Making Peace, Making Riots: Communalism and Communal Violence, Bengal, 1940–1947 1108428282, 9781108428286

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Making Peace, Making Riots The decade of the 1940s was a turbulent one for Bengal. War, famine, riots and partition – Bengal witnessed it all, and the unique experience of each of these created a space for diverse social and political forces to thrive and impact lives of people of the province. The book embarks on a study of the last seven years of colonial rule in Bengal, analysing the interplay of socioeconomic and political factors that shaped community identities into communal ones. The focus is on three major communal riots that the province witnessed – the Dacca Riots (1941), the Great Calcutta Killing (August 1946) and the Noakhali Riots (October 1946). However, the study does not limit itself to an understanding of communal violence alone; it also studies anti-communal resistance, especially the Gandhian model of peace-keeping to enable a complete understanding of a communal riot. It analyzes the Bengal famine, tracing the nature of breakdown of Bengali society, and their dependence on relief and rehabilitation – which came thickly coated in communal colours and transformed community perceptions into communal identities. These events were closely tied with the politics around the Secondary Education Bill and the transformation of the Muslim League from an arm-chair organization to a more popular party demanding Pakistan, with a distinct socialist colouring and a support base not just among Muslims but also some sections among the Scheduled Castes. This book moves beyond the binary understanding of communalism as Hindu versus Muslim and looks at the caste politics in the province, and offers a thorough understanding of the 1940s before partition. Anwesha Roy is Marie Curie Post-Doctoral Research Fellow in Gandhian Politics at the Department of History, King’s College London. She completed her PhD from Jawaharlal Nehru University and was a Charles Wallace Scholar to Britain in the year 2014.

Making Peace, Making Riots Communalism and Communal Violence, Bengal 1940–1947

Anwesha Roy

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Contents Maps and Figures Acknowledgements Abbreviations Glossary

ix xi xiii xv

Introduction 1 1. The Dacca Riot, 1941

2. Famine 1943 – Towards a Hardening of Community Identities

26

68

3. From Community to Communal: The Bengal Secondary Education Bill and the Idea of Pakistan

104

5. Noakhali Riots, October 1946

184

4. The Great Calcutta Killing, August

1946

6. A Test of Faith: Gandhi in Noakhali and Calcutta 1946–47 Concluding Remarks

148

214

247

Appendix 1 251 Appendix 2 253 Appendix 3 259 Appendix 4 260 Bibliography 263 Index 271

Maps and Figures Maps 3.1 Published in Mujibur Rehman Khan’s Pakistan (Mohammadi Book Agency, Calcutta, 1942) 3.2 Detailed map showing Muslim population in the different districts of Bengal, prepared by East Pakistan Renaissance Society in 1944 5.1 Map showing Noakhali, Tippera and adjoining regions

134 135 187

Figures 6.1 Cartoon in Dawn, 3 November 1946 227 6.2 Cartoon in Dawn, 2 November 1946. The image shows the Viceroy looking through a special microscope, provided by Gandhi that magnified the Noakhali casualties thousand times. Under such an influence, he ignores the plight of Muslims in Bihar 228 6.3 Cartoon in Dawn, 22 October 1946. The Cartoon depicts Gandhi using a ‘Book of Tricks’ to win over Muslims of Noakhali 228

Acknowledgements This book has come out of the research conducted while I was a doctoral scholar at the Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. I owe my gratitude to Professor Tanika Sarkar, without whose guidance and support this work would have been truly impossible. I would like to thank some of the other faculty members who were a source of inspiration, support and encouragement throughout my doctoral years and later as well – Professor Janaki Nair, Professor Kunal Chakrabarti, Professor Indivar Kamtekar and Professor Neeladri Bhattacharya. The National Archives of India (New Delhi) and the West Bengal State Archives (Kolkata) have been crucial in the course of my research and I am grateful towards their staff. I owe special thanks to the staff of Intelligence Branch Archives (Kolkata) and the Special Branch Archives (Kolkata) (which almost became my second home during research) for their ready assistance all the time. I also thank the staff of Nehru Memorial Museum and Library (New Delhi), Central Secretariat Library (New Delhi) and National Library (Kolkata) for ready access to all the important sources that have been used to construct this work. A fellowship from the Charles Wallace India Trust (CWIT) enabled me to visit the UK for field work in 2014. I was also assisted in this by the Indian Council for Historical Research. I am grateful to both for all their support. I must mention Mr Richard Alford, secretary of the Charles Wallace India Trust, who not only facilitated my visit to the UK but also helped me in all my scholarly endeavours while I was in London. I specially thank the staff of the British Library in London and the Centre of South Asian Studies Library in Cambridge for making my field work remarkably effortless and memorable. My heartfelt gratitude for the staff of the Dhaka University Library for providing me ready assistance during my field trip to Dhaka in 2013. A Teaching Assistantship at Ashoka University in 2015 brought me in contact with Dr Aparna Vaidik and Dr Gwen Kelly. They have been most helpful in every possible way. I hold my students at Ashoka University very close to heart – with them I have had some of the most intellectually stimulating discussions. Since

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2016, I have been a Marie Curie Post Doctoral Fellow at the Department of History, Kings College London. I am greatly indebted to the faculty members of the department for all their support. Special thanks to Dr Jon Wilson who has read parts of the manuscript and commented on it. I have had numerous discussions with him on some of the key concepts and ideas explored in the book, that have not only helped me to write better, but also have opened new avenues in my mind. Publication of this book has been made possible by Cambridge University Press, and I must thank them for their guidance at every step during this incredible journey. Sohini Ghosh and Aditya Majumdar deserve special mention, for patiently bearing with my endless queries and making the process of publication so smooth. My greatest debt is to my family. I am grateful to my parents, Amitava Ray and Tanuja Roy for always allowing me to follow my heart. My grandparents have been a great support for me, especially during the time of field work in Calcutta. I cannot express enough love for my sister Ashavari for believing in me and always showing great interest in my work. My parents in law, Sucheta Das and Pranab Kumar Das and my sister in law, Paromita have always supported me in all my academic endeavours. Prasenjit has forever been reordering my chaos and been my constant pillar of strength. I truly cannot express enough gratitude to him. Innumerable discussions with friends and fellow researchers helped to open new ideas in my mind and made research work stimulating and enjoyable. I thank Aksad Alam for his extremely valuable suggestions and an endless supply of reading materials during my stay in Dhaka. I must also mention Khademul Huq and Rita apa for their heart-warming hospitality, which made research at Dhaka very comfortable. I thank Neha Chatterji, Anubhav Sengupta, Anirban Bhattacharya and Anwesha Sengupta who have always been ready to discuss the questions and doubts that I presented them with from time to time while writing this book. I am especially grateful to Ishan Mukherjee, with whom I have had endless debates regarding the themes of the book. My understanding of several aspects of my work has evolved as a result of interactions with him. Archivehopping in Kolkata and the UK would not have been so much fun without him. Shreya Goswami has endured my manifold eccentricities and literally looked after me on several occasions. She has been the most understanding friend. Farha Noor and Swarnim Khare have been my support structure and my gratitude for them cannot be expressed in words. Sourav Mahanta deserves special thanks for helping me out with field work in Delhi, and I would have been lost without him. And last, but not the least, I thank Arti Minocha, Rajarshi Chunder and Ranjeeta Bhattacharya.

Abbreviations AICC AIML AIWC BPCC CWMG DIB FIC GOB IB MARS NAI NMML SB SC SDO WBSA

All India Congress Committee All India Muslim League All India Women’s Conference Bengal Provincial Congress Committee Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi District Intelligence Branch Famine Inquiry Commission Government of Bengal Intelligence Branch Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti National Archives of India Nehru Memorial Museum and Library Special Branch Scheduled Castes Sub-Divisional Officer West Bengal State Archives

Glossary Abala helpless woman Abwab fines or cesses levied by the landlord upon the peasants. Ahimsa non-violence Akhara gymnasium/ a place for wrestling Andolan a movement/ struggle Atar also called itar, is a sweet smelling oil or perfume Bhadralok a social class among Bengalis, generally comprising of prosperous, well-educated people. Bhog food offerings to Hindu deities Bhookh Michil Hunger March Brahmacharya celibacy Bustee slum Chadar cloth Chheni Chisel Dal-bhaat lentil curry and rice, a staple diet among Bengalis Darshan the auspicious act of seeing a holy person or a deity Ejahar Complaint Ghar Wapasi Homecoming; usually refers to the ‘re-conversion’ to Hinduism, of ‘lower’ castes, who had earlier been converted to Christianity or Islam. Ghat a flight of steps leading down to the river, often a place where Hindu cremation ceremonies take place. Goalas Milkmen Godown a warehouse Goonda a thug or a bully Gulail catapult Hartal closure of shops and offices as a sign of protest. Hat a local, rural market Janmashtami Hindu festival celebrating the birth of the God Krishna Jauhar Hindu practice of mass self-immolation by women to avoid capture/rape by invaders, usually after defeat in a war

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Glossary

Jumma Friday Prayer of Muslims Kalma the Muslim confession of Faith Kalwars artisans working with scrap metals Kasai butcher Khals small water bodies Khichuri also called Khichdi, is a dish made in South Asia by boiling together lentils and rice. Kripa grace or mercy Krishak farmer Lathi a long and strong stick Lungi a loose garment wrapped around the waist, extending to the ankles, usually worn by males in South Asia. Madad-i-maash Tax free lands given by Mughal Emperors as charity to pious/ religious/worthy recipients. Malechha or Mlechha, is a derogatory term for one who does not practice Hinduism. Mochi shoe-maker Mofussil countryside Mohalla neighbourhood Mussalman Muslim Namaskar a form of respectful greeting among Hindus Namaz Islamic prayer to be observed five times a day Patha male goat Phen starchy water that is drained out after the rice has been boiled. Pir a Muslim holy man Prarthana prayer Purdah Veil Ram-dhun Singing the name of Ram Ramzan the ninth month of the Islamic calendar and observed by Muslims across the world, celebrating the revelation of the Holy Quran to Prophet Mohammad. Rathajatra a Hindu festival, signified by the symbolic pulling of the ratha or chariot of the God Jagannath. Sadhana disciplined practice Salam salutation, usually also a form of greeting among Muslims Sangathan unity Sankharis Conch-shell workers in rural Bengal. Shiva Ratri a Hindu festival celebrated annually in honour of the God Shiva Shuddhi purification Teata Multi-mouthed Lance Thana a police station, often refers also to the area that comes under the jurisdiction of a particular police station.



Introduction 1

Introduction Let me begin with a bit of personal history. I grew up in a Bengali family that had seen the horrors of the partition of Bengal. Although I did not live in West Bengal (my father was posted in Bokaro Steel City, Jharkhand), on my frequent trips to Calcutta I was surprised to find how strong the Bengali Hindu identity there was, not just for my family, but also amongst most Bengalis living in the city. Probing deeper, I found that they consciously tried to reinforce this identity through ‘customs’, ‘traditions’, attire, food and cultural practices. Discussions about a glorious ‘Bengali’ past would often go beyond literary geniuses like Rabindranath Tagore and Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay; equally important was to remember ‘historical’ personalities who had ‘fought’ valiantly for our freedom. Interestingly, amongst many such ‘freedom fighters’, one name would figure prominently at the top of the list – Shyama Prasad Mookerjee, the wellknown leader of the Hindu Mahasabha from Bengal and, later, also the founder of the Jana Sangh. Hailed as a ‘saviour’ who prevented the Balkanization of Bengal, his politics of the Hindu Mahasabha were considered by the Calcutta Bengalis to be just and even necessary in the face of partition. In contrast, there was also a very conscious attempt to vilify Gandhi as one who had bartered away ‘India’s’ integrity to appease Muslims. My grandparents had migrated to Calcutta from East Bengal after being compelled, like many others before and after them, to flee their homeland after the partition of Bengal in 1947. The ugly communal riots had stirred their apprehensions about a future in East Bengal. I had heard stories about the Great Calcutta Killing and the Noakhali riots from my grandfather in which he would repeatedly recount how Hindus were butchered in thousands by their Muslim neighbours, and friends turned foes overnight. This perplexed me even more, because Hindus too had killed their Muslim neighbours in thousands. This selective amnesia, which I found not just among those who had witnessed the partition but also amongst the next generation who had only heard stories about it, drove me to seek an understanding of the deeper

2

Making Peace, Making Riots

currents that ran through the formation of such apparent ‘fixed’ categories as Hindus and Muslims. I also noticed the almost instinctive exclusion of Muslims from any ideas of the ‘Bengali community’. ‘Bengali’ was always and almost matter-of-factly equated with being Hindu. A more immediate brush with communalism was the Sikh massacres in 1984 which had affected even a small town like Bokaro Steel City quite badly. My parents had witnessed the riot and my father had narrowly escaped getting hurt. Community ties, with a strong sense of Hindu-Muslim-Sikh divide has since existed in a palpable way in this very small city1. My personal experiences of communal violence are located in the Gujarat massacres of 2002. The nature and scale of the violence were incomprehensible and the recurring newspaper images of a badly injured Muslim man with folded hands at a police station haunted me. I questioned the rationale behind such acts of violence, personalized vividly in the exalted faces of Hindu rioters with swords in their hands. In more recent times, the ‘saffron wave’ in almost the all of north, west and eastern India and parts of southern India in the wake of the Central Assembly polls of 2014 and in its aftermath, has made the reemergence of the Hindu Right in Indian politics a much more palpable reality. The repetitive harping of the Sangh Parivar about ‘rebuilding the Ram Temple’ in Ayodhya and the use of social media like Facebook and Twitter to reach out to the nation’s youth with its programme of Hindu cultural nationalism have also acquired new dimensions since the pre-poll mobilisation drive of 2014. Moreover, the recent insistence of extreme Hindu right-wing groups like the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) upon ‘Ghar Wapasi’ (homecoming) for people who had apparently ‘strayed away’ from Hinduism (which invariably focuses on the Dalit converts to Islam and Christianity) is also glaringly reminiscent of the Hindu Mahasabha’s Sangathan movement in the 1940s, especially in Bengal. In the setting of present day Bengal politics, the retreat of the Left has led to increased opportunities and subsequently attempts of the Hindu right-wing political groups to capture its base. This work is therefore the outcome of a long-standing urge to understand communalism, its growth, sustenance and, also, its limits in a plural society. HISTORIOGRAPHY I.  Debates around Communalism C. A. Bayly has argued in favour of a ‘pre-history of communalism’ in the land wars of eighteenth-century India. He makes a distinction between two



Introduction 3

situations. One, where religious buildings and festivals were the chief objects of conflict and rulers played an important part in initiating and resolving disputes. Second, where economic and social conflicts occurred predominantly between groups from different religious affiliations.2 In the former case, Bayly argues, ‘savage destruction and slaughter could take place between groups who continued to venerate the shrines and holy figures of each other’s traditions, but fought strenuously for immediate sovereignty of holy places. Sikhs may sometimes have vilified Muslims as ‘Turks’, but it seems unlikely that any monolithic communal identity existed or was in the process of emerging’.3 In the second case however, the conflicts between the religious communities which assumed the form of ‘land wars’ could be expressed in the vocabulary of ‘communal antagonism’. Bayly cites a couple of reasons behind classifying these land wars as ‘communal’. Firstly, the nature of the declining Mughal state and administration had ensured that holders of privileged tenures like madad-i-maash grants were mostly Muslims, while their local competitors belonged to ‘Hindu agricultural castes’ like Rajputs, Bhumihars and Jats’.4 Secondly, these land wars often assumed the form of savage attacks where demolition of mosques, graveyards and Sufi shrines along with houses of the Muslim gentry became the primary objective. He concludes that ‘The land wars of the eighteenth century which saw the rise of agrarian Sikh and Hindu peasantry against Muslim rural gentry were apparently no more or less ‘communal’ than the riots in eastern U.P. in the 1920s or eastern Bengal in the 1930s and 1940s’.5 There are some obvious contradictions in Bayly’s statements. On the one hand he asserts that no teleology should be established by which the conflicts of this period are stretched out to provide the background for Muslim or Hindu-Sikh contentions in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries.6 Yet, he uses an eighteenth-century milieu to trace the genesis of communalism in the colonial period in the late-nineteenth and twentieth centuries. By tracing what he calls a ‘pre-history of communalism’, Bayly seems to suggest an unbroken trajectory from the eighteenth century to the end of the colonial rule. He negates the experience of colonial ‘subjects’ in structuring their own notions of community through indices introduced by the colonial state like the Census, formalized educational ventures, print culture and institutionalized politics from 1937. The importance of specific political configurations at historical junctures and the importance of the historical juncture itself in providing the scope for the development of communalism and communal politics are also clearly overlooked in his argument.

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Making Peace, Making Riots

Bipan Chandra argues precisely in the opposite direction. He argues that it would be incorrect to treat communalism as a ‘remnant of the past’.7 He sees communalism as a byproduct of colonialism. Chandra defines communalism as ‘the belief that by virtue of following the same religion, a group of people have common social, political and economic interests’. Situating the rise of communalism in the British colonial impact, he argues that both nationalism and communalism were ‘modern phenomena’ and the products of social change witnessed during colonial rule.8 Chandra says that lack of deep penetration of nationalist ideology has contributed to the prevalence of communal ideology 9. Communalism was a ‘false consciousness’ as it presented reality in a distorted form; it was not just a ‘partial view of reality’ but a ‘false view’. Objectively, no real conflict between the interests of Hindus and Muslims existed.10 This false view, according to Chandra, developed because of the failure of certain sections of the Indian society to ‘adequately develop the new national consciousness’. In Chandra’s analysis, therefore, what constitutes true consciousness is inevitably nationalism. He argues that the acute shortage of superior jobs carrying high salaries and social status, along with rising prices during the World Wars, filled the middle classes with anxiety about their future and led to a sense of loss of identity as well. This often created an atmosphere of violence and brutality which, triggered by a religious issue, turned into communal riots. Such a sense of destruction of identity, when paired with lack of faith in the national movement, led individuals and groups from the middle classes to seek short term solutions. Here, the use of religion to posit one community against the other or blame one community for the failure of another was facilitating. On the other hand, Chandra claims, the ‘masses’ were attracted to communalism by ‘having their religious fervour excited’, for in their case, communalism involved or projected ‘none of their real life demands or interests’. In their case, the fear complex could be fully aroused not by claiming that their interests were in danger, but by insisting that their religion itself was in danger.11 Here, a certain elitist bias is evident in Chandra’s argument. Besides the obvious problems in treating the ‘masses’ as an amorphous category, he seems to imply that religion solely ordered the world view of the ‘masses’, whereas the ‘middle classes’ were concerned more about jobs and educational opportunities. He oversimplifies how the dynamic nature of communal ideology and identity formation could actually negotiate with ‘real interests’ of the ‘masses’, like economic and social betterment and mobility.



Introduction 5

Chandra’s statement that ‘communal tension was spasmodic and usually directly involved the lower classes only’12 is also problematic in that he sees the ‘lower classes’ as naturally susceptible to communal propaganda. He points out that participants in and the victims of a communal riot were ‘necessarily the urban poor and lumpen and goonda elements, though in a few cases peasants were also involved. There was seldom any physical participation of middle and upper classes, though they often lent material and moral support to the lumpen and goonda participants’13. My dissent with this view is that if we accept that the ‘lower classes’ can be easily or naturally swayed by propaganda, we inevitably also accept the fact that they do not have the agency for rational thinking of their own. Moreover, the physical absence of middle and upper classes in a communal riot that Chandra emphasizes, was negated by the presence of Bengali Hindu businessmen, ‘influential merchants’ and students who had been arrested on charges of rioting during the Great Calcutta Killing in August 1946.14 Although he argues that communalism and communal riots are different, his statement that ‘the overwhelming majority of Indians, especially in the rural areas, were unaffected by communal tensions’15 betrays a subconscious compulsion of looking at the extent of communalization through the prism of riots alone. This is especially true in the context of Bengal in the 1940s, where issues around the Census, education and famine relief resulted in thriving communal tension. In Chandra’s view of communalism, all other social identities are either denied or, when accepted in theory, are either negated in practice or subordinated to the religious identity.16 Here, Chandra once again oversimplifies the myriad ways in which communalism relates to and negotiates with such identities. Another problem with his line of argument lies in seeing communalism simply as the other of anti-colonial nationalism and seeing ‘nationalism’ as a monolithic homogenous category. He points out that nationalism acquired its validity because it was ‘the correct reflection of an objective reality: the developing identity of common interests of the Indian people, in particular against the common enemy, foreign imperialism’.17 Here Chandra negates the subjective experiences of ‘Indian people’ in constructing both their own versions of ‘interests’ and ‘common enemy’ in the course of their ‘developing identity’. He falls into the trap of seeing the ‘Indian Nation’ as a single, natural given category. Prabha Dixit, too, offers a similar understanding of communalism and the development of communal organizations. She argues for the singularity of nationalism, positing nationalism and communalism as mutually exclusive

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Making Peace, Making Riots

categories, communalism as the opposite of nationalism. She goes on to state, in a very different vein from Chandra, that Muslim communalism stood in the way of the development of ‘Indian’ nationalism (emphasis mine), thereby treating ‘Muslims’ and ‘Indians’ as separate binaries and falling within the communalist trap herself. Her contention is that ‘Muslim communalism in India did not arise as a reaction to Hindu communalism, nor was it religiously inspired. It was an independent political movement which developed as an antithesis of Indian nationalism’.18 She sees Muslim communalism arising as a political doctrine amongst the Muslim elite, as the only plausible and available way to safeguard their class interests, because they had lost out to the Hindus in the race for democratization and modernization. This elite then manipulated the ‘ignorant masses’ into falling in line with its political doctrine. Once again, we see the negation of agency to the ‘masses’ by treating them as ‘ignorant’ and naturally susceptible to the elite’s manipulation. Gyan Pandey offers a completely different take on the relationship between nationalism and communalism. He locates the rise of communalism in the Indian context in the 1920s. ‘Hindu’ and ‘Muslim’ political mobilization, he argues, had been seen in the past as necessary in the early stages of building Indian nationalism. But from the 1920s, such politics became the ‘chief flogging horse of Indian nationalism’.19 Thus was born the ‘nationalist version’ of the concept of communalism. According to Pandey, Indian nationalism was conceptualized only in opposition to the concept of communalism. This view challenges the view of nationalist historians who hold that communalism developed in opposition to Indian nationalism.20 The language of the ‘purely national’, unaffected by pulls of caste, class or religion, was put forward by leaders of the Indian National Congress, especially Gandhi; it elevated the concept of the Indian nation to a different plane, one that pushed its foundations beyond the notions of religious communities, castes and class.21 The idea of an essential ‘unity of India’ was put forward by the nationalist enterprise, and centuries of Muslim rule before the arrival of the British were also incorporated within this narrative along with ‘Hindu’ rulers like Ashoka and the Rajputs. Examples of the fifteenth-century mystic poet Kabir and the sixteenth-century Mughal ruler Akbar were celebrated to show the unity, syncretism and synthesis inherent in the ‘Indian’ cultural fabric.22 Communalism became everything that nationalism was not. This was the othering of communalism; it was seen as regressive, reactionary and essentially born out of the machinations of the colonial regime.



Introduction 7

However, Pandey points out, this nationalist enterprise was fraught with oversimplification. The nationalism being professed by the Congress reconstructed its past to establish in it the unity, uniqueness and pride of the ‘nation’23. But not all ‘nationalisms’ reconstructed their past in the same way (emphasis mine). Thus, Pandey makes space for the subjective conceptualization and construction of nationalism by different social groups. As he says, ‘one person’s nationalism was often another’s communalism’24. Moreover, the historical reconstruction of the past and its ‘unity’ by the nationalists was premised on great rulers of India – the Mughals, the Rajputs etc. What was completely overlooked in this narrative were common people as ‘historical agents, who were struggling to realize their many versions of truth, honour and just life.’25 Precisely because of this lacuna, nationalism was ‘forced into the kind of statist perspective’ that colonialism itself was promoting. Colonialist and the nationalist perceptions about communalism also overlapped. Both nationalists and colonialists accepted the ‘given-ness’ of communalism ‘as a more or less tangible phenomenon whose causes can be readily identified, and of its other – rationalism or liberalism, secularism or nationalism, however one chooses to put it’.26 Pradip Kumar Datta offers a nuanced understanding of communalism and communal identities. He argues against the singularity of collective identities in any form. He asserts that different identities are not necessarily hard boundaries that can never be transgressed. Even communal collective identities relate in different ways to class, gender and caste affiliations and what needs to be studied carefully are the vulnerabilities of such identities, the ways in which their ‘hardness’ has to mediate, compromise and suppress in order to produce ‘tentative unities’ that proclaim themselves to be ‘bonded monoliths’.27 Datta studies identity formation in a more dynamic form, arguing that communalism as an ideological field is fraught with inner tensions, in which it wrestles with the claims of other collectives. Therefore, communalism constantly engages in a process of displacing or actively opposing claims of other collective identities; it has the capability of submerging all vertical social divisions, but in this process it has to compete with rival identities and engage in a multiplicity of relationships with them, in order to neutralize their alternative structures of possibility and absorb them into itself. Moreover, communalism, unlike fascism or other political doctrines, lives in self-denial of its explicit objectives, where it can only imply what its principal characteristics are. It can never name itself directly as communalism. In the communal ‘imagery’, all symbols and meanings that are created become non-antagonistic and reinforce each other in their orientation towards a common adjective.28

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Making Peace, Making Riots

II. Debates Around Riots and Collective Violence Sandria B. Freitag, argues that the tendency of historians of communalism to extrapolate values and meanings from organizations alone leads to an incomplete understanding of the nature and development of communal consciousness. Further, a constant distinction between elite and popular reactions, labelling the latter as ‘violent’, implies a value judgement that renders popular protest suspect, less than legitimate, or even irrational: the ‘insensate violence’ of the bazaars and mohallas.29 She lays emphasis on the fact that participants also construct their respective communities for which they act, and in the process create their own ‘other’. Riots, in her analysis, occupy an important place because they typify public arena activities and enable the scholar to understand the nature of a particular community to which the participants of the riot conceive themselves as belonging. Riots constitute an essential component in a framework of social interaction that regards violence as one of a range of legitimate options of group action.30 Riots also measure the extent to which public arenas remained a viable form of negotiation and expression of urban socio-political relationships.31 Collective action, according to Freitag, is motivated by the participants’ perceptions that they belong to some kind of a whole, whether relational or ideological.32 She lays emphasis on gatherings in public arenas which create new social ties and emotional bonds, which could then be used as methods of mobilization. This last aspect is particularly important in studying the Noakhali riots and the Great Calcutta Killing, where such gatherings happened in public spaces. In these gatherings, the maulvis/pirs and local peasant leaders like Golam Sarwar spoke at length to the local populace. The public spaces and the activities that constituted it, then, become an important component in the mobilization of local Muslims of Calcutta and Noakhali in 1946. Moreover, by looking at the way participants themselves constitute and reconstitute their respective communities and the way they relate to it and act collectively, Freitag provides insights into the nature of a communal riot and reiterates the fact that any identity, whether communal or not, is never fixed. Patricia Gossman focuses on the rise of communalism amongst Muslims of East Bengal. She correctly argues that they never constituted a monolithic community. What is important to understand is how Bengali Muslim political leaders, especially those of the Muslim League, between 1905 and 1947, could successfully create symbols that cut across religious and class divisions.33 She focuses on the role played by the local pirs and religious leaders, who, in an attempt to forge a greater Muslim identity, were creating a new kind



Introduction 9

of community cohesiveness, cutting across the Ashraf and Atrap differences within the community. Gossman also studies the role that violence plays in acquiring its own symbolic and ritualized place in political mobilization. This, in turn, creates opportunities for the formation of new identities. Violence during riots facilitates leaders’ contest for legitimacy against one another. Violence, she asserts, is an effective tool for political mobilization because it cuts across other divisions and generates solidarity against threatened aggression. Representations of violence become a symbol which helps freeze popular constructions of identity34 at a certain point. Those who protect their communities during riots become heroes and in this context, the study of the ‘criminal elements’, e.g. the goondas, becomes important. Arguing that activities of leaders in inciting collective violence do not merely imply that riots are the outcome of elite efforts to manufacture mass support, she suggests the importance to couple the study of riot ‘with an analysis that stresses human agency’.35 Gyan Pandey, while studying the violence that accompanied partition, asserts that it can be seen in two forms: the first being the ‘violence of the state’, which is often presumed to be legitimate, organized, carefully controlled, whereas the second form, i.e. the ‘violence of the people’, is seen as being diametrically the opposite of the first – it is chaotic, uncontrolled, excessive and, likewise, illegitimate. Violent actors are often described as masses, rabble or mob. This precludes the possibility of any sense of rationality and agency that such a group might possess. Looking at violence as a representation of lack of reason and will on the part of those who actively participate in this is essentially a colonialist (or statist) discourse. Riots in this narrative, then, become ‘aberrational’ or ‘extraordinary’ cases, seen as ‘a temporary madness’ or a ‘temporary suspension of reason’. This is the ‘othering’ of violence, because reason, progress, modernity, rational thought, all belong to the purview of the state. Violent ‘masses’ are the ‘other’ who need to be controlled. Riots, therefore, often in colonialist discourse, and later in nationalist discourse as well, became a law and order problem, as was witnessed in the official records during the riots of Bengal in 1946-47. Moreover, the emphasis on the ‘criminal elements’ such as the goondas during a riot overlooks the important fact that at times, there is tacit support given to them by ‘respectable’ people. In such instances, they often become heroes and are looked upon as protectors of the community. We shall study this in greater detail when we analyse the Great Calcutta Killing and the Noakhali riots in Bengal in 1946-47.

