tag:theconversation.com,2011:/global/topics/indian-independence-anniversary-41753/articlesIndian Independence Anniversary – The Conversation2022-08-14T20:04:02Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1875262022-08-14T20:04:02Z2022-08-14T20:04:02ZAustralia wasn’t always supportive of India becoming independent. But 75 years on, relations have thawed<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/478653/original/file-20220811-15-18oqco.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=4%2C0%2C2991%2C1818&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Mohandas Gandhi, who led India's fight for independence, talks to a crowd in Ahmedabad, India in 1931. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>On this day 75 years ago, after a long battle for self-government, Great Britain finally withdrew from the subcontinent – allowing independence for India and Pakistan. </p>
<p>Once described as the “jewel in the crown”, the British withdrawal from the Indian empire was a reflection of the strength of the freedom movement, led by Mohandas Gandhi and others, as well as Great Britain’s plummeted standing as a power after the second world war. </p>
<p>As two countries part of the British empire, India and Australia had at least that in common. So what did India’s independence mean for its relationship with Australia? </p>
<h2>A history of mistrust and neglect</h2>
<p>There are few countries in Asia today that have more in common in both values and interests than India and Australia. The recently signed Economic Cooperation and Trade Agreement (EKTA) and the deepening security cooperation through the “Quad” (the Quadrilateral security dialogue, which also includes Japan and the United States) are examples of the robustness of the bilateral relationship. </p>
<p>But this was not always the case. For nearly six decades, bilateral relations were characterised by misperception, lack of trust, neglect, missed opportunities and even hostility. </p>
<p>Historically, Australia and India established diplomatic relations even before India’s independence. New Delhi set up a High Commission in Canberra in <a href="https://www.hcicanberra.gov.in/page/previous-high-commissioners/">1945</a>, while Australia had done so a year earlier. </p>
<p>In April 1947, Australia sent observers to the Asian Relations Conference in Delhi hosted by India’s future prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, signalling its willingness to identify with the “National Movements for Freedom” of the colonised countries of Asia. The then Labour government of Prime Minister Ben Chifley welcomed India’s independence and its willingness to be part of the Commonwealth.</p>
<p>However, this diplomatic honeymoon dramatically changed after Robert Menzies became prime minister in 1949. Menzies had been sceptical about India’s independence, <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=QJuNDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT165&lpg=PT165&dq=robert+menzies+india+a+country+has+not+reached+a+stage+at+which+the+majority+of+its+people+are+by+education,+outlook+and+training,+fit+for+self-government&source=bl&ots=roqIFkm6SF&sig=ACfU3U25isf-3CcpllWGMDOKXDADMr1ICg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiFuonE2r35AhViTmwGHa14BkwQ6AF6BAgfEAM#v=onepage&q=robert%20menzies%20india%20a%20country%20has%20not%20reached%20a%20stage%20at%20which%20the%20majority%20of%20its%20people%20are%20by%20education%2C%20outlook%20and%20training%2C%20fit%20for%20self-government&f=false">describing</a> it as a country that had “not yet reached the stage at which the majority of its people are by education, outlook and training, fit for self-government,” and disagreed with India’s decision to become a republic although remaining part of the Commonwealth of States. </p>
<p>In 1955, Menzies – Australia’s longest serving prime minister - went further. He decided Australia should not take part in the Bandung Afro-Asian conference. By distancing Australia from the “new world”, Menzies (who would later confess that the western world did not understand India) alienated Indians, offended Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru (India’s longest standing prime minister) and left Australia unsure, for decades, about its Asian identity. </p>
<p>Through these years, India and Australia rarely had a meaningful conversation. The reasons are not difficult to identify: the White Australia Policy, the Cold War, the Nehru-Menzies discord, India’s economic policies which strived for self-sufficiency, Canberra’s strident response to New Delhi’s nuclear tests in 1998, and <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2009-05-29/anger-grows-over-indian-student-bashings/1697904">attacks on Indian students</a> in Victoria in 2009. </p>
<p>The legacy of each was long-lasting: years after the White Australia Policy became history and Australia became one of the most multicultural nations, it seemed, at least anecdotally, that most Indians were unaware of this fundamental change. The only exposure most Indians had to Australia was to the Australian cricket team — the least multicultural of institutions. We used to celebrate each other’s problems rather than our successes. </p>
<h2>Improved relations</h2>
<p>A new chapter in India’s relations with Australia began in the second decade of the 21st century. In September 2014, the <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-09-03/first-meeting-for-tony-abbott-and-india27s-new-leader-narendra/5716150">visit of Liberal prime minister</a>, Tony Abbott, to India — also the first stand-alone state visit to be hosted by the Narendra Modi-led government — brought any sour historical relations to a close. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/abbotts-visit-to-take-australia-india-relations-beyond-cricket-31056">Abbott’s visit to take Australia-India relations beyond cricket</a>
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<p>In a reciprocal gesture, <a href="https://www.dfat.gov.au/geo/india/joint-statement-by-prime-minister-abbott-and-prime-minister-modi-brisbane-november-2014">two months later</a> Modi became the first Indian prime minister to visit Australia in 33 years. The last Indian prime minster to visit Australia had been <a href="https://www.hcicanberra.gov.in/page/bilateral-visits/">Indira Gandhi</a>, a visit remembered for its insignificance since it did nothing to improve relations.</p>
<p>Today, apart from being two English-speaking, multicultural, federal democracies that believe in and respect the rule of law, both have a strategic interest in ensuring a balance in the Indo-Pacific and in ensuring the region is not dominated by any one hegemonic power. In addition, Indians are today the <a href="https://visaenvoy.com/where-do-skilled-migrants-to-australia-come-from/#:%7E:text=The%20applicants%20who%20were%20granted,rate%20compared%20to%20other%20countries.">largest source of skilled migrants</a> to Australia. </p>
