September 12, 2022 • 25 mins
This week, Neha is joined by the founder of the 1947 Partition Archive, Dr. Guneeta Singh Bhalla and author and oral historian Aanchal Malhotra. They discuss how they preserve the stories of Partition survivors.
Sources/Links:
Follow Neha on Instagram and Twitter
Follow Partition on Instagram and Twitter
- Remnants of Partition: 21 Objects from a Continent Divided by Aanchal Malhotra
- https://www.1947partitionarchive.org/
- https://www.aanchalmalhotra.com/
- https://museumofmaterialmemory.com/
Voiceover for Aanchal Malhotra is provided by Wajiha Rizvi
Voiceover for Bagh Malhotra is provided by Noorbanu Virji
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Before this week's episode, I wanted to take a moment
to let y'all know about the devastating floods happening in
Pakistan right now. Over thirty million people have been affected,
with the death toll around eleven hundred and rising with
every passing day. Entire buildings are being washed away, with
many people sustaining injuries. I encourage every listener to donate
(00:22):
any amount they can to help alleviate this disaster. You
can find a list of organizations to send funds to
linked in the show notes. These stories had to be
the thing with saud Asia and many other ancient cultures
of the world is that all our histories are all
(00:45):
While there is such a beauty in these older traditions,
there is also real fear that these stories will get
lost if they're not driking down. I really felt that
that I didn't want these nuances to be raced. I
wanted to where do you go if you want to
(01:09):
pay tribute to someone? Most people would visit a specific
place like a grave, a memorial, or a site that
has been well preserved for visitors. But what if you
don't have any of those places at your disposal? Neither
India nor Pakistan have any memorials dedicated to partition. There
is no communal place to reflect on this grief. One
(01:31):
of the only ways we can ensure that memories and
stories of those who went through this very distressing event
don't get lost is by preserving their oral histories. Children
and grandchildren of partition survivors took it upon themselves to
start asking questions, recording interviews, and writing down stories that
their elders told them. It became clear that if they
(01:52):
didn't note these histories, no one else would. From I
Heart Radio, I'm Najazi's and This is Partition, a podcast
that will take a closer look into this often forgotten
part of history. My grandparents from my father's side, my
(02:29):
paternal grandparents and my dad when he was a baby,
they migrated from Lahore to what is now India in
ninety seven and it was a forced migration. It wasn't
something that they wanted to do, but you know, like
millions of people, they were uprooted from their home and uh,
you know, I grew up in India. The first ten
years of my life. I was an army kid, so
(02:49):
I lived in a lot of different places, including Gemmuine, Kashmi.
That's Dr Gunita Singh Bala, the founder of the ninety
seven Partition an Archive. You may recall her telling us
about the vast differences between what she learned about partition
from her family versus what she learned from school from
episode two. This discrepancy is something that has stayed with
(03:11):
her for decades. When conned the travel to Japan to
conduct research for her PhD, she visited the Hiroshima Peace Memorial.
It was here that she was inspired to document the
stories of her family and community in an archive. We
had read books in high school about the history of
(03:32):
the atomic bombing of Japan and so on, But when
you hear from survivors, it really fits you in a
different way because you connect with it on a human level.
You hear it in their voice, you see it in
their expressions, you hear how it impacted their very human lives.
She quickly understood this way of storytelling is one that
(03:54):
demands attention. It is not something that could easily be
swept under the road. I realized in that moment that
you know the power of witness testimony, that we needed
to hear the story of partition directly from people who
lived through it, because if I said something like I
did to my school teacher was dismissed very easily. But
(04:16):
when my grandmother, who lived through it, she told it differently.
She told it through every form of expression available to
Herder is very instinctive because she had lived through it,
and you can't really deny that. You know, this was
Goanitas Aha moment. I sort of casually started recording stories
on a trip to Punjab in two thousand nine. People
(04:37):
thought it was insane, like really strange what I was doing.
People who had witnessed it started to line up and
it was like, Oh, there's a need, like people want
to tell their story. Ever since then, Guanita has been
devoted to collecting these memories. Through this work, she's realized
that every moment is fleeting. In two nine, I finished
(05:01):
my pH d and I moved to Berkeley to do
my post talk and in a family member that I
was going to interview the last member of my family
in that nineties age group. I forgot my camera when
I meant to go talk to him before I came
back a couple of months later with my camera, he died.
I was like, Wow, this is a wake up call
like I have lost the adult version of my story
(05:23):
or in my family, but there are millions of other
families out there who still have this memory of partisition
and it needs to be documented for the world forgets.
