GarlandGurule05 at 16:59, 8 March 2026

2026-03-08T16:59:08Z

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{{short description|Indian historian}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Guneeta Singh Bhalla
| image =
| caption =
| birth_place = India
| occupation = Physicist Historian
| education = [[University of Florida]] (Ph.D.)
| known_for = Founder of [[The 1947 Partition Archive]]
| website = {{URL|1947partitionarchive.org}}
}}

'''Guneeta Singh Bhalla''' is an [[Indian Americans|Indian-American]] [[physicist]] and [[historian]], best known as the founder and executive director of [[The 1947 Partition Archive]], a non-profitable organization dedicated to preserving firsthand accounts of the [[Partition of India]] in 1947.<ref name="pbs2023">{{cite web |title=Dr. Guneeta Singh Bhalla |url=https://www.pbs.org/video/dr-guneeta-singh-bhalla-ypvwny/ |website=PBS |date=2023 |access-date=17 May 2025}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Guneeta Singh Bhalla |url=https://southasia.wisc.edu/2018-spring-lecture-series/guneeta-singh-bhalla/ |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=Center for South Asia |language=en-US}}</ref>

== Early life and education ==
Bhalla was born in India and spent part of her childhood in [[Punjab, India|Punjab]] before moving to the [[United States]], where accounts of her paternal grandmother's flight from [[Lahore]] to [[Amritsar]] during Partition first impressed upon her the human scale of the upheaval.<ref name="TOI2022">{{cite web |last=Kamal |first=Neel |title=Inspired by grandparents' story, Guneeta Singh Bhalla to make over 10k oral histories of Partition survivors |url=https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/inspired-by-grandparents-story-guneeta-singh-bhalla-to-make-over-10k-oral-histories-of-partition-survivors/articleshow/93529201.cms |website=The Times of India |date=12 August 2022 |access-date=20 June 2025}}</ref> At nineteen, she began informally recording family recollections, an impulse that would later shape her archival work.<ref name="Rediff2023">{{cite web |title='Partition is a massive part of our history' |url=https://www.rediff.com/news/interview/guneeta-singh-bhalla-partition-is-a-massive-part-of-our-history/20230324.htm |website=Rediff.com |date=24 March 2023 |access-date=20 June 2025}}</ref>

Bhalla earned a Ph.D. in [[condensed matter physics]] at the [[University of Florida]] in 2009; her dissertation explored size effects in phase-separated manganite nanostructures.<ref name="UFThesis">{{cite thesis |title=Size Effects in Phase-Separated Manganite Nanostructures |url=https://ufdc.ufl.edu/UFE0024921/00001 |degree=Ph.D. |publisher=University of Florida |year=2009 |access-date=20 June 2025}}</ref>

== Career in physics ==
Before dedicating herself to [[oral history]], Bhalla was an [[Experimental physics|experimental]] [[Condensed matter physics|condensed matter physicist]]. She completed her postdoctoral work at [[Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory]] and the [[University of California, Berkeley]], where she focused on [[quantum confinement]] at interfaces, including [[Heterostructure|oxide heterostructures]] and [[Domain wall (magnetism)|domain walls]] in [[multiferroics]].<ref name="UWMadison2018">{{cite web |title=Guneeta Singh Bhalla – Center for South Asia – UW–Madison |url=https://southasia.wisc.edu/2018-spring-lecture-series/guneeta-singh-bhalla/ |website=University of Wisconsin–Madison |year=2018 |access-date=20 June 2025}}</ref> She and her collaborators were the first to measure a definitive built-in polarization voltage at the [[Lanthanum aluminate]]–[[Strontium titanate]] interface, by using unique [[quantum tunnelling]] and [[capacitance]] measurements to characterize the interface.<ref name="nature">{{cite journal |last1=Singh-Bhalla |first1=G. |last2=Bell |first2=C. |last3=Ravichandran |first3=J. |last4=Siemons |first4=W. |last5=Hikita |first5=Y. |last6=Salahuddin |first6=S. |last7=Hebard |first7=A. F. |last8=Hwang |first8=H. Y. |last9=Ramesh |first9=R. |title=Built-in and induced polarization across LaAlO3/SrTiO3 heterojunctions |journal=[[Nature Physics]] |volume=7 |pages=80–86 |date=2011 |doi=10.1038/nphys1814|arxiv=1005.4257 }}</ref> Previously, she showed that electronic currents in phase-separated [[manganite]]s travel by quantum tunnelling between metallic islands separated by insulating islands.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Singh-Bhalla |first1=G. |last2=Selcuk |first2=S. |last3=Dhakal |first3=T. |last4=Biswas |first4=A. |last5=Hebard |first5=A. F. |title=Intrinsic Tunneling in Phase Separated Manganites |journal=[[Physical Review Letters]] |volume=102 |issue=7 |article-number=077205 |date=2009 |doi=10.1103/PhysRevLett.102.077205}}</ref>

