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The Scramble for Houses: Violence, a factionalized state, and informal economy in post-partition Delhi*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 April 2017

ROTEM GEVA
ROTEM GEVA*
Affiliation:
The Faculty of Humanities, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

The partition riots that erupted in Delhi following independence in 1947 resulted in the massacre of thousands of Muslims and the departure of roughly 300,000, leaving the remaining Muslim community seriously depleted, both numerically and politically. The article investigates the spatial aspect of Muslim minoritization in the city, namely their ghettoization, resulting from ongoing struggles over Muslim houses. It traces the gradual encroachment on the Muslim-majority neighbourhoods designated ‘Muslim zones’. An analysis of this dynamic reveals that, contrary to the prevalent assumption that Muslim zones were outside the jurisdiction of the Custodian of Evacuee Property, a great deal of the Custodian's intervention took place precisely in these areas. This investigation also reveals that, in addition to civic violence and the bureaucratic violence of the Custodian, a host of other factors played a significant role in determining the geography and intensity of encroachment—namely deep political divisions that cut across all levels of governance and policing, as well as socioeconomic class, informal economy, and corruption. This divided political, bureaucratic, and social landscape reflected the profound uncertainties underlying the process of decolonization, and sustained the violence that lingered on long after the partition riots had ended according to official narratives.

Type
Research Article
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 51 , Issue 3 , May 2017 , pp. 769 - 824
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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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Footnotes

*

I am grateful to Gyan Prakash and Bhavani Raman for their insightful comments on earlier versions of this article. I would also like to thank the two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions. Any errors are my own.

References

1 The Muslim population was 304,501 in the 1941 census, or 33.2 per cent of the total population. Based on Delhi's population growth rate in this decade, in March 1947, Muslims numbered an estimated 424,000. In the 1951 census, the Muslim population had dwindled to 99,501, or 5.71 per cent of the population. See Chopra, P., Delhi Gazetteer, Gazetteer Unit, Delhi Administration, New Delhi, 1976, p. 130 Google Scholar; Rao, V. K. R. V. and Desai, P. B., Greater Delhi: A Study in Urbanisation, 1940–1957, Planning Commission, Government of India, Delhi, 1965, p. 55 Google Scholar.

2 For examples of this approach, see Hasan, M., Legacy of a Divided Nation: India's Muslims since Independence, Hurst & Co., London, 1997)Google Scholar; Tan, T. Y. and Kudaisya, G., The Aftermath of Partition in South Asia, Routledge, New York, 2000 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Ansari, S. F. D., Life after Partition: Migration, Community and Strife in Sindh, 1947–1962, Oxford University Press, New York, 2005 Google Scholar); Talbot, I., Divided Cities: Partition and Its Aftermath in Lahore and Amritsar, 1947–1957, Oxford University Press, Karachi, 2006 Google Scholar; Chatterji, J., The Spoils of Partition: Bengal and India, 1947–1967, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2007 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Kaur, R., Since 1947: Partition Narratives among Punjabi Migrants of Delhi, Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 2007 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Khan, Y., The Great Partition: The Making of India and Pakistan, Yale University Press, New Haven, 2007 Google Scholar; Zamindar, V. F.Y., The Long Partition and the Making of Modern South Asia: Refugees, Boundaries, Histories, Columbia University Press, New York, 2007 Google Scholar; Chattha, I., Partition and Locality: Violence, Migration, and Development in Gujranwala and Sialkot, 1947–1961, Oxford University Press, Karachi, 2011 Google Scholar.

3 ‘80,000 refugees in Delhi now’, Hindustan Times, 5 August 1947.

4 ‘Refugees pouring into Delhi’, Hindustan Times, 21 August 1947.

5 For news on the occupation of non-Muslim houses in Lahore and other cities, see ‘Refugees welcome Nehru's assurance’, Hindustan Times, 26 August 1947.

6 Khurshid Ahmad Khan to R. N. Banerjee, ‘Fortnightly report for the first half of September 1947’, F. 1–47-C, Chief Commissioner Files (henceforth CC), Confidential Branch, Delhi State Archives (henceforth DSA). For a reconstruction of the partition riots in Delhi, see Pandey, G., Remembering Partition: Violence, Nationalism, and History in India, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2001 CrossRefGoogle Scholar, Chapter 6.

7 Shahjahanabad, popularly known as ‘old Delhi’, was the capital of the Mughal empire. It was named after Shah Jahan, the emperor who built it in the seventeenth century. The British took over Delhi in 1803 and, after the Great Revolt of 1857, moved to Civil Lines, a residential and administrative quarter for the colonial rulers to the north of old Delhi. In 1931, 20 years after the colonial capital was transferred to Delhi, the construction of the spacious New Delhi to the south of the old city was completed, and has since housed India's main governing bodies.

8 Delhi's Chief Commissioner Office to R. N. Banerjee, ‘Fortnightly report for the first half of November 1947’, F. 1–47-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA.

9 Pandey, Remembering Partition, p. 123.

10 Ibid., p. 141. ‘Purana Qila closed’, Hindustan Times, 24 October 1947.

11 Khurshid Ahmad Khan to R. N. Banerjee, ‘Fortnightly report for the second half of October 1947’, F. 1–47-C. For contrasting evaluations and analyses of Azad's address in the Jama Masjid, see Noorani, A. G. A. M., The Muslims of India: A Documentary Record, Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 2003, pp. 7, 52–4Google Scholar; Mufti, A., Enlightenment in the Colony: The Jewish Question and the Crisis of Postcolonial Culture, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 2007, pp. 165–8Google Scholar.

