https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0009cd4
I found this programme deeply moving. Not enough Brits feel appropriate remorse for what we did in Iraq. It is my belief that even liberal minded English people are deeply ingrained by our colonial past. Rabab Ghazoul suggests that Wales could play a significant role in changing our thinking because it both benefitted and took part in the colonial project but also experienced what it feels like being under English domination.
White women married to men of a different hue are rarely heard. I’m a bit like Wales! I remember my Primary School teacher putting up a map of the world and pointing to the two thirds of it painted red –the British Empire and Commonwealth. As a 10 year old I felt pride. Age and deeper knowledge changed that but I didn’t really begin to see us as others see us until I met Atam. His brother Kundan Lal was imprisoned at the same time as Gandhi during the Quit India Movement .I wrote Atam’s experiences in this feature for the Madras Courier.
The UK has never admitted responsibility for the carnage following implementing a hasty partition. The British Indian Army had policed the empire and fought in two world wars but was not employed to police partition. If it had there would still have been casualties but not on such a scale. It is my opinion that India and Pakistan would have had a better chance of healing the wounds if the trauma had been less.