Multidisciplinary Scientific Reviewer │Monthly │ Volume-01 │ Issue-03 │Oct 2014
. Partition –The Pain and the Pathos Anupama.D.Deshraj , Associate Professor & Head Department English in GVISH, Amravati, Maharashtra, India
Partition – The word itself evokes a sense of fear and alienation. An entire generation of people lived through this dreaded crisis. The political ramification of Partition left India divided but it has left the psyche of millions of affected by it. Several decades later, this horrific historical event still has the power to rouse strong feelings of alienation, creates the ‘other’ among neighbours and drive the communities apart. I have grown up listening to ‘real stories’ from my mother about her experience of the aftermath of the partition. She was born in a land lord’s family in Meerut and led a very comfortable life. The family wealth and the large size of it was often the talk of town. This joint family had often given shelter to youngsters shifting from rural areas to study in the city. It was then that country was divided and the ‘refugees ’poured into the city by the thousands. Their large house sprawling over an area of seven acres in the Cantt was turned into a shelter for the refugees. My mother recalls that each family residing in their compound in tents had older people staying at home, looking after the little ones while the young and abled- bodied spread all over the city in search of any work they could get their hands on. Right from hawking their wares to stitching and sewing clothes –no work was below their dignity. The enterprising spirit and the struggle to survive saw the Sikhs, the Punjabis and the Sindhis spread all over India. The assimilation of these masses into Indian society is one of the success stories of the most turbulent times of modern India. The property rights , the rehabilitation and resettlement of the refugees took a long time. It was a traumatic experience for many who had left behind their roots, their place of worship and their homeland for generations. I grew up seeing an old Punjabi lady in my neighbourhood. She was a beauty fair-skinned, blue eyed and bent over with age. She was my grandmother’s friend. The two of them spent long sweltering summer hours, sharing their woes and miseries. This Punjabi lady and my granny had both suffered the loss of their young children. My young uncle died tragically leaving my granny mourning till her death. But this Punjabi settler in our town was unique . She had come with her young sons and had survived the ordeal of being dispossessed of all their belongings and the hardship of travelling all the way from Lahore to an unknown and unheard place called Nagpur. Her family started a small eatery and suitably enough named it ‘Hindustan Hotel’. The hard working sons soon turned it into a profitable business. But this old lady offered a sweet and savoury treat along with a cup of tea to anyone who was ready to listen to her tales of loss and misery. She had lost her young daughter during the Partition. She did not know wheather she was alive or dead. Her detailed description of events and her plea for help to locate the whereabouts of her daughter moved every listeners to tears. Her helplessness and the futility of the entire violence that erupted
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Multidisciplinary Scientific Reviewer │Monthly │ Volume-01 │ Issue-03 │Oct 2014
during the partition left a mark on everyone who met her. She died, eager to meet her daughter –no longer willing to be away from her. Another story that I heard was from an old man who had come to India from Punjab(Pakistan). He had witnessed his parents, a young brother and sister being slaughtered before his eyes. Taking his young bride and two remaining sisters, he boarded a train with absolutely no belongings. Somehow he landed in an already overcrowded Delhi and decided to move further along. Hunger made the family get down at a place called Nagpur. They had never heard of it but somehow felt that it could be closer to Nanded,the holy city made famous by Guru Govind Singhji. Soon, he got a job as a truck driver and started earning a princely amount of rupees fifty. With sheer hard work, the young Sikh rose to become the President of Transporters Federation, started schools and colleges under Sikh Education Society,opened Gurudwaras for all devotees, joined the government as a legislator and died a very rich and successful man. But life had not been easy. Despite all the struggles, the Sikhs did not forget to celebrate life. Holi, Diwali, Baisakhi were all to be a special way of celebrating Raksha Bandhan. Anew dress and a set of jewellery was donated in the name of a sister lost. The members displaced or lost forever have never been forgotten. The partition narratives are testimony to the fact that the women of Sikhs, Hindus and Muslims were among