She said. It was overwhelming and overpowering, and there was
nothing that was going to stop her. Every cell in
(05:44):
my body was committed into making this happen. At this time,
Counta had a strenuous career as an experimental condensed matter
physicist at UC Berkeley. She was working constantly, but somehow
she was still able to find time to look for
objects to interview. Somehow, I was finding time to go
(06:05):
and table at mosques and Mondays and Goodwias in the
Bay Area, and people were lining up to sign up
to tell their story. She realized she needed to enlist
people to help her if she wanted to keep up
with the demand. So I started speaking at student clubs
(06:26):
at various South Asian groups. You know, I was new
to the barrier. I didn't know anyone, which I think
really helped because I didn't have that fear of judgment,
you know. I kind of just started doing this stuff.
So that's how our initial teams were formed, and it
was just um. You know, there was a lot of obstacles,
but I think when you are so drunk on an
(06:46):
idea and you're so absolutely committed and you feel it
to your core, nothing can stop you. So that's how
it happened. And I was working around the clock. She
recalls her home turning into a library in a way.
She had a lot of video and recording equipment from
a variety of places. Sometimes people would stop by and
borrow tape recorders and other equipment from her to record
(07:09):
oral histories of people they knew. Knita spent hours and
hours digitizing all the tapes she collected. So my computer
was running seven UM. So that's kind of how it started.
We started teaching in order to you know, the idea
was the crowdsource. Basically, the idea was that you can
use the internet to get support from other people to
(07:32):
solve big problems. So I was like, well, why don't
we do that, Why don't we come together to document partition?
So we collaborated with MUC Berkeley's Regional Oral History Office
and UM learned how to conduct oral histories properly, developed
training modules, and you know, I had a lot of
teaching experience in other fields, but it was very easy
(07:53):
to adapt that to oral history. She created a webinar
where thousands of people all over the world could take
a course and learn how to record these histories. What
was originally a side project turned into a fully fledged organization.
We've documented stories from I believe fourteen or fifteen countries
(08:16):
at this point, more than five hundred cities and villages,
thirty six languages, over ten thousand oral histories of partition,
which was our founding goal. To showcase the magnitude of
what Kunita created, I'm going to walk you through the website.
(08:37):
Once you reach the Partition Archive, you're showing a map
that is incredibly interactive. You can see where people migrated from,
where they migrated to their current city. You can zoom
in on different areas, and you can see the number
of stories that are located in each city and village.
(08:58):
It's truly truly in heat a bowl. Within moments, you
have thousands of stories of partition survivors at your fingertips.
That being said, one unfortunate and common reality of partition
is that many people are still looking for siblings, friends,
and other loved ones whom they were separated from back
(09:19):
in ninety seven, I asked Anita if she came across
any stories like this. Yes, we have connected lots and
lots of brothers and sisters, friends and family and cousins
who were separated in so that's been part of our
work for a decade now. Interestingly, I had documented this man,
(09:40):
l Bano. I had documented his grandmother's story in the
San Francisco Bay area, and he was really inspired by
what we were doing. The man wanted these interviews to
be put up on YouTube, but the archive was unable
to do that at that time. In this discussion, I
told her about an article I read earlier in the
Washington Post about two brothers who are reunited after seventy
(10:03):
four years, and in a lovely and surprising twist, the
same man she mentioned helped create the same YouTube channel
that showcase the brothers meeting again. He actually started his
own channel. It's called Punjabi Lahire. It's a live thing.
They go when they talk to people who migrated in
the same thing as us, but they focus only on
(10:25):
pun job and they do it live. And it's not
like the rigular squirrel history, if you will, it's more
like a conversation and uh, you know, like a little
TV show where they visit. It's a beautiful thing that
they've done well. Friends and family being reunited after decades
is a wonderful thing to see. These moments are constantly
(10:46):
plagued by the unmaleable borders of India and Pakistan. India
and Pakistan have a very complex relationship with each other
because of the lasting legacy of partition. It is still
near impos sable today for Pakistan needs to visit India
and for Indians to visit Pakistan. The wounds of still
(11:07):
run very deep. Goodita and I really commiserate over this
in my twenties when I was like traveling all over
the world for conferences during this enough for my academic
work and even in general, you know, just for fun.
