At the Crossroads of Destiny - Talking Partition and Independence at Humayun's Tomb and Khan Market

Humayun's Tomb may well have cemented Timurid rule in Dehli, but such an architectural marvel nonetheless commemorated a tragic death. Four centuries later, festivities in the city surrounding India's painfully-gained independence from the British Raj were mired by the largest, costliest and most tragic migration of people in human history. Amidst this mass influx and outflow of the new, harassed 'citizens' of India and East and West Pakistan, the tomb-complex and comparable, walled heritage sites of the capital from its Sultanate and Mughal past stepped up to provide desperately needed shelter from displacement, uncertainty and violence. As the dust and blood settled, new residential and commercial neighbourhoods like Khan Market bore testament to the resilient renewal of lives and fortunes post-1947. Join us this coming Saturday morning, the 4th of March, as we contextualize these two, seemingly-unrelated historical spaces within the landscape of Partition and the birth of a nation.