== The 1947 Partition Archive ==
A 2008 visit to the [[Hiroshima Peace Memorial]] convinced Bhalla of the power of survivor testimony in shaping public memory.<ref name="CalHum2022">{{cite web |title=The 1947 Partition & Oral Histories: An Interview with Dr Guneeta Singh Bhalla |url=https://calhum.org/1947-partition-interview/ |website=California Humanities |date=1 March 2022 |access-date=20 June 2025}}</ref> Returning to India the following year, she began filming interviews with Partition witnesses; by 2011 she left physics to establish [[The 1947 Partition Archive]] as a volunteer-run non-profit organization.<ref name="Rediff2023" /><ref>{{Cite web |title=Author: Bhalla, Guneeta Singh - The 1947 Partition Archive - Spotlight at Stanford Search Results |url=https://www.exhibits.stanford.edu/1947-partition/catalog?f%255Bauthor_person_facet%255D%255B%255D=Bhalla%252C+Guneeta+Singh |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20231222154704/https://exhibits.stanford.edu/1947-partition/catalog?f%5Bauthor_person_facet%5D%5B%5D=Bhalla%2C+Guneeta+Singh |archive-date=2023-12-22 |access-date=2025-05-17 |website=www.exhibits.stanford.edu |language=en}}</ref> The organization has since collected over 12,000 oral histories from across the world, preserving the memories of those affected by the 1947 Partition.<ref name="sikhnet">{{cite web |title=One Woman's Quest to Record the History of the 1947 Partition |url=https://www.sikhnet.com/news/one-womans-quest-record-history-1947-partition |website=SikhNet |access-date=17 May 2025}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.1947partitionarchive.org|title=The 1947 Partition Archive}}</ref>

== Publications ==
Bhalla has written essays and articles for various publications, including ''[[The Diplomat (magazine)|The Diplomat]]'', ''[[Business Standard]]'', and ''[[Rediff.com]]''.<ref name="muckrack">{{cite web |title=Guneeta Singh Bhalla's Articles |url=https://muckrack.com/guneeta-singh-bhalla/articles |website=Muck Rack |access-date=17 May 2025}}</ref> Her research papers have been published in ''[[Nature Physics]]'' and ''[[Physical Review Letters]]'', among other academic journals.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Singh-Bhalla |first1=G. |last2=Bell |first2=C. |last3=Ravichandran |first3=J. |last4=Siemons |first4=W. |last5=Hikita |first5=Y. |last6=Salahuddin |first6=S. |last7=Hebard |first7=A. F. |last8=Hwang |first8=H. Y. |last9=Ramesh |first9=R. |title=Built-in and induced polarization across LaAlO₃/SrTiO₃ heterojunctions |journal=Nature Physics |volume=7 |pages=80–86 |year=2011 |doi=10.1038/nphys1814 |url=https://www.nature.com/articles/nphys1814|arxiv=1005.4257 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Singh-Bhalla |first1=G. |last2=Selcuk |first2=S. |last3=Dhakal |first3=T. |last4=Biswas |first4=A. |last5=Hebard |first5=A. F. |title=Intrinsic tunneling in phase-separated manganites |journal=Physical Review Letters |volume=102 |article-number=077205 |year=2009 |doi=10.1103/PhysRevLett.102.077205 |url=https://journals.aps.org/prl/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevLett.102.077205}}</ref> In 2024, she and her team published a book titled ''[[10,000 Memories|10,000 Memories: A Lived History of Partition, Independence, and World War II in South Asia]]''.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://10000memories.com/|title=10000 Memories – To know where we are going, we must know where we have come from.}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.telegraphindia.com/culture/pre-launch-of-the-book-10000-memories-a-lived-history-of-partition-independence-and-world-war-ii-in-south-asia-gets-the-telegraph-thinking-about-partition/cid/1921883|title=The Partition Party}}</ref>

== Recognition ==
Her work has been widely recognized for its contribution to preserving [[South Asia|South Asian history]]. In 2023, she was featured in an episode of PBS's ''Global Perspectives'', where she shared her transition from [[physicist]] to [[historian]] and the global significance of the Partition archive.<ref name="pbs2023" /> In 2017, she was nominated for CNN News 18's Indian of the Year award in the Public Service category.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.firstpost.com/india/cnn-news18-indian-of-the-year-live-team-baahubali-pv-sindhu-activist-afroze-shah-among-nominees-4235653.html|title=Virat Kohli named CNN-NEWS18 Indian of the Year; says, 'Would love for cricket to be Olympic sport'|date=November 30, 2017|website=Firstpost}}</ref> That same year, she spoke at TEDx Ashoka about the importance of oral history documentation to understand Partition.<ref name="TED2018">{{cite web |title=Retrieving Lost Stories from the Partition of 1947 |url=https://www.ted.com/talks/guneeta_singh_bhalla_retrieving_lost_stories_from_the_partition_of_1947 |website=TED |year=2018 |access-date=20 June 2025}}</ref>

== References ==
{{reflist}}

== External links ==
* [https://www.1947partitionarchive.org/ The 1947 Partition Archive]
* {{LinkedIn page|in/guneeta}}
* [https://muckrack.com/guneeta-singh-bhalla/articles Articles by Guneeta Singh Bhalla on MuckRack]

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bhalla, Guneeta Singh}}
[[Category:Living people]]
[[Category:Indian women historians]]
[[Category:Oral historians]]
[[Category:Women physicists]]
[[Category:Indian emigrants to the United States]]
[[Category:University of California, Berkeley faculty]]
[[Category:Year of birth missing (living people)]]

Guneeta Singh Bhalla - Revision history

GarlandGurule05 at 16:59, 8 March 2026