12 Jawaharlal Nehru to Sardar Patel, 6 October 1947, ‘Selected works of Jawaharlal Nehru’ (henceforth SWJN), vol. 4, p. 128. See also Jawaharlal Nehru to Sardar Patel, 9 October 1947, SWJN, vol. 4, p. 133.

13 For example, the Situation Reports prepared by Congress Special Police Officers for the first week of October describe a gang that threatened Muslims who tried to reoccupy their houses in Gali Banduqwali (Ajmeri Gate): ‘Situation reports’ in F. 26–37–47-Police, Ministry of Home Affairs (henceforth MHA) Political, National Archives of India (henceforth NAI). See also the report of Zahid Hussain, Pakistan's High Commissioner in Delhi, who argued that there was no such thing as mixed localities any longer, and that Hindu localities were practically out of bounds for Muslims. ‘If a Muslim ventures into these areas, in 9 out of 10 cases he'll be attacked’: ‘25,000 refugees in Humayun's Tomb camp’, Hindustan Times, 26 November 1947. See also CID Source Report dated 15 May 1948, included in F.55/48-C, CC Files Confidential Branch, DSA.

14 Das Gupta, J. B., Indo-Pakistan Relations, 1947–1955, Djambatan, Amsterdam, 1958, p. 190 Google Scholar; Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 123.

15 Das Gupta, Indo-Pakistan Relations, p. 191; Schechtman, J. B., ‘Evacuee property in India and Pakistan’, Pacific Affairs, vol. 24, no. 4, 1951, p. 407 Google Scholar; Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 123.

16 Das Gupta, Indo-Pakistan Relations, pp. 191–2; Schechtman, ‘Evacuee property’, p. 407; Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 124.

17 ‘2,000 tenants liable to eviction’, Hindustan Times, 28 October 1947.

18 Ibid.

19 Ibid.

20 ‘Houses of evacuees: unauthorized occupants to be evicted’, Hindustan Times, 27 October 1947.

21 ‘Accommodation for refugees: second list of allottees’, Hindustan Times, 18 November 1947.

22 ‘Payment of rent by evacuee tenants’, Hindustan Times, 22 November 1947.

23 Jawaharlal Nehru to Mohammad Ali, 6 March 1954, SWJN, vol. 25, p. 348.

24 This spontaneous trend toward ghettoization was identified in other parts of India, notably West Bengal: Chatterji, The Spoils of Partition.

25 Khurshid Ahmad Khan to R. N. Banerjee, ‘Fortnightly report for the second half of September 1947’, F. 1–47-C; Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 29.

26 Jawaharlal Nehru to Sardar Patel, 21 November 1947, SWJN, vol. 4, p. 185.

27 ‘Demand for Muslim zones’, Hindustan Times, 29 November 1947; ‘CID report for the first half of December 1947’, F. 1–48-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA; Khurshid Ahmad Khan to R. N. Banerjee, ‘Fortnightly report for the first half of December 1947’, F. 1–47-C; Jawaharlal Nehru to Sardar Patel, 21 November 1947, SWJN, vol. 4, pp. 184–5.

28 According to section 18 of the Police Act (1861), Special Police Officers held ‘the same powers, privileges, and protection and shall be liable to perform the same duties and shall be amenable to the same penalties and be subordinate to the same authorities as the ordinary officer of the police’. See note by G. V. Bedekar, Deputy Secretary to Home Ministry, 14 October 1947, F. 26–37–47-Police, MHA Political, NAI.

29 A. Kidwai, In Freedom's Shade, Penguin, New Delhi, 2011, p. 200.

30 On 24 December 1947, Hindustan Times noted that Muslims who fled their homes and were in Humayun's Tomb and could not reoccupy their houses would be allotted with houses by the Custodian at the predominantly Muslim areas. See ‘Houses for homeless Delhi Muslims’, Hindustan Times, 24 December 1947.

31 Quoted in Hasan, Legacy of a Divided Nation, p. 148.

32 Ibid., Chapters 5–6; Pandey, G., ‘Can a Muslim be an Indian?’, Comparative Studies in Society and History, vol. 41, no. 4, 1999 CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed. In her recent book, Niraja Gopal Jayal approaches this issue in terms of a profound tension underlying Indian legal citizenship: between Jus Soli (birth) and Jus Sanguinis (blood-based descent). While the former is based upon one's residence in a territory and is thus more inclusive, the latter excludes all those who do not belong to the nation as an ethno-cultural entity. In India, religious affiliation—that is, communal identity—stands for the Jus Sanguinis principle: Jayal, N. G., Citizenship and Its Discontents: An Indian History, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 2013 Google Scholar.

33 See Nehru's letters to Patel in the months following partition, included in SWJN, vol. 4. See also ICS officers’ accounts of the day-to-day friction between Nehru and Patel concerning Nehru's intervention in Delhi's Administration: Interview with H.V.R. Iengar, Oral History Transcript No. 303, Nehru Memorial Museum and Library (henceforth NMML); Interview with Shankar Prasad, Oral History Transcript No. 494, NMML.

34 For example, Shankar Prasad, Delhi's Chief Commissioner from 1948 to 1954, noted that one of his greater challenges was to manoeuvre between the contradictory orders he received from Nehru and Patel: ibid., p. 165. See also Azad, M. A. K., India Wins Freedom: The Complete Version, Orient Blackswan, New Delhi, 2009 [1988], p. 231 Google Scholar.

