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to the author, contributed Empire in course of time, Written in an easy as the ‘sixth partition’ is
towards alienation of a the uncoupling process and engaging style, Sam conspicuously absent.
large number of Muslims, was without large-scale Dalrymple’s meticulously Similarly, while the
including Jinnah. These violence. researched history refresh- author touches upon the
events acted as triggers for On the other hand, ingly destroys the depic- reign of Zia-ul-Haq in his
the Partition of India and states which comprised tion that British imperi- recitation of the internal
Pakistan, which occurred the core of the Em- alism was benign. That strife in Pakistan, follow-
merely a decade later in pire — India, Pakistan, partition, rather than being ing the death of Jinnah
1947. In fact, it may be Bangladesh and Burma, a ‘simple’ and an ‘innocent’ and the formation of Ban-
suggested that Partition is witnessed unprecedented political act, was ‘layered’ gladesh, there is hardly any
an integral part of the Brit- bloodshed and displace- and a ‘shrewd’ tactic that discussion on the atroci-
ish Empire’s legacy. ment, in times of Partition. the colonial state employed ties that were inflicted on
Analysing British Shattered Lands stresses to achieve personal gains, Communist intellectuals,
perception of the Indian that the British-sponsored is highlighted in the study. including Faiz Ahmad Faiz,
Empire, the author makes partition(s), rather than Also, by delineating by the General’s govern-
an interesting observation. solving issues, complicated the rather long and tiring ment.
He argues that primarily them further. process of integration of Dalrymple’s account of
for diplomatic reasons, the In this context the cases princely states with India, South Asia’s chaotic 20th
colonial state played safe of Burma, India, Pakistan Pakistan and Burma, Dal- century is vivid, incisive
on the issue of describing and Bangladesh are very rymple is able to convinc- and expansive, all at once.
the extent of the empire. relevant. The problems ingly demonstrate that Peppered with anecdotes
Maps depicting the Raj in that plagued these nations shattering of the ‘Indian and rare archival photo-
its entirety were almost at the time of their forma- Empire’ occurred at mul- graphs, Shattered Lands
always published in ‘top tion continue to fester. The tiple levels, a fact rarely is an unputdownable
secrecy’. Regions such as fact that issues concern- acknowledged. history of the collapse of
Oman, Nepal, Tibet and ing Kashmir, insurgen- The book does have its the Indian Empire and the
a few Arab states border- cies, coups and unstable share of flaws. Given that layered concept known as
ing the Ottoman Empire governments, have become Britain played a crucial ‘Partition’. And for this the
never appeared in colonial more complicated over role in sowing the seeds young historian should be
maps. Indeed even though the years, has been well of discontent between commended.
some of these places were defined by the young Palestine and Israel, an ac- AMOL SAGHAR (The
separated from the Indian historian. count of what we may term Book Review)

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