Altruistic World Online Library

B. K. S. Iyengar
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 5/30/20

-- Iyengar’s Charisma of Incoherence, and Selected Indoctrination Defence Statements, by Matthew Remski

The videos below show two different instances of BKS Iyengar teaching at a yoga convention back in the 1990s.

The first one is particularly disturbing to watch. The student has cervical spondylosis and BKSI is shown dangerously pulling her out of position in Salamba Sarvangasana. Her neck could easily have been injured and she is clearly distressed by the reckless adjustment.

In the second video the student shown has lower back issues. BKSI treats his body as not much better than a slab of meat.

Can you imagine if a teacher up for certification had behaved in this way during a teaching assessment?

There is nothing admirable in this behavior. The arrogant, misplaced ownership BKSI asserts over his student's bodies is unnecessary and robs them of their personhood and self agency. He shows no sense of presence or connection to the many complex layers of the people that he is interacting with. In doing so, he leads them straight into harm's way.

There will be many ardent devotees who will try to explain this behavior away. Some will even try to glorify it. They will tell you not to believe what your eyes and gut are telling you about the violence you see. But once you strip the spiritual veneer away, that's what it is, violence, plain and simple.

I'm not denying BKS Iyengar's otherwise remarkable knowledge. But his delivery of that knowledge was mired in another, more brutal era. His methods were infused with the Indian caste culture and impacted by the British colonial rule that he was born into. Add to that the abuse that he suffered at the hands of his own teacher and you have a merciless, severe teaching style that has no place in contemporary culture.

I thoroughly reject the ongoing tradition in Iyengar Yoga of teachers treating another person's body with ownership and such a lack of care. Body treated as object, versus body treated as part of the continuum of the Self.

Let's keep the best of what BKSI had to offer and leave the rest behind. Or, as a dear friend said, "compost what is harmful so we can grow something healing and beautiful."

Our body should not be forced or punished like this. It should be honored and revered as temple to our Soul. Iyengar Yoga needs to and can evolve. It would be sad to see it become trapped in this wounded and antiquated type of behavior. Obsolete and lost to the wrong side of history.

Cassie Jackson
Liz Anne Potamianos
Karen Rain
Matthew Remski
Donna Farhi

-- Ann Tapsell West

B.K.S. Iyengar
Iyengar on his 86th birthday in 2004
Born: 14 December 1918, Bellur, Kolar district, Kingdom of Mysore (now Karnataka, India)
Died: 20 August 2014 (aged 95), Pune, Maharashtra, India
Occupation: Yoga teacher, author
Known for: Iyengar Yoga
Spouse(s): Ramamani
Children: Geeta and 5 others

Bellur Krishnamachar Sundararaja Iyengar (14 December 1918 – 20 August 2014), better known as B.K.S. Iyengar, was the founder of the style of yoga as exercise known as "Iyengar Yoga" and was considered one of the foremost yoga teachers in the world.[1][2] He was the author of many books on yoga practice and philosophy including Light on Yoga, Light on Pranayama, Light on the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, and Light on Life. Iyengar was one of the earliest students of Tirumalai Krishnamacharya, who is often referred to as "the father of modern yoga".[3] He has been credited with popularizing yoga, first in India and then around the world.[4]

The Indian government awarded Iyengar the Padma Shri in 1991, the Padma Bhushan in 2002 and the Padma Vibhushan in 2014.[5][6] In 2004, Iyengar was named one of the 100 most influential people in the world by Time magazine.[7][8]

Early years

B.K.S. Iyengar was born into a poor Sri Vaishnava Iyengar family[9] in Bellur, Kolar district,[10] Karnataka, India. He was the 11th of 13 children (10 of whom survived) born to Sri Krishnamachar, a school teacher, and Sheshamma.[11] When Iyengar was five years old, his family moved to Bangalore. Four years later, the 9-year-old boy lost his father to appendicitis.[11]

Iyengar's home town, Bellur, was in the grip of the influenza pandemic at the time of his birth, and an attack of that disease left the young boy sickly and weak for many years. Throughout his childhood, he struggled with malaria, tuberculosis, typhoid fever, and general malnutrition. "My arms were thin, my legs were spindly, and my stomach protruded in an ungainly manner," he wrote. "My head used to hang down, and I had to lift it with great effort."[12]

Education in yoga

In 1934, his brother-in-law, the yogi Sri Tirumalai Krishnamacharya, asked the 15-year-old Iyengar to come to Mysore, so as to improve his health through the practice of yoga asanas.[11][13] Krishnamacharya had Iyengar and other students give asana demonstrations in the Maharaja's court at Mysore, which had a positive influence on Iyengar.[11][14] Iyengar considers his association with his brother-in-law a turning point in his life[11] saying that over a two-year period "he (Krishnamacharya) only taught me for about ten or fifteen days, but those few days determined what I have become today!"[15] K. Pattabhi Jois has claimed that he, and not Krishnamacharya, was Iyengar's guru.[16] In 1937, Krishnamacharya sent Iyengar to Pune at the age of eighteen to spread the teaching of yoga.[11][17]

Though Iyengar had very high regard for Krishnamacharya,[15] and occasionally turned to him for advice, he had a troubled relationship with his guru during his tutelage.[18] In the beginning, Krishnamacharya predicted that the stiff, sickly teenager would not be successful at yoga. He was neglected and tasked with household chores. Only when Krishnamacharya's favorite pupil at the time, Keshavamurthy, left one day did serious training start.[19] Krishnamacharya began teaching a series of difficult postures, sometimes telling him to not eat until he mastered a certain posture. These experiences would later inform the way he taught his students.[20]

Iyengar reported in interviews that, at the age of 90, he continued to practice asanas for 3 hours and pranayamas for an hour daily. Besides this, he mentioned that he found himself performing non-deliberate pranayamas at other times.[15][18]

International recognition

Further information: Iyengar Yoga


In 1954, the violinist Yehudi Menuhin invited Iyengar to teach in Europe.

In 1952, Iyengar befriended the violinist Yehudi Menuhin.[21] Menuhin gave him the opportunity that transformed Iyengar from a comparatively obscure Indian yoga teacher into an international guru. Because Iyengar had taught the famous philosopher Jiddu Krishnamurti, he was asked to go to Bombay to meet Menuhin, who was known to be interested in yoga. Menuhin said he was very tired and could spare only five minutes. Iyengar told him to lie down in Savasana (on his back), and he fell asleep. After one hour, Menuhin awoke refreshed and spent another two hours with Iyengar. Menuhin came to believe that practising yoga improved his playing, and in 1954 invited Iyengar to Switzerland. At the end of that visit, he presented his yoga teacher with a watch on the back of which was inscribed, "To my best violin teacher, BKS Iyengar". From then on Iyengar visited the west regularly.[22] In Switzerland he also taught Vanda Scaravelli, who went on to develop her own style of yoga.[23]

He taught yoga to several celebrities including Krishnamurti and Jayaprakash Narayan.[24] He taught sirsasana (head stand) to Elisabeth, Queen of Belgium when she was 80.[25] Among his other devotees were the novelist Aldous Huxley, the actress Annette Bening, the film maker Mira Nair and the designer Donna Karan, as well as prominent Indian figures, including the cricketer Sachin Tendulkar and the Bollywood actress Kareena Kapoor.[12]

Iyengar made his first visit to the United States in 1956, when he taught in Ann Arbor, Michigan and gave several lecture-demonstrations; he came back to Ann Arbor in 1973, 1974, and 1976.[26]

In 1966, Iyengar published his first book, Light on Yoga. It became an international best-seller. As of 2005, it had been translated into 17 languages and sold three million copies.[2] It was followed by 13 other books, covering pranayama and aspects of yoga philosophy.[27]


Iyengar Yoga in Britain: Iyengar with yoga teacher Malcolm Strutt at Iyengar Centre House, London, 1971

In 1967, the Inner London Education Authority (ILEA) called for classes in "Hatha Yoga", free of yoga philosophy, but including asanas and "pranayamas (sic)" suitable especially for people aged over 40. The ILEA's Peter McIntosh watched some of Iyengar's classes, was impressed by Light on Yoga, and from 1970 ILEA-approved yoga teacher training in London was run by one of Iyengar's pupils, Silva Mehta. Iyengar was careful to comply with the proscription of yoga philosophy, and encouraged students to follow their own religious traditions, rather than trying to follow his own family's Visistadvaita, a qualified non-dualism within Hinduism.[28][29]

In 1975, Iyengar opened the Ramamani Iyengar Memorial Yoga Institute in Pune, in memory of his late wife. He officially retired from teaching in 1984, but continued to be active in the world of Iyengar Yoga, teaching special classes, giving lectures, and writing books. Iyengar's daughter, Geeta, and son, Prashant, have gained international acclaim as teachers.[8]

Iyengar attracted his students by offering them just what they sought – which tended to be physical stamina and flexibility.[18] He conducted demonstrations and later, when a scooter accident dislocated his spine, began exploring the use of props to help disabled people practice Yoga. He drew inspiration from Hindu deities such as Yoga Narasimha and stories of yogis using trees to support their asanas.[20] He was however thought by his students to be somewhat rough with his adjustments when setting people into alignment; the historian of yoga Elliott Goldberg records that, as well as being known for barking orders and yelling at students,[30] he was nicknamed, based on his initials B. K. S., "Bang, Kick, Slap".[30] In Goldberg's view, Iyengar "rationalized his humiliation of his followers as a necessary consequence of his demand for high standards",[31] but this was consistent with his childhood response to the rough and abusive treatment he received from Krishnamacharya, taking offence quickly, being suspicious of other people's intentions, and belittling others: "In other words, he sometimes behaved like Krishnamacharya".[31] Goldberg concludes, however, that Iyengar hid "a compassion of which Krishnamacharya was never capable", and his students remembered his playfulness as well as his unpredictable temper.[31]

Philanthropy and activism

Iyengar supported nature conservation, stating that it is important to conserve all animals and birds.[32] He donated Rs. 2 million to Chamarajendra Zoological Gardens, Mysore, thought to be the largest donation by an individual to any zoo in India.[32] He also adopted a tiger and a cub in memory of his wife, who died in 1973.[32]

Iyengar helped promote awareness of multiple sclerosis with the Pune unit of the Multiple Sclerosis Society of India.[33]

Iyengar's most important charitable project involved donations to his ancestral village of Bellur, in the Kolar district of Karnataka. Through the Bellur Trust fund which he established, he led a transformation of the village, supporting a number of charitable activities there. He built a hospital, India's first temple dedicated to Patanjali, a free school that supplies uniforms, books, and a hot lunch to the children of Bellur and the surrounding villages, a secondary school, and a college.[34]

Family

In 1943, Iyengar married 16-year-old Ramamani in a marriage that was arranged by their parents in the usual Indian manner. He said of their marriage: "We lived without conflict as if our two souls were one."[22] Together, they raised five daughters and a son. Ramamani died in 1973 aged 46; Iyengar named his yoga institute in Pune, the Ramamani Iyengar Memorial Yoga Institute, after her.[35]

Both Iyengar's eldest daughter Geeta (1944-2018) and his son Prashant have become internationally-known teachers in their own right. His other children are Vanita, Sunita, Suchita, and Savita.[36] Geeta, having worked extensively on yoga for women, published Yoga: A Gem for Women (2002); Prashant is the author of several books, including A Class after a Class: Yoga, an Integrated Science (1998), and Yoga and the New Millennium (2008). Since Geeta's death, Prashant has served as the director of the Ramamani Iyengar Memorial Yoga Institute (RIMYI) in Pune.[37] Iyengar's granddaughter, Abhijata Sridhar Iyengar, trained for a number of years under his tutelage, and is now a teacher both at the Institute in Pune and internationally.

Iyengar died on 20 August 2014 in Pune, aged 95.[38][39]

Legacy

3 October 2005 was declared as "B.K.S. Iyengar Day" by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors.[2] Anthropologist Joseph S. Alter of the University of Pittsburgh stated that Iyengar "has by far had the most profound impact on the global spread of yoga."[2] In June 2011, he was presented with a commemorative stamp issued in his honour by the Beijing branch of China Post. At that time there were over thirty thousand Iyengar yoga students in 57 cities in China.[40]

The noun "Iyengar", short for "Iyengar Yoga", is defined by Oxford Dictionaries as "a type of Hatha yoga focusing on the correct alignment of the body, making use of straps, wooden blocks, and other objects as aids in achieving the correct postures."[41]

On 14 December 2015, what would have been Iyengar's 97th birthday, he was honoured with a Google Doodle. It was shown in India, North America, much of Europe, Russia, and Indonesia.[42]

Bibliography

• (1966; revised ed. 1977) Light on Yoga. New York: Schocken. ISBN 978-0-8052-1031-6
• (1981) Light on Pranayama: The Yogic Art of Breathing. New York: Crossroad. ISBN 0-8245-0686-3
• (1985) The Art of Yoga. Boston: Unwin. ISBN 978-0-04-149062-6
• (1988) The Tree of Yoga. Boston: Shambhala. ISBN 0-87773-464-X
• (1996) Light on the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. London: Thorsons. ISBN 978-0-00-714516-4
• (2005) Light on Life: The Yoga Journey to Wholeness, Inner Peace, and Ultimate Freedom. (with Abrams, D. & Evans, J.J.) Pennsylvania: Rodale. ISBN 1-59486-248-6
• (2007) Yoga: The Path to Holistic Health. New York: Dorling Kindersley. ISBN 978-0-7566-3362-2
• (2000–2008) Astadala Yogamala: Collected Works (8 vols) New Delhi: Allied Publishers.
• (2009) Yoga Wisdom and Practice. New York: Dorling Kindersley. ISBN 0-7566-4283-3
• (2010) Yaugika Manas: Know and Realize the Yogic Mind. Mumbai: Yog. ISBN 81-87603-14-3
• (2012) Core of the Yoga Sutras: The Definitive Guide to the Philosophy of Yoga. London: HarperThorsons. ISBN 978-0007921263

References

1. Aubrey, Allison. "Light on life: B.K.S. Iyengar's Yoga insights". Morning Edition: National Public Radio, 10 November 1995. (full text) Retrieved 4 July 2007
2. Jump up to:a b c d Stukin, Stacie (10 October 2005). "Yogis gather around the guru". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 9 January 2013.
3. Iyengar, B.K.S. (2000). Astadala Yogamala. New Delhi, India: Allied Publishers. p. 53. ISBN 978-8177640465.
4. Sjoman 1999, p. 41.
5. "Ruskin Bond, Vidya Balan, Kamal Haasan honoured with Padma awards". Hindustan Times. HT Media Limited. 25 January 2014. Retrieved 22 August 2014.
6. "Padma Awards Announced". Press Information Bureau, Ministry of Home Affairs. 25 January 2014. Retrieved 26 January2014.
7. 2004 TIME 100 – B.K.S. Iyengar Heroes & Icons, TIME.
8. Iyengar, B.K.S. "Yoga News & Trends – Light on Iyengar". Yoga Journal. Archived from the original on 31 August 2007. Retrieved 15 November 2012.
9. "B. K. S. Iyengar Biography". Notablebiographies.com. Retrieved 26 December 2012.
10. Iyengar, B.K.S. (1991). Iyengar – His Life and Work. C.B.S. Publishers & Distributors. p. 3.
11. Iyengar, B.K.S. (2006). Light on Life: The Yoga Journey to Wholeness, Inner Peace, and Ultimate Freedom. USA: Rodale. pp. xvi–xx. ISBN 9781594865244. Retrieved 8 January 2013.
12. "B. K. S. Iyengar, Who Helped Bring Yoga to the West, Dies at 95". The New York Times. 21 August 2014.
13. Smith & White 2014, p. 124.
14. Singleton, Mark (2010). Yoga Body : the origins of modern posture practice. Oxford University Press. pp. 184, 192. ISBN 978-0-19-539534-1. OCLC 318191988.
15. Interview by R. Alexander Medin. "3 Gurus, 48 Questions" (PDF). Namarupa (Fall 2004): 9. 2004. Archived from the original (PDF) on 7 March 2013. Retrieved 30 March 2013.
16. Sjoman 1999, p. 49.
17. Iyengar, B.K.S. (2000). Astadala Yogamala. New Delhi, India: Allied Publishers. p. 57. ISBN 978-8177640465.
18. "Being BKS Iyengar: The enlightened yogi of yoga(part1-2)". YouTube. 22 June 2008. Retrieved 15 November 2012.
19. Pag, Fernando. "Krishnamacharya's Legacy". Yogajournal.com. Retrieved 15 November 2012.
20. "Being BKS Iyengar: The enlightened yogi of yoga(part2-2)". YouTube. 22 June 2008. Retrieved 15 November 2012.
21. SenGupta, Anuradha (22 June 2008). "Being BKS Iyengar: The yoga guru". IBN live. Retrieved 8 January 2013.
22. "BKS Iyengar obituary". The Guardian. 20 August 2014.
23. Wishner, Nan (5 May 2015). "The Legacy of Vanda Scaravelli". Yoga International.
24. "Life is yoga, yoga is life". Sakal Times. 13 December 2012. Archived from the original on 16 February 2013. Retrieved 9 January 2013.
25. "Light on Iyengar". Yoga Journal. San Francisco: 96. September–October 2005. Retrieved 10 January 2013.
26. "Yogacharya B. K. S. Iyengar Dies August 20" (PDF). IYNAUS. 20 August 2014.
27. "au:B. K. S. Iyengar". WorldCat. Retrieved 6 October 2019.
28. Newcombe 2007.
29. Newcombe 2019, pp. 99, 236-239.
30. Goldberg 2016, p. 382.
31. Goldberg 2016, p. 384.
32. "Zoo felicitates B.K.S. Iyengar". The Hindu. 10 June 2009.
33. "BKS Iyengar to participate in multiple sclerosis awareness drive". The Indian Express. 22 May 2010. Retrieved 9 January2013.
34. "Bellur Trust". Iyengar Yoga UK. Retrieved 11 September 2019.
35. "The Pune Institute". Iyengar Yoga (UK). Retrieved 16 October 2019.
36. BKS Iyengar Archive Project 2007. IYNAUS. 2007. [ISBN unspecified]
37. Biography: Geeta Iyengar
38. "Yoga guru B. K. S. Iyengar passes away". The Hindu. 20 August 2014.
39. "B. K. S. Iyengar, Who Helped Bring Yoga to the West, Dies at 95". The New York Times. 20 August 2014. B. K. S. Iyengar ... died on Wednesday in the southern Indian city of Pune. He was 95. ... The cause was heart failure, said Abhijata Sridhar-Iyengar, his granddaughter. ...
40. Krishnan, Ananth (21 June 2011). "Indian yoga icon finds following in China". The Hindu. Chennai, India. Retrieved 22 June2011.
41. Oxford Dictionaries. "Iyengar". Oxford: Oxford University Press. Retrieved 11 January 2013.
42. "97th birthday of B. K. S. Iyengar". Google Doodles Archive. 14 December 2015. Retrieved 14 December 2015.

Sources

Goldberg, Elliott (2016). The Path of Modern Yoga :The History of an Embodied Spiritual Practice. Inner Traditions. ISBN 978-1-62055-567-5. OCLC 926062252.
Newcombe, Suzanne (2007). "Stretching for Health and Well-Being: Yoga and Women in Britain, 1960–1980". Asian Medicine. 3 (1): 37–63. doi:10.1163/157342107X207209.
——— (2019). Yoga in Britain: Stretching Spirituality and Educating Yogis. Bristol, England: Equinox Publishing. ISBN 978-1-78179-661-0.
Smith, Frederick M.; White, Joan (2014). Singleton, Mark; Goldberg, Ellen (eds.). Chapter 6. Becoming an Icon: B. K. S. Iyengar as a Yoga Teacher and a Yoga Guru. Gurus of Modern Yoga. Oxford University Press. pp. 122–146. ISBN 978-0-19-993871-1.
Sjoman, Norman E. (1999). The Yoga Tradition of the Mysore Palace. New Delhi, India: Abhinav Publications. ISBN 81-7017-389-2.

External links

• Official website
• B. K. S. Iyengar on IMDb
• BBC World Service article and programme by Mark Tully
• Leap of faith (2008), Trivedi & Makim, Documentary about the life of BKS Iyengar
• BKS Iyengar – 97th birthday on YouTube. Google Doodle Collection. 13 December 2015. Retrieved 14 December 2015.
• BKS Iyengar Google Doodle. 97th Birthday of "Iyengar Yoga" Founder on YouTube. Rajamanickam Antonimuthu. 14 December 2015. Retrieved 14 December 2015.
• Ramamani Iyengar Memorial Yoga Institute at Google Cultural Institute

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Yoga Reconsiders the Role of the Guru in the Age of #MeToo
by Eliza Griswold
The New Yorker
July 23, 2019


In the Western context, yoga gurus such as Sharath Jois and Bikram Choudhury (pictured) become rock stars, and students compete for their favor.Photograph by Bob Riha, Jr. / Getty

Last week on Instagram, Sharath Jois, a grandson of Pattabhi Jois, the hugely influential founder of Ashtanga yoga, which has millions of followers worldwide, finally responded to several years’ worth of claims of sexual misconduct against his grandfather, who died in 2009, at the age of ninety-three. Since 2010, more than a dozen former students have come forward to accuse Guruji, as his followers called him, of sexually assaulting them in his yoga studio in Mysore, India, and during workshops while he was on tour in the United States. Their allegations include that he rubbed his genitals against their pelvises while they were in extreme backbends, lay on top of them while they were prostrate on the floor, and inserted his fingers into their vaginas—an action that fellow-students excused as an adjustment to their mula bandhas, the body’s lowest chakra, which lies between the genitals and the anus. After his grandfather’s death, Sharath became the director of the Shri K. Pattabhi Jois Ashtanga Yoga Institute, and the paramguru (or “guru’s guru”) of Ashtanga. “It brings me immense pain that I also witness him giving improper adjustments,” Sharath wrote in the post. “I am sorry it caused pain for any of his students. After all these years I still feel pain from my grandfather’s actions.”

This is only the latest in a string of scandals involving powerful men within the yoga community that date back decades. In 1991, protesters accused Swami Satchidananda, the famous yogi who issued the invocation at Woodstock, of molesting his students, and carried signs outside a hotel where he was staying in Virginia that read “Stop the Abuse.” (Satchidananda denied all claims of misconduct.) In 1994, Amrit Desai, the founder of the Kripalu Centre for Yoga, a well-known yoga-retreat center, was accused of sleeping with his students while purporting to practice celibacy. (Desai eventually admitted to having sexual contact with three women.) More recently, Bikram Choudhury, the founder of “hot,” or Bikram, yoga, has faced several civil lawsuits for sexual misconduct, including one filed in 2013 by his own lawyer, Minakshi Jafa-Bodden, who said that he not only harassed her but also forced her to cover up allegations of misconduct against other women. (Bikram has denied all allegations.) After Bikram failed to pay Jafa-Bodden a seven-million-dollar judgment issued against him by a California court, in 2017, the judge issued an arrest warrant, and Bikram reportedly fled the country. In 2012, John Friend, the founder of Anusara yoga, admitted to sleeping with several students. He was also accused of running a Wiccan coven called Blazing Solar Flames, where members often went naked. (In a public statement, Friend denied any involvement in “a sex coven.”) Friend withdrew for a time from public life but has since launched another form of yoga, called Sridaiva. Not all of the recent scandals have been sexual; some have involved financial impropriety or the physical abuse of students. During his workshops, B. K. S. Iyengar, who died in Pune, India, in 2014, openly slapped and kicked his students while telling them, according to the Times of India, “It’s not you I’m angry with, not you I kick. It’s the knee, the back, the mind that is not listening.”

Jois was born in 1915, in the rural village of Kowshika, in South India, and spent the first thirty-two years of his life living under British colonial rule. One day at school, when he was twelve, he attended a lecture in which a yoga instructor named Sri Krishnamacharya demonstrated several asanas, or poses. Jois ran away from home at fourteen, reunited with Krishnamacharya a few years later, and proceeded to study with him for twenty-five years. He went on to create Ashtanga, a form of yoga that involves a series of rigorous athletic poses that students are encouraged to practice six times a week. Beginning in the seventies, students flocked to Mysore to study with Jois, and, as his following grew, so did his fame and influence. Some students stayed in Mysore for months or even years to perfect their poses. Others came to venerate the teacher, prostrating themselves at his feet. Female students later complained that he sometimes kissed them on the mouth without their consent, and patted their buttocks when they hugged him or bowed before him. Jubilee Cooke, a fifty-three-year-old former student who says that she was groped by Jois during yoga sessions, didn’t realize that his behavior was something that she could report. “I didn’t know it was called sexual assault until I heard political pundits talking about what Trump had done on the ‘Access Hollywood’ tapes,” she told me.

Alex Auder, the forty-eight-year-old founder of Magu Yoga, a studio in Philadelphia, has been one of Jois’s most vocal critics. During the late nineteen-nineties, Auder taught at Jivamukti, in New York City, one of the places where Ashtanga first grew popular in the United States. But, in the past decade, she has become increasingly skeptical of some aspects of the practice. Initially, her criticisms focussed on the poses themselves, which she believes Jois designed with little regard for how they would be enacted by women. “The physical practice is totally off base—it’s patriarchal,” she told me. “For many women’s bodies, it simply doesn’t work.” (To illustrate this point, she recently posted a picture on Instagram of Sharath Jois assisting a pregnant woman to “drop back” from a standing position into a backbend, which struck Auder as ill-advised.) For the past five years, Auder has written about the increasing commodification of yoga, which she calls “neo-spiritualism”—an alliance between yoga and neoliberalism. Such criticism is not taken lightly in the Ashtanga community; according to Auder and others, those who speak out are often ostracized. “Sharath kicked anyone off the list of sanctioned teachers who ever criticized Pattabhi Jois or Ashtanga,” she told me. (Sharath did not respond to requests for comment on this article.)

For Karen Rain, a fifty-one-year-old former student who says that Jois repeatedly assaulted her between 1994 and 1998, at his studio in Mysore, the fear of being ostracized kept her from telling anyone about the abuse. “I knew it would bring me criticism and slander,” she told me. She was certain that her fellow-students would turn on her if she made her allegations public, and, in 2002, she left Ashtanga. “It destroyed my life as I knew it,” she said. “I loved the practice and was hoping to build my life and career around it.” In 2018, she told her story on Medium and included photographs showing Jois pressing his crotch to hers while she lifted her leg above her head. “Since the images are still photographs, you don’t really see that he’s humping me,” she told me.

Anneke Lucas, a fifty-six-year-old former student, who now works as an advocate for survivors of sexual abuse and is the founder of Liberation Prison Yoga, confronted Jois the moment he groped her crotch, during a class in Manhattan in 2001, and told him that he could go to prison for touching her like that. After she spoke out, she felt that her experience wasn’t taken seriously by other students and teachers, which she found more harmful than the assault. “I was far more hurt by the culture of silence and ignoring the victim and victim-blaming than the abuse itself,” she told me. “If there would’ve been support from the community, and it had been dealt with, it would have gone away.” Cooke has called out the magazine Yoga Journal for favorable articles that it published about Jois in the nineties. “Whether or not they did it consciously, it was grooming,” she said. “Encouraging people to go study with Pattabhi Jois and expect good things from him.”

Last year, Auder became Facebook friends with Rain, Lucas, and Cooke, and the four began discussing what they saw as Ashtanga’s toxic sexual culture. At first, Auder wasn’t sure how to process the severity of the women’s claims. “I’m a product of the seventies,” she told me, “and I don’t mind a pat on the ass.” But as the number of accusers grew over the last year she came to see that what others called “inappropriate adjustment” was really a pattern of sexual abuse, and that the powerful following that had grown up around Jois had helped to keep his accusers silent. After that, on Instagram, she called for an official response from Ashtanga leaders.

Instead of putting the controversy to rest, the statement that Sharath issued last week has kicked off a flurry of angry responses from people who argue that it comes too late, and that it reads like an attempt to end the controversy rather than a genuine effort to set things right. Critics accused Sharath of shirking blame for himself or his family and instead accusing other students of failing to protect their fellow-practitioners. “Why did they not act in support of their fellow students, peers, girlfriends, boyfriends, wives, husbands, friends and speak against this?” he asks. He followed this up with another statement, in which he grew more defensive. “You can criticize me what ever you want,” he wrote on Instagram, punctuating his post with crying-face emojis. “I have always respected & supported women my students know it & god knows it.” The post has since been deleted.

But the scandal has prompted other leaders, including Eddie Stern, a fifty-one-year-old yoga instructor who, for twenty-five years, was the head of one of the most influential Ashtanga schools in the United States, to speak out about Jois’s abuses. Stern studied under Jois for eighteen years and has since authored three books about Ashtanga. After the allegations were made public, he received letters from current students asking him to respond. “People have considered me to be part of this problem because I haven’t spoken publicly,” he told me. Although Stern has been talking in private to concerned students and fellow-teachers, now that Sharath has issued a statement, Stern has decided to speak to me for this article.

Jois’s abuses remained hidden for so long in part because of his overwhelming authority as a guru, which may reflect a larger problem within the culture of yoga. In traditional yogic practice, a guru is a mediator—a translator of sorts—through whom a set of teachings is passed down. Devotion to the guru is meant to symbolize devotion to the teachings, not to the man. But in the Western context gurus become rock stars, and students compete to curry favor with them. This gives gurus significant influence over their students, which is sometimes misused. “I had this idea in me that the guru was supposed to be this all-encompassing everything,” Stern said. “I, along with other people, superimposed these mythologies on top of a human being . . . It was a misunderstanding of what the relationship was supposed to be.