<p>Relations between India and Australia have deepened dramatically over the past decade. India’s economic growth and its burgeoning demand for energy, resources and education have made it suddenly one of Australia’s largest export markets. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-the-australia-india-relationship-has-nowhere-to-go-but-up-despite-differences-on-russia-and-trade-179937">Why the Australia-India relationship has nowhere to go but up, despite differences on Russia and trade</a>
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<p>Beyond the trade links, there is the shared concern in Canberra and New Delhi about security and stability in the region. We are living through a period of immense turbulence, disruption and even subversion. The near overwhelming presence of an illiberal, totalitarian China, increasingly unilateralist, interventionist and mercantilist - willing to write its own rules – is the single biggest challenge to the two countries. It was for this reason the Quad partnership began.</p>
<h2>Lessons for Australia</h2>
<p>As India and Indians celebrate the 75th anniversary of independence, it is more than just an event. For Indians independence was the culmination of a struggle of nearly 200 years, and the decades after independence have demonstrated the country’s growth as a self-confident country. </p>
<p>It has sustained, for the most, itself as a liberal democracy and improved its standing in the international system while earning the respect of the rest of the world, despite continuing problems. </p>
<p>Perhaps it’s time Australia – learning from the Indian example - declared itself as a republic, became much more inclusive in terms of empowering the Indigenous people, and recognised that it is today an Asian country, in a real sense, rather than being part of the Anglosphere.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/187526/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Amitabh Mattoo does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>India celebrates its 75th anniversary of independence today. As a fellow member of the Commonwealth, Australia wasn’t always supportive of India’s ambitions for self-determination.Amitabh Mattoo, Honorary Professor of International Relations, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/823932017-08-14T12:46:35Z2017-08-14T12:46:35ZThree families’ stories of new beginnings after the horror of Indian partition<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181947/original/file-20170814-23252-1nzhlai.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Saad Mohammad Al-Husainy, a student in Birmingham, marries Colette O'Neill in 1954.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photograph courtesy of Sùna Al-Husainy</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-partition-of-india-happened-and-why-its-effects-are-still-felt-today-81766?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20August%2010%202017&utm_content=Latest%20from%20The%20Conversation%20for%20August%2010%202017+CID_e009fc9f250328683a4f34f1bb89851f&utm_source=campaign_monitor_uk&utm_term=How%20the%20Partition%20of%20India%20happened%20%20and%20why%20its%20effects%20are%20still%20felt%20today">partition of the Indian subcontinent</a> was catastrophic for the over 10m people caught up in the turmoil of new borders, displacement and the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/books/first/b/butalia-silence.html">horrors</a> that plagued those on their way to new homes. But there were a few silver linings.</p>
<p>In 2016, I researched <a href="https://www.academia.edu/34217729/Skipping_Memories_on_Partition_and_the_Intersensory_Field_in_Subcontinental_Britain">Britain Asian recollections of partition</a> to write a play, <a href="https://www.sohayavisions.com/our-story">Silent Sisters</a>. The play is being <a href="https://www.richmix.org.uk/">performed</a> again in <a href="https://www.parkwoodtheatres.co.uk/The-Hawth">November</a> to mark 70 years since partition in August 1947.</p>
<p>I spoke to 52 people in workshops and individual interviews. It became evident that the pain, loss and restlessness of forced movement to either Pakistan or elsewhere in India played a big part in families’ decision to <a href="http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/findhelpsubject/history/history/asiansinbritain/histoutline/briefhist.html">migrate overseas</a>. The turbulence also spurred female survivors from conservative families to pursue educational and vocational careers that they would never have otherwise entertained.</p>
<h2>Restless spirits</h2>
<p>Community artist and activist, Sùna Al-Husainy, talked about her father, Saad Mahmood Al-Husainy, who passed away in London in 2012. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181865/original/file-20170813-21897-1nt1vwy.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181865/original/file-20170813-21897-1nt1vwy.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=794&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181865/original/file-20170813-21897-1nt1vwy.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=794&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181865/original/file-20170813-21897-1nt1vwy.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=794&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181865/original/file-20170813-21897-1nt1vwy.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=997&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181865/original/file-20170813-21897-1nt1vwy.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=997&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181865/original/file-20170813-21897-1nt1vwy.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=997&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Sùna Al-Husainy as a baby with her family, circa 1969.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photograph courtesy of Sùna Al-Husainy</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
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<p>As a young man, he had escorted the future premier of Pakistan, <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/jinnah_mohammad_ali.shtml">Mohammad Ali Jinnah</a>, to a meeting with India’s leader, <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/nehru_jawaharlal.shtml">Jawaharlal Nehru</a>, <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/mountbatten_lord_louis.shtml">Viceroy Louis Mountbatten</a> and the man tasked with drawing the lines of partition, <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-asia-40788079/cyril-radcliffe-the-man-who-drew-the-partition-line">Cyril Radcliffe</a>. </p>