I was really floored by the fact that it was
so easy for me to travel everywhere except Pakistan. That's
like the motherland, that's where we're all from. She was
(11:32):
a lot more composed in our conversation than I was,
but we came to a hopeful thought. Perhaps with a
number of oral history projects out there and the more
stories of reunions coming out, there is a slight glimmer
that maybe slowly, but surely, these walls and barriers will
come down. Now we have people who made the effort
(11:55):
to open up that recorridor. People are starting to take
small step up and I think projects like ours and
others are helping to break those boundaries. Finally, the Cathar
Pork Corridor is home to a sea holy site that
is on the Bakistani side of the border. It's it's
only three miles from India and it wasn't until two
(12:17):
that the area became a visa free crossing. This corridor
was the only way the aforementioned brothers could physically meet.
I think if we keep working at it, all of
us in our generation, I think we can help you
praise some of these tensions which really don't need to
be there if you really dig deep. At the top
(13:06):
of the episode, the voice you heard was of author
and oral historian until Molotra. She acknowledged her fear about
these stories disappearing if there wasn't a record of them anywhere.
Over many years, she has talked to numerous people about
partition and their memories associated with it, but it wasn't
until two thirteen she thought to start writing a book
(13:26):
called Remnants of Partition twenty one objects from a continent divided.
It might seem strange to some that I have written
a book about mere objects carried across the border, when
I could very well have written about the enormity of
memory and experience that survives. And I must admit that
(13:47):
at times during my interviews I did feel uncomfortable and
perhaps even petty, to be continually asking about things people
brought when clearly they had witnessed so much horror along
the path to safety. But still I would persist, what
did you bring? How much did you bring? How did
you bring it? What did you leave behind? Why? These things? Things? Things, things.
(14:14):
I have learned to say things in so many different languages.
It alarms me. But I will say this that continuing
to remember clearly as very difficult. And so my entry
point into the memory of that time remains the material object,
the personal possession. It is still my main gateway and
the life before it fabrics and documents and soil and
(14:37):
stones and touch and smell and caress. In October, Unto
was on sabbatical from grad school and returned to India.
One of her friends mentioned to her that he was
writing about old houses in billy. He was interested in
visiting Until's nanas her maternal grandfather's home phrase project Manana's
(15:05):
eldest brother. I remember he left the room and he
came back with an array of objects, and he said
that if you have to talk about the past, then
you know these objects are also old, and you must
talk about them as well. And two objects from that pile,
which were a medium sized vessel in which Lessie has
made out and a yardstick or the gas, had been
(15:26):
carried by his family from lower to Lizza, and they
were obviously by five and older than the house Pap
was standing in. And I had never seen those objects before.
They were so ordinary, so mundane, and there was nothing
exceptional about it, except for the stories that emerged when
he began touching the object, caressing it, talking about it.
(15:50):
It's like he remembered his childhood in law. He remembered
the gully, remembered eating chilgos as, he remembered drinking the
kind of you know, what makes a giant. He remembered
what the house looks like. He remembered his father using
the yard stick in their clothing store. He remembered their
mother making lesstie in the girl, and it was just
such a visceral transportation. Uncle's words brought me back to
(16:16):
the conversation I had with my mom in episode one,
where she said she would take a photo of her
family an object that couldn't easily be replaced. I often
think about what my family members brought with them, A newspaper,
a book, a piece from a school uniform. I can
only really wonder since my living grandparents don't remember what
they brought after seventy five years have passed. When I
(16:38):
saw the item question from home, I asked myself, what
would I have brought if I was in this position.
From time to time this question pops up in my
head and I still don't have any idea. So I
just had never considered objects to be photos of the past,
which of course they are, you know, the mini you
(17:00):
infuse them with memories, and I think that kind of
unfolding of the past that happened that afternoon, I couldn't
forget it, and I kept thinking about what people carry.
Actually that was the first thought, like what did they carry?
And how could they carry things? And you know, if
you're leaving your home at a moment's notice, one of
(17:20):
the things that you take what is valuable to you
emotionally or monetary. What do you carry? And so I
basically started a small exercise for myself and Danny, asking
refugees when migrated at the time of partition what they carried.
One of the chapters and Remnants of Partition is devoted
to Anto's grandmother, Bubma Lochra, who speaks of a piece
(17:42):
of druy that belonged to her mother. I showed you then,
but almost forgot that. My mother brought one other thing
with her all the way from the French til it
was the only thing She made sure to take it,
and now it is with me. But you have seen
(18:03):
it already many times. This was once a month taka,
something to be worn on the head. The stones are
peculiar to the frontier and upon only in that region.
