Cracking India, Bapsi Sidhwa

       Perhaps more important than the chosen identity of a nation is the feeling of that nation—the traditions, histories, cultures, and religious identities of a nation become that nation, and together form a consensus of identity among its people.  Because a nation is indeed fabricated and constructed by all of these things, it becomes a true community only when its identity is, for the most part, agreed upon. When the feeling of a nation is in conflict with itself, the nation as a whole will shift until its identity is more stable; we see this in the novel by the ways in which characters come to demonize friends and neighbors they have known for years for the sake of the new nation's identity.  In Cracking India, while the violence and protests are growing over whom and what ideals will create India/Pakistan, the characters begin to feel the tension from political leaders and government officials trickle down to their individual communities.  These tensions stem from the individuals’ pride in their own identities, self-defense against criticisms, and confusion over what will happen to their home as it was before.  The cause of these tensions are most represented in Cracking India by the religions of the characters, and we can see this when Lenny “becomes aware of religious differences” (100).  They were not important to her before, not only because she was a young child but also because the community all shared the feeling of the same community—their political and government leaders were not at odds with each other.  The characters in the novel only become divided into categories when the possibility of the split of the nation becomes a reality, as Lenny takes note when she claims “One day everybody is themselves—and the next day they are Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, Christian.  People shrink, dwindling into symbols”  (100). The confusion over the feeling of the imagined community begins not only to weaken the community itself, but also its inhabitants.  We see, as the confusion mounts, each character beginning to cling more and more to their personal identities as Muslim, Hindu, etc., and in doing so, clinging to the traditions and beliefs each feel should be important to the nation they belong to.  In asking “What is God?” in reference to these religious identities and behaviors, Lenny seems to also be asking what will the nation decide on—who will have the ultimate “right” answer (101).  The feelings of the individuals as well as the different religious groups represented in the novel play an important role in not only shaping the future nations, but also in how those nations develop and come to separate.  Indeed, one can think that if not for the tensions pressed upon these individuals by the leaders of their religions and peoples, the nation as Lenny saw it may never have cracked at all. 

Lahore and Amristar

  
Cracking India takes place in Lahore before the border of India and Pakistan is created; Lenny explains that "the Radcliff Commission deals out Indian cities like a pack of cards. Lahore is dealt to Pakistan, Amristar to India... I am Pakistani. In a snap. Just like that" (146). Identity, in this novel, is explained through the eyes of a child which allows the reader to feel the division from the point of view of a person with the least amount of control in the situation.  It is also expressed, increasingly as the novel develops, through the sense of being from and living in a particular place, and how this sense or feeling of a community affects the people who live there. 
After partition in 1947, the state of Punjab was divided between India and Pakistan, and the cities of Lahore and Amristar--just a distance of 31 miles from each other--became the main cities of conflict and riot during partition. An excerpt from Arnold J. Toynbee's East to West provides an explanation of what it meant for the state to be divided as it was, from the perspective of a Sikh/Muslim division that we are not clearly shown in Cracking India.  Both cities, before partition, carried a very heavy weight for people of Muslim, Sikh, and Hindu religions, and were considered a "common capital" for the Sikh and Muslim people. However, after partition Lahore became the capital of the new nation of Pakistan, which was now under the control of an Islamic leader, and Amristar became a city of India, remaining a central area of the Sikh religion. Partition not only physically divided the "twin cities", as Toynbee refers to them, but separated the peoples who depended on these cities to function together, as well. Suddenly Sikhs were not welcome in a city they formerly thought of as a home for their people. Life suddenly changed when a new border was drawn, and the identity associated with each place was altered dramatically.