Indo-Pak Partition: Mass Migration of Punjabis from West Punjab and its Socio-political Impacts

Description

Page: 433-437

Gurmangeet Kaur Pandey (Pursuing MA in Sociology from Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi, Delhi)

The objective of this essay is to explore the how movement of people affects ‘home’ and ‘host’ socially and politically. To fulfill this purpose, the forced mass migration that happened at the dawn of independence due to partition is taken into account. Firstly, the migration of 1947 is distinguished from the majority of migrations taking place today (in which economic factors are predominant). Then a small section is devoted to examining how the Radcliffe line was drawn and its ‘mechanical nature’, i.e., it was spontaneous and done without much thought. Then social and political impact of the migration is examined with the help of ethnographic examples and secondary literature. Unique kinship structures of Punjabis, how their movement brought about changes in dietary habits, how they are still called refugees despite legally being citizens, and how they react to cultural wrongs of partition. Then there is a discussion about how Punjabis who once lived on the fringes of the city (Delhi) went on to become the commanding elites of the city by first gaining economic dominance and then gaining dominance in the political power structure. Examples of those politicians are given whose political achievements confirm this fact. Examples of politicians such as ex-prime ministers Dr. Manmohan Singh, I.K. Gurjal, and politicians like R.K. Dhawan, Sushma Swaraj, Sunil Dutt are given. Then there is a small discussion about how the perception of partition has changed across generations in the migrant families and how a shift towards Hindu right is being seen as far as their political ideology is concerned. I conclude that the political and social impact of this migration often overlap and cannot be compartmentalized.