Wk. 13 Bibi Inder Kauri, I Spread My Wings

Question 1

Bibi Inder Kauri, I Spread My Wings

Answer 1

Bibi Inder Kauri, I Spread My Wings – Bibi Inder Kauri was a Sikh woman born in Rawalpindi (now part of Pakistan) who emigrated to India during the Partition of India in 1947, which created the two independent nations of Pakistan and India out of British India. In these excerpts, Kauri discusses her personal experience fleeing Karachi in Pakistan and also considers the broader nature of the Partition, especially the role of Muhammad Ali Jinnah (1876-1948), leader of the Muslim League and founder of Pakistan.

How does Kauri describe her experience of Partition in comparison with other men and women?

• Her personal experience was not so bad. She and her entire family were able to remain together and they all made it safely to India. Others were not so lucky. In particular, the women suffered greatly.
  
  • “How Partition affected men and women…You see, men: either they were killed or they escaped. Both ways they were spared. If they died the problems died with them; if they survived they were resettled, they earned their daily bread and carried on.”
  • “But the women were either left behind and treated like outcastes, often raped and brutalized – I mean if she came, she came with a guilty conscience, with the stigma of having been “soiled.” “
  • “When the Pakistanis did send some young girls back, they were never able to resettle here. Many were sent back forcibly, they didn’t want to come, they had married there, they had children. Many young Muslim boys [in Pakistan] had married Hindu girls, very honourably. Then the government told them they had to return to their own country, but they didn’t want to leave their husbands and children – there was no future for them here.”
  • “So in every way, you see, women suffered much more.”
  • “But those who lost everything, whose daughters were left behind, whose children were killed…how can they ever forget?”

What were relations between Hindus, Muslims, and Sikhs like before?

• Before partition, they all got along and lived aside one another, but the Muslims seemed to be considered 2nd class citizens, subordinate to the Hindus and the Sikhs.
  
  • “Hindus, Sikhs, and Muslims were not divided then [before Partition], they were not separate. They lived together even though their eating habits might have been different. Sikhs would not eat halal meat. So there were these differences. But we could have continued to live together. Why would we have gone to Karachi otherwise? There was no ill-feeling in our hearts.”
  • “Hindus and Sikhs owned land, Muslims laboured on their land. In a way, they were exploited by us, they were under us. The close relationship which I spoke about was between us and a handful of well-off Muslims. But the majority were poor and they were exploited by us.”

Why does she think Partition happened?

• The Muslims were a minority in India. They were subordinate to the majority Hindus and held no power. By having their own nation, the Muslims became the majority of their own country and were able to self-rule rather than be subject to the whims of the Hindus.
  
  • “The root of this lies in the fact that, deep down, people did think the Muslims were different. In their hearts the Hindus actually hated them.”
  • “a deep-seated dislike took root which began to show itself in such actions”
  • “[Jinnah] realized that no Muslim could be secure or at peace under Hindu rule”
  • “Muslims were a minority, they were economically backward and they were also conservative. So all these factors made them feel they could only prosper in a separate nation, they couldn’t do so in an undivided India where they would have been a minority and their share of power, facilities, and resources would have been marginal.”
  • “[Jinnah] was right, because in spite of all the inner conflicts within Pakistan Muslims are the rulers”
  • “India is a little afraid of Pakistan because it is a separate nation – it wouldn’t have been afraid of Muslims if they were part of India.”
  • “Now, Pakistan is a military dictatorship and we know the problems in such a rule, we know they cannot be very happy under such a rule, but at least they have a separate identity, a separate existence. We are afraid of that separate identity even though it is much smaller than ours and India is much larger, with vast resources. But we are afraid of their separate existence – and this is what Jinnah wanted.”

As a Sikh (neither Hindu nor Muslim), do you think she is a neutral observer?

• She seems to feel more closely aligned to the Hindus, looking down upon the Muslims as a whole despite having had friends who were “wealthy Muslims”.
  
  • “– there was a great affinity between Muslims and Sikhs: our culture was the same, our food, our dress, our language, everything was the same. As I told you, in Rawalpindi we had very good relations with the Muslims.”
  • HOWEVER, “the Sikhs didn’t understand because they were so close to the Hindus, even closer than they were to the Muslims.”
  • “Hindus and Sikhs owned land, Muslims laboured on their land. In a way, they were exploited by us, they were under us. The close relationship which I spoke about was between us and a handful of well-off Muslims. But the majority were poor and they were exploited by us.”
  • “Muslims were uneducated, not so enlightened and that contributed to their fanaticism. You see a similar tendency among the Sikhs, a kind of weakness. They also get very easily agitated in the name of religion. It was this religious feeling which was used to mobilize Muslims.”
• After Partition in 1947, both the Muslims and the Hindus started violence against the other, forcing them out of their country to the other.
  
  • “after ’47 we saw that our neighbors were looking at us differently, were looking askance at us. Where my husband’s clinic was, that was the place where they started killing Sikhs.”
  • “Muslims suffered terribly there – they had to leave their homes. How could they let the Hindus rest in peace after that?”
  • “…in Pindi Muslims were in the majority, they started attacking. After a while things cooled down a bit. But as soon as Partition happened the “work” that had been started by the Muslims was picked up here. We were no less. We also raped women, we also murdered and burnt houses here.”

POWERPOINT:

Kauri, I Spread My Wings

• How does she describe Rawalpindi before Partition?
  
  • They had good relations
    
    • Based on a shared culture: food, dress, language, etc.
    • There is a heightened cognizance of the different communities
  • There is also deep-seated dislike or hatred
    
    • Deep down the Hindus hate the Muslims b/c of Mughal history
    • Economic divisions: Hindus/Sikhs own land, Muslims work for them
• Her analysis of the politics (Gandhi, Nehru, and Jinnah)
  
  • Does this fit with what she said earlier?
  • She says that Jinnah was smart enough to see that Gandhi and other Congress leaders were “Hindus first”
    
    • Muslims would be a minority in a unified India
    • As a minority, their influence would be small and they would be vulnerable
  • As an independent country of Pakistan
    
    • Muslims have their own identity
    • India is afraid of Pakistan (and therefore respects them)
• Why did violence break out with Partition?
• What triggered those deep-seated dislikes and hatreds?
  
  • There was greater awareness and suspicion of different groups
  • Revenge or “action and reaction”
    
    • Series of events that leads to escalating revenge

Partition: The Big Picture

• In many places, Partition became ethnic cleansing
  
  • Pushing Muslims out of Hindu territory and vice versa
• About 14 million displaced people (like Kauri)
• Between 500,000 and 2 million killed
• Territorial disputes between India and Pakistan continue (Kashmir)
  
  • The nations have fought four wars since independence
  • Both are now nuclear powers