35 Jawaharlal Nehru to Sardar Patel, 6 October 1947, SWJN, vol. 4, p. 127; Sardar Patel to Jawaharlal Nehru, 12 October 1947; Rajendra Prasad to Sardar Patel, 14 May 1948, in Nehru-Patel, Agreement within Differences: Select Documents and Correspondences 1933–1950, N. Singh (ed.), National Book Trust, New Delhi, 2010, pp. 97, 42. See also Kidwai, In Freedom's Shade, pp. 170–1; Azad, India Wins Freedom, p. 231; Shankar, V., My Reminiscences of Sardar Patel, Vol. I, Macmillan Co. of India, Delhi, 1974, p. 99 Google Scholar. See also Zamindar's discussion of the relationship between the two, based on her interview with Khurshid Ahmad Khan's niece in Karachi: Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 91.

36 Jawaharlal Nehru to Sardar Patel, 30 September 1947, SWJN, vol. 4, pp. 110–14; Jawaharlal Nehru to Sardar Patel, 11 October 1947; Sardar Patel to Jawaharlal Nehru, 28 September 1947; Sardar Patel to Jawaharlal Nehru, 11 October 1947; Sardar Patel to Jawaharlal Nehru, 12 October 1947, in Singh, Nehru-Patel, pp. 47, 89, 94–7, 237–8.

37 See, for example, Urdu poster signed by 300 Muslims, included in F. 8(1)/48-Home, CC Files, Home-Press, DSA.

38 F. 26–37–47-Police, MHA Political, NAI. The whole process of recruitment into the Special Police was extremely divisive. Patel and Randhawa objected to the Delhi Provincial Congress Committee's intervention in recruitment, whereas Nehru criticized the recruitment of refugees and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh elements into the force: Sardar Patel to Jawaharlal Nehru, 28 September 1947; Sardar Patel to Jawaharlal Nehru, 12 October 1947, in Singh, Nehru-Patel, pp. 93–9, 237–9. See also Jawaharlal Nehru to Sardar Patel, 30 September 1947, SWJN, vol. 4, pp. 110–14; Jawaharlal Nehru to Sardar Patel, 29 November 1947, SWJN, vol. 4, p. 191; Jawaharlal Nehru to Sardar Patel, 30 November 1947, SWJN, vol. 4, pp. 199–200.

39 For the Shanti Dal and controversies surrounding it, see F. 54/48-C, CC Files Confidential Branch, DSA, Interview with Shankar Prasad, Oral History Transcript No. 494, NMML, pp. 153–4; Patel to Rajendra Prasad, 14 October 1948, included in Kidwai, In Freedom's Shade, p. 266.

40 Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 94.

41 Sardar Patel to K. C. Negoy, 21 December 1947, in Singh, Nehru-Patel, p. 256. See also Jawaharlal Nehru to Sardar Patel, 21 November 1947, SWJN, vol. 4, p. 184; Sardar Patel to Jawaharlal Nehru, 11 October 1947; Sardar Patel to Jawaharlal Nehru, 22 November 1947, in ibid., pp. 87–8, 256–7.

42 Zamindar, The Long Partition, pp. 90–1.

43 Kidwai, In Freedom's Shade, p. 201.

44 Subhadra Joshi's estimate was first cited in Tan and Kudaisya, The Aftermath of Partition, p. 199. Her short bio appears in ibid., p. 287, footnote 151.

45 This was the estimate of the rationing authorities, with regard to Paharganj, Karol Bagh, and New Delhi, as quoted in ‘Influx of refugees continues’, Hindustan Times, 17 November 1947. Chief Commissioner Khurshid Ahmad Khan estimated that 500 refugees or more were still entering Delhi every day. He pleaded with the Home Ministry to ban the further inflow of refugees into Delhi. As he clarified in his next report, at the end of November, since the UP government had forbidden any further entry of refugees into its province, the entire brunt of the Punjab's population movement was being borne by Delhi: Khurshid Ahmad Khan to R. N. Banerjee, ‘Fortnightly report for the second half of November 1947’, F. 1–47-C. By April, there were over 500,000 refugees in the city.

46 Thus, for example, the Criminal Investigation Department's fortnightly report for the first half of December 1947 notes that ‘a mob of 800 non-Muslims visited a Muslim mohalla and wanted the residents of that place to vacate their houses for them’, ‘CID report for the second half of December 1947’, F. 1–48-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA. See also Zamindar's discussion of attacks on Muslim zones turning them into ‘a contested and fearful urban geography’: Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 33.

47 For reports on attacks in Sadar Bazar localities, see Special Magistrate B. D. Joshi's Report on Sadar Bazar Area, F. 26–37–47-Police, MHA Political, NAI; Khurshid Ahmad Khan to R. N. Banerjee, ‘Fortnightly report for the second half of November 1947’, F. 1–47-C. See also Hindustan Times items: ‘Stray assaults in Delhi’, Hindustan Times, 4 November 1947; ‘Accidental firing in Chandni Chowk’, Hindustan Times, 16 November 1947; ‘Many stabbing cases in Delhi’, Hindustan Times, 24 November 1947; ‘Stabbing cases in the city’, Hindustan Times, 25 November 1947; ‘Fewer cases in city’, Hindustan Times, 26 November 1947. A Hindustan Times editorial condemning the violence clarifies that there was a real concern that the situation was about to spin out of control: Editorial: ‘The spirit of lawlessness’, Hindustan Times, 25 November 1947.

48 Habibur Rehman to DIG of Delhi Police, 14 January 1948, F.36–48-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA.

