Crisis of Belonging and Rehabilitation: Partition of India

In the year 1947, India witnessed partition and huge influx and exodus of people. This paper focuses on the case of Bengal and the problems of rehabilitation of the refugees of East Bengal with particular emphasis on their idea of 'desh' and 'home.' The major question lies in answering the broad question- Where lies the 'home'. The idea of nation is very relative as defined by Benedict Anderson in the book "Imagined community : reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism". The cognitive revolution about nation lead to a dilemma among the diasporic communities of East Bengal in India which resulted in far greater political consequences. The concept of 'desh' imagined by the refugees of East Bengal created an interchange of cityscape, social community, and also the characters of society. The imagination about the right over their "nation" lead them create their own "desh" in a place where ever they lived, be it their homeland, where they stayed mentally or house, where they lived physically. Thus, migration carries with it a whole gamut of emotional dilemma of identity and belonging.