My mother received it as a wedding gift from her
mother in law, and I believe it had been in
my father's family for quite a while before that. But
(18:27):
what I remember, she never worried after her wedding sermon,
just looked at it from time to time. When she
left Pakistan, though, she made sure to bring it because
she thought she could send it and get some money
to raise and educate us. I remember her telling us
how she had tied it within the codes of her
(18:49):
clothes for fear of being robbed on a way to Delhi,
which was precious. It would have brought us a happy
sum even at that time, but I don't think she
could have parted with it, and in a way, this
piece of jury was the only thing that remained of
her leg Once again, the subject of the borders came
(19:21):
up in addition to being an author until co created
the Museum of Material Memory with her friend Navva Malocha.
This online depository shares the same idea of objects telling stories.
So as I was working on recording stories of objects,
many people who started getting in touch with me that
(19:42):
had nothing to do with partition, but had aged objects
in their home. And these objects were sometimes even used,
you know, like you tensity in the kitchen, or fabrics
that had been fast down the generation that was still worn,
and they would ask me to come and write stories
about this. But I started thinking firstly about the accessibility
(20:03):
of the archives. You know, I am based in India,
but I would love for things to be seen by everybody.
And by everybody I mean Indians in the diaspora, Pakistani's,
Bangladesh's the dietspor of those two countries, nepolis of Ghanies,
people from Sri Lanka. How would you do that? And
the other thing I started thinking about was wouldn't it
(20:25):
be great if people started archiving stories of their objects
on their own. She emphasizes that intergenerational stories unrelated to
partition are just as important for the public to know.
Much like Pertica's work from last week's episode, the idea
of accessibility and resonating with one another across borders is
a vital Then I think that by doing that, we
(20:50):
not only are able to encompass obviously more of the
geographic diversity, but also include, you know, those kinds of
communities that really want impacted by partition, but who histories
have also gone and recorded. And I think the object
is a great way to enter into something that is
relatively unknown because you have something tangible in your hand
with a region whose borders continue to be so tenuinue.
(21:13):
Sometimes the digital is really a gift because it is
borderless and it allows us to converse. Really, I mean, yeah,
the internet can be a really harmful place in that
sense as well, but I think for us it was
really a gift because the common section of the archive
is really beautiful because people find I suppose the aspects
(21:36):
of themselves and other people's objects, or my mother had
something like that, or how intested Can you tell me
where you're from? My grandfather migrated from that place, you know.
So I think it was really about storytelling through the objects.
You can't walk on the soil of your ancestors because
of this border. There are a lot of obstacles standing
between you and your history. But I think the great
(21:57):
paradox of partition also is when Indians in Pakistani's meat overseas,
and how they immediately relate to one another and they
feel like they're speaking to their own. You know, I
am Indian and you are Pakistani Maia, but I know
so many nas that I dove and I have. I
feel like you are one of my own because you
(22:18):
relate to what I say, you understand my language, you
can pronounce my name in the right way. We have
shared history, which ultimately also means we have shared things,
which eventually, I hope, over the years, will mean we
can have shared reconciliation. It was at this point that
(22:40):
I began to cry. Unhel touched upon the truth that
I'm sure Indians and Pakistani's must know to be universal,
is that there is so much more that unites us
than divides us. I told her that I don't consider
myself a pessimist. I may be more of a realist.
But the light and optimism that Antil possesses on a
soy made me reconsider the mentality I have for my
(23:02):
everyday life. I think it's very easy to be quite
sad about what has happened in the past, but partition,
it can teach us less for the future. It can
teach us how we want to live in the present,
what kind of future we want to have for our children.
And I know that the work I'm doing it may
(23:24):
not make a difference, because one book cannot really make
a difference. But you know, many writers together, many artists together, musicians, dances, choreographers, filmmakers,
a cultural movement can make a difference. You see Miss
Marvel in Hollywood and you feel seen. You feel like
the pain that you may not have been able to
(23:46):
voice ever has found the voice and you feel like, yeah,
this is my story. When I watched Miss Marvel, I'm
not Pakistani I'm not an immigrant. I don't live in America.
But everything that Kamala lived through, that can with how history.
Being in garages, speaking to her grandmother, trying to make
new associations with this catastrophic event that she has not
(24:09):
lived through but has defined the generations of her family.
I related to that. I think that you know, empathy
is borderless. You don't need to be Indian Pakistani to
be able to empathize. One of my interview is said
to me that governments divide far easier than people. I
(24:29):
think it's true. Next time on Partition, I spoke to
Shanty Dungary about how he escaped from Lahore to Kashmir.
In He shared an abundance of herring memories with me.
(24:53):
So I would listen to the radio, read the newspaper,
and there were articles about the fire and down down Lahore.
