MEDIATING GENDER AND EMPOWERMENT: WOMEN PARTITION VICTIMS, BARAK VALLEY OF ASSAM

The Partition of India is the momentous event in the history of South Asia. It triggered bloody violence, a large number of brutal deaths, devastation, acute emotional, mental and psychologicaltrauma to millions of people who found themselves on the wrong side of the newly created border after Partition. In addition, Partition generated a huge forced migration of population who were compelled to leave behind their ancestral homeand hearth (wherein they lived for generations together)in order to save their lives. Although in the Partition violence, people suffered irrespective of their identity, its impact was experienced more severely by the socially and economically marginalised people such as women, Dalits, children and the differently-abled people.The Partition was carried out according to the Lord Mountbatten Plan of 3rd June, 1947 wherein Punjab was divided into East Punjab and West Punjab and Bengal into East Bengal and West Bengal Ostensibly, the province of Assam also experienced Partition which is a lesser known fact in the history of Partition. The fundamental cause of the Assam Partition was the linguistic divide between the Assamese and the Bengalis that started fomenting in colonial Assam due to the British policy of Divide and Rule.In the Assam Partition, not only the region experienced Partition but also the Bengali speaking Muslim majority district of Sylhet in Assam to re-install connectivity with then Lushai hills (now Mizoram state) and Tripura hills (now Tripura state).