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Making Peace, Making Riots

I return once again to the work of Pradip Kumar Datta. Riots occupy a prominent place in his study as well, although he points out that they are not the terminal points of the process of communalization but one of the interrelated elements in an entire process. He focuses on how, during a riot, the body itself becomes communalized36. His work is important for an understanding of the meanings that are attributed to symbols (including symbols placed around the body, like clothing or a beard), that in turn become the chief markers of communal antagonism during a riot. Datta argues that any riot derives its source of power from the dangers posed to the body, and that riots ‘take to their [il]logical conclusion . . . the burden of meaning placed by the urban gaze on the communal signifiers of the body.’37 This argument is a key component in my understanding of communal violence in the riots of 1941 in Dacca and in 1946 in Calcutta and Noakhali, when attacks on the body of the ‘other’ attained an unprecedented gruesomeness. Taking a cue from the examples of go-korbani (cow-slaughter) that Datta cites38, and the assertion that during a potential riot situation the power of a communalized discourse is derived from its ability to problematize the relationships within a lived social space, I extend the argument to the case of the Great Calcutta Killing. The mass rally organized by the Muslim League on Direct Action Day turned an abstraction of the achievement or nonachievement of Pakistan into a visible reality. This visibility in a social space becomes very important in the case of a communalized society. Visibility ensures the display of power relations within society or an inversion of existing power relations. The mass meeting of Muslims in a vast open field at the heart of the city was precisely a symbolic assertion of power in a public space. Hindus retaliated by keeping their shops open and preventing the rally from reaching the Ochterlony Monument at the Maidan. A riot scenario then implicitly becomes a power/authority contest over public space. From rights over ‘sacred space,’ which trigger riots on issues regarding music around mosques, to rights over non-sacred civic space, all are moored eventually in power struggles. III.  Historiography of Communalism and Communal Riots in Bengal Sumit Sarkar has traced the development of Muslim separatism and the roots of Muslim communalism from the Swadeshi Movement in Bengal 1903–08. He points to the ruptures under an apparent syncretism that defined the Swadeshi andolan in Bengal, arguing that ‘social barriers and taboos remained sufficiently formidable for both communities to retain always a sense of separate identity



Introduction 11

even at the village level.’39 He points out that the disparities in the ‘middleclass’ development amongst the Muslims and Hindus in Bengal regarding education and, consequently, appointment in government jobs constituted a fertile source of communalism. In the early period of the Swadeshi movement, patriotism came to be identified with Hindu revivalism, and the terms ‘Hindu’ and ‘national’ became almost synonymous. Muslims came to resent Hindu assumptions of superiority increasingly, and when, under the influence of Syed Ahmad Khan, they gradually began to take to the ‘modern’ form of English education, far from contributing to secular nationalism, it stimulated in the Muslims a fear of being left behind the Hindus in the race for jobs and political influence.40 The Wahhabi and the Faraizi movements already had profoundly ‘Islamisized’ the rural Muslim society. They denounced syncretist trends like the rural Muslims’ participation in Hindu rites and festivals. Hindu revivalism too, with its emphasis on the Ganapati Utsava, the anti-cowslaughter campaign and the Urdu-Nagari controversy ‘supplied fresh wind to the sails of the separatist movement being promoted from Aligarh.’41 Even when Swadeshi activists used Hindu-Muslim unity as one of their principal themes, there were several problems. On the one hand, communal harmony was notionally celebrated. But on the other, the evocation of traditional Hindu symbols went ahead on an unprecedented scale. Bipin Chandra Pal propounded his theory of ‘composite nationalism’ wherein the future progress of India was dependent on the advance of particular communities along their own lines. He visualized a ‘federal India’ in which units were not to be language based nationalities but were based on religious communities.42 Sarkar remarks that if the ‘federal India’ of the future was to have religious communities as its constituents, a basic disagreement between them would open the door for a partition of the country on communal lines; ‘only one short step thus logically divides Pal’s “composite patriotism” from the two-nation theory’.43 Eventually, the Swadeshi ideals had only a limited appeal for the Bengali Muslims. However, what made communalism dangerous in Bengal was the ‘incongruous Muslim combination of aristocratic leadership with anti-landlord demagogy.’44 The riots of 1906 –07 in Mymensingh, Jessore and other areas of the East Bengal countryside found an increasing response from Muslim lower classes and Sarkar sees an aggravation of the problem in the anti-zamindar and anti-mahajan tone of communal propaganda.45 The agrarian background in East Bengal districts, where peasants were mostly Muslims while zamindars and mahajans were Hindus, made this a potent possibility. Sarkar argues that from the Muslim point of view, the main lesson

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Making Peace, Making Riots

of 1906–07 was that in order to be significantly effective in Bengal, Muslim communalism must have an agrarian base.46 This lesson was well learnt by the Muslim League, as we shall observe in this book. Kenneth McPherson traces the rise of Muslim communalism in Bengal to the Khilafat–Non-Cooperation movement from 1918–22. He points out the limitations that the communal rapprochement faced during Khilafat and Non-Cooperation days and also identifies the attitude of the Hindu Bhadralok as a cause for the growth of Muslim communalism. He argues that although Muslim support for the boycott (organized in Calcutta as a part of the Khilafat–Non-Cooperation) was overwhelming, Hindu support was slacked. There was half-hearted support amongst Bengali Hindus for Khilafat and this plagued the rapprochement in Calcutta that had been attained briefly under the leadership of the Ali brothers and Gandhi.47 The reason behind this was that within Bengal, the Hindu urbanized middle classes and landowners were ‘nervously aware’ of the economic hegemony they exerted over the Muslim masses. ‘They feared to encourage Muslim political activity in case they themselves were threatened . . .’48 By the end of 1923, communal relations were in ruins and this was manifest in communal riots in Calcutta over issues like go-korbani and music before mosques. Communal tensions were further fuelled by the rise of the distinctly anti-Muslim Arya Samaj and the Shuddhi and Sangathan movements from 1923. C. R. Das’ Hindu-Muslim Pact in December 1923 met with lukewarm response and, in some cases, even with outright opposition amongst the Hindus of Calcutta. Public meetings were held to denounce the Pact as one sacrificing the Hindu interests. Even the Congress refused to ratify the pact in the face of strong opposition from Gandhi himself. Such reactions to the Pact, which was clearly conciliatory towards the Muslims, argues McPherson, confirmed the belief of many Muslims in Calcutta that the Congress was dominated by Hindu communalists.49 The Khilafat movement had politicized Muslims profoundly and created a sense of community solidarity hitherto not so clearly defined. Communal rapprochement during Khilafat and Non-Cooperation had provided the Muslims with much needed allies for their cause in the Congress. But once the Khilafat issue settled itself and the latent tension between the two communities came to the fore, communal antagonism resurfaced. McPherson sums up thus: the uplift and regeneration that the Muslims of Bengal ultimately sought, once the red-herring of the Khilafat had vanished, ‘was defined in negative terms of seizing the positions of economic power and influence held by their former allies, the Hindus.’50



Introduction 13

Suranjan Das makes a distinction between religious and communal identities. Religious identity concerns ‘personal allegiance’ to a set of dogmas and practices in search of rewards from a ‘transcendental reality.’51 Communal identities, on the other hand, identify individual commitment to special interests of a religious community for gaining ‘worldly advantages’ at the expense of other communities.52 Communal animosities, argues Das, are primarily motivated by conflicts over political power and economic resources. In this sense, Das critiques Bayly’s understanding of Indian communalism, stating that what Bayly characterizes as ‘pre-colonial communal riots’ were more religious than communal.53 Studying riots in Bengal from 1905 to 1947, Das looks at the transformation of the nature of communalism. Riots form the most important component of communalism for him through which he tries to understand communal consciousness. He argues that from 1940 onwards, as the Pakistan movement gained momentum, Hindu elites of Bengal became more apprehensive about losing their ground in provincial politics. From the 1940s, beginning with the Dhaka riot of 1941, a new pattern of riots emerged. Local maulvis and pirs were no longer active in inciting the crowd to violence. Instead, those who became significant were leaders of particular religious communities who were directly involved in promoting communal dissentions, and their cadres joined the crowds in violence.54 It is here that he notes a conjunction of ‘elite and popular communalism,’ where ‘the unorganized world of communal tensions was drawn into the realm of organized communal politics and the riot assumed important political overtones.’55 Das also notes some other points of difference between the riots of the 1940s and the ones that preceded them: assaults on women, rapes, abductions and forcible conversions, which got magnified during the Great Calcutta Killings and the Noakhali riots in 1946. This made it clear how communal consciousness had become increasingly tied up with the demand for Pakistan. Because of this connection between the riots and the Pakistan movement, Das labels the riots that took place in Bengal from 1946 as ‘Partition Riots’. He explores how these were carefully organized instead of being spasmodic incidents. Religion played an important role in mobilization of the masses and in legitimizing such violence. Summing up, Das argues that what happened in Bengal in the 1940s was a ‘psychological crystallization’ of communal identity among Hindus and Muslims.56 Hindu and Muslim community consciousness ‘assumed a distinct political identity, nourished by propaganda and hardened by riots.’57 However, there is a problem with Das’ mode of

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understanding communalism through the prism of riots. Riots are only an index of communalism. Studying the transformation of communalism through the nature of riots alone negates the influence of other indices like education or caste politics that shape communal consciousness. For Rakesh Batabyal, communalism is a modern and new articulation – the product of the new colonial presence.58 He lays importance on the political structure and processes at a specific historical juncture which shape the articulation of communalism, as well as the transformation of communalism itself into new forms and phases. 59 This makes the understanding of the ‘primacy of politics’ a corollary to that of communalism. With this understanding, Batabyal argues that by the 1940s, Muslims in general and the Muslim peasantry in particular, came to see an anti-Hindu pattern in the injustice and backwardness they had faced. This got translated into an idea of one community in opposition to the other. He sees the Bengal famine as a conjuncture which could have created new opportunities for transforming communal relations for the better, but political parties used the famine as a bargaining counter to drive home their respective demands, win electoral success and discredit rival parties. He also studies the elections and election campaigns of 1945 carefully and points out how mobilization and campaigning took place based on community lines, which also fed into the already brutalized consciousness that had emerged due to the famine. Like Das, Batabyal also studies the nature of violence during the riots, assaults on women, forced conversions and abductions, showing how communal consciousness had taken a firm hold on the people by mid-1946. An important component of Batabyal’s analysis revolves around Gandhi and his peace mission in Noakhali. Joya Chatterji’s work marks an important departure from the earlier studies on the partition of Bengal that looked at the prospect of partition as the inevitable conclusion of Muslim separatist politics. She provides fresh insights into the history of communal strife in Bengal, focusing on political and social processes that led to the demand for the partition. Her focus is on the growth of Hindu Bhadralok communalism. She shows how the Hindus of twentiethcentury Bengal were not helpless bystanders or victims to the division of their homeland. Chatterji argues that in contrast to the Bengal partition of 1905, in 1947, the partition actually was actively supported by the Hindu Bhadralok. It was designed to maintain their traditional superiority in a province where they were a numerical minority. Partition was perceived and propagated by the powerful Bhadralok section of the Hindu society in Bengal as the only way to regain influence and wrest power from the Muslim majority, a power that the



Introduction 15

Muslims had gradually come to exercise with the Communal Award and the rise of the Muslim League in Bengal after the elections of 1937. Chatterji propounds that the Communal Award of 1932 brought about important and far reaching changes in the politics of Bengal. It reduced the Bengali Hindu Bhadralok to an ‘impotent minority’ in the Legislative Assembly, by assigning to them far fewer seats than they had expected, compared to the Muslims whose share exceeded that of the Hindus by a substantial margin.60 The Award attracted widespread opposition from Bhadralok Hindus as they considered it a ‘frontal attack’ upon their position. The Bengal Provincial Congress Committee (BPCC), which was dominated by Bhadralok Hindus, opposed the Award on the lines that the interests of the Hindus had been sacrificed and that it would render the province economically, politically and, most importantly, ‘culturally’ impotent. The prospect of culturally ‘inferior’ Muslims gaining power was seen as a greater evil than British rule itself.61 As Bhadralok power gradually waned with the loss of economic power as well as with the rise of prosperous Muslim jotedars, Bengal society was increasingly polarized on class lines, which soon took on a communal colouring. The elections of 1937 and 1945 further showed the growing influence of the Muslim League, which intensified Bhadralok Hindus’ fears of Muslim domination in an undivided province. With the outbreak of the Great Calcutta Killings in August 1946, Bengali Hindus saw ‘a threat much closer to home against which they were ready to fight to the death.’62 Studying the riots that followed for five days after the Direct Action Day in Calcutta, Chatterji has done well to point out Hindu culpability as well in the riots. IV.  Debates Around Gender In Partition Historiography Although partition histories have been studied and narrated in various forms, what has only recently begun to be analyzed is how women negotiated with and lived through partition. The exploration of the differentiated and manifold experiences of women during partition began with feminist historians who have made a real difference by looking at how certain categories of victims – women and children – were typically victimized by men of their own communities as well as of other communities, and by their nation states. Women were one of the worst affected groups in partition and the exodus that followed it.63 I analyze three important works that look at partition through the prism of gender. Urvashi Butalia explains her dissatisfaction with reading the history of partition simply through the political developments that led up to

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it. Experiential aspects of the millions of people who lived through the pain, trauma and partition - what she calls the ‘human dimensions of this history’64 – were thereby left aside. She argues that what needs to be studied, therefore, is how people remember the ‘facts’ of such history and how they represent them. The sources that could be used for the reconstruction of such histories, argues Butalia, are the ways in which they have been handed down to us through fiction, memoirs, testimonies and individual and collective memories that partition and the violence that accompanied it had unleashed. She recognizes the problems with such sources, because memories are never completely ‘pure’ or ‘unmediated’. What is more important is how an individual or group chooses to remember such a history. Oral history ‘tends to burn the somewhat rigid timeframes within which history situates itself ’ as such narratives tend to flow into each other in terms of temporal time.65 Partition did not become a closed chapter with 1947. People live with it even today and they go back to it when communal riots erupt now. In this context, Butalia argues that the study of women in partition is of primary importance because reading women’s narratives alongside or against the grain of official discourses of history gives feminist historians a different and alternative view of history. Women relate to partition and partition violence in a completely different way from the way men do and this area needs to be recognized and analyzed. Butalia also recounted the kinds of violence that children and Dalits faced in Punjab. Community discipline in this context assumes violent forms over community members. In a similar vein, Jasodhara Bagchi and Subhoranjan Dasgupta point out that the ‘Grand Narrative’ of the history of partition, concentrating on politics and negotiations regarding boundaries, ignores the ‘human aspect’ of partition, the saga of the struggles and tribulations, and also the triumphs that common people, especially women, experienced in the course of the violence and the migrations that followed the communal carnage. They show how women in both Punjab and Bengal were targeted as prime objects of persecution, because the female womb became conquered territory and attacks on them became a direct attack on the honour and integrity of the rival community – ‘women are identified as the main objects of ruthless conquest.’66 However, even raped and abducted women displayed resilience, fortitude and strength during migration that immediately followed the Noakhali riots and continued for a long time thereafter. Refugee women often became the sole breadwinners of their newly displaced families and asserted themselves in a new country with new roles. Therefore, the authors argue, one must not study women’s history only with



Introduction 17

an exclusive focus on women’s sexuality, but also with a new focus on women’s migration histories and new workplaces where they created and asserted a new presence and in post-Independence political mobilizations where women began to figure in greater numbers.67 Gargi Chakravartty argues that partition stories are poignant because of their direct and indirect forms of violence. Rape, abduction and forced marriages during the Noakhali riots left permanent scars on women who were the worst affected groups during the communal carnage. Noakhali riots were especially traumatic for women, because violence here was legitimized by religion and the fear psychosis created by the actual and rumoured abductions and rapes of women led to major changes in everyday lives of women. Young girls were withdrawn from schools and were often forcibly married off at a young age to men of their own community to escape violation. Moreover, as Chakravartty notes, ‘The Noakhali violence marginalized women, who became victims of male chauvinism.’68 Not only men of rival communities, but men of their own communities used the prevailing chaos to take advantage of and exploit women. She studies how migration on both sides began much before August 1947, with families divided and moving away to ‘safer places’. Many Bengalis in East Bengal actually did not believe that the partition of Bengal in 1947 would be a permanent factor, just as the partition of Bengal in 1905 had not been that. Through interviews and oral testimonies, Chakravartty captures the essence of the trauma of women in partition, who were forced to migrate as a result of communal violence and state policy, yet never ceased to long for their erstwhile native homeland. Many of them, in the hope of returning someday, buried their utensils and other forms of property underground, with a hope of recovery that never got fulfilled. Her focus is, simultaneously, on the pain as well as on the activism of uprooted women in the rehabilitation process. THE PRESENT WORK This book embarks on an analysis of the last seven years of British rule in Bengal with the purpose of understanding the interplay of multiple socioeconomic, religious and political factors in the rise of communalism and communal politics in the province. Throughout the book, I have tried to argue against the singularity of any identity, be it that of class, caste or community. Through the analysis of community identities and communal politics, I have tried to maintain a focus on the ever-fluid nature of identity formations. Here I shall

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Making Peace, Making Riots

attempt to give a brief overview of the chapters and themes explored in the present work. The book opens with the first major riot of the decade, the Dacca Riot of 1941. Suranjan Das calls it ‘the transition to a new phase.’ Indeed, a close study of this riot reveals a certain pattern of violence that later also came to characterize communal disturbances like the Great Calcutta Killings and the Noakhali Riots of 1946. Forced conversions, large scale killings, rape and molestation of women, which were exceptional in riots of the earlier decades, became the norm from the Dacca Riot of 1941. Links with the issue of Pakistan were obviously new. However, the riot still retained some class-based characteristics of earlier disturbances of 1926 and 1930, like attacks on the properties of the Sahas, the chief Hindu trading community in Dacca. Hence, the riot stood at the cusp of transformation in the nature of communal violence in the province. It acquires importance in understanding how community consciousness was shaped by communal politics around the Secondary Education Bill of 1940 and the Census of 1941. As Pradip Kumar Datta explains, the census resulted, to some extent, in the stabilization of identities around new religious orientations, backed by institutional facilities such as reserved education and employment quotas.69 The Mahasabha and its various volunteer wings like the Bharat Sevarshram Sangha saw in the caste-wise classification of Hindus in the Census the possibility of a breakdown of ‘Hindu unity’. Hence it began to intensify its Sangathan activities amongst the Depressed Classes of Bengal, urging them to register themselves as only Hindus and not by their different castes. The introduction of the Secondary Education Bill by the League-dominated Bengal Government also crystallized such fears of ‘Hindu’ disintegration. In Bengal, higher education was a field dominated thus far by Caste Hindus. Franchise, social mobility and employment, all depended on educational qualifications. Education, in this sense, was a coveted political weapon as well. Hence, the attempts by Muslims to wrest greater control in the sphere of secondary education only aggravated communal politics, with Caste Hindus labelling it as an attempted ‘Pakistanization’ of the province. The Mahasabha, the Congress and the Muslim League rallied public opinion in the province strictly on communal lines directly leading to a surge on the communal barometer. Chapter 2 focuses on the Bengal famine of 1943. There have been significant studies of the causes of the famine and of the nature of the consequent economic and social dislocation of Bengal. However, none of them focuses on the possibilities that the famine created for community based mobilizations.



Introduction 19

Rakesh Batabyal has studied the Bengal famine as a conjuncture which could have created new opportunities for transforming communal relations for the better, but organized political parties used the famine as a bargaining counter to drive home their respective demands, win electoral success and discredit rival political parties. However, Batabyal keeps the focus limited to the high politics of ‘organized political parties’. There is a need to revisit the famine in light of the deep impact it had on communal politics around the process of relief and rehabilitation. The complete breakdown of Bengali society created a black hole where the meaning of existence itself got sucked in. In such a calamity, community association became the only thread that the ruptured society could hang on to. The chapter therefore studies in detail the nature of the dislocation in Bengal in terms of how the constant exposure to death, disease and hunger created a total dependence upon relief measures. An analysis of the nature and complexities of relief/rehabilitation is then drawn up to show how communal politics inserted itself deep into the relief process. This precluded the scope for the development of secular politics, in spite of serious attempts made in this direction by the Communists. Hence the famine became the most crucial juncture in the 1940s, which consolidated community based mobilizations not only by organized political parties but also by various volunteer Hindu organizations like the Bharat Sevashram Sangha and the Hindu Mission. This was also the time when these volunteer groups were able to consolidate their slogan of ‘Hindu unity’ amongst the Depressed Classes. While the ‘lower’ caste Hindus were generally poor and had suffered terribly due to the famine, the Scheduled Caste MLA in the Nazimuddin Ministry, Mukunda Behari Mullick, supported the Ministry and did not champion the cause of the Scheduled Castes during the food debate in the Assembly.70 This alienated the famine-affected ‘lower-caste’ non-Muslim peasantry in rural Bengal from its organized leadership and made the Sangathan work of the Mahasabha and other Hindu volunteer groups more effective. Sekhar Bandyopadhyay has shown that in the 1940s, Dalit politics at the grassroots had begun to show distinctive changes, and at a more general level ‘the Namasudra masses at this stage were developing a greater identification with the Hindu community and this Hinduization was gradually overshadowing their caste identity.’ 71 Concentrating only on high politics of the famine, hence, overlooks how community identity and communal politics reinforced each other in the everyday domain of relief processes. Studies of communalism, more often than not, tend to focus on the great divide between Hindus and Muslims, giving almost a bipolar view of communal

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politics. The caste factor complicates such a view and provides an interesting insight into the ways through which communalism mediates multiple identity indices. In Chapter 3, I have analyzed how the Scheduled Castes of Bengal navigated between their identities in terms of caste and religion. Sekhar Bandyopadhyay’s research has shown that the Scheduled Castes of Bengal, especially the Namasudras, had been politically active before the 1940s in asserting a separate identity. But throughout the 1940s, especially after the famine, we see a closer association of the Depressed Classes of Bengal with the Hinduization attempts by the Mahasabha and its various volunteer wings. The chapter studies the participation of the Depressed Classes in the educational politics of the province in the form of the Secondary Education Bill (SEB) of 1944. They had also been active in the controversy around the Education Bill of 1941. But in 1944, the League Ministry, in a desperate search for allies after its pathetic handling of the famine, made more definite overtures to the Scheduled Castes. Going beyond the rhetoric of religion, the League projected both Muslims and Scheduled Castes as common sufferers of Caste Hindu domination in the sphere of education and, hence, jobs. A distinct socialist message of the League became evident now. The elected members of the newly proposed Secondary Education Board were to be returned by separate electorates of Hindus, Muslims and Scheduled Castes. The response of the Scheduled Caste leadership in the Assembly was mixed, with one section directly opposing the Bill because they felt that they had not been given adequate representation. The inclusion of separate electorates was the biggest bone of contention for Caste Hindus, who saw in this a diabolical move to break ‘Hindu unity’. Not only political parties like the Mahasabha and the Congress, but also teachers and students across the province were drawn into severe protests. The ‘attempted Pakistanization’ rhetoric was used freely. What is interesting is that throughout the 1940s, every contentious issue between the two communities involved Pakistan in some way. By 1946, this had become the only issue. Whatever be the high politics, 1944–45 witnessed an increase in the number of communal disturbances between Muslims and Namasudras. The Bharat Sevashram Sangha and the Mahasabha had been actively translating the SEB into the trope of Hinduism in danger. In the aftermath of the famine, playing on the fear psychosis of attempted disintegration of community found a more receptive audience. It only fostered the consolidation of the Sangathan work of the various Hindu wings. The chapter also studies in detail the development of the Pakistan movement in Bengal and analyzes how the League transformed itself from an armchair



