandfather's family lived. But Nani's family lost their house, farmlands, livestock, and everything else they could not carry. Before the Partition the family was quite wealthy by local standards considering they owned around 2 marabba ( approx 25 acres in a marabba I think) of rich farmland , but after having lost everything, they suffered from acute poverty for a long time. Nani's father, from being a wealthy landowner, was reduced to pleading for work on other's farms in order to feed his family.

Very sad times.
Hopefully, anything of that scale NEVER happens again

 

[Salma_T]

Then how is India a secular country if Hinduism is the "binding rope".

Thought the same thing....How can you be secular when Hinduism is the 1 binding force.....So are all non Hindus not Indian @trooden

 

[Robert]

Partition was inevitable but the Brits should not left in such haste and actually overseen a proper demarcation of boundaries and installation of new governments, but I guess the role of a colonizer is to loot, plunder, destroy and then leave.

Britain had been almost smashed, her people exhausted and some turning inward was inevitable.

 

[Madplayer]

Thought the same thing....How can you be secular when Hinduism is the 1 binding force.....So are all non Hindus not Indian @trooden

Salma ji it is true that hinduism is the binding force behind Indian state. But for South India, their culture and language comes first. They will not mind seperating from India if it threatens their culture.

 

[IAJ]

I met an old indian man in Southall in September last year, he was around 85. While I was helping him to cross the road and over the bus station he said exact the same thing as Saj bhai. He said how their father lead whole family crossing the river, many died and they had to be completely silent during the escape. Even breathing loudly could have cost you your life.

 

[barah_admi]

I had the pleasure today to chat with someone who survived the 1947 partition.

Listening to him was an eye-opener, interesting and rather sad if I'm being truthful.

Some of the details of what he saw and witnessed were brual and horrific and frankly shocking.

He is a Hindu and spoke of how he lost Muslim and Hindu friends and saw some of his friends brutally murdered in front of his own eyes. He described the partition as something that he would compare to the holocaust.

He spoke of how he has never recovered fully from the events of 1947 and how those days still haunt him.

Should the 1947 partition be compared with the holocaust?

Have you had the chance to speak with anyone who lived through partition, if so, what were their memories?

You still have not replied to post 21 brother

 

[Realromeo]

So sad, literally millions died during the partition. Wild animals killing each other.

 

[JaDed]

Salma ji it is true that hinduism is the binding force behind Indian state. But for South India, their culture and language comes first. They will not mind seperating from India if it threatens their culture.

Many have a pluralistic society , they can have caste- religion- region- nationality.

Its common across ,Punjabis, Bengalis ,even Gujarathis,Assameese or Marathis too.

Ifeel you are confusing Up-Mp-Bihar-Haryana nationalism with every state.

 

[rhony]

So, would the people have killed each other if there was no partition? These people coexisted until then without issues. Did partition lead to the riots and hence the perception that it would have been an eventuality anyway even if there wasn't a partition? We'll never know. Agree with one of the posters who said it was more of a power struggle than a religious struggle. Muslims weren't sure of holding positions of power back then in India and hence the idea of partition came to the fore.