Border community and identity a study of Rai Sikhs of Punjab

Abstract

Punjab has traditionally remained the locus of Partition historiography. However, border- making practices and how borderlanders negotiate with these shifting realities rarely figure in the existing literature on Partition studies in India. Based on ethnographic fieldwork, this thesis attempts to fill this important gap by looking at the making of the Punjab borderland, and how it shapes the fate of communities living on the borderland. By tracing the everyday realities of the Rai Sikh community living in the border belt of Firozpur and Fazilka districts, the thesis explores the notion of community and identity in the process of resettlement of the Rai Sikhs on the Punjab borderland. The present study thus seeks to unravel the hitherto untold story of the Partition of Punjab by delving deep into the politics of the making of Punjab borderland. newline