For Rain, apologies from Ashtanga teachers have come too late. She is less interested in public statements and more interested in specific measures that schools can take to change their cultures. Some yoga communities have begun instituting official checks on how teachers are allowed to touch their students, including issuing “consent cards,” which students fill out to indicate whether they are willing to be touched and place at the edge of their mats. Rain wants Ashtanga teachers to pledge to offer free copies of articles about the accusations against Jois at their studios and to post unedited accounts of the allegations on their Web sites. She told me, “I’m offering them a way to make amends by giving the narrative to us.”

Eliza Griswold, a contributing writer covering religion, politics, and the environment, has been writing for The New Yorker since 2003. She won the Pulitzer Prize for general nonfiction for “Amity and Prosperity: One Family and the Fracturing of America,” in 2019.

Tirumalai Krishnamacharya
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 5/30/20


Krishnamacharya
At 100 years (1988)
Born: November 18, 1888. Chitradurga district, Mysore Kingdom
Died: February 28, 1989 (aged 100), Madras, India
Nationality: Indian
Occupation: Yoga teacher
Known for :"Father of modern yoga"

Tirumalai Krishnamacharya (November 18, 1888 – February 28, 1989)[1][2] was an Indian yoga teacher, ayurvedic healer and scholar. Often referred to as "the father of modern yoga,"[3][4] Krishnamacharya is widely regarded as one of the most influential yoga teachers of the 20th century. Like earlier pioneers influenced by physical culture such as Yogendra and Kuvalayananda, he contributed to the revival of hatha yoga.[5]

Krishnamacharya held degrees in all the six Vedic darśanas, or Indian philosophies. While under the patronage of the King of Mysore, Krishna Raja Wadiyar IV, Krishnamacharya traveled around India giving lectures and demonstrations to promote yoga, including such feats as apparently stopping his heartbeat.[6] He is widely considered as the architect of vinyāsa,[5] in the sense of combining breathing with movement; the style of yoga he created has come to be called Viniyoga or Vinyasa Krama Yoga. Underlying all of Krishnamacharya's teachings was the principle "Teach what is appropriate for an individual."[7] While he is revered in other parts of the world as a yogi, in India Krishnamacharya is mainly known as a healer who drew from both ayurvedic and yogic traditions to restore health and well-being to those he treated.[5] He authored four books on yoga—Yoga Makaranda (1934), Yogaasanagalu (c. 1941),[8] Yoga Rahasya, and Yogavalli (Chapter 1 – 1988)—as well as several essays and poetic compositions.[9]

Krishnamacharya's students included many of yoga's most renowned and influential teachers: Indra Devi (1899–2002); K. Pattabhi Jois (1915–2009); B. K. S. Iyengar (1918-2014); his son T. K. V. Desikachar (1938-2016); Srivatsa Ramaswami (born 1939); and A. G. Mohan (born 1945). Iyengar, his brother-in-law and founder of Iyengar Yoga, credits Krishnamacharya with encouraging him to learn yoga as a boy in 1934.[10][11]

Biography

Early life

Krishnamacharya was born on November 18, 1888 in Muchukundapura, situated in the Chitradurga district of present-day Karnataka, in South India, to an orthodox Iyengar family. His parents were Sri Tirumalai Srinivasa Tatacharya, a well-known teacher of the Vedas, and Shrimati Ranganayakiamma.[12] Krishnamacharya was the eldest of six children. He had two brothers and three sisters. At the age of six, he underwent upanayana. He then began learning to speak and write Sanskrit, from texts such as the Amarakosha and to chant the Vedas under the strict tutelage of his father.[2]

When Krishnamacharya was ten, his father died,[13] and the family had to move to Mysore, the second largest city in Karnataka, where Krishnamcharya's great-grandfather H.H. Sri Srinivasa Brahmatantra Parakala Swami, was the head of the Parakala Math.[14]

Scholastic education

Krishnamacharya spent much of his youth traveling through India studying the six darśana or Indian philosophies: vaiśeṣika, nyāya, sāṃkhya, yoga, mīmāṃsā and vedānta.[15] In 1906, at the age of eighteen, Krishnamacharya left Mysore to attend university at Benares, also known as Vārānasī, a city of hundreds of temples and a highly regarded North Indian center of traditional learning.[16] While at university, he studied logic and Sanskrit, working with Brahmashri Shivakumar Shastry, "one of the greatest grammarians of the age".[17] He also learned the Mimamsa from Brahmasri Trilinga Rama Shastri.[2]

In 1914, he once again left for Benares to attend classes at Queens College, where he eventually earned a number of teaching certificates. During the first year he had little or no financial support from his family. In order to eat, he followed the rules that were laid down for religious beggars: he was to approach only seven households each day and offer a prayer "in return for wheat flour to mix with water for cakes".[18] Krishnamacharya eventually left Queens College to study the ṣaḍdarśana (six darshanas) in Vedic philosophy at Patna University, in Bihar, a state in eastern India. He received a scholarship to study Ayurveda under Vaidya Krishnakumar of Bengal.[2]

Krishnamacharya was invited to the coronation of the Rajah of Dikkanghat (a principality within Darbhanga), at which he defeated a scholar called Bihari Lal in a debate, and received rewards and honors from the Rajah.[19] His stay in Benares lasted 11 years.

He studied with the yoga master Sri Babu Bhagavan Das and passed the Samkhya Yoga Examination of Patna.[2] Many of his instructors recognized his outstanding abilities in the study and practice of yoga and supported his progress. Some asked that he teach their children.[20]

The tale of Ramamohana Brahmachari and the Yoga Korunta

Further information: Yoga Korunta


Krishnamacharya claimed that he had spent seven and a half years at the foot of the sacred Mount Kailash in Tibet, learning the Yoga Korunta in the Gurkha language of Nepal.

Krishnamacharya told his pupils, including Iyengar, "an imagined history, it turns out, of thousands of asanas".[21] Mark Singleton and Tara Fraser note that he provided contradictory descriptions of the facts of his own life, sometimes denying tales he had told earlier, and sometimes mischievously[22] adding new versions.[22] According to one such tale, recounted by Mohan, during the vacations, which would last about three months, Krishnamacharya made pilgrimages into the Himalayas.[20] Krishnamacharya claimed in his Yoga Makaranda that at the suggestion of Gaṅgānāth Jhā, he sought to further his yoga studies by seeking a master named Yogeshwara Ramamohana Brahmachari, who was rumored to live in the mountains beyond Nepal and had supposedly mastered 7000 asanas.[23] For this venture, Krishnamacharya had to obtain the permission of the Viceroy in Simla, Lord Irwin, who was then suffering from diabetes.[20] At the request of the Viceroy, Krishnamacharya travelled to Simla and taught him yogic practices for six months. The viceroy's health improved and he developed respect and affection for Krishnamacharya.[24] In 1919, the Viceroy made arrangements for Krishnamacharya's travel to Tibet, supplying three aides and taking care of the expenses. After two and a half months of walking, Krishnamacharya arrived at Sri Brahmachari's school, supposedly a cave at the foot of Mount Kailash, where the master lived with his wife and three children.[5] Under Brahmachari's tutelage, Krishnamacharya claimed to have spent seven and a half years[25] studying the Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali, learning asanas and pranayama, and studying the therapeutic aspects of yoga.[5] He was supposedly made to memorize the whole of the Yoga Korunta in the Gurkha language, though no evidence of that text exists. As tradition holds, at the end of his studies with the guru, Krishnamacharya asked what his payment would be. The master responded that Krishnamacharya was to "take a wife, raise children and be a teacher of Yoga".[26][27]

According to the tale, Krishnamacharya then returned to Varanasi. The Maharajah of Jaipur called him to serve as principal of the Vidyā Śālā in Jaipur; but as he did not like being answerable to many people, Krishnamacharya shortly returned to Varanasi. In accordance with his guru's wish that he live the life of a householder, Krishnamacharya married Namagiriamma in 1925. After his marriage, Krishnamacharya was forced by circumstance to work in a coffee plantation in the Hasan district. It was after a lecture on the Upanishads in Mysore town hall in 1931 that he attracted the attention as a learned scholar that eventually led to his employment at the palace.[27]

Mysore years


Krishnamacharya in a yoga demonstration

Further information: Asana and Modern yoga

In 1926, the Maharaja of Mysore, Krishna Raja Wadiyar IV (1884–1940) was in Varanasi to celebrate his mother's 60th birthday and heard about Krishnamacharya's learning and skill as a yoga therapist.[28] The Maharaja met Krishnamacharya and was so impressed by the young man's demeanor, authority, and scholarship that he engaged Krishnamacharya to teach him and his family.[28] Initially, Krishnamacharya taught yoga at the Mysore Palace.[29] He soon became a trusted advisor of the Maharajah, and was given the recognition of Asthana Vidwan — the intelligentsia of the palace.[30]

During the 1920s, Krishnamacharya held many demonstrations to stimulate popular interest in yoga. These included suspending his pulse, stopping cars with his bare hands, performing difficult asanas, and lifting heavy objects with his teeth.[5] The Palace archive records show that the Maharaja was interested in the promotion of yoga and continually sent Krishnamacharya around the country to give lectures and demonstrations.[31]

In 1931, Krishnamacharya was invited to teach at the Sanskrit College in Mysore. The Maharaja, who felt that yoga had helped cure his many ailments, asked Krishnamacharya to open a yoga school under his patronage[5][32] and was subsequently given the wing of a nearby palace, the Jaganmohan Palace, to start the Yogashala, an independent yoga institution,[29] which opened on August 11, 1933.[28][33]


Gajasana, hand-drawn illustration in Sritattvanidhi, 19th century Mysore Palace manuscript. The scholar Norman Sjoman suggests that Krishnamacharya was influenced by the yoga poses in the manuscript.[34]

In 1934, he wrote the book Yoga Makaranda ("Essence of Yoga"), which was published by Mysore University. In the introduction to Yoga Makaranda, Krishnamacharya lists the Sritattvanidhi, a 19th-century treatise containing a yoga section by Maharaja of Mysore, Krishnaraja Wodeyar III (1794–1868) as one of the sources for his book. In The Yoga Tradition of the Mysore Palace, Norman Sjoman asserts that Krishnamacharya was influenced by the Sritattvanidhi and by the Vyayama Dipika, a Western-based gymnastics manual written by the Mysore Palace gymnasts.[34] Mark Singleton argues that he was influenced by the 20th century yoga pioneers Yogendra and Kuvalayananda, and that all three "seamlessly incorporate[d] elements of physical culture into their systems of 'yoga'."[35]

Krishnamacharya, unlike earlier yoga gurus such as Yogendra, "severely criticized his students" including his young brother-in-law, B. K. S. Iyengar.[36] He was equally bad-tempered at home with his family. In the view of the historian of yoga Elliott Goldberg, Iyengar "would never recover from or anywhere near comprehend the damage inflicted on him by Krishnamacharya's abuse" during his teenage years.[37]

In 1940, Krishna Raja Wadiyar IV died. His nephew and successor, Jayachamarajendra Wadiyar (1919–1974), less interested in yoga, no longer provided support for publishing texts and sending teams of teachers to surrounding areas.[38] Following political changes in 1946, around the time that India gained independence, a new government came into being and the powers of the maharajas were curtailed. Funding for the yoga school was cut off,[39] and Krishnamacharya struggled to maintain the school. At the age of 60 (1948), Krishnamacharya was forced to travel extensively to find students and provide for his family.[39] The yogashala in Mysore was ordered to be closed by K.C. Reddy, the first Chief Minister of Mysore State, and the school eventually closed in 1950.[5]

Madras years

After leaving Mysore, Krishnamacharya moved to Bangalore for a couple of years[40] and then was invited in 1952 to relocate to Madras, by a well-known lawyer who sought Krishnamacharya's help in healing from a stroke. By now, Krishnamacharya was in his sixties, and his reputation for being a strict and intimidating teacher had mellowed somewhat.


Krishnamacharya teaching a child

In Madras, Krishnamacharya accepted a job as a lecturer at Vivekananda College. He also began to acquire yoga students from diverse backgrounds and in various physical conditions, which required him to adapt his teaching to each student's abilities. For the remainder of his teaching life, Krishnamacharya continued to refine this individualized approach, which came to be known as Viniyoga.[5][41] Many considered Krishnamacharya a yoga master, but he continued to call himself a student because he felt that he was always "studying, exploring and experimenting" with the practice.[42] Throughout his life, Krishnamacharya refused to take credit for his innovative teachings but instead attributed the knowledge to his guru or to ancient texts.[5]

At the age of 96, Krishnamacharya fractured his hip. Refusing surgery, he treated himself and designed a course of practice that he could do in bed. Krishnamacharya lived and taught in Chennai until he slipped into a coma and died in 1989, at one hundred years of age. His cognitive faculties remained sharp until his death; and he continued to teach and heal whenever the situation arose.

Although his knowledge and teaching has influenced yoga throughout the world, Krishnamacharya never left his native India. Yoga Journal wrote:

You may never have heard of him but Tirumalai Krishnamacharya influenced or perhaps even invented your yoga. Whether you practice the dynamic series of Pattabhi Jois, the refined alignments of B. K. S. Iyengar, the classical postures of Indra Devi, or the customized vinyasa of Viniyoga, your practice stems from one source: a five-foot, two-inch Brahmin born more than one hundred years ago in a small South Indian village.[5]

By developing and refining different approaches, Krishnamacharya made yoga accessible to millions around the world.[5]

Approach

Further information: Yoga as therapy and Yoga as exercise

Krishnamacharya was a physician of Ayurvedic medicine. He "possessed enormous knowledge of nutrition, herbal medicine, the use of oils, and other remedies".[43] Krishnamacharya's custom as an Ayurvedic practitioner was to begin with a detailed examination to determine the most efficient path to take for a patient.[44] According to Krishnamacharya, even though the source or focus of a disease is in a particular area of the body, he assumed that many other systems in the body, both mental and physical, would also be affected. At some point during or after an initial examination, Krishnamacharya would ask if the patient was willing to follow his guidance. This question was important to a patient's treatment, because Krishnamacharya felt that if the person could not trust him fully there was little chance of his or her being healed.[45]


Krishnamacharya emphasised the use of three of Patanjali's eight limbs of yoga, not only asana but also pranayama and dhyana.[46]

Once a person began seeing Krishnamacharya, he would work with him or her on a number of levels including adjusting their diet; creating herbal medicines; and setting up a series of yoga postures that would be most beneficial. When instructing a person on the practice of yoga, Krishnamacharya particularly stressed the importance of combining breath work (pranayama) with the postures (asanas) of yoga and meditation (dhyana) to reach the desired goal.[46]

Krishnamacharya "believed Yoga to be India's greatest gift to the world."[47] His yoga instruction reflected his conviction that yoga could be both a spiritual practice and a mode of physical healing.[48] His style of yoga is now known as Vinyasa Krama Yoga.[49] Krishnamacharya based his teachings on the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali and the Yoga Yajnavalkya. Whereas Krishnamacharya was deeply devoted to Vaishnavism, he also respected his students' varying religious beliefs, or nonbeliefs.[50] A former student recalls that while leading a meditation, Krishnamacharya instructed students to close their eyes and "think of God. If not God, the sun. If not the sun, your parents."[5] As a result of the teachings he received from his father and other instructors, Krishnamacharya approached every student as "absolutely unique",[51] in the belief that the most important aspect of teaching yoga was that the student be "taught according to his or her individual capacity at any given time".[52] For Krishnamacharya, the path of yoga meant different things for different people, and each person ought to be taught in a manner that he or she understood clearly.[53]

Krishnamacharya's students included many of 20th century yoga's most renowned and influential teachers: Indra Devi; K. Pattabhi Jois; B. K. S. Iyengar; T. K. V. Desikachar; Srivatsa Ramaswami; and A. G. Mohan (born 1945).[10][11]

Leading yoga teachers among Krishnamacharya's pupils[10][11]

Student / Relationship / Known for / Founded school / Best-known book

Indra Devi (1899–2002) pupil Yoga with Hollywood stars — Yoga for Americans 1959
K. Pattabhi Jois (1915–2009) pupil Mysore style Ashtanga vinyasa yoga Yoga Mala 1999
B. K. S. Iyengar (1918-2014) brother-in-law Precision, props Iyengar Yoga Light on Yoga 1966
T. K. V. Desikachar (1938-2016) son Viniyoga Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram The Heart of Yoga 1995
Srivatsa Ramaswami (1939- ) pupil Vinyasa Krama yoga — Complete Book of Vinyasa Yoga 2005
A. G. Mohan (1945- ) pupil Svastha Yoga & Ayurveda — Yoga for Body, Breath, and Mind 2002

Accomplishment as a scholar

Krishnamacharya was highly regarded as a scholar. He earned degrees in philosophy, logic, divinity, philology, and music.[5][54] He was twice offered the position of Acharya in the Srivaishnava sampradaya, but he declined in order to stay with his family, in accordance with his guru's wishes.[5]

He also had extensive knowledge of orthodox Hindu rituals. His scholarship in various darshanas of orthodox Indian philosophy earned him titles such as Sāṃkhya-yoga-śikhāmaṇi, Mīmāṃsā-ratna, Mīmāṃsā-thīrtha, Nyāyācārya, Vedāntavāgīśa, Veda-kesari and Yogācārya.[55]

Works

1. Yoga Makaranda (1934)
2. Yogaasanagalu (c. 1941)
3. Yoga Rahasya (2004)
4. Yogavalli (Chapter 1 – 1988)

References

1. Mohan 2010, p. 125.
2. "Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram". Archived from the original on 11 April 2015.
3. Mohan, A. G.; Mohan, Ganesh (5 April 2017) [2009]. "Memories of a Master". Yoga Journal.
4. "The YJ Interview: Partners in Peace". Yoga Journal.
5. Pagés Ruiz 2001.
6. Mohan 2010, p. 7.
7. Mohan 2010, p. 38.
8. Singleton 2010, p. 240.
9. Mohan 2010, pp. 128–130.
10. Iyengar 2006, pp. xvi-xx.
11. Singleton & Fraser 2014, p. 83.
12. Mohan 2010, p. 1.
13. Pierce, Martin (January–February 1988). "A Lion in Winter". Yoga Journal: 61–62.
14. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 30 June 2010. Retrieved 12 August 2013.
15. http://malankazlev.com/kheper/topics/ea ... shanas.htm.
16. Mohan 2010, p. 2.
17. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 38.
18. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 40.
19. "Krishnamacharya – The King and the Young Man". Ashtanga Yoga Shala NYC.
20. Mohan 2010, p. 3.
21. Smith & White 2014, p. 125.
22. Singleton & Fraser 2014, p. 85.
23. Krishnamacharya, Tirumalai. Yoga Makaranda. p. 25. Kannada Edition 1934 Madurai C.M.V. Press
24. Mohan 2010, pp. 3–4.
25. Mohan 2010, p. 5.
26. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 44.
27. Singleton 2010, pp. 184–186, 197.
28. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 87.
29. Sjoman 1999, p. 52.
30. Iyengar 2000, p. 53.
31. Sjoman 1999, p. 53.
32. Mohan 2010, p. 6.
33. Singleton 2010, p. 181ff.
34. Cushman, Anne. "Yoga Through Time". Yoga Journal.
35. Singleton 2010, p. 111.
36. Goldberg 2016, pp. 370–371.
37. Goldberg 2016, p. 375.
38. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 94.
39. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 96.
40. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 101.
41. Mohan 2010, pp. 38-43.
42. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 104.
43. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 124.
44. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 129.
45. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 131.
46. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 111.
47. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 123.
48. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. xviii.
49. "Vinyasa Krama Yoga". Harmony Yoga. Retrieved 4 April 2019.
50. Mohan 2010, p. 107.
51. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 20.
52. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. 22.
53. Desikachar & Cravens 1998, p. xix.
54. Mohan 2010, pp. 3–5.
55. "Interview of the week: TKV Desikachar, Founder, Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram". Chennai Online Archives. Archived from the original on 20 October 2008. Retrieved 19 October 2008.

Sources

• Desikachar, T. K. V.; Cravens, Richard H. (1998). Health, Healing & Beyond : Yoga and the living tradition of Krishnamacharya. Aperture. ISBN 0-89381-941-7.
• Goldberg, Elliott (2016). The Path of Modern Yoga : the history of an embodied spiritual practice. Inner Traditions. ISBN 978-1-62055-567-5. OCLC 926062252.
• Iyengar, B.K.S. (2000). Astadala Yogamala. New Delhi, India: Allied Publishers. ISBN 978-8177640465.
• Iyengar, B. K. S. (2006). Light on Life: The Yoga Journey to Wholeness, Inner Peace, and Ultimate Freedom. Rodale. ISBN 978-1594865244.
• Mohan, A. G. (2010). Krishnamacharya: His Life and Teachings. Boston: Shambhala. ISBN 978-1-59030-800-4.
• Pagés Ruiz, Fernando (2001). "Krishnamacharya's Legacy". Yoga Journal (May/June 2001).
• Singleton, Mark (2010). Yoga Body: The Origins of Modern Posture Practice. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-539534-1.
• Singleton, Mark; Fraser, Tara (2014). Singleton, Mark; Goldberg, Ellen (eds.). Chapter 4. T. Krishnamacharya, Father of Modern Yoga. Gurus of Modern Yoga. Oxford University Press. pp. 83–106. ISBN 978-0-19-993871-1.
• Sjoman, N.E. (1999) [1996]. The Yoga Tradition of the Mysore Palace (2nd ed.). New Delhi, India: Abhinav Publications. ISBN 81-7017-389-2.
• Smith, Frederick M.; White, Joan (2014). Singleton, Mark; Goldberg, Ellen (eds.). Chapter 6. Becoming an Icon: B. K. S. Iyengar as a Yoga Teacher and a Yoga Guru. Gurus of Modern Yoga. Oxford University Press. pp. 122–146. ISBN 978-0-19-993871-1.
• Srivatsan, Mala (1997) Śrī Krishnamacharya the pūrnācārya. Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram. OCLC 39292632.

Media

• Dars, Jean-François (Director); Papillault, Anne (Director) (1989). Hundred Years of Beatitude (Documentary). CNRS.
• Wadiyar, Krishna Raja (Sponsor) (1989) [1938]. T. Krishnamacharya Asanas (Film). Archived from the original on 14 December 2013. Retrieved 8 February 2014.
• Schmidt-Garre, Jan (Director) (2012). Breath of the Gods: A Journey to the Origins of Modern Yoga (Documentary). PARS Media.

External links

• India portal
• Yoga Makaranda (Part 1)

Gerard Menuhin
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 5/30/20



Gerard Menuhin (born 1948[1] in Scotland)[2][3] is a Holocaust denier and far-right activist, associated with the neo-Nazi movement in Germany.[4][5]

His book Tell the Truth and Shame the Devil, published in 2015, argues that the Holocaust is "the biggest lie in history",[6] that Jews are an "alien, demonic force which seeks to dominate the world", that Jews are flooding Europe with non-white races, to create a "society of racial mongrels, under the rule of a “new Jewish nobility”", and plan to create a one-world government.[7] Menuhin argues that "the world owes Adolf Hitler an apology".[8]

He is the son of the violinist Yehudi Menuhin and dancer Diana Gould, and brother of pianist Jeremy Menuhin.

Background

Born in July[2][3] 1948[1] in Scotland, United Kingdom,[2][3] he is the son of violinist Yehudi Menuhin, who was Jewish and Diana Gould, an English ballerina who was a gentile.[9] He attended Eton College, completing his studies at Stanford University in California. The brother of the pianist Jeremy Menuhin,[10] Gerard did not want to follow in the footsteps of his father or brother and decided to enter into acting. In London's Mermaid Theatre, he landed a role in the Erich Kästner-piece Emil and the Detectives.[11]

In December 1970, when Menuhin was 22, he and his father temporarily lost their American citizenship after they were granted Swiss citizenship, as American law at the time did not permit dual citizenship.[12]

In 1985, he published his first book, a novel, Elmer, which was panned by critics.[13]

Menuhin was, until November 2005, the CEO of the German chapter of the Yehudi Menuhin Foundation. He was representative of the Menuhin family on the Board of the Menuhin Festival Gstaad in Gstaad, Switzerland. In June 2007, he took up the post as president of the Yehudi Menuhin Foundation in Grenchen, Switzerland.[14] Since 2009, there is no indication to be found of Menuhin's continuing administrative position with the Menuhin Festival Gstaad.[15]

He has previously worked for Menuhin IP Management GmbH (Menuhin IP Management Ltd liab Co) (Menuhin IP Management Sàrl) in Schöfflisdorf[15] which owns the official Yehudi Menuhin website.[16] The content of the website, however, is controlled by two of Yehudi Menuhin's other children, Jeremy Menuhin and Zamira Menuhin Benthall, as directors of SYM Music Company Limited.

Controversy over extremist views

A supporter of Adolf Hitler, Menuhin writes about Jews: "It remains for Jews only to imitate or destroy what they can never have or become, and to undermine the homogeneous social fabric via their political stooges, by civil-war-induced migrations and so-called anti-discriminatory legislation, including attacks on such core values as the traditional family, through contrived “gender neutral” and radical feminist ideologies and “movements.”"[17]

He considers himself anti-Zionist. Until 2005, his political views had barely registered with the outside world even though he has a regular column in the Munich-based ultra-German nationalist National Zeitung. Because of Gerard Menuhin's extremist or nationalistic utterances, he was relieved of his post as chairman on 12 November 2005 by the Yehudi Menuhin Foundation Germany. The London Times Berlin correspondent Roger Boyes reported a few days later, that Menuhin had "outed himself as a clear sympathiser with the neo-Nazi cause in two interviews he gave. In Deutsche Stimme" the newspaper of the far-right National Democratic Party of Germany (NDP), "he used classical anti-Semitic language while still staying within the boundaries of German law".[18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26]

"Apart from a few curious comments about America, we weren’t really aware of his politics", Winfried Kneip, YMF's chief executive, said.[26] Alarmed by press reports, from the Spiegel website among others, the Foundation took notice, that Gerard Menuhin had given interviews to the National Zeitung, writing a column named "Menuhin and how he sees the world", and also in the newspaper of the far-right NDP's Deutsche Stimme (German Voice).[19][27]

In November 2014, Israeli media referred to Menuhin as an example of a "Jewish anti-Semite" and "anti-Israel extremist". An article in The Jerusalem Post asserted that he "authored columns in the National-Zeitung, a paper infamous for its neo-Nazi and right-wing extremist ideas. He has also provided a fiercely anti-Israel interview with the pro-Iranian regime extremist German-language website, Muslim-Markt."[28][29]

Gerard Menuhin's book Tell the Truth and Shame the Devil was published in 2015. According to Menuhin, the Holocaust is "the biggest lie in history" and "Germany has no blame for the Second World War".[6]

Private life

Menuhin married Eva Struyvenberg in New York in March 1983, the daughter of Albert Struyvenberg from Seattle.[30][31][32] In 1990, he and Eva had one child together, Maxwell Duncan Menuhin, but later divorced.[31][32]

Bibliography

• Elmer, Hutchinson, 1985, ISBN 978-0091599003.
• Die Antwort, FZ-Verlag, 2007, ISBN 978-3-924309-81-7 (German).
• Tell the Truth and Shame the Devil, Barnes Review, 2015, ISBN 978-1937787295.
• Lies & Gravy: Landmarks in Human Decay, Castle Hill Publishers, 2019, ISBN 978-1591489894.
• Lived It Wrong: An Autobiography, Reconquista Press, 2020, ISBN 978-1-912853-16-8.