<p>She told me that partition went right through her father’s village in the Gurdaspur district of India’s Punjab province. “When I approached my father about it, he found it very difficult to talk about it,” she said. “But he did manage to bring out a full poster size photograph of the palace he grew up in.”</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181863/original/file-20170813-13476-c7e29e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181863/original/file-20170813-13476-c7e29e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=422&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181863/original/file-20170813-13476-c7e29e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=422&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181863/original/file-20170813-13476-c7e29e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=422&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181863/original/file-20170813-13476-c7e29e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=530&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181863/original/file-20170813-13476-c7e29e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=530&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181863/original/file-20170813-13476-c7e29e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=530&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Saad Mahmood Al-Husainy’s palace in India (no longer present), circa 1940.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photograph courtesy of Sùna Al-Husainy</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
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<p>Sùna Al-Husainy’s paternal family were Muslims, descendants of a 13th-century Sufi saint, <a href="http://wwwnfiecomblogspotcom.blogspot.co.uk/2009/12/hazrat-syed-imam-ali-shah-ra.html">Hazrat Imam Ali Shah Sahib</a>. His shrine is the <a href="https://dairamuhammadi.wordpress.com/biography/hazrat-syed-imam-ali-shah/">Makkan Sahrif</a>, now looked after by a Sikh octogenarian, <a href="http://makansharief-rattarchattar.blogspot.co.uk/2011/03/history-why-mela-is-celebrated-mela_28.html">Gurcharan Singh</a>, in India. </p>
<p>After partition, Saad Mahmood Al-Husainy moved to Lahore in Pakistan. As the eldest of six, he was expected to take the role of a <a href="https://www.revolvy.com/topic/Pir%20(Sufism)&item_type=topic">Sufi <em>pir</em></a> or master. Instead, in a bid to escape his sense of political despair and memories of the atrocities that he had witnessed, including the beheading of his household servants, he made the decision to leave for Britain. </p>
<p>He enrolled at the University of Birmingham in the late 1940s to study medicine. There, at a poetry recital of the Sufi saint, <a href="https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poet/jalal-al-din-rumi%5D">Jalal al-Din Muhammad Rumi</a>, he met an Irish woman, Colette O'Neill, who was training to be a teacher. They fell for each other, not least due to their love of poetry, and within three months, had got married. </p>
<h2>Creative impulses</h2>
<p>Siraj-Ud-Din was the maternal uncle of Javed Khan, one of the actors in <a href="https://en-gb.facebook.com/SilentSisterstheplay/">Silent Sisters</a>. He was a photographer living in the north-eastern Indian state of Bihar. In 1947, photographs were among his few belongings as he abandoned his home to sail with his extended family to the new nation of Pakistan. One of Siraj-Ud-Din’s pre-partition photographs was of female relatives in their former home in Bihar. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181845/original/file-20170812-13451-8ud7a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181845/original/file-20170812-13451-8ud7a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181845/original/file-20170812-13451-8ud7a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181845/original/file-20170812-13451-8ud7a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181845/original/file-20170812-13451-8ud7a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=519&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181845/original/file-20170812-13451-8ud7a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=519&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181845/original/file-20170812-13451-8ud7a2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=519&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Javed Khan’s maternal family with his grandmother in centre and mother on bottom right, taken in India, circa 1945.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photograph courtesy of Javed Khan</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
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<p>Another was taken around 1949 in their new home in the Punjab province of Pakistan.</p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181848/original/file-20170812-21897-15yuc71.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181848/original/file-20170812-21897-15yuc71.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181848/original/file-20170812-21897-15yuc71.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181848/original/file-20170812-21897-15yuc71.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181848/original/file-20170812-21897-15yuc71.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181848/original/file-20170812-21897-15yuc71.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181848/original/file-20170812-21897-15yuc71.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Javed Khan’s maternal relatives in Pakistan with grandfather in centre and mother on bottom left, circa 1949.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photograph courtesy of Javed Khan</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
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<p>Such photographs showing the resilience of ordinary refugees were a rarity. Khan reflected:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>We were lucky to have these pics. Mamu [uncle] ended up having a photo studio in Karachi. I remember it – where he did portraits and 10x8 lobby pics for cinemas. My dad helped him with hand-colouring them among several other jobs. </p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181851/original/file-20170812-13490-1x8kpyy.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181851/original/file-20170812-13490-1x8kpyy.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=549&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181851/original/file-20170812-13490-1x8kpyy.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=549&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181851/original/file-20170812-13490-1x8kpyy.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=549&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181851/original/file-20170812-13490-1x8kpyy.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=690&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181851/original/file-20170812-13490-1x8kpyy.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=690&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181851/original/file-20170812-13490-1x8kpyy.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=690&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Javed’s father, Wali Mohammed with his brothers, Fakhru and Shah Zaman (left to right) in Liverpool, circa 1960.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photograph courtesy of Javed Khan</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Born in Karachi in 1955, Khan travelled with his father to Liverpool on the now decommissioned <a href="http://iancoombe.tripod.com/id29.html">RMS Caledonia</a>. They met with his uncles who had moved to Britain in the 1950s. While Siraj-ud-Din stayed put in Karachi, Khan’s mother, Suriya Begum, joined them a year later.</p>
