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

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has taken up the responsibility of preserving this pain and history and connecting future generations with it

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.

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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........

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