ABSTRACT
It has been a challenging job for someone seeking entry into this crowded room of Partition research. Nevertheless, my focus on the East Bengal episode of the Partition itself has guided me to the least populated corner of the party. From there, I would like to be selective in interacting with only a handful of those scholars relevant to my research. One of my major concerns is, what does the existing body of research tell us or not about the Bengal episode of the event? Or, to be more specific, what does it tell us about the East Bengal experiences? What does the term ‘prolonged partition’ mean when qualifying the Partition in Bengal? What is the potential to broaden the concept further? In what particular way is East Bengal represented – or silenced – in Partition studies, and what are the implications of such a representation? Parallel to this, I would like to engage with the fact that, until recently, the Partition remained an erased chapter in Bangladesh, but now it seems to have some relevance in the contemporary nation-state.
