Any amount of discussion can't roll back the infinite miseries suffered by common people as a result of partition. Why to fix the blame? Who will decide whether blamed person is correctly blamed? Those who witnessed the partition are now past eighties and not consulted about this issue. Kashmir is not a problem, Pakistan should vacate its unauthorised occupation of Kashmir. Important now is for India to guard against the covert attacks sponsored by Pakistani grown, funded, sheltered, trained, tasked terrorists backed by its ISI. How much Pakistan is serious about peaceful relations with India, may be clear from 26/11 follow up. There is no use harping on partition, but we should concentrate on our security, population control, corruption free environments, for the purpose of growth and development.

This is a very myopic way of looking at our history.In last two thousand years, Hindus have lost Afghanistan,Pakistan, Bangladesh,Nepal, Tibet, Sri Lanka,Burma... Now author wants us to forget partition or pardon those who were responsible for it. For him,Kashmir is a problem ! For Hindus,it remains an unfinished agenda, till the occupied Kashmir is liberated.
You say , Hindus have developed a sense of ownership for this land.What is wrong with that? Fact, that Muslims voted for Paksitan and got it, proves that they did not have that sense of ownership.And if they did not have that sense, why should they wish to be " included" in Hindu scheme of things? And prey, why should you, as a Hindu be worried about that?

This is the best time to teach our children the history of Hindus and the sufferings they have undergone in last 2000 years.Instead you are blogging to make us forget all these.That is myopia.God may increase our sufferings further, but he should not condemn us to such myopias.

A good article by Santosh. We all should accept the reality. There are three independent countries and they should look forward to work together for peace and economic growth in the region. There is no doubt that being largest democray is better economically, but it had a lot of political problems and insurgencies.Pakistan became center of terrorism when USA left using Taliban in Afghanistan against USRR. International Community knows the problem and as friends providing great help and aid tpath to progress. Partition has been done accidently or by mistrust or mistatakes of the leaders, but it is fact. British Rulers were in hurry and they believed in divide and rule policy. They left without solving Kashmir Problems. Jinnah died soon and Nehru after agreeing to plebesite in UN took u turn. Let the historian decide why partion happened, the international community particularly USA should play its part in eliminating the terrorist from the region, solving unsoved issues and making a path for greater SAARC region for cooperation in economic development, education and poorty aliviation.

Its difficult to roll back and get the same boundries as it was before partition. However, a unificatation of all sub-continent states is possible, provided all parties sit with openmind in a brotherhood manner. SAARC could play a pivotal role. lets erase the boundries in between the states, a unified currency, a unified external poilcies, a weak centre containing federal republics.for sure it would be a super power united states of India. Pakistan will also get rid of its corrupted leaders and head of state and military junta ruling. No ISI No RAW peace and a combined force for construction No distruction. let Jaswant be the head of state of United India

Thanks Santosh for the analysis provoking write-up in your blog. I simply add that historians have rarely done justice in thier works. We believe in the formula that 'present politics is history for tomorrow while past politics is history now'. Jinnah, Patel, Gandhi or Nehru-much talked about leaders of yester years while fixing responsibility for the "partition". What sense does it make after sixtytwo years of happening. Is it not construed to be a media of political mileage ? One commentator has rightly mentioned that Hindus have ever failed to conserve integrity of their rule lands as they lost Afganistan, Pakistan, Burma, Tibbet one by one and there seemed none capable of handling the situation in time. As the Hindu world have forgotten glorious past of middle and south Asia today, the ongoing controversy over India's division ought to seize at this point of time. What we need instead is to fight unabatted terrorism, decling economy and human values for the betterment of all neighbouring countries. The SAARC nations should atleast understant the game plan of the west, particularly of the US and UK and join hands to fight out old British diplomacy of 'Divide and Rule'

Agree with the part about forgetting and moving on. On the other hand, we must learn from the treachery of Nehru and his role in aggravating the bloodshed by being obstinate. Also, the current congress is still following the same old principle of unbridled protection of minority rights at the expense of the majority sentiment. It seems like a repeat of the congress's stand in 1947 (Including Gandhi's stand of appeasing pakistan at the cost of hindus being massacared).

I know none would agree with my statements about congress and gandhi. Its anathema for people like us brought up on congress doctored history. Before you rate my post, please look up on the internet Nathuram Godse's defence of his violent act in the court. This is something which has been wiped off from the history books but I promise those who read it that you would have a mosit eye for what he had to say. Not justifying what he did, just asking people to read it to understand how the 'other' side (the 'communal' RSS type) thinks.

