Women Against Women In The Partition Of British India

1939 Words4 Pages

The 1947 partition of British India into two independent nations (India and Pakistan) was accompanied by enactments of violence unspeakable in their brutality and horror, leading Mushirul Hasan to label it a “bloody vivisection” (xii). Amongst the several atrocities at the time of partition were those committed specifically against women. Several women were raped, murdered, abducted and forced into marriage. They became the targets of horrific violence and their bodies became the sites over which victory was sought.
Gendered violence has mostly been read as metonymic of the violation of the land. Women’s bodies hold immense significance in an all-male dominated society where the responsibility for the protection of their chastity and honour rests on the shoulders of men. Their sexuality becomes highly problematic particularly at the time of disorder and war because their roles as biological reproducers and transmitters of culture make them highly vulnerable to acts of sexual exploitation by men of the ‘other’ community. In the context of the Partition of India, the unprecedented levels of sexual exploitation against women on both sides of the border testify their role as “objects in male constructions of their own honour” (Das 43). As Ruth Seifert puts it, the female body is “a symbolic representation of the body politic” (62) and rape of women is “the symbolic rape of the body of [the] community” (64). Robbing them of their honour becomes the means through which male power is destabilized, community’s identity is threatened and nation’s pride is defeated. Susan Brownmiller states, “In one act of aggression, the collective spirit of women and of the nation is broken, leaving a reminder long after the troops depart. And if she sur...

... middle of paper ...

... Women, 1998.
--."Recovery, Rupture, Resistance: The Indian State and the Abduction of Women During Partition ." Hasan, Mushirul. Inventing Boundaries: Gender, Politics and the Partition of India. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2000. 208-235.
Prakash, Bodh. "The Women Protagonist in Partition Literature." Ravikant, Tarun K. Saint. Translating Partition. New Delhi: Katha, 2001. 194-209.
Rajinder Singh Bedi, Allok Bhalla. "Lajwanti". Manoa, Vol. 19, No.1, Crossing Over: Partition Literature from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh (Summer, 2007), pp.21-32. 18 Mar. 2011
Seifert, Ruth. "War and Rape: A Preliminary Analysis." Stinglmayer, Alexandria. Mass Rape: The War against Women in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1994. 62-64.

Open Document