Patriotism, Partition and the Persecuted Social Biography of Victims of Partition

Despite prolonged violence and tragic sep­aration thereafter, numerous memories of the self-sacrificing efforts of the compatriots served as recollection in collective living in the Indian subcontinent.

This book explores the theme of continuous wreaking of brutal persecu­tion of a Hindu family on the one hand and the uncompromising efforts of Muslim friend and neighbours to protect this family on the other. It is set against the resultant and barbaric forces let loose after the propagation of the two nation theory, and the ultimate partition of India in 1947. Based on the social biography of a Hindu family that stayed back in East Pakistan it traces their journey, how they became the ‘other’ in the country of their birth and faced persecution. This, being branded the other, led to part of the family migrating to India, away from their natal roots. The 1965 India-Pakistan war further brought prolonged sep­aration and sufferings for these half-families living on both sides of the borders. Subjecting one to encounter helplessness, uncertainty and poverty in India, and the other to the state sponsored apathy, coercion, arrests and physical tortures. The vicious atmosphere of violent com­munal aggres­sion though did not stop their Muslim friends from pro­tecting them.