Michael Breecher has written that- 'Due to rumours, fear and frenzy, about one crore two million people were exchanged, half of whom were Hindus and half Muslims. Before the end of one year, about five lakh people either died or were killed. The streets of Delhi were filled with refugees. '
Moseley wrote that- 'In this exchange six lakh people were killed, one crore four million people were evicted and one lakh young girls were kidnapped or forcibly auctioned. …… The legs of the children were grabbed and slammed against the walls, the girls were raped and their chests cut off. Pregnant women's stomachs were ripped off.'
Questioning the policy of Jinnah and Liaquat Ali, Ayodhya Singh wrote- 'Did Jinnah or Prime Minister Liaquat Ali take immediate steps to stop the massacre of Hindus and Sikhs in Pakistan? Did he immediately expel the agents of imperialism like Moody? No, they promoted the opposite. It became the policy of few Muslim bourgeoisie and zamindars to drive out Hindus and Sikhs from Pakistan.'
The first batch of Sikh and Hindu refugees immigrated to India from West Punjab. They came from about 100 villages and cities of Punjab and their number was about thirty two thousand. These people came to India with their lives on their hands after suffering horrific torture and humiliation and were settled in India's first refugee camp amidst the sun and dust, 120 miles from Delhi. Gandhiji urged that he would like to meet those refugees and Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru should follow along. When the vehicles of Gandhi and Nehru reached the refugee camp, people shouting in anger surrounded them.
In August, the Prime Minister of India Jawaharlal Nehru and the Prime Minister of Pakistan Liaquat Ali, meeting in an open jeep, visited the riot-hit areas of Indo-Punjab and Pakistan-Punjab. Gandhiji did not get the opportunity to go to Punjab. He had to stop in Delhi. The germs of the epidemics of hatred and violence had reached Delhi, the capital of India.
On the other hand Gandhiji broke his fast in Calcutta and the fire started burning here in Delhi. Larry Collins and Dominic Lapierre have alleged that- 'The Akali Dal of Sikhs and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh of Hindus together set Delhi in the flames of Quami riots.'
The Muslims of Delhi, most of whom now wanted to go to Pakistan, were resettled in refugee camps that had survived the invasions of Hindus and Sikhs, but not from the filth that was causing diseases and killing people. She was One and a half to two lakh Muslim refugees were settled in Humayun's tomb and old fort. They were frightened to such an extent that even to bury their dead, they did not come out of those walls, but used to drop the corpses outside the high walls where they would be eaten by vultures and dogs.
As soon as Gandhi arrived in Delhi, the Muslim refugees got a new life. As long as Jinnah was in India, Muslims always considered him as their messiah. Now that Jinnah had gone to Pakistan, the Muslims considered his political enemy Gandhi as the Messiah.
For the next two months, the fierce caravans of stricken humanity passing through the plains of Punjab, taking the form of tiny pins with red ends, were going to move ant-like on the maps of the Government-House. Those little redheads of pins were symbols of the worst, of human suffering - sufferings that humans could not bear, but which only humans did.
The problem of refugees has arisen from time to time in the world, which has led to many extraordinary and unforgettable scenes, but can any scene stand close to the caravan in which eight lakh people were seen walking? The gift of the Partition of India was that caravan, the largest caravan in human history, the mere imagination of which makes the heart swell.
Many caravans, big and small, were moving from here to there and from here to there. As each caravan progressed, the red-headed pins were slowly moved on those maps of the Government House. Every morning government airplanes would fly on their inspection flights. Whatever could be available in the name of food and medicine, they would drop it on those caravans. Every major caravan was accompanied by security soldiers so that there was no looting.
They would try to divide everything at gunpoint. Watching the caravan moving slowly from the sky was an experience the pilots could never forget. One pilot has written that he kept flying for a full fifteen minutes at a speed of two hundred miles per hour but could not reach that end from this end of the caravan. During the day, a long streak of dust started rising towards the sky due to the movement of the caravan. Thousands of cows, buffaloes, bullock carts and camel carts used to move with these caravans and blow the dust.
Everyone would stay at night due to fatigue and hunger. Each family would light its own fire, so that whatever could be prepared dry or dry, the fire of the stomach would be extinguished. Instead of dust, now a streak of smoke started rising towards the sky. Long and high line which does not move back and forth, is rising vertically in one place and fire is burning at its bottom………..