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Tickell, Alex
(2025).
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/9780198945246.003.0075
Abstract
This article examines the racialized prejudice experienced by individuals from north-eastern India and West Bengal based on their visible, but highly variable, ‘Chinese’ somatic and cultural differences from most of the population. In particular, it isolates a single historical event, the 1962 Sino-Indian War, as a significant moment that coalesced racialized identity in the history of postcolonial India. During and directly after the 1962 conflict, India’s long-standing Chinese community was subject to racist attacks, police harassment, and imprisonment—with over 2,000 individuals, including elderly people and children, being interned for years in a former prisoner-of-war camp in Rajasthan. After being released, many former detainees found it difficult to re-establish their lives and businesses, and many subsequently emigrated to Canada, Australia, Hong Kong, and the United Kingdom. Since the millennium, this ‘forgotten’ history and the traumatic legacy of the racism of 1962 has been the subject of historical novels, memoirs, and community histories. These include Rita Chowdhury’s self-translated historical novel Chinatown Days (2018), Yin Marsh’s memoir Doing Time With Nehru (2015), Joy Ma and Dilip D’Souza’s co-authored non-fiction report The Deoliwallahs (2020), and community-produced video documentaries like The Meridian Society’s The Chinese from Bengal (2011). My article discusses these works as individually and collectively curated attempts to preserve community history and bear witness to the racism and discrimination suffered by members of the community.
Plain Language Summary
A survey of literature and memoirs dealing with the racialised experiences of Chinese heritage communities in India during and after the Sino-Indian war of 1962.
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