YouTuber unites woman left behind during Partition with family in India after 70 years

The horrors of Partition have long infiltrated the Subcontinent, with countless people reliving trauma, loss and the wounds of separation years after the region was divided into India and Pakistan.

One such story is of Daphia Bai residing in Punjab, Pakistan and who was only able to reconnect with her family 70 years after Partition, with the help of Pakistani Youtuber Muhammad Alamgir.

Alamgir, who persisted that people share his video as much as possible, spoke about the effects of the divide and how it impacted Bai for years before she could get in touch with her family in the city of Bikaner’s Morkhana town, 266 kilometres away.

“I spent all my life crying, offering money, ghee to people to help locate my family,” she shared, as she remembered the names of her grandparents, brother and sisters who were in a land across the border.

Her grandson, Naseer Khan added, "she used to tell us about a place in India which had a lot of peacocks…. she used to talk about attending her uncle’s wedding in that town.”

The process of the search was a long and tedious process - but as Bai reconnected with her loved ones over video, she was visibly teary-eyed, overwhelmed with emotions that consumed her.

In a follow-up video on Alamgir's channel on 13 September, she was thankful for the reconciliation - with her nephew reiterating how the search had become more torturous; and the separation hurting her even more with the death of her children.