First look around Amritsar

I slept very well last night. It's very quiet here, and there's no window in my room to let light in 😂.

I was in no rush to go anywhere, so I had a long, hot shower and made myself a coffee (it's the first room I've had since Goa that has a kettle!). When I went out to explore, Vicky, the hotel's tour man, was there. I got chatting to him and booked onto today's trip to the Pakistan border, which leaves the hotel at 2pm. He also recommended a restaurant to try the local breakfast dish - kulche - so I headed straight there. Inevitably, it's a type of flatbread stuffed with spicy potato and served with a chickpea curry and pickled red onions. It was tasty, but the curry was a little too spicy for me, even though I had it with lassi.

After breakfast, I went to the Partition Museum, which opened in 2017. It is located in the town hall. Photography is not allowed. It has no exhibits as such. The museum aims to be the central repository of stories, materials, and documents related to the post-partition riots that followed the division of British India into two independent dominions in 1947: India and Pakistan. The information is presented in a series of information boards. The museum also focuses on the history of the “anti-colonial movement, the Jallianwala Bagh massacre, the Komagata Maru incident, the All India Muslim League and the Indian National Congress. The building which houses the museum was once the British headquarters and a jail.

The story of partition is harrowing. The partition lines, drawn on a map by the British lawyer Cyril Radcliffe, divided the provinces of Punjab and Bengal into two parts, based on religion. As a result, millions of people found themselves on the wrong side of the border overnight. According to various estimates, more than 800,000 Muslims, Hindus, and Sikhs were killed in the riots that followed the partition between August 1947 and January 1948. Additionally, more than 1,400,000 people became refugees.

The Government of Punjab founded this museum with help from the Arts and Cultural Heritage Trust of the United Kingdom as a way to memorialise those who were affected by the partition. Therefore, the museum documents the catastrophic history of migration, loss of life and livelihood through testimonies of the first-generation partition survivors and their lived experiences. The museum provides a platform for the younger generations to know the aftermath of what has been dubbed as one of the cataclysmic events in the recent history of the Indian subcontinent. The museum acts as a reminder of not only the millions of individuals who lost their lives owing to violence as a result of the Partition of India, but also one of resilience, as many individuals, despite finding themselves in challenging circumstances, turned their lives around and contributed in their own ways towards the cause of nation-building.

It was certainly a thought-provoking and moving visit, particularly the accounts of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre. I'll write more about that when I've been to see the site.Read more