Introduction 21

organization to a mass-based party. I have traced the socioeconomic and political climate specific to Bengal that provided for the gradual emergence of the ‘socialist’ or populist self-image of the League, especially during the election campaign of 1945–46. The undefined and ambiguous nature of Pakistan, as formulated in the Lahore resolution of 1940, eventually came to have different dimensions for different groups within the Muslim community. In the extremely difficult scenario that existed for the peasants after the famine, it was easy for the League to turn the Muslim peasantry’s discontent against exploitative Hindu zamindars and mahajans, and give the class conflict a communal colouring. Also, the total failure of the Congress in Bengal to support agrarian reform proposals and the militant zeal with which the Mahasabha and other Hindu groups carried on Sangathan, went a long way in garnering support for the League. However, it is equally important to trace the differences and divergences within the Pakistan movement. Bengali Muslims and their different representative organizations, especially the East Pakistan Renaissance Society, vehemently opposed the imposition of Urdu and advocated Bengali as the official language in East Pakistan. Linguistic and ‘cultural’ differences between Bengali Muslims and their counterparts in the North West were emphasized. Hence, while the League was propagating a two-nation theory and a common Islamic brotherhood, Bengali Muslims were already talking in terms of their internal differences. Chapter 4 and 5 explore the Great Calcutta Killing and the Noakhali Riots respectively, two of the worst riots that Bengal had witnessed till then. The scale of violence in both the riots was unprecedented and directly linked with the Pakistan issue. While the Calcutta riots witnessed unprecedented killings amongst both Hindu and Muslim communities, the Noakhali riots were less about killings and more about large scale destruction of temples, forced conversions to Islam and attacks on women, forcing Hindus to flee the district. The horrors that these two riots unleashed and their sheer magnitude left no doubt that the bridge between the two communities had indeed crumbled. The mutual distrust that stemmed from them led people to cluster into the ‘safety’ of their own communities, freezing identities into solid blocs. Thus, territorial separation began even before partition was announced. The Calcutta and the Noakhali riots can also be categorized as ‘partition before partition’. On 21 October, Walter Gurner, the commissioner of Civil Relief in Bengal, stated at a press interview that according to the latest information in possession of the Bengal Government, more than 20,000 refugees had taken shelter in the three relief camps opened by the Government in the affected areas of Noakhali

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and Tippera.72 The Hindusthan Standard reported on 25 October that the total number of refugees to have reached Calcutta thus far was 12,626.73 Taking the subcontinent as a whole, both communities ended up inflicting atrocities on each other in equal measure. Noakhali happened to be an area where Muslims led the aggression. But this in no way indicated a general pattern. Calcutta saw rioting on both sides and the Noakhali situation was reversed soon at Bihar, where Muslims were largely the victims and which, moreover, was ruled by a Congress government at that time. At the same time, coming just before partition, the events of Calcutta and Noakhali did prefigure many of the features which accompanied the division of the country. The trend of migration of refugees to ‘safer’ zones elsewhere in East Bengal and also to Calcutta, along with the panic resulting from the Noakhali riots, created internal borders even before partition. In terms of violence, segregation, migration and patterns of relief work, Bengal in 1946 was a dress rehearsal for the formal division of the subcontinent. Words that were associated with the formal partition of 1947 had already become common: relief, relief camps, mass migration, refugees. Segregation and ghettoization of living patterns of 1946 were a foretaste of the new territorial boundaries and borders. Violence accompanied both processes in equal measure and all political organizations were complicit in their making in different ways. However, while it is important to study the shifting nature of communal violence, it is equally important to focus on anti-communal resistance, relief and peace efforts by both common people and organized political parties in the event of a communal riot. This is an aspect that has been totally ignored in the existing historiography of communalism and communal violence. The resulting lacuna has led to an incomplete understanding of communalism and an overarching focus on communal violence. Studying anti-communal resistance is important for understanding the limits to communal violence. My work, therefore, focuses in a major way on peace efforts and anti-communal resistance in the event of serious communal violence, like the Dacca Riot of 1941 and the Calcutta and Noakhali Riots of 1946. The study of Gandhi has been undertaken in the last chapter. Since I have studied anti-communal resistance and peace efforts extensively, it would be impossible not to engage with Gandhi and his politics of combating communal violence in Bengal in the final year before partition. I have attempted to explore the different layers in Gandhian nonviolence in this context through a study of his Noakhali peace mission (1946) and his Calcutta fast (1947). Research into the complexities of Gandhi’s peace mission and his fasts as the ‘ultimate tool



Introduction 23

of the Satyagrahi’ also unexpectedly revealed a strange undertone of hidden violence in certain aspects, especially in his messages to women. Moreover, the reception of Gandhi amongst Bengalis reveals interesting insights into the difference between Gandhi as a politician and Gandhi as the ‘Mahatma’ that he was generally perceived to be. The enchantment and the success of Gandhi lay in the fact that he knew when he had to deploy which side and when he had to merge these in order to achieve maximum results. Noakhali and Calcutta were examples when both were at work – his ideal of nonviolence and of using fasts as an infallible weapon to make an emotive appeal to the ‘erring parties’ (emphasis mine). The study of the ‘cult of the Mahatma’ hence becomes important in this context. ENDNOTES 1. This is in no way to suggest that the internal social divisions of caste, class and gender have ceased to co-exist. 2. C. A. Bayly, ‘A Pre-History of ‘Communalism’? Religious Conflict in India, 17001860,’ Modern Asian Studies 19, No. 2 (1985), p 190 3. Ibid, p 189. 4. Ibid, p 192. 5. Ibid, p 202. 6. Ibid, p 190. 7. Bipan Chandra, ‘Historians of Modern India and Communalism,’ in Communalism and the Writing of Indian History, ed. Romila Thapar et al. (New Delhi: People’s Publishing House, 1977), p 41. 8. Bipan Chandra, Communalism in Modern India (New Delhi:Vikas Publishing House, 1987), p 20, 34. 9. Chandra, ‘Historians of Modern India,’, p 43 10. Chandra, Communalism In Modern India, p 23. 11. Ibid, p 163. 12. Ibid, p 4. 13. Ibid. 14. This composition of the Hindu crowd during the Great Calcutta Killing has been studied by both Suranjan Das and Joya Chatterji. See, Suranjan Das Communal Riots in Bengal 1905–1947 (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1991), p 183; and Joya Chatterji, Bengal Divided: Hindu Communalism and Partition 1932–47 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), p 239. 15. Chandra, Communalism In Modern India, p 4. 16. Ibid, p 2. 17. Chandra, ‘Historians of Modern India’, p 40. The letters in bold are by Chandra. 18. Prabha Dixit, Communalism: A Struggle for Power (New Delhi: Orient Longman, 1974), p vii.

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19. Gyan Pandey, The Construction of Communalism In Colonial North India (New Delhi: Oxford University press, 2006), p 235. 20. Ibid, p 236. 21. Ibid, p 239. 22. Ibid, p 248. 23. Ibid, p 252. 24. Ibid, p viii. 25. Ibid, p 253. 26. Ibid, p 13. 27. P. K. Datta, Carving Blocs: Communal Ideology In Early Twentieth Century Bengal (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999), p 10. 28. Ibid, p 15. 29. Sandria B. Freitag, Collective Action and Community: Public Arenas and the Emergence of Communalism in North India (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1990), p 12. 30. Ibid, p 93. 31. Ibid, p 94. 32. Ibid, p 89. 33. Patricia A.Gossman, Riots and Victims: Violence and the Construction of Communal Identity among Bengali Muslims 1905-1947 (Boulder, CO, Westview Press,1999) p 3. 34. Ibid, p 8. 35. Ibid, p 102. 36. Datta, Carving Blocs, pp 108 and 259–260. 37. Ibid, pp 259–260. 38. Ibid, p 245. 39. Sumit Sarkar, The Swadeshi Movement in Bengal 1903–1908 (New Delhi: People’s Publishing House, 1973), p 409. 40. Ibid, p 414. 41. Ibid, p 416. 42. Ibid, p 423. 43. Ibid, p 424. 44. Ibid, p 443. 45. Ibid, p 455. 46. Ibid, p 462. 47. Kenneth McPherson, The Muslim Microcosm: Calcutta, 1918 to 1935 (Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner Verlag, 1974), p 58. 48. Ibid, p 59. 49. Ibid, p 79. 50. Ibid, p 60. 51. Suranjan Das, Interrogating Politics and Society: Twentieth Century Indian Subcontinent (New Delhi: Primus Books, 2014), p 2. 52. Ibid. 53. Ibid.



Introduction 25

54. Das, Communal Riots In Bengal, p 148. 55. Ibid, p 148. 56. Das, Interrogating Politics, p 31. 57. Ibid. 58. Rakesh Batabyal, Communalism in Bengal, From Famine to Noakhali 1943-47 (New Delhi: Sage Publications, 2005), p 58. 59. Ibid, p 50. 60. Chatterji, Bengal Divided, pp 20–21. 61. Ibid, p 26. 62. Ibid, p 232. 63. I must mention here that I do not look at refugee migration and rehabilitation as it falls outside the purview of my time period. This is in no way to negate the importance of this history. 64. Urvashi Butalia, The Other Side of Silence: Voices from the Partition of India (Penguin Books, New Delhi, 1998), p 7. 65. Ibid, p 13. 66. Jasodhara Bagchi and Subhoranjan Dasgupta, ed., The Trauma and The Triumph: Gender And Partition In Eastern India (Kolkata: Stree, 2003), p 3. 67. Ibid, p 9. 68. Gargi Chakravartty, Coming Out Of Partition: Refugee Women of Bengal (New Delhi: Bluejay Books, 2005), p 9. 69. Datta, Carving Blocs, p 25 70. Proceedings of the Bengal Legislative Assembly, Vol. 65, 14 July 1943, pp 418–421 71. Sekhar Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India: The Namasudras of Bengal 1872–1947 (Surrey: Curzon Press, 1997) p 210 72. Hindusthan Standard, 23 October 1946. 73. Hindusthan Standard, 25 October 1946, Statement given by the president of the Central Relief Co-ordination Committee.

26

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1 The Dacca Riot, 19411 The 1940s in Bengal were marked by a steady rise on the communal barometer. It is only fitting that I begin this study with an analysis of the first major riot of the decade. The Dacca riot of 1941 engulfed not only the city of Dacca but also the countryside, specifically the thanas of Raipur, Shibpur and Narsinghdi. It was in a way a harbinger to the horrors that would unleash in 1946 – the Great Calcutta Killing and the Noakhali riots. Described as ‘a transition to a new phase’ by Suranjan Das, it quantitatively and qualitatively ushered in a new kind of violence in the province. Hence it is, in several ways, key to understanding the later riots that shook Bengal a year before independence and partition. It is necessary to provide a background sketch of the various socioeconomic and political factors that led to the riot.2 Like most districts of East Bengal, Dacca too had a substantial Muslim population. In 1872, census enumerations had found that Muslims constituted 56.5 per cent of the population and each successive enumeration showed a marked increase in this percentage.3 Their rate of population growth between 1872 and 1901 was found to be nearly twice as much as that of Hindus.4 Muslims predominated in almost every part of the district, but their population was highest in the northern thanas of Raipura and Kapasia, and lowest in Dacca city, where they were outnumbered by Hindus.5 The proportion of Hindus was lowest in the Narayanganj subdivision. Namasudras were the dominant Hindu caste. They were numerous throughout the district, but mainly concentrated in Srinagar, Nawabganj and Keraniganj thanas.6 In the 1941 riot, this pattern of population distribution significantly determined the nature of violence. Hindu rioters were the chief aggressors in Dacca city, whereas Muslim rioters wreaked havoc in rural areas. Dacca had also been strongly inf luenced by the Wahabi and Faraizi movements, with their emphasis on avoidance of Hindu and other syncretic rites and rituals. Although numerically a minority, Hindus formed the bulk of the upper and middle classes in the city, with wealth and education being



The Dacca Riot, 1941 27

largely concentrated in their hands. In Dacca, like everywhere else in East Bengal, Hindus dominated trade and moneylending. The ratio of moneylenders was the highest in Dacca as compared to the rest of Bengal. It was estimated to be about 280 per lakh of persons as compared to 40 in Burdwan or 26 in Bankura.7 Although some Muslims were petty shopkeepers, they did not have the capital to compete with the Hindus in the wholesale and quasi-wholesale trade. The cream of commerce had consequently passed into Hindu hands.8 Moreover, due to the Islamic taboo on usury, Muslims were hardly engaged in moneylending. In time, the city had seen the Hindus become richer, while the condition of the Muslims had remained roughly the same.9 The sharp contrast in their socio-economic statuses was marked ‘most obviously’ by the different kinds of houses inhabited by the people of the two communities. Muslim residential areas were fast turning into overpopulated, insanitary slums. On the other hand, Hindus were building ‘palatial residences’ on the best urban sites.10 Before the 1941 riot, Dacca had already suffered two major communal disturbances in 1926 and 1930. A brief reference to them will provide an understanding of how the 1941 riot stood apart. The 1926 riot broke out after a large number of local Muslims protested against the playing of music around mosques during the Janmashtami festival.11 A Muslim hartal was organized on 8 and 9 September, which coincided precisely with the days of Janmashtami procession.12 The primary motive for the hartal was to prevent Muslim carriage drivers and cartmen from providing services to Hindus during the festival. Hindus carried out a smaller procession nonetheless. They shouted slogans like ‘Hindu Dharma ki Jai’, and on 10 September, organized a retaliatory boycott of Muslim carriage drivers. Trouble really started when during the boycott, the Hindus forced passengers to disembark from carriages and burnt down hackney carriages. Muslim carriage drivers predictably responded with a counter offensive. Disturbances went on for almost three days. The upheaval was predominantly an urban disturbance.13 The riot was marked by sporadic stabbings and attacks on Sahas, the leading Hindu mercantile community in Dacca. Instances of Muslims looting Hindu shops were limited, and there were no reports of rape, large scale murders or forced conversions. But nevertheless, a new development began from the 1926 riot, i.e. the desecration of images and idols of Hindu gods. Suranjan Das, who has conducted an in-depth study of the riot of 1926, observes that ‘The Janmashmati procession at Dacca .  .  . was a “time-honoured institution” where Muslim musicians and labourers were employed, wealthy Muslims lent their elephants and horses, and Muslims from surrounding villages crowded

28

Making Peace, Making Riots

the streets to watch the ceremony. But in 1925–26, this spirit was rapidly undermined.’14 Studying the Dacca riot of 1930, Tanika Sarkar has remarked, In Bengal . . . due to the rather peculiar configuration of property relations and social tensions conflicts did have a marked tendency to correspond to the contours of a communal conflict. Sectionalist politicians and Government officials played upon this peculiarity for all they were worth. The violence that ensued can be partially isolated from the undoubted pressures and strength of a distinctly religious response to a different community.15

The riot of 1930 was directly linked with the onset of the Depression from 1929. Dacca belonged to the heart of the jute belt.16 From 1926 the product market in jute had begun to wobble, and by 1930 it had completely collapsed. If in the year 1929 the index of jute prices is taken to be 100, in 1928 the index number was 107.3. But in 1930 it went down to 54.9, and crashed to 50.4 in the following year.17 The rural credit system completely collapsed. With the ‘cataclysmic drop’ in crop prices, the primary producers, especially the jute cultivators, found it extremely hard to obtain cash and make ends meet.18 Moneylenders simply refused to advance necessary cash loans. The rate of transfers of raiyati holdings picked up from the mid-1930s. In 1934, the approximate number of sales was 1,47,619, and of mortgages, 3,49,400. In 1936, this had increased to 1,72,956 sales and 3,52,469 mortgages.19 An official report from the district magistrate of Tippera described the situation thus: In normal times they would have tided over the crisis by resorting to the village mahajan, but on this occasion this source of supply was practically dried up. The village moneylenders scarcely have much accumulated balances; they deal in fluid cash, lending, realizing and lending again. In 1930, the arrangement was reversed; they realized little, their debtors could not pay and prospective borrowers could not get relief.20

The pattern of violence in Dacca in 1930 was typically marked by attacks on Hindu property and on the propertied class. The Hindu business centre at Kayettuli bore the brunt of repeated Muslim attacks. Loss of property was the primary Hindu grievance, not so much murder.21 The primary targets of the rioters were the houses of Sahas and moneylenders. Apart from numerous cases of tearing up debt bonds, there was also a massive plunder of a local hat (market) and Hindu property worth Rs 2,43,182 was destroyed.22 Several rice godowns were also attacked. Sugata Bose best describes the peasant mood: ‘If



The Dacca Riot, 1941 29

the availability of the credit disguised an exploitative, symbiotic relationship in a benevolent garb, its scarcity destroyed the justification for the exploitation and therefore the very basis of the ties between the peasants and the mahajans.’23 The cash famine was one of the major factors contributing to attacks on mahajans in the riot of 1930. Communal tension did spread to rural areas, but arson was fairly limited. There were no reports of rape or forced conversion. ‘Self-restraint, quite remarkable in a riot situation, was in fact evident when a huge armed Muslim gang attacked a Hindu house where four young girls were alone by themselves. The girls just lost their jewels.’24 Hindu moneylenders, and not so much landlords, were the main targets of attack. The probable reason behind this, according to Sarkar, was that the rent burden was not so heavy in Dacca. Moreover, as Sarkar remarks, ‘landlords were perhaps vested with some amount of customary legitimacy or authority in peasant minds, whereas mahajans, often forming a distinct group, external to peasants, and displacing them from their lands, would form no part of their patriarchal moral universe.’25 The rioting crowd also demonstrated an ‘alternate concept of fair deal,’ aroused more by a sense of undoing economic injustice than communal antipathy.26 Rioters did not necessarily always appropriate the looted property, but sold it at very low prices. As we shall see later, there was a shift from this in the pattern of violence that characterized the communal riot of 1941 in Dacca. The self-restraint that was visible in 1926 and 1930 was remarkably absent in not just the Dacca Riot of 1941, but also in all the major communal disturbances of the 1940s. In fact, attacks on women became the norm in the communal violence to come. 1930–31 was marked by a spate of hat looting and attacks on mahajans. As the downward spiral in the price of jute and other agricultural commodities continued, peasant purchasing power only crashed further. The looting of hats or bazaars which stocked these relatively expensive articles was, thus, an ‘expression of threatened consumer consciousness.’27 As Sarkar argues, the entire hat was seldom looted. Shops that stocked the more expensive items were isolated for the attack.28 Hat looting was rampant in Rajshahi, Dinajpur, Jessore and Faridpur. At Munshiganj subdivision of Dacca, a group of around fifty peasants attacked a hat at Tangibari in March and looted clothes and food items. But this form of hat looting was soon replaced by a more organized form of protest – the refusal to pay rent and pay back agricultural loans. The general peasant militancy of the 1930s crystallized into mushrooming of numerous Krishak Samitis. The prevailing economic distress and real shrinkage of credit as well as extortionate acts of village mahajans and smaller

30

Making Peace, Making Riots

landlords in the past prepared the ground for Krishak Samiti activities.29 Dacca was also one of the important nerve centres of Krishak Samiti Activities. An official report from the district magistrate of Tippera in December 1931 read: ‘Samitis have been started in almost every village with their own presidents and secretaries. Almost everybody in the village is a member of the Samiti except the mahajans.’30 These samitis demanded that mahajans had to surrender their documents and that they would decide when and how debts had to be repaid. As the decade waned, meetings of these samitis became more frequent, and they demanded the early establishment of Debt Settlement Boards. At a Samiti Conference held at Dacca in April 1936, Fazlul Huq, an important Krishak Samiti leader, helped to bring together most of the Krishak Samitis of almost all districts. Thus was born the Krishak Praja Party (KPP), in an attempt to unify Samiti activities throughout the province. This was also the beginning of an organized peasant politics in the province, which then exercised an important yet fluctuating influence on the politics of the province. A brief overview of the political scenario of the province is important here; it will be discussed in detail in chapter 3. Elections to provincial legislatures were held for the first time in 1937. In Bengal, the three main players were the Congress, the Muslim League and the KPP. In its election propaganda, the League stressed the need for Muslim solidarity as a prerequisite for making provincial autonomy meaningful to Muslims in Bengal.31 The main plank of the KPP propaganda was the abolition of zamindari without compensation. It promised ‘dal-bhaat’ to all in Bengal, a slogan devised to endear itself to the common-man.32 The Congress mainly talked of Swaraj, political change and constitutional reforms. In the elections of 1937, Fazlul Huq defeated the League candidate Nazimuddin by a big margin.33 The Muslim League got 39 seats (out of the 82 contested), KPP got 36 seats (out of the 75 contested) and the Congress got 54 seats, making a sweep in the general constituencies. Although the Muslim League obtained more seats, the percentage of votes polled was less than that of the KPP. Huq, being the leader of the KPP, opened negotiations with the Congress to form a coalition. However, talks between the two parties soon broke down. The Congress insisted on giving immediate importance to the release of political prisoners while for the KPP, the settlement of agrarian debt was the primary concern. As negotiations between the KPP and the Congress broke down, the KPP saw no option but to form a coalition ministry with the League, with Huq as the Chief Minister.34 However, this turned out to be the biggest political blunder for Huq – the selection of personnel of the Ministry



The Dacca Riot, 1941 31

was not in his hands, and nine out of eleven members were from the zamindar class. This was deeply resented by other members of the KPP, who soon began to distance themselves from the new coalition party. Faced with severe criticism from both the KPP and the Congress for completely deviating from his electoral promises, Huq joined the Muslim League in October 1937. With this, the ministry practically became a League ministry. Shila Sen observes, ‘Within six months he realised that to save the ministry, it was necessary to join the Muslim League and to satisfy the Muslim League it was necessary to arouse communal, i.e. anti-Hindu passions.’35 After coming to power in 1937, the League-dominated Bengal Government, under Fazlul Huq, passed certain legislations which directly benefitted the Muslim cultivators at the expense of the Hindu zamindars and moneylenders. The Bengal Tenancy Amendment Act of 1938 abolished the landlords’ transfer fee and the realization of abwab by the landlord or his agent was made punishable by fine.36 The Bengal Money-lenders Act of 1940 also curbed the activities of the Hindu moneylenders by abolishing compound interest, fixing maximum rates of interest and providing for repayment by instalments. This Act was specially lauded by the pro-League daily the Star of India as one which carried with it ‘a message of hope for those who have been for years plunged into dark despair of ever releasing themselves from the clutches of the avaricious and unscrupulous moneylender, who, with his extortionate usury sucks the lifeblood of the people.’37 This was the beginning of a number of pro-peasant legislations passed by the Bengal Government under the League leadership, which began to take the wind out of the KPP sails. Bengal in 1940 was already a communally charged province. Suranjan Das argues that outside the world of politics, some short-term changes in population and prices had made members of both communities ‘restive.’ The Census of 1941 reported that between 1931 and 1941, Dacca District had registered a population growth of 18.34 per cent and the city of Dacca alone had seen an increase of 35.03 per cent.38 Wages in the agricultural sector remained low, but the cost of living in Bengal increased by nearly 200 per cent compared to the pre-war years.39 Rice imports from Burma had been stopped because of the war, and low output meant reduced supply and rising prices of major food-grains. Allegations were also levelled by Muslim merchants against their Hindu counterparts of ‘cornering cloth’ and other essential items for higher profits later.40 Das argues that these economic developments affected most of the subordinate social groups among Muslims. This, in turn, was reflected in the pattern of violence against the Hindu trading community and propertied

32

Making Peace, Making Riots

classes during the riot, as we shall see later. The Sankharis (conch-shell workers), who had been active in the previous disturbances in Dacca, had seen a depression in their trade41 in the past decade; they were restless and were susceptible to communal propaganda.42 There were other short term political developments which directly impacted communal relations in the province. The twenty-first session of the All India Hindu Mahasabha was held on 28 December 1939 in Calcutta amidst great pomp and splendour. A grand reception was held on 27 December upon the arrival of Savarkar, president of the All India Hindu Mahasabha. The Amrita Bazar Patrika described the scene as almost a carnival: A most magnificent reception was given to Veer Savarkar, president-elect of the All India Hindu Mahasabha on arrival in Calcutta yesterday morning . . . The Wednesday procession was, to compute modestly, two-mile long and was marked by great popular enthusiasm. The enthusiasm displayed came as a great revelation to many. It indicated what swift strides the movement was making in Bengal and what gigantic proportions it had assumed in so short a time.43

The newspaper published an interesting editorial on 27 December, a day before the Mahasabha Conference began. It pointed out that the enthusiasm shown by Bengali Hindus for the Mahasabha was neither the result of a ‘reactionary communal mentality nor the outcome of any anti-Muslim prejudice.’44 Instead, the widespread support was said to have stemmed from the fact that unlike the Congress, the Mahasabha did not believe in making repeated concessions to the Muslims, whom the paper described as ‘reactionary communal groups who want to lean for support on foreign imperialists for the maintenance of their privileged position in the Indian body politic.’45 The daily argued that young Hindus of Bengal were not satisfied with the Congress’ preparations for attaining independence, i.e. through non-violence. Ridiculing the Gandhian method, it pointed out that young Hindus no longer shared the belief that the pursuit of the national ideal of freedom should be stopped for fear of any manifestation of violence on the part of communal reactionaries.46 Summing up, it stated: Torn by doubts and disappointments, the Hindus of Bengal have arrived at the conclusion that it is only by consolidating their own strength that they may expect a satisfactory solution of the communal or national problem. It is possibly this which explains their enthusiasm for the Hindu Mahasabha which promises a way out of the present difficulty.47



The Dacca Riot, 1941 33

The governor, Sir John Herbert, observed that owing to publicity in the press, the Hindu Mahasabha meeting had a ‘profound impression’ upon all sections of Hindus.48 Interestingly, the governor’s report to the viceroy that some deterioration of the communal situation was ‘generally expected’ as a result of this meeting49 belied an undertone of indifference. At the Mahasabha session important leaders made charged speeches, urging the removal of untouchability as the primary goal of Hindus.50 A program of action was laid down for this whereby it was hoped that in the next two years, more steps should be taken to remove untouchability than the previous two hundred years.51 Resolutions were also moved for the formation of a volunteer corps called the Hindu Militia, the main task of which would be to reorganize and consolidate the Hindu community. Provincial Hindu Sabhas were urged to organize these militias in their respective provinces very seriously. Already from 1938, the Bharat Sevashram Sangha (BSS), a popular Hindu revivalist organization, had intensified its activities amongst Namasudras, Paundra-Kshatriyas and other Scheduled Castes in the districts of Jessore, Khulna, Faridpur and Barisal.52 The main plank of the BSS was to mobilize untouchables and lower castes in order to increase the ‘muscle power’ of the community.53 Now, the Mahasabha also took this up seriously. Hindu martial spirit was seen as a necessity, with renewed emphasis on consolidation of the community. It explicitly identified the Muslim as enemy in a rather narrow and polarized understanding of nationalism. In February 1940, tension was reported from the Pabna College, where the college authorities had allowed the Saraswati Puja to be held within the college. Muslims were annoyed by this because a similar request to hold the Bakr-id sacrifices had been denied the previous week.54 Saraswati Puja celebrations also resulted in communal tension in Faridpur. The Imam of the Court Mosque was assaulted, and a major clash was only just prevented.55 In Chuadanga (Nadia), as a reprisal of the ‘more than usually splendid celebration’ of the Puja, beef and remains of meals were strewn in front of Hindu houses.56 Cases of desecration of idols were reported from Brahmanbaria and Bakarganj. April and May saw a serious communal clash between Muslims of Khulna and Namasudras of Jessore. Heavy police patrols, posted in the area to prevent further trouble, continued till the end of May.57 Dacca itself was communally quite restive. During the Rathajatra festival in July 1940, there was a minor communal disturbance in the city when some Muslim shops and stables in the Madan Mohan Basak Road were burnt.58 Further trouble was prevented when both Hindus and Muslims of the area