In con we started wadding about what's going to happen
men of your summer lives until next week. I'm nass
(25:18):
and this is Partition. Partition was developed as a part
of the Next Up initiative created by Anna Hosnier, Joel
Monique and Sina Median. Partition is produced by Anna Hosnier,
Tricia Mukerjee and Becca Ramos. It is edited by Rory Gagan,
(25:39):
with the original score composed by Mark Hadley.
Before this week's episode, I wanted to take a moment
to let y'all know about the devastating floods happening in
Pakistan right now. Over thirty million people have been affected,
with the death toll around eleven hundred and rising with
every passing day. Entire buildings are being washed away, with
many people sustaining injuries. I encourage every listener to donate
(00:22):
any amount they can to help alleviate this disaster. You
can find a list of organizations to send funds to
linked in the show notes. These stories had to be
the thing with saud Asia and many other ancient cultures
of the world is that all our histories are all
(00:45):
While there is such a beauty in these older traditions,
there is also real fear that these stories will get
lost if they're not driking down. I really felt that
that I didn't want these nuances to be raced. I
wanted to where do you go if you want to
(01:09):
pay tribute to someone? Most people would visit a specific
place like a grave, a memorial, or a site that
has been well preserved for visitors. But what if you
don't have any of those places at your disposal? Neither
India nor Pakistan have any memorials dedicated to partition. There
is no communal place to reflect on this grief. One
(01:31):
of the only ways we can ensure that memories and
stories of those who went through this very distressing event
don't get lost is by preserving their oral histories. Children
and grandchildren of partition survivors took it upon themselves to
start asking questions, recording interviews, and writing down stories that
their elders told them. It became clear that if they
(01:52):
didn't note these histories, no one else would. From I
Heart Radio, I'm Najazi's and This is Partition, a podcast
that will take a closer look into this often forgotten
part of history. My grandparents from my father's side, my
(02:29):
paternal grandparents and my dad when he was a baby,
they migrated from Lahore to what is now India in
ninety seven and it was a forced migration. It wasn't
something that they wanted to do, but you know, like
millions of people, they were uprooted from their home and uh,
you know, I grew up in India. The first ten
years of my life. I was an army kid, so
(02:49):
I lived in a lot of different places, including Gemmuine, Kashmi.
That's Dr Gunita Singh Bala, the founder of the ninety
seven Partition an Archive. You may recall her telling us
about the vast differences between what she learned about partition
from her family versus what she learned from school from
episode two. This discrepancy is something that has stayed with
(03:11):
her for decades. When conned the travel to Japan to
conduct research for her PhD, she visited the Hiroshima Peace Memorial.
It was here that she was inspired to document the
stories of her family and community in an archive. We
had read books in high school about the history of
(03:32):
the atomic bombing of Japan and so on, But when
you hear from survivors, it really fits you in a
different way because you connect with it on a human level.
You hear it in their voice, you see it in
their expressions, you hear how it impacted their very human lives.
She quickly understood this way of storytelling is one that
(03:54):
demands attention. It is not something that could easily be
swept under the road. I realized in that moment that
you know the power of witness testimony, that we needed
to hear the story of partition directly from people who
lived through it, because if I said something like I
did to my school teacher was dismissed very easily. But
(04:16):
when my grandmother, who lived through it, she told it differently.
She told it through every form of expression available to
Herder is very instinctive because she had lived through it,
and you can't really deny that. You know, this was
Goanitas Aha moment. I sort of casually started recording stories
on a trip to Punjab in two thousand nine. People
(04:37):
thought it was insane, like really strange what I was doing.
People who had witnessed it started to line up and
it was like, Oh, there's a need, like people want
to tell their story. Ever since then, Guanita has been
devoted to collecting these memories. Through this work, she's realized
that every moment is fleeting. In two nine, I finished
(05:01):
my pH d and I moved to Berkeley to do
my post talk and in a family member that I
was going to interview the last member of my family
in that nineties age group. I forgot my camera when
I meant to go talk to him before I came
back a couple of months later with my camera, he died.
I was like, Wow, this is a wake up call
like I have lost the adult version of my story
(05:23):
or in my family, but there are millions of other
families out there who still have this memory of partisition
and it needs to be documented for the world forgets.