Sources

1. Fragen & Antworten: Interview mit Gerard Menuhin
2. The Milwaukee Journal, 29 April 1949
3. Toledo Blade, 29 April 1949
4. Wie ticken die "Reichsbürger"? (in German), retrieved 14 June 2017
5. "Kölner „Klagemauer" vereint mit Neonazis – haGalil". Retrieved 14 June 2017.
6. Morrison, Richard (6 April 2016). "Yehudi Menuhin: The genius who put the fight for justice before his family". London. Retrieved 17 November 2016. (subscription required)
7. TELL THE TRUTH & SHAME THE DEVIL, GERARD MENUHIN, Castle Hill Publishers, page 108, 184, 186, 318
8. TELL THE TRUTH & SHAME THE DEVIL, GERARD MENUHIN, Castle Hill Publishers, page 77
9. Rosenbaum, Fred (2011) [2009]. Cosmopolitans: A Social and Cultural History of the Jews of the San Francisco Bay Area. Berkeley & Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press. p. 229.
10. "Another Son Is Born To Yehudi Menuhin". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. 3 November 1951. Retrieved 1 March 2013.
11. Berufliches: Gerard Menuhin, Der Spiegel, 14 December 1960
12. State Department Warning: Famed Violinist Told Citizenship in Danger, Tad Szulc, Eugene Register-Guard, 4 December 1970 (New York Times News Service)
13. Irony without humour, Ian Murray, Glasgow Herald, 20 April 1985.
14. Menuhin president bows to pressure, Solothurn Tagblatt / Espace Media Groupe, 8 June 2007. Der unsichtbare Elefant im Raum by Gerard Menuhin
15. http://www.moneyhouse.ch/fr/p/Gerard-Menuhin
16. http://menuhin.org/about
17. TELL THE TRUTH & SHAME THE DEVIL, GERARD MENUHIN, Castle Hill Publishers, page 233-34
18. Right-wing views troubles Menuhin, United Press International, 15 November 2005
19. Neonazi-Gesinnung: Yehudi-Menuhin-Stiftung trennt sich von Vorstand, Paul Nellen, Der Spiegel, 12 November 2005
20. Tabubruch bei "Vanity Fair": Der Nazi, der Jude und das Prinzip Eitelkeit, Henryk M. Broder, Der Spiegel, 4 November 2005
21. Der Schicksals-Vater, Joachim Kronsbein, Der Spiegel, 2005
22. Menuhin Stiftung entläßt Gerard Menuhin, DPA, Die Welt, 14 November 2005
23. Falscher Trost für Deutsche: Der Fall Gerard Menuhin, Thomas Assheuer, Die Zeit, 17 November 2005
24. Sohn von Yehudi Menuhin veröffentlichte Texte in echtsextremen Organen, Editorial Staff, Der Standard, 13 November 2005
25. Violinist’s son fired for remarks, Berlin (JTA), Cleveland Jewish News, 17 November 2005
26. Boyes, Roger (15 November 2005). "Menuhin's son forced to resign over 'anti-Semitic' interviews". The Times. Retrieved 17 November 2016. (subscription required)
27. Deutsche und Juden – Zu den Ufern der Vernunft: Gerard Menuhin über Vergangenheit und Zukunft des deutsch-jüdischen Verhältnisses (cached), Deutsche Stimme, November 2005
28. Analysis: Making sense of Germany’s anti-Semitic ‘Toiletgate’ scandal, Benjamin Weinthal, The Jerusalem Post, 16 November 2014
29. Muslim-Markt interviewt Gerard Menuhin, ehemaliger Vorstandsvorsitzender der Yehudi Menuhin Stiftung, Muslim-Markt, 14 February 2006
30. "Gerard Menuhin Wed To Eva Struyvenberg". The New York Times. 9 March 1983. Retrieved 6 December 2016.
31. Mosley, Charles, editor. Burke's Peerage and Baronetage, 106th edition, volume 2, page 1907. Crans, Switzerland: Burke's Peerage (Genealogical Books) Ltd, 1999.
32. http://www.thepeerage.com/p23823.htm#i238224

External links

• Official website
• Fredrick Töben (Adelaide – 5 January 2016), reviews Tell the Truth and Shame the Devil
• "I have confidence in the German people" Interview with Gerard in the National Gazette
• Interview with Gerard Menuhin
• [3]

Bengali Renaissance
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 6/1/20


Rabindranath Tagore was a poet, philosopher and artist. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913.

The Bengali Renaissance or simply Bengal Renaissance, (Bengali: বাংলার নবজাগরণ; Banglār Nobojāgoroṇ) was a cultural, social, intellectual and artistic movement in Bengal region in the eastern part of the Indian subcontinent during the period of the British Indian Empire, from the nineteenth century to the early twentieth century dominated by Bengalis.[1]

Historian Nitish Sengupta describes the Bengal Renaissance as taking place from Raja Ram Mohan Roy (1772–1833) through Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941).[2] According to historian Sumit Sarkar, nineteenth-century Bengali religious and social reformers, scholars, literary giants, journalists, patriotic orators and scientists were revered and regarded with nostalgia in the early and mid-twentieth century. In the early 1970s, however, a more critical view emerged. "Few serious scholars could deny that nineteenth-century Bengal had fallen considerably short of the alleged Italian prototype", wrote Sarkar. Although in 1990 the "average educated Bengali" still admired the Bengali Renaissance, "most intellectuals who would like to consider themselves radical and sophisticated", no longer glorified the period.[3]

Background

During this period, Bengal witnessed an intellectual awakening that is in some way similar to the Renaissance in Europe during the 16th century, although Europeans of that age were not confronted with the challenge and influence of alien colonialism. This movement questioned existing orthodoxies, particularly with respect to women, marriage, the dowry system, the caste system, and religion. One of the earliest social movements that emerged during this time was the Young Bengal movement, that espoused rationalism and atheism as the common denominators of civil conduct among upper caste educated Hindus.


Keshab Chandra Sen is one of the early pioneers of Brahmo Samaj.

The parallel socio-religious movement, the Brahmo Samaj, developed during this time period and counted many of the leaders of the Bengal Renaissance among its followers.[4] However, in that feudal-colonial era Brahmo Samaj, like the rest of society in years past, could not conceptualize a free India as it was influenced by the European Enlightenment (and its bearers in India, the British Raj) although it had traced its intellectual roots to the Upanishads. Their version of Hinduism, or rather Universal Religion (similar to that of Ramakrishna), although devoid of practices like sati and polygamy[citation needed] that had crept into the social aspects of Hindu life, was ultimately a rigid impersonal monotheistic faith, that was actually quite distinct from the pluralistic and multifaceted nature in the way the Hindu religion was practiced. Future leaders like Keshub Chunder Sen were as much devotees of Christ, as they were of Brahma, Krishna or the Buddha. It has been argued by some scholars that the Brahmo Samaj movement never gained the support of the masses and remained restricted to the elite, although Hindu society has accepted most of the social reform programmes of the Brahmo Samaj. It must also be acknowledged that many of the later Brahmos were also leaders of the freedom movement.

The renaissance period after the Indian Rebellion of 1857 saw a magnificent outburst of Bengali literature. While Ram Mohan Roy and Iswar Chandra Vidyasagar were the pioneers, others like Bankim Chandra Chatterjee widened it and built upon it.[5] The first significant nationalist detour to the Bengal Renaissance was given by the writings of Bankim Chandra Chatterjee. Later writers of the period who introduced broad discussion of social problems and more colloquial forms of Bengali into mainstream literature included Saratchandra Chatterjee.


Kazi Nazrul Islam, the national poet of Bangladesh.

The Tagore family, including Rabindranath Tagore, were leaders of this period and had a particular interest in educational reform.[6] Their contribution to the Bengal Renaissance was multi-faceted. Several members of the family, including Rabindranath, Abanindranath, Gaganendranath and Jyotirindranath Tagore, Asit Kumar Haldar and Jnanadanandini Devi have been associated with the movement.[7]

Comparison with European renaissance

The word "renaissance" in European history meant "rebirth" and was used in the context of the revival of the Graeco-Roman learning in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries after the long winter of the dark medieval period. But the modernization and efflorescence of Bengali culture was catalyzed by its contact with Western culture after the establishment of British rule in Bengal in 1857. Bengalis were the first people in Asian modernity to interact with Western culture in deep and meaningful-enough ways to produce works of lasting global interest. One serious comparison considers impacts of the so-called dramatis personae of the Bengal Renaissance like Keshab Chandra Sen, Bipin Chandra Pal and M. N. Roy. For about a century, Bengal's conscious awareness of a rapidly-changing modern world was more profound and predated that of the rest of India. Many of the leading figures of various fields in India and even the entire Asian region first ushering in both local and foreign new influences were Bengalis. Reformation of religion, society and education started with Rammohan Roy in India. The first great moderns in various fields in Asia- Novelist (Bankim Chandra Chatterjee), poet (Rabindranath Tagore), painter (Rabindranath Tagore, Gaganendranath Tagore and Abanindranath Tagore along with Japanese Yokoyama Taikan), sculptor (Ramkinkar Baij), philosopher (Krishna Chandra Bhattacharya) and scientist (Jagadish Chandra Bose along with Japanese Kitasato Shibasaburō) were from Bengal. The role played by Bengal in the modern awakening of India is thus comparable to the position occupied by Italy in the European renaissance.

There are other notable distinctions. The modernity of the Bengal Renaissance is sometimes referred to as post-Enlightenment modernity. Unlike the Italian Renaissance, it influenced and managed to impact a rather substantial portion of Indian society, however nearly all of its leading figures and advocates were members of the middle class, many of whom were also in sympathy with the goals of socialism.

According to Nitish Sengupta, though the Bengal Renaissance was the "culmination of the process of emergence of the cultural characteristics of the Bengali people that had started in the age of Hussein Shah, it remained predominantly Hindu and only partially Muslim."[8] There were, nevertheless, examples of Muslim intellectuals such as Syed Ameer Ali, Mosharraf Hussain,[8] Sake Dean Mahomed, Kazi Nazrul Islam, and Roquia Sakhawat Hussain. The Freedom of Intellect Movement sought to challenge religious and social dogma in Bengali Muslim society.

Science and technology


Jagadish Chandra Bose was one of the fathers of radio science.

During the Bengal Renaissance science was also advanced by several Bengali scientists such as Satyendra Nath Bose, Anil Kumar Gain, Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis, Prafulla Chandra Ray, Debendra Mohan Bose, Jagadish Chandra Bose, Jnan Chandra Ghosh, Gopal Chandra Bhattacharya, Kishori Mohan Bandyopadhyay, Jnanendra Nath Mukherjee, Sisir Kumar Mitra, Upendranath Brahmachari and Meghnad Saha.


Satyendra Nath Bose was one of the pioneers of quantum mechanics.

Jagadish Chandra Bose (1858–1937) was a polymath: a physicist, biologist, botanist, archaeologist, and writer of science fiction.[9] He pioneered the investigation of radio and microwave optics, made very significant contributions to botany, and laid the foundations of experimental science in the Indian subcontinent.[10] He is considered one of the fathers of radio science,[11] and is also considered the father of Bengali science fiction. He also invented the crescograph.

Anil Kumar Gain (1919–1978) and Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis (1893–1972) were leading mathematicians and statisticians of their time. Gain went on to found Vidyasagar University, while Mahalanobis laid the foundation of the Indian Statistical Institute.

Satyendra Nath Bose (1894–1974) was a physicist, specializing in mathematical physics. He is best known for his work on quantum mechanics in the early 1920s, providing the foundation for Bose–Einstein statistics and the theory of the Bose–Einstein condensate. He is honoured as the namesake of the boson. Although more than one Nobel Prize was awarded for research related to the concepts of the boson, Bose-Einstein statistics and Bose-Einstein condensate—the latest being the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physics, which was given for advancing the theory of Bose-Einstein condensates—Bose himself was never awarded the Nobel Prize.

Arts

Visual arts

Main article: Bengal School of Art

The Bengal School of Art was an art movement and a style of Indian painting that originated in Bengal and flourished throughout British India in the early 20th century. Also known as 'Indian style of painting' in its early days, it was associated with Indian nationalism (swadeshi) and led by Abanindranath Tagore.[12][13]

Following the influence of Indian spiritual ideas in the West, the British art teacher Ernest Binfield Havell attempted to reform the teaching methods at the Calcutta School of Art by encouraging students to imitate Mughal miniatures. This caused controversy, leading to a strike by students and complaints from the local press, including from nationalists who considered it to be a retrogressive move. Havell was supported by the artist Abanindranath Tagore.[14] As with the Italian Renaissance, artists drew inspiration from the past. Abanindranath drew inspiration from Indian miniatures, and Nandalal Bose was inspired by the murals of Ajanta Caves.

Some prominent artists associated with the Bengal school include Nandalal Bose, Abanindranath Tagore and Gaganendranath Tagore, Asit Kumar Haldar, Kalipada Ghoshal, Sunayani Devi, and Beohar Rammanohar Sinha. The Bengal school's influence in India declined with the spread of modernist ideas in the 1920s, and it eventually led to the development of modern Indian painting.

Music

Rabindranath Tagore was the most famous musician of this period.

Cinema


Satyajit Ray

Satyajit Ray was considered one of the greatest filmmakers of the 20th century. Although traditionally, the Bengali Renaissance is said to have ended with India's Independence, Ray is regarded by some as the last prominent figure of the movement.

Literature

Main article: Bengali literature

See also: Bengali poetry


Sukumar Ray

Rabindranath Tagore is the most influential literary figure of the movement. Tagore's 1901 Bengali novella, Nastanirh was written as a critique of men who professed to follow the ideals of the Renaissance, but failed to do so within their own families. In many ways Rabindranath Tagore's writings (especially poems and songs) can be seen as imbued with the spirit of the Upanishads. His works repeatedly allude to Upanishadic ideas regarding soul, liberation, transmigration and—perhaps most essentially—about a spirit that imbues all creation not unlike the Upanishadic Brahman. Tagore's English translation of a set of poems titled the Gitanjali won him the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913. He was the first Asian to win this award (and the first non-European/non-white person of 'colour' to win the Nobel Prize in any category).

Begum Rokeya is widely known for her work Sultana's Dream, which depicts a futuristic society of role reversal, in which men are locked away in seclusion, in a manner corresponding to the traditional Muslim practice of purdah for women.

According to historian Romesh Chunder Dutt:[15]

The conquest of Bengal by the English was not only a political revolution, but ushered in a greater revolution in thoughts and ideas, in religion and society ... From the stories of gods and goddesses, kings and queens, princes and princesses, we have learnt to descend to the humble walks of life, to sympathise with the common citizen or even common peasant … Every revolution is attended with vigour, and the present one is no exception to the rule. Nowhere in the annals of Bengali literature are so many or so bright names found crowded together in the limited space of one century as those of Ram Mohan Roy, Akshay Kumar Dutt, Isvar Chandra Vidyasagar, Isvar Chandra Gupta, Michael Madhusudan Dutt, Hem Chandra Banerjee, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and Dina Bandhu Mitra. Within the three quarters of the present century, prose, blank verse, historical fiction and drama have been introduced for the first time in the Bengali literature.

Science fiction

Main article: Bengali science fiction

Jagadish Chandra Bose is considered the father of Bengali science fiction. Subsequently, authors like Jagadananda Roy and Satyajit Ray have written in the genre.


Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar


Michael Madhusudan Dutt


Bankim Chandra Chatterjee


Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyay


Begum Rokeya

Religion and spirituality

Most notable Bengali religious and spiritual personalities are Atiśa, Tilopa, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, Ramakrishna, Sree Sree Thakur Anukulchandra, Nityananda, Haridasa Thakur, Jiva Goswami, Ramprasad Sen, Lokenath Brahmachari, Swami Vivekananda, Keshub Chandra Sen, Balananda Brahmachari, Vishuddhananda Paramahansa, Sri Aurobindo, Lahiri Mahasaya, Bamakhepa, Yukteswar Giri, Debendranath Tagore, Swami Abhedananda, Bhaktivinoda Thakur, Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, Mohanananda Brahmachari, Sitaramdas Omkarnath, Ram Thakur, Lalon, Tibbetibaba, Soham Swami, Nigamananda Paramahansa, Niralamba Swami, Pranavananda, Bijoy Krishna Goswami, Paramahansa Yogananda, Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar, Anukulchandra Chakravarty, Anandamayi Ma, Hariharananda Giri, Anirvan and Sri Chinmoy.


Chaitanya Mahaprabhu


Ramakrishna


Swami Vivekananda


Sri Aurobindo


Paramahansa Yogananda


A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

Contributing institutions

• Asiatic Society (est.1784)
• Fort William College (1800)
• Serampore College (1817)
• Calcutta School-Book Society (1817)
• Hindu School (1817)
• Hare School (1818)
• Sanskrit College (1824)
• General Assembly's Institution (1830) (now known as Scottish Church College)
• Calcutta Medical College (1835)
• Mutty Lall Seal's Free School & College (1842)
• Hindu College (1817) later Presidency College, Calcutta (1855) now Presidency University (since 2010)
• Bengal Engineering College, Shibpur (1856) now known as Indian Institute of Engineering Science and Technology, Shibpur
• University of Calcutta (1857)
• Vidyasagar College (1872)
• Hindu Mahila Vidyalaya (1873)
• Banga Mahila Vidyalaya (1876)
• Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science (1876)
• Bethune College (1879)
• Ripon College (1884) (now known as Surendranath College)
• National Council of Education, Bengal (1906) (now known as Jadavpur University)
• Visva-Bharati University (1921)
• University of Dhaka (1921)
• Maharaja Manindra Chandra College (1941)
• Seth Anandram Jaipuria College (1945)


The Asiatic Society


Visva-Bharati University


Hare School


Presidency University


Jadavpur University


University of Calcutta


University of Dhaka


Calcutta Medical College

See also

• History of Bengal
• Bengali people
• Ramtanu Lahiri
• Ramtanu Lahiri O Tatkalin Bangasamaj
• Adi Dharm
• Prarthana Samaj
• Ayyavazhi
• Calcutta Youth Choir
• Parineeta
• Structure of Ayyavazhi
• Tattwabodhini Patrika
• Scottish Renaissance
• Harlem Renaissance

References

1. Andrew Clinton Willford (1991). Religious Resurgence in British India: Vivekananda and the Hindu Renaissance. University of California, San Diego, Department of Anthropology.
2. Nitish Sengupta (2001). History of the Bengali-speaking People. UBS Publishers' Distributors. p. 211. ISBN 978-81-7476-355-6. The Bengal Renaissance can be said to have started with Raja Ram Mohan Roy (1775-1833) and ended with Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), although there were many other stalwarts thereafter embodying particular aspects of the unique intellectual and creative ferment.
3. Sarkar, Sumit (1990). "Calcutta and the Bengal Renaissance". In Chaudhuri, Sukanta (ed.). Calcutta: The Living City. Volume I: The Past. Oxford University Press. pp. 95, 97. ISBN 978-0-19-563696-3.
4. "Reform and Education: Young Bengal & Derozio", Bengalinet.com
5. Nitish Sengupta (2001). History of the Bengali-speaking People. UBS Publishers' Distributors. p. 253. ISBN 978-81-7476-355-6.
6. Kathleen M. O'Connell, "Rabindranath Tagore on Education", infed.org
7. Deb, Chitra, pp 64-65.
8. Nitish Sengupta (2001). History of the Bengali-speaking People. UBS Publishers' Distributors. p. 213. ISBN 978-81-7476-355-6.
9. A versatile genius Archived 3 February 2009 at the Wayback Machine, Frontline 21 (24), 2004.
10. Chatterjee, Santimay and Chatterjee, Enakshi, Satyendranath Bose, 2002 reprint, p. 5, National Book Trust, ISBN 8123704925
11. Sen, A. K. (1997). "Sir J.C. Bose and radio science". Microwave Symposium Digest. IEEE MTT-S International Microwave Symposium. Denver, CO: IEEE. pp. 557–560. doi:10.1109/MWSYM.1997.602854. ISBN 0-7803-3814-6.
12. "Bengal School". National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi. Archived from the original on 22 October 2018. Retrieved 13 February 2019.
13. Dey, Mukul. "Which Way Indian Art?". chitralekha.org. Retrieved 13 February 2019.
14. Cotter, Holland (19 August 2008). "'Rhythms of India' Exhibition at the Philadelphia Museum of Art: Indian Modernism Via an Eclectic, Elusive Artist". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 13 February 2019.
15. R. C. Dutt (1962) [First published 1877 as The Literature of Bengal]. Cultural Heritage of Bengal. (3rd ed). Punthi Pustak. p. 166–167, cited in Nitish Sengupta (2001). History of the Bengali-speaking People. UBS Publishers' Distributors. pp. 211–212. ISBN 978-81-7476-355-6.

Further reading

• Chatterjee, Pranab (2010). A Story of Ambivalent Modernization in Bangladesh and West Bengal: The Rise and Fall of Bengali Elitism in South Asia. Peter Lang. ISBN 9781433108204.
• Dasgupta, Subrata (2005). Twilight of the Bengal renaissance: R.K. Dasgupta & his quest for a world mind. the University of California: Dey's Publishing.
• Dasgupta, Subrata (2009). The Bengal Renaissance. Permanent Black. ISBN 978-8178242798.
• Dasgupta, Subrata (2011). Awakening: The Story of the Bengal Renaissance. Random House India. ISBN 978-8184001839.
• Dhar, Niranjan (1977). Vedanta and the Bengal Renaissance. the University of Michigan: Minerva Associates. ISBN 9780883868379.
• Fraser, Bashabi edited Special Issue on Rabindranath Tagore, Literary Compass, Wiley Publications. Volume 12, Issue 5, May 2015. See Fraser's Introduction pp. 161–172. ISSN 1741-4113.
• Kabir, Abulfazal M. Fazle (2011). The Libraries of Bengal, 1700-1947: The Story of Bengali Renaissance. Promilla & Co. Publishers. ISBN 978-8185002071.
• Kopf, David (1969). British Orientalism and the Bengal Renaissance. University of California Press. ISBN 978-0520006652.
• Kumar, Raj (2003). Essays on Indian Renaissance. Discovery Publishing House. ISBN 978-81-7141-689-9.
• Marshall, P. J. (2006). Bengal: The British Bridgehead: Eastern India 1740-1828 (The New Cambridge History of India). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521028226.
• Mittra, Sitansu Sekhar (2001). Bengal's Renaissance. Academic Publishers. ISBN 9788187504184.
• Pal, Bipin Chandra; Cakrabartī, Jagannātha (1977). Studies in the Bengal renaissance. the University of California: National Council of Education, Bengal.
• Sastri, Sivanath. A History of the Renaissance in Bengal: Ramtanu Lahiri, Brahman and Reformer, London: Swan, Sonnenschein (1903); Kolkata: Renaissance (2002).
• Sastri, Sibnath (2008). Ramtanu Lahiri, Brahman and Reformer: A History of the Renaissance in Bengal. BiblioLife. ISBN 978-0559841064.
• Sen, Amit (2011). Notes on the Bengal Renaissance. Nabu Press. ISBN 978-1179501390.
• Travers, Robert (2007). Ideology and Empire in Eighteenth-Century India: The British in Bengal. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521059688.

External links

• Copf, David (2012). "Bengal Renaissance". In Islam, Sirajul; Jamal, Ahmed A. (eds.). Banglapedia: National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh (Second ed.). Asiatic Society of Bangladesh.

Part 1 of 3

Partition of India
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 6/1/20


Partition of India
British Indian Empire in The Imperial Gazetteer of India, 1909. British India is shaded pink, the princely states yellow.
Date: August 1947
Location: British Raj, India and Pakistan
Outcome: Partition of British Indian Empire into independent dominions, India and Pakistan, and refugee crises
Deaths: 200,000 to 2 million,[1][a] 14 million displaced[2]


The prevailing religions of the British Indian Empire based on the Census of India, 1901

The Partition of India of 1947 was the division of British India[ b] into two independent dominion states, India and Pakistan by an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom.[3] India is today the Republic of India; Pakistan is today the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and the People's Republic of Bangladesh. The partition involved the division of two provinces, Bengal and Punjab, based on district-wise non-Muslim or Muslim majorities. The partition also saw the division of the British Indian Army, the Royal Indian Navy, the Indian Civil Service, the railways, and the central treasury. The partition was outlined in the Indian Independence Act 1947 and resulted in the dissolution of the British Raj, or Crown rule in India. The two self-governing countries of India and Pakistan legally came into existence at midnight on 15 August 1947.

The partition displaced between 10–12 million people along religious lines, creating overwhelming refugee crises in the newly constituted dominions. There was large-scale violence, with estimates of loss of life accompanying or preceding the partition disputed and varying between several hundred thousand and two million.[1][c] The violent nature of the partition created an atmosphere of hostility and suspicion between India and Pakistan that plagues their relationship to the present.

The term partition of India does not cover the secession of Bangladesh from Pakistan in 1971, nor the earlier separations of Burma (now Myanmar) and Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) from the administration of British India.[d] The term also does not cover the political integration of princely states into the two new dominions, nor the disputes of annexation or division arising in the princely states of Hyderabad, Junagadh, and Jammu and Kashmir, though violence along religious lines did break out in some princely states at the time of the partition. It does not cover the incorporation of the enclaves of French India into India during the period 1947–1954, nor the annexation of Goa and other districts of Portuguese India by India in 1961. Other contemporaneous political entities in the region in 1947, Sikkim, Bhutan, Nepal, and the Maldives were unaffected by the partition.[e]

Among princely states, the violence was often highly organised with the involvement or complicity of the rulers. It is believed that in the Sikh states (except for Jind and Kapurthala) the Maharajas were complicit in the ethnic cleansing of Muslims, while other Maharajas such as those of Patiala, Faridkot, and Bharatpur were heavily involved in ordering them. The ruler of Bharatpur is said to have witnessed the ethnic cleansing of his population, especially at places such as Deeg.[7]

Background

Partition of Bengal (1905)

Main article: Partition of Bengal (1905)


1909 Percentage of Hindus.


1909 Percentage of Muslims.


1909 Percentage of Sikhs, Buddhists, and Jains.









The 1921 Census of British India shows 69 million Muslims and 217 million Hindus out of a total population of 316 million.

In 1905, the viceroy, Lord Curzon, in his second term, divided the largest administrative subdivision in British India, the Bengal Presidency, into the Muslim-majority province of East Bengal and Assam and the Hindu-majority province of Bengal (present-day Indian states of West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand and Odisha).[8] Curzon's act, the Partition of Bengal—which some considered administratively felicitous, and, which had been contemplated by various colonial administrations since the time of Lord William Bentinck, but never acted upon—was to transform nationalist politics as nothing else before it.[8] The Hindu elite of Bengal, among them many who owned land in East Bengal that was leased out to Muslim peasants, protested strongly. The large Bengali Hindu middle-class (the Bhadralok), upset at the prospect of Bengalis being outnumbered in the new Bengal province by Biharis and Oriyas, felt that Curzon's act was punishment for their political assertiveness.[8] The pervasive protests against Curzon's decision took the form predominantly of the Swadeshi ("buy Indian") campaign and involved a boycott of British goods. Sporadically—but flagrantly—the protesters also took to political violence that involved attacks on civilians.[9] The violence, however, was not effective, as most planned attacks were either pre-empted by the British or failed.[10] The rallying cry for both types of protest was the slogan Bande Mataram (Bengali, lit: "Hail to the Mother"), the title of a song by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, which invoked a mother goddess, who stood variously for Bengal, India, and the Hindu goddess Kali.[11] The unrest spread from Calcutta to the surrounding regions of Bengal when Calcutta's English-educated students returned home to their villages and towns.[12] The religious stirrings of the slogan and the political outrage over the partition were combined as young men, in groups such as Jugantar, took to bombing public buildings, staging armed robberies,[10] and assassinating British officials.[11] Since Calcutta was the imperial capital, both the outrage and the slogan soon became known nationally.[11]

The overwhelming, but predominantly Hindu, protest against the partition of Bengal and the fear of reforms favouring the Hindu majority, now led the Muslim elite in India to meet with the new viceroy Lord Minto in 1906 and ask for separate electorates for Muslims. In conjunction, they demanded proportional legislative representation reflecting both their status as former rulers and their record of cooperating with the British. This led, in December 1906, to the founding of the All-India Muslim League in Dacca. Although Curzon by now had resigned his position over a dispute with his military chief Lord Kitchener and returned to England, the League was in favor of his partition plan. The Muslim elite's position, which was reflected in the League's position, had crystallized gradually over the previous three decades, beginning with the 1871 Census of British India, which had first estimated the populations in regions of Muslim majority.[13] For his part, Curzon's desire to court the Muslims of East Bengal had arisen from British anxieties ever since the 1871 census, and in light of the history of Muslims fighting them in the 1857 Mutiny and the Second Anglo-Afghan War.[13] In the three decades since that census, Muslim leaders across northern India, had intermittently experienced public animosity from some of the new Hindu political and social groups.[13] The Arya Samaj, for example, had not only supported Cow Protection Societies in their agitation,[14] but also—distraught at the 1871 Census's Muslim numbers—organized "reconversion" events for the purpose of welcoming Muslims back to the Hindu fold.[13] In the United Provinces, Muslims became anxious in the late 19th century Hindu political representation increased, and Hindus were politically mobilized in the Hindi-Urdu controversy and the anti-cow-killing riots of 1893.[15] In 1905 Muslim fears increased when Tilak and Lajpat Rai attempted to rise to leadership positions in the Congress, and the Congress itself rallied around the symbolism of Kali.[13] It was not lost on many Muslims, for example, that the rallying cry, "Bande Mataram," had first appeared in the novel Anandmath in which Hindus had battled their Muslim oppressors.[16] Lastly, the Muslim elite, and among it Dacca Nawab, Khwaja Salimullah, who hosted the League's first meeting in his mansion in Shahbag, was aware that a new province with a Muslim majority would directly benefit Muslims aspiring to political power.[16]

World War I, Lucknow Pact: 1914–1918


Indian medical orderlies attending to wounded soldiers with the Mesopotamian Expeditionary Force in Mesopotamia during World War I


Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (seated in the carriage, on the right, eyes downcast, with black flat-top hat) receives a big welcome in Karachi in 1916 after his return to India from South Africa


Muhammad Ali Jinnah, seated, third from the left, was a supporter of the Lucknow Pact, which, in 1916, ended the three-way rift between the Extremists, the Moderates and the League

World War I would prove to be a watershed in the imperial relationship between Britain and India. 1.4 million Indian and British soldiers of the British Indian Army would take part in the war, and their participation would have a wider cultural fallout: news of Indian soldiers fighting and dying with British soldiers, as well as soldiers from dominions like Canada and Australia, would travel to distant corners of the world both in newsprint and by the new medium of the radio.[17] India's international profile would thereby rise and would continue to rise during the 1920s.[17] It was to lead, among other things, to India, under its name, becoming a founding member of the League of Nations in 1920 and participating, under the name, "Les Indes Anglaises" (British India), in the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp.[18] Back in India, especially among the leaders of the Indian National Congress, it would lead to calls for greater self-government for Indians.[17]

The 1916 Lucknow Session of the Congress was also the venue of an unanticipated mutual effort by the Congress and the Muslim League, the occasion for which was provided by the wartime partnership between Germany and Turkey. Since the Turkish Sultan, or Khalifah, also had sporadically claimed guardianship of the Islamic holy sites of Mecca, Medina, and Jerusalem, and since the British and their allies were now in conflict with Turkey, doubts began to increase among some Indian Muslims about the "religious neutrality" of the British, doubts that had already surfaced as a result of the reunification of Bengal in 1911, a decision that was seen as ill-disposed to Muslims.[19] In the Lucknow Pact, the League joined the Congress in the proposal for greater self-government that was campaigned for by Tilak and his supporters; in return, the Congress accepted separate electorates for Muslims in the provincial legislatures as well as the Imperial Legislative Council. In 1916, the Muslim League had anywhere between 500 and 800 members and did not yet have its wider following among Indian Muslims of later years; in the League itself, the pact did not have unanimous backing, having largely been negotiated by a group of "Young Party" Muslims from the United Provinces (UP), most prominently, the brothers Mohammad and Shaukat Ali, who had embraced the Pan-Islamic cause.[19] However, it did have the support of a young lawyer from Bombay, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, who was later to rise to leadership roles in both the League and the Indian independence movement. In later years, as the full ramifications of the pact unfolded, it was seen as benefiting the Muslim minority elites of provinces like UP and Bihar more than the Muslim majorities of Punjab and Bengal. At the time, the "Lucknow Pact" was an important milestone in nationalistic agitation and was seen so by the British.[19]

Montagu–Chelmsford Reforms: 1919

Secretary of State for India, Montagu and Viceroy Lord Chelmsford presented a report in July 1918 after a long fact-finding trip through India the previous winter.[20] After more discussion by the government and parliament in Britain, and another tour by the Franchise and Functions Committee to identify who among the Indian population could vote in future elections, the Government of India Act of 1919 (also known as the Montagu–Chelmsford Reforms) was passed in December 1919.[20] The new Act enlarged both the provincial and Imperial legislative councils and repealed the Government of India's recourse to the "official majority" in unfavourable votes.[20] Although departments like defence, foreign affairs, criminal law, communications, and income-tax were retained by the Viceroy and the central government in New Delhi, other departments like public health, education, land-revenue, local self-government were transferred to the provinces.[20] The provinces themselves were now to be administered under a new dyarchical system, whereby some areas like education, agriculture, infrastructure development, and local self-government became the preserve of Indian ministers and legislatures, and ultimately the Indian electorates, while others like irrigation, land-revenue, police, prisons, and control of media remained within the purview of the British governor and his executive council.[20] The new Act also made it easier for Indians to be admitted into the civil service and the army officer corps.

