Writing in from the periphery: Partition narratives from Rurban Delhi

Abstract

The concern of Partition narratives has generally been with displacement, loss of identity, alienation, gender and violence, as well as the rehabilitation of refugees. What is elided in them is the tragedy of those villagers who lost their land and livelihood in order to make space for the thousands of refugees who were resettled in “refugee” colonies. This article explores a key aspect of the impact of the Partition of India; namely, the rapid transformation of rural spaces in the periphery of the capital city of Delhi, which saw a massive influx and resettlement of refugees. It does this by looking at the novels of a lesser-known Hindi novelist, Jagdish Chandra, to foreground the alienation and uprooting of members of rural communities from their traditional moorings.

Keywords:

• Partition
• Delhi
• post-Independence society
• urbanization
• land acquisition
• Jats
• refugee resettlement
• livelihoods

Notes

1. Introduced in 1908–09, the term lal dora refers to an area of land demarcated as part of the village abadi (habitation) and exempt from municipal planning and development law. The government marked the land by drawing red lines around it, hence lal dora, which has been translated variously as “red line” (Mitchell 2010, 59) and “red ink” (Pati 2017, 94).

2. Jain (2017) explains that “Kallu and Nathu were awarded compensation of Rs. 2,217 10 anna and 11 pai. They never accepted it and shifted out of Delhi to Pignor in Haryana. [ … ] [T]hey never returned to claim an enhanced compensation. The generations that followed never had enough money to contest the same.”

3. “Rurban” is used to describe land in the countryside on the edge of a town or city, on which new housing and businesses are built.

4. According to Yong and Kudaisya (2002) the physical urban area of Delhi grew tenfold during this period. The boundaries of Greater Delhi expanded from 198 sq km in 1951 to 323 sq km in 1961 (193).

5. A dalaal is a middleman who makes money on any deal or financial transaction. The term is colloquially used for a property agent.

6. Yong and Kudaisya (2002) remark that the “Rajiv Kapur, chief of the United Nations’ agency for refugee welfare characterizes Delhi as ‘a Wild West boomtown’ where ‘everybody’s on the make, anything goes’” (193).

7. This difference is the obvious consequence of access to education. In Yashpal’s novel, Tara and Kanak have been to school and college before the Partition violence separates them from their families. Their dislocation provides them with an opportunity to break away from the stifling patriarchal hold of their families and become independent women in many ways.