34

Making Peace, Making Riots

formed a Peace Committee. Two hundred rupees were raised by subscription and paid to the owners as compensation for their losses. The Manasha Puja in August 1940 further raised the communal temper. A Hindu procession playing loud music crossed a mosque during prayer time and was stopped by Muslim worshippers. Although the matter was settled and there was no outward disorder, for a while communal tension simmered.59 The Murapara incident in August 1940 also added to this. Murapara was a village in Narayangunj subdivision of the district of Dacca. It was a part of the constituency of Mr Shahabuddin, a member of the Muslim League. In August 1940, some Muslims cut down branches of trees which adjoined a building described as ‘a mosque situated in the compound of a Hindu gentleman’.60 Orders were passed under Section 144 (which prohibited the assembly of more than five people), but they were defied and the police were attacked. A maulvi was suspected of having started the agitation. He was arrested, and the sanction of the Bengal Government for detaining him was sought. But the Government ordered the release of the maulvi, and League ministers subsequently pressurized the sub-divisional officer to adjourn the hearing of the case against all the accused.61 Both the Congress and the Mahasabha made high weather of this incident alleging that the League ministry had interfered in the law and order process to protect members of their own community. These were alarming signs of escalation of conflict. What consolidated and worsened the communal temper in almost the entire province were the Secondary Education Bill (1940) and the census propaganda of 1940–41. The Secondary Education Bill (hereafter referred to as SEB) was introduced in the Bengal Legislative Assembly in August 1940 by the Bengal Premier and Education Minister Fazlul Huq. The Bill proposed to set up a large board of secondary education to regulate and control it. It sought therefore to bring out secondary education from the control and regulation of the Calcutta University.62 The proposed board would consist of 50 members who would be elected through separate electorates. Excluding the president, the board would have 22 Hindus, 20 Muslims and 7 Europeans. In accordance with the Poona Pact, the Scheduled Castes (hereafter referred to as SCs) would have reserved seats among Hindu representation.63 Three important players now emerged on the political scene – League Muslims, ‘Caste Hindus’ and the Scheduled Castes. Muslim opinion in the Assembly, dominated by the League and its sympathizers, welcomed the government measure as a just one. Fazlul Huq himself claimed that the Bill was necessary since Muslims of Bengal



The Dacca Riot, 1941 35

had had a ‘bitter experience’ of the University’s conception of an ‘adequate representation’ of Muslim interests. Muslims had in the past years been grossly underrepresented in the University’s Syndicate, the body responsible for deciding the fate of secondary education.64 Fazlur Rahman, a League MLA of Dacca, also echoed similar sentiments when he claimed that the Calcutta University had so far followed an educational policy which had never taken into consideration the needs of Muslim students.65 Hence it was absolutely essential to wrest control of secondary education from the Calcutta University. The Bill was claimed to have the support of the ‘oppressed’ sections of Bengal, i.e. the Muslims and the SCs. The only reason as to why the Bill was labelled as a ‘communal’ one, argued Syed Badrudduja, was that it was being sponsored by a government that enjoyed the support of the Muslim majority of the province.66 SC leaders were already disenchanted with the Fazlul Huq Government in matters of their own education. They had earlier been disappointed with the budget of 1938–39, because only a paltry amount of Rs 30, 000 was granted for the development of SC education in Bengal.67 Under pressure from opposition from SC leaders, Huq presented a supplementary budget later that year. But even that had failed to impress the SC leaders in the Assembly, because the grant of Rs 5 lakhs that was provided was not an annual grant, but a nonrecurring grant to be spent over an unspecified number of years.68 Scheduled Caste leaders were mostly united in their opinion that the Secondary Education Bill of 1940 did not give them adequate representation on the proposed board. While the SC ministers in the Cabinet staunchly supported the bill69, there were others who had their reservations. Pramatha Ranjan Thakur70 opposed the bill on the grounds that the SC representation in the proposed board was inadequate. His contention was that on the board of fifty members, there would be only five SCs who would be ‘more or less nominated by the Government and the Scheduled Castes as a community would have no power to send in their representatives independently to the Board.’ 71 Moreover, although a Scheduled Caste Secondary Education Committee had been proposed, it was nowhere mentioned clearly in the bill that members of this committee would be solely SCs. Thakur, in fact, later resigned from the Select Committee where the bill was eventually sent. He explained that he was disillusioned by the conduct of the Muslim members on the committee.72 Rasik Lal Biswas, another SC MLA, had a mixed opinion. On one hand, he did not support the Caste Hindu motion for circulating the bill to elicit public opinion. He reasoned that the SC community was not organised enough to form a concerted public opinion. On the other hand, he

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Making Peace, Making Riots

also supported Thakur’s objection that the SC representation on the proposed board was grossly inadequate.73 Upendra Nath Barman, another SC MLA representing the Independent Scheduled Caste Party, supported the ‘principle’ of the bill, but at the same time, he supported the motion for circulating the bill for public opinion74. The Caste Hindu bloc, consisting of the Bengal Congress and the Hindu Mahasabha, opposed the Bill tooth and nail. Right at the very beginning, they refused to offer their names to the proposed Select Committee. The main bone of contention was that it brought communalism into education by introducing separate representation and that it increased official control over education. In this sense, Caste Hindus claimed, it was not an educational bill; rather, it was a political bill. They proposed that instead of immediately referring the bill to the Select Committee, it should be circulated for garnering public opinion. Congress representatives claimed that ‘in the interest of nationalism, the sacred field of education must be kept free from all communal questions.’75 The following argument is illuminating: It may be known to the House that the Hon’ble education minister has recently started a second grade college in his native village, which by the way is my village too, and may I tell the House that the staff he has appointed for the college is by no means Muslim in composition. It is rather Hindu in composition. Not that the Hon’ble education minister has any super-abundance of love for the Hindus or any hatred for his co-religionists! He has simply appointed the best men available in the field . . .’ 76 [Emphasis mine.]

The italicised phrases reek of the ingrained sense of superiority of Caste Hindus. The use of the phrase ‘second grade’ for a college set up by the Muslim education minister is juxtaposed with deep irony about the ‘best men’ in the field. It is also interesting that when a suggestion was made to institutionalize provisions for educationally disadvantaged groups, it was branded as communal. At the same time, the ‘Hindu’ discourse invariably ignored the special needs of the SCs. Caste Hindu opposition bordered on open threats. Atul Sen declared that if the Ministry tried to impose the bill, Hindus would ‘unsettle a settled fact’ and this would involve the two communities in a deadly conflict. Shyama Prasad Mookerjee, one of the most prominent leaders of the Hindu Mahasabha, argued that 75 per cent of the children in secondary schools belonged to Hindus, and most schools in the province had been set up by Hindu endeavour. Hence, it did not make sense to give control of education to Muslims. He offered three



The Dacca Riot, 1941 37

interesting courses to the Government of Bengal. One was to drop the bill ‘by the voice of reason.’77 The second, applicable if the government decided to go ahead with the bill, was that Hindus should be given the liberty to develop their education as they themselves deemed fit. This would involve, as he pompously declared: If for some years Hindus and Muslims living in Bengal can thus separately proceed with the task of their educational reconstruction in an atmosphere devoid of bitterness and conflict, it is more than likely that sooner than we expect they may both agree to evolve a national system of education consistent with the needs of the province . . . Let the finances be distributed in accordance with the number of pupils reading at various stages and let the professional institutions be maintained on a non-communal basis. Such separate provisions have existed in several countries faced with minority problems. Muslims urge in season and out of season that although for 90 years they have received education during British rule mainly in institutions funded and maintained by Hindu money, that the Hindus have been responsible for destroying their culture and retarding the growth of their education. If that is their true estimate and apprehension, it is better that they should take control of their education for some years to come.78

The third alternative for the government would be to force through the bill in spite of all opposition. In that case, threatened Mookerjee, Hindus were ready to fight the ‘menace’ rather than reduce themselves to ‘a state of subservience in the field of culture.’79 Prominent Mahasabha leaders toured different parts of Bengal condemning the Secondary Education Bill and urging Hindus to unite for the ‘national’ cause. At the same time, they reiterated the call for Hindu Sangathan as the crying need of the hour and promoted the Mahasabha as the only ‘Hindu Nationalist Organization.’80 The Bengal Hindu Mahasabha held its annual general meeting in Calcutta in September 1940. It was attended by about 250 members from all over the province. Its annual report presented at this meeting claimed that a great danger was threatening Bengal in the form of the Education Bill and all Hindus were asked to sink their differences of caste and class and rally under the leadership of Savarkar.81 The report also claimed that the membership of the Bengal Mahasabha was on the rise and that there were 366 branches of Hindu Sabhas at the end of August 1940, of which 153 had been established in the last year.82 A conjunction between education and community self-defence was visualised. The fear of disintegration of the ‘Hindu’ community as a result

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of increasing self-assertiveness of the SCs was linked with the obvious need of re-incorporating the latter within traditional Hindu fold. This was then mapped on to the fear of a projected disintegration of the great Hindu community because of an imminent Muslim onslaught through their attempted ‘Pakistanization’ of every domain of public life, including education. The need for organizing a volunteer corps for protecting the ‘legitimate rights’ of Hindus was reiterated. The Working Committee of the Mahasabha proposed to launch a movement for physical regeneration throughout the province. For this, the annual report claimed, a physical training camp had already been organised in Calcutta where several young men from different parts of Bengal were given training in self-defence techniques. They were said to have gone back to their respective districts to impart physical training in their own localities.83 The report thus represented Muslims in 1940: There was widespread campaign of vilification of Hindus, their deities and their worship, carried on by prominent members of the Moslem [sic] League Party. The chief minister also indulged in frequent outbursts and tirades against the Hindus. The ignorant Muslim masses in some cases thought that Muslim Raj had come and a number of images of Hindu deities and temples were broken and desecrated at some places in East and North Bengal. There were also many cases of economic boycott of Hindus . . .84

This report of the Mahasabha was published in prominent pro-Hindu newspapers such as the Hindusthan Standard and the Amrita Bazar Patrika. A cause-and-effect ripple was thus created by emphasizing the need to organise and unite the entire Hindu community and train it in a combat culture in order to defend themselves from a Muslim onslaught. Shyama Prasad Mookerjee himself went on a tour of important districts like Rajshahi, Dinajpur and Jalpaiguri on 9 September to promote the ideals of the Mahasabha and organise Sangathan. Before this, Mahasabha volunteers had extensively toured districts in Bengal to promote cow protection. These sustained efforts by the Mahasabha gradually bore fruit in some districts. In Namasudra populated areas like Jessore and Narail, events like the All Bengal Hindu Day, which was observed in August 1940, had some success.85 The Mahasabha drive also began to receive the active assistance of prominent SC leaders such as Patiram Roy (Paundra-Kshatriya community), who participated in the Backward Class Hindu Conference organised by the Bharat Sevashram Sangha in March 1941, where issues like conversion and Shuddhi were discussed.86



The Dacca Riot, 1941 39

The next wave of communal antagonism began with the census operations of 1941–42. The Bengal governor remarked in February 1941 that the most ‘lively interest’ was being displayed about them.87 Both Hindu and Muslim leaders proclaimed the danger that the census enumeration could underestimate numbers in their own community and inflate the numbers for the other. The charge was clearly reminiscent of the census propaganda of 1931, when allegations were made by both Hindus and Muslims that enumerators from the other community had exaggerated numbers of their own co-religionists by ‘fictitious entries’ while suppressing details about the other community.88 The Hindu Mahasabha now organised a series of meetings in various parts of the province, where important leaders like N. C. Chatterjee and S. P. Mookerjee emphasized the importance of the census figures and the necessity for ‘vigilance’ to see to it that the numbers were correctly recorded.89 The governor reflected that the tours and meetings organised by the Mahasabha were a cause of ‘immediate source of anxiety’ since they accentuated communal feelings, and remarked that ‘only the gravest consequences can be expected to result from an extended agitation by a body which could and would appeal to communal fanaticism and would be unrestrained by any profound adherence to principles of non-violence.’90 In a confidential report to the viceroy on 7 March 1941, he confided that as a result of the census issue, communal tensions had reached a climax.91 Fazlul Huq issued the following statement in March 1941: I am now convinced that the Muslims will be shown as something near 30% and the Hindus a little over 60% of the population in Bengal. What else could happen when lawyers, scientists, professors, lecturers, landlords, merchants, Brahmins and non-Brahmins and all the medley caste and sub-caste have deliberately combined to tell lies and make false statements in order to inflate their figures? What better can I expect when I find men who have spent their whole life in the teaching of the youth, making false statements without the slightest qualms of conscience and indulging in an orgy of chicanery, perjury and falsehood? . . . If dishonesty succeeds in Bengal as it has so often succeeded in the past, and a mockery of figures is put forth as a census of the population, I will decide definitely in favour of Pakistan.92

This was just the fodder that Hindu Mahasabha leaders needed. The Mahasabha used this as an opportunity to carry on their tirade against the Muslim leaders of the Ministry. N. C. Chatterjee, the president of the All Bengal Census Board, alleged that Huq had lost his mental balance.93 The

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Hindu Mahasabha held a massive protest meeting in Calcutta on 3 March 1941. It accused the chief minister of abusing his position and for carrying on a ‘persistent partisan propaganda of a viciously communal nature.’94 The meeting called upon all classes and sections of Hindus irrespective of political and party affiliations to unite, hold public meetings and express their ‘strong disapprobation’ of Fazlul Huq and demand that he be removed from the position of the chief minister of Bengal. Advocate Phanindranath Mukherjee filed a petition before the chief presidency magistrate on 7 March against Fazlul Huq on charges of defamation. Hindu teachers of Bengal also claimed that they were ‘indignant’ about the ‘reckless and mendacious’ charges levelled against teachers and professors as a ‘foul and sinister conspiracy’ to deflate the Muslim population of Bengal.95 A protest meeting of Hindus held at the Town Hall in Calcutta on 6 March ridiculed Huq thus: ‘We all earnestly request Mr Fazlul Huq to take leave, enjoy rest in a salubrious climate until there is complete restoration of mental equilibrium .  .  .’96 In the interior villages of different districts like Mymensingh, meetings were held under the auspices of the Mahasabha, where the chief minister’s remarks were discussed.97 The Hindu Conference held at Krishnanagar in November 1940 pointed out the importance of ‘accuracy’ in the census and urged Hindus to record themselves ‘simply as Hindus’98 and not give their caste details. It condemned the Bengal Government’s alleged intention to count Hindus according to their castes and subcastes while refusing to record the numbers of different Muslim social groups such as Momins, Bedias etc. The conference also passed several resolutions to promote Hindu solidarity, organise their defence power and even for the establishment of a military college in Bengal for imparting martial training to the Bengali youth.99 Amidst all this uproar, the Congress was conspicuous in its silence. Muslim League leaders reacted in a predictable fashion. At a meeting held in Town Hall in Calcutta on 9 March 1941, under the Presidency of Maulana Akram Khan, Member of Legislative Council (MLC), it was declared that the returns of the present census would be absolutely unacceptable to the Muslims, and that the census organizations in Bengal had supposedly been exploited by the Hindu Mahasabha and the Congress to undermine the Communal Award and the Poona Pact.100 The meeting expressed its confidence in the leadership of Fazlul Huq and characterized ‘the cry of a section of the Mahasabhite high class Hindu capitalists against Fazlul Huq as a device to cover their sins and offenses against census operation.’101 Khan accused the Hindu Mahasabha of appointing propaganda officers who toured the rural areas to deflate the



The Dacca Riot, 1941 41

number of Muslims. He warned Hindus that this tactic, if adopted in future, ‘would bring about a serious situation in the province.’102 Khan Bahadur Sharifuddin Ahmad, secretary of the Bengal Central Census Board, issued a statement to the press where he said that the propaganda started by the leaders of the Hindu Mahasabha through their public speeches and writings was ‘designed to inflate the number of Hindus and secure a reduction in the number of Muslims in this province and is consequently mischievous.’103 The press was entangled in both these issues, only making matters worse. Both pro-Hindu and pro-League newspapers published every detail of the Legislative Assembly proceedings on the Secondary Education Bill. The Hindusthan Standard gave its ‘unqualified support’ to the Caste Hindu Opposition.104 The entire text of the resignation letter of SC leader P. R. Thakur from the Select Committee was published on 8 September, wherein he mentioned that Muslim leaders were interested in the Bill only for communal reasons.105 The newspaper openly labelled the Hindu ‘cause’ as the truly ‘national’ one, while that of the Muslims was denigrated as communal. The difference, it claimed, between the Hindu and Muslim cause was obvious: It is that Hindus want a Board composed of educationists who should have the interests of education at heart and would have no objection to a Board entirely composed of Muslims if they were taken in on the ground of their educational experience and knowledge of educational problems and not because they professed a particular faith. They would, for the same underlying reason, equally strongly oppose the inclusion of a single Muslim in the Board if he came simply as a Muslim and a party nominee . . . their opposition is prompted by considerations which it is easy to recognise as those of the nation.106

Details of protest meetings held all over the province were published almost daily by pro-Hindu newspapers. A very grandiose description of the Krishnanagar Hindu Conference was published in the erudite monthly journal Modern Review. It claimed that thousands attended the conference at the Town Hall, and an equally large number stood outside, listening to speeches of Mahasabha leaders on loudspeakers.107 The Amrita Bazar Patrika described the Hindu protest meeting at the Calcutta Town Hall on 6 March thus, It was a mammoth gathering which assembled at the Town Hall on Thursday – a gathering which was without parallel within recent memory. It reminded one of the greatest demonstration which was held years ago to protest against the attack of Lord Lytton against the women of Bengal over which Mrs Sarojini Naidu presided. Yesterday’s demonstration bore eloquent testimony to the

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Making Peace, Making Riots depth of indignation to which the feelings of Hindus have been roused by the attacks of the chief minister. Both by its size and representative character the demonstration was unique. Thousands were crowded out, who filled up the steps of the Town Hall and adjoining places and listened to the proceedings, which were broadcast through loud-speakers.108

The Muslim point of view, in an article published in the Statesman under the column ‘Shahed’109 ridiculed S. P. Mookerjee’s three courses to the Bengal Government about the Secondary Education Bill. Regarding the second course of action, where Mookerjee suggested a separation of educational institutions for Hindus and Muslims, the article suggested that it was nothing short of an acceptance of Pakistan. It pointed out that the same instinct which had prompted Mookerjee to suggest the separation of education in Bengal had prompted Muslim minorities in India to seek a similar political solution for a bigger problem.110 The Star of India, the League mouthpiece in Bengal, published an editorial on 7 February 1941 regarding the census operations. It issued a warning that the Muslims of Bengal were in ‘blissful slumber’ while attempts were made ‘to cut the soil of this province from underneath their feet.’111 It claimed that it could give the Bengal Muslims ‘irrefutable evidence’ that an overwhelming majority of Hindus of Bengal was thinking only in terms of the census and praying that by any means the tables will be turned on the Muslims of Bengal.112 It stated, ‘With all the emphasis at our command we warn the Muslims of Bengal today that their very existence in this province is at stake, as inflation of the Hindus spells, as sure as the rising sun, the annihilation of the Muslims of Bengal.’113 On 4 March 1941, the Star of India wrote provocatively, ‘The time has come for the little rats to know that the lion is not dead, only sleeping; the challenge is to be accepted; the enmity is to be met on its own ground; Mussalmans cannot resort to meanness and trickeries which characterise their political enemies; the Hindus will see to whom Bengal belongs; they shall be taught the lesson they need.’114 Incidentally, although the governor watched the census propaganda very closely and admitted that it was leading to a worsening of the communal situation, he did not act upon it. He justified his inaction to Linlithgow stating, These charges and counter charges have raised a high pitch of communal feeling, but I felt that it would be unwise to strike in any obvious manner until the census operations were over, lest I should be accused of interfering with that freedom of speech which both sides demanded as a requisite to ensure that their followers were enumerated.115



The Dacca Riot, 1941 43

After the census enumeration was over in March, John Herbert proposed to hold a meeting to discuss the situation. The meeting would comprise of the representative leaders of each group in the assembly, i.e. the Muslims, Scheduled Castes, the Forward Bloc (represented by Sarat Bose) and the official Conress (represented by Kiran Shankar Roy). He assured the viceroy that at this meeting he would take a ‘very firm and uncompromising line, because at this stage any hesitancy would only lead to an intensification of communal disharmony.’116 Obviously, the governor was too late. He had felt the communal pulse in the city before the census propaganda had started. Had he acted earlier, some efforts could have been made to keep the leaders of both the communities in check. Such indifference of the colonial government was not new. It was not the first time that they had been confronted with rising communal temper before or during census enumerations. Communal animosities around census speculations were known from the time of the 1911 census.117 Commenting on the effects of census, Kenneth Jones remarks, ‘Religions became communities mapped, counted and above all compared with other religious communities.’118 Pradip Kumar Datta explains that the census could explain to some extent the stabilization of identities around new religious orientations, backed up by institutional facilities such as reserved education and employment quotas.119 Holi celebrations on 13 and 14 March led to a number of instances of communal tension in the province.120 At Bhola (Bakarganj), local officers tried to take measures to prevent coloured water from being sprinkled on Muslims. However, a couple of instances of that did take place. In retaliation, some Muslims slaughtered a calf and paraded the town with the carcass sprinkling its blood on the way.121 Three Muslims were arrested in this connection. The situation in Chittagong and Noakhali were reported to be ‘very threatening’ but no actual disturbances occurred.122 In Khulna, on the borders of Faridpur and Bakarganj, trouble was reported on 14 March. A minor issue over the price of jute developed into a very serious confrontation between Muslims and Namasudras.123 A Namasudra village and a Muslim village were burnt leaving three dead and many more injured. Considerable stocks of grain were also destroyed. But the most serious disturbance took place in Dacca, which we shall now study in detail. THE RIOT On 14 March, the day of Holi, trouble started at Sankhari Bazar, an area thickly populated by the Sankharis, or Hindu conch-shell workers. Coloured

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water fell on a Muslim woman and resulted in a minor clash between the two communities. There were disturbances near the Babu Bazar Police Station and at the entrance to the Sankhari Bazar, where the two communities threw brickbats at each other, but crowds were dispersed quickly by the arrival of the police.124 15 and 16 March were relatively quiet. On the 17th, some Hindu milkmen at Naya Sarak Yusuf Market were attacked by Muslims.125 The same night, twelve Hindus and six Muslims were assaulted in different parts of the town of Dacca. The situation worsened from the night of 17 March, when there was a small fire in a Muslim shed on the Tanti Bazar and Malitola Bridge Junction. There were rumours of an attack on a temple at Malitola on the 17th. However, the Dacca Riot Enquiry Committee claimed that there was no apparent damage to the temple and no deliberate attack had taken place, although stray missiles could have landed nearby as a result of the crowds throwing brickbats at each other126. On the night of 17 March, one Muslim was stabbed to death while nine Muslims and six Hindus were injured. There are discrepancies in reports about a funeral procession carrying the corpse of Faiz Khan, the Muslim who was stabbed to death on 17 March. Several Hindu witnesses claimed before the Enquiry Committee that on 18 March they saw a funeral procession of a Muslim at the north-west end of the city, numbering around 2500, and that the processionists were crying out ‘Allah hoo Akbar’ and ‘Hindu sala log ko maro.’127 (Kill the wretched Hindus). The police, however, reported that the procession consisted only of about fifteen to twenty family members of the deceased and that there was no shouting of slogans.128 The official Riot Enquiry Committee agreed with the police report. The first ‘pitched battle’ between the two communities occurred on the morning of 18 March at the junction of the Manohar Khan Bazar with the Nawabpur road.129 The Manohar Khan Bazar was a Muslim stronghold to the west of the Nawabpur road which divided it from the Hindu stronghold of Thatari Bazar.130 Even the additional superintendent of police (city) was attacked with bricks when he arrived at the scene of trouble.131 Arson of a serious nature began in the city from 18 March. The first fire broke out at Mihilal Saha’s cloth shop on the main Chowk Circular Road at about 10 pm.132 The Chowk area was the main Hindu business centre and the Sahas were the wealthiest Hindu mercantile community of Dacca. More cases of arson were reported from the morning of the 19th. Between 11 am and 1 pm, shops of Gopi Mohan Saha and the Padma Bastralaya on the west and east corners of Sawari Ghat Lane were set ablaze. On the 20th and 21st, more shops in Sawari Ghat and Barakatra and on the Chowk Circular Road were damaged by fire.133



The Dacca Riot, 1941 45

From 19 March, the delivery of mail stopped for about a fortnight. Since the afternoon of 19 March, an order under section 144 of the Criminal Procedure Code was put into force in Dacca, prohibiting the assembly of more than five persons and on carrying of weapons, and imposed a curfew order.134 A state of emergency was declared, and the Dacca Defence Scheme was brought into operation by 9 pm on 18 March. It provided for greater police mobilization and for calling out the Eastern Frontier Rifles and posting them at certain danger points in the city.135 On 21 March afternoon, the rioting took a turn for the worse when Mr P. Nag, the subdivisional officer at Dacca, was stabbed near Islampur while trying to disperse riotous crowds. Around noon that day, there was a ‘serious clash’ between the two communities near Swamibagh, in the course of which members of both communities sustained serious injuries.136 The police arrived and arrested a number of apparently innocent Hindu youths, as a result of which Hindus of that locality panicked, and began to leave their homes and move elsewhere within the city; some were reported to be leaving Dacca altogether.137 The Amrita Bazar Patrika reported that from 21 March, foodstuff in the city had run short in some Hindu localities. When people from such localities went to Narayanganj for food, Muslim shopkeepers refused to sell them anything.138 Reports of attacks on mosques and temples were mostly exaggerated. However, there were a few attacks on both between the 18th and the 21st. The Thatari Bazar mosque, some twenty or thirty yards from the junction of Nawabpur Road, was attacked on the 18th. The Rai Saheb Bazar mosque was also damaged on 19 March, but the Enquiry Committee claimed that there was no clear evidence that it had been deliberately attacked. On the 19th, a temple at south Maisundi was attacked and partly burnt.139 There was a brief lull in the disturbances between 21 and 28 March, although isolated cases of stabbing, looting and arson continued during this period. Armed and unarmed pickets were posted in different localities. Armed police passed along the main roads in every locality from the night of 21 March.140 On 22 March, due to rumours that the Gopibagh locality to the east of Hatkhola would be attacked by Muslims from villages, most Hindu women and children fled the area. At about 11 pm, a Muslim hut was burnt in the locality.141 The Amrita Bazar Patrika reported of it being rumoured that with a view to throw the blame on the Hindus, some Muslims of the area had set fire to the hut.142 On 23 May, shops began to open at Patuatuli, Nawabpur and Islampur.143 From 25 March, curfew was relaxed and new curfew hours imposed from 10 pm to 5 am.144 From 27 March, tension eased further and

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people started visiting adjacent localities to enquire about friends and relatives. Still both communities remained confined in localities dominated by their coreligionists.145 Panic continued in the city. Leaders of the Bengal Provincial Muslim League issued a statement on 22 March asking the Muslims of Dacca not to hold ‘Pakistan Day’ celebrations on 23 March, as had been decided by the All India Muslim League.146 However, there were widespread protests against this decision. The Star of India, in an article on 24 March 1941, wrote: We do not see why the League Executive should think that if Muslims hold their Pakistan Day meetings, communal situation would further deteriorate. There is nothing in the Pakistan scheme which can be termed as communal; the Muslims have a scheme which is, at least, according to themselves, the only solution to the Indian impasse . . .147

Eventually, Pakistan Day meetings were held all over Calcutta and in the rest of the province, but not in Dacca. Such self-restraint by the provincial government changed completely with the stepping up of the Pakistan demand in Bengal from 1944, as we shall observe in subsequent chapters. On 22 March, the governor of Bengal wrote to the viceroy that orders have been issued under the Defence of India Rules for pre-censorship of all except approved press reports on the Dacca Riot.148 According to the order, ‘all matters relating to any communal disturbance in the province, whether by way of news, comment, correspondence, notice, statement, advertisement, illustration, or otherwise, shall, before being published in any document, be submitted for scrutiny to a) In Calcutta to the special press advisor b) Elsewhere to the district press advisor.’149 While the situation in Dacca city remained serious, there was an outbreak of disturbances in the Narsinghdi Circle in the Narayanganj subdivision of the district of Dacca from 1 April. Raipura, Shibpur and Narsinghdi thanas were the worst affected areas. In the rural areas, Muslims were the chief aggressors. Trouble started at Adiabad Bazar (also known as the Radhaganj Bazar) on 1 April in Raipura, when a number of Hindu shops were attacked by Muslims.150 There are contradictory reports as to why the trouble started, but from this point onwards the situation deteriorated rapidly and ‘large bands of Muslims, in most instances several hundred strong, attacked Hindu villages or Hindu paras, committing looting and arson on a very large scale.’151 The Adiabad - Rahimabad area, just on the border of Raipura and Shibpur police stations were roughly the center of disturbances in the rural areas.