I feel the tendency to forget the past is an escapist route. We should not forget that it is not India that is talking of the unfinished task. The fact is that even after getting Pakistan the elements that demanded it have not mentally adjusted themselves to living with India which they fear is much bigger and is out to destroy its existence. No amount of goodwill gestures by leaders like Nehru and even Vajpayee can reassure Pakistan that India does not entertain any ill feeling against it.
The fact of the matter is we need to be aawre of the disgruntled mentality of the Pakistani establishment (not the common people) not just for the sake of our past history but also for the sake of our present security (as has been proved by the 26/11 terrorist attacks) and also with a view of India's future development and progress.
Resting on our economic progress will in no way remove the threat that we face from that insecure country called Pakistan.
It is Pakistan's insecurity that allows it to be used by other superpowers like USA as well as China.
-- taral
The reality is that it is the Pakistani establishment that needs to mentally adjust itself to the existence of India as its neighbour. No amount of foreign aid can help it overcome this TRUTH

The agony is,how so called the citizens of the biggest democracy dont talk about the biggest lie
which nehro did front of the whole world(united nations)that india will have plebesite voting in kashmir.nehro was a biggest lier and sole perpetrator of deviding india.
indian govt.and public are living in denial mood.indians has to understand once and forall that kashmir is not your.kashmir belong to kashmiris,rather they are muslime,hindus or sikhs.they are the only have right to decide about their distany.corupt few sitting in islamabad and india cannot decide.
if kashmir problem is not solved,their will be another war.after that short war ,you guys dont have to worry about india and pakistan,both countries will be burn out scrapyard.
kashmiris will be comming down from the hills to collect wood and rot iron to make hunting tools.
so wake up and stop talking about snatching part of pakistan kashmir,insted start talking about india and pakistan both leave the kashmir and let all the hindu and sikh migrants back into kashmir and let them decide what they want for their state.
this is the only way to save the future of grandchildrens of this continenet.
JAI HOU

Jitendra Desai and Sharda are entitled to their views, which are indicative of a majoritarian approach. I fear and feel sad when I hear their voices. As long as these views remain what they are-a minority of extreme right wing people- we have hope for pluralism and greatness for India. Jitendra should look at history and see why religion/majoritarian based approaches have mostly led to disasters. People like Santosh, on the other hand, give me hope that India would truly be great because of people like him, and not join the ranks of majoritarian right wing republics like Sri Lanka.
Partition should teach this lesson as well, and anger prevents us from moving forward in a positive frame of mind. The history of Pakistan should teach Jitendra the simple lessons of a majoritarian approach gone haywire.

He who forgets the past is condemed for the future. It is extreamly important that future generation must know the history of its country, so that no such thing happen again, specially for a democratic countries, as these countries are run by consensus. Jaswant Singh and other writers with different opinion are doing great favour to future generation, let many flowers bloom with all different smell and flavour.

We Indians should now concentrate on nation
building activity. We should now concentrate for
making India the best nation in the world. We
should be the example to every country in the
world. Now concentrate for making nation the
Super India.

whenever we discuss British role in the partition of this country or some other country under thier colonial rule, we harp on their policy of divide and rule.I want to know who is not guilty of this policy?
Great manu divided our society in to castes to make it easier for the ruling class to lord it over others.Even to day, instead of giving up the caste system, political parties use this system for vote bank purpose.When akalis of Punjab became too big for their boots, Indira gandhi tried to divide Sikh society propping up Bindranwale and paid heavy price for that.Since no further division on the basis of religion is possible, the politicians do everything to keep alive this division ,by reservations, quota, seperate laws ,instead of treating every one equal regardless of religion. Added to this , there are cases like Andhra where people speaking same language ,want to divide themselves into seperate states.Yet , we have the gall to point a finger at british for practicing divide and rule policy.Are we saints?

Who has actually helped in partition or actually made the partition happen does not matter after all these years.
India is a Country by itself and should look out for itself.
We look at the area of Pakistan Occupied Kashmir,Kargil, 26/11 and many many many more to blame as if its over and done with.
Its high time to take a stand make sure that if our neighbours dont want to support us, then we very well answer them the same way.
Its time we actually make a decision and stick by it, we have negotiated for peace talks for a very long time but in vain...
Why are we silent...?
Why do we let them take advantage of our patience?
Havent we seen enough blood shed already?

Wats so important about the partition, we are much better off than they are....
We must concentrate on our security, growth, better cleaner politics, infrastructure, poverty eradication...
Concentrate on internal well being and growth, external automatically comes....
I am not the decision maker, but can only post Comments like this...hope someone reads this and realizes its actually time to stand up for ourselves instead of giving Kasab Basmati Rice in Jail....
I feel ashamed when i read that someone caught RED HANDED is demanding from our government......

History, they say, is a fiction written by the victor. You only have to compare the history books published in India and Pakistan. Views on the same issues are exactly opposite. Indian history is written by the Indian national congress and Pakistani history is written by Pkistan muslim league and subsiquently by the army.
Having said that, we should now forget the past on concentrate on the future. India has managed to do so to a degree and hence we see the economic and scientific progress whereas Pakistan has continued to be bogged down by the history of partition. There will always be those in India who will want to create controvercy over partition and profit from it. As a democratic country we cannot prevent anyone from expressing his views. But we must take a mature approach and ignore such people.