<p>Packed with hopes of having a better life in the former colonial heartland than in Pakistan itself, Khan’s family went to live in Yorkshire. In 1977, inspired by the artistic talents of his maternal relatives, Khan headed south to pursue a career in fine art prior to acting.</p>
<h2>New horizons for women</h2>
<p>Kaunain Rahman, a postgraduate student who attended one of the workshops for <a href="https://twitter.com/SohayaV">Silent Sisters</a>, attributed her studying at the University of Sussex to fateful decisions made by her female ancestors. During the turmoil of partition, her great grandparents refused to move from Delhi. <a href="http://www.1947partitionarchive.org/">Like many other minorities who had befriended their neighbours</a>, they were under the belief that they would be protected from any communalist attacks. But this was not to be. One night, marauders arrived <em>en masse</em> at their gates:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>My great grandfather had his hunting rifle ready. And he had six daughters. If the mob breaks through, then he was ready to shoot and kill his daughters because he didn’t want them to be raped and then killed. It was only because my great grandmother’s brother-in-law had connections with politicians that they were airlifted out in the nick of time. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>After their spectacular escape, they moved to Calcutta (Kolkata) with hardly anything to their name. Still, it spurred <a href="http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/book-review-ritu-menon-and-kamla-bhasins-borders-and-boundaries/1/264073.html">a new lease of life particularly for the women</a>. She told me:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I’m sitting here today because of the decisions my great grandmother had made at that time. She had a few gold bangles. She sold all of them. And instead of keeping them for her daughter’s dowry or for food or for shelter, she put her daughters into schools. And those daughters went on to become successful women in their own respective fields. And then their daughters, and their daughters, well, one of them is me! </p>
</blockquote>
<p>And so out of great devastation came incredible courage and new beginnings as partition survivors spread their wings far and wide.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/82393/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Raminder Kaur has received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council and the Arts and Humanities Research Council, and as artistic director of Sohaya Visions, from Arts Council England.</span></em></p>For some, the forced movement and brutalities of partition in 1947 led to new opportunities for women and migration to Britain.Raminder Kaur, Professor of Anthropology and Cultural Studies, University of SussexLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/770682017-08-11T13:47:17Z2017-08-11T13:47:17ZColonialism in India was traumatic – including for some of the British officials who ruled the Raj<p>When India gained independence from Britain on August 15 1947, the majority of Anglo-Indians had either left or would leave soon after. Many within the Indian Civil Service would write of the trauma that they experienced from witnessing the violence of the years leading up to the end of British rule and the bloodbath that would follow as the lines of <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-partition-of-india-happened-and-why-its-effects-are-still-felt-today-81766">partition</a> were revealed.</p>
<p>Colonialism was certainly a far more traumatising experience for colonial subjects than their colonisers. They suffered poverty, malnutrition, disease, cultural upheaval, economic exploitation, political disadvantage, and systematic programmes aimed at creating a sense of social and racial inferiority. While some may argue that any suffering on the part of the British colonialists ought to be met with little sympathy, this is not a reason to obscure it from history. </p>
<p>It was the very notion that Indian civil service servicemen were usurpers, full of privilege, in a foreign land that led to the sapped sense of humanity that many wrestled with – both during and after their India careers. </p>
<p>As my own forthcoming book details, some shut themselves off from the day-to-day lives of Indians, unless forced to engage for work purposes. Others escaped through drowning themselves in alcohol, opium or other drugs. Some convinced themselves of the intellectual superiority of the white man and his right to rule over “lesser races”, while a number found solace in Christianity. Several came to see their role as being a peacekeeper between various ethnic and religious groups, despite the irony of the British having encouraged and exploited the categorisation of colonial subjects on these grounds in the first place. </p>
<p>Underneath all of this sits a trauma that the coloniser had to either deal with – or resign their post and go home.</p>
<h2>Serving the Raj</h2>
<p>One serviceman of the late Raj who I have focused on in my research is an example of the coping mechanisms that British officials deployed. Andrew Clow entered the Indian Civil Service in 1912 at the age of 22 and would remain a civil servant until 1947 when he reached the mandatory retirement ceiling of 35 years. His most notable portfolios were as secretary of the Indian Labour Bureau in the late 1930s, followed by minister for communications and then governor of Assam from 1942 to 1947. </p>
<p>Clow, and his one thousand or so colleagues at any one time, effectively ruled India during the late Raj. This was a time of declining British prestige, and declining public and political opinion of colonialism as an acceptable social, economic and political practice. The <a href="http://www.palgrave.com/de/book/9781349024391">rise</a> of the Indian independence movement with Mohandas Gandhi as its nominal leader, coincided with the anti-British international propaganda concerning its empire that came from the Soviet Union and its sympathisers. </p>
