The Museum Of Agony: A Miserable Tale of Partition

A still from inside the museum.

(Photo: AP)

Seventy years ago, in 1947, India was divided, carving two newly-independent nations from former British India. Now, India is getting its first museum dedicated to the partition and its violent aftermath.

The Partition Museum, housed in Amritsar's historic Town Hall building, will take visitors on an immersive journey through India during the time of partition, when more than 12 million people fled their homes and hundreds of thousands were killed.

There’s also a well – in memory of the women who plunged to their deaths to escape sexual violence during the partition.

Visitors walking through the galleries will be transported back to the times leading up to the partition, seeing some of the earliest calls for a separate Muslim state and a map of the two nations post-partition.

Mallika Ahluwalia, the museum's CEO, heard stories of undivided India from her 83-year-old grandmother.

She hopes the museum will pay tribute to the partition survivors, such as her grandmother, and bring their stories to the world through video and audio recordings.

Partition isn’t a macro question only about nations, it’s a micro question where millions of individuals, human beings, each of them, what they lost...It’s a very humbling thing, you end up feeling so grateful to that generation who, I think, helped rebuild the nation, despite having suffered such trauma

Mallika Ahluwalia, CEO, Partition Museum

"Revival, you should revive the thought that this must never happen again," says the 92-year-old Krishen Khanna, who is a partition survivor.

Video Editor: Vivek Gupta