Well, I agree with Santosh's conclusion that we should feel grateful to be in India than in Pakistan. Even as a Muslim, one can understand that It's India where the community has enjoyed the maximum democratic rights than any other country in the world. In Pakistan, the woes of Muslims have only been aggravated on some pretext or the other. The present militancy in there is more more about their inner division than jihad against infidel forces. It's all because, as veteran Indian journalist MJ Akbar points out, the idea of India is more stronger than the idea of Pakistan. But to be fair Jinnah too would have shared the same idea.

Learn from the past, but don't live in the past.
The future is more important and India needs to look to those challenges. China though successful economically looms as a threat politically and militarily for everyone in Asia and maybe beyond. The godless Chinese want all of us in South Asia to keep fighting between ourselves while they become too powerful for anyone to challenge. They support Pakistan not because they love them but because they can act as the knife on India's back.
Its the same British strategy... "we divide and they rule". I think we all should start living in the future and make a confederation of SAARC nations just like the European union.

Dear Readers,
It does not make any sense crying over split milk, it will be better if it would be thrown away rather sooner
than later.
We did not install a portrait of Mr. Jinnah
in our parliament,but Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel,
LM Tilak, Rajendra Prasad and Nehru and
that is that.
I feel sorry for Pakistani people that Mr. Jinnah
brought all miseries to Pakistani people and
they have to live with it. It was founded on a
WRONG principle.
It is impossible to change geography than behavior.We have so many problems to solve. This
was happened 62 years and we are still paying a
heavy price today by proxy war by Pakistani
armed forces, terrorist and infiltrators. What
is important that we have to force our Government
to take some drastic steps to prevent such occurrences. Unfortunately all parties and all leaders who came to power after Independence have
failed to solve Kashmir issue. It is already
causes so many problems for Kashmiri Pandits who
have been displaced from their own homeland.
What a pity full situation for them?.
No party or no politician in any party are even
raising this issue. The article 370 in our constitution must be abrogated and change J& K
to Kashmir and allow anyone who start the business
over there must be allowed any reservation.
On top all this Indian Government should insist
to Vacant so called POK, Why Indian government allowed that Butcher of Kargil to visit India?
Indian Government should raise an issue with UN
about ethnic cleansing done by Musharaf and hold
him accuntable.
God bless INDIA Indian Armed forces, JAI HIND.
Thank you,
Sincerely,
Rajendra M. Parikh
Arlington, Texas USA

R E C O M E N D A T I O N.

I recoomend this article to Tarun Vijay.
.
I hope by reading this he learns how to write as well as understands how "It is interesting to note that those who are the most vocal about the treacherous division of India, have no great desire to include the community for which Pakistan was created. "

For Jitender Desai

While you are teaching Hindu history to your children, would you include:

1. How caste based violence still continues in India.
.
2. Would you include the widely practised Paedophilia, girls as young as 11 still married to older men in our villages.
.
3. Will you tell them that Inidia was once not Hindu and that Hinduism was thrust on the original poulation of this country.
.
4. Will you tell them that we turn a blind eye to the abortions of female foetuses.

Or.

5. Will your History lesson be restricted to Ram is Real, Babari Masjid (not ours) was a Hindu Temple (ours).

6. Hindus, made slaves of the original population of India.
.
7. Beastiality, murals adorn the outside of our temples (Khajurao).
.
8. Only in India can the word prostitute and temple be used in the same sentence.
.
I can go on

Everybody must be entitled to live as he/she wishes . We must not impose our opinions on others. The majority of Kashmiris do not want to be with India just as Pakistanis did not want to be with India. They all have their reasons to do that and we must all respect it.

Ever since Bangla Desh was converted from East Pakistan or created, it is proved that the basis of partition of India that is having a separate Muslim country was wrong. Actually there can't be a Muslim country or Hindu country because there are no countries on this basis. There are countries with rich people and poor people. There can be many more countries made from within existing countries. Having worked in gulf country and seen people from many nationalities I am able to say this. Imagine Kashmir independent of India and Pakistan, it will be a country of rich and poor like Bangla Desh is nothing more than that. All other definitions will be hoodwinkings.

