undergraduate thesis
The Invisible Satchel:
An exploration into the experience of Sindhi-Hindus during the Partition of India
and the significance of these testimonies in the Indian diaspora
Pain is like an invisible satchel; we often don’t realise how heavy it becomes and for how long we have been wearing it. It hides under the weight of everyday life, of priorities and perspective until the burden of the satchel, growing heavier each day, becomes an intrinsic part of who we are.
The kind of pain kept inside the satchel is one that has been suppressed for many years. It has been kept tightly locked by the naivety of youth, and any attempts to pick the lock start unravelling the myriad of coping mechanisms that have woven together to form the very fabric of who we are.
Emotional trauma of any scale is not generally talked about in Asian communities around the world. Ours is not a culture of oversharing. Feminists may say its because of the deeply patriarchal aspects of our cultures, others because of a minimalist culture of expression. From my understandings over the last 21 years, its not because we’re oppressed by heavy-tongued men, or because we lack the vocabulary to voice our pain. It is because of the focus that diaspora culture places on the mundane; of living day-to-day and making sure families have the bare necessities.
The Indian diaspora is made up of immigrants from all backgrounds and it stretches like a brown patchwork quilt to all corners of the globe. Despite the diversity, there are trends in our stories. Arriving to new countries where the official language does not flow as easily as it used to, having to build up support systems manually, from the ground up, all contribute to the culture of compartmentalisation. It is how excessive emotions are bottled up and slotted into the satchel that is almost sewn in to the base of our spines.
Slowly, as stability grabs the family unit as if to say, “Don’t worry, you can be with ease instead of anxiety,” the strands of the satchel begin to loosen, but only slightly. With systematic pulling and prodding, slowly it begins to disintegrate. The uncorking of emotional bottles is like a salve to some, the first honest deep breath that they’ve enjoyed in years.
For others, recounting tales, allowing oneself to think about their journey thus far is a painful process. It’s a reminder of the foreign land of the past, that contain voices of people no longer able to tell their own stories. It is only through gentle discussion that un-bottling the vials in the satchel becomes a form of catharsis.
When I talk in metaphors about un-bottling and recognising trauma, I speak directly to the reality of so many of the elder generations in the Indian diaspora. Partition survivors, as they have come to be known in scholarship, are relics of the past, unwritten books telling the unwhitewashed reality of living through the dissemination of the British Raj and the creation of Pakistan.
They say museums are a historian’s best friend. They’re synonymous with history and walking through the hallowed halls, no matter the geography, is often like walking through the halls of time itself. Each object is a direct window into a time long since passed, flies on the wall of some of the most infamous historical events. Its no wonder then, that my grandparents are both my best friends.
My Nani and Dadu, or Dr Pushpa and Professor Kamal Bose are my maternal grandparents. They both lived through one of the most violent transitions from colonialism to independence; Partition. We are fortunate to see each other once or twice a year, and each time, I look at them with awe. They are pillars of strength that decorate building façades of adversity; the kinds of which that Hollywood can only dream of.
My Nani and Dadu have always been opposites in most senses of the word, a potential contributing factor to their 54 year marriage. The dichotomy in their Partition stories could not be more apparent. Compared to Nani, my Dadu was not a refugee, instead experienced Partition from the inside. Like many other Sindhi-Hindus, Nani and her family were painted refugees by the Partition conflict and had to leave everything and flee into the fragmented geography created by the Radcliffe line.
Not only did the Sindhi community face tumult like all other Indians, they also fought the enemy of erasure. Since 1947, there has been no internally allocated territory for the community, especially the population of Sindhi-Hindus, like Nani, who were forced to leave the area of Sindh that became Karachi after Partition. Hindus living in Muslim majority provinces, and vice versa became verified horror stories, hardly any minority made it out alive. Partition allowed the seeds of hate and distrust that had been sowed by the British to blossom. Fires of hate that had been carefully stoked during the Raj engulfed even the most rational people.
