Just watched "The Day India Burned - Partition" on BBC2. Very sad first hand stories from both sides of the Partition, about the mess, dislocation and the killings. And the main players - Mountbatton, Nehru, Jinnah and Gandhi - all come off badly. I remember my father's stories of the trek from the Muslim side to the Hindu/Sikh side of Punjab when he was 9. Terrible. So a day to celebrate as it meant Independence but not for the 1 million people who lost their lives.
Over the last few years (since the thawing in relations) the fans have been pretty good. But it used to get quite ugly.
If I remember rightly, when we used to run to Slough Mail Centre, before it moved to Greenford and we lost alot of road-runs, there were two unloading ramps, one staffed by mainly Muslims, one by mainly Sikhs/Hindus. My mate unloaded on one and went to the other to pick up the SN mail and the second ramp-staff refused to help him as he'd just come from the other. The Indo-Pakistan problem even ran over to life in Slough. I only ever went their twice in the middle of the night so I dunno if he was pulling my leg.
May well be true - depends upon when this was. Communal relations could be strained at times depending upon whether India & Pakistan were sabre-rattling at the time. And Slough went through a phase of bad communal relations due to gang warfare (which had spilled over from west London - the gangs were divided along religious lines, and the local colleges had a lot of problems).
This was back in the mid-late 90s. Couple of lads ( Indian & Pakistani) at my work give each-other stick but it's no worse than our English-Scottish jibes.
I also watched the programme, my family already had a low opinion of mountbatten and Co I felt ashamed when I watched the goings on.
I also watched the programme, my family already had a low opinion of mountbatten and Co I felt ashamed when I watched the goings on. A book well worth reading is: Amazon.co.uk: The Shadow of the Great Game: Books: Narendra Singh Sarila
