Partition

Aug

2019

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Look back in hope

Expert InsightAnjali Roy, IIT Kharagpur, Independence, Independence Day, memory, Partition, postmemory, Routledge

Can there be looking ahead without looking back? The 73rd Independence Day of India could be a good time to ask the question. But as Prof. Anjali Roy’s just-released book on the ‘memories and post memories of Partition’ makes obvious, the question is a complicated one, for looking back itself is a complicated task. One reason that has complicated the ‘looking back’ at Partition –a fact of history indissociable from Independence - is the deafening silence surrounding it. Part of this is because of the conscious erasure of the disturbing memories of Partition in order to promote the triumphalist narrative…

Nov

2018

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By Chirosree Basu

Beyond the horror and heartbreak of Partition

Expert Insight1947, Anjali Gera Roy, embodied violence, heartbreak, horror, IIT Kharagpur, Partition, Partition Archive, untold stories, victimhood, victims

Dr Anjali Gera Roy's ongoing project, “After Partition: Post-memories of the Afterlife of Partition 1947”, is part of the worldwide initiative to record the stories of the victims of Partition as they orally recount their horror and heartbreak A house by the river. Moonshine on the waters. And an amazing sunrise every day. That is how Sova Mukherjee recounts the idyll she had to leave behind in Noakhali when political vagaries and Partition drove them away from their land. The family got divided as they shifted to Ganderia in old Dhaka and then to Kolkata before coming together again. Sova…