The Selective Amnesia On Partition
Does the Left shun Partition talk because it shatters the 'both sides equally guilty' myth?
On August 14, Pakistan celebrates its birth. Since 2021, the Narendra Modi government has chosen to mark that date as a stigma on humanity, declaring it 'Partition Horrors Remembrance Day"—an evocative tribute to the excesses that claimed millions of lives.
The initiative is not unlike the West's 'Holocaust Memorial Day", which honours victims and survivors while warning of the dangers of antisemitism. Similarly, Partition Horrors Remembrance Day not only pays tribute to victims but reminds the world that Pakistan was born not of a hope-filled progressive impulse but of a medieval separatist whim—an exclusive homeland for Muslims, where they would be the chosen people.
But why pass up a chance to expose Pakistan's nihilistic outlook—one its army chief, General Asim Munir, recently exalted in his defence of the two-nation theory, days before Islamist supremacists struck in Pahalgam?
Does the Left shun Partition talk because it shatters the 'both sides equally guilty" myth? Is history being secularised to bury the roots of Muslim separatism for political ends?
About the Author
Rahul Shivshankar
Rahul Shivshankar is Consulting Editor at Network18. He tweets at @RShivshankar
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