Hindus Fleeing Noakhali

 

“No one puts their children in a boat unless the water is safer than the land.”

— Warsan Shire

A rare photograph of Bengali Hindus fleeing Noakhali (1946) in the dead of night. The photograph was taken by renowned Indian photographer Sunil Janah, who worked as an assistant to American photographer Margaret Bourke-White. Sunil Janah had travelled to Noakhali around November.

(Note: The 1946 Noakhali Pogrom was a preplanned ethnic cleansing program, it is wrongly termed as riot. Riots witness violence from both sides. Noakhali 1946 was a one sided attack on unsuspecting Hindus.)