She said. It was overwhelming and overpowering, and there was
nothing that was going to stop her. Every cell in
(05:44):
my body was committed into making this happen. At this time,
Counta had a strenuous career as an experimental condensed matter
physicist at UC Berkeley. She was working constantly, but somehow
she was still able to find time to look for
objects to interview. Somehow, I was finding time to go
(06:05):
and table at mosques and Mondays and Goodwias in the
Bay Area, and people were lining up to sign up
to tell their story. She realized she needed to enlist
people to help her if she wanted to keep up
with the demand. So I started speaking at student clubs
(06:26):
at various South Asian groups. You know, I was new
to the barrier. I didn't know anyone, which I think
really helped because I didn't have that fear of judgment,
you know. I kind of just started doing this stuff.
So that's how our initial teams were formed, and it
was just um. You know, there was a lot of obstacles,
but I think when you are so drunk on an
(06:46):
idea and you're so absolutely committed and you feel it
to your core, nothing can stop you. So that's how
it happened. And I was working around the clock. She
recalls her home turning into a library in a way.
She had a lot of video and recording equipment from
a variety of places. Sometimes people would stop by and
borrow tape recorders and other equipment from her to record
(07:09):
oral histories of people they knew. Knita spent hours and
hours digitizing all the tapes she collected. So my computer
was running seven UM. So that's kind of how it started.
We started teaching in order to you know, the idea
was the crowdsource. Basically, the idea was that you can
use the internet to get support from other people to
(07:32):
solve big problems. So I was like, well, why don't
we do that, Why don't we come together to document partition?
So we collaborated with MUC Berkeley's Regional Oral History Office
and UM learned how to conduct oral histories properly, developed
training modules, and you know, I had a lot of
teaching experience in other fields, but it was very easy
(07:53):
to adapt that to oral history. She created a webinar
where thousands of people all over the world could take
a course and learn how to record these histories. What
was originally a side project turned into a fully fledged organization.
We've documented stories from I believe fourteen or fifteen countries
(08:16):
at this point, more than five hundred cities and villages,
thirty six languages, over ten thousand oral histories of partition,
which was our founding goal. To showcase the magnitude of
what Kunita created, I'm going to walk you through the website.
(08:37):
Once you reach the Partition Archive, you're showing a map
that is incredibly interactive. You can see where people migrated from,
where they migrated to their current city. You can zoom
in on different areas, and you can see the number
of stories that are located in each city and village.
(08:58):
It's truly truly in heat a bowl. Within moments, you
have thousands of stories of partition survivors at your fingertips.
That being said, one unfortunate and common reality of partition
is that many people are still looking for siblings, friends,
and other loved ones whom they were separated from back
(09:19):
in ninety seven, I asked Anita if she came across
any stories like this. Yes, we have connected lots and
lots of brothers and sisters, friends and family and cousins
who were separated in so that's been part of our
work for a decade now. Interestingly, I had documented this man,
(09:40):
l Bano. I had documented his grandmother's story in the
San Francisco Bay area, and he was really inspired by
what we were doing. The man wanted these interviews to
be put up on YouTube, but the archive was unable
to do that at that time. In this discussion, I
told her about an article I read earlier in the
Washington Post about two brothers who are reunited after seventy
(10:03):
four years, and in a lovely and surprising twist, the
same man she mentioned helped create the same YouTube channel
that showcase the brothers meeting again. He actually started his
own channel. It's called Punjabi Lahire. It's a live thing.
They go when they talk to people who migrated in
the same thing as us, but they focus only on
(10:25):
pun job and they do it live. And it's not
like the rigular squirrel history, if you will, it's more
like a conversation and uh, you know, like a little
TV show where they visit. It's a beautiful thing that
they've done well. Friends and family being reunited after decades
is a wonderful thing to see. These moments are constantly
(10:46):
plagued by the unmaleable borders of India and Pakistan. India
and Pakistan have a very complex relationship with each other
because of the lasting legacy of partition. It is still
near impos sable today for Pakistan needs to visit India
and for Indians to visit Pakistan. The wounds of still
(11:07):
run very deep. Goodita and I really commiserate over this
in my twenties when I was like traveling all over
the world for conferences during this enough for my academic
work and even in general, you know, just for fun.
I was really floored by the fact that it was
so easy for me to travel everywhere except Pakistan. That's
like the motherland, that's where we're all from. She was
(11:32):
a lot more composed in our conversation than I was,
but we came to a hopeful thought. Perhaps with a
number of oral history projects out there and the more
stories of reunions coming out, there is a slight glimmer
that maybe slowly, but surely, these walls and barriers will
come down. Now we have people who made the effort
(11:55):
to open up that recorridor. People are starting to take
small step up and I think projects like ours and
others are helping to break those boundaries. Finally, the Cathar
Pork Corridor is home to a sea holy site that
is on the Bakistani side of the border. It's it's
only three miles from India and it wasn't until two
(12:17):
that the area became a visa free crossing. This corridor
was the only way the aforementioned brothers could physically meet.
