Writing about Punjab, it seems, is an attempt to render the incomprehensible, comprehensible. That, at least, seems to be the case for most histories of the region, each of which, in their own way, grapple with the incomprehensibility of Partition. And so it’s somewhat predictable that Rajmohan Gandhi, recently the toast of the literary circuit in Pakistan, begins his account by a reference to Partition. By his own admission, Punjab: A History from Aurangzeb to Mountbatten, is an attempt at “healing the wound” of 1947. It’s also an inquiry that’s born of a need to understand the region better: a region that is today divided in four provinces / states across two countries. It’s also a region that has affected his life in profound ways; especially as a son of Delhi who witnessed its rapid transformation into a Punjabi city during Partition.

Locating and defining the precise contours of the region, however, is easier said than done. Geography, while significant, is simply one of the many ways through which Punjab can be located. Language is another. According to Gandhi, the common thread tying the region together was and is the Punjabi language, which marks out the “Punjabis as a distinct people.” That in turn is linked to the idea of Punjabiyat, which, according to the author, is hard to define. The idea of Punjabiyat or the distinctiveness of the Punjabi people, despite their considerable heterogeneity, makes it possible for Gandhi to analyse the “Punjabi psyche,” which apparently “had always privileged survival.” But things become even more complicated than that, because in the 18th century, the “Sikh Punjabi” managed to break free of this “psychological trait” while his “Muslim fellow Punjabi” did not.

That these representations are essentialist is to state the obvious. One can argue that this is a trap that Gandhi has laid out for himself. For these representations are, to an extent, borne out of a framework which views the Punjab and its people as distinctive from other regions and peoples of the subcontinent. In other words, once this claim has been made, the author is compelled to define just what it is that makes the Punjab and Punjabis so distinctive. A way out perhaps could have been to complicate and historicise the idea of distinctiveness (itself, in part, a colonial construct) which in turn could have opened up different and exciting ways of thinking of about “regional” histories. Put another way, a regional history of Punjab might have been better served by rescuing it from the suffocating embrace of Punjabiyat.

To return to the “Muslim Punjabi”; one of the aims of this book is to engage with an “important question” which “has not been addressed in existing scholarship: Why was Punjab’s Muslim majority unable to fill the power vacuum when, post Aurangzeb, the Mughal Empire retreated from the Province?” While there could potentially be a number of ways of answering this, one immediate response comes to mind: why is this question important at all? This, perhaps, could be one reason why this issue hasn’t been addressed by existing scholarship. Because at the heart of it is an assumption that the “Muslim Punjabi” was an exclusivist mode of self identification in the 18th century with clearly defined interests and political objectives.

To be fair though, Gandhi does say that while he has “unavoidably spoken of ‘Hindus,’ ‘Muslims,’ and ‘Sikhs’ in pre-British Punjab,” it should be remembered that these exclusivist classifications were a “British idea to begin with.” If this is the case, one might be forgiven for asking: why are these representations so unavoidable after all?

In referring to individuals in terms of their presumed religious affiliations in the pre-colonial period, as Gandhi mostly does, does one run the risk of writing an anachronistic history? This, however, is a broader problem that inflects much of historical scholarship on South Asia. And at the heart of this crisis is a failure to conceive of and write about identities and collectivities that are not refracted through the prism of exclusivist communal affiliations, which are themselves largely an outcome of colonial modernity in South Asia.

Speaking of colonial modernity, Gandhi is correct in his claim that most histories of the Punjab have restricted themselves to analysing the colonial history of the region. Favoured themes include, but are not restricted to, the histories of nationalism, communalism and radicalism (of the Bhagat Singh variety). Gandhi seeks to enlarge the frame by examining the pre-colonial period as well. That said, the question of why he specifically chose to focus on the period from Aurangzeb’s death onwards, is not entirely clear. Either way, enlarging the period of analysis is an ambitious and admirable undertaking.

What follows then, after a brief foray into Punjab’s history prior to Aurangzeb, is a largely chronological account, which is, for the most part, concerned with charting the political history of the region. Within the region itself, this is mostly a story about central, eastern and northern Punjab. At times, the narrative is daunting in its details, with names, dates, and events hurriedly thrown together without any detailed analysis. The account ends with Partition and a chapter on ‘Insaniyat’ which movingly recounts instances of compassion, humanity, and the bridging of religious divides at a time when the province was engulfed in communal hatred. A post-script then discusses the varying trajectories of the two Punjabs and the future of Punjabiyat.

Both insaniyat and Punjabiyat, it seems, have the potential of bridging the divide between the two Punjabs. According to the author, the process of “healing and renewal” may begin once Punjabis ask each other: “For tomorrow’s sake, can we learn from yesterday?” Learning from yesterday, however, is easier said than done. Because learning from yesterday requires, in part, a history that highlights the everydayness, ordinariness and fluidness of identities which refuse to align themselves with the fixed categories of ‘Hindu,’ ‘Muslim,’ Sikh’ or even of ‘Punjabiyat.’ Amongst other things, this is precisely where Gandhi’s work falls short. By projecting essentialist representations onto the past, he forecloses alternate possibilities of imagining the future. And one way of imagining such a future could be to de-centre and de-emphasise the politics of identity, and even the idea of Punjab and Punjabiyat itself, in our histories. Alongside others, this perhaps can be one route to Gandhi’s otherwise laudable aim of achieving peace and reconciliation between the two countries.

The reviewer has a PhD in South Asian history from the University of Oxford.

Punjab: A History from Aurangzeb to Mountbatten

(History)

By Rajmohan Gandhi

Aleph Publications, India

ISBN 9382277587

400pp.