Bhubaneswar woman recounts partition horrors amid NCERT module row

The Partition of India in 1947 remains one of the darkest chapters in history, a tragedy that not only divided a nation but also uprooted millions of lives. While crores lost their homes and land, lakhs perished in the unprecedented violence.

The recent observance of Partition Horrors Remembrance Day and the release of NCERT’s controversial module titled “Three Culprits of Partition” have once again brought painful memories to the fore. Survivors who migrated from Pakistan to India, and now reside in Odisha, have recalled their harrowing experiences.

Trains arriving from across the border loaded with corpses, bloodied bodies piled in bogies, these remain unforgettable images for those who lived through the carnage. Ishwar Dhoopar, a Bhubaneswar resident who was a child during Partition, narrowly escaped the massacres when his father put him and his nine siblings on a train to India.

“I can never erase those horrors from my mind. We were in the train when sword-yielding men came towards us. They only wanted to kill ‘sardars’. I can never forget those days,” recalled an emotional Ishwar.

Others like Aarti Dhoopar, though born later in Delhi, grew up listening to terrifying stories of Partition from her father and grandfather, who had left everything behind in Pakistan and survived by selling balloons and bananas in India.

“When my grandparents came here from Pakistan, he has told me that it was the last train with people alive. After that, trains were filled with bodies. My granddaughter recalls he had a friend, Ahmed, who suggested he leave for India. So, my grandfather sent all the kids to India,” revealed Aarti.

Meanwhile, Geeta Narula, who was only two years old at the time and lived in Amritsar, remembers the atmosphere of fear that hung over border families.

“As Amritsar is on the border, there was more violence there. There were rumours that Amritsar would go into Pakistan. So, my husband and his family had fled to another place. Later, after India’s Independence, they returned to their homes,” revealed Geeta.

Even today, 78 years later, debates continue on who was responsible for Partition. NCERT’s latest module names Mohammad Ali Jinnah, Congress, and Lord Mountbatten as the three culprits. But with Congress objecting strongly to this categorisation, the controversy has only intensified.