A greater number of Indians were now enfranchised, although, for voting at the national level, they constituted only 10% of the total adult male population, many of whom were still illiterate.[20] In the provincial legislatures, the British continued to exercise some control by setting aside seats for special interests they considered cooperative or useful. In particular, rural candidates, generally sympathetic to British rule and less confrontational, were assigned more seats than their urban counterparts.[20] Seats were also reserved for non-Brahmins, landowners, businessmen, and college graduates. The principle of "communal representation," an integral part of the Minto-Morley Reforms, and more recently of the Congress-Muslim League Lucknow Pact, was reaffirmed, with seats being reserved for Muslims, Sikhs, Indian Christians, Anglo-Indians, and domiciled Europeans, in both provincial and Imperial legislative councils.[20] The Montagu-Chelmsford reforms offered Indians the most significant opportunity yet for exercising legislative power, especially at the provincial level; however, that opportunity was also restricted by the still limited number of eligible voters, by the small budgets available to provincial legislatures, and by the presence of rural and special interest seats that were seen as instruments of British control.[20]

Two-nation theory

Main article: Two-nation theory

The two-nation theory is the ideology that the primary identity and unifying denominator of Muslims in the Indian subcontinent is their religion, rather than their language or ethnicity, and therefore Indian Hindus and Muslims are two distinct nations regardless of commonalities.[21][22] The two-nation theory was a founding principle of the Pakistan Movement (i.e., the ideology of Pakistan as a Muslim nation-state in South Asia), and the partition of India in 1947.[23]

The Pakistan Movement or Tehrik-e-Pakistan (Urdu: تحریک پاکستان‎ – Taḥrīk-i Pākistān) was a political movement in the first half of the 20th century that aimed for and succeeded in the creation of the Dominion of Pakistan from the Muslim-majority areas of British India.

Pakistan Movement started originally as the Aligarh Movement, and as a result, the British Indian Muslims began to develop a secular political identity. Soon thereafter, the All India Muslim League was formed, which perhaps marked the beginning of the Pakistan Movement. Many of the top leadership of the movement were educated in Great Britain, with many of them educated at the Aligarh Muslim University. Many graduates of the Dhaka University soon also joined.

The Pakistan Movement was a part of the Indian independence movement, but eventually it also sought to establish a new nation-state that protected the political interests of the Indian Muslims.

-- Pakistan Movement, by Wikipedia

The ideology that religion is the determining factor in defining the nationality of Indian Muslims was undertaken by Muhammad Ali Jinnah, who termed it as the awakening of Muslims for the creation of Pakistan.[24] It is also a source of inspiration to several Hindu nationalist organizations, with causes as varied as the redefinition of Indian Muslims as non-Indian foreigners and second-class citizens in India, the expulsion of all Muslims from India, establishment of a legally Hindu state in India, prohibition of conversions to Islam, and the promotion of conversions or reconversions of Indian Muslims to Hinduism.[25][26][27][28]

The Hindu Mahasabha leader Lala Lajpat Rai was one of the first persons to demand to bifurcate India by Muslim and non-Muslim population. He wrote in The Tribune of 14 December 1924:

Under my scheme the Muslims will have four Muslim States: (1) The Pathan Province or the North-West Frontier; (2) Western Punjab (3) Sindh and (4) Eastern Bengal. If there are small Muslim communities in any other part of India, sufficiently large to form a province, they should be similarly constituted. But it should be distinctly understood that this is not a united India. It means a clear partition of India into a Muslim India and a non-Muslim India.[29]

There are varying interpretations of the two-nation theory, based on whether the two postulated nationalities can coexist in one territory or not, with radically different implications. One interpretation argued for sovereign autonomy, including the right to secede, for Muslim-majority areas of the Indian subcontinent, but without any transfer of populations (i.e., Hindus and Muslims would continue to live together). A different interpretation contends that Hindus and Muslims constitute "two distinct and frequently antagonistic ways of life and that therefore they cannot coexist in one nation."[30] In this version, a transfer of populations (i.e., the total removal of Hindus from Muslim-majority areas and the total removal of Muslims from Hindu-majority areas) was a desirable step towards a complete separation of two incompatible nations that "cannot coexist in a harmonious relationship." [31][32]

Opposition to the theory has come from two sources. The first is the concept of a single Indian nation, of which Hindus and Muslims are two intertwined communities.[33] This is a founding principle of the modern, officially secular, Republic of India. Even after the formation of Pakistan, debates on whether Muslims and Hindus are distinct nationalities or not continued in that country as well.[34] The second source of opposition is the concept that while Indians are not one nation, neither are the Muslims or Hindus of the subcontinent, and it is instead the relatively homogeneous provincial units of the subcontinent which are true nations and deserving of sovereignty; the Baloch has presented this view,[35] Sindhi,[36] and Pashtun[37] sub-nationalities of Pakistan and the Assamese[38] and Punjabi[39] sub-nationalities of India.

Muslim homeland, provincial elections, World War II, Lahore Resolution: 1930–1945


Jawaharlal Nehru, Sarojini Naidu, Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, and Maulana Azad at the 1940 Ramgarh session of the Congress in which Azad was elected president for the second time


Chaudhari Khaliquzzaman (left) seconding the 1940 Lahore Resolution of the All-India Muslim League with Jinnah (right) presiding, and Liaquat Ali Khan centre

Although Choudhry Rahmat Ali had in 1933 produced a pamphlet, Now or never, in which the term "Pakistan", "the land of the pure", comprising the Punjab, North West Frontier Province (Afghania), Kashmir, Sindh, and Balochistan, was coined for the first time, the pamphlet did not attract political attention.[40] A little later, a Muslim delegation to the Parliamentary Committee on Indian Constitutional Reforms gave short shrift to the Pakistan idea, calling it "chimerical and impracticable".[40] In 1932, the British Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald accepted Dr. Ambedkar's [Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar] demand for the “Depressed Classes” to have separate representation in the central and provincial legislatures. The Muslim League favoured the award as it had the potential to weaken the Hindu caste leadership. However, Mahatma Gandhi, who was seen as a leading advocate for Dalit [untouchable] rights, went on a fast to persuade the British to repeal the award. Ambedkar had to back down when it seemed Gandhi's life was threatened.[41]

Two years later, the Government of India Act 1935 introduced provincial autonomy, increasing the number of voters in India to 35 million.[42] More significantly, law and order issues were for the first time devolved from British authority to provincial governments headed by Indians.[42] This increased Muslim anxieties about eventual Hindu domination.[42] In the 1937 Indian provincial elections, the Muslim League turned out its best performance in Muslim-minority provinces such as the United Provinces, where it won 29 of the 64 reserved Muslim seats.[42] However, in the Muslim-majority regions of the Punjab and Bengal regional parties outperformed the League.[42] In the Punjab, the Unionist Party of Sikandar Hayat Khan, won the elections and formed a government, with the support of the Indian National Congress and the Shiromani Akali Dal, which lasted five years.[42] In Bengal, the League had to share power in a coalition headed by A. K. Fazlul Huq, the leader of the Krishak Praja Party.[42]

The Congress, on the other hand, with 716 wins in the total of 1585 provincial assemblies seats, was able to form governments in 7 out of the 11 provinces of British India.[42] In its manifesto, the Congress maintained that religious issues were of lesser importance to the masses than economic and social issues. However, the election revealed that the Congress had contested just 58 out of the total 482 Muslim seats, and of these, it won in only 26.[42] In UP, where the Congress won, it offered to share power with the League on condition that the League stop functioning as a representative only of Muslims, which the League refused.[42] This proved to be a mistake as it alienated Congress further from the Muslim masses. Besides, the new UP provincial administration promulgated cow protection and the use of Hindi.[42] The Muslim elite in UP was further alienated, when they saw chaotic scenes of the new Congress Raj, in which rural people who sometimes turned up in large numbers in Government buildings, were indistinguishable from the administrators and the law enforcement personnel.[43]

The Muslim League conducted its investigation into the conditions of Muslims under Congress-governed provinces.[44] The findings of such investigations increased fear among the Muslim masses of future Hindu domination.[44] The view that Muslims would be unfairly treated in an independent India dominated by the Congress was now a part of the public discourse of Muslims.[44] With the outbreak of World War II in 1939, the viceroy, Lord Linlithgow, declared war on India's behalf without consulting Indian leaders, leading the Congress provincial ministries to resign in protest.[44] The Muslim League, which functioned under state patronage,[45] in contrast, organized "Deliverance Day", celebrations (from Congress dominance) and supported Britain in the war effort.[44] When Linlithgow met with nationalist leaders, he gave the same status to Jinnah as he did to Gandhi, and a month later described the Congress as a "Hindu organization."[45]

In March 1940, in the League's annual three-day session in Lahore, Jinnah gave a two-hour speech in English, in which were laid out the arguments of the Two-nation theory, stating, in the words of historians Talbot and Singh, that "Muslims and Hindus ... were irreconcilably opposed monolithic religious communities and as such, no settlement could be imposed that did not satisfy the aspirations of the former."[44] On the last day of its session, the League passed, what came to be known as the Lahore Resolution, sometimes also "Pakistan Resolution," [44] demanding that "the areas in which the Muslims are numerically in the majority as in the North-Western and Eastern zones of India should be grouped to constitute independent states in which the constituent units shall be autonomous and sovereign." Though it had been founded more than three decades earlier, the League would gather support among South Asian Muslims only during the Second World War.[46]

Viceroy Linlithgow proposed in August 1940 that India be granted a Dominion status after the war. Having not taken the Pakistan idea seriously, Linlithgow supposed that what Jinnah wanted was a non-federal arrangement without Hindu domination. To allay Muslim fears of Hindu domination, the 'August offer' was accompanied by the promise that a future constitution would consider the views of minorities.[47] Neither the Congress nor the Muslim League were satisfied with the offer, and both rejected it in September. The Congress once again started a program of civil disobedience.[48]

In March 1942, with the Japanese fast moving up the Malayan Peninsula after the Fall of Singapore,[45] and with the Americans supporting independence for India,[49] Winston Churchill, the wartime Prime Minister of Britain, sent Sir Stafford Cripps, the leader of the House of Commons, with an offer of dominion status to India at the end of the war in return for the Congress's support for the war effort.[50] Not wishing to lose the support of the allies they had already secured—the Muslim League, Unionists of Punjab, and the Princes—Cripps's offer included a clause stating that no part of the British Indian Empire would be forced to join the post-war Dominion. The League rejected the offer, seeing this clause as insufficient in meeting the principle of Pakistan.[51] As a result of that proviso, the proposals were also rejected by the Congress, which, since its founding as a polite group of lawyers in 1885,[52] saw itself as the representative of all Indians of all faiths.[50] After the arrival in 1920 of Gandhi, the pre-eminent strategist of Indian nationalism,[53] the Congress had been transformed into a mass nationalist movement of millions.[52] In August 1942, the Congress launched the Quit India Resolution which asked for drastic constitutional changes, which the British saw as the most serious threat to their rule since the Indian rebellion of 1857.[50] With their resources and attention already spread thin by a global war, the nervous British immediately jailed the Congress leaders and kept them in jail until August 1945,[54] whereas the Muslim League was now free for the next three years to spread its message.[45] Consequently, the Muslim League's ranks surged during the war, with Jinnah himself admitting, "The war which nobody welcomed proved to be a blessing in disguise."[55] Although there were other important national Muslim politicians such as Congress leader Abul Kalam Azad, and influential regional Muslim politicians such as A. K. Fazlul Huq of the leftist Krishak Praja Party in Bengal, Sikander Hyat Khan of the landlord-dominated Punjab Unionist Party, and Abd al-Ghaffar Khan of the pro-Congress Khudai Khidmatgar (popularly, "red shirts") in the North West Frontier Province, the British were to increasingly see the League as the main representative of Muslim India.[56] The Muslim League's demand for Pakistan pitted it against the British and Congress.[57]

1946 Election, Cabinet Mission, Direct Action Day, Plan for Partition, Independence: 1946–1947

Further information: Indian general election, 1945 and Indian provincial elections, 1946


Members of the 1946 Cabinet Mission to India meeting Muhammad Ali Jinnah. On the extreme left is Lord Pethick Lawrence; on the extreme right, Sir Stafford Cripps.


An aged and abandoned Muslim couple and their grandchildren are sitting by the roadside on this arduous journey. "The old man is dying of exhaustion. The caravan has gone on," wrote Bourke-White.


An old Sikh man is carrying his wife. Over 10 million people were uprooted from their homeland and traveled on foot, bullock carts and trains to their promised new home.


Gandhi in Bela, Bihar, after attacks on Muslims, 28 March 1947.

In January 1946 mutinies broke out in the armed services, starting with RAF servicemen frustrated with their slow repatriation to Britain.[58] The mutinies came to a head with mutiny of the Royal Indian Navy in Bombay in February 1946, followed by others in Calcutta, Madras, and Karachi. Although the mutinies were rapidly suppressed, they had the effect of spurring the Attlee government to action. Labour Prime Minister Clement Attlee had been deeply interested in Indian independence since the 1920s, and for years had supported it. He now took charge of the government position and gave the issue the highest priority. A Cabinet Mission was sent to India led by the Secretary of State for India, Lord Pethick Lawrence, which also included Sir Stafford Cripps, who had visited India four years before. The objective of the mission was to arrange for an orderly transfer to independence.[58]

In early 1946, new elections were held in India. With the announcement of the polls the line had been drawn for Muslim voters to choose between a united Indian State or Partition.[59] At the end of the war in 1945, the colonial government had announced the public trial of three senior officers of Subhas Chandra Bose's defeated Indian National Army who stood accused of treason. Now as the trials began, the Congress leadership, although it never supported the INA, chose to defend the accused officers.[60] The subsequent convictions of the officers, the public outcry against the beliefs, and the eventual remission of the sentences created positive propaganda for the Congress, which enabled it to win the party's subsequent electoral victories in eight of the eleven provinces.[61] The negotiations between the Congress and the Muslim League, however, stumbled over the issue of partition.

British rule had lost its legitimacy for most Hindus, and conclusive proof of this came in the form of the 1946 elections with the Congress winning 91 percent of the vote among non-Muslim constituencies, thereby gaining a majority in the Central Legislature and forming governments in eight provinces, and becoming the legitimate successor to the British government for most Hindus. If the British intended to stay in India the acquiescence of politically active Indians to British rule would have been in doubt after these election results, although the views of many rural Indians were uncertain even at that point.[62] The Muslim League won the majority of the Muslim vote as well as most reserved Muslim seats in the provincial assemblies, and it also secured all the Muslim seats in the Central Assembly. Recovering from its performance in the 1937 elections, the Muslim League was finally able to make good on the claim that it and Jinnah alone represented India's Muslims[63] and Jinnah quickly interpreted this vote as a popular demand for a separate homeland.[64] However, tensions heightened while the Muslim League was unable to form ministries outside the two provinces of Sind and Bengal, with the Congress forming a ministry in the NWFP and the key Punjab province coming under a coalition ministry of the Congress, Sikhs and Unionists.[65]

The British, while not approving of a separate Muslim homeland, appreciated the simplicity of a single voice to speak on behalf of India's Muslims.[66] Britain had wanted India and its army to remain united to keep India in its system of 'imperial defence'.[67][68] With India's two political parties unable to agree, Britain devised the Cabinet Mission Plan. Through this mission, Britain hoped to preserve the united India which they and the Congress desired, while concurrently securing the essence of Jinnah's demand for a Pakistan through 'groupings. [69] The Cabinet mission scheme encapsulated a federal arrangement consisting of three groups of provinces. Two of these groupings would consist of predominantly Muslim provinces, while the third grouping would be made up of the predominantly Hindu regions. The provinces would be autonomous, but the centre would retain control over the defence, foreign affairs, and communications. Though the proposals did not offer independent Pakistan, the Muslim League accepted the proposals. Even though the unity of India would have been preserved, the Congress leaders, especially Nehru, believed it would leave the Center weak. On 10 July 1946 Nehru gave a "provocative speech," rejected the idea of grouping the provinces and "effectively torpedoed" both the Cabinet mission plan and the prospect of a United India.[70]'

After the Cabinet Mission broke down, Jinnah proclaimed 16 August 1946 Direct Action Day, with the stated goal of peacefully highlighting the demand for a Muslim homeland in British India. However, on the morning of the 16th, armed Muslim gangs gathered at the Ochterlony Monument in Calcutta to hear Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, the League's Chief Minister of Bengal, who, in the words of historian Yasmin Khan, "if he did not explicitly incite violence certainly gave the crowd the impression that they could act with impunity, that neither the police nor the military would be called out and that the ministry would turn a blind eye to any action they unleashed in the city."[71] That very evening, in Calcutta, Hindus were attacked by returning Muslim celebrants, who carried pamphlets distributed earlier which showed a clear connection between violence and the demand for Pakistan, and directly implicated the celebration of Direct Action Day with the outbreak of the cycle of violence that would later be called the "Great Calcutta Killing of August 1946".[72] The next day, Hindus struck back, and the violence continued for three days in which approximately 4,000 people died (according to official accounts), both Hindus and Muslims. Although India had had outbreaks of religious violence between Hindus and Muslims before, the Calcutta killings were the first to display elements of "ethnic cleansing".[73] Violence was not confined to the public sphere, but homes were entered and destroyed, and women and children were attacked.[74] Although the Government of India and the Congress were both shaken by the course of events, in September, a Congress-led interim government was installed, with Jawaharlal Nehru as united India's prime minister.

The communal violence spread to Bihar (where Hindus attacked Muslims), to Noakhali in Bengal (where Muslims targeted Hindus), to Garhmukteshwar in the United Provinces (where Hindus attacked Muslims), and on to Rawalpindi in March 1947 in which Hindus were attacked or driven out by Muslims.[75]

The British Prime Minister Attlee appointed Lord Louis Mountbatten as India's last viceroy, and he was given the task to oversee British India's independence by June 1948, with the instruction to avoid partition and preserve a United India, but with adaptable authority to ensure a British withdrawal with minimal setbacks. Mountbatten hoped to revive the Cabinet Mission scheme for a federal arrangement for India. But despite his initial keenness for preserving the centre, the tense communal situation caused him to conclude that partition had become necessary for a quicker transfer of power.[76][77][78][79]

Vallabhbhai Patel was one of the first Congress leaders to accept the partition of India as a solution to the rising Muslim separatist movement led by Muhammad Ali Jinnah. He had been outraged by Jinnah's Direct Action campaign, which had provoked communal violence across India and by the viceroy's vetoes of his home department's plans to stop the violence on the grounds of constitutionality. Patel severely criticized the viceroy's induction of League ministers into the government and the revalidation of the grouping scheme by the British without Congress approval. Although further outraged at the League's boycott of the assembly and non-acceptance of the plan of 16 May despite entering government, he was also aware that Jinnah enjoyed popular support amongst Muslims, and that an open conflict between him and the nationalists could degenerate into a Hindu-Muslim civil war. The continuation of a divided and weak central government would in Patel's mind, result in the wider fragmentation of India by encouraging more than 600 princely states towards independence.[80] Between the months of December 1946 and January 1947, Patel worked with civil servant V. P. Menon [Rao Bahadur Vappala Pangunni Menon] on the latter's suggestion for a separate dominion of Pakistan created out of Muslim-majority provinces. Communal violence in Bengal and Punjab in January and March 1947 further convinced Patel of the soundness of partition. Patel, a fierce critic of Jinnah's demand that the Hindu-majority areas of Punjab and Bengal be included in a Muslim state, obtained the partition of those provinces, thus blocking any possibility of their inclusion in Pakistan.

The Partition of Bengal in 1947, part of the Partition of India, divided the British Indian province of Bengal based on the Radcliffe Line between India and Pakistan. Predominantly Hindu West Bengal became a state of India, and predominantly Muslim East Bengal (now Bangladesh) became a province of Pakistan....

The partition, with the power transferred to Pakistan and India on 14–15 August 1947, was done according to what has come to be known as the "3 June Plan" or "Mountbatten Plan"....

In 1905, the first partition in Bengal was implemented as an administrative preference, making governing the two provinces, West and East Bengal, easier.[2] While the partition split the province between West Bengal, in which the majority was Hindu, and the East, where the majority was Muslim, the 1905 partition left considerable minorities of Hindus in East Bengal and Muslims in West Bengal. While the Muslims were in favour of the partition, as they would have their own province, Hindus were not. This controversy led to increased violence and protest and finally, in 1911, the two provinces were once again united.....

Under the Mountbatten Plan, a single majority vote in favour of partition by either notionally divided half of the Assembly would have decided the division of the province, and hence the house proceedings on 20 June resulted in the decision to partition Bengal. This set the stage for the creation of West Bengal as a province of India and East Bengal as a province of the Dominion of Pakistan....

After it became apparent that the division of India on the basis of the Two-nation theory would almost certainly result in the partition of the Bengal province along religious lines, Bengal provincial Muslim League leader Suhrawardy came up with a new plan to create an independent Bengal state that would join neither Pakistan nor India and remain unpartitioned. Suhrawardy realised that if Bengal was partitioned, it would be economically disastrous for East Bengal as all coal mines, all jute mills but two and other industrial plants would certainly go to the western part since these were in an overwhelmingly Hindu majority area. Most important of all, Calcutta, then the largest city in India, an industrial and commercial hub and the largest port, would also go to the western part. Suhrawardy floated his idea on 24 April 1947 at a press conference in Delhi.

However, the plan directly ran counter to that of the Muslim League's, which demanded the creation of a separate Muslim homeland on the basis of the two-nation theory. Bengal provincial Muslim League leadership opinion was divided. Barddhaman's League leader Abul Hashim supported it. On the other hand, Nurul Amin and Mohammad Akram Khan opposed it. But Muhammad Ali Jinnah realised the validity of Suhrawardy's argument and gave his tacit support to the plan. After Jinnah's approval, Suhrawardy started gathering support for his plan.

On the Congress side, only a handful of leaders agreed to the plan. Among them was the influential Bengal provincial congress leader Sarat Chandra Bose, the elder brother of Netaji [Subhas Chandra Bose] and Kiran Shankar Roy. However most other BPCC leaders and Congress leadership including Nehru and Patel rejected the plan. The Hindu nationalist party Hindu Mahasabha under the leadership of Shyama Prasad Mukherjee vehemently opposed it. Their opinion was that the plan is nothing but a ploy by Suhrawardy to stop the partition of the state so that the industrially developed western part including the city of Kolkata remains under League control. They also opined that even though the plan asked for a sovereign Bengal state, in practice it will be a virtual Pakistan and the Hindu minority will be at the mercy of the Muslim majority forever....

Soon afterwards, division arose among Bose and Suhrawardy on the question of the nature of the electorate; separate or joint. Suhrawardy insisted upon maintaining the separate electorate for Muslims and Non-Muslims. Bose was opposed to this. He withdrew and due to lack of any other significant support from the Congress's side, the United Bengal plan was discarded....

A massive population transfer began immediately after partition. Millions of Hindus migrated to India from East Bengal. The majority of them settled in West Bengal. A smaller number went to Assam, Tripura and other states. However the refugee crisis was markedly different from Punjab at India's western border. Punjab witnessed widespread communal riots immediately before partition. As a result, population transfer in Punjab happened almost immediately after the partition as terrified people left their homes from both sides. Within a year the population exchange was largely complete between East and West Punjab. But in Bengal, violence was limited only to Kolkata and Noakhali. And hence in Bengal migration occurred in a much more gradual fashion and continued over the next three decades following partition. Although riots were limited in pre-independence Bengal, the environment was nonetheless communally charged. Both Hindus in East Bengal and Muslims in West Bengal felt unsafe and had to take a crucial decision that is whether to leave for an uncertain future in another country or to stay in subjugation under the other community. Among Hindus in East Bengal those who were economically better placed, particularly higher caste Hindus, left first. Government employees were given a chance to swap their posts between India and Pakistan. The educated urban upper and middle class, the rural gentry, traders, businessmen and artisans left for India soon after partition. They often had relatives and other connections in West Bengal and were able to settle with less difficulty. Muslims followed a similar pattern. The urban and educated upper and middle class left for East Bengal first.

However poorer Hindus in East Bengal, most of whom belonged to lower castes like the Namashudras found it much more difficult to migrate. Their only property was immovable land holdings. Many sharecropped. They didn't have any skills other than farming. As a result, most of them decided to stay in East Bengal. However the political climate in Pakistan deteriorated soon after partition and communal violence started to rise. In 1950 severe riots occurred in Barisal and other places in East Pakistan, causing a further exodus of Hindus.... Throughout the next two decades Hindus left East Bengal whenever communal tensions flared up or relationship between India and Pakistan deteriorated, as in 1964. The situation of the Hindu minority in East Bengal reached its worst in the months preceding and during the Bangladesh Liberation War of 1971, when the Pakistani army systematically targeted ethnic Bengalis regardless of religious background as part of Operation Searchlight....

Though Muslims in post-independence West Bengal faced some discrimination, it was unlike the state sponsored discrimination faced by the Hindus in East Bengal. While Hindus had to flee from East Bengal, Muslims were able to stay in West Bengal. Over the years, however, the community became ghettoised and was socially and economically segregated from the majority community. Muslims lag well behind other minorities like Sikhs and Christians in almost all social indicators like literacy and per capita income.