<h2>Doubt and self-loathing</h2>
<p>In the early 1920s, the Indian independence movement grew in prominence and received a significant level of sympathy at home and abroad. In 1919, the <a href="http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/the-amritsar-massacre">Amritsar Massacre</a> of unarmed protesters by British and Gurka troops received much public criticism. A year later, two of Clow’s civil service intake year group were assassinated in a market in Midnapore, West Bengal. From letters Clow wrote to a friend, we know he considered resigning on several occasions during the early 1920s. This period of reflection led him to fundamentally question his role within the colonial system, but he ultimately decided to continue his career.</p>
<p>Clow was a devout Christian and his life in India would develop into a religious cocoon of sorts where he used his relationship with God to suppress his trauma at being a colonial usurper.</p>
<p>As he became more senior within the administration he increasingly distanced himself from Indians, Indian culture and expressed little sympathy for the plight of people who suffered from British exploitation. He spent the vast majority of his time with other Europeans and his holidays at his house at the British hill station of Simla. His diaries throughout the 1930s and 1940s became almost entirely written prayers requesting salvation punctuated by private comments of self-loathing, written in confidence between himself and God. </p>
<h2>Defender of British colonialism</h2>
<p>Upon his retirement from the Indian Civil Service in 1947, Clow returned to Scotland and became chairman of the newly-created Scottish Gas Board. His private time was spent largely in the pursuit of the preservation of the legacy of British India. He voraciously read memoirs and other reflections by his former colleagues, and would lambast any critique of the British, even if those criticisms were rather sparse. </p>
<p>Clow’s failure to concede publicly that colonialism was an exploitative practice is indicative of a complex reaction to his trauma at being a key part of a system of suppression. His heightened religiosity was a key part of his way of dealing with this. In many ways he “used” God to negate his discomfort at being one of the main figures of the British colonial enterprise.</p>
<p>Clow was typical of many within the Indian Civil Service who became troubled by their roles facilitating the exploitation of the Indian subcontinent for the British Empire. Yet, rather than resign his post and become a critic of colonial practices, Clow built a number of internal mechanisms so that he could carry on. Reactions like Clow’s go some way to explain the romance that many within British society have had for the age of empire. But today, 70 years on from the end of the Raj, public bodies and the British media are willing to engage in a much more robust critique.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/77068/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Colin Alexander does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>How one member of the Indian Civil Service coped with being a colonial usurper.Colin Alexander, Principal Lecturer in Political Communications, Nottingham Trent UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/803022017-08-10T10:37:47Z2017-08-10T10:37:47ZThe gift of civilisation: how imperial Britons saw their mission in India<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181528/original/file-20170809-26031-rksntj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">By Simpson, William (1823-1899) via Wikimedia Commons</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The politician and historian Thomas Babington Macaulay imagined, in 1840, the fall of a great empire. He <a href="http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/macaulay/ranke1.html">conjured a future</a> “when some traveller from New Zealand shall, in the midst of a vast solitude, take his stand on a broken arch of London Bridge to sketch the ruins of St Paul’s”. </p>
<p>This was a nod by Macaulay to Edward Gibbon’s hope 60 years previously – expressed in <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/books/00/05/07/reviews/000507.07breent.html">Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire</a> – that great scholars might eventually arise from the Maori population as a result of the civilising influence of British colonial rule. Book-ending 1780 and 1840, therefore, are reflections on the rise and fall of empires and civilisations, metaphorically and literally illustrated by their successors – travellers who sit among the crumbling ruins recording the ultimate failing of even mankind’s greatest achievements.</p>
<p>The loss of America, the French revolution, Napoleonic adventuring and a radical climate in which the middle classes were alarmed at the sight of Chartist crowds marching in the streets, also suggested disquieting visions of the future for British elites. The Greco-Roman empires had fallen, Hindu culture and Mogul power had declined in India. Was the British Empire inevitably destined to crumble, like <a href="https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46565/ozymandias">Shelley’s Ozymandias</a>?</p>
<p>Linking these concerns was British self-identification as successors of Greco-Roman antiquity – as having inherited the mantle of the “cradle of civilisation”. In their <a href="https://lra.le.ac.uk/bitstream/2381/31454/6/Rogers%20and%20Hingley%20-%20Gibbon%20paper.pdf">2010 paper on Gibbon</a>, British academics Adam Rogers and Richard Hingley note how: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>The British drew upon the classical past through an interactive mutual relationship between classical texts, scholarship, and politics; through this approach they developed intellectual discourses about both cultural superiority and decline.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>During the <a href="http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1833/jul/10/east-india-companys-charter">1833 East India Bill debate</a>, Macaulay described Britain’s appropriation of the glory of ancient empires. Britain was:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The most renowned of Western Conquerors … beyond the point where the phalanx of Alexander refused to proceed … a territory larger and more populous than France, Spain, Italy and Germany put together … the world has seen nothing similar.