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goonda

The Terror of Decolonization: Exploring French India’s “Goonda Raj”

Author(s): 
Jessica Namakkal
Publisher/Sponsor: 
Taylor and Francis Online
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1369801X.2016.1231586

Abstract: The colonial archives are filled with documents detailing incidents of arson, beatings, shootings, robberies and harassment that occurred along the contours of the numerous borders that separated French India from India following the departure of the British in 1947. The framing of these years as a period of terror wrought by “goondas” covered an underlying anxiety about the future of the nation-state and national citizenship at the moment of decolonization.