India 's Partition After Independence

The general cause of the Indian Independence Movement was India’s desire for independence from British, French and Portuguese Rule. The aim of the movement was “Swaraj, a self-governing India” (Sharma, 2005, p. 22). One, more specific, cause of the Indian Independence Movement took place in 1905 when the province of Bengal was divided into two provinces,

q. This shows that Nationalism still plays a large role in keeping India together, regardless of their diverse religious identities. Secularism

Many people believe that in the 1940’s most of India’s problems involving independence was to do with divisions within India rather than British imperialism. In this essay I will be looking at both points of view and finally giving my opinion. I will be using three sources also to help me show both sides of the story. I will also be using my further knowledge to add a wider range of knowledge.

Bengal's growing need for an identity, equal and ethnic acceptance and a pride in their mother language eventually led to many conflicts both emotional and political. Having been recently independent from British India, the Two Nation Theory was engraved in everyone's minds. But the geographical division of East and West Pakistan was much more than distance; it was felt as a conspiracy for West Pakistan to govern the entire country (Bose, 1).The war was considered an unnecessary act by some as autonomy was the desired result and not a new country. However as the story of the lives of civilians unfold the distrust and unfairness of the situation in the country is seen to be evident.

The phrase “the empire on which the sun never sets” has been applied to many various empires throughout the centuries. During the nineteenth-century, it became popular to apply the phrase to the British Empire and remained as such throughout all of the nineteenth-century and most of twentieth-century. However, following World War I, Britain’s hold began to waver as the Empire’s colonies cried for independence with unruly nationalist movements, none more so than the South Asian colony of India; in which Britain’s firm rule had become known as ‘the British Raj’. India had fought alongside their British rulers during World War I in hopes it would gain them independence, however this hope was not fulfilled and the Indian colony

Congress found a charismatic leader by the name of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, a political activist and civil right champion.

On the midnight of 14 August 1947, when the world was sleeping India awoke to life and freedom. Awaking from the slumber of foreign yoke the nation resolved to break away from all the shackles which had brought insurmountable pain and misfortune on its children. Purging itself from the scum of ignorance, communalism and archaic traditions which ensured subjugation of millions in the name of caste and sex were few such resolutions. True to the ideals of a modern parliamentary democracy which the country chose to follow, the constitution was turned into a potent weapon to deal with all such vices which was holding the country back. Untouchability was prohibited, communal electorates were done away with, and secularism was enshrined, in short with swift strokes of pen a social revolution was commenced upon.

Examining Jinnah 's long and chequered public life, for some forty-four years (1904-48), helps determine the core ideological values he was committed to throughout his political career. Based on his initial speeches and writings, Jinnah was a committed nationalist and didn’t believe in separate electorates for Hindu and Muslim, but later however, used the provision of separate electorate to gain his first elected office in 1909, as Bombay 's Muslim representative on the Imperial Legislative Council. But, later with the his shift, though gradual towards communalism and the subsequent demand of Pakistan in 1940 made his a communalist to the very core who believed that Hindus and Muslims can never share the same territory and hope for equal representation. This essay examines how Jinnah’s politics evolved through phases, merged into the next, without sudden shifts. It analyses how his ideologies underwent a drastic shift from 1937 onwards, and led to him advocating the goal of Pakistan, and to build it primarily in Islamic terms without it being a theocratic state.

Hinduism, reimagine India as a unified Hindu nation, and inflame collective sentiment against the largest

Abstract: The present paper tried to discuss sensitive issues depicted in Manohar Malagaonkar’s ‘A Bend in the Ganges’. It is learnt that Indian freedom struggle became a historical event in the Indian socio-polity but also on the world map. During Indian freedom movement partition took place. The consequences of partition, Hindu-Muslim communal riots, loss of lives to get freedom have been discussed in the paper.

The Partition of India in August, 1947 was a significant event in history that accounted for the separation of one of the world’s oldest civilization into two, independent nations – Pakistan and India. Like many other wars in history, The Partition of India was instigated by religious, political and social conflict. This resulted in violence, discrimination and the largest human displacement in contemporary history. While the Partition was well-studied, much of our understanding was focused on the political side of history, not the human side of it. This was why oral history played an important role in manifesting the complexity of a historical event. Our focus here is Maya Rani’s testimony from Butalia’s book, The Other Side of Silence:

The british ruled over India for over two centuries, introducing systems, ideas, and practices into the indian culture. In 1935, The Government of India Act was the most recent time India had been governed, and the government had a fair amount of responsibility. The already existing social order influenced the nationalist movement, and the leaders being chosen. India developed a federal government, with three legislative lists of power. The constitution of India is federal but also includes a strong central government, with power over the union. The central government has power over the states even though they are supposed to be autonomous. The new constitution of india separates itself greatly from its british ruled past, just not necessarily politically. For example, new fundamental rights were provided in this constitution for the first time, however the idea of suffrage was also introduced by this constitution. There was much social and economic reform that took place due to them trying to break away from their british past. https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=dtKe6XV8z7wC&oi=fnd&pg=PR10&dq=independence+of+india&ots=DEXY6BHkwP&sig=nzxK29rpFpr8eRL1ZogYXZbMNz0#v=onepage&q=independence%20of%20india&f=false

Memory of a singular event can differ amongst individuals, even those in the same neighborhood or family. Each individual brings a collective of different experiences, mindsets, identities, etc. to the table and therefore, perceives events differently. Although a seemingly simple concept, there is a distinctness of individual memory that does not coincide with the collective memory of a community. In terms of historical events, a nation’s communal memory is not solely rooted in ‘fact’ but also in the oral histories of those individuals who lived through the event. There is no one history. Consequently, there is a discourse between the collective memory of the community and the individual memory. India’s 1947 partition reveals that there are many different histories to the independence of India and the subsequent creation of Pakistan. By utilizing the text Cracking India, author Bapsi Sidhwa examines the disparities between the two types of memories in order to reconcile the past with contemporary India/Pakistan.

Before the Partition of India, in 1947, India was considered a country with a reasonably peaceful history. However, during and after the Partition, sexual violence, both towards men and women, escalated, resulting in the rape and abduction of over 80,000 women. Cracking India, by Bapsi Sidhwa, tells a story that highlights these violent acts by both Muslims and Hindus, through the eyes of a disabled young Parsi girl named Lenny, who witnesses first hand the violence of Partition when she mistakenly participates in the abduction of her ayah, Shanta. Throughout Cracking India, Lenny observes as the religions involved in Partition become increasingly violent towards both men and women, within their own religions and against others.

Today, the legacy of 1947 increasingly poses a threat than any other time before on the subcontinent. Part has really ended up being a trauma from which the mainland has never completely recouped. Yet unfortunately, this is not reflected in its history composing, a reality that is regretted by a lot of people. Alok Bhalla, for instance, in his presentation to an accumulation of Partition stories in English interpretation states that regarding the matter of Partition, there is not only an absence of incredible expositive expression, there is, all the more genuinely, an absence of extraordinary history Indeed, if this is accurate to any degree, this is maybe on the grounds that Indian historiography has centered more on Independence than on Partition, more on the bringing together constrain of patriotism than the divisive compels that lease the nation in 1947. For quite a while, Indian history composing emulated the customary patriot talk in which the part of the incredible Congress pioneers and the vitality of national joining were dependably given pride of spot. This specific talk has been termed the 'Nehruvian story' of Indian history, and one can't overemphasize the significance of Nehru's own books in designing this talk. Such works of Nehru's as An Autobiography and The Discovery of India show how he saw Indian history and how he reinterpreted it to an advanced mainstream patriot talk for the rising independent state of India.