Growing up in India during the 70s and 80s, I was always fascinated with history. I remember visiting places like Ferozepur or Faridkot in Punjab from Delhi. I could see mosques along the way in paces like Rohtak, Hissar, Sirsa or Ambala. Back then these all looked dilapidated and seemed misplaced among the looming encroachments of shops and houses. As if the grandeur of a once established culture was being torn apart by people who had no intention of preserving it. From the train I could make out the old mughalserais jotting the landscape of the Punjab plains. I remember the old marker on a road in Ferozepur that had kilometers to Lahore written on it. When we reached these places, the tho
A sense of panic and hysteria enveloped Punjab in the summer of 1947. The triggers were most likely rumors that a surrounding village has been burned and looted. People will gather around and try to decide what to do next. If you are a Muslim living in Amritsar, Ferozepur or Batala, it will be even tougher to decide whether to leave the area or not since they were confident that the contiguously Muslim dominated zillas of Ferozepur, Gurdaspur, Hoshiarpur, and Lahore would be awarded to Pakistan. If you are a Sikh or a Hindu living in Lahore or in Montgomery district you would be confident that there's little chance that the Boundary Commission led by Sir Radcliffe would give the capital of t
