| Abstract: | ABSTRACTThe refugee, in India's Partition history, appears as an enigmatic construct – part pitiful, part heroic, though mostly shorn of agency – representing the surface of the human tragedy of Partition. Yet this archetype masks the undercurrent of social distinctions that produced hierarchies of post-colonial citizenship within the mass of refugees. The core principle of the official resettlement policy was self-rehabilitation, that is, the ability to become a productive citizen of the new nation state without state intervention. Thus, the onus of performing a successful transition – from refugee to citizen – lay on the resourcefulness of the refugees rather than the state. This article traces the differing historical trajectories followed by ‘state-dependent’ and ‘self-reliant’ refugees in the making of modern citizenry in post-colonial India. |