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181531/original/file-20170809-26048-g2u7nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181531/original/file-20170809-26048-g2u7nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=435&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181531/original/file-20170809-26048-g2u7nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=435&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181531/original/file-20170809-26048-g2u7nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=435&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181531/original/file-20170809-26048-g2u7nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=547&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181531/original/file-20170809-26048-g2u7nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=547&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181531/original/file-20170809-26048-g2u7nw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=547&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A civilising influence: British officials take two Indian princelings hostage in 1793.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Robert Home, National Army Museum</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Indian elephant in the rooms of the British cabinet and the East India Company was the insecurity of their eastern empire. A colonial administrator in India, Samuel Sneade Brown, <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=BeUWLhTsJrUC&pg=PA191&lpg=PA191&dq=our+dangers+lie+in+the+vast+mass+of+people+whom+we+have+subjected+to+our+rule+in+this+country&source=bl&ots=DeUf0y9d4J&sig=klMLScPkVBSgS70gaDBMrSXjWXk&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwixkaqO-MnVAhWMKMAKHa_FCj4Q6AEIJjAA#v=onepage&q=our%20dangers%20lie%20in%20the%20vast%20mass%20of%20people%20whom%20we%20have%20subjected%20to%20our%20rule%20in%20this%20country&f=false">wrote home to his mother</a>: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Our dangers lie in the vast mass of people whom we have subjected to our rule in this country, and who would gladly rise and shake off the yoke of the ‘feringees’ [foreigners]. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Equally thorny, was the ambivalence of continental conquest by a nation committed to representative government. In justification, the British drew parallels with their own relationship with the Roman empire. The colonial administrator <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/trevelyan_charles.shtml">Charles Trevelyan</a> <a href="https://archive.org/stream/ontheeducationof015100mbp#page/n39/mode/2up/search/domestic">described Rome’s conquest</a> of Britain – “[how] the acquisitions made by superiority in war, were consolidated by superiority in the arts of peace; and the remembrance of the original violence was lost in that of the benefits which resulted from it.” Imposition “from without” was, <a href="https://archive.org/stream/ontheeducationof015100mbp#page/n39/mode/2up/search/domestic">he wrote</a>, necessary because “the instances in which nations have worked their way to a high degree of civilisation from domestic resources only are extremely rare”.</p>
<p>Trevelyan boldly hoped that “the Indians will … soon stand in the same position toward us in which we once stood towards the Romans … from being obstinate enemies, the Britons soon became attached and confiding friends”.</p>
<p>Thus the British equated contemporary Indians with their pre-Roman selves – and their contemporary selves with the Romans. As the Romans had civilised and befriended the British, the British would do the same for India, justifying imperial imposition and allaying fears of being “swept off the face of Upper India like chaff”.</p>
<h2>In Britain’s image</h2>
<p>The Romans had offered a sense of inclusion and common purpose – and the British envisaged assimilating India in their own image. “The past history of the world authorises us to believe that the movement which is taking place in India,” <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=HWUEAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA36&lpg=PA36&dq=trevelyan+decided+change+for+the+better+in+the+character+of+the+people&source=bl&ots=d5LU8hsheO&sig=BACpl6cHBOOqoi8xSqLotQiwA1I&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjAoMyQhcrVAhUpDMAKHR7EDrIQ6AEILDAC#v=onepage&q=trevelyan%20decided%20change%20for%20the%20better%20in%20the%20character%20of%20the%20people&f=false">Trevelyan wrote</a>, suggested a “decided change for the better in the character of the people”. </p>
<p>The Romans had adopted Greek tastes, and Britain was acculturated by the Romans – now the Anglicist policy of educating India in the English language would create, as <a href="https://archive.org/stream/Minutes_201311/MinutesNew#page/n5/mode/2up">Macaulay famously put it</a>: “a class of persons, Indian in blood and colour, but English in taste, in opinions, in morals, and in intellect”.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181534/original/file-20170809-26006-1mv2hps.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181534/original/file-20170809-26006-1mv2hps.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181534/original/file-20170809-26006-1mv2hps.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181534/original/file-20170809-26006-1mv2hps.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181534/original/file-20170809-26006-1mv2hps.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181534/original/file-20170809-26006-1mv2hps.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/181534/original/file-20170809-26006-1mv2hps.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Glory of empire: the Victoria Memorial in Kolkata.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Joydeep via Wikimedia Commons</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Classical discourse thus informed imperial policy. But it was also part of metropolitan debate advocating political reform, which aimed for middle-class inclusion rather than universal suffrage. Trevelyan noted how the Romano-British civilising precedent began among the upper and middle-classes – the rich, the learned, the men of business. Indian reform would lead to “a national representative assembly” but, like back home, comprising the middle and upper-classes. </p>
<p>Equally, British working-class education was developed <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03085149700000025">largely on the Indian model</a>, associating the British lower-classes with colonial natives, justifying patriarchal oversight and political exclusion. Thus, images of empire are also visions of home.</p>
<h2>Decline and fall</h2>
