"The situation created in the N.W.F.P. and the Punjab had become serious. Riots broke out first in N.W.F.P. and thereafter spread to the whole of the Punjab. On our way to Kashmir (in May 1947) we stopped at Lahore and from there went up to Rawalpindi. We found intense apprehension among the Hindus because the Muslim leaders were openly and boastfully talking of using violence against the Hindus. In the Rawalpindi district, we found widespread destruction. Every Hindu and Sikh public building in that city had been turned into a refugee camp. We saw a house where the children from the village had collected and which had been set on fire. We saw the bones of the little ones. “In a village called Thoa Khalsa, after a prolonged fight between Hindus and Sikhs on one side and Muslims on the other, when all men belonging to the Sikh and Hindu com- munities were killed, seventy-four women and girls and children decided to save their honour by jumping into the well of a house where they had all collected for safety. Led by the wife of the owner of the house, Smt- Lajwanti, all of them jumped into the well after reciting japji. We were shown the well and given photographs showing it full of dead bodies. ““We were informed that when some local leaders ap- proached a highly-placed British official for protection, he said, “Go to Gandhi, he will come to your help."