When the British left India, they left the country in ruins. The mutual killings had started in 1946 in Kolkata with the infamous Great Calcutta Riot. The riot left an estimated 10,000–15,000 dead in five days and 200,000 displaced. The government had to call the army to quell the riot, and this became the pattern both in the Punjab and Bengal. As the hour of independence approached, communities attacked each other in the entire northern, western, and eastern parts of the country. Acts of killing, burning, ransacking, rape, looting, maiming, and displacing spread like wildfire. The army had to be rushed to several places. What did independence mean, what was signified by freedom, and what was political power to be used for? What was sovereignty? If people were sovereign, did this mean Hindus exercising sovereignty over everyone else, or Muslims, or autonomous regions? What did the term ‘nation’ actually mean when everyone was talking of the nation gaining sovereignty, all at the same time? For the British, the main thing was getting out of India as quickly as possible and until then maintaining the minimum of law and order.