Post- Partition India: New Beginnings Amidst Chaos... Part I

These are articles for serious readers who genuinely want to learn about the world outside the US of A and thus get an international perspective which I genuinely believe could be an important factor in resolving so much world tension-but then I am an optimistic idealist!)

This article is also based both on childhood reminisces and discussions with other family and friends in US. Unfortunately, along with both my parents, I have also lost my two oldest brothers prematurely, whereas the third brother born in pre-partition India is settled in New Delhi . Consequently, the aim here is to essentially provide a flavor of that turbulent time when thousands of uprooted refugee families resettled in New Delhi, my family, being one of them. I also want to illustrate how the new Government of India still in its infancy, stepped up to the plate and worked hard on the rehabilitation of thousands of refugees who themselves rose to the challenge amidst both sorrow and excitement at being a part of a new nation and carved a new cultural identity for themselves in Delhi which became a base for the exuberant Punjabi culture. The idea is to share all this through my family's story.

Luckily I have been able to dig up old photographs which somehow I had been instinctively wise enough to bring with me during my many trips to India, otherwise they would have been lost in the various family upheavals which have taken place over the years...

So let us continue...

As I explained in earlier posts, my parents barely escaped with their lives leaving behind their home, ancestral property, friends, their livelihood and essentially their entire lifestyle during the horrific events that occurred during the territorial division of India into the two sovereign nations of India and Pakistan in 1947. Approximately 12 million were displaced in this upheaval and hundreds and thousands died -the psychological wounds inflicted run deep in both the countries and are still not fully healed.

Reaching the Delhi Railway station after the fateful train journey from Pakistan to New Delhi in India, my parents had no clue what to do after the instant euphoria at having escaped death had evaporated. As good fortune would have it, in the crazy mayhem that ensued, father spotted a senior government officer, father's former colleague from his days as a bureaucrat under the British administration. Father turned to him for help and he immediately responded and had the family transported to my my aunt, mother's sister, place. She had a house in the premises of a Delhi hospital where my uncle was a doctor. The house was already teaming with similarly desperately situated relatives breathing down each other's necks in cramped living quarters. Soon, thereafter my parents found safe haven with my maternal grandparents who had wisely reached Delhi earlier from Pakistan. My mother's sister and husband who was a doctor with whom my parents stayed along with other relatives immediately after reaching Delhi.

My maternal grandfather was also a doctor, a pathologist trained in England, who had also been based in Lahore. Always a sanguine person, he had sensibly left Lahore earlier and reached Delhi before my parents arrival. Having served as a senior medical officer under the wealthy princely ruler of the now disputed state of Kashmir, grandfather fortunately had invested wisely in substantial property in Delhi which at that time was rented to a school. The property was immediately vacated on an emergency basis and became a shelter for many family members including my other aunts and uncles with their children. My parents were certainly blessed to have found refuge with none other than the extended family, but not many refugees who came to Delhi were so lucky.


Mother with my three oldest brothers stayed at the old medieval type of property that her parents had bought wisely and which served as a refuge for many family members who escaped Pakistan. This property's land-value skyrocketed in real-estate in later years because it is in the heart of Delhi. Delhi has today grown exponentially and real-estate is premium value.

This is a picture of my mother with her parents and her brothers in 1949 after my parents migrated to India. Note how it is a sign of respectability for Indian women to cover their heads. The picture shows my youngest uncle (on the right) who had joined the Navy and was leaving for London for his training. Despite India's freedom from the British rule, England and India continued to have strong ties and the Indian who could manage it, went to England for higher studies. It has been a unique relationship of both deep affection and anger all at the same time

The Indian government had set up huge refugee camps in large open spaces in the city where staggering number of displaced families were living in tents in conditions which were far from sanitary due to overcrowding and lack of proper facilities. The newly created government of free India, ill-prepared and untrained to deal with a debacle of such magnitude, did what it could to provide shelter and protect the refugees. There were more than 160 government-operated refugee camps within different parts of India including of course the Indian section of Punjab - East Punjab. Separate refugee camps sheltered Muslims fleeing from Delhi and who were waiting for a passage across the border or just local Muslims who did not want to migrate to Pakistan but were waiting out the communal horror..(Remember the Indian Republic is secular.) Delhi was a city divided and in complete turmoil!

Gandhiji, literally the heart of India's freedom struggle made incessant calls for Hindu-Muslim unity till his assassination in January 1948, shattering the already wounded soul of the new nation.
Mahatma Gandhi the remarkable spiritual and political leader, referred to as the "Father of India" launched the non-violent movement against the British rule using civil disobedience as an anti-colonial tool that eventually won India its independence.


Jawaharlal Nehru, the first Prime Minister of India,a renowned orator whose speech on India's Independence delivered to India's Constituent Assemby on August 14, 1947, "Tryst with Destiny" is considered an all-time classic masterpiece for its rich narrative expressing the hopes and dreams of a new nation .

Nonetheless to India's credit, the new fledgling government under the leadership of Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of India, rose to the occasion and designed a number of legal, executive and and financial mechanisms to assist and eventually integrate the incoming Hindus and Sikhs into the national mainstream. Emergency committees were set -up. Local voluntary organizations became very active in providing food and clothing to the refugees. Security was provided in the camps and much effort was made by the new administration to rehabilitate and resettle the uprooted masses.

It was a surreal time when the the shell-shocked families seeking refuge struggled with conflicting emotions of joy and pride in being Indian citizens while at the same time trying to come to terms and picking up the pieces of their shattered lives...

To be continued in Part II.