In the annals of 1947 Partition historiography, communal riots occupy a pivotal position. Post-independence, the Barisal riots of February 1950 occupy a pre-eminent position in Partition literature, being the catalyst of the largest mass migration in a single month in the eastern sector. Deviating from this high politics of communal violence, this chapter attempts to explore somewhat ‘sporadic localised’ riots in Calcutta and its twin city across the river – Howrah – in February–March 1950. Culling information from archival documents, personal memoirs, newspaper reports and government records, the chapter will bring to the fore the broad implication lurking behind this communal violence and contextualise the issue in the larger framework of the rehabilitation policy of the West Bengal government, saddled with an unending stream of refugees from East Bengal, post-independence. The riot-torn belt of Pilkhana in Howrah district, or Ismail Street/Zakaria Street in Calcutta, consisted predominantly of Muslim-inhabited areas, and the ulterior motive of the government was to rehabilitate the Hindu migrants by evicting the Muslims and instilling in them fear psychosis so as to prevent their return for good. The chapter, thus, analyses the flip-side of rehabilitation, where Hindu rehabilitation at times became co-terminous with minority persecution, eviction and displacement. The 1950 riots signal the beginning of the changing mosaic of the post-Partition cities, where fear and mutual distrust racked the psyches of the citizens of two communities and the undercurrent of subtle fear ran through them. www.researchgate.net/publication/347721345_1950_riots_and_fractured_social_spaces