49 Copy of Intelligence Bureau Report on the Events of 9 December, in R. N. Banerjee to Khurshid Ahmad Khan, 12 December 1947, F. 8(1)/48-Home, CC Files, Home-Press, DSA.

50 ‘More Muslims leave Delhi’, Hindustan Times, 14 November 1947; ‘25,000 refugees in Humayun's Tomb camp’, Hindustan Times, 26 November 1947. See also Kidwai, In Freedom's Shade, Chapter 4.

51 ‘CID report for the first half of January 1948’, ‘CID report for the second half of January 1948’, ‘CID report for the first half of February 1948’, ‘CID report for the second half of February 1948’, F. 1–48-C.

52 The Criminal Investigation Department lists appear in ‘Muslim pockets in Delhi Volumes I–II’, Files 117, 118, Delhi Police Records, Sixth Installment, NMML.

53 The fifth area of Kashmiri Gate was negligent in its Muslim population. In fact, it was one of the hardest-hit areas during the riots and many of the inhabitants fled in September.

54 As mentioned in note 1 above, this is a drastic decline when compared with the 1941 census, which listed 304,971 Muslims in Delhi and its rural areas. On the eve of partition, Delhi's Muslims numbered an estimated 424,000.

55 A copy of the Urdu report prepared by the Jamaat-e Islah-e Custodian is located in a Criminal Investigation Department file concerning refugees in Delhi: F. 26, Delhi Police Records, Second Installment, NMML.

56 A 1952 letter to Nehru by Subhadra Joshi explains that most of the Muslims in Delhi were tenants, though some owned houses in the areas where they did not reside. Their houses were declared evacuee property or forcibly taken possession of by the refugees and they could not realize rent from them: Jawaharlal Nehru to A. P. Jain, 23 September 1952, SWJN, vol. 19, p. 162.

57 ‘Evacuee immovable property’, Hindustan Times, 6 December 1947.

58 The Criminal Investigation Department list estimates that Nawab Ganj was a Muslim pocket of 2,400 people.

59 On refugees trying to break into sealed houses in Nawab Ganj, see SP of Police City Report on the Political Situation of Delhi, 14 August 1948, in F. 371, Delhi Police Records, Eighth Installment, NMML.

60 For Zamindar's understanding that the Muslim zones were outside the jurisdiction of the Custodian, grounded in the Constituent Assembly Debates, see Zamindar, The Long Partition, pp. 132–6. My findings reveal that a great deal of the bureaucratic violence she so aptly analyses took place precisely in the Muslim zones.

61 See an Urdu poster describing the attacks on Muslim houses in December, including Pul Bangash, in F. 8(1)/48-Home, CC Files, Home-Press, DSA. See also M. S. Randhawa to Khurshid Ahmad Khan, ‘Fortnightly report for the second half of February 1948’, F. 1–48-C. For the ongoing pressures in Pul Bangash in June 1948, see ‘More arrests’, Hindustan Times, 15 June 1948.

62 Indeed, in January 1948, two months after the disturbances in Pul Bangash, the Custodian released a press note that there were many vacant houses in Pul Bangash which the Ministry for Rehabilitation intended to arrange for occupancy: ‘15 arrested in Khari Baoli’, Hindustan Times, 10 January 1948.

63 The Indo-Pakistani Karachi Agreement of January 1949 temporarily relaxed such restrictions on private transactions, but the agreement was soon violated, and the two dominions formally banned sales and exchanges again by July 1949. See Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 126.

64 Schechtman, ‘Evacuee property’, pp. 407–8; Das Gupta, Indo-Pakistan Relations, pp. 191–3; Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 126.

65 Schechtman, ‘Evacuee property’, p. 407. For a detailed comparison of the difference, calculated by the Indian government, see Das Gupta, Indo-Pakistan Relations, pp. 188–9; Zamindar, The Long Partition, pp. 124–5.

66 The debate over government-level compensation or private transactions continued to be at the centre of the dispute, as seen in correspondence between Nehru and Pakistan's Prime Minister Mohammad Ali in 1953–54. See Jawaharlal Nehru to Mohammad Ali, 8 October 1953, SWJN, vol. 24, pp. 455–6; Jawaharlal Nehru's Note for Ministry of States, 18 October 1953, SWJN, vol. 24, pp. 457–9; Jawaharlal Nehru to A. P. Jain, 27 November 1953, SWJN, vol. 24, pp. 459–61; Jawaharlal Nehru to Mohammad Ali, 27 November 1953, SWJN, vol. 24, pp. 461–3; Jawaharlal Nehru to Mohammad Ali, 6 March 1954, SWJN, vol. 25, pp. 346–52; Jawaharlal Nehru to Mohammad Ali, 7 May 1954, SWJN, vol. 25, pp. 353–5.

67 ‘Transfer of property rights’, Hindustan Times, 25 January 1948.

68 See Zamindar's discussion of this point. She claims that, in 1950, the definition of ‘evacuee’ was clarified to mean only persons who migrated to Pakistan: Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 127.

69 J. P. Ray (Home Secretary to the CC, Delhi) to the Sub-Registrar, Delhi, 20 March 1948, F.41–48-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA.

70 Sham Narain Pandit (Sub-Registrar) to J. P. Rai (Home Secretary to the CC, Delhi), 1 April 1948, F.41–48-C.

71 Central ordinance number 27 of 1949 (Administration of Evacuee Property Ordinance 1949), promulgated on 18 October, 1949.

