ABSTRACT
The 1940s was a period of great crisis for the Sikh community in the Punjab. During the climacteric phase that culminated in the dissolution of the British Raj, the Sikhs regarded with consternation the Muslim League’s Pakistan demand that threatened to convert the Punjab, a Muslim majority province, into an Islamic state. In their frantic attempts to prevent themselves from becoming ‘a helpless minority’ at the mercy of a ‘Muslim tyranny’ should Pakistan become a reality, the Sikhs eventually agreed to a partition of the province. The upshot was that, in August 1947, when the Punjab was partitioned, half the community found themselves with their large tracts of valuable canal colony lands and many important holy shrines on the Pakistan side of the border. This led to a massive uprooting and abandoning of land and property as the Sikhs fled Western Punjab to avoid being killed by the Muslims.
