Article
Archipelago of Remembrance: Archiving Island History
1 Independent Researcher, India
* Correspondence: banerj.r@gmail.com
Abstract: Why did a Bengali photojournalist from Dhamrai in erstwhile East Pakistan establish a photography studio in Port Blair? The story of Pramatha Kishore Sanyal’s arrival to Andaman is intertwined with independent India’s history of refugee rehabilitation. There were many mainland communities that were settled on the islands between 1949 and 1980, including Bengal Partition’s refugees. Several government employees were also transferred to aid the task of rehabilitation.Mr. Sanyal’s wife, Sabita, was one such person.
The late photographer’s collection of black-and-white images from the 1960s-80s depict the indigenous Onge people of Little Andaman Island. With the settlement of mainland communities, the creation of Indian Ocean tribal reserves, and the 2004 tsunami, the habitation zone of Onge has changed. A small number of photographs from miscellaneous sources show the simultaneous process of refugee rehabilitation across the Islands. Upon a chance encounter with these images, I was struck with the impulse to digitally preserve them, hopeful that they will highlight the convergence of peoples and cultures that make island spaces.
The photo-archive is aimed to serve the dual purpose of preservation of memories and building a space for generational transmission of memories to the island’s youth. The article details the process of building this archive, its contents, and its potential to align academic research with a community-oriented approach to collection, preservation, and dissemination of islanders’ narratives.
Keywords: Andaman Islands; Bay of Bengal; island studies; archiving; memory studies; partition; migration
https://doi.org/10.59711/jims.12.110027
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