72 Zamindar, The Long Partition, pp. 145–6. See also ‘Notes on the new evacuee property ordinance’, No. 14(57)Cus/49, 18 October 1949, in F. 126–49-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA.

73 See correspondences in F. 126–49-C, F. 41–48-C.

74 In April 1948, the Custodian complained to the Chief Commissioner that there was constant interference from the Delhi courts in the work of the Custodians, and that injunctions were frequently issued even in cases where the courts had no jurisdiction. He asked that the courts be informed that, according to the East Punjab Evacuee Property Act, no order made by the Custodian could be called into question by the courts ‘except as provided by the Act’ but did not elaborate what this might include. See V.D. Dantyagi (Ministry of R&R) to Khurshid Ahmad Khan, D.O. No. 484-JS/48, 14 April 1948, in F. 41–48-C. My emphasis.

75 Zamindar has shown the intimate connection between the evacuee property legislation on one hand and the introduction of the permit and passport systems on the other. This section builds upon her analysis while introducing new evidence that buttresses her argument. Zamindar, The Long Partition.

76 For the limited space and resources available for absorbing the muhajirs in West Pakistan, see Ansari, Life after Partition; Chattha, I., ‘Competition for resources: partition's evacuee property and the sustenance of corruption in Pakistan’, Modern Asian Studies, vol. 46, no. 5, 2012 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Zamindar, The Long Partition.

77 Zamindar cites Criminal Investigation Department statistics suggesting that 16,350 Muslims returned to Delhi between March and August 1948. Since about 4,450 left, the increase in the Muslim population in the city amounted to only 11,900, much lower than newspaper estimates: Zamindar, The Long Partition, pp. 86–8.

78 For a collection of vernacular newspaper cuttings from July 1948, all reporting on the infiltration and arrests of ‘Pakistani spies’, see F. 8 (59A) 1948, CC Files, Home-Press, DSA. See also fortnightly report on the Delhi Press and its coverage of the return of Muslims: ‘Fortnightly report on the tone of the press for the second half of April 1948’, in F. 1–48-C.

79 See correspondences in F. 56/48-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA. For arrests of Muslims suspected of arriving ‘with the intention of creating communal trouble’, see also Criminal Investigation Department reports in: F. 371, Delhi Police Records, Eighth Installment, NMML.

80 See the Criminal Investigation Department and SP of Police City reports on the developing trend among Muslims of arriving on a temporary permit and overstaying its term: SP of Police City Report on the Political Situation of Delhi, 14 August 1948, Ram Lal, S. P. of Police CID, ‘Result of secret enquiries’, 20 September 1948, No. DS-8556/57. Both reports are located in F. 371, Delhi Police Records, Eighth Installment, NMML. See also Zamindar, The Long Partition, pp. 104–5.

81 ‘Notes on the new evacuee property ordinance’, No. 14(57)Cus/49, 18 October 1949, in F. 126–49-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA.

82 Ibid., p. 14.

83 Assistant Custodian Judicial to SP of Police CID, 18 January 1952, in F. 96, Delhi Police Records, Fifth Installment, NMML.

84 On the charge of Muslim Leagui leanings in cases of evacuee property, see F. 37/49-C Vol. II, CC Files Confidential Branch, DSA. On the utilization of informants, even if self-interested ones, and allegations of Muslim Leagui affiliation, see also Zamindar, The Long Partition, pp. 146–7.

85 Letter from Mohd. Yusuf, Gali Akhrewali Churiwalan, Delhi to Deputy Commissioner, Delhi, 16 March 1952, in F. 277, Delhi Police Records, Eighth Installment, NMML.

86 Dihlavi, S. A., ‘Maan: Dilli Aath Mahine Baad’, in Dilli Ki Bipta, Shahrzad, Karachi, 2010 [1950], p. 69 Google Scholar, my translation from the Urdu.

87 Joshi's information to Nehru was summarized in Jawaharlal Nehru to A. P. Jain, 23 September 1952. See note 56 above.

88 ‘Yeh Custodian Office Hai’, Al Jamiat, 27 July 1949.

89 Kaur, Since 1947, p. 114.

90 Similar complaints were voiced by refugee tenants of the Custodian: ‘Extract from CID Daily Diary’, 3–4 October 1949, in F. 28, Delhi Police Records, Second Installment, NMML.

91 For example, ‘Ten important resolutions of Ahrar General Council’, 8 August 1949, in F. 37/49-C Vol. II, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA. On the Custodian's habit of avoiding collection for a long time and then showing up and demanding lump sums of money, see also Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 142. Zamindar relies on an article from Al Jamiat from August 1952 warning readers to pay duly in order to avoid eviction.

92 Siddiqi, A. R., Smoke without Fire: Portraits of Pre-Partition Delhi, Aakar Books, Delhi, 2011, p. 294 Google Scholar.

93 This is how Abdul Rahman Siddiqui recollects the riots in his recent memoir: ibid., pp. 294–5.

94 M.S. Randhawa to Khurshid Ahmad Khan, ‘Fortnightly report for the first half of January 1948’, F. 1–48-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA. See also the daily reports by Jagan Nath, City Superintendent of Police, on the situation in Phatak Habash Khan, located in F. 21/48-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA. For Hindustan Times coverage, see ‘Crowd of refugees tear-gassed in Delhi’, Hindustan Times, 5 January 1948; ‘Lathi charge on refugees in Khari Baoli’, Hindustan Times, 7 January 1948; ‘Minor incidents in Delhi’, Hindustan Times, 8 January 1948; ‘Refugees tactics to occupy vacant houses’, Hindustan Times, 9 January 1948; ‘No incidents in Delhi’, Hindustan Times, 9 January 1948; ‘15 arrested in Khari Baoli’, Hindustan Times, 10 January 1948; ‘Delhi situation normal’, Hindustan Times, 11 January 1948; Amolak Ram Kapur, Letter to the Editor, Hindustan Times, 11 January 1948. The military barracks in Bela Road and Anand Parbat were opened as temporary shelters for Hindu and Sikh refugees as a result of the disturbances in Phatak Habash Khan.

