New Delhi, :The Premchand Archives & Literary Centre (JPALC), Jamia Millia Islamia (JMI) commemorated Partition Horror’s Remembrance Day today (August 14th) ) with an exhibition of photographs and books titled THE UPHEVAL. The exhibition features photographs of the Partition by Margaret Bourke-White, Homai Vyarawalla (India’s first woman press photographer), Sunil Janah, Henri Cartier-Bresson, PN. Sharma and other anonymous photographers of the Press Information Bureau (PIB). The exhibition traces the history of the Partition violence through themes titled `The Decision’, `The Tumult’, `The Dislocation’ and `The Survivors’.
Mr. M. Nasim Haider, Officiating Registrar, JMI inaugurated the exhibition in the presence of Deans, Directors, senior faculty members and students. Prof. Shohini Ghosh, Hony. Director of the JPALC said that the exhibition was modest in scale but rich in content because the photographs on display had shaped our visual imagination of the Partition. Of special interest are photographs taken by two important women in the history of world photography. They are HOMAI VYARAWALLA (1913-2012) India’s first woman press photographer and MARGARET BOURKE-WHITE ((1904-1971), American photographer and arguably the world’s first women war correspondent Vyarawalla’s unique photographs are now a part of the recorded history of India which includes the day India voted for the Partition of India. Bourke-White who worked on a larger canvas, took her photographs during the violence of Partition by putting her own life at great risk. Historians have correctly observed that she was the first photo-journalist to capture the Partition of India as a human tragedy.
In addition to the photographs, the exhibition displays books on the Partition which include those written by authors whose collections are part of the JPALC like Qurratulain Hyder and Begum Anees Kidwai. Also on display are books on the Bengal Partition by Prof. Joya Chatterji and other historians of the Partition. Newer books like Salmaa Siddique’s Evacuee Cinema: Bombay and Lahore in Partition Transit (2022) are also on display. The exhibition will remain open from Monday-Friday (10:30AM-4:30M) till August 26, 2024.
Click Here for More Institutional Activities