Genocide: - DIIS

The Punjab 1937-47 - A Case of Genocide?
lack of external constraints – no international sanctions or intervention. 23
These three preconditions were all amply present in the Punjab in 1947.
Firstly, the process of decolonisation and the creation of the two new states
of India and Pakistan threw Punjab into a state of complete turmoil, secondly,
the communal differences and the ensuing hostilities were the cause
of the internal strife which was given a historical hue by the political leadership
and lastly, the British unwillingness to counter the violence. This led
to a breakdown of law and order and provided suitable conditions for the
confl ict to grow unhindered.
The genocide scholar Mark Levene has argued that the emergence of nationalism,
especially in multiethnic societies creates what he has named
‘zones of genocide’ where confl icting national aspirations battle over the
same resources and territory. 24 However, in Punjab the notion of communalism
25 better serves as an explanation for partition violence. The
origin of the concept of communalism is still widely debated. A historian
of modern India Bipan Chandra sees communalism more as a product of
colonial rule than as a (conscious colonial) construction. 26 Through their
ability to divide and rule the British succeeded in dividing Indian society. 27
Gyanendra Pandey argues that communalism grew out of British writings
on Indian society. According to him communalism was constructed by the
23 Barbara Harff (1987), “The Etiology of Genocides“, in Isidor Wallimann & Michael N. Dobkowski
(eds.), Genocide and the Modern Age. Etiology and Case Studies of Mass Death. New
York, p. 43.
24 Mark Levene (1998), “Creating a Modern “Zone of Genocide“: The Impact of Nation and
State Formation on Eastern Anatolia, 1878-1923“, Holocaust and Genocide Studies, vol. 12, no.
3, p. 418-19.
25 The term communalism denotes a phenomenon where two or more communities in the
same locality believe that they cannot coexist. It is based on the construction of ‚Self‘ and
‚Other‘ and often leads to the belief that the Other needs to be expelled from the locality.
26 Bipan Chandra (1984), Communalism in Modern India. New Delhi.
27 Bipan Chandra et al (1988), India’s Struggle for Independence 1857-1947. New Delhi, p. 398-
442. For a further debate on communalism see: K. N. Panikkar (ed.) (1991), Communalism in
India: History, Politics and Culture. New Delhi; Ayesha Jalal (1996), “Secularism, Subalterns
and the Stigma of ‘Communalism’: Partition Historiography revisited”, Modern Asian Studies,
30, 3, p. 681-89.
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