-- Partition of Bengal (1947), by Wikipedia

Patel's decisiveness on the partition of Punjab and Bengal had won him many supporters and admirers amongst the Indian public, which had been tired of the League's tactics. Still, he was criticized by Gandhi, Nehru, secular Muslims and socialists for a perceived eagerness for the partition. When Lord Mountbatten formally proposed the plan on 3 June 1947, Patel gave his approval and lobbied Nehru and other Congress leaders to accept the proposal. Knowing Gandhi's deep anguish regarding proposals of partition, Patel engaged him in private meetings discussions over the perceived practical unworkability of any Congress-League coalition, the rising violence, and the threat of civil war. At the All India Congress Committee meeting called to vote on the proposal, Patel said:

I fully appreciate the fears of our brothers from [the Muslim-majority areas]. Nobody likes the division of India, and my heart is heavy. But the choice is between one division and many divisions. We must face facts. We cannot give way to emotionalism and sentimentality. The Working Committee has not acted out of fear. But I am afraid of one thing, that all our toil and hard work of these many years might go waste or prove unfruitful. My nine months in office have completely disillusioned me regarding the supposed merits of the Cabinet Mission Plan. Except for a few honourable exceptions, Muslim officials from the top down to the chaprasis (peons or servants) are working for the League. The communal veto given to the League in the Mission Plan would have blocked India's progress at every stage. Whether we like it or not, de facto Pakistan already exists in the Punjab and Bengal. Under the circumstances, I would prefer a de jure Pakistan, which may make the League more responsible. Freedom is coming. We have 75 to 80 percent of India, which we can make strong with our genius. The League can develop the rest of the country.[81]

Following Gandhi's denial[82] and Congress' approval of the plan, Patel represented India on the Partition Council, where he oversaw the division of public assets and selected the Indian council of ministers with Nehru. However, neither he nor any other Indian leader had foreseen the intense violence and population transfer that would take place with partition. Late in 1946 the Labour government in Britain, its exchequer exhausted by the recently concluded World War II, decided to end British rule of India, and in early 1947 Britain announced its intention of transferring power no later than June 1948. However, with the British army unprepared for the potential for increased violence, the new viceroy, Louis Mountbatten, advanced the date for the transfer of power, allowing less than six months for a mutually agreed plan for independence. In June 1947, the nationalist leaders, including Nehru and Abul Kalam Azad on behalf of the Congress, Jinnah representing the Muslim League, B. R. Ambedkar representing the Untouchable community, and Master Tara Singh representing the Sikhs, agreed to a partition of the country along religious lines in stark opposition to Gandhi's views. The predominantly Hindu and Sikh areas were assigned to the new India and predominantly Muslim areas to the new nation of Pakistan; the plan included a partition of the Muslim-majority provinces of Punjab and Bengal. The communal violence that accompanied the announcement of the Radcliffe Line, the line of partition, was even more horrific. Describing the violence that accompanied the Partition of India, historians Ian Talbot and Gurharpal Singh write:

There are numerous eyewitness accounts of the maiming and mutilation of victims. The catalogue of horrors includes the disembowelling of pregnant women, the slamming of babies' heads against brick walls, the cutting off of the victim's limbs and genitalia, and the displaying of heads and corpses. While previous communal riots had been deadly, the scale and level of brutality during the Partition massacres was unprecedented. Although some scholars question the use of the term 'genocide' concerning the Partition massacres, much of the violence was manifested with genocidal tendencies. It was designed to cleanse an existing generation and prevent its future reproduction."[83]

On 14 August 1947, the new Dominion of Pakistan came into being, with Muhammad Ali Jinnah sworn in as its first Governor-General in Karachi. The following day, 15 August 1947, India, now a smaller Union of India, became an independent country with official ceremonies taking place in New Delhi, and with Jawaharlal Nehru assuming the office of prime minister, and the viceroy Mountbatten staying on as its first Governor General. Gandhi remained in Bengal to work with the new refugees from the partitioned subcontinent.

Geographic partition, 1947

Mountbatten Plan


Mountbatten with a countdown calendar to the Transfer of Power in the background

The actual division of British India between the two new dominions was accomplished according to what has come to be known as the "3 June Plan" or "Mountbatten Plan". It was announced at a press conference by Mountbatten on 3 June 1947, when the date of independence - 15 August 1947 - was also announced. The plan's main points were:

• Sikhs, Hindus and Muslims in Punjab and Bengal legislative assemblies would meet and vote for partition. If a simple majority of either group wanted partition, then these provinces would be divided.
• Sind and Baluchistan were to make their own decision.[84]
• The fate of Northwest Frontier Province and Sylhet district of Assam was to be decided by a referendum.
• India would be independent by 15 August 1947.
• The separate independence of Bengal was ruled out.
• A boundary commission to be set up in case of partition.

The Indian political leaders accepted the Plan on 2 June. It could not deal with the question of the princely states, which were not British possessions, but on 3 June Mountbatten advised them against remaining independent and urged them to join one of the two new dominions.[85]

The Muslim League's demands for a separate country were thus conceded. The Congress's position on unity was also taken into account, while making Pakistan as small as possible. Mountbatten's formula was to divide India and, at the same time, retain maximum possible unity.

Abul Kalam Azad expressed concern over the likelihood of violent riots, to which Mountbatten replied:

At least on this question I shall give you complete assurance. I shall see to it that there is no bloodshed and riot. I am a soldier and not a civilian. Once the partition is accepted in principle, I shall issue orders to see that there are no communal disturbances anywhere in the country. If there should be the slightest agitation, I shall adopt the sternest measures to nip the trouble in the bud.[86]

Jagmohan has stated that this and what followed showed a "glaring failure of the government machinery".[86]

[b]On 3 June 1947, the partition plan was accepted by the Congress Working Committee.[87] Boloji states that in Punjab, there were no riots, but there was communal tension, while Gandhi was reportedly isolated by Nehru and Patel and observed maun vrat (day of silence). Mountbatten visited Gandhi and said he hoped that he would not oppose the partition, to which Gandhi wrote the reply: "Have I ever opposed you?"[88]

Within British India, the border between India and Pakistan (the Radcliffe Line) was determined by a British Government-commissioned report prepared under the chairmanship of a London barrister, Sir Cyril Radcliffe. Pakistan came into being with two non-contiguous enclaves, East Pakistan (today Bangladesh) and West Pakistan, separated geographically by India. India was formed out of the majority Hindu regions of British India, and Pakistan from the majority Muslim areas.

Part 2 of 3

On 18 July 1947, the British Parliament passed the Indian Independence Act that finalized the arrangements for partition and abandoned British suzerainty over the princely states, of which there were several hundred, leaving them free to choose whether to accede to one of the new dominions or to remain independent outside both.[89] The Government of India Act 1935 was adapted to provide a legal framework for the new dominions.[/b]

The Union of India, also called the Dominion of India, was an independent dominion in the British Commonwealth of Nations between 15 August 1947 and 26 January 1950. It was created by the Indian Independence Act 1947 and was transformed into the Republic of India by the promulgation of the Constitution of India in 1950.

The King was represented by the Governor-General of India. However, the Governor-General was not designated Viceroy, as had been customary under the British Raj. The office of Viceroy was abolished on independence. Two governors-general held office between independence and India's transformation into a republic: Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma (1947–48) and Chakravarti Rajagopalachari (1948–50). Jawaharlal Nehru was Prime Minister of India throughout.

Since the late 1920s the Indian independence movement had been demanding Pūrṇa Swarāj (complete self-rule) for the Indian nation and the establishment of the Dominion of India and the Dominion of Pakistan was a major victory for the Swarajis. Nevertheless, the Partition was controversial among the people, and resulted in significant political instability and displacement.

The 1946 Cabinet Mission to India proposed 'Union of India' as a political unit that would encompass both British India and the Indian princely states. The Mission's plan did not come into fruition due to disagreements over the powers to be held by the Union government. On 3 June 1947, it was decided that British India would be partitioned into two sovereign states, both dominions: Pakistan, consisting of Muslim-majority regions, and India, consisting of the rest. In deference to the wishes of Indian National Congress, it was accepted that the partition would be regarded as the Muslim majority areas splitting off from India.

The Partition of took place on 15 August 1947, leading to the creation of Pakistan (which later split into the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and the People's Republic of Bangladesh in 1971) and India (later the Republic of India).

Most of the 565 princely states within Indian territory acceded to the Dominion of India. The Hindu-majority Junagadh State located in modern-day Gujarat attempted to accede to Pakistan under Nawab Sir Muhammad Mahabat Khanji III, who was a Muslim. It was annexed militarily by the Indian government. Similarly, the State of Hyderabad sought to remain independent and was also annexed by India in 1948.

The newly created states of Pakistan and India both joined the Commonwealth, a platform for cooperation between the countries that had been part of the British Empire. Nevertheless, they soon found themselves at war beginning in October 1947, over the contested princely state of Jammu and Kashmir. Pakistani militants entered the state, alarming Maharaja Hari Singh who appealed to India for military intervention, in exchange for the signing of the Instrument of Accession and annexation into India. The region is contested to this day and two other Indo-Pakistan wars occurred as part of the Kashmir conflict.

The Dominion of India began working towards a constitution based on liberal democracy immediately after independence.

The Constituent Assembly adopted the Constitution of India, drafted by a committee headed by B. R. Ambedkar, on 26 November 1949. India abolished the role of the constitutional monarchy and became a federal, democratic republic after its constitution came into effect on 26 January 1950; henceforth celebrated as Republic Day. The governmental structure was similar to that of the United Kingdom but within a federal system. Rajendra Prasad became the first President of India.

-- Dominion of India, by Wikipedia

Following its creation as a new country in August 1947, Pakistan applied for membership of the United Nations and was accepted by the General Assembly on 30 September 1947. The Dominion of India continued to have the existing seat as India had been a founding member of the United Nations since 1945.[90]

Radcliffe Line

Further information: Radcliffe Line


A map of the Punjab region c. 1947.

The Punjab—the region of the five rivers east of Indus: Jhelum, Chenab, Ravi, Beas, and Sutlej—consists of inter-fluvial doabs, or tracts of land lying between two confluent rivers. These are the Sind-Sagar doab (between Indus and Jhelum), the Jech doab (Jhelum/Chenab), the Rechna doab (Chenab/Ravi), the Bari doab (Ravi/Beas), and the Bist doab (Beas/Sutlej) (see map on the right). In early 1947, in the months leading up to the deliberations of the Punjab Boundary Commission, the main disputed areas appeared to be in the Bari and Bist doabs. However, some areas in the Rechna doab were claimed by the Congress and Sikhs. In the Bari doab, the districts of Gurdaspur, Amritsar, Lahore, and Montgomery were all disputed.[91] All districts (other than Amritsar, which was 46.5% Muslim) had Muslim majorities; albeit, in Gurdaspur, the Muslim majority, at 51.1%, was slender. At a smaller area-scale, only three tehsils (sub-units of a district) in the Bari doab had non-Muslim majorities. These were: Pathankot (in the extreme north of Gurdaspur, which was not in dispute), and Amritsar and Tarn Taran in Amritsar district. Besides, there were four Muslim-majority tehsils east of Beas-Sutlej (with two where Muslims outnumbered Hindus and Sikhs together).[91]

Before the Boundary Commission began formal hearings, governments were set up for the East and the West Punjab regions. Their territories were provisionally divided by "notional division" based on simple district majorities. In both the Punjab and Bengal, the Boundary Commission consisted of two Muslim and two non-Muslim judges with Sir Cyril Radcliffe as a common chairman.[91] The mission of the Punjab commission was worded generally as: "To demarcate the boundaries of the two parts of Punjab, based on ascertaining the contiguous majority areas of Muslims and non-Muslims. In doing so, it will take into account other factors." Each side (the Muslims and the Congress/Sikhs) presented its claim through counsel with no liberty to bargain. The judges, too, had no mandate to compromise, and on all major issues they "divided two and two, leaving Sir Cyril Radcliffe the invidious task of making the actual decisions."[91]

Independence, population transfer, and violence


Train to Pakistan being given an honor-guard send-off. New Delhi railway station, 1947


Rural Sikhs in a long oxcart train headed towards India. 1947.


Two Muslim men (in a rural refugee train headed towards Pakistan) carrying an old woman in a makeshift doli or palanquin of 1947.


A refugee train on its way to Punjab, Pakistan

Massive population exchanges occurred between the two newly formed states in the months immediately following the Partition. There was no conception that population transfers would be necessary because of the partitioning. Religious minorities were expected to stay put in the states they found themselves residing in. However, an exception was made for Punjab, where the transfer of populations was organized because of the communal violence affecting the province, this did not apply to other provinces.[92][93]

"The population of undivided India in 1947 was approx 390 million. After partition, there were 330 million people in India, 30 million in West Pakistan, and 30 million people in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh)." Once the boundaries were established, about 14.5 million people crossed the borders to what they hoped was the relative safety of religious majority. The 1951 Census of Pakistan identified the number of displaced persons in Pakistan at 7,226,600, presumably all Muslims who had entered Pakistan from India; the 1951 Census of India counted 7,295,870 displaced persons, apparently all Hindus and Sikhs who had moved to India from Pakistan immediately after the Partition.[2] The overall total is therefore around 14.5 million, although since both censuses were held about 4 years after the Partition, this numbers includes net population increase following the mass migration.[94]

About 11.2 million (77.4% of the displaced persons) were in the west, the majority from the Punjab of it: 6.5 million Muslims moved from India to West Pakistan, and 4.7 million Hindus and Sikhs moved from West Pakistan to India; thus the net migration in the west from India to West Pakistan (now Pakistan) was 1.8 million. The other 3.3 million (22.6% of the displaced persons) were in the east: 2.6 million moved from East Pakistan to India, and 0.7 million moved from India to East Pakistan (now Bangladesh); thus, net migration in the east was 1.9 million into India.

Punjab


A refugee special train at Ambala Station during the partition of India

The Partition of British India split the former British province of Punjab between the Dominion of India and the Dominion of Pakistan. The mostly Muslim western part of the province became Pakistan's Punjab province; the mostly Hindu and Sikh eastern part became India's East Punjab state (later divided into the new states of Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh). Many Hindus and Sikhs lived in the west, and many Muslims lived in the east, and the fears of all such minorities were so great that the Partition saw many people displaced and much inter-communal violence. Some have described the violence in Punjab as a retributive genocide.[95]

The newly formed governments had not anticipated, and were completely unequipped for, a two-way migration of such staggering magnitude, and massive violence and slaughter occurred on both sides of the new India-Pakistan border. Estimates of the number of deaths vary, with low estimates at 200,000 and high estimates at 2,000,000. The worst case of violence among all regions is concluded to have taken place in Punjab.[96][97][98][99] Virtually no Muslim survived in East Punjab (except in Malerkotla) and virtually no Hindu or Sikh survived in West Punjab.[100]

Lawrence James observed that 'Sir Francis Mudie, the governor of West Punjab, estimated that 500,000 Muslims died trying to enter his province, while the British high commissioner in Karachi put the full total at 800,000. This makes nonsense of the claim by Mountbatten and his partisans that only 200,000 were killed: [James 1998: 636]".[101]

During this period, many alleged that Tara Singh was endorsing the killing of Muslims. On 3 March 1947, at Lahore, Singh, along with about 500 Sikhs, declared from a dais "Death to Pakistan." [102] According to political scientist Ishtiaq Ahmed, "On March 3, radical Sikh leader Master Tara Singh famously flashed his kirpan (sword) outside the Punjab Assembly, calling for the destruction of the Pakistan idea prompting violent response by the Muslims mainly against Sikhs but also Hindus, in the Muslim-majority districts of northern Punjab. Yet, at the end of that year, more Muslims had been killed in East Punjab than Hindus and Sikhs together in West Punjab."[103][104][105][106] Nehru wrote to Gandhi on 22 August that up to that point, twice as many Muslims had been killed in East Punjab than Hindus and Sikhs in West Punjab.[107]

Bengal

Main article: Partition of Bengal (1947)

The province of Bengal was divided into the two separate entities of West Bengal, awarded to the Dominion of India, and East Bengal, awarded to the Dominion of Pakistan. East Bengal was renamed East Pakistan in 1955, and later became the independent nation of Bangladesh after the Bangladesh Liberation War of 1971.

While the Muslim majority districts of Murshidabad and Malda were given to India, the Hindu majority district of Khulna and the Buddhist majority, but sparsely populated, Chittagong Hill Tracts were given to Pakistan by the Radcliffe award.[108]

Thousands of Hindus, located in the districts of East Bengal, which were awarded to Pakistan, found themselves being attacked, and this religious persecution forced hundreds of thousands of Hindus from East Bengal to seek refuge in India. The massive influx of Hindu refugees into Calcutta affected the demographics of the city. Many Muslims left the city for East Pakistan, and the refugee families occupied some of their homes and properties.

Sindh

At the time of Partition, most of Sindh's prosperous middle class was Hindu. There were then 1,400,000 Hindu Sindhis, though most were concentrated in cities such as Hyderabad, Karachi, Shikarpur, and Sukkur. Hundreds of Hindus residing in Sindh were forced to migrate. Some anti-Hindu violence in Sindh was precipitated by the arrival of Muslim refugees from India with minimal local Muslim support for the rioters. Sindhi Hindus faced low scale rioting unlike the Punjabi Hindus and Sikhs who had to migrate from West Punjab.[109]

On 6 December 1947, communal violence broke out in Ajmer in India, precipitated by an argument between Sindhi Hindu refugees and local Muslims in the Dargah Bazaar. Violence in Ajmer again broke out in the middle of December with stabbings, looting and arson resulting in mostly Muslim casualties.[110] Many Muslims fled across the Thar Desert to Sindh in Pakistan.[110] This sparked further anti-Hindu riots in Hyderabad, Sindh. On 6 January anti-Hindu riots broke out in Karachi, leading to an estimate of 1100 casualties.[110] 776,000 Sindhi Hindus fled to India.[111] The arrival of Sindhi Hindu refugees in North Gujarat's town of Godhra sparked the March 1948 riots there which led to an emigration of Muslims from Godhra to Pakistan.[110]

Despite the migration, a significant Sindhi Hindu population still resides in Pakistan's Sindh province, where they number at around 2.3 million as per Pakistan's 1998 census; the Sindhi Hindus in India were at 2.6 million as per India's 2001 Census. Some bordering districts in Sindh had a Hindu majority like Tharparkar District, Umerkot, Mirpurkhas, Sanghar and Badin, but their population is decreasing, and they consider themselves a minority in decline. Only Umerkot still has a majority of Hindus in the district.[112] The Sindhi community did not face large scale violence, but felt deprivation of homeland and culture.[110]

Gujarat

During the partition, there was no mass violence in Gujarat as there was in Punjab and Bengal.[113] Only about 2.2% of the migrants to Pakistan were from Gujarat and Bombay city, and of them, about 75% went to Karachi due to business interests.[113]

Delhi


A crowd of Muslims at the Old Fort (Purana Qila) in Delhi, which had been converted into a vast camp for Muslim refugees waiting to be transported to Pakistan. Manchester Guardian, 27 September 1947.

For centuries Delhi had been the capital of the Mughal Empire from Babur to successors of Aurangzeb and previous Turkic Muslim rulers of North India. The series of Islamic rulers keeping Delhi as a stronghold of their empires left a vast array of Islamic architecture in Delhi, and a strong Islamic culture permeated the city. In 1911, when the British Raj shifted their colonial capital from Calcutta to Delhi, the nature of the city began slightly changing. The core of the city was called ‘Lutyens’ Delhi’ named after the British architect Edwin Lutyens, and was designed to service the needs of the small, but growing population of the British elite gentry. Nevertheless, in 1941 the Census listed Delhi's population as being 33.2% Muslim.

As refugees began pouring into Delhi in 1947, the city was ill-equipped to deal with the influx of residents. Refugees “spread themselves out wherever they could. They thronged into camps…colleges, temples, gurudwaras, dharmshalas, military barracks, and gardens”.[114] By 1950, the government began allowing squatters to construct houses in certain portions of the city. As a result, neighborhoods such as Lajpat Nagar and Patel Nagar sprung into existence, which carry a distinct Punjabi characteristic to this day. However, as thousands of Hindu and Sikh refugees from Punjab fled to the city this created an atmosphere of upheavals as communal pogroms rocked the historical stronghold of Indo-Islamic culture and politics. Pakistani diplomat in Delhi, Hussain, alleged that the Indian government was intent on eliminating Delhi's Muslim population or was indifferent to their fate. He reported that Army troops openly gunned down innocent Muslims.[115] Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru estimated 1000 casualties in the city. However, other sources claimed that the casualty rate had been 20 times higher. Gyanendra Pandey's more recent account of the Delhi violence puts the figure of Muslim casualties in Delhi as being between 20,000–25,000.[116]

Tens of thousands of Muslims were driven to refugee camps regardless of their political affiliations, and numerous historical sites in Delhi such as the Purana Qila, Idgah, and Nizamuddin were transformed into refugee camps. In fact, many Hindu and Sikh refugees eventually occupied the abandoned houses of Delhi's Muslim inhabitants.[117] At the culmination of the tensions in Delhi, 330,000 Muslims were forced to flee the city to Pakistan. The 1951 Census registered a drop of the Muslim population in the city from 33.2% in 1941 to 5.3% in 1951.[118]

Princely States

In several cases, rulers of princely states were involved in communal violence or did not do enough to stop in time. Some rulers were away from their states for the summer, such as those of the Sikh states. Some believe that the rulers were whisked away by communal ministers in large part to avoid responsibility for the soon-to-come ethnic cleansing. However, in Bhawalpur and Patiala, upon the return of their ruler to the state, there was a marked decrease in violence, and the rulers consequently stood against the cleansing. The Nawab of Bahawalpur was away in Europe and returned on 1 October, shortening his trip. A bitter Hassan Suhrawardy would write to Mahatma Gandhi:

What is the use now, of the Maharaja of Patiala [Yadavindra Singh], when all the Muslims have been eliminated, standing up as the champion of peace and order?[119]

During the Partition of India numerous pogroms occurred in and around the princely state of Patiala. In several cases, organized bands of Sikhs were responsible for atrocities. The late Harkishan Singh Surjeet, of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), witnessed the events and claimed in an interview: ‘The communal attacks on the minorities were definitely planned. I know more about the persons involved in the eastern wing because I was there. I saw those dreadful acts with my own eyes. In that conspiracy, the Maharaja of Patiala was involved. The idea was that if the Muslims were driven out.'” The attacks on Sikhs and Hindus in March 1947 in Rawalpindi are regarded as one of the major crimes that triggered off others. Nehru believed the Maharaja had sought to ethnically cleanse the territory of Muslims as part of this effort. Maharajas of Patiala and Faridkot, and Yadavindra Singh is quoted as having said "We won't leave a Muslim here" at a party with British officers.[5] The Foreign Minister of Patiala, Sardar Bari Ram Sharma issued a denial stating "I definitely assert that no Patiala soldier has associated himself with or has been involved in any killings in any part of the East Punjab."

-- Yadavindra Singh, by Wikipedia

With the exceptions of Jind and Kapurthala, the violence was well organised in the Sikh states, with logistics provided by the durbar.[120] In Patiala and Faridkot, the Maharajas responded to the call of Master Tara Singh to cleanse India of Muslims. The Maharaja of Patiala was offered the headship of a future united Sikh state that would rise from the "ashes of a Punjab civil war".[121] The Maharaja of Faridkot, Harinder Singh, is reported to have listened to stories of the massacres with great interest going so far as to ask for "juicy details" of the carnage. The ruler of Bharatpur State personally witnessed the cleansing of Muslim Meos at Khumbar and Deeg. When reproached by Muslims for his actions, the Maharaja retorted by saying: "Why come to me? Go to Jinnah."

In Alwar [Tej Singh Prabhakar/N.B. Khare] ...

Sir Tej Singh was a supporter of Hindu nationalism through the Akhil Bharatiya Hindu Mahasabha, and hosted the Akhil Bharatiya Kshatriya Mahasabha of which he served as president in 1947. He opposed Mahatma Gandhi's Non-cooperation movement. There is speculation that he supported and funded the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. He appointed Dr N.B. Khare [Dr. Narayan Bhaskar Khare] as his prime minister who failed to prevent, and some say encouraged pushing, Alwar into sectarian violence that saw Muslims forcefully converted, forced out, and in some cases murdered during the Partition of India. He was accused but found innocent of playing a role in the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi, with a claim (never upheld) that the revolver used in the assassination came from Sir Tej Singh. His association with the implicated Hindu Mahasabha and a prominent suspect at the time, Dr N.B. Khare (his Prime Minister), added to the suspicion. The issue remains controversial to this day.[5][6]

-- Tej Singh Prabhakar, by Wikipedia

Khare was a member of the Viceroy's Executive Council from 7 May 1943 to 3 July 1946 where he was in charge of the Commonwealth Relations Department. He was responsible for placing on the Statute book the Indian Reciprocity Act Amendment Bill and enforcing it against South African Europeans for getting acquitted all the highly placed Indians in Malaya, like Dr. Goho, who were charged with high treason and collaboration with the Japanese, for securing rights of citizenship for Indians domiciled in America, for withdrawing the High Commissioner of India from South Africa, for applying economic sanctions against South Africa and for lodging complaint against South Africa in the United Nations.

Khare later became the Prime Minister of then Alwar State from 19 April 1947 to 7 February 1948. He was elected as a member of the Constituent Assembly of India in July 1947.

Khare was appointed as the Premier or Chief Minister of the first elected government of the Central Provinces and Berar in August 1937. His sacking of Ravi Shankar Shukla, Dwarika Prasad Mishra and D S Mehta led to disciplinary action against him by the Congress President Subhas Chandra Bose. He resigned at the request of the Indian National Congress leadership in July 1938 and was ousted from party. He wrote a pamphlet accusing Mahatma Gandhi and Sardar Patel for his ouster from party titled "To my Countrymen: My Defence".

After the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi, Khare was put under house arrest in Delhi on suspicion of being a part of the conspiracy with Nathuram Godse and Narayan Apte. He was immediately sacked from his Constituent Assembly seat in February 1948 and as Prime minister of Alwar state. The government tried to implicate him in mass killings and communal violence but had to release him in absence of hard evidence. Khare rejoiced, as mentioned in his book: "As a result, today there is not a single Muslim in the whole of the Alwar State… In this way, the Meo problem [ Meo is a Muslim community from North-Western India, particularly in and around Mewat that includes Mewat district of Haryana and parts of adjacent Alwar and Bharatpur districts in Rajasthan. Meos speak Mewati] in the State which was troubling the State for several centuries has been solved at least for the time being." He later he joined Hindu Mahasabha on 15 August 1949 and was its President from 1949 to 1951 and the Vice-President of the All India Hindu Mahasabha in 1954.

-- Narayan Bhaskar Khare, by Wikipedi

and Bahawalpur communal sentiments extended to higher echelons of government, and the prime ministers of these States were said to have been involved in planning and directly overseeing the cleansing. In Bikaner, by contrast, the organisation occurred at much lower levels.[122]

Alwar and Bharatpur

In Alwar and Bharatpur, princely states of Rajputana (modern-day Rajasthan), there were bloody confrontation between the dominant, Hindu land-holding community and the Muslim cultivating community.[123] Well-organised bands of Hindu Jats, Ahirs and Gujars, started attacking Muslim Meos in April 1947. By June, more than fifty Muslim villages had been destroyed. The Muslim League was outraged and demanded that the Viceroy provide Muslim troops. Accusations emerged in June of the involvement of Indian State Forces from Alwar and Bharatpur in the destruction of Muslim villages both inside their states and in British India.[124]

In the wake of unprecedented violent attacks unleashed against them in 1947, 100,000 Muslim Meos from Alwar and Bharatpur were forced to flee their homes, and an estimated 30,000 are said to have been massacred.[125] On 17 November, a column of 80,000 Meo refugees went to Pakistan. However, 10,000 stopped travelling due to the risks.[123]

Jammu and Kashmir

Main article: 1947 Jammu massacres

In September–November 1947 in the Jammu region of the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir, a large number of Muslims were massacred, and others driven away to West Punjab. The impetus for this violence was partly due to the "harrowing stories of Muslim atrocities", brought by Hindu and Sikh refugees arriving to Jammu from West Punjab since March 1947. The killings were carried out by extremist Hindus and Sikhs, aided and abetted by the forces of the Dogra State, headed by the Maharaja of Jammu and Kashmir Hari Singh. Observers state that Hari Singh aimed to alter the demographics of the region by eliminating the Muslim population and ensure a Hindu majority.[126][127]

Hari Singh was born on 23 September 1895 at the palace of Amar Mahal, Jammu, the only surviving son of Raja Amar Singh Jamwal, the brother of Maharaja Pratap Singh, then the Maharaja of Jammu and Kashmir. Since the Maharaja had no issue, Hari Singh was heir to the throne of Jammu and Kashmir.

In 1903, Hari Singh served as a page of honour to Lord Curzon at the grand Delhi Durbar. At the age of thirteen, he was sent to Mayo College in Ajmer. A year later, in 1909, his father died, and the British took a keen interest in his education and appointed Major H. K. Brar as his guardian. After Mayo College, Hari Singh went to the British-run Imperial Cadet Corps at Dehra Dun for military training.

Maharaja Pratap Singh appointed him as the commander-in-chief of the State Forces in 1915.

The "youthful escapades" of Hari Singh included paying £300,000 for blackmail by a prostitute in Paris in 1921. That issue had resulted in a court case in London in 1924 during which the India Office tried to keep his name out of proceedings by arranging for him to be referred to as "Mr A."

Singh was known as a lavish spender of money. The funeral of his uncle and former ruler Pratap Singh is believed to have expended much gold and jewellery in the funeral pyre.

Hari Singh's married life is dark. He married four times as his first three wives failed to give birth to his heirs. Each of them died within a few years of childlessness allowing Hari Singh to immediately take a new bride. His last wife, Tara Devi Sahiba of Kangra, had a son.

Following the death of his uncle Pratap Singh in 1925, Hari Singh ascended the throne of Jammu and Kashmir. He made primary education compulsory in the state, introduced laws prohibiting child marriage, and opened places of worship to the low castes.

The Seal of Maharaja Hari Singh had a Crown at the top. A katar or ceremonial dagger sat below the crown. Two soldiers held flags. An image of the sun was between them, that symbolised his Rajput lineage from Lord Surya, the Hindu Sun God.

Hari Singh was believed to have been hostile towards the Indian National Congress, in part because of the close friendship between Kashmiri political activist and socialist Sheikh Abdullah and the Congress leader Jawaharlal Nehru. He also opposed the Muslim League and its members' communalist outlook, as represented by their two-nation theory.

