A century has passed since the Jallianwala Bagh carnage. On April 13, 1919, British troops fired 1,650 rounds at 15,000 unarmed Indians, mostly Sikhs in a space of 6 to 7 acres that was walled on all sides apart from five narrow entrances, one of which was blocked. The crowd had gathered to protest the draconian Rowlatt Act, a law passed in response to a perceived threat from revolutionary nationalists. The Act allowed indefinite detention and incarceration without trial for a period of up to two years, among other abuses by the colonial authorities. According to estimates, 500 to 600 people died. Less conservative estimates state the figure may actually be as high as 1,000. Some accounts even claim that the firing was directed towards the exits through which people were trying to escape. According to the testimony of General Reginald Dyer, who gave the order to open fire at the civilian crowd, the crowd was not given a warning to disperse. Dyer expressed no remorse for this atrocity. Although he was eventually forced to resign, many British Indians approved of his order. Legendary author Rudyard Kipling even hailed Dyer as “the man who saved India”. A hundred years after the massacre and 72 years after the British left the Subcontinent, it is necessary to take stock of how far we have come. While the British Raj is no more, there is plenty that suggests all that has changed in the Subcontinent is the skin colour of the colonizers. Many repressive laws from the colonial period remain in place in Pakistan, India and Bangladesh. And in Pakistan, although such actions are forbidden by the law, the state can still make people disappear when there is a perceived threat of militancy or separatism. Yes; the people of Pakistan, India and Bangladesh are free of the British yoke. But in real terms, that is all the progress that has been made in real terms. Freedom from state terrorism, poverty, hunger and abuse is still a distant dream for the common people of the Subcontinent. *