<p>Finally, returning to civilisational decline, <a href="http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1833/jul/10/east-india-companys-charter">Macaulay conceded</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The sceptre may pass away from us … There is an empire exempt from all natural causes of decay. Those triumphs are the pacific triumphs of reason over barbarism; that empire is the imperishable empire of our arts and our morals, our literature and our laws.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The message here is the same as the New Zealander at St Pauls. In the far future, Britain has continued the cycle of European superiority. The Greco-Roman torch of Western civilisation – which was once passed to the British – has migrated to the newly civilised southern hemisphere. In Macaulay’s future, Britain has completed its “civilising mission”. </p>
<p>In such a vision, Macaulay employs classical discourse to give value to Britain’s Indian empire and soothe fears of civilisational decline. As Macaulay <a href="https://archive.org/details/lifeandlettersof002360mbp">said of his major work</a>, the History of England: “I have had the year 2000, and often the year 3000, often in my mind.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/80302/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Robinson receives funding from Midland 3 Cities, for PhD research</span></em></p>Intellectuals of the time saw the British Empire as the heir to the civilising influence of ancient Rome.David Robinson, PhD researcher, 19th century British travel literature on India and Italy, University of NottinghamLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/817662017-08-10T10:21:00Z2017-08-10T10:21:00ZHow the Partition of India happened – and why its effects are still felt today<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/181415/original/file-20170808-22982-ikgy1m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Mahatma Gandhi with Lord and Lady Mountbatten, 1947.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AMountbattens_with_Gandhi_(IND_5298).jpg">Wikimedia Commons</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>“Partition” – the division of British India into the two separate states of India and Pakistan on August 14-15, 1947 – was the “last-minute” mechanism by which the British were able to secure agreement over <a href="http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00maplinks/modern/maps1947/maps1947.html">how independence would take place</a>. At the time, few people understood what Partition would entail or what its results would be, and the migration on the enormous scale that followed took the vast majority of contemporaries <a href="http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/findhelpregion/asia/india/indianindependence/chronology/index.html">by surprise</a>.</p>
<p>The main vehicle for nationalist activity was the Indian National Congress, whose best-known leaders included <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/hinduism/people/gandhi_1.shtml">Mahatma Gandhi</a> and <a href="http://www.pmindia.gov.in/en/former_pm/shri-jawaharlal-nehru/">Jawaharlal Nehru</a>. Even before the 1940s, it had long argued for <a href="http://www.open.ac.uk/researchprojects/makingbritain/content/indian-national-congress">a unitary state with a strong centre</a>; even though Congress was ostensibly secular in its objectives, organisations representing minority interests increasingly viewed this idea with suspicion, believing that it would entrench the political dominance of Hindus, who made up about 80% of the population.</p>
<p>At around 25% of its population, Muslims were British India’s largest religious minority. Under imperial rule, they had grown accustomed to having their minority status protected by a system of reserved legislative seats and separate electorates. The British system of political control hinged on identifying interest groups willing to collaborate, a governing style <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/40400043">often described</a> as “divide and rule”.</p>
<p>The prospect of losing this protection as independence drew closer worried more and more Muslims, first in parts of northern India, and then, after World War II, in the influential Muslim-majority provinces of Bengal and Punjab. In 1945-6, the <a href="https://www.dawn.com/news/1310662">All-India Muslim League</a>, led by <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/12/jinnah-founder-pakistan-independence-partition-1947-archive">Muhammad Ali Jinnah</a>, won a majority of Muslim votes in provincial elections. This strengthened the party’s claim to speak for a substantial proportion of, but never all, the subcontinent’s Muslims.</p>
<p>Then came World War II – and suddenly, the political stakes in India were considerably higher. </p>
<h2>The end of the Raj</h2>
<p>When Britain took India into the war without consultation in 1939, Congress opposed it; large nationalist protests ensued, culminating in the 1942 <a href="http://www.open.ac.uk/researchprojects/makingbritain/content/1942-quit-india-movement">Quit India</a> movement, a mass movement against British rule. For their part in it, Gandhi and Nehru and thousands of Congress workers were imprisoned until 1945. </p>
<p>Meanwhile, the British wartime need for local allies gave the Muslim League an opening to offer its cooperation in exchange for future political safeguards. In March 1940, the Muslim League’s “Pakistan” resolution called for the creation of “separate states” – plural, not singular – to accommodate Indian Muslims, whom it argued were a separate “nation”.</p>
<p>Historians <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1998/12/26/arts/taking-on-pakistan-s-hero-then-taking-the-heat.html">are still divided</a> on whether this rather vague demand was purely a bargaining counter or a firm objective. But while it may have been intended to solve the minority issue, it ended up aggravating it instead.</p>
<p>After the war, Attlee’s Labour government in London recognised that Britain’s devastated economy could not cope with the cost of the over-extended empire. A <a href="http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/findhelpregion/asia/india/indianindependence/transfer/transfer2/">Cabinet Mission</a> was dispatched to India in early 1946, and Attlee described its mission in ambitious terms:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>My colleagues are going to India with the intention of using their utmost endeavours to help her to attain her freedom as speedily and fully as possible. What form of government is to replace the present regime is for India to decide; but our desire is to help her to set up forthwith the machinery for making that decision.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>An act of parliament proposed June 1948 as the deadline for the transfer of power. But the Mission failed to secure agreement over its proposed constitutional scheme, which recommended a loose federation; the idea was rejected by both Congress and the Muslim League, which vowed to agitate for “Pakistan” <a href="http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/findhelpregion/asia/india/indianindependence/transfer/transfer2/index.html">by any means possible</a>.</p>
