The Partition of Bengal - Past, Present and Future February 25, 2006

Fifty eight years of Independence have done little to diminish the scale of interest in the events which led to the end of the British Raj and the division of India into two sovereign independent states. Indian mainstream historiography failed miserably to cite the wrongs of Partition, a conspiracy first given a political shape in the plan to divide Bengal in 1905, by Lord Curzon, the then Viceroy. That conspiracy was defeated at the time by the united resistance of the people of Bengal.

But ultimately this conspiracy nevertheless did succeed, almost exactly four decades later on the 15th of August, 1947. This conspiracy was responsible for the bloodshed and the unresolved legacy of bitterness between the two successor states along with endless communal strifes India has had to bear since Independence. In many ways it has overshadowed the release of the subcontinent from colonial rule; unlike the event which is now taken for granted, it continues to be an important factor in the complexion of South Asia. Accompanied by bloody rioting and the transfer of populations and far from laying discord at rest, it merely institutionalised that discord at an international level.

Partition continues to have an impact in the memories of millions of individuals and families affected by communal slaughter and ethnic cleansing, in the continuing dispute over Kashmir and in the costly military and nuclear stand off between the two countries.

In the centenary year of Curzon's evil design to vivisect Bengal, an investigation of the history behind Partition of India has a relevance beyond the event itself. The problem of Hindu-Muslim antagonism in undivided India during the last phase of the British Empire has a relevance beyond the confines of that time and space, and an examination of how it arose may throw light to avoid similar horrific situations in the future.