95 Pugree was an illegal lump sum of money transferred in addition to, or instead of, monthly rent. It will be discussed at length further below.

96 Daily Report sent by Jagan Nath, SP Police City, 7 January 1948, in F. 21/48-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA.

97 Daily Report sent by Jagan Nath, SP Police City, 8 January, 1948, in F. 21/48-C. For Hindustan Times reports on this matter, see ‘No incidents in Delhi’, Hindustan Times, 9 January 1948; ‘15 arrested in Khari Baoli’, Hindustan Times, 10 January 1948; ‘Delhi situation normal’, Hindustan Times, 11 January 1948.

98 Copies of the signed statements of Subhadra Joshi and Sikandar Bakht are located in File 55/48-C, CC Files Confidential Branch, DSA. SP Police City Jagan Nath's report is in F. 371, Delhi Police Records, Eighth Installment, NMML. The Criminal Investigation Department report is located in F. 26, Delhi Police Records, Second Installment, NMML.

99 Subhadra Joshi's statement in File 55/48-C, CC Files Confidential Branch, DSA.

100 Jawaharlal Nehru to Mridula Sarabhai, 12 September 1948, SWJN, vol. 7, pp. 49–50.

101 Telegram from Hifzur Rahman, General Secretary, Jamiat Ulema, to Delhi's CC, DC and SP CID, 6 June 1949, in F. 96, Delhi Police Records, Fifth Installment, NMML.

102 ‘Extract from CID Daily Diary, 20–21.8.49’, in F. 27, Delhi Police Records, Second Installment, NMML.

103 The name change illustrates how ‘the national is crushing the city’ and its past: Gupta, N., Delhi between Two Empires, 1803–1931: Society, Government and Urban Growth, Oxford University Press, Delhi, 1981, p. ix Google Scholar.

104 Oldenburg, P., Big City Government in India: Councilor, Administrator, and Citizen in Delhi, published for Association for Asian Studies by the University of Arizona Press, Tucson, 1976, p. 76 Google Scholar.

105 Krafft, T., ‘Contemporary Old Delhi: transformation of an historical place’, in Shahjahanabad/Old Delhi: Tradition and Colonial Change, Ehlers, E. and Krafft, T. (eds), Manohar, Delhi, 2003 [1993], p. 116 Google Scholar.

106 Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 142.

107 Talbot, Divided Cities, pp. 49–50.

108 ‘Refugees pouring into Delhi’, Hindustan Times, 21 August 1947.

109 S. A. Dihlavi, Dilli Ki Bipta, Schehrzade, Karachi, 2010 [1950], pp. 32–3.

110 Jawaharlal Nehru to Sardar Patel, 6 October 1947, SWJN, vol. 4, p. 128. Other sources corroborate that some of Delhi's residents were occupying other people's houses: as mentioned above, the Custodian announced in October that there were 2,000 people to be evicted from evacuee property, some of whom were Delhi residents.

111 Kidwai, In Freedom's Shade, p. 202.

112 Zamindar, The Long Partition, pp. 142–3. See also Dihlavi, ‘Maan’, p. 71.

113 Kidwai, In Freedom's Shade, pp. 111, 202.

114 The letter is included in F. 37/49-C Vol. II, CC Files Confidential Branch, DSA.

115 This was clarified by M. N. Masud, Maulana Azad's secretary, who forwarded the letter to the Chief Commissioner, noting that Kalan Masjid was one of the few strongholds of nationalist Muslims before partition, but unfortunately this mohalla suffered greatly during the riots and again when a large number of its residents were arrested and detained under the Punjab Public Safety Act: F. 37/49-C Vol. II.

116 Kidwai, In Freedom's Shade, p. 202.

117 Included in F. 26, Delhi Police Records, Second Installment, NMML, my translation from the Urdu. This discussion strengthens Ravinder Kaur's study of refugees’ rehabilitation in Delhi, showing how it was inflected by considerations of class, caste, and gender, preserving distinctions and hierarchies of colonial Punjab. Ian Talbot makes a similar point with regard to rehabilitation strategies in Lahore and Amritsar: Kaur, Since 1947; Talbot, Divided Cities.

118 ‘Enquiry into officer’, Times of India, 13 November 1948.

119 Khosla, G. D., Memory's Gay Chariot: An Autobiographical Narrative, Allied Publishers, New Delhi, 1985, p. 177 Google Scholar. See also Interview with Shankar Prasad, Oral History Transcript No. 494, NMML, 195.

120 Included in the report discussed above.

121 Telegram from Habibur Rahman of Jamiat Ulema, 14 January 1948, F.36–48-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA.

122 SP Police City Report on Hakim Khalil ur Rahman, 23 September 1948, File 55/48-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA. For another case in which Subhadra Joshi intervened, see ‘CID report for the first half of October 1948’, F. 1–48-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA. On Shanti Dal's interventions and clashes with the Custodian, see also Kidwai, In Freedom's Shade, pp. 265–7.