I think if we keep working at it, all of
us in our generation, I think we can help you
praise some of these tensions which really don't need to
be there if you really dig deep. At the top
(13:06):
of the episode, the voice you heard was of author
and oral historian until Molotra. She acknowledged her fear about
these stories disappearing if there wasn't a record of them anywhere.
Over many years, she has talked to numerous people about
partition and their memories associated with it, but it wasn't
until two thirteen she thought to start writing a book
(13:26):
called Remnants of Partition twenty one objects from a continent divided.
It might seem strange to some that I have written
a book about mere objects carried across the border, when
I could very well have written about the enormity of
memory and experience that survives. And I must admit that
(13:47):
at times during my interviews I did feel uncomfortable and
perhaps even petty, to be continually asking about things people
brought when clearly they had witnessed so much horror along
the path to safety. But still I would persist, what
did you bring? How much did you bring? How did
you bring it? What did you leave behind? Why? These things? Things? Things, things.
(14:14):
I have learned to say things in so many different languages.
It alarms me. But I will say this that continuing
to remember clearly as very difficult. And so my entry
point into the memory of that time remains the material object,
the personal possession. It is still my main gateway and
the life before it fabrics and documents and soil and
(14:37):
stones and touch and smell and caress. In October, Unto
was on sabbatical from grad school and returned to India.
One of her friends mentioned to her that he was
writing about old houses in billy. He was interested in
visiting Until's nanas her maternal grandfather's home phrase project Manana's
(15:05):
eldest brother. I remember he left the room and he
came back with an array of objects, and he said
that if you have to talk about the past, then
you know these objects are also old, and you must
talk about them as well. And two objects from that pile,
which were a medium sized vessel in which Lessie has
made out and a yardstick or the gas, had been
(15:26):
carried by his family from lower to Lizza, and they
were obviously by five and older than the house Pap
was standing in. And I had never seen those objects before.
They were so ordinary, so mundane, and there was nothing
exceptional about it, except for the stories that emerged when
he began touching the object, caressing it, talking about it.
(15:50):
It's like he remembered his childhood in law. He remembered
the gully, remembered eating chilgos as, he remembered drinking the
kind of you know, what makes a giant. He remembered
what the house looks like. He remembered his father using
the yard stick in their clothing store. He remembered their
mother making lesstie in the girl, and it was just
such a visceral transportation. Uncle's words brought me back to
(16:16):
the conversation I had with my mom in episode one,
where she said she would take a photo of her
family an object that couldn't easily be replaced. I often
think about what my family members brought with them, A newspaper,
a book, a piece from a school uniform. I can
only really wonder since my living grandparents don't remember what
they brought after seventy five years have passed. When I
(16:38):
saw the item question from home, I asked myself, what
would I have brought if I was in this position.
From time to time this question pops up in my
head and I still don't have any idea. So I
just had never considered objects to be photos of the past,
which of course they are, you know, the mini you
(17:00):
infuse them with memories, and I think that kind of
unfolding of the past that happened that afternoon, I couldn't
forget it, and I kept thinking about what people carry.
Actually that was the first thought, like what did they carry?
And how could they carry things? And you know, if
you're leaving your home at a moment's notice, one of
(17:20):
the things that you take what is valuable to you
emotionally or monetary. What do you carry? And so I
basically started a small exercise for myself and Danny, asking
refugees when migrated at the time of partition what they carried.
One of the chapters and Remnants of Partition is devoted
to Anto's grandmother, Bubma Lochra, who speaks of a piece
(17:42):
of druy that belonged to her mother. I showed you then,
but almost forgot that. My mother brought one other thing
with her all the way from the French til it
was the only thing She made sure to take it,
and now it is with me. But you have seen
(18:03):
it already many times. This was once a month taka,
something to be worn on the head. The stones are
peculiar to the frontier and upon only in that region.
My mother received it as a wedding gift from her
mother in law, and I believe it had been in
my father's family for quite a while before that. But
(18:27):
what I remember, she never worried after her wedding sermon,
just looked at it from time to time. When she
left Pakistan, though, she made sure to bring it because
she thought she could send it and get some money
to raise and educate us. I remember her telling us
how she had tied it within the codes of her
(18:49):
clothes for fear of being robbed on a way to Delhi,
which was precious. It would have brought us a happy
sum even at that time, but I don't think she
could have parted with it, and in a way, this
piece of jury was the only thing that remained of
her leg Once again, the subject of the borders came
(19:21):
up in addition to being an author until co created
the Museum of Material Memory with her friend Navva Malocha.
