Women of Partition 1947: Aftermath lives in Pakistan

Abstract

Partition 1947, if one side provided salvation from the prolonged colonial rule, the other, it brought mass-level displacement. Females were the major sufferers of this forced migration, a major group that scholars have historically neglected. Countless maidens turned into mothers; brides became widowed. Drawing on previously untapped and rich unpublished memoirs, including archival data, vernacular old newspapers, assembly debates, and declassified documents, this paper considers the role of the state, society, and charitable institutions in the lives of these women. It intends to analyze how women’s self-identity was targeted twice during migration and recovery. Thus, they had to bear physical, mental, psychological, and emotional torture. It highlights how state’s respect is prioritized over female self-respect. It also explores the circumstances they had to face after the partition. It answers the question of how, besides the state, male strata of society, charitable institutions took a keen interest in humanitarian grounds for the permanent shadow of assaulted ladies—related with these philanthropic steps, what sorts of socio-economic security was grunted to destitute ladies. This article argues that the acceptance ratio, sympathy, consolation, and cooperation for destitute women was larger in West Punjab than in East Punjab. This articulates that the early days of compassion laid the modern benevolence in the early years of Pakistan. It then posits such questions: what was the attitude of families and society after acceptance? Did they were owned virtuously, or did other fates await them?