the greatest victims of religious and cultural persecution. Once the inevitable partition was decided and announced, it created a mental shock among the Hindus and the Sikhs who began to worry about their future safety and peace. But the news of separate country a lot of jubilation amongst the Muslim population. Both the Hindus on one hand and the Muslim on the other hand suddenly became aware of their separate identity. The individual identities merged with the identity of the community and having good relations begins to drift apart because of the communal hatred aggravated by the partition of the country. On both sides of the newly created border, women were kidnapped, abducted, raped and brutally killed. Defilement of a woman’s body was considered to be the violence inflicted upon women was equivalent to a sacrilege against one’s religion, country, family . Many women died trying to avoid sexual violation, preserve their chastity, and protect their religious and family honour. Some women set themselves ablaze and sometimes all the women in family committed mass suicide. The history of Indian Civilization that boasts of the legacy of worshipping the womenfolk as goddesses will always remember those gruesome incidences with shame. Chaman Nahal .the writer wrote “The women that were discovered were led away silently by their families. None shows joy at reunion; some seemed sorry the girls had come back at all,soiled and dishonoured.” Writers from both the sides have written about partition depicting their own sides. Chaman Nahal’s “Azadi”, Khuswant singh’s “Train to Pakistan”,Salman Rushdie’s “Midnights’s Children, Manju Kapur’s “Difficult Daughters, Manohar Malgonkar’s “A Bend in the Ganges”, Bapsi Sidhwa’s “Ice Candy –Man”, Bhisham Sahni’s “Tamas”,
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Multidisciplinary Scientific Reviewer │Monthly │ Volume-01 │ Issue-03 │Oct 2014
Partition is not a bygone event, it still lingers in the minds of the people.The people who suffered are still enduring the hurt from the era because the emotional and psychological issues from the past incidents stills hangs with them in their hearts and minds. The stories do not record the pain,trauma and sufferings of those who had to part from their kin, friends, and neighbours , their deepening nostalgia for places they had lived in for generations, the anguish of devotees removed from their places of worship, and the harrowing experience of the countless people who boarded trains thinking they would be transported to the realization of their dreams, but of whom not a man , woman or child survived the journey. Examining Partition from a literary perspective provides keener insight into the vacillating personal experiences and national histories.
These stories are of recalling certain memories,feeling of disillusionment with the self,others and the the nation. They exhibits the tensions of self-definition based exclusively on religion and nationalistic grounds.Seizing of property, raping women and murdering children in the fields,refugee camps and of mass exodus.The conflict of religion was their then and it still persists now. Hoshyarpur to Lahore In this paper the researcher has tried to discuss the pathos of women from both the sides of the borders through the Paro the heroine of Pinjar and Bano the heroine of Dastaan. Dastaan showcases famous actors such as Samina Peerzada, Saba Qamar, and Bilal Khan. It primarily highlights the pathos of society and the instability that broke ties between kin during the harsh times of partition. It depicts how India was suffering from internal turmoil; it was being ripped apart in to two pieces, and the people were bleeding with it. Although, to the viewer, Razia Butt’s stance in Dastaan might come across as nationalistic, leaning towards Pakistan and Muslims in general. However, the writer still did a commendable job at striking a balance of both good and evil in all three religious groups, Islam, Sikhism and Hinduism. One example is when a Hindu man tried to insult and rape Bano, simply for being a Muslim woman, another Hindu came to her rescue Based on the novel, Bano, Dastaan begins with the wedding of Suraiya (Saba Qamar), Hassan's aunt and Bano's soon-to-be sister-in-law. She is engaged to Saleem (Ahsan Khan), bano's eldest brother, Hassan (Fawad Khan) and Bano (Sanam Baloch) had not seen each other for years and had no relationship whatsoever prior to Suraiya and Saleem's wedding. They slowly begin to develop feelings for each other, with Hassan visiting Ludhiana every now and then. Hassan is in his final year at the Islamia College as an engineer student. He is an active supporter of the All-India Muslim League, and the leader of the Ludhiana Branch. He strongly believes in the establishment of Pakistan and is an avid follower of Qaid-E-Azam, leader of the Muslim League and Pakistan Movement. Meanwhile, Bano's brother and Suraiya's husband, Saleem, is an active supporter of the Indian Congress, with all his friends being Hindu, and believes that the establishment of Pakistan will not help, but rather lessen the position of Muslims in India. The political debate between Saleem and Hassan begins as friendly competition, but intensifies as conditions worsen throughout India for Muslims. Saleem, hot-tempered and rash, begins to bring political debates into family life and eventually forbids Suraiya to visit Hassan or his mother Rasheeda, her only sister. But Hassan is not dissuaded. He continues to spread the message of Pakistan throughout Saleem's family, causing