The Dacca Riot, 1941 47

A letter from the Hindu inhabitants of Sutrapur to the district magistrate of Dacca stated that on the night of 2 April, there was a ‘serious attempt’ to attack and loot Hindu houses of the mohalla by not less than 300 Muslims of the neighbouring areas; the miscreants started throwing brickbats and gulail to frighten and drive away the inhabitants from their houses, which would allow them to loot the vacant houses.152 Hindu witnesses deposed before the Enquiry Committee that their villages were attacked by Muslim mobs numbering between two hundred and two thousand, headed by persons ‘who seemed to be leaders’, dressed in khaki or black shirts and carrying swords.153 They shouted slogans such as ‘Allah-hoo-Akbar’, ‘Pakistan Zindabad ’, ‘Huq Saheb ki Jai’ etc. They also claimed that the mob told them that they had been given seven days when they were free to attack the Hindus who must either accept Islam or leave the locality.154 This advance intimation of forced conversion later became widespread in Noakhali in 1946. Members of the Enquiry Committee visited parts of the rural area affected by the riot on 7th and 8th June, and also made an aerial survey of the affected area on 13 June. It admitted that even after two months of the occurrence of the disturbances, the scenes were ‘pathetic’ - villages had been razed to the ground and all that remained were a few pucca houses, iron safes and blackened corrugated iron sheets.155 From the morning of 3 April, an exodus of people to Agartala and Tripura started. In a letter to the viceroy on 7 April 1941, the governor of Bengal reported that planes were used for reconnaissance and that the presence of the inspector general of police at Dacca would ensure fair and firm action. The governor was eager to emphasize prompt action by the police and military in Dacca. He pointed out that the police force had been reinforced by three platoons of Eastern Frontier Rifles to prevent the further spread of disorders. On 1 July 1941, he informed the viceroy that the police force had been further strengthened by twelve European sergeants from Calcutta, 150 East Frontier Rifles from Chittagong and Barrackpur and 450 armed police from Presidency, Burdwan and Rajshahi Range reserves.156 On 10 April 1941, the governor reported that the situation was returning to normal and more than 200 arrests had already been made.157 He stressed that the riots had been confined to ‘general looting and arson’ and no authenticated reports of assault or forcible conversion had been received. In a telegram on 19 April, he further stated that about 2000 refugees had already returned to their villages and the situation was completely under control.158 On 14 April, an announcement was made that ‘in all cases in Dacca of assaults on individuals

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or rioting or street fighting or any other disturbance whatsoever, wholesale arrests are liable to be made of male persons of the community believed to be responsible residing in the locality.’159 The Enquiry Committee claimed that these wholesale arrests had a good deterring effect, although it admitted that the system of wholesale arrests had inconvenienced many innocent and law abiding citizens.160 Although in the rural areas Hindus were generally the victims, instances of retaliation were not completely absent. A Bengali pamphlet circulating in Dacca on 17 April 1941 goaded Hindus to take revenge on the ‘infidel Muslim community’ which was carrying on ‘inhuman oppression’ on Hindus.161 The pamphlet claimed that Hindus were being coerced to embrace Islam, eat beef and read the Koran. On refusal, they were apparently killed. It also stated that the Muslim hooligans were ‘ravishing’ Hindu women and ‘polluting temples by throwing beef therein’, and declared that: Brothers! Kick at the British lion and seize the sceptre of justice in your own hands. With your own hand stab your assailant at his heart. Drink the blood of his heart and pacify your heart. Unite all the Hindus living in various localities of the town and attack the Muslim localities in an organized way from all directions and annihilate them. And afterwards make a drive towards the villages and destroy the Muslims totally.162

The Intelligence Branch of Calcutta, in a report on 14 May 1941, stated that they had information from their ‘agent’ that an ‘ex-convict’ Gobinda Kar was travelling to the United Provinces via Calcutta ‘to procure an expert in bomb-making’ and to collect arms ‘for the purpose of committing outrages’ against Muslims of Dacca.163 The agent also reported that ‘attempts were being made to procure phosphorous and carbon sulphate to make fire-bombs for perpetrating outrages on the Muslims in the town.’164 An intercepted Bengali letter from one Noni Gopal Das of Dacca spoke of the fear psychosis and the drive for retaliation that had seized Hindus. The letter asks the recipient to send help soon and if possible send some daggers. He specified, ‘The daggers must be double edged. Supplying a sketch. Tear out the letter. Mind it that you are living in Mohameddan reign.’165 The Special Branch of the Calcutta Police had information that members of the Dacca Anushilan Party were trying to ‘avenge the wrong committed upon the Hindus.’166 The party sought to procure arms from Comilla for this



The Dacca Riot, 1941 49

purpose. Apparently, the party had also advised its student members to keep a number of daggers in stock. A member of the party, Kedareswar Sengupta, had apparently declared that attempts had also been made to secure financial help from the Hindu Mahasabha.167 Disturbances at Dacca led to troubling repercussions in an already communally charged province. In April, the governor admitted to fearing that clashes might spread to the neighbouring district of Tippera, and police forces were sent out as a precautionary measure.168 In Feni (Noakhali), there were a few reports of temple desecrations. In Patuakhali (Bakarganj) an idol was found inside a mosque, after which a cow’s skull was planted in a temple.169 The situation in Chittagong was also reported to be ‘worrying.’170 ‘Alarmist rumours’ were circulated throughout East Bengal.171 The governor wrote to the viceroy that in Calcutta, some highly objectionable leaflets were circulating amongst Hindus which urged them to rise up against Muslim ‘oppression’ and gave the most ‘lurid and exaggerated’ account of the Dacca disturbances.172 He observed, ‘There is no doubt that the order imposing censorship of news from Dacca has been of great value in controlling the spread of rumours, but it is difficult to prevent their dissemination by leaflets and letters.’173 In a report dated 7 April 1941, the Special Branch of the Calcutta police stated that as a result of the riot, the position of the Hindu Mahasabha had greatly improved and that of the Bengal Congress had declined.174 Almost everyone in Dacca, the report said, was unwilling to contribute to the Relief Fund opened by the Congress, but would readily contribute to that of the Mahasabha. The report claimed that this was because there was a general perception that the Bengal Congress, being a non-communal body, was providing relief to both Hindus and the Muslims, and this would not be tolerated by the Hindus of Dacca.175 The Mahasabha propaganda had borne fruit and resulted in preventing Hindus from contributing to the Congress fund. There were other instances too of attempts by the Mahasabha to communalize the situation even more. In a letter on 9 April 1941, the Central Intelligence Officer from Karachi wrote to his counterpart in Calcutta that the general secretary of the Bengal Hindu Mahasabha had been sending photos of Hindu riot casualties to local and other papers all over the country.176 He was claiming that property worth Rs 25 lakhs had been destroyed. He had asked the newspapers to publish these reports and pictures so that Hindus all over the country would know about the fate of Hindus at Dacca.177 The riots, therefore, considerably helped the fortunes of communal political parties, even as they seriously polarised Hindus and Muslims.

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CHARACTERISTICS MARKING THE RIOT While the riots of 1941 showcased some of the familiar patterns of violence, there were also some marked differences. The nature of violence in this riot also set the trend for rioting that would become rampant in the riots of Calcutta and Noakhali in 1946. As in the disturbances of 1926 and 1930, houses and shops belonging to the Saha community were attacked most often. But unlike previous instances, these attacks were much more violent. For three days, from 19 to 21 March, there was considerable looting and enormous destruction of property by arson in the Chowk area.178 As mentioned before, the Chowk was the main centre for Hindu business. It largely comprised of double- or triple-storeyed brick buildings, belonging to the Sahas. Rooms on the ground floor were used as showrooms and godowns where goods were stored. The DREC stated that it was clear that the total loss incurred by the Hindu business community in this area was quite large.179 Stabbing was not ‘sporadic’ as in earlier riots but it was now the most common method used to harm or kill members of the other community. The governor of Bengal, in a telegram to the viceroy on 28 June, stated that there had been reports of stabbing following the Rathajatra festival.180 It became a more frequent feature with Fazlul Huq’s visit to Dacca. An intercepted letter by the Special Branch of Calcutta Police, from one Mr A. B. Guha to Shyama Prasad Mookerjee, dated 10 April 1941, stated that the presence of the chief minister and other ministers in the province encouraged fresh cases of stabbing, including one at the Jagannath Hall of the Jagannath University of Dacca, which led to the closure of the university.181 Hindu residents of Dacca were hence drawing a direct link between the presence of League ministers and an escalation of violence. From 17 March to 3 June, the DREC reported that there had been 86 reported cases of stabbings in the city.182 Arson and looting assumed serious proportions and this was a major departure from the previous instances of disturbances. Both Hindus and Muslims set fire to each other’s shops. Fires were started ‘surreptitiously’ from the gullies and passages behind the big shops. The ordinary method was to pour kerosene oil under the doors and then insert a burning rag at the end of a stick . . . As a rule, the shop was set on fire first and looting took place when the fire was extinguished and goods were exposed.183



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The method ensured that fires would have taken a firm hold before their presence was discovered.184 The Enquiry Committee, on its part, noted that there was a complete absence of fire-fighting appliances in Dacca, apart from the so-called ‘fire engine’ which was apparently a converted watering cart. The water hose leaked at several places and most attempts to douse the flames were useless.185 The greater part of the looting took place in later stages when the intensity of the fire had reduced and the goods inside the shop or the house were exposed.186 However, as the Enquiry Committee claimed, the general impression of looting was also exaggerated, since many people who saw owners removing goods with the help of the police jumped to the conclusion that rioters were looting with the help of the police.187 Kamini Kumar Dutta, (a Congressman and a member of the Legislative Council) found, after a tour of the affected areas in the rural hinterland, that only Hindu houses were burnt.188 He pointed out that the modus operandi of the parties committing loot and arson was the same. They first demanded money for exempting the houses from fire and loot. After extorting the money, some houses were spared, but most of them were still looted and burnt.189 He claimed that from the statements of a large number of victims, it appeared to him that the ‘raiding parties’ had a list with them of the prominent houses to be looted and burnt. They mostly belonged to rich moneylenders and landlords.190 Forced conversions were a novelty for the 1941 riot. While there were no reported cases of conversion to Islam from the city, several were reported from rural areas. No specific numbers were, however, available. Many witnesses from Raipura, Shibpur and Narsinghdi gave evidence of forced conversion or attempts at conversion before the Enquiry Committee.191 According to the report of the DREC, instances were ‘both numerous and widespread.’192 One Hindu witness claimed that after his house was looted, a number of Muslims came to him on 4 April and told him that if he did not embrace Islam, his house would be burnt. His family was forced to recite the kalma and wear a lungi, and a paper was given to him with the instruction that if any Muslim later came to burn his house, the piece of paper should be shown to him. The contents of the paper could be translated as, ‘We of Laterba Palpara have embraced the sacred Islamic faith. Every Muslim should see to it that no house of Laterba is molested.’ It was signed by one ‘Maulvi Korbanali of Sachimara.’193 The Additional Superintendent of Police Mr Mukherji also reported a similar instance on 3 April. On his way to quell a fire, he heard shouts of Allah-hooAkbar at a distance. Reaching the house from which slogans were emanating, he found a large number of people assembled there. Some Muslims were

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arrested after the Hindu owner of the house complained of attempts at forced conversion. On a table in the room, there was a paper which read, ‘We the following persons accept Islam voluntarily and in good faith.’194 Almost all cases of loot and arson followed the same pattern. First, Hindu inmates were asked if they would convert to Islam. If they agreed, they were immediately made to go through a formal ceremony of conversion. In some cases, houses of converted Hindus were spared from loot and arson, but they were informed that a common feast would soon be held where they would have to eat beef and marry off ‘their women’ to Muslims.195 Members of the Congress and the Mahasabha shouted themselves hoarse that the riot was the direct result of the propaganda around Pakistan. The Bengal Congress claimed that after the Pakistan meeting at Bhairab (where Nazimuddin had presided), local Muslim leaders were bold enough to preach that ‘Pakistan has been established and that only Muslims should reside in Pakistan and the Hindus who would be converted may be allowed to live in Pakistan.’196 S. P. Mookerjee also claimed that Muslim attackers were crying out slogans like Pakistan Zindabad, Jinnah Zindabad and Fazlul Huq Zindabad.197 According to him, reports gathered by the Hindu Mahasabha from the refugees indicated that Muslims had proclaimed that Pakistan had been established, and demanded that Hindus should embrace Islam if they wanted to live peacefully.198 Instances of attacks on the police and the armed forces by the rioters were not uncommon. On 19 March, there was one such incident at the Nawab Yusuf Bazar, when rioters attacked a police party with brickbats and shouts of Allah-hoo-Akbar. Soon, more rioters gathered and threw more bricks at the police. Some forces of the Eastern Frontier Rifles patrolling the area warned the rioters and eventually had to open fire at them in self-defense, as a result of which three of them died on the spot and two others died later in a hospital.199 On the same day, when Mr Ranjit Roy tried to approach a row of abandoned Hindu shops which had been set on fire along the road between Maulvi Bazar and Chowk Square, he found the street barricaded with broken planks from which large nails were sticking out, making it impossible for motor cars to approach the scene.200 On 21 March, at Swamibagh, when the police arrived at a scene of disturbance, Inspector Allen was almost shot from one of the Hindu houses.201 This incident led to the arrest of 94 Hindus. On 4 April, at Saikerchar, which is at a short distance from the Rahimabad area, a police party was attacked by a Muslim mob.202.



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Charges were repeatedly levelled by both local Hindus and Muslims and by leaders, especially of the Hindu Mahasabha, of inaction and discrimination by the police and local authorities. S. P. Mookerjee, commenting on the system of mass arrests, stated that the police failed to get hold of the actual assailants, and a large number of people, most of whom were innocent, were arrested in a general round up of local people. He further claimed that houses of wellknown Hindus were searched without any pretext.203 The station master of Khanabari had informed Kamini Dutta that on receipt of information about the looting of the Radhanagar Bazar on the afternoon of 1 April, he had sent a message to the district magistrate and the police superintendent of Dacca repeatedly, but no immediate action was taken by the concerned authorities.204 Mookerjee complained that many attacks against the Hindus could have been averted if the police officers at Raipura had made even a little effort in time. He also suggested that in the earlier stages, the attitude of the authorities was characterized by ‘practically complete apathy’ and that they refused to accept suggestions made by Hindus for the adoption of effective precautionary measures to prevent the spread of the mischief.205 According to him, ‘Known bad characters of different affected localities were allowed to roam at large, in spite of repeated suggestions from the Hindu public to control their movements.’ He cited examples of two such goondas, Arman and Habib.206 Activities of the goonda named Arman were also discussed by the Enquiry Committee. Interestingly, according to the Committee Report, Arman, a wellknown burglar, had surrendered himself to the police a few days before the riot broke out, saying that he was likely to be implicated falsely by the Hindus in the event of a communal riot. He asked permission to reside in the thana. Permission was granted to him, but no watch was kept on his movements during the day. The Enquiry Committee Report mentions: ‘The result was that he lived in the security of the police station from where he could, if so disposed, sally forth for any criminal purpose and return again safe from pursuit’.207 So the concerns raised by Mookerjee in terms of the free movement of goondas were not completely without foundation. A Hindu witness claimed that when his shop was looted by some Muslim rioters, he went to the subdivisional officer for help, but nobody came to his rescue.208 The same witness also claimed that when he was trying to move the women of his household to safety, because all Hindu shops near him were set on fire, he had again gone to the Armed Police for help, but to no avail.209 The Enquiry Committee too confirmed three cases where the authorities did not live up to their roles. The first was the case of Sub-Inspector Ansaruddin.

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According to the committee report, on 19 and 20 March, he did little to stop disturbances in the Chowk area. His movements from 18 March to 22 March were not very clear, and his arrivals and departures were not clearly mentioned in the station diary. His personal diary too, it appeared, had been written up later and was wrongly dated.210 Two other sub-inspectors, Mr Aziz and Mr Abdul Latif were also accused by the Enquiry Committee of ignoring their primary duties of preventing fire and looting in the Chowk area for performing ‘less important and urgent duties.’211 However, the Enquiry Committee was quick to mention that their inactivity was not due to their ‘pronounced sympathy’ with the Muslims; rather it was their failure to realize the seriousness of the conditions of the area which had prompted them to pay attention to other tasks.212 Nonetheless, the inaction of the police force and the presence of the League-dominated Government added to the feelings of insecurity and distrust. The Enquiry Committee repeatedly made excuses as to why it was difficult for the police to arrest more offenders and recover larger quantities of loot. It said that the maze of lanes and alleyways which intersected every few yards of the town afforded countless means for culprits to escape.213 It claimed that the police force was ‘wholly inadequate’ to patrol entire areas and ‘pursuit would almost certainly be fruitless.’214 The police were unable to arrest several Muslim goondas who were active during the riot, because apparently, the names that were submitted by the Hindus to the police were only nicknames, and the police had no other information by which they could take desired action against them.215 In fact the DREC also blamed the public for not offering any cooperation. People not only failed to give information that might have led to the arrest of offenders or to the recovery of property, but also increased the difficulties of the police ‘by frequently summoning them to deal with incidents which only existed in their own fearful minds.’216 The committee maintained that the public often made ‘unreasonable demands’ for police protection – ‘The waste of police material in affording such protection is obvious, and the insistent demand shows how little the public appreciate the magnitude of the task which the police were called upon to perform.’217 It is obvious that the scale of violence and level of organization in 1941 was much higher than in the previous instances. In the riots of 1926 and 1930, the main victims were the economically better off class amongst Hindus, especially the Sahas. But although there were attacks on the houses of wealthy Sahas in the Chowk area, stabbings and murders now became more numerous and they were not limited to well-off Hindus alone. The Enquiry Committee itself



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described the violence as ‘an orgy of indiscriminate stabbing . . . all that was necessary was that the victim should be a member of the opposite community. Beggars and cripples were not spared so long as the number of victims could be increased.’218 Violence was directed at all parts of the rival community – places of worship, homes and the body itself.219 This time the links of the riot with the world of organized politics were more conspicuous. The concept of a community was more consolidated and active. In the conjunction of class and community, scales were tipped heavily in favour of the latter. ANTI-COMMUNAL RESISTANCE, RELIEF AND REHABILITATION Even amidst such dark times, a flicker of hope still shimmered in the form of inter-community solidarity and goodwill. Even before the riot started, some friendly Muslims warned the Hindus about impending violence.220 Some rich Hindus left their valuables with local Muslims and the latter kept them safely and returned them to the respective owners after the disturbances had subsided.221 There were some mosques in the Hindu majority quarters which were protected and defended by Hindus, and likewise, Muslims protected many temples in Muslim majority areas.222 Neighbourliness was a habit that persisted even in times of great rupture. After violence had continued for some time, there was a general tendency among all political organizations to restore order. On 22 March, S. P. Mookerjee, Dr R. C. Majumdar, the nawab of Dacca and a few other Hindu and Muslim leaders went to different localities in the city and appealed to the people for peace with assurances of adequate police protection in case of fresh trouble.223 A goodwill mission of students under the joint auspices of the Bengal Provincial Students Federation (BPSF) and the All Bengal Muslim Students League left for Dacca from Calcutta on 22 March, to try and establish communal harmony and provide relief to distressed victims.224 On 25 March, a meeting of students of both communities was held at a park in the city, where peace measures were discussed. Mr Gairuddin Pradhan, general secretary of the Carmichael Hostel of the Dacca University, attended it. He said that students were the key to restoring Hindu-Muslim unity and appealed to Muslim students to come forward and help the victims.225 It has been mentioned before that the Government of Bengal had tried to cancel the Pakistan Day meetings which were to be held in the city on 23 March. The official Government communiqué read:

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Making Peace, Making Riots Government have noted with regret that recent events at Dacca and a few other places have interfered with the communal concord which had hitherto been prevailing throughout the province. They are therefore anxious that the situation should not further deteriorate. To this end they are of the opinion that it is most desirable that no meeting should be held to put forward the views of any particular community since, at this juncture, such meetings may, even inadvertently, be the cause of accentuating communal discord.226

Several Relief Committees sprang up in the city of Dacca and in affected rural areas. Important amongst them were the Bharat Sevashram Sangha, the Ramakrishna Mission, the Narayanganj-Dacca Hindu Relief Committee, the Marwari Relief Society, the Hindu Mahasabha, the Congress Constructive Workers Association and The Bengali Merchants Association. However, apart from the last two relief groups, all of the above provided relief exclusively to Hindus. Ananda Prasad Choudhuri of the Congress Constructive Workers Association, in a letter to Rajkumari Amrit Kaur at Sevagram (Wardha) on 17 May 1941, mentioned that the largest amount of relief material was distributed by the government; the government provided up to a pound of free rice per day to every Hindu in about 65–70 villages affected in the area.227 After 10 April, the government stopped the supply of free rice and started advancing agricultural loans instead. The Congress Constructive Workers Association ran a cheap grain shop where rice was sold to the distressed at reduced prices. However, deep distrust prevailed between the two communities and restoring goodwill was, understandably, not easy. Nalini Ranjan Sarkar and Kiran Shankar Roy, leaders of the Bengal Congress Assembly Party, along with Kalipada Mukherjee, member of the All India Congress Committee, arrived at Mymensingh on 16 April on their way to Dacca. There, they met prominent Congress workers and held discussions on the communal problem. Kiran Shankar Roy, also from the Congress, pointed to the danger of false rumours. He said that whatever might be the political differences between the two communities, the path of fighting and rioting was certainly not the way to settle differences.228 He appealed to the people of Mymensingh to make the peace committees a ‘living organization’ so that all causes of friction could be properly dealt with and the spread of false rumours and ‘mischievous propaganda’ might be avoided. A printed appeal for peace by Chief Minister Fazlul Huq was also circulated all over Dacca on 18 April.229 But their belated peace efforts were not entirely successful. Panic-stricken refugees began to leave Dacca from the night of 2 April and took shelter in Agartala in the state of Tripura. The ruler of Tripura, Maharaja Manikya



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Bahadur, gave them asylum. Kamini Kumar Dutta claimed that he had visited Agartala and by the morning of 5 April, the number of refugees had reached five thousand.230 The Railway Company, claimed Dutta, was transporting these refugees free of charge. By 8 April, the number of refugees at Agartala had reached ten thousand, and a relief committee was formed there by local Hindus and Muslims to tend to their needs. Maharaja Manikya Bahadur personally looked after the conveyance of the refugees to Agartala and their accommodation there. He also agreed to give any amount of land that the refugees would require for erecting their temporary shelters.231 However, the biggest problem was how to restore confidence in their minds and rehabilitate them, as the large population of refugees could not live on charity for a long time. Some of the refugees were so panic-stricken that they were planning to settle down in the Tripura State permanently.232 Gandhi was at Sevagram when the Dacca Riot took place, but he constantly kept in touch with the Congress relief workers in the affected areas. His opinion about organizing relief and handling the situation was different from conventional ones, and they make for an interesting study. He wrote to the secretary of the BPCC, Mr. Guha, on 23 April that relief by way of organizing food and clothing did not seem too relevant to him; he was more concerned about why riots occurred in the first place in spite of Congress activities in the province.233 His message to Congress relief workers was that they must not be satisfied with mere relief work. That, according to him, was the task of ‘social workers.’ Congressmen should find out ways to combat the evil of communalism. He pointed out that governments could not be expected to help in a scenario where people were easily frightened.234 In a letter to Shyama Prasad Mookerjee on 21 April, he said that he was feeling ‘dazed and powerless;’ it pained him to see that thousands of people were leaving their homes.235 He said that if refugees were true votaries of nonviolence, ‘they would not flee before a crowd of a few hundred goondas’ and that ‘they would die to a man in the defence of their hearths and homes . . .’236 He believed that such people, who had fear in their heart, could never be nonviolent; for them violence was the only option – ‘I can expect violent people to become nonviolent some day but I am not so sure about cowards becoming non-violent all of a sudden.’237 He confessed that during communal trouble, he had not yet been able to demonstrate the efficacy of nonviolent action on a mass scale, but he wished to live to show such an example.238 This had deeper implications for his philosophy of nonviolence and its practical application in combating communalism. This aspect has been analyzed in greater detail in the last chapter.

