Unforgettable Partition Tales of Forgiveness, Strangers Giving Refuge & Friendships Defying Borders

All wounds don’t look the same. Some are subtle grazes; others are slightly more invasive; and then there are the ones that penetrate, fester, and bleed, almost always leaving a scar. 

Does the scar ever fade? Does the ache ever lessen?  

A hunt for the answers led me to the survivors of the Partition of 1947. The ‘Radcliffe Line’ pierced through India’s skin that year, running through the provinces of Punjab and Bengal, dividing British India into two independent dominion states, the Union of India and Dominion of Pakistan. 

But, alongside the pain, there emerged powerful tales of courage and kindness. As Guneeta Singh Bhalla, founder of The 1947 Partition Archive, says, “It’s generational trauma that can’t be forgotten.” Yet within these stories are moments of hope — neighbours protecting each other, strangers offering refuge, friendships that defied borders.

Through over 10,200 oral histories collected across 14 countries in more than 36 languages, the archive preserves not just the memories of loss but also the enduring spirit of humanity that shone through those turbulent times. And as I listened to these voices from the past, I realised — time may not erase wounds, but it can weave them into legacies of love, empathy, and unity.

‘Partition taught me to forgive’   

Amid the chaos and heartbreak of Partition, eight-year-old Shane Ali’s life was marked by loss, danger, and unimaginable change. Yet, from those darkest moments emerged an extraordinary journey — one that would lead him from fear to forgiveness, and from loneliness to a life filled with family, love, and peace.

If Guneeta had to sift through the 100-odd Partition narratives she’s documented over the years and pick a story that’s left her with the strongest aftertaste of hope, she says it would have to be that of her protagonist, Shane Ali. 

One particular day is burned into his memory; it was when mobsters attacked his village. Shane remembers their pounding on the door of the hideout where he and his mother, along with the other women and children from the village, were holed up. 

When the door did not give in to their demands, they broke the roof. Their agenda was tragically simple: kill the boy children; spare the girls. Shane’s mother, thinking on her feet, made best use of her dupatta (Indian scarf) to disguise her son as a girl. 

While the trick fooled the mobsers, that was the last time Shane saw his mother before she was killed. 

Later that day, while attempting to run away from the pain and mobsters, he was caught. But once again, on the brink of death, he was spared. “The mobster had been instructed to bring back one boy — alive,” Guneeta recounts the story she was told. Shane was that one lucky boy.  

The next few years saw him being adopted by a Sikh family, then being consigned to a refugee camp, where he reunited with his extended family. But, he couldn’t gel with them. He only spoke and understood the vocabulary of grief. His past had numbed him.  

Some days, studying helped. Other days, it was the dark corner of the local mosque, where Shane found refuge. It was here that he made a friend who’d also known grief like him, having lost his parents at an early age. One day, the friend divulged the antidote. “From the bottom of your heart, forgive and you’ll be cured.” And in trying it, Shane found freedom. Guneeta shares that Shane is now settled in California, surrounded by children, grandchildren, and a lot of love.

‘Partition taught me that help arrives when you least expect’  

Najar Singh’s early life was marked by uncertainty and loss. Yet, through the kindness of one teacher who saw his potential, he found stability, purpose, and the strength to rise above his past — proving that even the smallest act of care can change the course of a life.

‘What is your identity?’ 

‘I am a refugee.’

“Partition stories are almost always about the people who left their lives behind and crossed over to the other side. They changed their identities. But what about the people who never had one?” Gurmeet Singh, part of The 1947 Partition Archive team, documented the story of Najar Singh, who was born during the mass exodus and left in a basket at the India-Pakistan border. 

Najar was discovered by a couple crossing over to India. Childless at the time, they saw it as fate, picked up the basket, and continued. Najar remembers his childhood; then, of course, he was oblivious to the prequel story that led him there. 

He presumed the couple were his parents. Atleast, until then, the way they loved him was proof of it. But when Najar was five, the couple had a child of their own. He recalled to Gurmeet how his luck changed overnight. 

He was mistreated. In Class 7, he quit school and began herding cows for the next few years. But a teacher soon discovered him. He was Najar’s inflection point. The teacher secured him a job at the Punjab Electricity Board, helped him find his footing in the world, and stuck around until Najar made his way up the professional ladder. 