123 CID Report on Shanti Dal, 23 October 1948, F. 26, Delhi Police Records, Second Installment, NMML.

124 Kidwai, In Freedom's Shade, p. 267.

125 Ibid., pp. 267–8.

126 Excerpt of Mohanlal Saxena's letter to Mridula Sarabhai, 31 August 1948, included in ibid., p. 266.

127 Ibid., p. 268.

128 The houses were allotted in Bara Hindu Rao and Sita Ram Bazar. See File 55/48-C, CC Files Confidential Branch, DSA.

129 Kidwai, In Freedom's Shade, p. 106.

130 IB Report on Vacant Muslim Houses, 4 May 1950, F. 98, Delhi Police Records, Sixth Installment, NMML.

131 Jawaharlal Nehru to Mohanlal Saxena, 11 April 1950, SWJN, vol. 14II, p. 162. On the riots of 1950s in UP, see also Brass, P. R., The Production of Hindu-Muslim Violence in Contemporary India, Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 2003, p. 76 Google Scholar; Hasan, Legacy of a Divided Nation, Chapter 6. According to Zamindar, 135,000 Muslims fled across the western border: Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 169.

132 IB Report on Vacant Muslim Houses, 4 May 1950, F. 98, Delhi Police Records, Sixth Installment, NMML.

133 Ibid.

134 ‘Custodian Ka Taza Insaf’, Al Jamiat, 8 May 1950, my translation from the Urdu.

135 Jawaharlal Nehru to Mohanlal Saxena, 14 April 1950, SWJN, vol. 14II, p. 163.

136 Since the Ordinance for Administration of Evacuee Property, promulgated on 18 October 1949, was to expire in April 1950, a draft bill on the administration of evacuee property was introduced in the Indian parliament.

137 Jawaharlal Nehru to Mohanlal Saxena, 14 April 1950, SWJN, vol. 14II, p. 164.

138 Ibid.

139 Note to the Minister of Rehabilitation, 29 May 1950, SWJN, vol. 14II, p. 177.

140 Ibid., p. 178.

141 ‘Muslim pockets in Delhi Vol. II’, F. 118, Delhi Police Records, Sixth Installment, NMML.

142 SP of CID Rikhi Kesh to Deputy Director of IB Handoo, 25 May 1950, F. 118.

143 SP of CID Rikhi Kesh to Deputy Director of IB Handoo, 12 July 1950, F. 118.

144 Jawaharlal Nehru to Mohanlal Saxena, 14 April 1950, SWJN, vol. 14II, p. 164.

145 Note to B.N. Kaul, Principal Private Secretary to the Prime Minister, 22 September 1952, SWJN, vol. 19, p. 162.

146 Note to the Minister of Home Affairs, 19 June 1954, SWJN, vol. 26, p. 198.

147 Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 131. According to Zamindar, India finally removed the clause about intending evacuees from the legislation in 1953: ibid. See also ‘Quarterly report on the Muslim press’, 30 September 1952, F. 1–52-C, CC Files, Confidential Branch, DSA.

148 Jawaharlal Nehru to A. P. Jain, 27 November 1953, SWJN, vol. 24, pp. 459–61.

149 Jawaharlal Nehru to Morarji Desai, 22 March 1954, SWJN, vol. 25, p. 98, footnote 4; Note to the Minister of Rehabilitation and Cabinet Secretary, 20 December 1953, SWJN, vol. 24, pp. 463–4.

150 See Nehru's letter to Mohammad Ali that provides Nehru's perspective on the history of the dispute and why Pakistan was at fault: Jawaharlal Nehru to Mohammad Ali, 6 March 1954, SWJN, vol. 25, pp. 346–52.

151 Jawaharlal Nehru to Mohammad Ali, 7 May 1954, SWJN, vol. 25, pp. 353–4.

152 Das Gupta, Indo-Pakistan Relations, p. 204.

153 Jawaharlal Nehru to Mohammad Ali, 9 November 1954, SWJN, vol. 27, p. 177.

154 Jawaharlal Nehru to Mehr Chand Khanna, 25 May 1955, SWJN, vol. 28, p. 561.

155 Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 122.

156 Jawaharlal Nehru to J.K. Bhonsle, 22 December 1954, SWJN, vol. 27, p. 178.

157 Note to the Minister for Home Affairs, 19 June 1954, SWJN, vol. 26, p. 197.

158 CID Fortnightly Reports, January–August 1956, F.34/56, CC Files, Confidential and Cabinet, DSA.

159 Note to the Home Ministry, 26 September 1955, SWJN, vol. 30, p. 235.

160 Quoted in Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 90. Similarly, Patel, as mentioned above, talked about the danger of creating ‘eyesores and miniature Pakistans and Hindustans in the whole city’. In another letter, he wrote: ‘I also feel that the notion that Muslims can feel or can be given a sense of security only in Muslim mohallas is a negation rather than corollary of the AICC resolution.’ See Sardar Patel to K.C. Negoy, 21 December 1947; Sardar Patel to Jawaharlal Nehru, 22 November 1947, in Singh, Nehru-Patel, pp. 255–7.

161 See Mufti's analysis of Maulana Azad's understanding, prior to partition, that Muslims were not a minority in the qualitative sense, and his assessment of their minoritization in the aftermath of partition: Mufti, Enlightenment in the Colony, pp. 164–8.