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The Dacca Riot of 1941 stood at the crossroads in the history of communal violence in Bengal.239 It ushered in a new, more organized form of communal violence. The scale of the riots also got larger from here. In a way, it was the precursor to the genocide of 1946–47, as after this, the communal atmosphere in Bengal intensified steadily. The world of organized politics increasingly tied itself into popular perceptions of community interests. Every attempt was made to rouse community-based consciousness on all political issues that came to the fore. This was particularly true of famine relief and the Bengal Secondary Education Bill of 1944, which further embittered relations between the two communities. We shall now turn our attention to these developments. ENDNOTES 1. In this chapter, as elsewhere in the book, Dacca has been used, instead of the current name of the city, i.e Dhaka. 2. A much more detailed analysis has been made in chapter III 3. B. C. Allen, Eastern Bengal District Gazetteers, Dacca (The Pioneer Press, Allahabad, 1912), p 62. 4. Ibid. 5. Ibid, p 63. 6. Ibid, p 68. 7. Tanika Sarkar, Bengal 1928–1934, The Politics of Protest (Oxford University Press, Delhi, 1987), p 111. 8. B. C. Allen, Eastern Bengal District Gazetteers, Dacca (The Pioneer Press, Allahabad, 1912), p 65. 9. Sarkar, The Politics of Protest, p 110. 10. Ibid. 11. It is a Hindu festival celebrating the birth of Lord Krishna. 12. Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 84 13. Ibid, p 88. 14. Ibid, p 77. 15. Sarkar, The Politics of Protest, p 106. For more details on the nature of the configuration of these property relations and social tensions, see Chapter III. 16. The jute belt comprised the main jute growing districts of East Bengal, namely Dacca, Mymensingh, Faridpur, Tippera, Pabna and Rajshahi 17. Sarkar, The Politics of Protest, p 112. 18. Sugata Bose, Agrarian Bengal: Economy, Social Structure and Politics, 1919–1947 (Hyderabad: Cambridge University Press in association with Orient Longman, 1987), p 112. 19. Partha Chatterjee, Bengal, 1920–1947, Volume 1, The Land Question (Calcutta: K. P. Bagchi and Company, 1984), p 143



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20. WBSA, File No. 849/31 Home Political, Confidential letter from district magistrate of Tippera to the under secretary, Political Department, 26 December 1931. 21. Sarkar, The Politics of Protest, p 113. 22. Ibid, p 107. 23. Bose, Agrarian Bengal, p 190. 24. Sarkar, The Politics of Protest, p 113. 25. Ibid, p 113. 26. Das, ‘Communal Violence in Twentieth Century Colonial Bengal,’ in Suranjan Das, Interrogating Politics, p 6. 27. Sarkar, The Politics of Protest, p 127. 28. Ibid. 29. Bose, Agrarian Bengal, p 198. 30. Ibid, p 197. 31. N. N. Mitra, ed., The Indian Annual Register, 1936, Volume 1, Published by The Annual Register Office, 16-1 Komedan Bagan Lane, P. O. Park Street, Calcutta, p 301. 32. Shila Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal 1937–1947 (New Delhi: Impex India, 1976), p 79–80. 33. For further details see Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal, p 88. 34. The Muslim League had agreed to all the conditions of the KPP – the primeministership of Huq and the KPP electoral program. 35. Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal, p 99. 36. Report of the Dacca Riots Enquiry Committee, Government of Bengal, Home Department, Political (Henceforth referred to as DREC), p 28. 37. Star of India, 12 September 1940. 38. Census of India, 1941, Volume IV, pp 8-9, 18, Cited in Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 147. 39. Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 147. 40. Ibid, p 148. 41. The Conch-shell industry had been described in the Census of India 1931 as ‘decadent’. Census of India, 1931, Volume IV, Part I, p 305. 42. Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 155. 43. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 28 December 1939. 44. Ibid, 27 December 1939. 45. Ibid. 46. Ibid. 47. Ibid. 48. India Office Records (hereafter IOR) File No. L/PJ/5/146, governor’s report on the political situation for the first half of January 1940. 49. Ibid. 50. Throughout the 1920s, the Depressed Classes of Bengal in general and the Namasudras in particular had begun to assert their voice against Caste Hindu social norms. They had organized and participated in some temple entry Satyagrahas,

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most notable of which was the Munshiganj Satyagraha of August 1929, which went on for almost eight months. While the Congress staunchly condemned such modes of Satyagrahas, Sekhar Bandyopadhyay observes that this sort of assertive behavior on part of the Depressed Classes alarmed the protagonists of Hindu solidarity. The Depressed Classes in Bengal largely stayed away from the Civil Disobedience Movement in 1930, and later showed some enthusiasm for the Communal Award (1932). Although they were dissatisfied with only ten seats allocated to them in Bengal, they were partly satisfied with the provision of election through special electorates. Gandhi’s fast unto death in 1932 to reverse the provision of separate electorates for the depressed classes found little sympathy amongst those of Bengal. The fast ended with the signing of the Poona Pact that accepted the reservation of seats for the Depressed Classes from the general electorate seats in the provincial Legislatures. In Bengal, the number of such seats was now increased to 30. Initially, the Namasudras were strongly dissatisfied with Ambedkar signing Poona Pact because of the loss of the Special Electorates. However, as the Poona Pact was also accepted by the British, the Depressed Classes in Bengal did not have much option but to accept it as well. Although the Depressed Classes were by no means united, with fractures within themselves and also within the dominant Namasudra leadership, their general assertiveness against Caste Hindu domination was seen as alarming by the various Hindu right wing groups, especially the Mahasabha. Hence, in the absence of much Congress action in this regard, there was an increased emphasis by the Mahasabha on making important overtures to the Depressed Castes in Bengal. See Sekhar Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India: The Namasudras of Bengal, 1872–1947 (Surrey: Curzon Press, 1997). 51. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 29 December 1939. 52. Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India, p 214. 53. Ibid. 54. IOR, File No. L/PJ/5/146, governor’s report on the political situation for the 1st half of February 1940. 55. Ibid, governor’s report on the political situation for the 2nd half of February 1940. 56. Ibid. 57. Ibid. 58. Dacca Riot Enquiry Committee, p 1. 59. Ibid. 60. Ibid, p 30. 61. Ibid. 62. So far, both Calcutta University and the Department of Education were in charge of formulating and developing Secondary Education. 63. Assembly Proceedings, Official Report, Bengal Legislative Assembly (hereafter referred to as BLAP) 8th Session, Volume LVII, No. 5, pp 45–46. 64. Ibid, p 44, Speech by Fazlul Huq. 65. Ibid, p 243, Speech by Fazlur Rahman. 66. Ibid, p 107, Speech by Syed Badrudduja. 67. Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India, p 177. 68. Ibid.



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69. There were two Scheduled Caste ministers in the 1st Fazlul Huq Cabinet: Prasannadeb Raikat (Rajbansi) and Mukunda Behari Mullick (Namasudra). 70. He was a prominent Namasudra leader of the Calcutta Scheduled Caste League, which was formed in 1938, with pro-Congress leanings. Other important leaders of this group were Rasiklal Biswas, Monmohan Das and Jogendranath Mandal (who became its president in 1940). Members of the Calcutta Scheduled Caste League also formed the Independent Scheduled Caste Party in 1938 as a new Legislative Party within the Bengal Legislative Assembly. It was formed at the residence of Sarat Bose to cooperate with the Congress and withdraw support from the Huq-Muslim League Coalition Party. However, these Namasudra leaders of the Independent Scheduled Caste Party had maintained that they would keep a separate existence in the Legislature. With Subhash Bose’s arrest and subsequent escape from the country, the relationship of Scheduled Castes with the Congress began to turn rocky. By 1942, there were fresh realignments within the SC leadership. In March 1942, another Parliamentary party was constituted called the Bengal Scheduled Caste Party, with Mukunda Behari Mullick as the leader and Rasiklal Biawas as the Whip. By 1943, two distinct factions emerged within the SC leadership in Bengal: the Bengal Scheduled Caste Party with Pulin Behari Mullick and Mukunda Behari Mullick as its prominent leaders and the Bengal Scheduled Caste League led by Jogendranath Mandal, the latter more or less supporting the Nazimuddin Ministry. In 1943, Mandal also formed the Bengal branch of the All India Scheduled Caste Federation (founded by Ambedkar in 1942). For more details on the shifting Scheduled Caste allegiances during the early 40s, see Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India. 71. BLAP, 8th Session, Volume LVII, No. 5, p 79, Speech by Pramatha Ranjan Thakur. 72. Hindusthan Standard, 8 September 1940. For the full text of the letter written by P. R. Thakur to Fazlul Huq tendering his resignation, see Appendix 1. 73. BLAP, 8th Session, Volume LVII, No. 5, p 111, Speech by Rasik Lal Biswas. 74. Ibid, pp 191–195, Speech by Upendra Nath Barman. 75. Ibid, p 82, Speech by Congress MLA Atul Chandra Sen. 76. Ibid. 77. Ibid, p 277, Speech by S. P. Mookerjee. 78. Ibid, pp 277-78, Speech by S. P. Mookerjee. 79. Ibid, p 279. 80. Hindusthan Standard, 4 September 1940. It should be noted that by condemning the Bill which tried, in however limited a way, to safeguard the interests of the SCs, the Mahasabha was clearly trying to safeguard the Caste Hindus’ interests. 81. Ibid, 8 September 1940. 82. Ibid, 8 September 1940. 83. Ibid. 84. Ibid. 85. Sekhar Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Culture and Hegemony: Social Domination in Colonial Bengal (New Delhi: Sage Publications, 2004), p 201. 86. Bandyopadhyay, Protest and Identity in Colonial India, p 214. The Mahasabha claimed that Hindu ‘lower’ castes were repeatedly being converted to Islam, either

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forcibly during riots or sometimes voluntarily. The Shuddhi (or purification) of such castes was envisaged by reconverting them into the Hindu fold. 87. IOR, File No. L/PJ/5/148, p 269, Report on the political situation for the first half of February 1941. 88. Census of India 1931, Volume V, Bengal and Sikkim, Part I Report, p xiv. 89. IOR, File No. L/PJ/5/148, p 269, Report on the political situation for the first half of February 1941. 90. Ibid, p 258, Report on the political situation for the second half of February 1941 91. Ibid, p 254, Confidential Report no. 4, governor’s Camp. Bengal, 7th March, 1941. 92. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 2 March 1941. 93. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 3 March 1941. 94. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 4 March 1941. 95. Ibid, 6 March 1941. 96. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 7 March, 1941. 97. Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Culture and Hegemony, p 205 98. Modern Review 68, no. 6 (December 1940): p 600–1. 99. Ibid. 100. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 10 March 1941. 101. Ibid. 102. Ibid. 103. Star of India, 5 February 1941. 104. Hindusthan Standard, 30 August 1940. 105. For the full text of the letter published by the newspaper, see Appendix 1. 106. Hindusthan Standard, 30 August 1940. 107. Modern Review 68, No. 6 (December 1940): p 599 108. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 7 March 1941 109. The Statesman, 2 September 1940, p 3. ‘Dar-el-Islam by Shahed’ – Regarding this particular column, the Statesman wrote: ‘In his weekly feature, “Shahed” puts forward a Muslim point of view on current questions. The Statesman recognizes that the Muslim community has fewer facilities than Hindus or Europeans for the expression of opinion in the Press in India, but the editor accepts no responsibility for ‘Shahed’s” views.’ 110. Ibid. 111. Star of India, 7 February, 1941. 112. Ibid. 113. Ibid. 114. Star of India, 4 March 1941. Also see Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 146. 115. IOR, file No. L/PJ/5/148, p 254, Confidential Report No. 4, Governor’s Camp, Bengal, 7th March, 1941 - Confidential letter from the Governor of Bengal to the viceroy. 116. Ibid. 117. See, Pradip Kumar Datta, Carving Blocs: Communal Ideology in Early Twentieth Century Bengal (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999), p 23–24



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118. Kenneth Jones, ‘Religious Identity and the Indian Census,’ in The Census in British India: New Perspectives, ed. N. G. Barrier (New Delhi: Manohar Publications, 1981), p 81. 119. Datta, Carving Blocs, p 25 120. Holi could lead to a potentially explosive situation because often amidst the carnivalesque frivolities, coloured water would, intentionally or un-intentionally, be thrown on members of the other community. 121. IOR, File no. L/PJ/5/148, p 233. Report on Political Situation for second half of March 1941. 122. Ibid. 123. Ibid. 124. DREC, p 2. 125. S. P. Mookerjee, Ist Installment (Uma Prasad Mookerjee) Papers , NMML, Printed Publications, Serial Number 1, p 5 – Statement submitted on behalf of the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha and the Dacca Hindu Mahasabha before the Dacca Riots Enquiry Committee, 1941. 126. DREC, p 2 127. DREC, p 7 128. Ibid. 129. Ibid, p 3. 130. DREC, p 3. 131. Ibid, p 3. 132. DREC, p 13. 133. Ibid. 134. S. P. Mookerjee 1st Installment (Uma Prasad Mookerjee) Papers , NMML, Printed Publications, Serial Number 1, p 6 - Statement submitted on behalf of the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha and the Dacca Hindu Mahasabha before the Dacca Riots Enquiry Committee, 1941 135. DREC, p 3. 136. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 22 March, 1941. 137. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 22 March, 1941. 138. Ibid. 139. DREC, p 5. 140. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 23 March 1941. 141. Ibid. 142. Ibid. 143. Dacca Prakash, 1 June 1941. 144. Ibid. 145. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 28 March 1941. 146. Star of India, 24 March, 1941. 147. Ibid. 148. NAI, File No 5/25/41 Poll (I), p 7. Telegram dated 22nd March 1941 from The governor of Bengal to the viceroy. 149. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 24 March, 1941. 150. DREC, p 32.

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1 51. DREC, p 32. 152. SB File No PM 734/41, 1941 p 32, Petition dated 3rd April 1941 from the Hindu inhabitants of Jorepool Lane, P.S. Sutrapur, District Dacca, to the district magistrate, Dacca. 153. DREC, p 32. 154. Ibid, p 32. 155. Ibid, p 33. 156. NAI, Home Political File No 5/8/41 Poll (I), p 26, Telegram from governor of Bengal to viceroy, dated 30 June 1941. 157. Ibid, p 15, Telegram from governor of Bengal to viceroy, dated 10 April 1941. 158. Ibid, p 22, Telegram from governor of Bengal to viceroy, dated 19 April 1941. 159. DREC, p 11. 160. Ibid. 161. SB File No PM 734/41 1941, p 145, English translation of a Bengali leaflet titled ‘Hindus only will protect the Hindus’, Intercepted by Special Branch on 17.4.1941. The author of this leaflet is unknown. 162. Ibid, p 145. This translation is by the police officer who compiled the report. 163. SB File No PM 734/41 (II), p 87, Gist from A. S. 249, dated 5.5.41, Intelligence Branch, CID, Calcutta, dated 14th May, 1941, No. C/S 2822/2. 164. Ibid. 165. Ibid, p 25, English translation and copy of a Bengali letter, bearing the postal seal of Farashgange, dated 18 April 1941. 166. SB File No PM 734/41 (II), p 173-74, Statement of A.S. 249, dated 24.4.41 (by letter) received by Special Branch on 28.4.41. 167. Ibid. 168. IOR File No. L/PJ/5/148, p 219. Report on Political Situation for the first half of April 1941. 169. Ibid. 170. IOR File No. L/PJ/5/148, p 215, Confidential Report from the Bengal governor to the viceroy, dated 22 April 1941. 171. Ibid, p 219. 172. Ibid, p 215. 173. Ibid. 174. SB File No. PM 734/41, 1941, p 1 A, ‘Bengal Congress – Hindu Mahasava’ Special Branch Report dated 7.4.41. 175. Ibid. 176. Ibid, p 41 D, Copy of Memo No. 5/A. I. /39, dated 9th April 1941, from the Central Intelligence Officer, Karachi, to the Central Intelligence Officer, Calcutta. 177. Ibid. 178. DREC, p 12. 179. Ibid, p 13. 180. NAI, Home Political File No. 5/8/41 Poll (I), p 24, Telegram from governor of Bengal to viceroy, dated 28th June 1941. 181. SB File No PM 734/41, 1941, p 12. Special Branch interception of Inland/Foreign Mail on 15th April 1941, from A. K. Guha, Dacca to S. P. Mookerjee. Letter is dated as 14.4.41.



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1 82. DREC, p 76. 183. DREC, p 14. 184. Ibid, p 17. 185. Ibid, p 17. 186. Ibid, p 18. 187. Ibid. 188. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), NMML, Subject File No. 27, p 43 - Letter dated Calcutta, 10th April, 1941, from Kamini Kumar Dutta, M.L.C, Bengal Legislative Council, to the Bengal Provincial Congress Committee, Calcutta. 189. Ibid, p 85 - Letter dated Comilla, the 20th April, 1941, from Kamini K. Dutta, Member, Bengal Legislative Council, to the president, Bengal Provincial Congress Committee, Calcutta. 190. Ibid, p 86. 191. DREC, p 34. 192. Ibid, p 34. 193. Ibid, p 34. 194. Ibid, p 35. 195. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), NMML, Subject File No. 27, p 86 - Letter dated Comilla, the 20th April, 1941, from Kamini K. Dutta, Member, Bengal Legislative Council, to the president, Bengal Provincial Congress Committee, Calcutta. 196. SB File No 734/41 (II), p 206, Statement of Shrish Chatterjee, member of BPCC; Report of additional deputy commissioner of police, dated 19 June 1941. 197. Ibid, pp 95–100, Statement of the Dacca Situation by Dr. S. P. Mookerjee on 16 April 1941. 198. Ibid. 199. Dacca Prakash, 1 June 1941, p 2. 200. DREC, pp 13–14. 201. DREC, p 5. 202. Ibid, p 36. 203. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), NMML, Subject file No. 23, p 6. Statement by Dr. Shyama Prasad Mookerjee, Working President, All-India Hindu Mahasabha, 1941. 204. Ibid, Subject file No 27, p 49 - Letter dated Calcutta, 10th April, 1941, from Kamini Kumar Dutta, M.L.C, Bengal Legislative Council, to the Bengal Provincial Congress Committee, Calcutta. 205. S. P. Mookerjee (Uma Prasad Mookerjee) Papers, NMML, Printed Material, Serial Number 1, p 6. Statement submitted on behalf of the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha and the Dacca Hindu Mahasabha before the Dacca Riots Enquiry Committee, 1941. 206. Ibid. 207. DREC, p 12. 208. Dacca Prakash, 22 June 1941, p 2. 209. Ibid.

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2 10. DREC, p 16. 211. Ibid, p 16. 212. Ibid, p 17. 213. DREC, p 22. 214. Ibid. 215. Ibid, p 12. 216. Ibid. 217. DREC, p 10. 218. Ibid, p 31. 219. Das, ‘Communal Violence in Twentieth Century Colonial Bengal,’ p 8 220. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), NMML, Subject File No. 27, p 45 - Letter dated 10th April, 1941, Calcutta, from Kamini Kumar Dutta, M.L.C, Bengal Legislative Council, to the Bengal Provincial Congress Committee, Calcutta. 221. Ibid, p 47 - Letter dated 10th April, 1941, Calcutta, from Kamini Kumar Dutta, M.L.C, Bengal Legislative Council, to the Bengal Provincial Congress Committee, Calcutta. 222. Ibid, p 88 - Letter dated 20th April 1941, Comilla, from Kamini K. Dutta, Member, Bengal Legislative Council, to the president, Bengal Provincial Congress Committee, Calcutta. 223. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 23 March 1941. 224. Ibid, 24 March 1941. 225. Ibid, 26 March 1941. 226. Ibid, 23 March 1941. 227. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), NMML, Subject File No. 27, p 91 Letter dated 17.5.1941, from Ananda Prasad Choudhuri, Congress Constructive Workers’ Association, Relief Centre: P.O. Raipura (Dacca) to Rajkumari Amrit Kaur, Sevagram, Wardha. 228. Amrita Bazar Patrika 22 April 1941. 229. Ibid, 19 April 1941. 230. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), NMML, Subject File No. 27, pp 41-42 - Letter dated Calcutta, 10th April, 1941, from Kamini Kumar Dutta, M.L.C, Bengal Legislative Council, to the Bengal Provincial Congress Committee, Calcutta. 231. Ibid, p 49, Letter dated Calcutta, 10th April, 1941, from Kamini Kumar Dutta, M.L.C, Bengal Legislative Council, to the Bengal Provincial Congress Committee, Calcutta. 232. Ibid, p 51 - Letter dated Calcutta, 10th April, 1941, from Kamini Kumar Dutta, M.L.C, Bengal Legislative Council, to the Bengal Provincial Congress Committee, Calcutta. 233. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), NMML, Subject File No. 30, p 4 Handwritten Letter dated Sevagram, 23.4.41, from M. K. Gandhi, to A. Guha, secretary, B.P.C.C. 234. Ibid, p 4.



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235. Ibid, p 5. Handwritten letter, dated 21.4.41, Sevagram, Wardha, from M. K. Gandhi, to Shyama Prasad Mookerjee. 236. Ibid. 237. Ibid, p 6. Handwritten letter, dated 21.4.41, Sevagram, Wardha, from M. K. Gandhi, to Shyama Prasad Mookerjee. 238. Ibid, p 7. Handwritten letter, dated 21.4.41, Sevagram, Wardha, from M. K. Gandhi, to Shyama Prasad Mookerjee. 239. Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 159.

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2 Famine 1943 – Towards a Hardening of Community Identities What is happening is no ordinary famine – but a complete disintegration of social life – or a putrefaction of all social life. Villages are wiped out. The boatmen and fishermen communities are no more in many places. The poor peasant is driven from the land with his family . . . mothers sell children. Young girls sell themselves to the lust of men who give them venereal diseases and aid hunger in killing them. Parental love, filial duty, conjugal affection, love of village and home – all the precious heritage of man acquired within the course of centuries, has disappeared for thousands whose only thought is about a morsel of decent food. That is what Bengal is – abominable degradation of human beings, a blot on the Indian national movement – an indictment of selfish bureaucratic rule in this country. ‘Collapse of Social Life’, People’s War, 7 November 1943

There could not be a better description of the impact of the famine of 1943–44 in Bengal, one of the most horrifying experiences in the history of the province. Also known as ‘Panchasher Manwantar’1, it shook Bengali society to its very roots. There have been numerous studies on the causes of the famine of 1943.2 However, there is a need to revisit the famine in the light of the deep impact that it had on communal politics in Bengal. The near total absence of food as a result of a man-made catastrophe set in motion a chain reaction. The chapter has been divided into two sections. The first section studies in detail the impact of hunger on Bengali society in 1943–44. Widespread destitution, first due to the War and then the unavailability of food and other basic necessities like clothing, kerosene and cooking oil, led to a downward spiral in the social and moral order. As family and kinship ties failed to secure survival, the community association alone kept the shattered people together. The second section links up this terrible experience to the complete dependence of famine victims on



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relief. A detailed analysis of the nature and complexities of relief/rehabilitation is drawn up to show how communal politics insinuated itself deep into the relief process. This, in turn, shaped the social and political developments in Bengal in subsequent years. I. T HE FAMINE OF 1943 – THE RUPTURE IN BENGALI SOCIETY One would be mistaken to believe that the breakdown of the social and moral order was only a response to hunger. Bengal was steadily facing a major and multifaceted crisis as a result of the war and the effects of the cyclone of 1942 in the coastal areas of Midnapore. By 1942, Japan had advanced to her eastern borders, and this brought the War closer to Bengal. In reaction, in February 1942, the Government of India brought into operation its ‘Denial Policy’ in order to prevent Japanese soldiers from advancing further into the country in the event of an invasion. The Policy meant two things – one, the removal of rice and paddy estimated to be in excess from the coastal districts of Midnapore, Backergunj, Noakhali, Tippera and Khulna, and two, the removal and frequent destruction of boats which they thought the enemy could use to their advantage. 3 Around 40,000 boats were destroyed in the whole of East Bengal. This profoundly affected the basic livelihood of the people, most of whom were poor farmers and fishermen. Places where the Denial Policy came into operation were some of the richest rice producing areas in East Bengal from where rice used to be transported to the adjacent deficit areas like Dacca.4 The withdrawal of boats immediately affected the movement of food supplies, as East Bengal comprised primarily of marshy lands, interspersed with khals or chars, where boats were the only mode of commutation.5 For instance, in Midnapore, the district magistrate issued an order that all types of boats in the Nandigram and Moyna thanas of the Contai subdivision had to be removed in only a matter of three hours. Since this was almost impossible to do, hundreds of boats were burnt and hardly any compensation was paid to their owners.6 It was not just the supply of rice that was affected. Fishermen could not reach their fishing patches, cultivators of island paddies and sand-bars had to abandon their crops, and potters could not carry their goods in bulk to the market.7 In 1944, restrictions were imposed on the movement of fishing vessels in the Bay of Bengal. Their movement was restricted to within ten miles in Chittagong and Noakhali and fifteen miles in the remaining coastline

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of Bengal.8 As a result, fishing was greatly reduced, and in several places, completely stopped. Fish has been an important part of Bengali diet for all classes, and its disappearance, along with that of rice – the staple grain – was an important link in the domino effect in the food chain. Rural economic life was thrown completely out of gear. The official Famine Enquiry Commission, constituted by the Government of India in 1944 to investigate the causes of the famine, reported that the Denial Policy measures were very unpopular, and that the Bengal Government did not even properly maintain the boats that were removed. The government had claimed that it was not a ‘practical proposition’ for them to do so, given the enormous number that had been seized.9 The Commission nonetheless blamed it for not making better arrangements, arguing that had the seized boats been better maintained, they could have been used later for the movement of food grains during and after the famine.10 In the words of a British official posted in East Bengal at that time, the Denial Policy, especially the removal of boats, had ‘throttled’ the economic life of the lower delta.11 In addition to all this, the fall of Burma by the end of 1942 also spread huge panic. Earlier, there was the hope that if there was a shortage of rice, more could be easily procured from Burma. However, this was now ruled out and ‘that had a very depressing effect – it added to the panic.’12 As Bengal directly turned into a war zone, a large number of American and British soldiers started pouring in. Apart from a large-scale evacuation of the local people to make room for the military infrastructure, military atrocities in the war zones of East Bengal became rampant. Attacks on villagers and assaults on women were common. According to reports from villagers, ‘minor’ oppressions like non-payment for purchased goods by soldiers and unwarranted beating up of people were daily occurrences.13 There were repeated incidents of soldiers breaking into into local houses and sexually assaulting women. When the men of these households came out to defend the women, they were often stabbed or shot.14 Looting of ornaments, cattle and utensils by the troops was also regularly reported. From January to August 1944, there were twenty-one recorded cases of assault, murder, reckless driving, drunken and disorderly behaviour in public, and criminal trespassing against the US Army alone.15 Both the colonial and provincial governments, however, remained indifferent to the difficulties of the people. A letter written to Gandhi by some villagers from Chenua (about four miles south of Feni subdivision of Noakhali) regarding military atrocities of 16 April 1942 illustrates the point:



Famine 1943 – Towards a Hardening of Community Identities 71 On 16 April forenoon some soldiers were engaged in the village of Chenua in some work and some of them did molest the women of two houses nearby and did commit acts of robbing gold and silver ornaments and cash money. The alarm raised attracted the villagers and there was a clash between the villagers and soldiers resulting in fire being opened by the soldiers killing two of the villagers and wounding others. In the afternoon of the same date there was a retaliatory raid by the soldiers in the village on the plea of searching for a missing gun in the morning occurrence. In the raid there was plundering of houses and ravishing of women . . . The police is holding investigation and I learnt from the investigation that that there is no chance of tracing the culprits for failure of identification. The military authorities are not cooperating.16

On top of the economic dislocation resulting from the War, a cyclone struck the coastal areas of Midnapore in 1942. The official estimate of the loss of life in the Contai subdivision of Midnapore was somewhere around 10,000, but unofficial reports from relief workers put the number at around 30,000.17 Once the cyclone retreated, corpses and carcasses were often found huddled together, houses got wiped out, tanks were polluted as a result of the pile up of stinking corpses, and malaria of the most virulent type broke out soon after. Paddy fields were destroyed and food and clothing became scarce. Often relief workers would find naked men and women sitting on the road, begging.18 Calcutta was, like the rest of Bengal, on edge from 1941 with the War fast advancing on the eastern frontier after the fall of Malaya and Singapore. Fantastic rumours about bombing of the city and a possible Japanese invasion found an over-receptive audience. Ishan Mukherjee focuses on two types of identifiable rumours. One stemmed from the fear of a large scale civic evacuation in light of the imminent bombing. Another set focussed on the inability and even unwillingness of the British Government to protect the interests of its colonial subjects. The latter often made Japanese occupation, one that could emancipate India from the clutches of British Imperial dominance, a desirable change.19 ‘War rumours’, whose source remained ever so elusive, also gave rise to panic. Mukherjee argues that there was ‘pervasive fear’ that once the city had been evacuated, it would be completely destroyed in order to prevent it from being used as a Japanese base for further advance into India. The British Government found it a most daunting task to control such rumours. This sort of rumour mongering and the ‘pervasive fear’ that stemmed from it became ‘symptomatic of the deep uncertainties about the future;’ the people of Calcutta lived in constant anxiety about Japanese bombings. As

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these fears materialised soon with waves of Japanese air raids, people were left to wonder what lay ahead.20 On the one hand, many looked forward to Japanese occupation to rid Bengal of British domination.21 On the other, there was uncertainty about Japanese goodwill once Calcutta was bombed. These conflicting emotions, which encompassed all classes of the population, stretched the civic morale to a breaking point. Newspaper reports made matters worse, providing optimum breeding grounds for anxiety. For instance, the Amrita Bazar Patrika reported on 6 July 1941 that street vendors of Calcutta were warning the city people that they should take what was available now, for in a couple of months they would stop bringing supplies to Calcutta because of the impending air raids.22 Even the festival of Durga Puja (the annual worship of Goddess Durga), an occasion of grand celebrations, spectacle and fun amongst Bengali Hindus, subsided into a whimper due to the War. War time inflation, petrol rationing, blacked out streets and the fear of air raids dampened spirits.23 Japanese bombs fell on Calcutta in broad daylight on 5 December 1943, causing massive damage to life and property in the coaling berths at the Kidderpore docks and the Bengal Nagpur Railway (BNR) depot.24 Apart from the physical damage to the docks and the railway depot, there was the grim spectacle of hundreds of corpses that lay rotting all around, unattended and unclaimed. In the aftermath of the bombings, the gates of the docks were unmanned, allowing onlookers to enter the area. These ‘onlookers’ not only took back with them exaggerated rumours, but also collected ‘souvenirs’ from the scene.25 The British Government and the provincial administration tried to play down the seriousness of the damage by characterizing it as ‘slight’, but rumours and actual sights of the damage sharply contested that claim. Morale, especially among dock workers, reached an all-time low, with thousands fleeing the city. Most important was the ‘treatment of the corpses’ by the colonial state after the bombing. Even three days after the attack, several dead bodies still littered the docks. The ARP (Air Raid Personnel), the police and the Calcutta Corporation were confused about their respective responsibilities regarding the removal of corpses.26 No accurate statistics of the number of casualties are available. There were irregularities in hospital statistics about how many corpses were brought in. In several cases the police simply moved an ‘unspecified number’ of corpses to the nearby Mominpore Morgue, where they once again lay unclaimed and unidentified. To the colonial state, these corpses meant a ‘security risk’ which endangered the War effort by registering the success of Japan’s attack.27 Interestingly, as Janam Mukherjee points out,



Famine 1943 – Towards a Hardening of Community Identities 73

the only classification that was deemed ‘essential’ for most of these corpses was that of religious affiliation. In most cases, corpses were handed to either the Hindu Satkar Samiti or the Anjuman Mofidul Islam, according to the deceased’s perceived religious community.28 This was a model that was later followed for famine corpses as well. Mukherjee sums up: The colonial state was, in this sense, reifying religious affiliation, by means of corpses, that would parallel the political distinction that was being used to ‘divide and rule’ . . . It is a chilling fact that in the dehumanizing darkness of war and famine, this one simple and explosive distinction was all that was required in demarcating the disposable citizens of Calcutta.29

This all-consuming religious identification followed by the colonial state was also continued by the various relief organizations that came up during the famine. As we shall see later in this chapter, relief came thickly coated in religious distinctions. Not only corpses, but also the living were bundled into either of the two communities, as if no other identity mattered. This had far reaching consequences on communal relations in the province, which we shall study in the next section. From January 1943, the price of rice scaled phenomenally. From Rs 11.40 per maund on 4 January 1943, it rose to Rs 15 on 3 March 1943.30 This was true not only in rice-deficit districts but also in surplus districts like Barisal. The reason was that rice from all surplus districts was moving into Calcutta, as both private and government industries in Calcutta engaged in War-time production were some of the biggest buyers, in order to maintain a steady and secure food supply for their workers.31 Rice was also purchased in huge quantities for feeding the army. Its movement from the mofussils to Calcutta reduced even the surplus districts of Bengal to deficit ones. In May 1943, the price of rice shot up to Rs 40 per maund. That was when the steady trickle of people from villages all over Bengal into Calcutta in search of food started. Hungry people from the mofussils hoped to find food in Calcutta. By August, the stream had turned into a flood. As food became scarce in villages, some grain looting and hunger marches were reported at an early stage. The Director General of Food B. R. Sen stated before the Famine Inquiry Commission that in the early months of 1943, during the despatch of rice from 24Parganas to Midnapore, there were some cases of looting on the way.32 Greenough, however, points out that in general, rural violence was limited during the famine. Simple gang robbery, looting of grain barges and isolated acts of desperation did happen, but there was no uprising,

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no food riots and certainly no insurrection – ‘Begging, foraging, migration and patient self-denial were far more common than rebellion or expropriation from the wealthy.’33 B. R. Sen gave an explanation for this: in a famine of such a scale, people are so weakened that by the time they came to the place which could give them some food, they had no physical reserve left in them to take to violence.34 Greenough, on the other hand, argues that the communist-led Kisan Sabhas were encouraging peasants to take what was their due from the zamindars. But since the Communist Party was in an informal alliance with the ministry due to its pro war effort line, they made no organised efforts to seize crops, or hoard grains or land.35 Calcutta soon became the preferred destination of hungry villagers. By September 1943, streets were filled with destitutes from the mofussils. The People’s Relief Committee, started by the Communist Party of India, gave figures of destitutes on the pavements as around 1, 25,000. They were lying or roaming about in search of either charity or death.36 By October, the city’s pavements were littered with thousands of beggars in every stage of decrepitude. Some were dead, others were dying and all were badly starved.37 The destitutes literally beggared description – ‘ten weeks of malnutrition, wandering in search of food, anxiety and fear, exposure to sun and rain and all manner of infection, had reduced them to mere skin and bone.’38 T. G. Narayan, an eyewitness who was in Calcutta during the famine to collect reports for the Madras Hindu, points out that the people dying on pavements mostly consisted of landless labourers who had come from the neighbouring districts of the 24 Parganas, Hooghly and Midnapore, and other more distant villages.39 Destitutes foraging in dustbins along with stray dogs was not an uncommon sight. Tapan Ray Choudhury, then a student at the Presidency College in Calcutta, recalls that beggars were never rare in Calcutta, but people who came here during the famine were not the usual beggars; initially they would not beg, they simply stared at passers-by.40 They died quietly, and soon, the sight of the dead on the streets became common. Gradually, when these destitutes realised that rice was unavailable, they began to cry out for phen (water which is drained out after the rice has been boiled). Unbearably pathetic cries of ‘phen dao go, phen dao’ (please give us the rice water) were heard everywhere. Beggars would assemble in front of houses during lunch hour and cry out for the meagre phen. Bimal Kar’s novel Dewal (The Wall) brings out, in the form of a dialogue between the protagonist Uma and a beggar, the cultural meanings of rice amongst Bengalis. When Uma gives the beggar two chapattis as food, the beggar refuses to accept them and continues to wail for phen.41 This



Famine 1943 – Towards a Hardening of Community Identities 75

reiterates Greenough’s argument about the signification of rice as something more than food.42 But soon, the constant exposure to death, disease and destitutes normalised the spectacle. As Ray Choudhury remarks, walking on the streets full of destitutes became so common that one simply learnt to ignore them.43 Ironically, War-time Calcutta was in many ways also a ‘boom-town’. European and American soldiers were everywhere, especially at Chowrungee. They always had money and spent it lavishly. New eateries and restaurants came up. Calcutta continued to have fun in spite of the famine. Notwithstanding the rising price of rice, the cost of meals at such eateries did not increase by much.44 Semi-clad destitutes would often be found lying at the doorstep of fancy restaurants, but that did not stop people from entering these places.45 Once, a dying mother and child were spotted on the pavement opposite the Duff Hostel. When an adjacent ARP office was notified and asked to remove them, the personnel on duty simply turned away, saying that it was not under their jurisdiction.46 Such apathy for the dead or the dying has also been explored in Dewal. Basu, one of the protagonists, is a young boy who joined the ARP during the War. One of his tasks was to inform the ARP office about destitutes dying on the pavements and to arrange for the removal of the dead or dying. One day, he was asked by his superior at the ARP office to stand guard near a dying man till an ambulance arrived to pick him up. Basu refused to do so since he found it disgusting to have a sick dying man at his feet, who must be in a bad, dishevelled state.47 He tells his superior that only the day before he had sent a dying woman to a hospital. She was skeletal and completely naked! Earlier he used to feel nauseous on seeing them, now he did not care.48 Moreover, after these destitutes had been fed at a voluntary local food kitchen, the ‘respectable’ folk of the locality would grumble about all the fuss that had been made on the street, about how destitutes ate messily and scattered their plates around.49 The death rate on the streets of Calcutta was, in fact, so high that it was claimed to be about 250 per cent above normal by Dr M. U. Ahmed, a Health Officer.50 So severe was the resultant congestion at cremation ghats and burial grounds in and around the city that the Calcutta Corporation was requested to increase its staff at these places and also make arrangements for extra pyres and grave diggers.51 Most famine-stricken patients in Calcutta hospitals were picked up from the streets in a stage of extreme exhaustion. The Famine Enquiry Commission Report described them as ‘living skeletons’, their weight often reduced by as

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much as one-third of the normal.52 Many patients also suffered from mental disorientation. According to the Enquiry Commission’s Report: When taken to hospital, such patients made little effort to help themselves and received medical attention with an indifference which sometimes amounted to passive obstruction. They did not care how dirty or naked they were. Those with famine diarrhoea would repeatedly soil their beds and pay no attention to the protests of the attendants. In a few cases maniacal symptoms were present.53

The situation in the countryside was much worse and it was here that the true magnitude of the famine manifested itself. It was not just hunger that played havoc with lives of people. Diseases such as malaria and cholera sapped whatever life was left. About a half of the population of Bengal was affected by the most virulent form of malaria, and starvation made people too weak to resist its onslaught. In parts of Chittagong, Dacca, Burdwan and Midnapore, the death rate among people affected by malaria was so high that entire subdivisions were threatened with extinction.54 For Howrah in January 1944, statistics showed that out of 1100 villages, 700 were severely affected by malaria; in 1943 alone it was estimated that about fifteen thousand people had succumbed to malaria.55 In Jessore, by the beginning of 1944, about 12 lakh people had fallen victim to malaria, of whom sixty thousand died.56 In Barisal, not just malaria, but also cholera, smallpox and oedema broke out in epidemic form, claiming nearly fifty thousand victims.57 In Mymensingh, by December 1943, the daily death count due to malaria alone was about 1,500.58 According to the Dinajpur District Board Records, between June and December 1943, nearly 4,500 had died due to malaria and about 3,000 from cholera.59 Along with the food crisis and epidemics, there was also a cloth famine. The price of cloth soared in Bengal by at least 300 per cent60, because yarn was taken away from the mofussils to supply to the army. F. O. Bell, an Indian civil servant, while touring rural areas of East Bengal, found that women of even middle-class families were clad in torn quilt covers or loin cloth.61 Hungry and naked, people in rural Bengal suffered not just hunger but also shame as they could not clothe themselves. A majority of the destitute children and women went naked. This theme has been explored in Hasan Azizul Huq’s poignant novel Agunpakhi (The Fire Bird). The author describes how unclothed men, women and children, who had come from neighbouring villages in search of some food, would hide behind bushes during the day. Overcome by shame, they could not beg during daytime; the cover of the night proved useful to scrounge around for some food.62



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What Bengal witnessed was a complete breakdown of rural life. Calcutta was an extension of the theatre of devastation. There is no doubt that the famine of 1943 was a class famine. The worst affected were the landless labourers, peasants, artisans and fishermen who suffered from sheer starvation and lack of clothing. The ‘upper’ caste middle-class or the Bhadralok in rural Bengal may not have suffered as much from starvation, as from the ‘social degradation’ that they believed the famine had inflicted upon them. Some middle-class families in the towns of the rural hinterland could afford to buy rice because they continued to have some income throughout the famine.63 But most of the populace were forced to beg on the streets as the last resort in desperate circumstances. Obviously, they were lacerated by a social stigma attached to begging. Several ‘upper’ caste Hindus found begging extremely difficult on account of their position in society.64 A Bengali writer-teacher H. K. Gupta described his condition thus: Because most of the relief organizations are for the poor, my family members cannot even come out for want of clothes . . . I cannot stand on the roads with beggars on account of my position in society. I have got a very big family of 15 members to maintain. They are now more helpless than beggars .  .  . I have sold all the golden ornaments and other valuables of my wife at a very nominal price.65

As the price of rice shot up to Rs 35 per maund in July, landless labourers, fishermen and artisans reached the end of their resources and began to perish. After selling off all that they had for a morsel, they simply began to die out. The streets of Chandpur, one of the worst affected villages in Tippera, stank of the dead. Between June and November 1943, over 3,300 street deaths were recorded.66 In villages, people with food were remarkably callous and selfish. They had, according to the district magistrate of Faridpur, ‘seen too much of it’ and their sensitivity had become dulled.67 A sample survey conducted by the Bengal Provincial Kisan Sabha in 1944 in six villages of Contai in Midnapore showed that 105 families out of a total of 254 had lost all their land. Land transfers during the famine were 200 to 300 per cent higher than in normal years.68 T. G. Narayan, while touring Contai, described the physical condition of the people as quite wretched. Clad in dirty rags, they moved about on their haunches, picking up scattered grains of rice or gram. They were so hungry that they ate up on the spot the grains coated in dust and dirt. All the typical signs of starvation were seen – swollen faces, bellies and ankles, dry withered skin with bones sticking out of them.69 In Tippera, mortality peaked in

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December 1943, when the number of deaths was 272 per cent in excess of the quinquennial average.70 In October 1943, reports from Tippera read of the the food shortage being so acute that food could not be provided even in relief kitchens. Noakhali and Faridpur were in a similar situation. Rural education suffered terribly. Most schools in the villages closed down. Primary schools were the worst hit, as most of their students came from the poorer classes.71 Most students were flocking to relief kitchens, most others were stricken with malaria. Even when some did turn up, teachers were not available to take classes. According to a report by the communist leader P. C. Joshi in People’s War, teachers got only Rs 7 per month and Rs 3 as dearness allowance.72 That was hardly enough to feed oneself, let alone a family. Greenough cites from several such teachers in rural areas, who wrote petitions to the Bengal Relief Committee that special help be given to them. As the famine worsened, the Government of Bengal cancelled their dearness allowance, as a result of which several teachers had to quit their jobs and look for employment elsewhere. Many lost their jobs in Calcutta as schools shut down. They then made their way back to their villages, but unable to bear the impossible burden of feeding their families, men would simply desert their families.73 The memorandum of the Mahila Atmaraksha Samity submitted to the Famine Inquiry Commission in 1944 summed up the collapse of familial ties as men deserted their dependents and mothers were forced to sell off children74. Given below is the story of a woman called Aifaljan from a destitute camp at Comilla: She belonged to Heimchar in Chandpur sub-division. Her father was a boatman. Her mother died years ago and, soon after her marriage to Yakub Ghazi, her father also died. She had neither brother nor sister. She was happy with Yakub and bore him a son . . . The famine hit them in June. For ten weeks they struggled to keep their son and themselves alive. They sold their hut, sold their utensils, sold all they had, except the clothes they were in, to be able to buy food. They were willing to sell their labour. There was none to purchase it. They came to the end of their tether in September and their son died. She said ‘Sir, my child’s last cry was for rice, a little rice. And I saw him die because I could not give a little rice to him’ . . . For Aifaljan one sad event followed another in quick succession. Yakub, unable to support her, divorced her, abandoned her and left, he said, to join the army. She began then her wanderings from free kitchen to free kitchen and hearing that food was available in Comilla, came here by train along with several others of her village.75



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Another was a woman called Majada at Chittagong: Majada was another girl of 20 or 21 from the same Amirabad. She wanted to live with her head erect . . . During the terror of the famine her husband deserted the home, leaving her behind, and went away to Feni. He came back an invalid with rheumatism, having lost all capacity to earn. When the [free] kitchen, the workhouse and all other means of living were closed down one after another [January 1, 1944], Majada was at last forced to take up work in the labour corps. But there she realised that her modesty had to be bartered for her earning. She left the job, and not only that, she brought away with her another 10 to 15 out of those polluted stinking surroundings . . . Three months later- only a few days back- I visited Amirabad again. Again I met Majada, this time on her deathbed . . . Majada told me that she could not keep her pledge. The pangs of hunger had driven her once again to the Labour Corps.76

These two stories reflect the plight of women, who were the worst victims of the famine. The aftermath of the famine found ‘a trail of bodies broken by privations, an army of homeless widows, a veritable generation of young women left guardianless, husbandless and an ever-increasing number of orphans.’77 All over rural Bengal, women from peasant, fishermen and artisan families began to join the Military Labour Corps in large numbers. They literally sold themselves in hordes, and young boys acted as pimps for the military.78 With the disintegration of family life, closing of the Government free kitchen, no alternative occupation, and given the demand created by the military, prostitution or death were the only two roads left. Kanak Mukherjee, then a MARS worker, told the story of a woman who had sold her five-year-old daughter into prostitution, in return for money which was given to her only after two months.79 It was not enough to provide food for such women – Kanak Mukherjee found that several women, immediately after their meal at the local free kitchens, would venture out and openly visit the soldiers’ camps.80 The task of rehabilitation was, therefore, much more complex. The plight of Chittagong was especially bad. Here, by November 1943, mass prostitution had come to prevail. Around 30,000 women had joined the Labour Corps from where girls were easily drafted into brothels at Dolghat and Kulgau.81 In October 1943, the All Parties Relief Committee at Netrakona, East Bengal, rescued 12 girls who had been sold to prostitution, their prices ranging from Rs 10 to Rs 180.82 In Rangpur and Chandpur districts, large scale trafficking in women was going on and ‘veritable centres’ had been

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set up for this purpose.83 Similar cases of prostitution were reported from Barisal and Faridpur as well. Several instances of mothers selling their young daughters to local wealthy men were also reported. Some of these women were rescued by the relief workers of the Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti and brought to shelter homes, but it was difficult to determine their exact number. The famine situation in Bengal restructured but also reinforced gender norms in Bengali rural society, as women bereft of family ties were treated as sex objects of soldiers. The pattern of subsistence ensured that men favoured themselves in the race for survival and women were left to fend for themselves in whatever way they could. II.  T HE POLITICS OF RELIEF, REHABILITATION AND COMMUNITY In such desperate conditions, relief was of paramount importance. The Bengali poor became totally dependent on relief, not just for food and clothes, but for the recovery of a way of life that had been thrown out of gear. Different relief organizations catered to different classes of destitute, and in this section, I shall try and evaluate the impact of politicization through relief operations. This will in turn enable us to understand the possibilities of community based consciousness that were opened up in the political and social milieu of postfamine Bengal. Relief centres, both official and private, came up in abundance. Some of these were the Bengal Relief Committee, Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti (MARS), the Marwari Relief Society, the Ramakrishna Mission, Arya Samaj Relief Society, the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha Relief Committee, Stock Exchange Relief Committee, Gujrat Seva Samity, Punjab Relief Committee, Calcutta Relief Committee and the Bengal Women’s Food Committee. All of them, except the Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti, were then grouped under the Relief Coordination Committee started at the end of September 1943 for coordinating the work of the non-official relief organizations in Calcutta. Apart from the MARS, all the above mentioned sprung up in aid of the Hindu community. The Bengal Relief Committee was started by Dr S. P. Mookerjee and encompassed many smaller relief organizations from Calcutta and the districts. Later, the Hindu Mahasabha Relief Committee was also started by S. P. Mookerjee, because, as he claimed, many donors had expressed the desire that the Mahasabha alone should handle their money.84



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There were several problems around relief work. Bleaching powder, which was essential for maintaining sanitary conditions not just in hospitals, but also on the streets, was generally in short supply due to the War. Little attempt was made by local bodies or by the Government of Bengal to secure it in adequate quantities.85 The cholera epidemic that broke out during the famine, infected tank and river water, making tube wells an essential source of clean water supply. But again, because of the War, prices of materials required for their repair and maintenance shot up and the local bodies and district boards failed to maintain them.86 Moreover, the Government of Bengal was unable to get enough doctors and nurses to work in hospitals. Doctors were generally reluctant to work in rural areas because of poor sanitary conditions and epidemics wreaked by the famine.87 Sweepers were also in short supply, owing to demands of the military, and a large number had to be recruited from the United Provinces.88 Food was obviously the most important item on the relief programme. During August and September 1943, a large number of free kitchens were started by the Government of Bengal. By November, about 6,625 free kitchens were operating all over Bengal.89 Out of these, 551 were financed and run by private relief and charitable organizations, 4,469 by the government, and the remainder were subsidized by the government but run by other agencies.90 Free kitchens were also set up by several charitable organizations and private relief organizations. In Calcutta alone, 40 such food kitchens were opened by non-official organizations. There were seven government-run kitchens in Calcutta, a number ridiculously small, given the extent of the need. Food was primarily distributed in the form of free doles of uncooked items, and food grains were also sold at cheap rates by the grain shops. The Government of Bengal issued a circular in August 1943 which specified the quantity of food to be supplied – a) free gruel at 2 chataks (4 oz) of foodgrains per head b) uncooked food-grain doles per head per day – (i) 4 chataks (8 oz) for adults who normally do manual work (ii) 3 chataks (6 oz) for other adults and (iii) 2 chataks (4 oz) for children aged 2-14 years.91 Distribution of milk was mainly carried out by the Indian Red Cross Society. In September 1943, the army also gave it about 200 tons of milk. Milk was also donated to the Red-Cross Society by the USA.92 The Famine Inquiry Commission admitted that the food at the kitchens was very meagre. The gruel that was issued supplied only about 600 calories for adults and just half as much for children. It consisted primarily of a mixture of grains, especially millets. Bajra mixed in the gruel was generally ‘unfamiliar and unpalatable for the Bengalees’ [sic] and sometimes so indigestible that it

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caused ‘intestinal irritation, diarrhoea and death in numerous destitutes.’93 Some charitable organizations did provide some rice with gruel whenever they could obtain it. From December 1943, government food kitchens were gradually closed down94 and the destitute were taken to homes and orphanages built for them. The Calcutta Improvement Trust managed to turn a bustee area in North Calcutta into accommodation for several thousand poverty-stricken. But getting them to such homes was not easy – they were demoralised, and children preferred becoming peripatetic vagrants. Often, force had to be used: Children – skin and bone – had got into the habit of feeding like dogs. You tried to give them a decent meal but they would break away and start wandering about and eat filth. You had to lock them up in a special room. They would come to normal after they had been fed and kept for a fortnight in a decent manner.95 [Emphasis mine.]