In 1947, after India gained independence from British rule, Jammu and Kashmir could have joined India, joined Pakistan, or remained independent. Hari Singh originally manoeuvred to maintain his independence by playing off India and Pakistan. There was a widespread belief that rulers of the princely states, in deciding to accede to India or Pakistan, should respect the wishes of the population, but few rulers took any steps to consult on such decisions. Jammu and Kashmir was a Muslim majority state. Pashtun Tribesman from Pakistan then invaded Kashmir and defeated Hari Singh's forces. Hari Singh appealed to India for help. Although the Indian Prime Minister Nehru was ready to send troops, the Governor-General of India, Lord Mountbatten of Burma, advised the Maharaja to accede to India before India could send its troops. Hence, considering the emergency situation, the Maharaja signed the Instrument of Accession on 26 October 1947, joining the whole of his princely state (including Jammu, Kashmir, Northern Areas, Ladakh, Trans-Karakoram Tract and Aksai Chin) to the Dominion of India. These events triggered the first Indo-Pakistan War.

Pressure from Nehru and Sardar Patel eventually compelled Hari Singh to appoint his son and heir, Yuvraj (crown prince) Karan Singh, as Regent of Jammu and Kashmir in 1949, although he remained titular Maharaja of the state until 1952, when the monarchy was abolished. He was also forced to appoint the popular Kashmiri leader Sheikh Abdullah as the prime minister of Kashmir. He had a contentious relationship with both Nehru and Abdullah. Karan Singh was appointed 'Sadr-e-Riyasat' ('Head of State') in 1952 and Governor of the State in 1964. Abdullah would later be dismissed from his position as prime minister of Kashmir and jailed by Karan Singh.

-- Hari Singh, by Wikipedia

Resettlement of refugees in India: 1947–1951

According to the 1951 Census of India, 2% of India's population were refugees (1.3% from West Pakistan and 0.7% from East Pakistan). Delhi received the largest number of refugees for a single city – the population of Delhi grew rapidly in 1947 from under 1 million (917,939) to a little less than 2 million (1,744,072) during the period 1941–1951.[128] The refugees were housed in various historical and military locations such as the Purana Qila, Red Fort, and military barracks in Kingsway Camp (around the present Delhi University). The latter became the site of one of the largest refugee camps in northern India, with more than 35,000 refugees at any given time besides Kurukshetra camp near Panipat. The campsites were later converted into permanent housing through extensive building projects undertaken by the Government of India from 1948 onwards. Many housing colonies in Delhi came up around this period, like Lajpat Nagar, Rajinder Nagar, Nizamuddin East, Punjabi Bagh, Rehgar Pura, Jangpura and Kingsway Camp. Several schemes such as the provision of education, employment opportunities, and easy loans to start businesses were provided for the refugees at the all-India level.[129]

Many Sikhs and Hindu Punjabis came from West Punjab and settled in East Punjab (which then also included Haryana and Himachal Pradesh) and Delhi. Hindus fleeing from East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) settled across Eastern India and Northeastern India, many ending up in neighbouring Indian states such as West Bengal, Assam, and Tripura. Some migrants were sent to the Andaman islands, where Bengalis today form the largest linguistic group.

In 1789, the Bengal Presidency established a naval base and penal colony on Chatham Island in the southeast bay of Great Andaman. The settlement is now known as Port Blair (after the Bombay Marine lieutenant Archibald Blair who founded it). After two years, the colony was moved to the northeast part of Great Andaman and was named Port Cornwallis after Admiral William Cornwallis. However, there was much disease and death in the penal colony and the government ceased operating it in May 1796.

In 1824, Port Cornwallis was the rendezvous of the fleet carrying the army to the First Burmese War. In the 1830s and 1840s, shipwrecked crews who landed on the Andamans were often attacked and killed by the natives and the islands had a reputation for cannibalism. The loss of the Runnymede and the Briton in 1844 during the same storm, while transporting goods and passengers between India and Australia, and the continuous attacks launched by the natives, which the survivors fought off, alarmed the British government. In 1855, the government proposed another settlement on the islands, including a convict establishment, but the Indian Rebellion of 1857 forced a delay in its construction. However, because the rebellion gave the British so many prisoners, it made the new Andaman settlement and prison urgently necessary. Construction began in November 1857 at Port Blair using inmates' labour, avoiding the vicinity of a salt swamp that seemed to have been the source of many of the earlier problems at Port Cornwallis.

17 May 1859 was another major day for Andaman. The Battle of Aberdeen was fought between the Great Andamanese tribe and the British.

The Great Andamanese are classified by anthropologists as one of the Negrito peoples, which also include the other four aboriginal groups of the Andaman islands (Onge, Jarawa, Jangil and Sentinelese) and five other isolated populations of Southeast Asia. The Andaman Negritos are thought to be the first inhabitants of the islands, having emigrated from the mainland tens of thousands of years ago.

Until the late 18th century, the Andamanese peoples were preserved from outside influences by their fierce rejection of contacts (which included killing any shipwrecked foreigners) and by the remoteness of the islands. Thus the ten Great Andamanese tribes and the other four indigenous groups are thought to have diverged on their own over the course of millennia....

Estimates of the Great Andamanese population by the time of the first British settlement (1789–1796) vary between 2000 and 6600 individuals. When the British established a permanent settlement and penal colony on Great Andaman in the 1860s, the population was estimated at 3500. At that time their isolated stone-age culture was suddenly confronted with the industrial and colonial culture of 19th century Europe. The colonial administrators proactively tried to pacify and co-opt the tribes, recruiting them to capture escaped convicts. Populations went into sharp decline as contact intensified. Imported diseases, to which the islanders had no immunity, decimated the tribes at the end of the 19th century; In some cases, people who became sick were killed by other tribe members in an attempt to stop contagion. The migration of mainland settlers to the islands accelerated this decline.

By 1901, only 625 Great Andamanese were left, and following censuses reported steadily declining numbers: 455 in 1911, 207 in 1921, 90 in 1931. Von Eickstedt counted "around one hundred" in 1927.

In 1949, the surviving Great Andamanese were relocated to a reservation on Bluff Island (1.14 km2) in an attempt to protect them from diseases and other threats. In 1951, after Indian independence, their numbers had shrunk to about 25, mostly from the northern tribes. They became extinct in the mid 20th century, but had a few admixed individuals which went to an all-time low of only 19 in 1961.

-- Great Andamanese, by Wikipedia

Today, a memorial stands in Andaman water sports complex as a tribute to the people who lost their lives. Fearing foreign invasion and with help from an escaped convict from Cellular Jail, the Great Andamanese stormed the British post, but they were outnumbered and soon suffered heavy loss of life. Later, it was identified that an escaped convict named Doodnath had changed sides and informed the British about the tribe's plans. Today, the tribe has been reduced to some 50 people, with less than 50% of them adults. The government of the Andaman Islands is making efforts to increase the headcount of this tribe.

In 1867, the ship Nineveh wrecked on the reef of North Sentinel Island. The 86 survivors reached the beach in the ship's boats. On the third day, they were attacked with iron-tipped spears by naked islanders. One person from the ship escaped in a boat and the others were later rescued by a British Royal Navy ship.

For some time, sickness and mortality were high, but swamp reclamation and extensive forest clearance continued. The Andaman colony became notorious with the murder of the Viceroy Richard Southwell Bourke, 6th Earl of Mayo, on a visit to the settlement (8 February 1872), by a Muslim convict, a Pathan from Afghanistan, Sher Ali Afridi. In the same year, the two island groups Andaman and Nicobar, were united under a chief commissioner residing at Port Blair.

From the time of its development in 1858 under the direction of James Pattison Walker, and in response to the mutiny and rebellion of the previous year, the settlement was first and foremost a repository for political prisoners. The Cellular Jail at Port Blair, when completed in 1910, included 698 cells designed for solitary confinement; each cell measured 4.5 by 2.7 m (15 by 9 ft) with a single ventilation window 3 metres (10 ft) above the floor.

The Indians imprisoned here referred to the island and its prison as Kala Pani ("black water"); a 1996 film set on the island took that term as its title, Kaalapani. The number of prisoners who died in this camp is estimated to be in the thousands. Many more died of harsh treatment and the harsh living and working conditions in this camp.

The Viper Chain Gang Jail on Viper Island was reserved for troublemakers, and was also the site of hangings. In the 20th century, it became a convenient place to house prominent members of India's independence movement.

The Andaman and Nicobar islands were occupied by Japan during World War II. The islands were nominally put under the authority of the Arzi Hukumat-e-Azad Hind (Provisional Government of Free India) headed by Subhas Chandra Bose, who visited the islands during the war, and renamed them as Shaheed (Martyr) & Swaraj (Self-rule). On 30 December 1943, during the Japanese occupation, Bose, who was allied with the Japanese, first raised the flag of Indian independence. General Loganathan, of the Indian National Army, was Governor of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, which had been annexed to the Provisional Government. According to Werner Gruhl: "Before leaving the islands, the Japanese rounded up and executed 750 innocents."

At the close of World War II, the British government announced its intention to abolish the penal settlement. The government proposed to employ former inmates in an initiative to develop the island's fisheries, timber, and agricultural resources. In exchange, inmates would be granted return passage to the Indian mainland, or the right to settle on the islands. J H Williams, one of the Bombay Burma Company's senior officials, was dispatched to perform a timber survey of the islands using convict labor. He recorded his findings in 'The Spotted Dear' (1957).

The penal colony was eventually closed on 15 August 1947 when India gained independence. It has since served as a museum to the independence movement.

-- Andaman Islands, by Wikipedia

Sindhi Hindus settled predominantly in Gujarat, Maharashtra, and Rajasthan. Some, however, settled further afield in Madhya Pradesh. A new township was established for Sindhi Hindu refugees in Maharashtra. The Governor-General of India, Sir Rajagopalachari, laid the foundation for this township and named it Ulhasnagar (namely 'city of joy').

A settlement consisting largely of Sikhs and Punjabi Hindus was also founded in Central Mumbai's Sion Koliwada region, and named Guru Tegh Bahadur Nagar.[130]

Resettlement of refugees in Pakistan: 1947–1951

The 1951 Census of Pakistan recorded that the most significant number of Muslim refugees came from the East Punjab and nearby Rajputana states (Alwar and Bharatpur). They were several 5,783,100 and constituted 80.1% of Pakistan's total refugee population.[131] This was the effect of the retributive ethnic cleansing on both sides of the Punjab where the Muslim population of East Punjab was forcibly expelled like the Hindu/Sikh population in West Punjab.

Migration from other regions of India were as follows: Bihar, West Bengal and Orissa, 700,300 or 9.8%; UP and Delhi 464,200 or 6.4%; Gujarat and Bombay, 160,400 or 2.2%; Bhopal and Hyderabad 95,200 or 1.2%; and Madras and Mysore 18,000 or 0.2%.[131]

So far as their settlement in Pakistan is concerned, 97.4% of the refugees from East Punjab and its contiguous areas went to West Punjab; 95.9% from Bihar, West Bengal and Orissa to the erstwhile East Pakistan; 95.5% from UP and Delhi to West Pakistan, mainly in Karachi division of Sindh; 97.2% from Bhopal and Hyderabad to West Pakistan, mainly Karachi; and 98.9% from Bombay and Gujarat to West Pakistan, largely to Karachi; and 98.9% from Madras and Mysore went to West Pakistan, mainly Karachi.[131]

West Punjab received the largest number of refugees (73.1%), mainly from East Punjab and its contiguous areas. Sindh received the second largest number of refugees, 16.1% of the total migrants, while the Karachi division of Sindh received 8.5% of the total migrant population. East Bengal received the third-largest number of refugees, 699,100, who constituted 9.7% of the total Muslim refugee population in Pakistan. 66.7% of the refugees in East Bengal originated from West Bengal, 14.5% from Bihar and 11.8% from Assam.[132]

NWFP and Baluchistan received the lowest number of migrants. NWFP received 51,100 migrants (0.7% of the migrant population) while Baluchistan received 28,000 (0.4% of the migrant population).

The Government undertook a census of refugees in West Punjab in 1948, which displayed their place of origin in India.

Data on the Number of Muslim refugees in West Punjab from the Districts of East Punjab and Neighbouring Regions[133]

Places / Number
Amritsar (East Punjab) / 741,444
Jalandhar (East Punjab) / 520,189
Gurdaspur (East Punjab) / 499,793
Hoshiarpur (East Punjab) / 384,448
Karnal (East Punjab) / 306,509
Hissar (East Punjab) / 287,479
Ludhiana (East Punjab) / 255,864
Ambala (East Punjab) / 222,939
Gurgaon (East Punjab) / 80,537
Rohtak (East Punjab) / 172,640
Delhi / 91,185
Kangra (East Punjab) / 33,826
United Provinces / 28,363
Shimla (East Punjab) / 11,300

Data on the Number of Muslim refugees in West Punjab from the Princely states in East Punjab and Rajputana[133]

Name / Number

Patiala (East Punjab) / 308,948
Alwar (Rajputana) / 191,567
Kapurthala (East Punjab) / 172,079
Faridkot (East Punjab) / 66,596
Bharatpur (Rajputana) / 43,614
Nabha (East Punjab) / 43,538
Jind (East Punjab) / 41,696
Together other small states / 39,322

Missing People

A study of the total population inflows and outflows in the districts of Punjab, using the data provided by the 1931 and 1951 Census has led to an estimate of 1.3 million missing Muslims who left western India but did not reach Pakistan.[101] The corresponding number of missing Hindus/Sikhs along the western border is estimated to be approximately 0.8 million.[134] This puts the total of missing people, due to Partition-related migration along the Punjab border, to around 2.2 million.[134] Another study of the demographic consequences of partition in the Punjab region using the 1931, 1941 and 1951 censuses concluded that between 2.3 and 3.2 million people went missing in the Punjab.[135]

Rehabilitation of women

See also: Violence against women during the partition of India

Both sides promised each other that they would try to restore women abducted and raped during the riots. The Indian government claimed that 33,000 Hindu and Sikh women were abducted, and the Pakistani government claimed that 50,000 Muslim women were abducted during riots. By 1949, there were legal claims that 12,000 women had been recovered in India and 6,000 in Pakistan.[136] By 1954, there were 20,728 Muslim women recovered from India, and 9,032 Hindu and Sikh women recovered from Pakistan.[137] Most of the Hindu and Sikh women refused to go back to India, fearing that their family would never accept them, a fear mirrored by Muslim women.[138]

Post-Partition migration

Pakistan

Even after the 1951 Census, many Muslim families from India continued migrating to Pakistan throughout the 1950s and the early 1960s. According to historian Omar Khalidi, the Indian Muslim migration to West Pakistan between December 1947 and December 1971 was from U.P., Delhi, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, and Kerala. The next stage of migration was between 1973 and the 1990s, and the primary destination for these migrants was Karachi and other urban centres in Sindh.[139]

In 1959, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) published a report stating that from 1951 to 1956, a total of 650,000 Muslims from India relocated to West Pakistan.[139] However, Visaria (1969) raised doubts about the authenticity of the claims about Indian Muslim migration to Pakistan, since the 1961 Census of Pakistan did not corroborate these figures. However, the 1961 Census of Pakistan did incorporate a statement suggesting that there had been a migration of 800,000 people from India to Pakistan throughout the previous decade.[140] Of those who left for Pakistan, most never came back.

Indian Muslim migration to Pakistan declined drastically in the 1970s, a trend noticed by the Pakistani authorities. In June 1995, Pakistan's interior minister, Naseerullah Babar, informed the National Assembly that between the period of 1973–1994, as many as 800,000 visitors came from India on valid travel documents. Of these only 3,393 stayed.[139] In a related trend, intermarriages between Indian and Pakistani Muslims have declined sharply. According to a November 1995 statement of Riaz Khokhar, the Pakistani High Commissioner in New Delhi, the number of cross-border marriages has dropped from 40,000 a year in the 1950s and 1960s to barely 300 annually.[139]

In the aftermath of the Indo-Pakistani War of 1965, 3,500 Muslim families migrated from the Indian part of the Thar Desert to the Pakistani section of the Thar Desert.[141] 400 families were settled in Nagar after the 1965 war and an additional 3000 settled in the Chachro taluka in Sind province of West Pakistan.[142] The government of Pakistan provided each family with 12 acres of land. According to government records, this land totalled 42,000 acres.[142]

The 1951 census in Pakistan recorded 671,000 refugees in East Pakistan, the majority of which came from West Bengal. The rest were from Bihar.[143] According to the ILO in the period 1951–1956, half a million Indian Muslims migrated to East Pakistan.[139] By 1961 the numbers reached 850,000. In the aftermath of the riots in Ranchi and Jamshedpur, Biharis continued to migrate to East Pakistan well into the late sixties and added up to around a million.[144] Crude estimates suggest that about 1.5 million Muslims migrated from West Bengal and Bihar to East Bengal in the two decades after partition.[145]

India

Due to religious persecution in Pakistan, Hindus continue to flee to India. Most of them tend to settle in the state of Rajasthan in India.[146] According to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan data, just around 1,000 Hindu families fled to India in 2013.[146] In May 2014, a member of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), Dr Ramesh Kumar Vankwani, revealed in the National Assembly of Pakistan that around 5,000 Hindus are migrating from Pakistan to India every year.[147] Since India is not a signatory to the 1951 United Nations Refugee Convention it refuses to recognise Pakistani Hindu migrants as refugees.[146]

The population in the Tharparkar district in the Sind province of West Pakistan was 80% Hindu and 20% Muslim at the time of independence in 1947. During the Indo-Pakistani wars of 1965 and 1971, the Hindu upper castes and their retainers fled to India, this led to a massive demographic shift in the district.[141] In 1978 India gave citizenship to 55,000 Pakistanis.[146] By the time of the 1998 census of Pakistan, Muslims made up 64.4% of the population and Hindus 35.6% of the population in Tharparkar.

The migration of Hindus from East Pakistan to India continued unabated after partition. The 1951 census in India recorded that 2.5 million refugees arrived from East Pakistan, of which 2.1 million migrated to West Bengal while the rest migrated to Assam, Tripura and other states.[143] These refugees arrived in waves and did not come solely at partition. By 1973 their number reached over 6 million. The following data displays the major waves of refugees from East Pakistan and the incidents which precipitated the migrations:[148][149]

Year / Reason / Number

1965 / Indo-Pakistani War of 1965 / 107,000
1956 / Pakistan becomes Islamic Republic / 320,000
1947 / Partition / 344,000
1964 / Riots over Hazratbal incident / 693,000
1948/ Fear due to the annexation of Hyderabad / 786,000
1971 / Bangladesh liberation war / 1,500,000
1950 1950 / Barisal Riots / 1,575,000
1947–1973 / Total / 6,000,000[150]

Perspectives

The Partition was a highly controversial arrangement, and remains a cause of much tension on the Indian subcontinent today. According to American scholar[151] Allen McGrath, many British leaders including the British Viceroy, Mountbatten, were unhappy over the partition of India.[152] Lord Mountbatten of Burma had not only been accused of rushing the process through but also is alleged to have influenced the Radcliffe Line in India's favor.[153][154][155] The commission took longer to decide on a final boundary than on the partition itself. Thus the two nations were granted their independence even before there was a defined boundary between them.

Some critics allege that British haste led to increased cruelties during the Partition.[156] Because independence was declared prior to the actual Partition, it was up to the new governments of India and Pakistan to keep public order. No large population movements were contemplated; the plan called for safeguards for minorities on both sides of the new border. It was a task at which both states failed. There was a complete breakdown of law and order; many died in riots, massacre, or just from the hardships of their flight to safety. What ensued was one of the largest population movements in recorded history. According to Richard Symonds, at the lowest estimate, half a million people perished and twelve million became homeless.[157]

However, many argue that the British were forced to expedite the Partition by events on the ground.[158] Once in office, Mountbatten quickly became aware that if Britain were to avoid involvement in a civil war, which seemed increasingly likely, there was no alternative to partition and a hasty exit from India.[158] Law and order had broken down many times before Partition, with much bloodshed on both sides. A massive civil war was looming by the time Mountbatten became Viceroy. After the Second World War, Britain had limited resources,[159] perhaps insufficient to the task of keeping order. Another viewpoint is that while Mountbatten may have been too hasty, he had no real options left and achieved the best he could under difficult circumstances.[160] The historian Lawrence James concurs that in 1947 Mountbatten was left with no option but to cut and run. The alternative seemed to be involved in a potentially bloody civil war from which it would be difficult to get out.[161]

Conservative elements in England consider the partition of India to be the moment that the British Empire ceased to be a world power, following Curzon's dictum: "the loss of India would mean that Britain drop straight away to a third rate power."[162]


Four nations (India, Pakistan, Dominion of Ceylon, and Union of Burma) that gained independence in 1947 and 1948

Venkat Dhulipala rejects the idea that the British divide and rule policy was responsible for partition and elaborates on the perspective that Pakistan was popularly imagined as a sovereign Islamic state or a 'New Medina', as a potential successor to the defunct Turkish caliphate[163][164] and as a leader and protector of the entire Islamic world. Islamic scholars debated over creating Pakistan and its potential to become a true Islamic state.[163][164] The majority of Barelvis supported the creation of Pakistan[165][166] and believed that any co-operation with Hindus would be counter productive.[167] Most Deobandis, who were led by Maulana Husain Ahmad Madani, were opposed to the creation of Pakistan and the two-nation theory. According to them Muslims and Hindus could be a part of a single nation.[168][169][170]

In their authoritative study of the partition, Ian Talbot and Gurharpal Singh have shown that the partition was not the inevitable end of the so-called British 'divide and rule policy' nor was it the inevitable end of Hindu-Muslim differences.[171]

A cross-border student initiative, The History Project, was launched in 2014 to explore the differences in perception of the events during the British era, which led to the partition. The project resulted in a book that explains both interpretations of the shared a history in Pakistan and India.[172][173]

A Berkeley California-based non-profit organization, The 1947 Partition Archive, collects oral histories from people who lived through the Partition and consolidated the interviews into an archive.[174] A 2019 book by Kavita Puri, Partition Voices: Untold British Stories, based on the BBC Radio 4 documentary series of the same name, includes interviews with about two dozen people who witnessed partition and subsequently migrated to Britain.[175][176]

In October 2016, The Arts and Cultural Heritage Trust (TAACHT) of India set up what they describe as "the world’s first Partition Museum" at Town Hall in Amritsar (in Punjab state). The Museum, which is open from Tuesday to Sunday, offers multi-media exhibits and documents that describe both the political process that led to partition and carried it forward, and video and written narratives offered by survivors of the events.[177]

Part 3 of 3

Artistic depictions of the Partition

Main article: Artistic depictions of the partition of India

The partition of India and the associated bloody riots inspired many in India and Pakistan to create literary/cinematic depictions of this event.[178] While some creations depicted the massacres during the refugee migration, others concentrated on the aftermath of the partition in terms of difficulties faced by the refugees in both side of the border. Even now, more than 70 years after the partition, works of fiction and films are made that relate to the events of partition. The early members of the Progressive Artist's Group of Bombay cite "The Partition" of India and Pakistan as a key reason for its founding in December 1947. They included FN Souza, MF Husain, SH Raza, SK Bakre, HA Gade and KH Ara, who went on to become some of the most important and influential Indian artists of the 20th Century.[179]

Literature describing the human cost of independence and partition comprises Bal K. Gupta's memoirs Forgotten Atrocities (2012), Khushwant Singh's Train to Pakistan (1956), several short stories such as Toba Tek Singh (1955) by Saadat Hassan Manto, Urdu poems such as Subh-e-Azadi (Freedom's Dawn, 1947) by Faiz Ahmad Faiz, Bhisham Sahni's Tamas (1974), Manohar Malgonkar's A Bend in the Ganges (1965), Chaman Nahal's AZADI (1975) originally written in English and winner of the Sahitya Akedemi Award in India (1977), and Bapsi Sidhwa's Ice-Candy Man (1988), among others.[180][181] Salman Rushdie's novel Midnight's Children (1980), which won the Booker Prize and The Best of the Booker, wove its narrative based on the children born with magical abilities on midnight of 14 August 1947.[181] Freedom at Midnight (1975) is a non-fiction work by Larry Collins and Dominique Lapierre that chronicled the events surrounding the first Independence Day celebrations in 1947.

There is a paucity of films related to the independence and partition.[182][183][184] Early films relating to the circumstances of the independence, partition and the aftermath include Nemai Ghosh's Chinnamul (Bengali) (1950),[182] Dharmputra (1961)[185] Lahore (1948), Chhalia (1960), Nastik (1953). George Cukor's Bhowani Junction (1956), Ritwik Ghatak's trilogy of Meghe Dhaka Tara (Bengali) (1960) / Komal Gandhar (Bengali) (1961) / Subarnarekha (Bengali) (1962);[182][186] later films include Garm Hava (1973) and Tamas (1987).[185] From the late 1990s onwards, more films on this theme were made, including several mainstream ones, such as Earth (1998), Train to Pakistan (1998) (based on the aforementioned book), Hey Ram (2000), Gadar: Ek Prem Katha (2001), Khamosh Pani (2003), Pinjar (2003), Partition (2007), Madrasapattinam (2010)[185] and Viceroy's House (2017). The biographical films Gandhi (1982), Jinnah (1998) and Sardar (1993) also feature independence and partition as significant events in their screenplay. A Pakistani drama Daastan, based on the novel Bano, highlights the plight of Muslim girls who were abducted and raped during partition.

The novel Lost Generations (2013) by Manjit Sachdeva describes the March 1947 massacre in rural areas of Rawalpindi by the Muslim League, followed by massacres on both sides of the new border in August 1947 seen through the eyes of an escaping Sikh family, their settlement and partial rehabilitation in Delhi, and ending in ruin (including death), for the second time in 1984, at the hands of mobs after a Sikh assassinated the prime minister.

The 2013 Google India advertisement Reunion (about the Partition of India) has had a strong impact in India and Pakistan, leading to hope for the easing of travel restrictions between the two countries.[187][188][189] It went viral[190][191] and was viewed more than 1.6 million times before officially debuting on television on 15 November 2013.[192]

See also

• List of princely states of India
• Princely states of Pakistan
• Indian independence movement
• Pakistan Movement
• History of Bangladesh
• History of India
• History of Pakistan
• History of the Republic of India
• Indian annexation of Goa
• The 1947 Partition Archive

Notes

1. "The death toll remains disputed with figures ranging from 200,000 to 2 million."[1]
2. British India consisted of those regions of the British Raj, or the British Indian Empire, which were directly administered by Britain; other regions, of nominal sovereignty, was which were indirectly ruled by Britain, were called princely states.
3. "The death toll remains disputed to this day with figures ranging from 200,000 to 2 million."[1]
4. Coastal Ceylon, part of the Madras Presidency of British India from 1796, became the separate crown colony of British Ceylon in 1802. Burma, gradually annexed by the British during 1826–86 and governed as a part of the British Indian administration until 1937, was directly administered after that.[4] Burma was granted independence on 4 January 1948 and Ceylon on 4 February 1948. (See History of Sri Lanka and History of Burma.)
5. The Himalayan kingdom of Sikkim was established as a princely state after the Anglo-Sikkimese Treaty of 1861. However, the issue of sovereignty was left undefined.[5] In 1947, Sikkim became an independent kingdom under the suzerainty of India and remained so until 1975 when it was absorbed into India as the 22nd state. Other Himalayan kingdoms, Nepal and Bhutan, having signed treaties with the British designating them as independent states, were not a part of British India.[6] The Indian Ocean island of The Maldives, became a protectorate of the British crown in 1887 and gained its independence in 1965.

