‘Finally we are together’: partition’s broken families reunite after seven decades

Social media is helping long-lost relatives discover each other after a lifetime separated by the India-Pakistan border

It was an embrace that held 74 years of pain and longing. As Sikka Khan, 75, fell into the arms of his older brother Sadiq Khan, now in his 80s, the pair wept with simultaneous sorrow and joy. More than seven decades had passed since the brothers, torn apart by the horrors of partition, had seen each other. With Sikka in India and Sadiq in Pakistan, neither knew if the other was alive. Yet both had never stopped looking.

But on a crisp January afternoon this year, the pair were reunited along the border that had so devastatingly fractured their family. Finally, we are together," Sadiq told his brother, tears streaming down his face.