Violence against women during the Partition of India

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During the Partition of India, violence against women occurred extensively.[1] It is estimated that during the partition between 75,000[2] and 100,000[3] women were kidnapped and raped.[4] The rape of women by men during this period is well documented,[5] with women sometimes also being complicit in these attacks.[5][6] In March 1947, systematic violence against women started in Rawalpindi where Sikh women were targeted by Muslim mobs.[7][8] Violence was also perpetrated on an organized basis, with Pathans taking Hindu and Sikh women from refugee trains while armed Sikhs periodically dragged Muslim women from their refugee column and killing any men who resisted, while the military sepoys guarding the columns did nothing.[9]

It has been estimated that in the Punjab, the number of abducted Muslim women was double the number of abducted Hindu and Sikh women, because of the actions of coordinated Sikh jathas[10] who were aided and armed by Sikh rulers of the 16 semi-autonomous princely states in Punjab which overlapped the expected partition border, and had been preparing to oust the Muslims from East Punjab in case of partition.[11] India and Pakistan later worked to repatriate the abducted women. Muslim women were to be sent to Pakistan and Hindu and Sikh women to India.[10]

  1. ^ Žarkov, Dubravka (2007). The Body of War: Media, Ethnicity, and Gender in the Break-Up of Yugoslavia. Duke University Press. p. 172. ISBN 978-0822339663.
  2. ^ Aftab, Tahera (30 November 2007). Inscribing South Asian Muslim Women: An Annotated Bibliography & Research Guide (Annotated ed.). Brill. p. 224. ISBN 978-9004158498.
  3. ^ Ian Talbot; Gurharpal Singh (23 July 2009). The Partition of India. Cambridge University Press. pp. 2–3. ISBN 978-0-521-85661-4.
  4. ^ Butalia, Urvashi (2011). Harsh Dobhal (ed.). Writings on Human Rights, Law and Society in India: A Combat Law Anthology. Human Rights Law Network. p. 598. ISBN 978-81-89479-78-7.
  5. ^ a b Kabir, Ananya Jahanara (25 January 2010). Sorcha Gunne, Zoe Brigley Brigley Thompson (ed.). Feminism, Literature and Rape Narratives: Violence and Violation (1st ed.). Routledge. p. 149. ISBN 978-0415806084.
  6. ^ Chowdhry, Geeta (2000). Sita Ranchod-Nilsson, Mary Ann Tétreaul (ed.). Women, States, and Nationalism: At Home in the Nation? (1st ed.). Routledge. pp. 107–110. ISBN 978-0415221726.
  7. ^ Cite error: The named reference sikh was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  8. ^ Major, Abduction of women during the partition of the Punjab 1995, pp. 59.
  9. ^ Major, Abduction of women during the partition of the Punjab 1995, pp. 60.
  10. ^ a b Barbara D. Metcalf; Thomas R. Metcalf (24 September 2012). A Concise History of Modern India. Archived 2022-12-29 at the Wayback Machine p 226, Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-139-53705-6.
  11. ^ Brass, Paul R. (2003-03-01). "The partition of India and retributive genocide in the Punjab, 1946-47: Means, methods, and purposes 1". Journal of Genocide Research. 5 (1): 71–101. doi:10.1080/14623520305657. ISSN 1462-3528. S2CID 14023723.