This online depository shares the same idea of objects telling stories.
So as I was working on recording stories of objects,
many people who started getting in touch with me that
(19:42):
had nothing to do with partition, but had aged objects
in their home. And these objects were sometimes even used,
you know, like you tensity in the kitchen, or fabrics
that had been fast down the generation that was still worn,
and they would ask me to come and write stories
about this. But I started thinking firstly about the accessibility
(20:03):
of the archives. You know, I am based in India,
but I would love for things to be seen by everybody.
And by everybody I mean Indians in the diaspora, Pakistani's,
Bangladesh's the dietspor of those two countries, nepolis of Ghanies,
people from Sri Lanka. How would you do that? And
the other thing I started thinking about was wouldn't it
(20:25):
be great if people started archiving stories of their objects
on their own. She emphasizes that intergenerational stories unrelated to
partition are just as important for the public to know.
Much like Pertica's work from last week's episode, the idea
of accessibility and resonating with one another across borders is
a vital Then I think that by doing that, we
(20:50):
not only are able to encompass obviously more of the
geographic diversity, but also include, you know, those kinds of
communities that really want impacted by partition, but who histories
have also gone and recorded. And I think the object
is a great way to enter into something that is
relatively unknown because you have something tangible in your hand
with a region whose borders continue to be so tenuinue.
(21:13):
Sometimes the digital is really a gift because it is
borderless and it allows us to converse. Really, I mean, yeah,
the internet can be a really harmful place in that
sense as well, but I think for us it was
really a gift because the common section of the archive
is really beautiful because people find I suppose the aspects
(21:36):
of themselves and other people's objects, or my mother had
something like that, or how intested Can you tell me
where you're from? My grandfather migrated from that place, you know.
So I think it was really about storytelling through the objects.
You can't walk on the soil of your ancestors because
of this border. There are a lot of obstacles standing
between you and your history. But I think the great
(21:57):
paradox of partition also is when Indians in Pakistani's meat overseas,
and how they immediately relate to one another and they
feel like they're speaking to their own. You know, I
am Indian and you are Pakistani Maia, but I know
so many nas that I dove and I have. I
feel like you are one of my own because you
(22:18):
relate to what I say, you understand my language, you
can pronounce my name in the right way. We have
shared history, which ultimately also means we have shared things,
which eventually, I hope, over the years, will mean we
can have shared reconciliation. It was at this point that
(22:40):
I began to cry. Unhel touched upon the truth that
I'm sure Indians and Pakistani's must know to be universal,
is that there is so much more that unites us
than divides us. I told her that I don't consider
myself a pessimist. I may be more of a realist.
But the light and optimism that Antil possesses on a
soy made me reconsider the mentality I have for my
(23:02):
everyday life. I think it's very easy to be quite
sad about what has happened in the past, but partition,
it can teach us less for the future. It can
teach us how we want to live in the present,
what kind of future we want to have for our children.
And I know that the work I'm doing it may
(23:24):
not make a difference, because one book cannot really make
a difference. But you know, many writers together, many artists together, musicians, dances, choreographers, filmmakers,
a cultural movement can make a difference. You see Miss
Marvel in Hollywood and you feel seen. You feel like
the pain that you may not have been able to
(23:46):
voice ever has found the voice and you feel like, yeah,
this is my story. When I watched Miss Marvel, I'm
not Pakistani I'm not an immigrant. I don't live in America.
But everything that Kamala lived through, that can with how history.
Being in garages, speaking to her grandmother, trying to make
new associations with this catastrophic event that she has not
(24:09):
lived through but has defined the generations of her family.
I related to that. I think that you know, empathy
is borderless. You don't need to be Indian Pakistani to
be able to empathize. One of my interview is said
to me that governments divide far easier than people. I
(24:29):
think it's true. Next time on Partition, I spoke to
Shanty Dungary about how he escaped from Lahore to Kashmir.
In He shared an abundance of herring memories with me.
(24:53):
So I would listen to the radio, read the newspaper,
and there were articles about the fire and down down Lahore.
In con we started wadding about what's going to happen
men of your summer lives until next week. I'm nass
(25:18):
and this is Partition. Partition was developed as a part
of the Next Up initiative created by Anna Hosnier, Joel
Monique and Sina Median. Partition is produced by Anna Hosnier,
Tricia Mukerjee and Becca Ramos. It is edited by Rory Gagan,
(25:39):
with the original score composed by Mark Hadley.
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