Presenter
Singh Abhishek Kumar - Ambedkar University Delhi, Kashmiri Gate Campus, Ambedkar University Delhi, Kashmiri Gate Campus, New Delhi, IndiaPanel
13 – Partition refugee camps: New debates and perspectivesAbstract
This paper focuses on the Dandakaranya Rehabilitation Project which began in 1958. It looks into the caste aspect of this rehabilitation and tries to examine to what extent the promises that were made to the refugees about Dandakaranya were fulfilled, or were only done to lure them into a remote place starkly different from the geographical conditions they were accustomed to. There were three different stages for rehabilitation in Dandakaranya, first was the transit camps, second was the worksite camps and the final was the villages in which refugees were settled. For sources, I would be referring to the Prime Minister Museum and Library, National Archives, Legislative and State Assembly Debates, Chhattisgarh Archives, autobiographies and oral narratives. This paper tries to study these camps, what were the living conditions in them, and how the dual scheme of government of rehabilitation along with the development of the region came through.
