Opinion | Partition Horrors: 1947 Must Not Be Forgotten; It Must Be Understood

Partition was not merely an event of drawing a boundary line. It was the name of homes being uprooted, memories shattering, relationships breaking, and centuries-old shared culture being wounded.

August 15, 1947, gave India its independence, but along with the dawn of that freedom, a night descended upon the lives of millions, the darkness of which persisted for generations.

Some dates in history do not stay on calendars; they live in the collective memory of society. August 14, 1947, is one such date. To forget it is dangerous because oblivion does not end history but rather turns its wounds into unspoken questions for future generations.

Therefore, our respected Prime Minister Narendra Modi has taken up the responsibility of preserving this pain

and history and connecting future generations with it.

Remembering Partition is not about generating hatred against any community. On the contrary, remembering Partition honestly is about understanding that human tragedy in which ordinary people from Hindu, Sikh, Jain, and other communities became the biggest victims.

Could India’s Partition have been averted? This question remains one of the most difficult questions in history, but if one seeks answers with impartiality, a glimpse of the truth will be found.

Many historians differ on whether Partition was inevitable or whether different political decisions could have preserved the possibility of a united India. However, if we turn the pages of history, we will find that through deliberate politics and conspiracies, several forces gradually widened distrust. Communal politics, British colonial policies, differences between the Congress and the Muslim League, the politics of separate electorates, and the haste in the transfer of power made the circumstances extremely complex.

But if we go back a little further with reality and impartiality, we can understand how major powers gradually worked towards this. It is my clear belief that just as the decision to partition Bengal, taken by the British in 1905, could be reversed in 1911, the Partition of India in 1947 could also have been prevented with the same vision.

What is the situation today? The hard truth is that because of that divisive decision, a permanent enemy in the form of Pakistan was created in our neighbourhood, which has constantly made malicious efforts to destabilise India. If the political will of that time had been firm in this complex and serious matter, the outcome today could have been different. Even if we had received power later, this Partition could have been stopped.

At that time, we needed to exert pressure that the British should first grant us independence and that we would then chart our own course forward. But that was not done. In a way, we surrendered before the British, the price of which continues to be paid even today.

In 1946, violence in Calcutta, Noakhali, Bihar, Punjab, and other regions, facilitated by the negligence of British rule and, in many instances, by organised political mobilisation, began to tear society apart from within.

Ultimately, under the guise of these circumstances, the British power, in collusion with the Muslim League, accelerated the transfer of power, and following the June 3, 1947, plan, the path to India’s Partition was opened.

However, one lesson of history is clear—when political disagreement turns into social distrust and fear replaces dialogue within society, the future of nations can change very rapidly.

The purpose of remembering this day is not merely to pick at the wounds of the past but to pay tribute to the indomitable courage, struggle, and sacrifice of those millions of unknown people who lost their loved ones during Partition and, even after losing everything, started their lives afresh from zero.

Prime Minister Modi’s vision is clear: a country that forgets its historical mistakes and tragedies can never strengthen its future. This day reminds us of the price of freedom and why the country’s integrity must always remain paramount for us.

It is extremely important to know why and how that massive destruction happened. The seeds of this tragedy were not sown overnight. Behind it were the British policy of “divide and rule”, the communal politics of the Muslim League, and certain weaknesses of the leadership of that time, which was in a hurry to attain power.

The result was that humanity was torn to shreds in the streets of Calcutta, Noakhali, Bihar, and Punjab. Families who had lived together in brotherhood for centuries were torn apart, and communities that had shared neighbourhoods, traditions, and relationships for generations suddenly found themselves on opposite sides of a bloody divide.

During Partition, it is estimated that around 14 to 16 million people were displaced. There are differences among historians regarding the death toll; generally, estimates range from several hundred thousand to about one million or more deaths. But these statistics do not tell the full picture of that tragedy.

A statistic cannot tell that a mother lost her child in a crowd. A number cannot tell that an elderly person cast a last glance back at his ancestral home. A government register cannot record that a girl’s wedding photograph, a family’s genealogy, a shop’s ledger, or a temple’s key was left behind.

Partition did not just displace people; it displaced people’s memories.

Refugee camps were established. Millions of people continued to cross the border on trains, bullock carts, foot, caravans, and trucks. Many trains reached their destinations, but the people sitting inside them were no longer alive. It was a soul-shaking spectacle.

Hindu, Sikh, and Jain women were especially victims of horrific violence. Incidents of rape, abduction, forced conversion, and separation from families occurred on a massive scale, with estimates suggesting that more than 100,000 women were affected. Women bore some of the deepest and often least-recorded pain of this tragedy.

Yet, even in the midst of this unimaginable devastation, one of the greatest human stories of India’s reconstruction began to unfold.

This was one of the greatest human stories of India’s reconstruction because, in this tragedy, it was not merely a piece of land that was left behind, nor were only brick-and-mortar houses abandoned. Our culture and civilisation themselves were shattered.

Sacred Geography and Faith

Ancient sites such as Nankana Sahib, Panja Sahib, Katas Raj, Hinglaj Mata Temple, Sharda Peeth, and Taxila were left behind. The places where our ancestors had practised spiritual meditation and devotion were suddenly on the other side of a line drawn on a map.