<figure>
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<p>All the while, communal violence was escalating. In August 1946, the <a href="http://time.com/3879963/vultures-of-calcutta-the-gruesome-aftermath-of-indias-1946-hindu-muslim-riots/">Great Calcutta Killing</a> left some 4,000 people dead and a further 100,000 homeless.</p>
<p>By March 1947, a new viceroy, Lord Louis Mountbatten, arrived in Delhi with a mandate to find a speedy way of <a href="http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/findhelpregion/asia/india/indianindependence/indiapakistan/partition4/index.html">bringing the British Raj</a> <a href="http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/findhelpregion/asia/india/indianindependence/transfer/transfer5/index.html">to an end</a>. On June 3, he announced that independence would be brought forward to August that year, presenting politicians with an ultimatum that gave them little alternative but to agree to the creation of two separate states. </p>
<p>Pakistan – its eastern and western wings separated by around 1,700 kilometres of Indian territory – <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/1751044.stm">celebrated independence</a> on August 14 that year; India did so the following day. The new borders, which split the key provinces of the Punjab and Bengal in two, were officially approved on August 17. They had been drawn up by a Boundary Commission, led by British lawyer <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-asia-40788079/cyril-radcliffe-the-man-who-drew-the-partition-line">Cyril Radcliffe</a>, who later <a href="http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/findhelpregion/asia/india/indianindependence/indiapakistan/partition9/index.html">admitted</a> that he had relied on out-of-date maps and census materials.</p>
<h2>Torn apart</h2>
<p>Partition <a href="http://time.com/4421746/margaret-bourke-white-great-migration/">triggered</a> riots, mass casualties, and a colossal wave of migration. Millions of people moved to what they hoped would be safer territory, with Muslims heading towards Pakistan, and Hindus and Sikhs in the direction of India. As many as 14-16m people may have been eventually displaced, travelling on foot, in bullock carts and by train. </p>
<p>Estimates of the death toll post-Partition range from 200,000 to two million. Many were killed by members of other communities and sometimes their own families, as well as by the contagious diseases which swept through <a href="http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/resources/the-road-to-partition/communal-disturbances/">refugee camps</a>. Women were often targeted as symbols of community honour, with up to 100,000 raped or abducted. </p>
<p>What can explain this intensely violent reaction? Many of the people concerned were very deeply attached not just to religious identity, but to territory, and Britain was reluctant to use its troops to maintain law and order. The situation was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/jul/23/the-raj-war-peoples-history-second-world-war-yasmin-khan-review">especially dangerous</a> in Punjab, where weapons and demobilised soldiers were abundant.</p>
<p>Another unforeseen consequence of Partition was that Pakistan’s population ended up more religiously homogeneous than originally anticipated. The Muslim League’s leaders had assumed that Pakistan would contain a sizeable non-Muslim population, whose presence would safeguard the position of Muslims remaining in India – but in West Pakistan, non-Muslim minorities comprised only 1.6% of the population by 1951, compared with 22% in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh). </p>
<p>And even though Pakistan was ostensibly created as a “homeland” for India’s Muslim minority, not all Muslims even supported its formation, never mind migrated there: Muslims remained the largest minority group in independent India, making up around 10% of the population in 1951. Gandhi himself was <a href="http://www.historytoday.com/richard-cavendish/mahatma-gandhi-shot">assassinated in January 1948</a> by a Hindu nationalist extremist who blamed him for being too supportive of Muslims at the time of Partition.</p>
<p>Both states subsequently faced huge problems accommodating and rehabilitating post-Partition refugees, whose numbers swelled when the two states <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/static/in_depth/south_asia/2002/india_pakistan/timeline/1947_48.stm">went to war</a> over the disputed territory of Jammu and Kashmir in 1947-8. Later bouts of communal tension generated further movement, with a trickle of people still migrating as late as the 1960s. </p>
<p>Today, the two countries’ relationship is far from healthy. <a href="https://theconversation.com/kashmir-flare-up-puts-india-under-new-pressure-to-deal-with-pakistan-65741">Kashmir remains a flashpoint</a>; both countries are <a href="https://theconversation.com/where-did-the-idea-of-an-islamic-bomb-come-from-69385">nuclear-armed</a>. Indian Muslims are frequently suspected of harbouring loyalties towards Pakistan; non-Muslim minorities in Pakistan are increasingly vulnerable thanks to the so-called <a href="http://www.dw.com/en/pakistans-islamization-before-and-after-dictator-zia-ul-haq/a-19480315">Islamisation</a> of life there since the 1980s. Seven decades on, well over a billion people still live in the shadow of Partition.</p>
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/india-tomorrow-a-podcast-series-from-the-anthill-episode-guide-114654">India Tomorrow</a> is a seven-part podcast series from The Conversation, taking an in-depth look at the big issues facing India ahead of the 2019 Indian elections.</em></p>
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/india-tomorrow-podcast-series-from-the-anthill-trailer-114641?utm_source=TCUK&utm_medium=linkback&utm_campaign=TCUKengagement&utm_content=AnthillHeaderBanner2114648">Click here to listen to the India Tomorrow trailer from The Anthill</a></em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/81766/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sarah Ansari has previously received funding from the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) to explore the impact of Independence and Partition on life in India and Pakistan. </span></em></p>As the British Empire became an unaffordable burden, planning for India’s independence quickly ran into trouble.Sarah Ansari, Professor of History, Head of Department, Royal Holloway University of LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.