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Multidisciplinary Scientific Reviewer │Monthly │ Volume-01 │ Issue-03 │Oct 2014
Saleem's anger to explode on many occasions. Other than Saleem, his entire family become strong supporters of the Muslim League, especially Bano, who makes posters and signs for the Pakistan Movement. Hassan and Bano eventually become engaged, and Saleem decides to leave behind his rivalry with Hassan for Bano's sake. Soon, Hassan gets a job in Rawalpindi and has to leave immediately. He and Rasheeda leave Ludhiana, with the promise that they will be back 5 months later for the wedding. Meanwhile, Suraiya is pregnant. During this time tensions between Hindus and Muslims escalate dramatically, and violence outbreaks all throughout India. Hate crimes against Muslims become common, and the fighting spreads all across India states, getting threateningly closer to Ludhiana every day. As the fighting becomes more pronounced, Muslims retaliate, leaving nobody safe. Saleem seems to be under the impression that his Hindu friends and families will be able to protect his family from rioters, but upon trying to get this assurance from them, they say, "What will we say to them? Why would they listen to us?" Saleem begins sensing a cold distance his Hindu friends have developed towards him and, while on his way home, encounters a sobbing Muslim man who lost his entire family and home. He begins to realize the importance of the creation of Pakistan and rushes home, telling his family to tightly lock up their doors and gates and to be ready for any kind of attack. On a fateful night, a group of Sikhs and Hindus attack the family's home. All of the men, which includes many other Muslims who sought refuge in their house, stay on the bottom floor with their swords and knives intending to fight. All the women— including Bano, Suraiya, and Bibi (Bano's mother)--are huddled on the roof of the house. Saleem and all the men brutally murdered in a terrible massacre. A pregnant Suraiya, upon seeing her husband stabbed, throws herself off the roof to be with her dying husband. She lays next to him, trying to move her bloodied hand to be with his when a Sikh rioter brutally stabs her womb, killing Suraiya and her baby. Other women also throw themselves from the roof while others are carried away to be raped and killed. Bano's other brother, before being killed, shouts to his mother, "Choke Bano!" Bano's mother, with Bano's tearful consent, tries to choke her to death to protect her from losing her honor, virtue, and religion from theHindu and Sikh rapists, but two of Saleem's Hindu friends arrive claiming to save them. Saleem's friend, Ram, tries to rape Bano, but his other friend saves her by killing Ram out of guilt. Bano, alone with her mother, manages to escape Ludhiana, where they seek shelter in a refugee camp for Muslims. The Muslim refugees are headed by a young brave Muslim man who lost his entire family. Thirsty and hungry, they try to walk to Pakistan, encountering poisoned wells along the way. Eventually, Hindu rioters attack this caravan. Bano is separated from her mother and raped. It is presumed her mother is raped as well; Bano crawls toward her mother's now lifeless body, seeing her Ta'wiz necklace next to it. Bano, grief-stricken and in shock, wears her mother's necklace and lays next to her body. A Sikh man (Bilal Khan) stumbles upon Bano and her dead mother, and he helps nurse her back to health after her first rape. He then boards her on a train heading toward Lahore and leaves. It was common for trains to arrive in Lahore full of dead
