Hello and welcome to Conflicted, the history podcast where we talk about the struggles that

shaped us, the tough questions that they pose, and why we should care about any of it.

Conflicted is a member of the Evergreen Podcast Network, and as always, I'm your host, Zach

Cornwell. I suppose it's very on-brand to say that I have extremely mixed emotions about the topic that we are about to explore today.

On the one hand, I am incredibly excited, and on the other hand, I'm absolutely terrified.

See, on my laptop, I have this folder, and in that folder is a very long list of potential

topics for the show, for Conflicted. And today's topic has been languishing on

that list for almost the entire time I've been doing this show, which at this point is coming

up on about three years. So for three years, I've been avoiding this thing, which of course

begs the question, why have I been avoiding it? Obviously, we do not shy away from difficult topics on this show.

But in terms of complexity, depth, and sheer scope, this one is almost unparalleled.

It is also very emotionally charged. This topic means something to people. It's still raw. It

still hurts. And yet, paradoxically, almost no one

in the Western Hemisphere knows much about it at all. In today's episode, we are going to be talking

about something called the partition of India. Partition, of course, means division or separation.

For almost 200 years, the British Empire held dominion over the Indian

subcontinent. What began as a series of handshake deals with a few curious Maharajas

snowballed into a complete and total subjugation of 400 million people. From the peaks of the

Himalayas to the river deltas of Bengal, the Union Jack fluttered proudly,

a symbol of his majesty's absolute control over one of the oldest cradles of civilization.

India was, as one writer put it, quote, the jewel in the crown of the British Empire,

their chief source of wealth and a vital well of military manpower.

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