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46. Yasmin Khan (2017). The Great Partition: The Making of India and Pakistan, New Edition. Yale University Press. pp. 18–. ISBN 978-0-300-23364-3. Although it was founded in 1909 the League had only caught on among South Asian Muslims during the Second World War. The party had expanded astonishingly rapidly and was claiming over two million members by the early 1940s, an unimaginable result for what had been previously thought of as just one of the numerous pressure groups and small but insignificant parties.
47. William Roger Louis; Wm. Roger Louis (2006). Ends of British Imperialism: The Scramble for Empire, Suez, and Decolonization. I.B. Tauris. pp. 397–. ISBN 978-1-84511-347-6. He made a serious misjudgment in underestimating Muslim sentiment before the outbreak of the war. He did not take the idea of 'Pakistan' seriously. After the adoption of the March 1940 Lahore resolution, calling for the creation of a separate state or states of Pakistan, he wrote: 'My first reaction is, I confess, that silly as the Muslim scheme for partition is, it would be a pity to throw too much cold water on it at the moment.' Linlithgow surmised that what Jinnah feared was a federal India dominated by Hindus. Part of the purpose of the famous British 'August offer' of 1940 was to assure the Muslims that they would be protected against a 'Hindu Raj' as well as to hold over the discussion of the 1935 Act and a 'new constitution' until after the war.
48. L. J. Butler (2002). Britain and Empire: Adjusting to a Post-Imperial World. I.B. Tauris. pp. 41–. ISBN 978-1-86064-448-1. Viceroy Linlithgow's 'August Offer,' made in 1940, proposed Dominion status for India after the war, and the inclusion of Indians in a larger Executive Council and a new War Advisory Council, and promised that minority views would be taken into account in future constitutional revision. This was not enough to satisfy either the Congress or the Muslim League, who both rejected the offer in September, and shortly afterward Congress launched a fresh campaign of civil disobedience.
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55. Khan 2007, p. 43.
56. Robb 2002, p. 190
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62. Brown, Judith Margaret (1994). Modern India: the origins of an Asian democracy. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-873112-2. Yet these final years of the raj showed conclusively that British rule had lost legitimacy and that among the vast majority of Hindus Congress had become the raj's legitimate successor. Tangible proof came in the 1945–6 elections to the central and provincial legislatures. In the former, Congress won 91 percent of the votes cast in non-Muslim constituencies, and in the latter, gained an absolute majority and became the provincial raj in eight provinces. The acquiescence of the politically aware (though possibly not of many villagers even at this point) would have been seriously in doubt if the British had displayed any intention of staying in India. (pp. 328–329)
63. Barbara D. Metcalf; Thomas R. Metcalf (2012). A Concise History of Modern India. Cambridge University Press. pp. 212–. ISBN 978-1-139-53705-6.
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65. Sugata Bose; Ayesha Jalal (2004). Modern South Asia: History, Culture, Political Economy (2nd ed.). Psychology Press. pp. 148–149. ISBN 978-0-415-30787-1.
66. Burton Stein (2010). A History of India. John Wiley & Sons. p. 347. ISBN 978-1-4443-2351-1. His standing with the British remained high, however, for even though they no more agreed with the idea of a separate Muslim state than the Congress did, government officials appreciated the simplicity of a single negotiating voice for all of India's Muslims.
67. Jeffery J. Roberts (2003). The Origins of Conflict in Afghanistan. Greenwood Publishing Group. pp. 85–. ISBN 978-0-275-97878-5. Virtually every Briton wanted to keep India united. Many expressed moral or sentimental obligations to leave India intact, either for the inhabitants' sake or simply as a lasting testament to the Empire. The Cabinet Defense Committee and the Chiefs of Staff, however, stressed the maintenance of a united India as vital to the defense (and economy) of the region. A unified India, an orderly transfer of power, and a bilateral alliance would, they argued, leave Britain's strategic position undamaged. India's military assets, including its seemingly limitless manpower, naval and air bases, and expanding production capabilities, would remain accessible to London. India would thus remain of crucial importance as a base, training ground, and staging area for operations from Egypt to the Far East.
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70. Barbara D. Metcalf; Thomas R. Metcalf (2002). A Concise History of India. Cambridge University Press. pp. 211–213. ISBN 978-0-521-63974-3. Its proposal for an independent India involved a complex, three-tiered federation, whose central feature was the creation of groups of provinces. Two of these groups would comprise the Muslim majority provinces of east and west; a third would include the Hindu majority regions of the center and south. These groups, given responsibility for most of the functions of government, would be subordinated to a Union government, would be subordinated to a Union government controlling defense, foreign affairs, and communications. Nevertheless, the Muslim League accepted the Cabinet mission's proposals. The ball was now in Congress's court. Although the grouping scheme preserved a united India, the Congress leadership, above all Jawaharlal Nehru, now slated to be Gandhi's successor, increasingly concluded that under the Cabinet mission proposals the Center would be too weak to achieve the goals of the Congress, which envisioned itself as the successor to the Raj. Looking ahead to the future, the Congress, especially its socialist wing headed by Nehru, wanted a central government that could direct and plan for an India, free of colonialism, that might eradicate its people's poverty and grow into an industrial power. India's business community also supported the idea of a strong central government In a provocative speech on 10 July 1946, Nehru repudiated the notion of compulsory grouping or provinces, the key to Jinnah's Pakistan. Provinces, he said, must be free to join any group. With this speech, Nehru effectively torpedoed the Cabinet mission scheme, and with it, any hope for a united India.
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76. Ziegler, Philip (1985). Mountbatten: The Official Biography. London: HarperCollins. p. 359. ISBN 978-0002165433..
77. Ayesha Jalal (1994). The Sole Spokesman: Jinnah, the Muslim League and the Demand for Pakistan. Cambridge University Press. p. 250. ISBN 978-0-521-45850-4. These instructions were to avoid partition and obtain a unitary government for British India and the Indian States and at the same time observe the pledges to the princes and the Muslims; to secure agreement to the Cabinet Mission plan without coercing any of the parties; somehow to keep the Indian army undivided, and to retain India within the Commonwealth. (Attlee to Mountbatten, 18 March 1947, ibid, 972–974)
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141. Hasan, Arif; Mansoor, Raza (2009). Migration and Small Towns in Pakistan; Volume 15 of Rural-urban interactions and livelihood strategies are working paper. IIED. p. 16. ISBN 978-1-84369-734-3.
142. Hasan, Arif (30 December 1987). "Comprehensive assessment of drought and famine in Sind arid ones leading to a realistic short and long-term emergency intervention plan" (PDF). p. 25. Retrieved 12 January 2016.
143. "Wayback Machine". 1 September 2006. Archived from the original on 1 September 2006. Retrieved 22 May 2020.
144. Ben Whitaker, The Biharis in Bangladesh, Minority Rights Group, London, 1971, p. 7.
145. Chatterji – Spoils of partition. p. 166
146. Rizvi, Uzair Hasan (10 September 2015). "Hindu refugees from Pakistan encounter suspicion and indifference in India". Dawn.
147. Haider, Irfan (13 May 2014). "5,000 Hindus migrating to India every year, NA told". Dawn. Retrieved 15 January 2016.
148. P. N. Luthra – Rehabilitation, pp. 18–19
149. Aditi Kapoor, A home ... far from home?, The Hindu, 30 July 2000. During the Bangladesh liberation war, 11 million people from both communities took shelter in India. After the war, 1.5 million decided to stay.
150. Chatterji, Joya (September 2007), "'Dispersal' and the Failure of Rehabilitation: Refugee Camp-dwellers and Squatters in WestBengal", Modern Asian Studies, 41 (5): 998, doi:10.1017/S0026749X07002831, JSTOR 4499809
151. Stephen P. Cohen (2004). The Idea of Pakistan. Brookings Institution Press. p. 59. ISBN 978-0-8157-9761-6. American scholar Allen Mcgrath
152. Allen McGrath (1996). The Destruction of Pakistan's Democracy. Oxford University Press. p. 38. ISBN 978-0-19-577583-9. Undivided India, their magnificent imperial trophy, was besmirched by the creation of Pakistan, and the division of India was never emotionally accepted by many British leaders, Mountbatten among them.
153. Niall Ferguson (2003). Empire: how Britain made the modern world. Allen Lane. p. 349. ISBN 9780713996159. In particular, Mountbatten put pressure on the supposedly neutral Boundary Commissioner, Sir Cyril Radcliffe—cruelly mocked at the time by W.H.Auden—to make critical adjustments in India's favor when drawing the frontier through the Punjab.
154. "K. Z. Islam, 2002, The Punjab Boundary Award, In retrospect". Archived from the original on 17 January 2006. Retrieved 22 May 2020.
155. Partitioning India over lunch, Memoirs of a British civil servant Christopher Beaumont. BBC News (10 August 2007).
156. Stanley Wolpert, 2006, Shameful Flight: The Last Years of the British Empire in India, Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-515198-4
157. Symonds, Richard (1950). The Making of Pakistan. London: Faber and Faber. p. 74. OCLC 1462689. At the lowest estimate, half a million people perished and twelve millions became homeless.
158. Lawrence J. Butler, 2002, Britain and Empire: Adjusting to a Post-Imperial World, p. 72
159. Lawrence J. Butler, 2002, Britain and Empire: Adjusting to a Post-Imperial World, p 72
160. Ronald Hyam, Britain's Declining Empire: The Road to Decolonisation, 1918–1968, p. 113; Cambridge University Press, ISBN 0-521-86649-9, 2007
161. Lawrence James, Rise and Fall of the British Empire
162. Judd, Dennis, The Lion and the Tiger: The Rise and Fall of the British Raj, 1600–1947. Oxford University Press: New York. (2010) p. 138.
163. "Was Pakistan sufficiently imagined before independence?". The Express Tribune. 23 August 2015. Retrieved 8 March2017.
164. Ashraf, Ajaz. "The Venkat Dhulipala interview: 'On the Partition issue, Jinnah and Ambedkar were on the same page'". Scroll.in. Retrieved 8 March 2017.
165. Long, Roger D.; Singh, Gurharpal; Samad, Yunas; Talbot, Ian (2015). State and Nation-Building in Pakistan: Beyond Islam and Security. Routledge. p. 167. ISBN 978-1317448204. In the 1940s a solid majority of the Barelvis were supporters of the Pakistan Movement and played a supporting role in its final phase (1940–7), mostly under the banner of the All-India Sunni Conference which had been founded in 1925.
166. John, Wilson (2009). Pakistan: The Struggle Within. Pearson Education India. p. 87. ISBN 978-8131725047. During the 1946 election, Barelvi Ulama issued fatwas in favour of the Muslim League.
167. Cesari, Jocelyne (2014). The Awakening of Muslim Democracy: Religion, Modernity, and the State. Cambridge University Press. p. 135. ISBN 978-1107513297. For example, the Barelvi ulama supported the formation of the state of Pakistan and thought that any alliance with Hindus (such as that between the Indian National Congress and the Jamiat ulama-I-Hind [JUH]) was counterproductive.
168. Jaffrelot, Christophe (2004). A History of Pakistan and Its Origins. Anthem Press. p. 224. ISBN 978-1843311492. Believing that Islam was a universal religion, the Deobandi advocated a notion of a composite nationalism according to which Hindus and Muslims constituted one nation.
169. Abdelhalim, Julten (2015). Indian Muslims and Citizenship: Spaces for Jihād in Everyday Life. Routledge. p. 26. ISBN 978-1317508755. Madani...stressed the difference between qaum, meaning a nation, hence a territorial concept, and millat, meaning an Ummah and thus a religious concept.
170. Sikka, Sonia (2015). Living with Religious Diversity. Routledge. p. 52. ISBN 978-1317370994. Madani makes a crucial distinction between qaum and millat. According to him, qaum connotes a territorial multi-religious entity, while millat refers to the cultural, social and religious unity of Muslims exclusively.
171. Jayeeta Sharma (2010) A Review of “The Partition of India,” History: Reviews of New Books, 39:1, 26–27, doi:10.1080/03612759.2011.520189
172. "The News International: Latest News Breaking, Pakistan News". http://www.thenews.com.pk. Retrieved 22 May 2020.
173. "The History Project". The History Project. Retrieved 18 November 2017.
174. Sengupta, Somini (13 August 2013). "Potent Memories From a Divided India". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 22 February 2020.
175. Ghosh, Bishwanath (24 August 2019). "'Partition Voices – Untold British Stories' review: The long shadow of Partition". The Hindu. ISSN 0971-751X. Retrieved 22 February 2020.
176. Mishra, Anodya (15 September 2019). "This collection of Partition interviews gives us new ways to look at migration and refugees". Scroll.in. Retrieved 22 February 2020.
177. "About the Partition Museum". Retrieved 17 March 2018.
178. Cleary, Joseph N. (2002). Literature, Partition and the Nation-State: Culture and Conflict in Ireland, Israel, and Palestine. Cambridge University Press. p. 104. ISBN 978-0-521-65732-7. Retrieved 27 July 2012. The partition of India figures in a good deal of imaginative writing...
179. "Progressive Artists Group of Bombay: An Overview". Artnewsnviews.com. 12 May 2012. Retrieved 18 November 2017.
180. Bhatia, Nandi (1996). "Twentieth Century Hindi Literature". In Natarajan, Nalini (ed.). Handbook of Twentieth-Century Literatures of India. Greenwood Publishing Group. pp. 146–147. ISBN 978-0-313-28778-7. Retrieved 27 July 2012.
181. Roy, Rituparna (2011). South Asian Partition Fiction in English: From Khushwant Singh to Amitav Ghosh. Amsterdam University Press. pp. 24–29. ISBN 978-90-8964-245-5. Retrieved 27 July 2012.
182. Mandal, Somdatta (2008). "Constructing Post-partition Bengali Cultural Identity through Films". In Bhatia, Nandi; Roy, Anjali Gera (eds.). Partitioned Lives: Narratives of Home, Displacement, and Resettlement. Pearson Education India. pp. 66–69. ISBN 978-81-317-1416-4. Retrieved 27 July 2012.
183. Dwyer, R. (2010). "Bollywood's India: Hindi Cinema as a Guide to Modern India". Asian Affairs. 41 (3): 381–398. doi:10.1080/03068374.2010.508231. (subscription required)
184. Sarkar, Bhaskar (2009). Mourning the Nation: Indian Cinema in the Wake of Partition. Duke University Press. p. 121. ISBN 978-0-8223-4411-7. Retrieved 27 July 2012.
185. Vishwanath, Gita; Malik, Salma (2009). "Revisiting 1947 through Popular Cinema: a Comparative Study of India and Pakistan" (PDF). Economic and Political Weekly. XLIV (36): 61–69. Archived from the original (PDF) on 21 September 2013. Retrieved 27 July 2012.
186. Raychaudhuri, Anindya (2009). "Resisting the Resistible: Re-writing Myths of Partition in the Works of Ritwik Ghatak". Social Semiotics. 19 (4): 469–481. doi:10.1080/10350330903361158.(subscription required)
187. Naqvi, Sibtain (19 November 2013). "Google can envision Pakistan-India harmony in less than 4 minutes…can we?". The Express Tribune.
188. "Google reunion ad reignites hope for easier Indo-Pak visas". Deccan Chronicle. PTI. 15 November 2013.
189. Chatterjee, Rhitu (20 November 2013). "This ad from Google India brought me to tears". The World. Public Radio International.
190. Peter, Sunny (15 November 2013). "Google Search: Reunion Video Touches Emotions in India, Pakistan; Goes Viral [Video]". International Business Times.
191. "Google's India-Pak reunion ad strikes emotional chord". The Times of India. 14 November 2013.
192. Johnson, Kay (15 November 2013). "Google ad an unlikely hit in both India, Pakistan by referring to traumatic 1947 partition". ABC News/Associated Press.

Further reading

Textbook histories

• Bandyopādhyāẏa, Śekhara (2004), From Plassey to partition: a history of modern India, Delhi: Orient Blackswan, ISBN 978-81-250-2596-2
• Bose, Sugata; Jalal, Ayesha (2004), Modern South Asia: History, Culture, Political economy: second edition, Routledge, ISBN 978-1-134-39715-0
• Brown, Judith Margaret (1994), Modern India: the origins of an Asian democracy, Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0-19-873112-2
• Dyson, Tim (2018), A Population History of India: From the First Modern People to the Present Day, Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0-19-882905-8
• Kulke, Hermann; Rothermund, Dietmar (2004), A history of India, Routledge, ISBN 978-0-415-32920-0
• Ludden, David (2002), India and South Asia: a short history, Oneworld, ISBN 978-1-85168-237-9
• Markovits, Claude (2004), A history of modern India, 1480–1950, Anthem Press, ISBN 978-1-84331-152-2
• Metcalf, Barbara Daly; Metcalf, Thomas R. (2006), A concise history of modern India, Cambridge University Press, ISBN 978-0-521-86362-9
• Peers, Douglas M. (2006), India under colonial rule: 1700–1885, Pearson Education, ISBN 978-0-582-31738-3
• Robb, Peter (2002), A History of India, Palgrave Macmillan (published 2011), ISBN 978-0-230-34549-2
• Spear, Percival (1990) [First published 1965], A History of India, 2, Penguin Books, ISBN 978-0-14-013836-8
• Stein, Burton; Arnold, David (2010), A History of India, John Wiley and Sons, ISBN 978-1-4051-9509-6
• Talbot, Ian (2016), A History of Modern South Asia: Politics, States, Diasporas, Yale University Press, ISBN 978-0-300-19694-8
• Talbot, Ian (2015), Pakistan: A New History, Hurst, ISBN 978-1-84904-370-0
• Talbot, Ian; Singh, Gurharpal (2009), The Partition of India, Cambridge University Press, ISBN 978-0-521-85661-4
• Wolpert, Stanley (2008), A new history of India, Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0-19-533756-3

Monographs

• Ansari, Sarah. 2005. Life after Partition: Migration, Community and Strife in Sindh: 1947–1962. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. 256 pages. ISBN 0-19-597834-X
• Ayub, Muhammad (2005). An army, Its Role and Rule: A History of the Pakistan Army from Independence to Kargil, 1947–1999. RoseDog Books. ISBN 978-0-8059-9594-7..
• Butalia, Urvashi. 1998. The Other Side of Silence: Voices from the Partition of India. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. 308 pages. ISBN 0-8223-2494-6
• Bhavnani, Nandita. The Making of Exile: Sindhi Hindus and the Partition of India. Westland, 2014.
• Butler, Lawrence J. 2002. Britain and Empire: Adjusting to a Post-Imperial World. London: I.B.Tauris. 256 pages. ISBN 1-86064-449-X
• Chakrabarty; Bidyut. 2004. The Partition of Bengal and Assam: Contour of Freedom(RoutledgeCurzon, 2004) online edition
• Chattha, Ilyas Ahmad (2009), Partition and Its Aftermath: Violence, Migration and the Role of Refugees in the Socio-Economic Development of Gujranwala and Sialkot Cities, 1947–1961, University of Southampton, School of Humanities, Centre for Imperial and Post-Colonial Studies
• Chatterji, Joya. 2002. Bengal Divided: Hindu Communalism and Partition, 1932—1947. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press. 323 pages. ISBN 0-521-52328-1.
• Chester, Lucy P. 2009. Borders and Conflict in South Asia: The Radcliffe Boundary Commission and the Partition of Punjab. Manchester University Press. ISBN 978-0-7190-7899-6.
• Daiya, Kavita. 2008. Violent Belongings: Partition, Gender, and National Culture in Postcolonial India. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. 274 pages. ISBN 978-1-59213-744-2.
• Dhulipala, Venkat. 2015. Creating a New Medina: State Power, Islam, and the Quest for Pakistan in Late Colonial North India. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 1-10-705212-2
• Gilmartin, David. 1988. Empire and Islam: Punjab and the Making of Pakistan. Berkeley: University of California Press. 258 pages. ISBN 0-520-06249-3.
• Gossman, Partricia. 1999. Riots and Victims: Violence and the Construction of Communal Identity Among Bengali Muslims, 1905–1947. Westview Press. 224 pages. ISBN 0-8133-3625-2
• Hansen, Anders Bjørn. 2004. "Partition and Genocide: Manifestation of Violence in Punjab 1937–1947", India Research Press. ISBN 978-81-87943-25-9.
• Harris, Kenneth. Attlee (1982) pp 355–87
• Hasan, Mushirul (2001), India's Partition: Process, Strategy and Mobilization, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0-19-563504-1.
• Herman, Arthur. Gandhi & Churchill: The Epic Rivalry that Destroyed an Empire and Forged Our Age (2009)
• Ikram, S. M. 1995. Indian Muslims and Partition of India. Delhi: Atlantic. ISBN 81-7156-374-0
• Jain, Jasbir (2007), Reading Partition, Living Partition, Rawat, ISBN 978-81-316-0045-0
• Jalal, Ayesha (1993), The Sole Spokesman: Jinnah, the Muslim League and the Demand for Pakistan, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, ISBN 978-0-521-45850-4
• Judd, Denis (2004), The lion and the tiger: the rise and fall of the British Raj, 1600–1947, Oxford University Press, ISBN 978-0-19-280579-9
• Kaur, Ravinder. 2007. "Since 1947: Partition Narratives among Punjabi Migrants of Delhi". Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-568377-6.
• Khan, Yasmin (2007), The Great Partition: The Making of India and Pakistan, Yale University Press, ISBN 978-0-300-12078-3
• Khosla, G. D. Stern reckoning : a survey of the events leading up to and following the partition of India New Delhi: Oxford University Press:358 pages Published: February 1990 ISBN 0-19-562417-3
• Lamb, Alastair (1991), Kashmir: A Disputed Legacy, 1846–1990, Roxford Books, ISBN 978-0-907129-06-6
• Metcalf, Barbara; Metcalf, Thomas R. (2006), A Concise History of Modern India (Cambridge Concise Histories), Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, ISBN 978-0-521-68225-1
• Mookerjea-Leonard, Debali. (2017). Literature, Gender, and the Trauma of Partition: The Paradox of Independence London and New York: Routledge. ISBN 978-1138183100.
• Moon, Penderel. (1999). The British Conquest and Dominion of India (2 vol. 1256 pp)
• Moore, R.J. (1983). Escape from Empire: The Attlee Government and the Indian Problem, the standard history of the British position
• Nair, Neeti. (2010) Changing Homelands: Hindu Politics and the Partition of India
• Page, David, Anita Inder Singh, Penderel Moon, G. D. Khosla, and Mushirul Hasan. 2001. The Partition Omnibus: Prelude to Partition/the Origins of the Partition of India 1936–1947/Divide and Quit/Stern Reckoning. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-565850-7
• Pal, Anadish Kumar. 2010. World Guide to the Partition of INDIA. Kindle Edition: Amazon Digital Services. 282 KB. ASIN B0036OSCAC
• Pandey, Gyanendra. 2002. Remembering Partition:: Violence, Nationalism and History in India. Cambridge University Press. 232 pages. ISBN 0-521-00250-8 online edition
• Panigrahi; D.N. 2004. India's Partition: The Story of Imperialism in Retreat London: Routledge. online edition
• Raja, Masood Ashraf. Constructing Pakistan: Foundational Texts and the Rise of Muslim National Identity, 1857–1947, Oxford 2010, ISBN 978-0-19-547811-2
• Raza, Hashim S. 1989. Mountbatten and the partition of India. New Delhi: Atlantic. ISBN 81-7156-059-8
• Shaikh, Farzana. 1989. Community and Consensus in Islam: Muslim Representation in Colonial India, 1860–1947. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. 272 pages. ISBN 0-521-36328-4.
• Singh, Jaswant. (2011) Jinnah: India, Partition, Independence
• Talib, Gurbachan Singh, & Shromaṇī Guraduārā Prabandhaka Kameṭī. (1950). Muslim League attack on Sikhs and Hindus in the Punjab, 1947. Amritsar: Shiromani Gurdwara Parbankhak Committee.
• Talbot, Ian. 1996. Freedom's Cry: The Popular Dimension in the Pakistan Movement and Partition Experience in North-West India. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-577657-7.
• Talbot, Ian and Gurharpal Singh (eds). 1999. Region and Partition: Bengal, Punjab and the Partition of the Subcontinent. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. 420 pages. ISBN 0-19-579051-0.
• Talbot, Ian. 2002. Khizr Tiwana: The Punjab Unionist Party and the Partition of India. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. 216 pages. ISBN 0-19-579551-2.
• Talbot, Ian. 2006. Divided Cities: Partition and Its Aftermath in Lahore and Amritsar. Oxford and Karachi: Oxford University Press. 350 pages. ISBN 0-19-547226-8.
• Wolpert, Stanley. 2006. Shameful Flight: The Last Years of the British Empire in India. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. 272 pages. ISBN 0-19-515198-4.
• Wolpert, Stanley. 1984. Jinnah of Pakistan

Articles

• Brass, Paul. 2003. The partition of India and retributive genocide in the Punjab,1946–47: means, methods, and purposes Journal of Genocide Research (2003), 5#1, 71–101
• Gilmartin, David (1998), "Partition, Pakistan, and South Asian History: In Search of a Narrative", The Journal of Asian Studies, 57 (4): 1068–1095, doi:10.2307/2659304, JSTOR 2659304
• Gilmartin, David (1998), "A Magnificent Gift: Muslim Nationalism and the Election Process in Colonial Punjab", Comparative Studies in Society and History, 40 (3): 415–436, doi:10.1017/S0010417598001352, JSTOR 179270
• Gupta, Bal K. "Death of Mahatma Gandhi and Alibeg Prisoners" http://www.dailyexcelsior.com
• Gupta, Bal K. "Train from Pakistan" http://www.nripulse.com
• Gupta, Bal K. "November 25, 1947, Pakisatni Invasion of Mirpur". http://www.dailyexcelsior.com
• Jeffrey, Robin (1974), "The Punjab Boundary Force and the Problem of Order, August 1947", Modern Asian Studies, 8 (4): 491–520, doi:10.1017/s0026749x0000562x, JSTOR 311867
• Ravinder Kaur (2014), "Bodies of Partition: Of Widows, Residue and Other Historical Waste", Histories of Victimhood, Ed., Henrik Rønsbo and Steffen Jensen, Pennsylvania University Press
• Kaur, Ravinder. 2009. 'Distinctive Citizenship: Refugees, Subjects and Postcolonial State in India's Partition', Cultural and Social History.
• Kaur, Ravinder. 2008. 'Narrative Absence: An 'untouchable' account of India's Partition Migration, Contributions to Indian Sociology.
• Kaur Ravinder. 2007. "India and Pakistan: Partition Lessons". Open Democracy.
• Kaur, Ravinder. 2006. "The Last Journey: Social Class in the Partition of India". Economic and Political Weekly, June 2006. epw.org.in
• Khalidi, Omar (1998-01-01). "From Torrent to Trickle: Indian Muslim Migration to Pakistan, 1947–97". Islamic Studies. 37 (3): 339–352.
• Khan, Lal (2003), Partition – Can it be undone?, Wellred Publications, p. 228, ISBN 978-1-900007-15-3
• Mookerjea-Leonard, Debali (2005), "Divided Homelands, Hostile Homes: Partition, Women and Homelessness", Journal of Commonwealth Literature, 40 (2): 141–154, doi:10.1177/0021989405054314
• Mookerjea-Leonard, Debali (2004), "Quarantined: Women and the Partition", Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East, 24 (1): 35–50, doi:10.1215/1089201x-24-1-35
• Morris-Jones (1983), "Thirty-Six Years Later: The Mixed Legacies of Mountbatten's Transfer of Power", International Affairs, 59 (4): 621–628, doi:10.2307/2619473, JSTOR 2619473
• Noorani, A. G. (22 December 2001 – 4 January 2002), "The Partition of India", Frontline, 18 (26), archived from the original on 2 April 2008, retrieved 12 October2011
• Spate, O. H. K. (1947), "The Partition of the Punjab and of Bengal", The Geographical Journal, 110 (4/6): 201–218, doi:10.2307/1789950, JSTOR 1789950
• Spear, Percival (1958), "Britain's Transfer of Power in India", Pacific Affairs, 31 (2): 173–180, doi:10.2307/3035211, JSTOR 3035211
• Talbot, Ian (1994), "Planning for Pakistan: The Planning Committee of the All-India Muslim League, 1943–46", Modern Asian Studies, 28 (4): 875–889, doi:10.1017/s0026749x00012567
• Visaria, Pravin M (1969), "Migration Between India and Pakistan, 1951–61", Demography, 6 (3): 323–334, doi:10.2307/2060400, JSTOR 2060400, PMID 21331852
• Chopra, R. M., "The Punjab And Bengal", Calcutta, 1999.

Primary sources

• Mansergh, Nicholas, and Penderel Moon, eds. The Transfer of Power 1942–47 (12 vol., London: HMSO . 1970–83) comprehensive collection of British official and private documents
• Moon, Penderel. (1998) Divide & Quit
• Narendra Singh Sarila, "The Shadow of the Great Game: The Untold Story of India's Partition," Publisher: Carroll & Graf

Popularizations

• Collins, Larry and Dominique Lapierre: Freedom at Midnight. London: Collins, 1975. ISBN 0-00-638851-5
• Seshadri, H. V. (2013). The tragic story of partition. Bangalore: Sahitya Sindhu Prakashana, 2013.
• Zubrzycki, John. (2006) The Last Nizam: An Indian Prince in the Australian Outback. Pan Macmillan, Australia. ISBN 978-0-330-42321-2.

Memoirs and oral history

• Azad, Maulana Abul Kalam (2003) [First published 1959], India Wins Freedom: An Autobiographical Narrative, New Delhi: Orient Longman, ISBN 978-81-250-0514-8
• Bonney, Richard; Hyde, Colin; Martin, John. "Legacy of Partition, 1947–2009: Creating New Archives from the Memories of Leicestershire People," Midland History, (Sept 2011), Vol. 36 Issue 2, pp 215–224
• Mountbatten, Pamela. (2009) India Remembered: A Personal Account of the Mountbattens During the Transfer of Power

Historical-Fiction

• Mohammed, Javed: Walk to Freedom, Rumi Bookstore, 2006. ISBN 978-0-9701261-2-2

External links

• 1947 Partition Archive
• Partition of Bengal – Encyclopædia Britannica
• India Memory Project – 1947 India Pakistan Partition
• The Road to Partition 1939–1947 – The National Archives
• Indian Independence Bill, 1947
• India's Partition: The Forgotten Story British film-maker Gurinder Chadha, directors of Bend It Like Beckham and Viceroy's House, travels from Southall to Delhi and Shimla to find out about the Partition of India – one of the most seismic events of the 20th century. Partition saw India divided into two new nations – Independent India and Pakistan. The split led to violence, disruption, and death.
• Sir Ian Scott, Mountbatten's deputy private secretary in 1947, talking about the run up to Partition

Bibliographies

• Select Research Bibliography on the Partition of India, Compiled by Vinay Lal, Department of History, UCLA; University of California at Los Angeles
• South Asian History: Colonial India – University of California, Berkeley Collection of documents on colonial India, Independence, and Partition
• Indian Nationalism – Fordham University archive of relevant public-domain documents

Margaret Bourke-White
by Wikipedia
Accessed: 5/30/20

-- Mass Migration During Independence of India and Pakistan in 1947, by Margaret Bourke-White

Sheikh Abdullah, recently released from jail, manoeuvred into the vacuum created by the flight of the maharaja and his courtiers. With communist help, he organised a militia, some of which was trained and equipped by the Indian army. This was both a defence force should invaders again imperil the Kashmiri capital and a demonstration to all that the old regime of princely autocracy had been swept away. Sheikh Abdullah's supporters flooded the streets of Srinagar, and the city pulsed with political energy. 'The National Conference red flag ... decorates every public building in the city,' the Times of India reported. 'In the main square in the heart of the city, which has been renamed "Red Square", a giant red flag flutters from a tall mast under which workers and ordinary people foregather at all hours of the day to hear the latest news of the war and exchange political gossip.'23

Amid all this turmoil, Sheikh Abdullah received a letter from Freda in England and found the time to write a brief reply from the hotel in Srinagar which had become his temporary headquarters:

We are facing a grim struggle and the enemy is almost at our door-step. But we are confident that we shall turn the corner.