"History Repeats" - Thats why students are thought History- we have to learn from the mistakes and move on. There is really a grave need to thoroughly analyze the consequences, the causes of partition. It's not that past mistakes are to be buried completely, it is not that we shouldn't question historical legends. Without questioning we can't learn and there was/is/will be no perfect human being.
Indian has to be partitioned because if not we might have had twin systems- twin nations within a nation. We would have find separate electorates, separate wing at every government office.
Partition couldn't have taken place had people didn't liked it to happen. It is a reality, but it is a big catastrophe.
I feel it is the partition which made constitution fathers to make India a secular country with special rights to minorities, had it not been the case we would also have seen military coups.
We should learn from partition in the present scenario of communal down tones. Partition has various dimensions. It is not that single person is responsible for it, it is definitely a collective responsibility from both sides.
The partition may be faded away from the memories , the wounds may be completely healed - but we should pass on what made it happen and what has to be done to prevent it in future.
For eg- world wars are also a collective responsibility and it is not just because to one single Hitler or Germany.

To Mr. Ravi,

Don't single out Hindus for all atrocities. Let me cite some examples:
1. Are u aware of female castration practiced by some muslim countries.
2. Are u aware of the slave trading and later blatant unequality (till the 1960s) in the US against blacks.
3. Are u aware that even in most of the developed countries the women's rights have been recognized only (that too gradually) in the second half of 20th century.
4. Are u aware about the total absence of women's right in the staunchly religious islamic nations?
5. Are u aware that even today in Taliban controlled area womn are not able to walk freely on the streets.
6. Are u aware that in Sudan a women wearing pants would be publicly flogged.
7. Are u aware that an equivalent of our caste system existed in Europe in the form of feudalism?
8. Are u aware that in Russia before overthrowing of the Czar the common man found it impossible to have one decent meal a day and same was the case in China?
This list is endless too. So dont go about mindless accusations of Indian mindset without understanding the history of rest of the world. It is due to people like you that we have been ruled by foreigners for over a 1000 years. Wake up and try and take india forward with pride. All countries and all societies had their own share of shameful practices as each had to experiment and evolve and the fact is that the successful ones have come out of it and as Mr. Dessai says have progressed after shrugging away and learning from experiences.

Agree with the part about forgetting and moving on. On the other hand, we must learn from the treachery of Nehru and his role in aggravating the bloodshed by being obstinate. Also, the current congress is still following the same old principle of unbridled protection of minority rights at the expense of the majority sentiment. It seems like a repeat of the congress's stand in 1947 (Including Gandhi's stand of appeasing pakistan at the cost of hindus being massacared).

If you do not learn from History, it is bound to repeat!! Forget about the partition and you will suddenly face the next partition of india. And by the way people have already forgotten that Indonesia, Malaysia, Combodia which were predominantly hindu nations are now non-hindu.
Unless we tackle the mutual hate between Hindus and muslims, nothing is going to change. And that is impossible in an environment of appeasement and the reaction to it.

Can somebody give the numbers/figures about hindus and muslims killed during partition. How hindus and sikhs in majority were massacured and no muslims. Now blaming Ghandi & Nehru for it is not justifed. Yes if they would have played good part by accomodating Jinnah's demand for muslims rights, it would have been a different situation. A United India with Muslin rulers is not acceptable to majority because they cannot forget the 600 years rule of Moguls. Now India is without of Nepal, Bangladesh & Pakistan and this is reality. Indians should stop blame game. Strong and secured neighbours are the boundaries of India stopping another invader to Delhi. We should not the forget history but look forward for future to live in peace for economic development and providing shelter and food to poor in the region.

In the long run, we're all dead.

A time frame of 100 years:
Borders are fluid. Take it in writing, 100 years from now (if we're alive to see the day. probably not), the subcontinent will not have borders, the way they are today. Like they are not, what they used to be 100 years back.

Religious affiliation is fluid. The muslim man today, could easily have been a hindu 10 generations earlier, and vice versa.

Ownership of land, countries, states? Really?
The owner of the subcontinent is not, can not, be a single religious community. It might be difficult, but not impossible to disassociate this binding in our collective consciousness.

What can help, right now, is to start living in the present. And for the present. Let us stop indoctrinating our younger generations with religious views which we think are correct. Give them the opportunity to grow up in an environment where there is no generalisation about all members of their religious community being the 'good guys' and the others 'bad guys'.

There is hope. Start living a happy life today, and let your children have at least an environment that is free from the toxin of religious fundamentalism and ideas of religious states and nationhood.

pallakard says"Also, the current congress is still following the same old principle of unbridled protection of minority rights at the expense of the majority sentiment"; If the parliament gave way to the majority sentiment of a nationalist Hindu majority then one can be sure that laws would be passed to make life untenable for these groups with the view to religious clensing of non Hindus and the extermination of dissident factions such as the dalits.Much the same as Nazi Germany
India is a secular state so get used to it .

The sentiment about moving on is good, but India should also be aware of the threat from military dominated, Islamic terrorist country next door. As for the majoritarian issue, only Moslems and a tiny number of Christians have a problem with the idea of an India with a Hindu ethos and Hindu character. Parsees, Jews, Buddhists, Jains and the vast majority of Sikhs don't have a problem with it at all.