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Muslims with only a few survivors, and this train was no exception: it is attacked bySikh rioters. Basant Singh (Babrik Shah), a rioter, chases after Bano on the train. She turns around and shouts, "Do it! Do whatever you want to do! Your Guru (God) will never forgive you! I'll ask him myself if he taught you Sikhs to do this to girls." She then falls unconscious, and Basant Singh kidnaps her, bringing her to his home. She awakens in his home where he and his mother live. At first, she refuses to tell them her name, and so Basant Singh calls her Sundar Kaur, meaning "beautiful princess," in Punjabi. He gives her the impression that he will take her to Pakistan himself once the dangers are gone. He also tells her she can write to Hassan and he'll deliver the letters. Bano believes his lies and cannot wait to go to Pakistan. Throughout her time there, they constantly try to convert her to Sikhism. They take her to the Gurdwara to pray, but she sneaks off and prays the Muslim salat. Basant's mother also forcibly teaches her how to recite Sikh scripture and forces her to wear the silver bracelet Sikhs wear. Bano says to his mother, "I can forget everything in this world. I can forget that I am Naseeruddin's daughter, that I am the sister of Faheem and Saleem, and that I am Hassan's fiance. But I can never forget that I am first and foremost a Muslim. I will never bow down to your Guru Granth Sahib!" Nearly a year later, Basanta has not lived up to his promise, claiming that the roadways are still blocked and that traveling to Pakistan is too dangerous of a venture. Eventually, Bano learns of his plans to forcibly marry her and convert her, and she attempts to run away again. This time though, when Basanta catches her, he doesn't treat her gently as with the first time. He tries whatever method he can to break her; beating her, raping her, forcing her to become a Sikhni (in vain), marrying her, and in the end, having her give birth to his child. After many years Basant Singh runs to the roof to go save his child, because he is about to fall off a roof. Instead, he slips, falls, and dies. Bano immediately takes her son and leaves to go to Pakistan. Whilst this is happening, Hassan eventually falls in love with Rabia and they become engaged. Bano is taken by a lady who sends a letter to Hassan to inform him Bano is here. Hassan receives the letter and takes Bano and the child home. Hassan decides to marry Bano as she has became his responsibility now and he wants to break off his engagement to Rabia. Rabia and her mother have been told about Hassan breaking off the engagement and they go to Hassan’s house. Rabia's mother tells Rabia to take care of Bano so Hassan can see you can look after her whilst being Hassan's wife. Rabia does what her mom tells her and looks after Bano, Hassan sees this and is happy. However one days he over hears a conversation between his mom and Rabia mom about Rabia taking care of Bano so Hassan can marry her and gets angry. He argues with Rabia saying that how can she try winning my heart by looking after Bano now and after the wedding you forget her and she becomes a "piece of furniture" Rabia says that just like him, Bano is her relative, and now that even if he does ask her to marry her she will says no. She says that her love is more true than his is for Bano. Bano overhears this and interrupts them telling them that if they truly want to do something for her, get married. The next day Hassan doesn't find Bano and realises she left the house. He blames everyone in the house. Bano is living with a family where she does their household chores, she gets a job in a modern family where she realises that Pakistan is not how she thought it would be.
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Bano goes to work to get her stuff and the man there takes her to the storage room and attempts to abuse her. She takes the scissors that were to cut open the boxes and stabs hims to death. She is happy because she says that she has cleaned the grounds of Pakistan. Police find about Bano's murder, and is taken to jail. Hassan and Rabia get married, but still visit her in jail. Both Dastaan and Pinjar speaks the pain and pathos of the heroine Banoo and Puro. These two female characters suffer because of their gender and religion. It has always been seen that women folk are the suffers as they always accepts things and considers their pain as a part of their destiny. In conclusion, it can be said that each country suffered immensely and nearly a million lives were lost. Literature on either of the border drawn after ‘the partition’, has reflected its own perspective. Years later, there is a clamour to build memorials for the leaders who failed ( in my opinion) to provide true leadership. I feel the best way to remember those lost million lives (and now forgotten by the ruling class) is by not building any memorial but by living in peace and harmony . The pain and the pathos exist but let peace prevail above everything else.
WORK CITED:- 1.Pramod K.Nair, Literary Theory Today,(2002) Asia Book Club , New Delhi. 2.Sheela Tiwari & Neetu Baghel,The Poignancy Felt By The Helpless &Innocent Victims Displaced By The Partition.(2014).Dattsons,New Delhi. 3.Sharmila Ray,Partition Poetry:Relocating An Archive, 2014,,Dattson,New Delhi. 4.www.Literature Across The Border.com 5.www.Pinjar.com. 6.www.Dastaan.com.
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