The whole country was burning
70 years later, the Sindhi community still battles erasure. The plight of the Sindhi people is rarely mentioned in already whitewashed history books, or in discourse about Partition and its effects. In 2011, there was an attempt to remove ‘Sindh’ from the Indian national anthem.3 Although unsuccessful, it merely represents a larger issue that India has. The trauma of Partition and the end of the Raj is hardly addressed.
Domestic issues that are rooted in the British occupation are swept under the proverbial rug, or slotted into the satchel and tidied away. A culture of self-hatred has formed in its place. We are soon to blame our own people and make mass generalisations about the current state of the country, without realising that we perpetuate the culture of psychological colonisation and self-hatred put in place by the British.
As the generations who experienced Partition first hand reaches the ‘winter of their lives’, as Nani likes to say, younger generations in our community have become the custodians of this precious collective memory. The sacrifices made by my grandparent’s generation, their parents and so many others before them in the Raj must not be forgotten. They endured circumstances created by the upper echelons of the British government, that sought to rape and pillage India for the direct benefit of the Crown.
It is only because of their sacrifices that the United Kingdom is still able to wear its crown of moral superiority.
I will attempt to discuss some of the experiences of the Sindhi-Hindu community that were cultivated by the adoption of Sindh into Pakistan. I will also try and place their survivor testimonies in the wider context of the Indian diaspora, and discuss the historical significance of such.
My interviews with Sindhi-Hindu survivors have reinforced the underlying fact that history that is not the mainstream and oftentimes contradicts our own knowledge and existing literature, is not wrong. It is just as valid, and these stories and the people telling them have just as much of a place on the historical bookshelf as any other experiences.
Slowly we unravel. Slowly we unpick. Slowly, we learn the truth that so many never had the chance to tell themselves.
Although not the only conflict in a former British colony that occurred after independence, Partition is an example of the most violent chaos that the process of rapid decolonisation caused.
“Partition is to the psyche of Indians and Pakistanis what the Holocaust is to the Jews.”- Adil Najam
In direct comparison to work done by historians in order to facilitate reconciliation processes surrounding the Holocaust, to date, there has been no such reconciliation attempts around Partition. Existing history around colonised India is coated in a thick layer of whitewash, however the recent trend in revisionist history has sought to remedy this. But, in the global conscious, Partition is, at least to the survivors I interviewed, is severely overlooked.
India as a country hasn’t necessarily helped things. The narrative of moving forward and building a stable nation after what can only be described as a tumultuous handover has placed an emphasis on forgetting rather than remembering. After all the trauma she endured, one cannot blame Bharat Mata (Mother India) for choosing to adopt this strategy as she finally stood on her own two feet again. However, as historians recognise that generations of Indians who survived Partition are slowly becoming few, not-for-profit crowdsourced projects such as the 1947 Partition Archives have grown.
The question of the historical significance of this topic is slightly tricky. Significance, after all, is a subjective concept. Historical significance has long been decided by the victor, in terms of Partition history, the British. The creation of ‘hero’ narratives by the UK in order to justify their behaviour in India, and the refutation of indigenous, un-whitewashed historical narratives have sent the message to survivors and Indians in the wider diaspora that our history is not comparatively significant.
Historical significance has said to be determined by whether or not the themes in the history discussed can be linked to larger trends. The experiences of Sindhi-Hindus is historically significant because not only is it intimate history for me, reflecting a personal, familial, cultural and ancestral topic, but it also fits more broadly into Partition narratives. It explains the symbolic significance of why Independence Day celebrations in India are important in reclaiming nationalism. The experiences of Sindhi-Hindus is also a great teacher of contemporary lessons, of why humanity must not let similar events occur in the future.
“I think it’s so important that they tell their stories because if anything like this happens again… we can’t let it happen again. It was the end of the world for so many people, it was the end of the world. We can’t let it happen again.”- Sameer Syed
The fundamental importance of oral history to the historical significance of the Sindhi-Hindu experience cannot be overlooked. As Portelli says, “Oral sources give us information about people or social groups whose written history is either missing or distorted.”
