Politics of hate and politics of heat: The psychology of communal violence following the Partition

To add another lens to the event, I will refer briefly to two accounts – one intellectual and long-distant one and the other a direct witness – of the killings in Calcutta, from Nirad C Chaudhuri and Ashis Nandy. Chaudhuri had left Calcutta for good in 1942, but he had friends and relatives in the city that passed on information. Nandy was nine years old and new to the city.

In his memoir, Thy Hand Great Anarch! Chaudhuri writes with characteristic bluntness:

“The unwillingness of the Government of Bengal was certainly intentional, and if they at last asked for military intervention that was only to save themselves from the obvious charge of being behind the massacres. It is also possible that they asked for military help when they saw that the game of killing was going against Muslims.”

The fact of a leader or government abetting crime often happens through carefully crafted acts of prevention of duty (which is prevention of law and justice). It is difficult in retrospect to hold them responsible as the motivational aspects behind such facts are clouded by claims that befuddle and confuse interpretation. Objectivity must negotiate with suspicion and good faith. This false challenge is deliberately created to withhold judgment. Chaudhuri blames Suhrawardy’s...

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