I think the best you can do for us at present would be to help us to set up an Information Bureau in New Delhi to work as the medium of our publicity in the outside world. I do not want to call you here because coming here at present is unsafe and unpleasant.

I should love to hear from Bedi. The two of you have done such a lot for us.24

Freda and Bedi took no notice of Sheikh Abdullah's warning to stay clear of Srinagar. Within a few days of their re-assembly as a family in India in December 1947, they all moved on to Kashmir. While the Indian army by then had the upper hand, Kashmir was a war zone. 'From Delhi we were flown in an army troop carrier, Dakota DC5,' Ranga recalls. 'No formal seats, fixed benches along the length of the aircraft and seat belts anchored to the body of the plane. Our great dane Rufus on the floor shivered out of fright all the way. When we landed in Srinagar it was a hive of military activity.' Bedi's role was to work closely with Sheikh Abdullah, both on policy and propaganda. The family were allotted evacuee property -- a simple but well situated house with the name Dar-ul-Aman ('home of peace') at Gagribal, close to Srinagar's renowned Dal Lake.

Within days of arriving in Srinagar, the Bedis had a visit from one of the commanding photo-journalists of the era. Margaret Bourke-White had provided Life with its first front cover in 1936. She was a war photographer in Europe but turned her back on the 'decay of Europe' and came to India just as it was about to achieve independence. 'I witnessed that extremely rare event in the history of nations, the birth of twins,' she wrote.25 She arrived in India in March 1946 and spent seven months travelling widely across the subcontinent, meeting and photographing all the main political players. She returned in September 1947, as it became clear that the birth of twin nations, midnight's children, was also a profound human calamity. Her powerful and unsettling images of Partition -- of migration and massacre -- are among her most memorable. She was determined to record India's passage to independence not only in images but in a book, Halfway to Freedom, sub-titled 'a report on the new India' and published in 1949, is a vivid account of India's faltering steps to full nationhood.

When fighting erupted in Kashmir in late October 1947, Margaret Bourke-White was determined to get there. For a photo-journalist, the prime requirement is to be at the heart of the action -- there's no other way of capturing the most commanding images. Early in November, Sir George Cunningham, the governor of Pakistan's North West Frontier Province, noted in his diary that two American women journalists from Life had been refused permission to go to Abbottabad, the informal headquarters of the invading force, and beyond to Baramulla.26 That didn't stop her. She managed to reach Abbottabad and to meet and photograph a band of several hundred armed Pathans on their way to Kashmir:

Unlike higher officials, these tribesmen seemed to know what was going on when I questioned them.

'Are you going into Kashmir?' I asked.

'Why not?' they said. 'We are all Muslims. We are going to help our Muslim brothers in Kashmir.'

Sometimes their help to their brother Muslims was accomplished so quickly that the trucks and buses would come back within a day or two bursting with loot, only to return to Kashmir with more tribesmen, to repeat their indiscriminate 'liberating' -- and terrorizing of Hindu, Sikh and Muslim villager alike.27

A few weeks later, Margaret Bourke-White managed to reach the Kashmir Valley -- approaching not from Pakistani territory but from the Indian side. 'Just before Christmas of 1947 I flew over the wild mountain barrier, with guerrilla warfare going on fiercely but invisible among the ravines and chasms below, and landed in the enchanted city of Srinagar. Everyone who has ever visited Kashmir knows it has a special magic. "It is a different world altogether," my friend Bedi, who was my guide in Kashmir, expressed it; "the water and the land combines into one."'28

The account Bourke-White gave of the turbulence in Kashmir -- the political cohesion of its people, the progressive credentials of the National Conference's manifesto and their 'legendary' leader Sheikh Abdullah, 'this good-natured, weather-beaten, eminently practical and rather homely young man' -- reflect the political outlook of her guide and host. Indeed, her two chapters on Kashmir capture the high water mark of the progressive New Kashmir movement. She interviewed Sheikh Abdullah and several of his associates, met members of his people's militia, and encountered the key figure in the underground movement during the Quit Kashmir campaign. And of course, she got to know Bedi's wife.

Freda Bedi is a fair-haired English girl whom Bedi had met and married when both were students at Oxford. She had become deeply interested in the welfare of her adopted country, learned the language, and wore the long full pajama like dress of Kashmiri women. She had her own jail record -- acquired for her participation in the freedom movement -- which is the proud badge of every patriotic Indian who has worked for independence.

Bourke-White also wanted to see the evidence of the invaders' largely indiscriminate destruction, and having heard about the desecration of a convent at Baramulla and the ransacking of the mission hospital, she persuaded Bedi to take her there:

It was badly defaced and littered, and a delegation of students from Srinagar was coming next day to clean it up and salvage what remained of the library .... They would put the Christian mission in as good order as they could in time for Christmas Day.

We made our way into the ravaged chapel, wading through the mass of torn hymnbooks and broken sacred statuary. The altar was deep in rubble. Bedi stooped down over it and picked up one fragment, turning it over carefully in his big hands. It was the broken head of Jesus, with just one eye remaining.

'How beautiful it is,' said Bedi, 'this single eye of Christ looking out so calmly on the world. We shall preserve it always in Kashmir as a permanent reminder of the unity between Indians of all religions which we are trying to achieve.'29

And that's where she left her account of Kashmir -- an impassioned, if partial, piece of reportage. She recited uncritically what she heard from Bedi, and this has to be marked down as one of his key successes as a propagandist. There's hardly a whisper of criticism of Sheikh Abdullah and the movement he headed, and hardly a good word about Pakistan or the invaders acting in its name.

B.P.L. Bedi pops up repeatedly in the pages of Halfway to Freedom as Bourke-White's friend and guide. In Delhi in mid-January 1948 a couple of weeks after leaving Kashmir, she conveniently caught sight of him when attending Gandhi's prayers during a fast to protest against the communal hatred unleashed by Partition. 'Bedi was a giant of a figure in his billowing wool homespun which swept in coarse, oatmeal-colored folds from his massive shoulders to his Gargantuan feet, bare and crusty in their open sandals.'30Another two weeks later, she was again with Bedi in Delhi when she heard of Gandhi's assassination and rushed with her camera to the spot. The following day, Bedi and sixteen-year-old Binder accompanied Bourke-White to Gandhi's cremation, Bedi using his persuasiveness to help get access, and Binder being little short of heroic in guarding the cameras from the crush of the crowd and helping Bourke-White to a vantage point.

Margaret Bourke-White was in her early forties when she arrived in India -- vivacious, sociable, successful, determined and with two failed marriages behind her. She embarked on an affair with one of India's best-known journalists, Frank Moraes -- handsome, hard living, Oxford-educated with an accent to match. He was a friend of the Bedis. He was also married -- and Beryl Moraes, in the throes of a mental health crisis, turned up with her young son Dom at Bourke-White's hotel room to remonstrate. She had other Indian lovers. Her publisher, Peter Jayasinghe, suggested marriage but was rebuffed. For a woman 'who had so little wish to do harm,' says her biographer, 'Margaret left behind her a wide swath of injured wives.'31 Whether Freda was among those who had reason to feel injured, it's difficult to say with certainty. There are stray hints in Bedi's letters at an intimacy. What I really feel like saying to you -- I have told these petals to whisper!' he wrote to Bourke-White in September 1949, just ten days before Freda gave birth to their fourth child.32 That could be a flirtatious aside -- it feels as if it's something more.

B.P.L. Bedi and Margaret Bourke-White seem not to have met again after her departure from India in early 1948, but they kept in touch by letter for almost two decades more. Eight years after Gandhi's assassination, Bedi wrote to his old friend -- that letter hasn't survived, but Bourke-White's tender reply has.

It was wonderful to hear from you. Yes I too think of you when the anniversary rolls round of the solemn events in which we shared. And I think of you always, and with quiet affection ....

I was very moved, Bedi dear, at your letter. I too felt we were always very close in understanding and those terrible -- and, in a way, majestic -- events through which we moved, brought us even closer.33

In subsequent years, Bedi offered support and succour through the photo-journalist's diagnosis with Parkinson's disease and her gradual decline in health. 'Remember we who lived through the stormiest of struggles have the deepest faith in the doings of the Divine ... ,' Bedi wrote, reflecting the unorthodox spiritual turn his life had taken. 'I am directed by the Celestial Masters to tell you that your future is greater than your past.'34 Bourke-White wrote respectfully of Bedi's personal journey and fondly of their shared adventures: 'How vividly I remember your long, strong stride on our excursions in Srinagar, Amritsar and Delhi.'35 A few years later, at Bedi's prodding, she wrote in support of funding for a project he had devised to translate and publish Sufi poetry. 'He is one of the most scholarly, cultivated and great-hearted of men.' A generous comment about an old friend she hadn't seen for sixteen years -- and the last act of a loving friendship of which Freda can hardly have been unaware.36

-- The Lives of Freda: The Political, Spiritual and Personal Journeys of Freda Bedi, by Andrew Whitehead

Margaret Bourke-White
Bourke-White interviewed on Person to Person, 1955
Born: Margaret White, June 14, 1904, The Bronx, New York City
Died: August 27, 1971 (aged 67), Stamford, Connecticut, US
Nationality: American
Alma mater: Columbia University; University of Michigan; Purdue University; Western Reserve University; Cornell University
Occupation: Photographer, photojournalist
Spouse(s): Everett Chapman (m. 1924; div. 1926); Erskine Caldwell (m. 1939; div. 1942)

Margaret Bourke-White (/ˈbɜːrk/; June 14, 1904 – August 27, 1971) was an American photographer and documentary photographer.[1] She is best known as the first foreign photographer permitted to take pictures of Soviet industry under the Soviet's five-year plan,[2] the first American female war photojournalist, and having one of her photographs (the construction of Fort Peck Dam) on the cover of the first issue of Life magazine.[3] She died of Parkinson's disease about eighteen years after developing symptoms.

Early life

Margaret Bourke-White,[4] born Margaret White[5] in the Bronx, New York,[6] was the daughter of Joseph White, a non-practicing Jew whose father came from Poland, and Minnie Bourke, who was of Irish Catholic descent.[7] She grew up in Bound Brook, New Jersey (in a neighborhood now part of Middlesex), and graduated from Plainfield High School in Union County.[6][8] From her naturalist father, an engineer and inventor, she claimed to have learned perfectionism; from her "resourceful homemaker" mother, she claimed to have developed an unapologetic desire for self-improvement."[9] Her younger brother, Roger Bourke White, became a prominent Cleveland businessman and high-tech industry founder, and her older sister, Ruth White, became well known for her work at the American Bar Association in Chicago, Ill.[7] Roger Bourke White described their parents as "Free thinkers who were intensely interested in advancing themselves and humanity through personal achievement," attributing this quality in part to the success of their children. He was not surprised at his sister Margaret's success, saying "[she] was not unfriendly or aloof".

Margaret's interest in photography began as a hobby in her youth, supported by her father's enthusiasm for cameras.[6] Despite her interest, in 1922, she began studying herpetology at Columbia University, only to have her interest in photography strengthened after studying under Clarence White (no relation).[6] She left after one semester, following the death of her father.[5] She transferred colleges several times, attending the University of Michigan (where she became a member of Alpha Omicron Pi sorority),[10] Purdue University in Indiana, and Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio.[5] Bourke-White ultimately graduated from Cornell University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1927, leaving behind a photographic study of the rural campus for the school's newspaper, including photographs of her famed dormitory, Risley Hall.[5][6][11] A year later, she moved from Ithaca, New York, to Cleveland, Ohio, where she started a commercial photography studio and began concentrating on architectural and industrial photography.

In 1924, during her studies, she married Everett Chapman, but the couple divorced two years later.[9] Margaret White added her mother's surname, "Bourke" to her name in 1927 and hyphenated it.[5]

Architectural and commercial photography

One of Bourke-White's clients was Otis Steel Company. Her success was due to her skills with both people and her technique. Her experience at Otis is a good example. As she explains in Portrait of Myself, the Otis security people were reluctant to let her shoot for many reasons.

Firstly, steel making was a defense industry, so they wanted to be sure national security was not endangered. Second, she was a woman, and in those days, people wondered if a woman and her delicate cameras could stand up to the intense heat, hazard, and generally dirty and gritty conditions inside a steel mill. When she finally got permission, technical problems began.

Black-and-white film in that era was sensitive to blue light, not the reds and oranges of hot steel, so she could see the beauty, but the photographs were coming out all black. She solved this problem by bringing along a new style of magnesium flare, which produces white light, and having assistants hold them to light her scenes. Her abilities resulted in some of the best steel factory photographs of that era, which earned her national attention. "To me... industrial forms were all the more beautiful because they were never designed to be beautiful. They had a simplicity of line that came from their direct application of purpose. Industry... had evolved an unconscious beauty – often a hidden beauty that was waiting to be discovered" Margaret Bourke-White, Portrait of Myself (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1963), 49.

Photojournalism


"Kentucky Flood", February 1937

In 1929, Bourke-White accepted a job as associate editor and staff photographer of Fortune magazine, a position she held until 1935.[5] In 1930, she became the first Western photographer allowed to take photographs of Soviet industry.[5]

She was hired by Henry Luce as the first female photojournalist for Life magazine in 1936.[5] She held the title of staff photographer until 1940, but returned from 1941 to 1942,[5] and again in 1945, after which she stayed through her semi-retirement in 1957 (which ended her photography for the magazine)[3] and her full retirement in 1969.[5]

Her photographs of the construction of the Fort Peck Dam were featured in Life's first issue, dated November 23, 1936, including the cover.[12] This cover photograph became such a favorite (see[13]) that it was the 1930s' representative in the United States Postal Service's Celebrate the Century series of commemorative postage stamps. "Although Bourke-White titled the photo, New Deal, Montana: Fort Peck Dam, it is actually a photo of the spillway located three miles east of the dam," according to a United States Army Corps of Engineers web page.[14]

During the mid-1930s, Bourke-White, like Dorothea Lange, photographed drought victims of the Dust Bowl. In the February 15, 1937 issue of Life magazine, her famous photograph of black flood victims standing in front of a sign which declared, "World's Highest Standard of Living", showing a white family, was published. The photograph later would become the basis for the artwork of Curtis Mayfield's 1975 album, There's No Place Like America Today.

Bourke-White and novelist Erskine Caldwell were married from 1939 to their divorce in 1942,[5] and collaborated on You Have Seen Their Faces (1937), a book about conditions in the South during the Great Depression.

She also traveled to Europe to record how Germany, Austria, and Czechoslovakia were faring under Nazism and how Russia was faring under Communism. While in Russia, she photographed a rare occurrence, Joseph Stalin with a smile, as well as portraits of Stalin's mother and great-aunt when visiting Georgia.

World War II

Bourke-White was the first known female war correspondent[5] and the first woman to be allowed to work in combat zones during World War II. In 1941, she traveled to the Soviet Union just as Germany broke its pact of non-aggression. She was the only foreign photographer in Moscow when German forces invaded. Taking refuge in the U.S. Embassy, she then captured the ensuing firestorms on camera.

As the war progressed, she was attached to the U.S. Army Air Force in North Africa, then to the U.S. Army in Italy and later in Germany. She repeatedly came under fire in Italy in areas of fierce fighting.

"The woman who had been torpedoed in the Mediterranean, strafed by the Luftwaffe, stranded on an Arctic island, bombarded in Moscow, and pulled out of the Chesapeake when her chopper crashed, was known to the Life staff as 'Maggie the Indestructible.'"[3] This incident in the Mediterranean refers to the sinking of the England-Africa bound British troopship SS Strathallan that she recorded in an article, "Women in Lifeboats", in Life, February 22, 1943. She was disliked by General Dwight D Eisenhower but was friendly with his chauffeur/secretary, Irishwoman Kay Summersby, with whom she shared the lifeboat.

In the spring of 1945, she traveled throughout a collapsing Germany with Gen. George S. Patton. She arrived at Buchenwald, the notorious concentration camp, and later said, "Using a camera was almost a relief. It interposed a slight barrier between myself and the horror in front of me." After the war, she produced a book entitled Dear Fatherland, Rest Quietly, a project that helped her come to grips with the brutality she had witnessed during and after the war.

The editor of a collection of Bourke-White's photographs wrote: "To many who got in the way of a Bourke-White photograph—and that included not just bureaucrats and functionaries but professional colleagues like assistants, reporters, and other photographers—she was regarded as imperious, calculating, and insensitive."[3]

Korean War

She served as a photographer of Life during Korean War.[15]

Recording the India–Pakistan partition violence


An iconic photograph that Margaret Bourke-White took of Mohandas K. Gandhi in 1946

Bourke-White is known equally well in both India and Pakistan for her photographs of Dr. Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar at his home Rajgriha, Dadar in Mumbai on the occasion of a third impression of his book which was published in December 1940 as Thoughts on Pakistan (the book was republished in 1946 under the title India's Political What's What: Pakistan or Partition of India). These photographs were published on LIFE magazine cover. She also photographed M. K. Gandhi at his spinning wheel and Pakistan's founder, Mohammed Ali Jinnah, upright in a chair.[16][17]

She also was "one of the most effective chroniclers" of the violence that erupted at the independence and partition of India and Pakistan, according to Somini Sengupta, who calls her photographs of the episode "gut-wrenching, and staring at them, you glimpse the photographer's undaunted desire to stare down horror." She recorded streets littered with corpses, dead victims with open eyes, and refugees with vacant eyes. "Bourke-White's photographs seem to scream on the page," Sengupta wrote. The photographs were taken just two years after those Bourke-White took of the newly captured Buchenwald.[16]

Sixty-six of Bourke-White's photographs of the partition violence were included in a 2006 reissue of Khushwant Singh's 1956 novel about the disruption, Train to Pakistan. In connection with the reissue, many of the photographs in the book were displayed at "the posh shopping center Khan Market" in Delhi, India. "More astonishing than the images blown up large as life was the number of shoppers who seemed not to register them," Sengupta wrote. No memorial to the partition victims exists in India, according to Pramod Kapoor, head of Roli, the Indian publishing house coming out with the new book.[16]

She had a knack for being at the right place at the right time: she interviewed and photographed Mohandas K. Gandhi just a few hours before his assassination in 1948.[18] Alfred Eisenstaedt, her friend and colleague, said one of her strengths was that there was no assignment and no picture that was unimportant to her. She also started the first photography laboratory at Life magazine.[9]

Later years and death

In 1953, Bourke-White developed her first symptoms of Parkinson's disease.[5] She was forced to slow her career to fight encroaching paralysis.[3] In 1959 and 1961, she underwent several operations to treat her condition,[5] which effectively ended her tremors but affected her speech.[3] In 1971, she died at Stamford Hospital in Stamford, Connecticut, aged 67, from Parkinson's disease.[4][5][19]

Bourke-White wrote an autobiography, Portrait of Myself, which was published in 1963 and became a bestseller, but she grew increasingly infirm and isolated in her home in Darien, Connecticut. In her living room, there "was wallpapered in one huge, floor-to-ceiling, perfectly-stitched-together black-and-white photograph of an evergreen forest that she had shot in Czechoslovakia in 1938". A pension plan set up in the 1950s, "though generous for that time", no longer covered her health-care costs. She also suffered financially from her personal generosity and "less-than-responsible attendant care."[3]

Legacy

Bourke-White's photographs are in the Brooklyn Museum, the Cleveland Museum of Art, the New Mexico Museum of Art[20] and the Museum of Modern Art in New York as well as in the collection of the Library of Congress.[9] A 160-foot-long photomural she created for NBC in 1933, for the Rotunda in the broadcaster's Rockefeller Center headquarters, was destroyed in the 1950s. In 2014, when the Rotunda and Grand Staircase leading up to it were rebuilt, the photomural was faithfully recreated in digital form on the 360-degree LED screens on the Rotunda's walls. It forms one of the stops on the NBC Studio Tour.

Many of her manuscripts, memorabilia, photographs, and negatives are housed in Syracuse University's Bird Library Special Collections section.

Principal exhibitions

Group

• John Becker Gallery, New York: 1931 (Photographs by Three Americans, with Ralph Steiner and Walker Evans)
• Museum of Modern Art, New York:1949 (Six Women Photographers, 1951 (Memorable Life Photographs))[21]

Individual

• Annual Exhibition of Advertising Art, New York: 1931 (with Anton Bruehl; art works by others)
• Little Carnegie Playhouse, New York: 1932
• Rockefeller Center, New York: 1932
• Art Institute of Chicago: 1956
• Syracuse University, NY: 1966
• Carl Siembab Gallery, Boston: 1971
• Witkin Gallery, New York: 1971
• Andrew Dickson White Museum of Art, Cornell University, Ithaca: 1972 (retrospective)[21]

Public collections

• Brooklyn Museum
• Cleveland Museum of Art
• Library of Congress
• Museum of Modern Art, New York City
• New Mexico Museum of Art
• Rijksmuseum Amsterdam[22]

Portrayals in popular culture

Bourke-White was portrayed by Farrah Fawcett in the television movie, Double Exposure: The Story of Margaret Bourke-White (1989) and by Candice Bergen in the 1982 film Gandhi.

Awards

• honorary Doctorate: Rutgers University, 1948[5]
• honorary Doctorate: University of Michigan (Ann Arbor), 1951[5]
• Achievement Award: US Camera, 1963[5]
• Honor Roll Award: American Society of Magazine Photographers, 1964[5]

In 1990, she was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame.[23] She was designated a Women's History Month Honoree in 1992 and again in 1994 by the National Women's History Project.[24]

Publications

• Eyes on Russia (1931)
• You Have Seen Their Faces (1937; with Erskine Caldwell) ISBN 0-8203-1692-X
• North of the Danube (1939; with Erskine Caldwell) ISBN 0-306-70877-9
• Shooting the Russian War (1942)
• They Called it "Purple Heart Valley" (1944)
• Halfway to Freedom; a report on the new India (1949)
• Interview with India,(1950)
• Portrait of Myself. Simon Schuster. (1963). ISBN 0-671-59434-6
• Dear Fatherland, Rest Quietly (1946)
• The Taste of War (selections from her writings edited by Jonathon Silverman) ISBN 0-7126-1030-8
• Say, Is This the USA? (Republished 1977) ISBN 0-306-77434-8
• The Photographs of Margaret Bourke-White ISBN 0-517-16603-8

Biographies and collections of Bourke-White's photographs

• Margaret Bourke-White: Photography of Design, 1927–1936 ISBN 0-8478-2505-1
• Margaret Bourke-White ISBN 0-8109-4381-6
• Margaret Bourke-White: Photographer ISBN 0-8212-2490-5
• Margaret Bourke-White: Adventurous Photographer ISBN 0-531-12405-3
• Power and Paper, Margaret Bourke-White: Modernity and the Documentary Mode ISBN 1-881450-09-0
• Margaret Bourke-White: A Biography by Vickie Goldberg (Harper & Row: 1986) ISBN 0-06-015513-2
• Bourke-White: A Retrospective, Collected and Circulated by the International Center of Photography, New York. Exhibition catalog United Technologies Corporation, 1988
• Margaret Bourke-White: Twenty Parachutes, Nazraeli Press, 2002 ISBN 1-59005-013-4
• Margaret Bourke-White: The Early Work, 1922–1930 Selected, with an essay by Ronald E. Ostman and Harry Littel (David E Godine 2005) ISBN 9781567922998
• For the World to See: The Life of Margaret Bourke-White by Jonathan Silverman ISBN 0-670-32356-X
• Down North: John Buchan and Margaret Bourke-White on the Mackenzie by John Brinckman ISBN 978-0-9879163-3-4
• Witness to Life and Freedom: Margaret Bourke-White in India & Pakistan by Pramod Kapoor (Roli & Janssen 2010) ISBN 9788174366993

In popular culture

Fictional character based on Margaret Bourke-White on-screen.[25]

• Megan Fox in South Korean movie The Battle of Jangsari

References

1. Hudson, Berkley (2009). Sterling, Christopher H. (ed.). Encyclopedia of Journalism. Thousand Oaks, Calif.: SAGE. pp. 1060–67. ISBN 978-0-7619-2957-4.
2. Benton, Whisenhunt, William; E., Saul, Norman. New perspectives on Russian-American relations. p. 193. ISBN 9781138916234. OCLC 918941221. This was the first time a professional photographer from abroad had been allowed to take pictures of the "Piatiletl" (Five-year plan).
3. Callahan, Sean. "The Last Days of a Legend". Scout Productions. Bullfinch Press. Archived from the originalon December 13, 2013. Retrieved March 7, 2017.
4. "ULAN Full Record Display – Bourke-White, Margaret". Union List of Artist Names – Getty Research. The J. Paul Getty Trust. Retrieved June 4, 2010.
5. Gaze, Delia, ed. (1997). Dictionary of Artists, Volume 1. Taylor & Francis. p. 1512. ISBN 9781884964213.
6. "The Industrial revelations of Margaret Bourke-White". USA Today, the Society for the Advancement of Education. April 2005. Retrieved June 5, 2010. A native of the Bronx, NY, Margaret Bourke-White (1904–71) first gained recognition as an industrial photographer based in Cleveland
7. Roger Bourke White. "Roger White's Autobiography". Retrieved June 2, 2010.
8. "She grew up in Bound Brook, NJ, and graduated from Plainfield High School". Archived from the original on September 12, 2006. Retrieved June 21, 2007.
9. "Margaret Bourke-White". Gallery M. Retrieved July 2,2006.
10. "Greek Life NPC Alpha Omicron Pi". Student Affairs. East Carolina University. Retrieved June 5, 2010.
11. Bourke-White, Margaret; Ronald Elroy Ostman; Harry Littell (2005). Margaret Bourke-White: the early work, 1922–1930. David R. Godine Publisher. p. 88. ISBN 9781567922998.
12. "1930s source:life fort peck dam margaret bourke white – Google Search". Google.
13. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on May 6, 2010. Retrieved July 5, 2010.
14. [1] Web page for U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Office of History. Retrieved July 2, 2006. Archived April 9, 2005, at the Wayback Machine
15. LIFE in Korea: Rare and Classic Photos From the 'Forgotten War'
16. Sengupta, Somini, "Bearing Steady Witness To Partition's Wounds," an article in the Arts section, The New York Times, September 21, 2006, pages E1, E7
17. Kapoor, Pramod (2010). Witness to Life and Freedom : Margaret Bourke-white in India & Pakistan. New Delhi: Lustre Press, Roli Books. ISBN 978-81-7436-699-3.
18. Bourke-White, Margaret (1949). Halfway to Freedom: A Report on the New India in the Words and Photographs of Margaret Bourke-White. New York: Simon and Schuster. pp. 225–233.
19. Whitman, Alden (August 28, 1971). "Margaret Bourke-White, Photo-Journalist, Dead at 67". The New York Times. Retrieved March 21, 2010. Margaret Bourke-White, one of the world's pre-eminent photographers, died yesterday morning at the Stamford (Conn.) Hospital from complications after a long battle with Parkinson's disease, a nerve disorder. She was 67 years old and lived in Darien, Conn.
20. "Margaret Bourke-White". New Mexico Museum of Art. Retrieved September 20, 2013.
21. "Bourke-White, Margaret". Dictionary of Women Artists. Chicago: Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers. 1997.
22. "Search". Rijksmuseum.nl.
23. "Bourke-White, Margaret". National Women's Hall of Fame.
24. "Honorees: 2010 National Women's History Month". Women's History Month. National Women's History Project. 2010. Archived from the original on June 3, 2017. Retrieved June 14, 2017.
25. '장사리' 메간 폭스 출연에 숨겨진 사연은? [★비하인드

External links

• Margaret Bourke-White Papers at Syracuse University
• Images from Time's image archive by Margaret Bourke-White.
• Margaret Bourke-White in the collection of The Museum of Modern Art
• Women in History: Margaret Bourke-White
• Distinguished Women: Margaret Bourke-White
• Margaret Bourke-White Photographs
• Masters of Photography: Margaret Bourke-White
• Margaret Bourke-White in cosmopolis.ch
• Margaret Bourke-White at Find a Grave

Part 1 of 9

Mass Migration During Independence of India and Pakistan in 1947
by Margaret Bourke-White
Life Magazine
1947

These photographs were taken in 1947 during the period of independence of India and Pakistan. The photographer is Margaret Bourke-White. These photographs collected from Life Archive hosted by Google.

The strong survive;... the old and weak fall by the way.

-- Halfway to Freedom: In the words and pictures of Margaret Bourke-White

Part 2 of 9