Historical initiative digitally preserves India’s post-Partition heritage

Originally Published August 20, 2024 by Coventry University(opens in a new tab)

More than 20,000 images, prints and documents from the two decades following India’s Partition will be digitised through a new research initiative led by Coventry University.

The remarkable collection, housed at Hamilton Studios in Mumbai, spans nearly 100 years of Indian history and encompasses more than 600,000 objects.

The digitisation project focuses on the years 1947 to 1967, an important period following the Partition; a significant geopolitical event that ended nearly two centuries of British colonial rule and divided the Indian subcontinent into two separate nations: India and Pakistan.

Ben Kyneswood(opens in a new tab), Associate Professor of Digital Heritage and Culture at Coventry University’s Research Centre for Creative Economies, will collaborate with Hamilton Studios and the National Institute for Design (NID) in Ahmedabad, a city in the Indian state of Gujarat, to digitise the Partition materials.

Funded by the Modern Endangered Archives Programme(opens in a new tab) at the University of California, Los Angeles Library, the project aims to bridge historical divides, foster cultural preservation and illuminate how the Partition continues to shape the stories of India and its people.

Many of the objects in the collection are passport photographs, reflecting the intention to travel from Bombay (now Mumbai), India’s main port at the time. Hamilton studio is in Mumbai’s Ballard Estate area, near the new custom house and port.

Other digital assets include glass and celluloid negatives to produce high-quality reproductions of historical photographs; test prints and invoices to reveal photographic techniques and economic details; legal documents to shed light on legal frameworks; and products for advertisement to illustrate the marketing strategies and consumer culture of the time.

Beyond migration narratives, the project captures a diverse range of experiences and stories from the era, including the lives of Maharajahs (rulers) as well as weddings, celebrations, business tycoons, marketing endeavours, family and office groups and vibrant street scenes.

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