In 2019 Indian prime minister Narendra Modi revoked Kashmir’s special status in India’s constitution, taking away its autonomy. ibid.
What dark deals have been done by world leaders to prolong the conflict in Kashmir? ibid.
‘The conflict between India and Pakistan goes back to 1947: Partition was a sudden and fairly brutal process, and the problem was that Kashmir which is both Muslim and Hindu was made into a special territory.’ ibid. Michael Clarke, military specialist
Bigger battles were yet to come between these fierce and ultimately nuclear rivals. ibid.
Pakistan launched a series of air strikes against Indian airbases in Kashmir. India responded with force. Its army [December 1971] captured some 90,000 Pakistani troops in Eastern Pakistan … On 16th December 1971 Eastern Pakistan became the new sovereign state of Bangladesh. ibid.
Pakistan became the third largest recipient of American aid. ibid.
In Kashmir, the Islamic insurgency ramped up the pressure on India. ibid.
After decades of conflict, Kashmir still remains an open sore between these two nuclear giants … A wound that doesn’t look like it will be healing any time soon. ibid.
In late March the Indian government ordered a nationwide lockdown forcing everyone to stay at home. As a result in April alone, about 122 millions lost their jobs … The poorest Indians were beaten and forced to do humiliating exercises as punishment for ignoring the restrictions. Daily wage workers suffered the most severe consequences … Covid 19: World in Danger, Discovery 2020
To imagine the level of disorientation they must have felt: these were men from villages in rural India; they’d never left their homeland before and many of them will have known very very little about the outside world. To make matters much worse, when they’d left India, they hadn’t even been told where they were going. It was only in the last days of their journey they were told the truth. David Olusoga, The World’s War: Forgotten Soldiers of Empire I: Martial Races, BBC 2020
Alongside units from the regular army, it was made up of men from a dozen different ethnic groups led by white British officers who had made their careers in British India … The authority of the India Corps’ British officers drew much of its self-confidence from a racial theory that was rooted in the imperial experience in British India. ibid.
‘Many of the men show a tendency to break into poetry which I am inclined to regard as a rather ominous sign of mental disquietude’. ibid. Captain Howell’s letter of perceived ethnic traits
Far from covering himself in glory, Mountbatten’s actions in extracting Britain from India were to leave a devastating legacy. Lord Mountbatten: Hero or Villain? Channel 5 2020
Partition: two days later when the borders were revealed, panic set in. And the full horror of partition was unleashed. In the ensuing weeks, one million people lost their lives, and fifteen million were displaced as people fled across the borders. ibid.
India: it recently overturned the Victorian law that criminalised homosexuality. Stephen Fry, Out There II, BBC 2003
How in the nineteenth century a British government coup in India created the British Raj. And was heralded by the Victorians as the civilising triumph of the empire. British History’s Biggest Fibs with Lucy Worsley III, BBC 2017
They called themselves the Honourable East India Company and they went to great lengths to engineer a facade of British respectability. ibid.
She also came to India … an even more daunting challenge … Two million people are thought to have turned out to greet the royal motorcade. George Alagiah: The Queen: Her Commonwealth, BBC 2018
India: Over 250 million workers joined protesting farmers in one of the biggest nationwide strikes ever:
Shutdown Across Sectors, as Over 25 Core Workers Join One of the Biggest Strikes Ever, 26 November 2020.
In one of the biggest nationwide strikes by workers, joined by protesting farmers in India, several states saw a complete shutdown … Over 250 million workers across sectors participated in the strike, called by 10 central trade unions and hundreds of worker associations and federations in perhaps the biggest ever coordinated general strike anywhere in the world.
Kerala, Puducherry, Odisha, Assam and Telangana witnessed a complete shutdown while normal life was partially affected in several other states as workers struck work and took to the streets, protesting against the ‘anti-worker’ and pro-corporate policies and labour laws as well as the new farm laws brought in by the Narendra Modi-led Bharatiya Janata party government, among other demands …
The joint platform includes Indian National Trade Union Congress (INTUC), All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC), Hind Mazdoor Sabha (HMS), Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU), All India United Trade Union Centre (AIUTUC), Trade Union Co-ordination Centre (TUCC) and Self-Employed Women’s Association (SEWA), All India Central Council of Trade Unions (AICCTU), Labour Progressive Federation (LPF) and United Trade Union Congress (UTUC).
The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh-affiliated Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh stayed away from the joint action.
… Farmers from across the country also marched to Delhi in protest against the new corporate-friendly farm laws and in solidarity with workers, braving arrests, teargas, water cannons and numerous barricades on the way, especially in Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. Business and Human Rights Resource Centre article 26 November 2020
Britain is about to leave the greatest territory in its empire: India. But with the clock ticking towards independence, neighbours become mortal enemies in a fight for land and power. India 1947: Partition in Colour, Channel 4 2022
Colourised archive and private documents will tell the story of the personal rivalries between the key players at the centre of partition: Nehru, Jinnah and Mountbatten. ibid.
Mountbatten’s wife was having an affair with Nehru. ibid.
In March 1946 the British sent a team to agree terms with the leaders of India’s biggest political parties. ibid. caption
It takes five days for enough British troops to be deployed to quell the violence. ibid.
So essentially the Indians are set free to kill each other. ibid. historian
The appointment of a new viceroy, a decision that would affect the lives of millions: Lord Louis ‘Dickie’ Mountbatten, last Viceroy of India. ibid.
1947: Mountbatten leaves Britain to take up his new appointment as Viceroy. ibid.
The Mountbattens’ own unconventional marriage would soon come to have a profound impact on political events. ibid.
I regard Jinnah as a psychopathic case. ibid. Mountbatten
Plan Falcon as it’s known is approved in London; it has not been discussed with any of the Indian leaders. ibid.
He did bully Jinnah into agreeing to the partition plan. ibid. historian
The way that partition is announced sent a shockwave throughout India … 73 days to create two new countries with two different identities. It sounds insane because it is insane. ibid.
India will be divided creating a new nation of Pakistan. But Jinnah, leader of the Muslim league, is left dismayed that his new country will be in two parts separated by a thousand miles. Then Mountbatten makes the extraordinary announcement that partition will take place not in a year but in ten weeks’ time. India 1947: Partition in Colour II
19 days after Mountbatten’s broadcast, Lahore, capital of the Punjab, is the first city to erupt into violence. ibid.
Trust between Mountbatten and Jinnah hits a new low. ibid.
‘It was a dreadful example of gerrymandering, it was deceitful, it was hugely dangerous.’ ibid. Son of boundary team member
The exact location of the partition boundary lines are finally announced resulting in a huge upsurge in violence. ibid.
It’s now estimated that during Partition between 1 and 3 million people lost their lives. Between 12 and 18 million people were displaced in the largest migration in human history. ibid. captions