D. Answer the following questions in brief.
1. What were the problems before the newly formed nation of India in 1947 in terms of
rehabilitation of the refugees?
Answers
Answer:
Whenever one hears the word ‘refugee’, there are many terms and phrases that spring to mind—‘human rights’, ‘mass exodus’, ‘violence’, ‘national security’, etc.
A refugee is defined as “a person who owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his nationality and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country; or who, not having a nationality and being outside the country of his former habitual residence as a result of such events, is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to return to it".
This definition is given by the Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees, a crucial treaty in international refugee law. The treaty entered into force approximately half a century ago on 4 October 1967 and 146 countries are parties to the protocol.
India in its 70 years as an independent nation-state has seen its fair share of refugee problems. And of course, it started with Partition itself.
The Partition of India of 1947 was the division of British India into two independent dominion states, India and Pakistan. The Dominion of India is today the Republic of India; the Dominion of Pakistan is today the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and the People's Republic of Bangladesh. The partition involved the division of two provinces, Bengal and Punjab, based on district-wise non-Muslim or Muslim majorities. The partition also saw the division of the British Indian Army, the Royal Indian Navy, the Indian Civil Service, the railways, and the central treasury. The partition was outlined in the Indian Independence Act 1947 and resulted in the dissolution of the British Raj, or Crown rule in India. The two self-governing countries of India and Pakistan legally came into existence at midnight on 15 August 1947.