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'The Other Side of Silence: Voices from the Partition of India' was written by:
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Answer: Option A — Urvashi Butalia
Detailed Solution
"The Other Side of Silence: Voices from the Partition of India" is a book by the Indian writer, publisher and feminist Urvashi Butalia, published in 1998.
About the book:
- It is an oral history of the Partition of India in 1947, based on interviews with people who lived through it, especially women, children and Dalits, whose experiences were often missing from official histories.
- It describes the violence, displacement and suffering of Partition, including the abduction of women, forced marriages and the "honour killings" of women by their own families to protect them from capture.
- It also describes the government's efforts to recover abducted women after Partition.
- Butalia begins with the story of her own family: her uncle stayed in Pakistan and converted to Islam, while her grandmother was left behind with him.
- The book won the Oral History Book Association Award (2001) and the Nikkei Asia Prize for Culture (2003).
About Urvashi Butalia:
- She was born in 1952 in Ambala, Haryana.
- In 1984, with Ritu Menon, she co-founded "Kali for Women", India's first feminist publishing house.
- In 2003, she founded "Zubaan", an independent feminist publishing house.
- She has been active in the Indian women's movement and in campaigns against violence against women.
- She received the Padma Shri in 2011.
- She translated Baby Halder's "Aalo Aandhari" into English as "A Life Less Ordinary" (2006).
Other important books on the Partition:
- Ritu Menon and Kamla Bhasin: "Borders and Boundaries: Women in India's Partition" (1998).
- Yasmin Khan: "The Great Partition" (2007).
- Aanchal Malhotra: "Remnants of a Separation" (2017), which tells the Partition through objects carried by refugees.
- Fiction: "Train to Pakistan" (Khushwant Singh), "Tamas" (Bhisham Sahni) and "Pinjar" (Amrita Pritam).
Why not the other options?
- ✗Ritu Menon co-wrote "Borders and Boundaries".
- ✗Yasmin Khan wrote "The Great Partition".
- ✗Aanchal Malhotra wrote "Remnants of a Separation".
Quick tip
Remember: "The Other Side of Silence" (1998, oral history of Partition) = Urvashi Butalia (co-founder of Kali for Women 1984 and founder of Zubaan 2003; Padma Shri 2011).
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Books & Authors — Preparation
This question tests your understanding of Books & Authors, a key topic in the General Knowledge section. The detailed solution above uses a step-by-step approach to show the reasoning, and where available, a shortcut that helps you solve similar questions in under 90 seconds during the actual exam.
This topic covers famous books and their authors, including ancient Indian texts, works of the freedom struggle, classic and modern literature, autobiographies of famous people, and recently published books by well-known personalities. Questions usually name a book and ask for its author, or the other way round. Ancient and historical books, such as Arthashastra (Kautilya), Indica (Megasthenes) and Gitanjali (Rabindranath Tagore), are tested most often. Autobiographies are another favourite, so learn titles such as 'My Experiments with Truth' (Mahatma Gandhi) and 'Wings of Fire' (A. P. J. Abdul Kalam). Practise the books and authors questions below, written in the style of the general awareness sections of exams such as SSC, banking, railways, CUET GAT, MAH CET and CLAT. Each question comes with a detailed explanation that adds related facts, so every question helps you revise more than one point.