Decolonization and Genocide: Re-Examining Indian Partition, 1946–1947

Abstract:This article proposes that the Indian Partition of 1947 could be classified as a form of “decolonizing genocide.” It draws upon the original Lemkinian criteria for genocide in order to re-examine aspects of Partition violence. The author thus discusses the need to expand the existing terminology and frameworks that scholars have previously used to analyze the Partition; examines the different state and non-state groups involved, and how the climate of decolonization enabled different state and non-state groups to mobilize in various forms and degrees; and studies the victim groups, particularly, women and their experiences of sexual violence. From the case of Indian Partition, this article argues that the conditions present during decolonization help to perpetuate a specific kind of organized violence, carried out by state, quasi-state, and non-state agents, which is genocidal in both its logic and nature. Thus, re-examining Indian Partition as decolonizing genocide allows us to move beyond Eurocentric and state-oriented definitions of genocide in order to create a more effective approach towards understanding mass violence in decolonizing and postcolonial societies.