After the Partition: A Shared Cultural Heritage in Essex
After the Partition: A Shared Cultural Heritage in Essex
Funded through the National Lottery Heritage Fund
Over half a million Sikhs, Hindu’s and Muslims came to Britain because of the upheaval of Partition, the promise of economic opportunities and a safer life. In 2024 Essex Cultural Diversity Project was awarded funding from the National Lottery Heritage Fund for Sikh, Hindu and (Pakistani) Muslim communities living in Essex to reflect on seven decades of their family’s lives, to explore experiences, challenges, successes, and social change from 1947 to today. The project will pose the question: how has British culture changed and how have they changed British culture?
With few original settlers surviving, this is the last chance to bring three generations together to document the fortunes of settlers and their families who can trace their migration directly to Partition between India and Pakistan. This will be a rare chance to focus on lived experiences since Partition, rather than on the experience of Partition itself, opening opportunities to explore this unique cultural context within and between communities. As time passes and memories fade, it is important for Sikhs, Hindus, and Muslims to capture what shaped their modern heritage for posterity, and to reflect on wider issues of migration and colonialism today.
We aim to capture people’s memories through oral history recording, films and interviews. We will also create a touring pop-up exhibition in the Punjab and in the UK with original images, memories, materials and artefacts, belongings from the time of the Partition which migrants bought with them when settling in the UK.
Indi Sandhu, ECDP Creative Director and CEO said ‘This is an excellent opportunity to for us to highlight the significance of Partition and how it affected people who came to settle in Essex after 1947. Through the project we will raise awareness about diverse communities, traditions, and cultures, and promote community cohesion through a heritage focus on the story of the Partition. We are keen that the second and third generations born in Essex from Hindu, Sikh and Muslim communities connect and communicate with the first generation of migrants from the subcontinent to learn more about the Partition and how they have contributed to the wider society in Essex over the years.’’
Listen Now: Oral History Recordings
Recorded in Autumn 2024, these interviews capture people’s experience of Partition and life in the UK. The interviewer is Sikh historian Simran Bance. Click the arrow to open each interview.
Born in Jalandhar, East Punjab, Harjit Singh Kang was around 10 years old when he experienced the exodus of thousands of Sikhs into his village during the partition of India. He recalls the many families carrying their belongings on “gaddis” as they poured into East Punjab from areas such as Lahore and Rawalpindi. At his young age, he felt a huge sense of helplessness and sympathy, as those who suffered described the onslaught of mobs during their treacherous journey across the border.
In the late 1950’s Harjit Singh saw his brother take his chance by travelling to England to make a living. Not long afterwards, his brother encouraged him to come to the UK in 1961, where he boarded an Air India flight directly to Heathrow Airport at the price of just 1500 rupees. Settling in Barking with anticipation for starting a new life in the East End of London, Harjit witnessed how his brother had shaved his beard and removed his turban due to the covert discriminatory barriers which hindered him from employment. On the suggestion of his brother, Harjit felt he had no choice but to follow, and in 1963, he too shaved his beard and removed is turban. He eventually landed a job as a post man for Royal Mail in the East End, becoming familiar with most streets across Barking, Ilford and Newham, Essex. Only after 15 years when the discrimination of dress code had eased and with the passing of the Race Relations Act in 1976, did Harjit finally feel proud and comfortable to wear his turban again and grow his beard as an East End post man.
He gave a total of 26 years of service to the Royal Mail, and this commitment and hard work granted him promotions throughout his career. He describes how he first would cycle to work every day, until he could afford a car, and then purchasing his first house in Barking, Essex for £4000, where he currently still lives today with his wife Mohinder Kaur Kang.
Born in Ipswich, 1955, Prabhjot Kaur was the first of her family to be born in the UK after the Partition of India. Both her parents Narinjan Singh Lovly and Sukchain Kaur, originally from West Punjab in modern day Pakistan, travelled across the border to East Punjab following the turmoil and upheaval of Partition. In an attempt to build a living and provide for his family, Narinjan Singh travelled to England on numerous occasions in the 1930’s and 40’s learning the trade of pedalling in the East End. Punjabis like him made their money travelling door to door in towns, selling household essentials and clothing, for many British residents, this was the first time they had encountered turbaned Sikhs.
With the intention to settle in Ipswich and work in London to buy pedalling stock, Singh called his family over to England. In 1954 Sukchain Kaur and her children spent 15 days on an exciting trip, travelling by sea to start their new lives in Ipswich. Belonging to one of the earliest migrant Punjabi families in Ipswich, Prabhjot Kaur recalls positive memories of her childhood, where the community was close and hostility was rare. In the late 1950’s Narinjan Singh opened “Punjab General Store” which was the first Asian store in East Anglia. While the rooms above served as the family home, the shop below was a successful grocery and convenience store for local residents, and eventually stocked international food for later arriving migrants from the West Indies and Bangladesh.
After spending much of her childhood making fond memories in supporting her family’s shop, Prabhjot Kaur eventually moved to East London in 1973, after marriage, and has since lived in Essex for over 50 years.
Mohinder Kaur Kang, born in Jalandhar East Punjab, arrived in England in the early 1960’s once her husband Harjit Singh Kang had already settled and secured a job as a post man in Barking. After two years of being apart, Mohinder Kaur was eager and excited to start a new life in a country where the houses appeared larger, and money easier to come by.
Unfortunately, like many Punjabi women who would not have been able to speak or understand English, Mohinder describes how she scarcely interacted with other British ladies and found difficulty in navigating her life outside the house. She recalls how men in her family would regularly come together to either celebrate or socialise. At the request of her brother, she would spend a lot of time preparing Punjabi meals, pakoras, samosas and rotis for him and his many friends. For women like Mohinder Kaur, the access to new facilities like gas cookers and newly opening grocery shops for international groceries especially in Ilford, meant that she was able to prepare meals just like the ones in Punjab, but more efficiently than before.
Although Mohinder found the cultural and language barrier troubling, this did not deter her from using her free time to earn money from home, where she utilised her seamstress skills. For 20 years, Mohinder Kaur worked her sewing machine, taking orders from local men and women to make jackets, hats and ladies purses and dresses. Income was often little, as she would charge 2⅟₂ shillings for a jacket. However sometimes, she describes, she could earn up to £10 a week in 1970, around £100 in today’s money. With these small amounts of disposable income, Mohinder Kaur was able to support her husband, as they built their lives together in East End. She currently lives with her retired husband, Harjit Singh Kang in Barking where they have been living for 60 years.
