Calcutta (Kolkata) was deeply affected by the partition of British India. Sir Cyril Radcliffe’s line that separated the eastern wing of Pakistan (present-day Bangladesh) from India had devastating consequences for the region’s economy and society.

The Partition of India (1947) is commonly understood as a violent territorial and political separation of peoples, their forced evictions and migration as well as communal upheavals. But India's Partition can be seen as something more than separation of communities and the creation of distinct national identities. This paper suggests that refugee rehabilitation, one of the important processes of the post-Partition years, formed the rubric through which we remember 1947.