The Indian subcontinent is a vast area in Asia. Today, it is divided into three countries: India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. When the British arrived in the 17th century, however, the subcontinent had several empires and states. Each one had leaders, languages, cultures, and religions. At first, the British came to trade. They followed other Europeans like the Portuguese, the Dutch, and the French who came to India before them in search of popular spices like cinnamon, pepper, and turmeric. From their initial trading posts in a region called Bengal, the British slowly conquered the whole Indian subcontinent and brought its diverse people and cultures under the rule of a single government. The colony of India became the largest colony in the British Empire.
By the 1940s, after nearly 200 years of foreign rule, many people in India were unhappy with the British and wanted to govern themselves. They felt that British policies were unfair, exploited Indians, and created many economic and social problems. The Quit India Movement, led by an Indian lawyer named Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, started organizing protests for Indian independence. Although Gandhi wanted the protests to be peaceful, violence erupted all over the country. The British government cracked down on protestors, and British pilots even bombed parts of the country.
Meanwhile, World War II was raging around the world. The British Indian Army fought in the war on behalf of the Allied forces. The Allies won the war in 1945, but Britain had suffered many losses and needed to be rebuilt. The British government decided it would be better for the British to leave India, where anti-British protests were rising. The big question was how to transfer governance. British India was vast and home to nearly 400 million people, mostly divided into two big religious groups, Hindus and Muslims. Tensions rose between them as Indian independence inched closer to reality. There were concerns that Muslims would be at a disadvantage in a new country with a Hindu majority. The conflict between these two groups led to clashes across the country.
After much discussion, it was decided that the British would divide British India into two independent countries with their own governments. India would
be formed out of the Hindu-majority regions while Pakistan would be formed from primarily Muslim areas. However, two big provinces—Bengal in the east and Punjab in the west—had nearly equal numbers of Muslim and Hindu residents.
A British lawyer named Cyril Radcliffe was tasked with carving up the colony to form the two new countries of India and Pakistan. This difficult task had to be completed in just five weeks. When the division was announced, millions of people had to leave the homes that their families had lived in for hundreds of years and move across the subcontinent. Their new home country was determined by the lines that a single man had drawn.
This is known as the Partition of India.
Partition became the largest movement of people
in history not caused by war or famine. Nearly 12 million people lost their homes and became refugees in their new countries. Many families were torn apart as some members moved and others remained, never to meet again. People perished on the journey or in riots and clashes.
In August of 1947, British rule in India finally came to an end. As the British departed, two new countries, India and Pakistan, were born. Later, after a war in 1971, Pakistan’s eastern wing became independent, forming the third country on the subcontinent, Bangladesh.
Partition continues to influence the lives of people in all three countries. Tensions between India and Pakistan remain high, and there have been multiple armed conflicts since 1947. In particular, India and Pakistan dispute over another province, Kashmir. Travel and trade between these two countries can be difficult. Even cricket matches between India and Pakistan can lead to protests. More than 70 years later, the ghost of Partition continues to haunt India and its neighbors.