There exists few thorough recounts of Sindhi-Hindu written history among the limited Partition scholarship. Without the insistence of modern historians in documenting the oral histories in the remaining Partition survivors, it is only a matter of time before they are lost to us as a community forever.
“Now we say folks can steal your wealth, but not your knowledge.”- Anonymous Interviewee
Discussing the experiences of Sindhi-Hindus creates a niche for the community to tell their history where there wasn’t one before. It is significant because it helps place their experiences in the wider context of Partition scholarship as they are most often left out of mainstream narratives due to the territorial, cultural and linguistic erasure they faced as a result of their mass exodus.
In contemporary terms, the niche that is afforded to the Sindhi-Hindu community in which they can tell their history is especially important in a time where we have white nationalism in Britain rejoicing in Brexit, and a correlated rise in anti-immigrant sentiments across the globe. Documenting the Sindhi-Hindu experience and slotting it into the wider history of Partition, helps to bolster against right-wing cries of demanding that indigenous peoples as a whole,‘move on’ and ‘get over’ their painful histories.
The effects of the trauma created by Partition still silently lives on. Non-whitewashed, holistic histories create what our current narratives do not; acknowledgement. Without understanding the past, not just in terms of the historical ‘victor’, we cannot go on to build a stable future. Above all, teaching and promoting inclusive authentic history promotes a sense of equality. These stories, especially those in the Sindhi-Hindu community are no less important than the tales of those part of the ethnic majority, both inside and outside of the subcontinent.
“We have no culture anymore.” -Pushpa Bose
Transcribing this direct quote from the interview with Nani, and even more broadly unearthing the oral histories of elders in my family, it seems to make my very soul ache. I truly underestimated the profound effect that writing this article would have on me. Never before have I had to confront the harsh realities of the experiences of the elders around me, and never have I had to consider the invisible satchels they have worn for so many years. In examining oral histories from the survivors I interviewed, I have used “confrontation as a ‘search for unity’”, within my own partiality and positioning.
When I asked her to elaborate, Nani said that because Sindhis had been forced to leave Sindh, they had resultantly lost their “identity, culture and language.” Her two younger siblings never got the chance to learn the Sidhi language as their relocation to Delhi prioritised Hindi over other local dialects. Like many other immigrants, Nani and her family have had to redefine what it means to be a Sindhi-Hindu in their own terms, in the context of the diaspora.
‘Comparison has become the thief of joy to many Sindhi-Hindus’, she says as she compares her own experience to that of my Dadu. Compared to him, a proud Bengali man who has so much experience, identity and pride in his Kolkata state nationality, Sindhi-Hindus do not enjoy the same deep rooted nationalism, Nani elaborates.
The collation of information about the niche experiences of Sindhi-Hindus will perhaps allow for a modern identity to be built, that wraps a supportive, validating hand around the countless families who, “never dreamt that they would lose everything.” The above quote from an extended relative, Mr. Mohan Dadlani, is best reflective of the Partition experience. Partition was an unfathomable horror on both sides and it brought out the worst capabilities of humankind. Painted with the brush of hindsight, many documentaries that have interviewed Partition survivors, and even participants in my own interviews have expressed that Partition was unnecessary. There were some religious tensions but no one could have ever foretold the reaction to the decision to Partition India
Man: “This part of Punjab, and that part of Punjab they were once the same, so the cultures are very similar.”
Anthony Bourdain: “Well, it’s a popular metaphor for India/Pakistan, is twins separated at birth.”
Man: “They were never twins. I mean, it was one country. You could say ‘dismembered’. If you cut a body in two, it is not going to become twins…It’s sad you know. You—you can see them. They are doing the same work as you are doing. They dress the same. They look the same. But you can’t talk to them.”
-Transcript from Anthony Bourdain; Parts Unknown (S03,E01)
Even though most of my interview subjects were children at the time of Partition, there is hardly an air of youthful innocence that shrouds their recounts.