162 ‘. . . one extending southward from the Jama Masjid into Suiwalan and up to the Turkaman Gate, the other extending from Chandni Chowk and Ballimaran westwards through the area south of the Fatehpuri Mosque to Farashkhana and Kucha Pandit.’ Oldenburg, Big City Government in India, pp. 159–60.

163 Specifically, Qasabpura and other neighbourhoods near Idgah. To Shahjahanabad and Sardar Bazar, we should add the small enclave of Nizamuddin basti and the area of Okhla in New Delhi.

164 One of Oldenburg's informants, for example, estimated that, inside Shahjahanabad, Farash Khana, which, before Partition, had been 85 per cent Muslim was now 50 per cent Muslim and 25 per cent refugee. Kucha Pandit saw a similar shift: Oldenburg, Big City Government in India, p. 160.

165 Krishna, G., ‘Communal violence in India: a study of communal disturbance in Delhi, Part 2’, Economic & Political Weekly, vol. 20, no. 3, 1985, p. 119 Google Scholar.

166 Editorial: ‘Bhes Na Badlo’, Al Jamiat, 14 July 1949, my translation from the Urdu.

167 Rajendra Prasad to Sardar Patel, 14 May 1948, in Singh, Nehru-Patel, pp. 42–3.

168 Pandey, ‘Can a Muslim be an Indian?’. They faced, as Mufti claims, a serious dilemma echoing that of the Jewish minority in Europe: ‘To be a Jew outright won't do at all, but not to be a Jew will do still less’. Excerpt from Lessing's play Nathan the Wise (1778), quoted in Mufti, A., ‘Secularism and minority: elements of a critique’, Social Text, vol. 45, no. 4, 1995, p. 76 Google Scholar.

169 Devji, F., ‘Hindu/Muslim/Indian’, Public Culture, vol. 5, no. 1, 1992, p. 14 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Subramaniam, R., ‘Culture of suspicion: riots and rumors in Bombay, 1992–1993’, Transforming Anthropology, vol. 8, no. 1&2, 1999 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Subramanian's account of the communalization of Bombay in the aftermath of the 1992–93 riots and the resort to dissimulation of identity is reminiscent of Delhi in the aftermath of partition.

170 Metcalf, B. D., ‘Observant Muslims, secular Indians: the political vision of Maulana Husain Ahmad Madani, 1938–57’, in From the Colonial to the Postcolonial: India and Pakistan in Transition, Chakrabarty, Dipesh, Majumdar, Rochona, and Sartori, Andrew (eds), Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 2007, p. 109 Google Scholar.

171 Ibid., p. 97.

172 Needham, A. D. and Rajan, R. S. (eds), The Crisis of Secularism in India, Duke University Press, Durham, 2007 Google Scholar. See also Shefali Jha's analysis of the tension underlying the Constituent Assembly Debates between the ‘no concern’ theory of secularism and the ‘equal respect’ theory. While the former advocated a total separation between state and religion and cultivated the identity of Indians as individual citizens holding equal rights, rather than as members of distinct communities, the second envisioned the state as an involved actor in the field of religion, respecting and cultivating all religions equally. It was this second approach, with its emphasis on the cultural and educational rights of religious minorities, that eventually reigned supreme. I suggest that Jamiat Ulema's agenda since before independence was commensurate with this second approach. See Jha, S., ‘Secularism in the Constituent Assembly Debates, 1946–1950’, Economic & Political Weekly, vol. 37, no. 30, 2002 Google Scholar; ‘Rights versus representation: defending minority interests in the constitent assembly’, Economic & Political Weekly, vol. 38, no. 16, 2003.

173 Oldenburg, P., India, Pakistan, and Democracy: Solving the Puzzle of Divergent Paths, Routledge, New York, 2010 Google Scholar.

174 Gould, W., Bureaucracy, Community, and Influence in India: Society and the State, 1930s–1960s, Routledge, New York, 2011, p. 13 Google Scholar.

175 Fuller, C. J. and Harris, J., ‘For an anthropology of the modern Indian state’, in The Everyday State and Society in Modern India, Fuller, C. J. and Bénéï, V. (eds), Hurst & Co., London, 2001 Google Scholar; Hansen, T. B., The Saffron Wave: Democracy and Hindu Nationalism in Modern India, Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1999 Google Scholar; Gupta, A., ‘Blurred boundaries: the discourse of corruption, the culture of politics, and the imagined state’, American Ethnologist, vol. 22, no. 2, May 1995 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. A pioneering article in this respect is Mitchell, T., ‘The limits of the state: beyond statist approaches and their critics’, American Political Science Review, vol. 85, no. 1, 1991 Google Scholar.

176 Fuller and Harris, ‘For an anthropology’, p. 3.

177 Greenhouse, C. J., ‘Introduction: altered states, altered lives’, in Ethnography in Unstable Places: Everyday Lives in Contexts of Dramatic Political Change, Greenhouse, Carol J., Mertz, Elizabeth, and Warren, Kay B. (eds), Duke University Press, Durham, 2002, p. 9 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

178 Zamindar, The Long Partition, pp. 64–7.

179 See, for example, materials included in F. 28, Delhi Police Records, Second Installment, NMML.

180 Ilyas Chattha interestingly argues that the evacuee property was formative of the practice and discourse on corruption in early-independent Pakistan, serving as justification of the military takeover in 1958. See Chattha, ‘Competition for resources’.

181 The refugees’ perspective was represented by the Urdu dailies Milap and Pratap that shifted from Lahore to Delhi after partition.

182 By 1951, a mere 200,000 non-Muslims remained in West Pakistan: Zamindar, The Long Partition, p. 128.