Years later, he learnt about his origin story; he coaxed it out of his grandmother, who revealed he’d been carried across the border in a basket. As Gurmeet recalls Najar telling him, “When I heard how I was carried over the border, the ground slipped under my feet. It made sense why everyone disliked me.” His chequered past and a shadow of anonymity trailed him all through life, during his first marriage and during his second. The minute he’d share the story of his roots, love turned into scorn. 

While searching for his roots and his living family feels like chasing another unknown, Najar says he'll always remember the teacher who stepped in. The teacher who extended a hand of hope. 

‘Partition taught me the power of friendship’ 

Decades after Partition tore them apart, two best friends — Sudin and Safiquddin — found their way back to each other. It was a reunion filled with laughter, tears, and memories, proving that even the deepest divides can’t dim the light of true friendship.

“Someone is here to see you,” Sudin Chattopadhyay, the secretary of West Bengal’s Board of Secondary Education, was told. 

“Send him in,” he replied. 

The man who entered Sudin’s office was vaguely familiar. He carried traces of Sudin’s best friend and once inseparable companion, Safiquddin. 

But was it really him? After all these years? 

All it took was Safiquddin to speak to erase any doubts that Sudin had. This was his friend, the one he met every evening for years, discussing literature, politics, and things only best friends understand. 

When Sudin recounted his friend’s comeback to Jayosree Adhikari of The 1947 Partition Archive team, he “cried like a little boy”. Jayosree understood the depth of their friendship, a bond salted with memories of Partition. 

She shares, “The two friends were in their twenties during Partition. They lived in Madhyamgram, West Bengal. One evening, Safiquddin returned home to find his house burning to the ground — the work of refugees who’d come to Madhyamgram.” 

Luckily, Safiquddin and his family escaped unhurt. But the incident left him feeling he did not belong. Safiquddin moved to East Pakistan. 

And, overnight, Sudin lost a friend. 

Decades later, as his friend stood in front of him, Sudin was overcome with emotion. They indulged in the memories of their youth. As heartwarming as these conversations were, they also held up a mirror to how barbaric Partition really was. 

“Safiquddin left because he felt he did not have a country to call his own anymore; he felt like a man without an identity,” Sudin told Jayosree. But, in many ways, Partition taught him, when all else fades, friendship remains. 

‘Partition taught me humanity is the most important religion’  

Amolak Singh Bhatia journeyed from Pakistan to India in 1947; on the way, he experienced how, even in the darkest of times, humanity still survived.

Year 1947 

Nothing in the air suggested the day was going to be a life-changing one for Amolak Singh Bhatia. He woke up. Proceeded with his routine. Did not dwell too much on the rumours that India was going to be divided. Even if that happened, his village, Dheerkay Kalan (present-day Pakistan), was too small to be affected, he believed.

As Sahiba Kaur Chhabra, part of The 1947 Partition Archive team, retells the story of her grandfather’s migration to India during Partition, she shares how the magnanimity of the event took years to settle in. 

“When the truck came to take the family to the station from where they would go to Amritsar, my great-grandfather quickly scribbled an amanat nama (trust document) bequeathing all their assets to their Muslim neighbours until the time they got back,” Sahiba shares. 

“We will be back,” was the promise. 

Fate knew better. 

But, while Amolak’s memories of Partition are coloured with fear, confusion, and grief, there are two stories he always tells Sahiba, to underscore how, even in the darkest of times, humanity breathed hope. 

Sahiba shares, “On the train journey to Amritsar, there was a rumour that the railway station water had been poisoned so that anyone who drank the water would die. A military personnel — a Muslim, who was assigned the duty of taking this cohort of people to the Indian side of the border — volunteered to drink the water and test it. ‘Even if it is poisoned, I will die. You will all be safe,’ he told the people on the train.” 

…

These stories underscore an irony. While religion became the pretext of Partition, it also became the reason for hope. And, in these conversations, I found the answer to my question. 

Do scars ever heal? Does the pain ever lessen? 

It lives on. In the changed food habits of the people who crossed the border, in the ‘we’ll be back’s that were never fulfilled, in the crinkle of their eyes every time they think of how they shut their home doors for one last time — knowing they’d never return. 

The wound is there. The bleeding has stopped. But the scar might never fade.  

But then again, it depends on how you see scars.  

They can either be reminders of hurt. 

Or reminders of survival.