Refugees and the Politics of the Everyday State in Pakistan
Subtitle: Resettlement in Punjab, 1947-1962
By: Elisabetta Iob
Edition: First edition.
Series: Royal Asiatic Society Books
Publisher: Taylor and Francis
Published: 2017
Place of publication: London
Language: eng
Number of pages: 174
ISBN-13: 9780203729700
Subjects: East Indians; Relocation; Refugees; History; Forced migration; Social aspects; Réfugiés; Histoire; Aspect social; SOCIAL SCIENCE; Ethnic Studies; General
Description: "The Partition of India in 1947 involved the division of two provinces, Bengal and the Punjab, based on district-wise Hindu or Muslim majorities. The Partition displaced between 10 and 12 million people along religious lines. This book provides a comprehensive and in-depth analysis of the resettlement and rehabilitation of Partition refugees in Pakistani Punjab between 1947 and 1962. It weaves a chronological and thematic plot into a single narrative, and focuses on the Punjabi refugee middle and upper-middle class. Emphasising the everyday experience of the state, the author challenges standard interpretations of the resettlement of Partition refugees in the region and calls for a more nuanced understanding of their rehabilitation. The book argues the universality of the so-called 'exercise in human misery', and the heterogeneity of the rehabilitation policies. Refugees' stories and interactions with local institutions reveal the inability of the local bureaucracy to establish its own 'polity' and the viable workability of Pakistan as a state. The use of Pakistani documents, US and British records and a careful survey of both the judicial records and the Urdu and English-language dailies of the time, provides an invaluable window onto the everyday life of a state, its institutions and its citizens. A carefully researched study of both the state and the everyday lives of refugees as they negotiated resettlement, through both personal and official channels, the book offers an important reinterpretation of the first years of Pakistani history. It will be of interest to academics working in the field of refugee resettlement?and South Asian History and Politics."--Provided by publisher.
Table of contents: title: Cover ; Title; Copyright; Contents; Map; Tables; Image; Acknowledgements; Abbreviations; Glossary; Note on transliterations and translations; Introduction; 1 Memories, swords, blood and freedom: when independence came to India and Pakistan; The 1947 March to May communal violence and the early flows of refugees; Translating the 'big political ideas' at stake into practice; Moulding both personal and political identities out of the Partition mayhem; Moving towards freedom; Making sense of the official narrative and figures; 2 Camps, homes, towns and villages.; title: 'There's no place like home': the politics of intimacy, domesticity and resettlement among West Punjabi refugeesLiminalities of citizenship: refugee camps and temporary structures; Elective affinities: refugees, homes, domesticity and belonging; From homes to towns and cities: refugees and the negotiation of urban space and identity; Something old, something new and something borrowed: the rural resettlement of refugees in Pakistani Punjab; 3 Patronage, bureaucratic unruliness and the resettling of Partition refugees in everyday Pakistani Punjab.; title: Overthrowing the king: challenging Pakistani bureaucracy's strengthsPowerful friends, influential acquaintances: conceptualising Pakistani bureaucracy; Ersatz bureaucracy for people on the brink of marginality; Turning political? Administrative failures and political demands; 4 Punjab Assembly, party seats, electoral boxes; Pawns in a political game: refugees, electoral rules and competitions and the politics of West Punjab's stability; Pieces at the beginning of the game: engineering a new electoral system; The king's jewels: defining parties' dynamics.; title: With friends like these ... : checkmating political rivalsThe after-match party of the 1951 elections; 5 Constituent Assembly and neighbours; Self-portraits in spherical mirrors: Partition refugees and the elaboration of the 'basic (dis)order' of Pakistan; All that glitters is not gold: refugees, resettlement policies and the challenge of creating an everyday state; Until death tears us apart: Pakistan, India and the resettlement of refugees in West Punjab; All for one and one for all: creating a nation, levelling down differences; Conclusion; Appendix: note on primary sources; Index.