501(c)(3)
A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, Trust (business), trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of ...
non-profit
A nonprofit organization (NPO), also known as a nonbusiness entity, nonprofit institution, not-for-profit organization, or simply a nonprofit, is a non-governmental (private) legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public, or so ...
oral history
Oral history is the collection and study of historical information from
people, families, important events, or everyday life using audiotapes, videotapes, or transcriptions of planned interviews. These interviews are conducted with people who pa ...
organization in
Berkeley, California
Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Anglo-Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland, Cali ...
, and a registered trust in Delhi, India founded by Guneeta Singh Bhalla that collects, preserves, and shares first-hand accounts of the Partition of India in 1947.
Given the sensitive relationship between Partition stories and Hindu–Muslim relations, only a small portion of the Archive's collection has been released to the public in edited form. Currently, access to the stories is granted on a case-by-case basis to scholars for academic research.
In 2023, the Archive started to observe June 3 as the Partition Remembrance Day because it was on this day in 1947 that the viceroy declared the
Mountbatten Plan
The partition of India in 1947 was the division of British India into two independent dominion states, the Union of India and Dominion of Pakistan. The Union of India is today the Republic of India, and the Dominion of Pakistan is the Islami ...
to divide India. It also announced to launch a book with 4000 oral testimonies and 1000 photographs illustrating the voices of the partition survivors spread across various countries in South Asia and elsewhere.
History
The organization started in 2010 when Dr Guneeta Singh Bhalla began recording video interviews with elder Partition witnesses throughout the
San Francisco Bay Area
The San Francisco Bay Area, commonly known as the Bay Area, is a List of regions of California, region of California surrounding and including San Francisco Bay, and anchored by the cities of Oakland, San Francisco, and San Jose, California, S ...
and was formalized in 2011. The creation of the 1947 Partition Archive was inspired by the
Hiroshima Peace Memorial
The , originally the Hiroshima Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall, and now commonly called the Genbaku Dome, , is part of Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima, Japan, and was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1996.
The building ...
and the work of various
Holocaust
The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...
memorials.
Organization
The 1947 Partition Archive crowd-sources the collection of Partition witness interviews and conducts free classes, in the form of an online Oral History Workshop, to train volunteers in story-collection and interviewing techniques. As of July 2023, over 10,200 interviews have been collected from more than 450 cities and villages in 14 countries including India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Israel among others. These interviews are documented in diverse languages and dialects. The Archive's website includes a Story Map that shows the migration patterns of each interviewee.
The Archive's methods of crowd-sourcing story collection include Story Scholars, a fellowship program in which individuals are chosen based on academic merit and prior experience to conduct interviews in a selected region, and Citizen Historians, a program in which volunteers can contribute Partition stories to the organization's website. Based on the Archive's digital media platforms, ordinary citizens across the globe are "invited to join free oral history webinar workshops to learn the basic techniques for documenting oral histories, as outlined by the
Oral History Association
The Oral History Association (OHA) is a professional association for oral historians and others interested in advancing the practice and use of oral history.Baylor University’s open source online resources." According to Dr Bhalla, "workshop attendees who successfully submit their first oral history interview, and it matches The Archive’s standards with its nine-point criteria, are certified as ‘Citizen Historian’ volunteers."
The Archive also offers funding for a one-month immersive residency to university faculties and students to research on Partition, known as the Tata Trusts Partition Archive Research Grants, in association with the
University of Delhi
The Delhi University (DU, ISO 15919, ISO: ), also and officially known as the University of Delhi, is a collegiate university, collegiate research university, research Central university (India), central university located in Delhi, India. It ...
, Ashoka University, and Guru Nanak Dev University. The primary objective of the Archive is to collect the "vanishing history of Punjab and South Asia through crowdsourced lived memories."
Opposition to the partition of India
Opposition to the partition of India was widespread in British Raj, British India in the 20th century and it continues to remain a talking point in South Asian politics. Those who opposed it often adhered to the doctrine of composite nationalism ...
Partition of India
The partition of India in 1947 was the division of British India into two independent dominion states, the Dominion of India, Union of India and Dominion of Pakistan. The Union of India is today the Republic of India, and the Dominion of Paki ...