Home Cultural Studies Introduction - Connecting the partitions of India and Palestine
Chapter
Licensed
Unlicensed Requires Authentication

Introduction - Connecting the partitions of India and Palestine

Institutions, policies, laws and people
  • Victor Kattan and Amit Ranjan
View more publications by Manchester University Press
To Publisher Page
The breakup of India and Palestine
This chapter is in the book The breakup of India and Palestine

Abstract

The introduction compares and contrasts the decisions taken by the British Government and the United Nations to partition India and Palestine in 1947 by drawing attention to their timing, which occurred within months of each other. The chapter then traces the etymology of partition to earlier imperial divisions in the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, portraying partition as an imperial continuum. The similarities in British administrative policies in India and Palestine are then considered – identifying colonial subjects by their socially constructed religious identities – and attention is drawn to the provenance of both places as holy lands. The role of institutions, such as the League of Nations and the United Nations, in partition, are then considered, as well as the influence of external powers such as the USA and the Soviet Union. Finally, the introduction summarises the contributions in the chapters that follow.

Abstract

The introduction compares and contrasts the decisions taken by the British Government and the United Nations to partition India and Palestine in 1947 by drawing attention to their timing, which occurred within months of each other. The chapter then traces the etymology of partition to earlier imperial divisions in the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, portraying partition as an imperial continuum. The similarities in British administrative policies in India and Palestine are then considered – identifying colonial subjects by their socially constructed religious identities – and attention is drawn to the provenance of both places as holy lands. The role of institutions, such as the League of Nations and the United Nations, in partition, are then considered, as well as the influence of external powers such as the USA and the Soviet Union. Finally, the introduction summarises the contributions in the chapters that follow.

Chapters in this book

  1. Front Matter i
  2. Dedication v
  3. Contents vii
  4. List of contributors ix
  5. Foreword by Lucy Chester xiii
  6. Acknowledgements xvi
  7. Introduction - Connecting the partitions of India and Palestine 1
  8. Part I: The partition of British India
  9. 1 The Mountbatten Viceroyalty reconsidered 35
  10. 2 The paradigmatic partition? The Pakistan demand revisited 57
  11. Part II: The partition of Palestine
  12. 3 Partition and the question of international governance 75
  13. 4 Fighting for Palestine as a holy duty? The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood and the partition of Palestine in 1947 91
  14. Part III: The partitions of India and Palestine compared
  15. 5 The communal question and partition in British India and mandate Palestine 113
  16. 6 India’s dilemmas of pragmatism v. principles 138
  17. Part IV: The consequences of partition for South Asia, the Middle East and beyond
  18. 7 The partitions of India and Palestine and the dawn of majority rule in Africa and Asia 159
  19. 8 ‘Unfinished’ partition 193
  20. 9 Civil war, total war or a war of partition? Reassessing the 1948 War in Palestine from a global perspective 222
  21. 10 Partitioned identities? Regional, caste and national identity in Pakistan 259
  22. Afterword 278
  23. Index 289
https://doi.org/10.7765/9781526170323.00007

Chapters in this book

  1. Front Matter i
  2. Dedication v
  3. Contents vii
  4. List of contributors ix
  5. Foreword by Lucy Chester xiii
  6. Acknowledgements xvi
  7. Introduction - Connecting the partitions of India and Palestine 1
  8. Part I: The partition of British India
  9. 1 The Mountbatten Viceroyalty reconsidered 35
  10. 2 The paradigmatic partition? The Pakistan demand revisited 57
  11. Part II: The partition of Palestine
  12. 3 Partition and the question of international governance 75
  13. 4 Fighting for Palestine as a holy duty? The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood and the partition of Palestine in 1947 91
  14. Part III: The partitions of India and Palestine compared
  15. 5 The communal question and partition in British India and mandate Palestine 113
  16. 6 India’s dilemmas of pragmatism v. principles 138
  17. Part IV: The consequences of partition for South Asia, the Middle East and beyond
  18. 7 The partitions of India and Palestine and the dawn of majority rule in Africa and Asia 159
  19. 8 ‘Unfinished’ partition 193
  20. 9 Civil war, total war or a war of partition? Reassessing the 1948 War in Palestine from a global perspective 222
  21. 10 Partitioned identities? Regional, caste and national identity in Pakistan 259
  22. Afterword 278
  23. Index 289
Sign up now to receive a 20% welcome discount
Institutional Access
How does access work?
Have an idea on how to improve our website?
Please write us.
© 2025 De Gruyter Brill
Downloaded on 2.10.2025 from https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.7765/9781526170323.00007/html?srsltid=AfmBOoqr4pfBI2BB63DSlGdd6pohCvUNcJ5zOGoDmtUCdDEKm78mBIkd
Scroll to top button