Cultural Continuity

The continuous stream of Sindhi, Punjabi, Multani, and Bengali cultures suffered a severe blow. Languages survived, dialects survived, but their natural development came to a standstill.

Punjab and Bengal were not merely administrative units. They were living civilisations of shared language, music, literature, cuisine, folk traditions, and family relationships. Partition severed these cultural worlds.

Lahore, Amritsar, Dhaka, Calcutta, Multan, Rawalpindi, Lyallpur, Sialkot—millions of Indian families had memories attached to these cities.

Dialects changed. The geographical continuity of families was broken. The meanings of folk songs changed. The communal character of festivals was affected. The streets where multiple communities had lived together began to lose their diversity.

Yet, culture did not die entirely. It came to India with the displaced families. It came in food, in language, in music, in stories, in folk songs, and survived in the memories of future generations.

This horror shook the Sikh community to its core. Punjab, the land of the Gurus and the heartland of a Sikh empire that had once extended towards Kabul, was divided into two. Historic gurdwaras and fertile Sikh lands were left behind. At the same time, the Jain community also lost its historical heritage and temples in cities such as Lahore and Sialkot.

Despite this, in this hour of crisis, the Sikh and Jain communities displayed remarkable humanity. They opened the doors of their temples, gurdwaras, and dharamshalas to refugees, providing them shelter and support when they had nowhere else to go.

Yet, even in this darkness, the extraordinary human capacity for reconstruction was visible.

In Delhi, Amritsar, Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Meerut, Jaipur, and many other cities across the country, refugees established new neighbourhoods, opened shops, set up industries, built schools, and restarted their lives. In cities such as Meerut, they established settlements like “Jain Nagar” and began their lives afresh.

In the history of Partition, the episode of Jogendra Nath Mandal, a prominent Dalit leader of that time, deserves special attention.

Mandal was one of the prominent Dalit leaders from Bengal and had political cooperation with the Muslim League. He believed that an alliance with the Muslim League could provide Dalits an opportunity to liberate themselves from upper-caste dominance and secure a rightful share in political power.

After the creation of Pakistan, he was made the first law and labour minister of Pakistan. This was an important symbol that a Dalit leader held a significant position in the power structure of the newly formed country. But this political experiment did not last long.

Under Mandal’s influence, a large number of people from the Dalit community went to Pakistan with hopes and dreams for their future. They were promised that Muslim and Dalit communities would move forward together and that, unlike India, future generations in Pakistan would be free from caste discrimination and other forms of social disadvantage.

Driven by these hopes, they overlooked a fundamental reality: in a country whose foundation was increasingly being shaped by religious exclusivism, how could adherents of other religions expect equal opportunities to progress?

Soon after Pakistan came into existence, the reality and intentions of its rulers began to become apparent.

In East Pakistan, incidents of discrimination, violence, and administrative neglect against Hindu Dalits increased steadily. Cases involving the abduction, rape, and forced conversion of Dalit girls became increasingly common. Even after becoming the Law Minister, Mandal found himself unable to do much to prevent this persecution, leaving him deeply disappointed.

Ultimately, in 1950, he resigned from his ministerial position in Pakistan and decided to return to India. In his resignation letter, he expressed serious concerns regarding the condition of minorities and their political rights.

Mandal’s experience also demonstrates that more important than constitutions and political declarations is the question of how a state actually protects its most vulnerable citizens.

Now the question arises: what would the picture be today if Partition had not happened?

Imagine if that line had never been drawn; how different the picture might have been. Undivided India could today have been the world’s third-largest economy. The trade network stretching from Karachi and Chittagong to Mumbai could have been one integrated economic system.

Better management of the Indus, Ganga, and Brahmaputra river systems could have made it easier to address challenges such as water scarcity and floods. There might have been no wars or cross-border terrorism, and Kashmiri Hindus might never have had to become refugees in their own country. The enormous resources spent on defence could instead have been directed towards national development.

The 15 years following Partition were filled with immense uncertainty and struggle. People lived in tents and spent nights on railway tracks, but through their hard work, courage, and resilience, they rebuilt their homes and their lives.

Today, when we look back, this is not merely the sorrow of the past; it is a reflection of our national consciousness. Through the efforts of the Modi government, the entire country is paying heartfelt tribute to those who sacrificed everything during this tragedy.

Our resolve must be that we always remember the land and cultural heritage of our ancestors and remain vigilant against forces that seek to divide the country so that history never repeats itself.

Therefore, 1947 must be remembered—not for hatred, but for consciousness.

For those millions of people whose graves were never made.

For those families whose homes remained in another country.

For those mothers who lost their children along the way.

For those children who understood the meaning of being a refugee in their childhood.

For those Sikh families who left behind their ancestral land and sacred sites in Punjab.

For those Jain families whose temples and settlements remained across the border.

For those Dalits who dreamed of securing their rights in a new political system and then collided with its harsh reality.

And for those countless human beings who saved another human being even amid violence.

The greatest monument to the horror of Partition is not a building. It is our collective memory.

It must be kept alive.

Because the greatest tragedies of history are repeated when society begins to believe that they never happened at all.

Yatendra Sharma is State Secretary and State Media In-charge of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Uttar Pradesh. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect News18’s views.