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A review by encyclopediabritanika
The Great Partition by Yasmin Cordery Khan
challenging
informative
slow-paced
3.75
3.7/5 stars
Ok, it took me 2 months but I did it. I finished. This book was relatively short (only 285 pages) but it was *DENSE* But I've made my way through. Almost nothing is taught of the partition of India and Pakistan, though it displaced TENS OF MILLIONS of people and erupted in horrible violence. It was just something I heard of as I listened to elders speak at gatherings - "how did your family cross?" is such a common question and I didn't quite understand the magnitude of it. I was grateful for the Partition storyline in Ms. Marvel (watch that show if you haven't!) but wanted to comprehensive understanding. This book is incredibly researched and lays it all out. At its core its a lesson of imperialism and colonial interventions ruin lives. England ruled the Raj for hundreds of years, decided it could no longer support empire after WWII, and then just left. But not before doing a few things to make things even worse - like have a guy in England, who had never been to the region before, draw the demarcation line. It went through villages, and homes. It didn't take anything practical into account. And then these people found themselves on opposite lines from family. The book also showed how the religious extremism of Hindu v Muslim has developed under the auspices of partition and has a direct line to things like Modi's extreme right stance and genocide of Muslims in India in present day. Snippets that stood out to me:
"One in ten people in Pakistan was a refugee. Each country had to resettle, feed and house a group as large as the total population of Australia." "Foot columns sometimes 30–40,000 strong, created human caravans 45 miles long in places." Think of the scale of that!
I was also floored to learn that they had not planned for a migration: "The plan had not made allowances for any potential mass population exchanges and the ensuing two-way movement of people caught both national leaderships unawares, pulling the rug out from under their feet and invalidating the safeguards that had been notionally built into the plan."
It all happened so quickly, and without planning, and people's lives were upended (in many many cases ruined or ended completely in the violence).
Despite the density, this book was definitely worth a read and I hope we in the West learn more about this cataclysmic event.
Ok, it took me 2 months but I did it. I finished. This book was relatively short (only 285 pages) but it was *DENSE* But I've made my way through. Almost nothing is taught of the partition of India and Pakistan, though it displaced TENS OF MILLIONS of people and erupted in horrible violence. It was just something I heard of as I listened to elders speak at gatherings - "how did your family cross?" is such a common question and I didn't quite understand the magnitude of it. I was grateful for the Partition storyline in Ms. Marvel (watch that show if you haven't!) but wanted to comprehensive understanding. This book is incredibly researched and lays it all out. At its core its a lesson of imperialism and colonial interventions ruin lives. England ruled the Raj for hundreds of years, decided it could no longer support empire after WWII, and then just left. But not before doing a few things to make things even worse - like have a guy in England, who had never been to the region before, draw the demarcation line. It went through villages, and homes. It didn't take anything practical into account. And then these people found themselves on opposite lines from family. The book also showed how the religious extremism of Hindu v Muslim has developed under the auspices of partition and has a direct line to things like Modi's extreme right stance and genocide of Muslims in India in present day. Snippets that stood out to me:
"One in ten people in Pakistan was a refugee. Each country had to resettle, feed and house a group as large as the total population of Australia." "Foot columns sometimes 30–40,000 strong, created human caravans 45 miles long in places." Think of the scale of that!
I was also floored to learn that they had not planned for a migration: "The plan had not made allowances for any potential mass population exchanges and the ensuing two-way movement of people caught both national leaderships unawares, pulling the rug out from under their feet and invalidating the safeguards that had been notionally built into the plan."
It all happened so quickly, and without planning, and people's lives were upended (in many many cases ruined or ended completely in the violence).
Despite the density, this book was definitely worth a read and I hope we in the West learn more about this cataclysmic event.