Watched The Viceroy's House and left confused thanks to my glaring lack of knowledge of Indian history. Gurinder Chadha tells the story of partition from one perspective, supported by a set of facts that pundits may or may not agree with. But it makes for great story-telling and the premise sounds entirely plausible. As someone who comes from a refugee family, I felt woefully uninformed about the facts of history that had such a great impact on my own family and fourteen million others. Growing up in India, the stories of partition formed a backdrop against which the present unfolded. The stories were often told by older family members who had direct experience and memories of that time. Then there was a huge volume of literature centered on the topic many of these books were made into movies.
So there was no lack of clarity on what partition meant at the human level to the people who had suffered through it. Yet I know very little about the reasons and drivers of this event that continues to define the fate of the subcontinent to this day. Why did we end up in this place, what if we had leadership that gave us a different fate. Were we left divided against our will, were we played by our imperial overlords. So many questions that would take years of reading and in-depth research to truly answer. As Marcus Gravey said "A people without the knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots."
People like me are a prime example of what Gravey describes. It is a travesty that all the Indian history we know is what was taught in high school;to characterize that as "knowing" is laughable. Unless we made a serious effort to educate ourselves, seek out a multitude of conflicting perspectives to arrive at our own independent conclusion, we really know nothing about Indian history. Chadha made me aware of the depth of my ignorance in a subject that I should have known something about. She has inspired me to learn.
So there was no lack of clarity on what partition meant at the human level to the people who had suffered through it. Yet I know very little about the reasons and drivers of this event that continues to define the fate of the subcontinent to this day. Why did we end up in this place, what if we had leadership that gave us a different fate. Were we left divided against our will, were we played by our imperial overlords. So many questions that would take years of reading and in-depth research to truly answer. As Marcus Gravey said "A people without the knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots."
People like me are a prime example of what Gravey describes. It is a travesty that all the Indian history we know is what was taught in high school;to characterize that as "knowing" is laughable. Unless we made a serious effort to educate ourselves, seek out a multitude of conflicting perspectives to arrive at our own independent conclusion, we really know nothing about Indian history. Chadha made me aware of the depth of my ignorance in a subject that I should have known something about. She has inspired me to learn.
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