“Psychologically; they bear heavy scars. The scars have been permanent.” -Anonymous Interviewee
Trends in our stories, despite differences in circumstances became apparent during my research. Stories of Partition survival are often incomplete without the mention of the trains, and the Indian railway. It is said that almost 15 million people crossed borders that were created by the Radcliffe line, and the vast train network that the British had thrust across the nation facilitated this movement. The “geography of trauma” although physically limited to India and Pakistan, knows no emotional borders.
Almost hand in hand with the imagery in testimonies about train journeys are themes of ‘near misses’. The disparity of minutes, and sometimes, even seconds allowed for families to escape, for events to unfold that would have entirely rewritten the chapter in the book of the lives of so many. It is here that some derive their faith in God. Sometimes, the word coincidence falls painfully short when describing the plethora of ‘near misses’ during this time.
Nani tells a story of a missed train and the anguish that another night had to be spent sleeping on the platform. Tensions among the adults ran high and anxiety was in the air. After a restless sleep, they awoke the next morning to the news that the very train they had missed, that they had seen leave the station before their eyes, full of Hindu refugees had been slaughtered. The train had been hijacked by Muslim rebels halfway through the journey and none who had got on the train, ever disembarked.
Trains were the motorised saviour of so many people, they allowed for safe and efficient passage across miles of land to safety. But, they are also the site of so many endings. Famous massacres, such as ones in Amritsar and Calcutta have been recorded extensively. But what of the ones that fall through the cracks?
“Somebody threw the stone of 1947 in the middle of the pond. A thousand ripples erupted from the bottom of the pond. Every ripple has a story behind it …” -Gulzar
The stories carried by the ripples have often been justified through the lens of religion, not uncommon in dealing with traumatic events on any scale.16 India has and always will be a deeply religious place, the birthplace of Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism and Jainism. India’s connection to religion and the importance placed upon it, is partially what led to Partition.
Many British historians have argued that irreconcilable religious differences were to blame for the decision to split the country. It is easy to step back and allow the need for justification to assign blame where there isn’t any. Coexistence engulfed India long before the entrance of any European colonial power. The patchwork quilt of difference was not always sewn with the thread of peace, however, to shove blame on religious tensions would be to steal the spotlight of responsibility from who it should be directly pointed at.
The scale and effects of the trauma of Partition is reflected in the crisis of faith so many experienced after witnessing untold horrors. One has to ask the question of the severity and permanence of the kind of trauma that forced a plethora of deeply religious people to lose faith in such an integral part of their culture and identity.
After Partition, life in the refugee camp was like hell and I lost faith in God…I started losing faith in God. I could not believe that a loving and Just God would allow kind hearted persons like my parents and other refugees to suffer so much without any fault on their part.” -M. Dadlani
Two years ago, on a trip to India with my grandparents, we caught the Rajdhani Express from Kolkata to Delhi. We stood at the platform and waited for our train. I didn’t think twice about stepping on and finding our cabin, letting the melody flowing through my white earphones distract me from the hubbub of the station. Soon, the Indian landscape flowed past, uninterrupted except for the occasional village.
70 years ago, there would have been no guarantee that my grandparents and I would have safely reached Delhi. Even base objects, such as the train carried such different meaning to not only my own family, but many of my fellow Indians. Without the efforts of archival projects, these connotations would never have been uncovered. I would never think twice about what it now means to be able to travel on the domestic Indian rail network, with both my Nani and Dadu seated safely beside me. Learning about our history has not only given me an appreciation for even the most mundane aspects of everyday life, but everything is dusted with a fine coating of the sweet taste of value.
Sitting on this train is not just sitting on a worn seat. It’s a privilege that so many before me never had the chance to do, or, one that was violently taken from them
The next morning, we arrive at Delhi station. After making sure that our belongings are with us, we alight at the platform. Amongst the chaos that is Delhi, there are only pockets of quiet refuge.
If anyone listened, they would have been able to hear the sound of the invisible satchels hitting our backs lightly with every step we took.