The Ramakrishna Mission was one of the most important non-governmental organizations which did relief work in the rural areas. Several relief centres under the Mission’s supervision were started at Narayanganj, Dacca town and Barisal. In Narayanganj, it also supervised a relief hospital. In Dacca town, the Mission helped about 2,000 families through monetary relief and service.96 It also started free kitchens at Sonargaon, Paikpara and Kalma, which were in the Munshiganj subdivision of the Dacca district. At the Contai subdivision of Midnapore, it distributed every week, on behalf of the government, rice doles to 40,000 people and milk to about 1,200 children.97 The People’s Relief Committee (PRC), the relief wing of the Communist Party of India, was also engaged in relief work in Calcutta as well as the rural hinterland. They concentrated on rehabilitating fishermen and peasants. Free canteens were started in the districts, mostly run by the women workers. At the forefront were communist women like Renu Chakravartty, Ashalata Bannerjee, Snehalata Goswami, Manikuntala Sen and Leela Chowdhury. They would cook and distribute the food themselves. In all kitchens run by communists, Hindus and Muslims worked together without any communal bias. A large number of donations to the PRC also came from well-to-do peasants and workers themselves.98 It also distributed blankets and clothes to the destitute and organised a number of medical units of students and peasant volunteers which went into the interiors of villages and set up dispensaries. The Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti (MARS) which had been started in April 1942, carried out the most intense relief work, especially among women. The MARS was born out of the need to organize relief work by and among women,



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while CPI men formed the Janaraksha Samiti, which was a part of the PRC. The women’s front involved women from all strata of society, chiefly from the peasantry and labouring class.99 As early as September 1942, the MARS raised over 10,000 signatures in favour of opening more price control shops and shops for women in particular. On 17 March 1943, when the price of rice rose to Rs 20, the MARS organised a march of about 5,000 women to the Legislative Assembly in Calcutta to awaken mass consciousness about the food crisis.100 Similar hunger marches by the MARS took place all over Bengal. On 13 March 1943, 400 peasant women of Bankura went on a hunger march to the district magistrate demanding more price control shops. Again, on 22 March, about 500 women workers organised a ‘Bhookh Michil ’ and met the district magistrate. The magistrate was forced to send them to the local food committee office, and all of them returned home with rice.101 Similarly, 600 women in Pabna, mostly Muslims, went to the district magistrate demanding more control shops. Similar hunger marches were organised at Faridpur, Khulna, Mymensingh and Barisal under the leadership of communist women. Everywhere, the local authorities were forced to provide immediate help to such women.102 What was noteworthy was the public activism among very poor women. Relief became a matter of right, not charity. In fact, the MARS was one of the first organizations to start relief work in Calcutta. By August 1943, they were running sixteen ‘Khichuri’ kitchens and seven milk canteens in the city. The milk canteens were run specifically for destitute children and expecting or nursing mothers. Under the initiative of the MARS, a united relief committee comprising fourteen women’s organizations was formed, called the Bengal Women’s Food Committee, so that relief work for women could be better coordinated.103 The Samiti also organized the Nari Seva Sangha, consisting of all relief organizations in Calcutta that were involved in rendering relief to women.104 The MARS organised relief in the worst affected villages of East Bengal. In Barisal, two food canteens were opened where about 1500 people were fed daily. Five milk canteens were also started. In Dacca town, seven milk distributing centres were opened and together with the Dacca Central Relief Committee (a local committee), one cheap food canteen was started.105 The greatest number of food canteens was started in Chittagong, where fifteen canteens were managed by women, and nurses were provided for relief emergency hospitals106. Similar food and milk canteens were also started in Comilla, Noakhali and Mymensingh. The MARS also cooperated with the Bengal Medical Relief Coordination Committee in setting up clinics and hospitals.107

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In several districts, MARS volunteers worked in government hospitals. In 1945, the Chittagong Nari Samiti started the then only children’s hospital in Eastern India for destitute children, as the number of dying destitute children was so large that the City General Hospital had had its hands quite full.108 The MARS also proposed opening ‘homes’ where helpless women could find shelter as well as earn for themselves. They started cottage industries such as spinning, weaving, paddy husking etc. to increase the purchasing power of women. All these long-term ventures were directed at making women selfsufficient and self-reliant. So, relief, in their hands, became something more: a plan for women’s economic self-sufficiency. The MARS’s work was politically significant. It did not just focus on providing relief through food and clothing, but worked towards arousing secular and rights-based political consciousness amongst women. Wherever they went, local MARS committees were started and they spoke to women about the larger political situation in the country, especially in Bengal. They raised awareness about the need to free Gandhi and other political prisoners who were jailed for participating in the Quit India Movement. The first provincial conference of MARS was held on 8 May 1943 in Calcutta and attended by hundreds of women from all over the province. Many women marched on foot, shouting slogans not just for food, but also against fascism and for the release of Gandhi and other national leaders.109 At the conference, MARS leaders explained to them why national political issues could no longer be separated from matters which closely affected their lives. Posters were put up of Soviet women who were fighting for their own liberation. For most illiterate women who attended the conference, such illustrations were important and inspiring. They said more than what words could express. In several ways, therefore, efforts by the MARS went far deeper than mere philanthropic work. It was relief and rehabilitation in a holistic sense of the word – attempts at liberation of women from the confines of their home and bringing them to the national front. With the help of Bengali songs, dances and the staging of skits and plays, the MARS went deeper down into rural society than any other relief organization. Immense contributions were made by the Bengal Cultural Squad and Indian People’s Theatre Association (IPTA), both of which sprang up as important cultural organizations under the communist influence. The Bengal Cultural Squad was formed in 1943 by the noted social activist and singer Binoy Roy. Under his initiative, the Squad travelled throughout the country and performed its choir Bhookha Hai Bengal (Bengal is Hungry) along with other songs and



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plays.110 It helped raise awareness about the Bengal famine. In 1944, the Squad travelled to Bombay for three weeks, with the programme ‘Voice of Bengal’. The programme consisted of performances of a one-act play on the plight of the destitute who came to Calcutta, a ‘hunger and epidemic dance’, a ‘famine ballet’ portraying the happy pre-famine conditions and other performance pieces like patriotic songs in Bengali, Hindi, Marathi and Gujarati.111 The IPTA was first formed in May 1943 in Bombay, and soon, it opened branches in different parts of the country. In Bengal, the IPTA performed plays such as Jabanbandi and Nabanna that were based on the War and the famine. Both these plays, performed in Bengal throughout 1944, had the famine, the plight of the Bengali peasantry and agrarian questions as central to their theme. Jabanbandi was presented for the first time in February 1944 during the Kisan Conference in 24 Parganas. It was also later performed at the peasant conference at Dinajpur in March 1944. Upon invitation by the Bengal Kisan Sabha, in July 1944, this was performed in front of thousands of peasants in 24 Parganas.112 Nabanna, a four-act play depicting the crisis in peasant lives and ending with a message of hope as peasants returned home to the new harvest, was first staged on 24 October 1944 in Calcutta. Thereafter it was also performed in several parts of Bengal. In Calcutta alone there were forty performances. This helped the IPTA establish a popular base in rural areas. The money collected from the sale of tickets at these performances was sent to various relief committees, especially the People’s Relief Committee. Throughout 1943 and 1944, the Bengal branch of the IPTA and the Bengal Squad worked together and toured different provinces like Punjab, Bombay, Maharashtra and Gujarat, collecting over two lakhs rupees in aid of the famine victims of Bengal.113 The Progressive Writers’ Association (PWA), with Marxist leanings, had been formed in 1936 in Lucknow. The objective of this association had been to make a rupture in the ‘escapist’ literature which was flooding the country and to produce literature that would reflect the facts of existence.114 During the War and the Famine, the PWA in Bengal churned out several fantastic pieces of prose mainly on anti-fascism and the famine. Young writers like Manik Bandyopadhyay and Tarashankar Bandyopadhyay wrote novels and short stories with graphic testimonies of War and famine victims, challenging the idea of a bountiful Bengal. Tarashankar’s novel Manwantar (1944), while emotively describing the famine in the countryside, also talked of the communists’ efforts in providing relief. Manik Bandyopadhyay’s novels and short stories were even more hard-hitting. While in Chintamani115 (1946) he

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talked of hunger snapping ties of friendship, in Pratibimba (Mirror, 1944) and Aj Kal Porshur Golpo (Tales of Today, Tomorrow and Thereafter, 1946) he focused on the plight of unclothed and abandoned women. These novels and stories were written in a hard-hitting style to stir the consciousness of its readers and evoke empathy towards famine victims. The Left, therefore, provided a major stream of relief providers who also brought with them an alternative and inclusive political consciousness. It was possible because the CPI had been legalized when they supported the War effort after Germany invaded the Soviet Union. Congress workers were largely missing from the scene of relief work because most of their leaders were locked up in jails for the Quit India Movement. Labanyaprova Dutt, a member of the Congress, released a press statement in September 1943, explaining this absence. She stated that it was a matter of ‘great regret’ that in the famine of 1943, the Congress would not be able to organise relief work ‘under its own supervision.’116 However, soon, a section of this relief work got entangled in communal politics. In November 1943, V. D. Savarkar, the president of the All India Hindu Mahasabha, issued a statement which was published in the daily Mahratta. It kicked up a storm and started a string of allegations and counter allegations. Savarkar talked of an ‘organised Muslim campaign’ in the faminestricken parts of Bengal to convert hundreds of starving Hindu women and children to Islam. He accused ‘Muslim proselytizers’ of not giving food to dying Hindu mothers and their children, and saving them from their agony only if they renounced their ‘cherished Hindu faith’ and accepted Islam before they died; he stated that hundreds of Hindu children were being bought ‘as you buy vegetables’ or picked up by the roadside and sent to conversion centres by these proselytizing agencies.117 Savarkar then appealed to the Hindus of the country to send relief to members their own community alone. The Government of India expressed concern about the statement. It was apprehensive that although Mr Savarkar had only a limited following in the province, his statement was likely to have ‘a most mischievous effect.’118 The Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha, in fact, emerged on the forefront of communal politics in relief work. Relief became a matter of interparty bickering. The Mahasabha never missed an opportunity to vilify the League Ministry. It accused Muslim relief workers of insisting on a change of religion before they provided help to destitutes. It claimed to have saved a large number of such families by restoring them to Hinduism.119 Manoranjan Chaudhuri, secretary of the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha, alleged that



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in order to save Bengal from the famine, they had insisted upon an all parties’ government on the basis of complete cooperation. But the League was not prepared to accept Muslims who were not its supporters.120 The Mahasabha accused Muslims relief workers and the League ministry of providing relief to their community only, and claimed that there were certain government homes maintained exclusively for distressed women and children where only Muslims were being admitted.121 S. P. Mookerjee, who was the real face of the Bengal Relief Committee, declared pompously that 99 per cent of the contributions to the Bengal Relief Committee and the Hindu Mahasabha Relief Committee had come from non-Muslims, clearly implying that Muslims were sending their relief money only for their co-religionists.122 The Mahasabha also claimed that ‘certain organizations’ like the Khaksars were removing the destitute from Bengal to distant places without any consideration of their religion and choice. The Mahasabha insisted that Hindu orphans should remain in the custody of Hindu organizations and Muslim orphans amongst Muslims. The Government of India had sanctioned Rs 3 crores for rehabilitation. The League ministry was once again criticized for using it all up in aiding its own community.123 Mookerjee, now a self-proclaimed representative of destitute Hindus, also argued that the government was insensitive to the feelings of Hindus in employing Muslim cooks in their gruel kitchens. He claimed that they had refused to employ Hindu cooks, and consequently, many Hindus were forced to avoid such kitchens.124 Indicting the League Ministry, he declared, A Party Ministry, which does not enjoy the confidence of large sections of the people, must not be allowed to play with the lives of millions of human beings. Let Lord Wavell and Mr Casey look at Bengal’s problem from a detached and impartial point of view, create a state of affairs which will render harmonious co-operation between Government and people possible for saving the province from ruin and destitution and not allow the welfare of the people to be subordinated to any other consideration, political, communal or imperial.125

In a speech at a Town Hall Meeting in Calcutta on 6 June 1943, Mookerjee said that a ministry which was ‘pledged to Mr Jinnah and Pakistan’ would now have to realize the ‘economic futility’ of Pakistan and stop its ‘baneful activities’ which were leading to disharmony and disunity.126 The Muslim League, he said, was dancing to the tune of British imperialism, and the Mahasabha hoped that a day would come when both the Mahasabha and the Congress

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would stand on the same platform.127 The Mahasabha, thus, now projected itself onto the anti-imperialist platform and brought itself on an equal footing with the Congress, despite being distant from all anti-colonial struggles so far. As many as nineteen institutions, belonging to the All India Spinner’s Association, Khadi Pratishthan and Abhay Ashram of Comilla, had been banned in Bengal and their stocks of Khadi and cash seized.128 This created an uproar amidst Hindu circles, which eventually boiled down to an attack on the League ministry. The Amrita Bazar Patrika was on the forefront in this. It accused the League ministry of being hand in glove with the central government in imposing the ban on Abhay Ashram, which had been actively involved in rehabilitation of the famine stricken villages.129 The newspaper pointed out that Sir Nazimuddin, the chief minister of Bengal, deliberately avoided lifting the ban on the Ashram. In fact, Amrita Bazar Patrika steadfastly vilified the League ministry. It cried itself hoarse claiming that the Bengal Government had been advised by the Government of India to use the air raid posts in the city to provide shelter to the destitute, but the advice was ignored.130 It claimed that the Bengal Government had made false promises of setting up evacuee camps in and around Calcutta from where the destitute would be rehabilitated to their own villages. In reality, work had not even been started on any such evacuee camp.131 The Calcutta Relief Committee presided by Jnananjan Niyogi, which was one of the major non-governmental relief organizations in Calcutta, was no less vocal in this regard. In the memorandum submitted by the Committee to the FIC, Niyogi claimed that ‘prolonged political education and suffering naturally gave to the Hindus more social-service sense and consideration than the Moslems who had suffered no brunt of political struggle. Hindus could organize relief work with greater promptitude, higher spirit of self-sacrifice and better efficiency.’132 He accused the Muslim League and Muslims in general of carrying out only limited relief work, and Mr. Jinnah of sending only Rs 5000 for ‘his dying Pakistan brethren in Bengal.’133 Communal politics around relief was not limited to mere mudslinging and political bickering. A more far-reaching aim of the Mahasabha came to light when along with its usual communal propaganda, it also stepped up its Hindu Sangathanist activities. Most of the Sangathan work around this time built up the fear that the Hindu community itself was dying. Hence there was an urgent need to not only unify Hindus but also inculcate a martial spirit in them. Although initially the Mahasabha’s relief activity was directed mainly towards the Bengali middle classes in Calcutta and in the affected rural areas of



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East Bengal, this was also the time when the Mahasabha started expanding its base amongst ‘lower’ caste Hindus. Here, the class-caste distinction eventually coalesced in the wider interests of the ‘Hindu’ community, and relief provided an important window of opportunity for the Mahasabha to consolidate its base amongst the Scheduled Caste population of Bengal. Mookerjee himself, at the helm of the Bengal Relief Committee, published a booklet titled Panchasher Manwantar (The Famine of 1350). In the preface to the second edition, the publisher mentions that the first edition sold out so fast in the first three weeks of its publication in 1943 that they had to bring out a second edition soon in 1944.134 Hindu militant activities in the province were stepped up under the auspices of the Mahasabha with the formation of the Hindu Shakti Sangha in Calcutta in 1944. A number of branches were opened in different areas of East Bengal to unify Hindus and instil the spirit of ‘selfdefence’ in them. On 19 March 1944, a printed Bengali leaflet headed ‘Hindu Sabdhan’ (Hindus Beware) and its Hindi version issued by one Kartik Prasad Rana, ‘captain’ of the Hindu Shakti Sangha, were found put up in different parts of Bowbazar Street in Calcutta. It warned Hindus against the ‘Pakistan activities’ of the ‘Eastern Pakistan Corps’ and the ‘Muslim National Guard.’ It said that a volunteer militia under the name of the Hindu Shakti Sangha had been formed to protect the ‘economic, religious and cultural rights of the Hindus.’ It urged Hindus to join this organization which was ‘furthering the ideals of Veer Savarkar.’135 A letter from Ashutosh Lahiri, general secretary of the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha to one Ranen Ray, who was a member of the Hindu Mahasabha of Rajshahi, was intercepted by the Calcutta Special Branch Police on 2 April 1944. Lahiri had written that the annual meeting of the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha would take place in Rajshahi on 15 and 16 April 1944. He had asked Ray to furnish details about the workings of the Hindu Shakti Sangha, specially asking for the number of its branches, their exact locations and the number of members receiving training in different centres. The Mahasabha leadership in Bengal took the work of the Shakti Sangha very seriously and became increasingly involved with it.136 By August 1944, it was made compulsory that members of the various branches of the Shakti Sanghas had to be members of the Bengal Hindu Mahasabha as well.137 However, in spite of this massive membership and organizational drive, the exact number of members in the Shakti Sangha is not known. The oath of the Hindu Shakti Sangha (formulated around November 1944) is interesting. The text of it is given below:

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Making Peace, Making Riots The holy land of Hindustan is my Fatherland. I swear by the name of Revered Mother India and Almighty God that I will try with my heart and soul to protect and improve the Hindu nation, culture and Hindu civilization and do my best to achieve the complete independence and get full control of Hindustan with a view to making the state progressive and powerful and I will remain always ready to prevent any wrongful attack on Hindu nation and religion. I will not hesitate in the least to welcome any sort of misery, trouble and danger in order to protect the Hindu brothers and sisters who are in distress. Henceforth I will try with my heart and soul to organise a powerful and independent Hindu state in Hindustan by creating unity among all sections of Hindus. I also swear that I will always, everywhere and in all circumstances, obey without hesitation the orders passed by the leader selected by the Sangha. Principle: 1. To inaugurate the martial (Kshatra) spirit among the Hindu nation 2. To establish the ideal of true humanity and bravery among the Hindu nation. 3. To prevent all sorts of attack on the Hindu religion and culture and to fight for the all-round improvement of the Hindus 4. To practice the policy of self-defence and to culture gymnastics in fixed method in order to increase physical strength and efficiency in activity. 5. To help in all respects the oppressed and distressed Hindus irrespective of caste and creed 6. To organise a well-disciplined and self-sufficient Hindu nation by creating a sense of unity regarding state and religion. 7. To serve the destitute will be one of the main duties of the Shakti Sangha.138

It is quite obvious from this that the Shakti Sangha was involved in providing ‘relief ’ to the ‘Hindu’ destitute of all castes and creeds. Apart from relief in the conventional sense, this was also synonymous with integrating and unifying the Hindu community of Bengal in such a time of ‘crisis’. This unification was urgent because of the alleged threat of disintegration of the Hindu community in the face of the famine and also the alleged attempted ‘Pakistanization’ of the province by the Muslim League. It is obvious that the other side of the ‘relief ’ coin was an accelerated communal propaganda and mobilization. Demands for militant Hindu unity were also put forth by other splinter yet organized Hindu groups like the Hindu Mission and the Bharat Sevashram Sangha. Since the 1930s, the Hindu Mission had proclaimed the need to mobilize Namasudras and other ‘lower’ castes and present a unified Hindu



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community in order to thwart the ‘Muslim threat’. It had begun work in the East Bengal districts to help the ‘lower’ caste poor.139 In the aftermath of the famine, the Hindu Mission stepped up its Hindu Sangathanist activities and its centres at Jhargram, Asansol and Kalighat provided help to many young girls, women and children. It claimed that most of them had been rescued from Muslim homes and brothels and ‘similar bad quarters where they were sold or tempted or forced to take shelter under pressure of hunger and starvation.’140 In June 1944, the Mission also issued an appeal for more funds to serve the destitute ‘in the larger interests of the Hindu community’.141 The Bharat Sevashram Sangha had also urged the unification and militarization of Hindus since the late 1930s. Since 1934–35, it had been actively working among the Namasudras and other ‘lower’ castes in Jessore, Khulna, Faridpur and Barisal.142 The famine provided it with a further opportunity. At one of its meetings held on 22 February 1944 at its headquarters at Rash Behari Avenue in Calcutta, the leaders of the Sangha along with N. C. Chatterjee, who was a prominent leader of the Bengal Mahasabha, passed resolutions on a number of issues. The most interesting of them was the removal of untouchability in Hindu society, pressing upper class Hindus ‘to save by all means the powerful fighting classes of Bengal such as the Mahishyas, the Namasudras, the Poundra Kshatriyas and the Bagdies’. It requested the ‘leaders, preachers and workers of various Hindu organizations to make arrangements for the protection of helpless Hindu women and children.’143 At the same meeting, the Bharat Sevashram Sangha also protested the refusal by the Civil Supplies Department to provide more rice for bhog (offerings to deities).144 This particular meeting, according to the Calcutta Special Branch report, was attended by nearly 2,000 people, of which about 500 were women. At the end of this meeting, N. C. Chatterji exhorted the crowd by adding that Hindus ‘should have their trident sharpened to cut the Pakistan scheme to pieces and bring in freedom for the country.’145 At another meeting on 11 August 1944, the Bharat Sevashram Sangha urged the Hindu public to come to the rescue of the Scheduled Caste community which was ‘on the verge of ruin’, and insisted on ‘the imperative need of effective coordination among all Hindu elements in order to set up a common and united front against the forces of disruption.’146 Most of these Sangha meetings were held on days of important Hindu festivals like Janmashtami and Shiva Ratri. This was obviously a symbolic reference to Hindu unity with the invocation of a common ritual universe. The repeated emphasis on the ‘urgent need’ to serve and protect the Scheduled

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Castes – the Namasudras and other ‘lower’ castes, (who were the worst affected amongst the ‘non-Muslim’ population of Bengal) - shows that famine relief and rehabilitation work was used by these Hindu volunteer groups, all of which owed allegiance to the Mahasabha, to further their own scheme of acculturation of the ‘lower’ castes within the Hindu aka Mahasabha fold. The reference to Namasudras, Mahishyas and other lower castes as ‘powerful fighting classes’ in such meetings was a trope to underline their role as saviours of the Hindu community in the hour of crisis. The Hindu Mission and the Bharat Sevashram Sangha avidly toured the famine affected parts of Bengal, opening local branches of their respective organizations. The Bharat Sevashram Sangha also started numerous branches of Rakshi Dals and Milan Mandirs with the same objectives. These Milan Mandirs also served the purpose of ‘Shuddhi’, apparently reconverting several ‘backward classes’ like the Santhals and Rajbansis.147 Caste disabilities such as untouchability had been one of the primary factors for the alienation of the Scheduled Castes (of whom the Namasudras and Rajbansis formed the majority in Bengal) from the Hindu fold and their attempts to forge a separate identity. But as Sekhar Bandyopadhyay has shown, in the 1940s, Dalit politics at the grassroots had begun to show distinctive changes, and at a more general level ‘the Namasudra masses at this stage were developing a greater identification with the Hindu community and this Hinduisation was gradually overshadowing their caste identity.’148 While the ‘lower’ caste ‘Hindu’ population were generally poor and had suffered terribly due to the famine, the Scheduled Caste MLA in Nazimuddin’s cabinet, Mukunda Behari Mullick, supported the ministry and did not champion the cause of the Scheduled Castes during the food debate in the Legislative Assembly.149 This would have further alienated the famine affected ‘lower’caste non-Muslim peasantry in rural Bengal from its organized leadership. Moreover, since the early forties, prominent Scheduled Caste leaders like Upendranath Edbar and Patiram Roy had also identified with the Mahasabha rhetoric. In 1941, Patiram Roy addressed the ‘Backward Class Hindu Conferences’ organized by the Bharat Sevashram Sangha, where issues such as conversion, Shuddhi and primary education were discussed.150 Throughout the famine period of 1943–44, the Mahasabha used relief as a window of opportunity to foster a common Hindu identity. It worked especially hard amongst ‘lower’-castes to enlist them in its communal agenda. It managed to open several rural branches in Faridpur, Dacca, Jessore, Bakarganj and Khulna – all of them thickly-populated Namasudra areas.151 In its annual



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report for 1943–44, the Mahasabha boasted that whereas in the previous year the number of branches of the Sabha stood at 1,004, now, despite the famine, the figure had mounted to 1,217, and the total number of new members was 40,887 as against 15,474 in the previous year.152 The repercussions of such Hinduization of caste politics were seen in increasing communal tensions between the Scheduled Castes and Muslims, and frequent outbreaks of smallscale communal disturbances throughout 1944, an aspect which has been discussed in greater detail in the next chapter. The League reacted with equal fervour. It turned the tables on the Mahasabha, arguing that they were the ones providing relief only to Hindus.153 M. A. H. Ispahani, speaking on behalf of the Muslim League, called Savarkar’s allegations a complete bluff, highly deplorable and likely to increase bitterness between the two communities.154 In his statement before the Famine Inquiry Commission, Hamidul Huq Chaudhury of the Bengal Provincial Muslim League dismissed all the Mahasabha allegations as baseless. He said that the Ramakrishna Mission had also received funds, food etc. from the coffers of the Muslim Chamber of Commerce, so there was no question of partiality towards Muslims.155 Tamizuddin Khan, the education minister of Bengal, called such attempts an ‘organized propaganda to create prejudice against the Bengal ministry by resort to unfair advantage of the food situation.’156 The League Ministry, on its part, fully utilised the press for communalizing relief measures. The Star of India, the League’s mouthpiece in Bengal, carried a lengthy editorial on 6 December 1943 deploring Savarkar’s statements as the ‘ravings of a fevered brain.’157 Absolving the League government of all blame, the newspaper insisted that the Muslim Chamber of Commerce Relief Committee made no distinction either in its administration of relief or in dispensation of sympathy; it had provided relief to the destitute irrespective of religion.158 Interestingly, it justified the demand for Pakistan in the wake of such allegations by the leader of the Hindu Mahasabha, remarking sarcastically that if Savarkar honestly believed in what he had said, there was all the more reason that Hindus should have nothing to do with ‘such objectionable people’ and let them have their separate homeland – ‘When selfishness, hatred and suspicion had gone so far, it was no use perpetuating them through a common central government.’159 In fact, using the famine as an excuse, the League now stepped up its Pakistan propaganda. Pakistan Day meetings were held all over Bengal on 5 March 1944 to explain to Muslims the meaning and desirability of a separate province for themselves.

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The League also stepped up the militarization of the community from 1943. The main volunteer organization of the Muslim League in Bengal, as elsewhere in the country, was the Muslim National Guard160. On 3 March 1944, the copy of a note prepared by the Intelligence Bureau of the Home Department, Government of Bengal, was forwarded to the Central Intelligence Officer posted in Calcutta. This note was prophetic: Whatever may be the potentialities of this volunteer organization, it has, as a rule, respected the terms of the general ban on the volunteer organizations. Muslim National Guards have in the past arranged displays and parades only on special occasions such as the Annual Session of the AIML. However, the re-organization of the National Guard is to be one of the main functions of the ‘Council of Action’ recently constituted by a resolution of the Working Committee of the AIML. If, as has been recently reported by a well-placed observer, the intention of this ‘Council of Action’ is to put the League Organization throughout India on a fighting basis against Hindus or the British government, as and when occasion arises, the League will no doubt find in the MNG a well-disciplined organization to carry out its plans. Moreover, the fact that the MNG’s display at the Karachi session of the AIML is said to have been disciplined, suggests a certain amount of training and it is felt that this organization might be given rather closer attention in future.161

Although till 1944, the Muslim National Guards’ branches was fairly limited in number, intelligence reports showed that they were quite organized. As on March 1944, the headcount of the MNG was 750, but what is interesting to note is that the head office of the MNG was located in the same building as the election department of the Calcutta Muslim League.162 This meant that these militarized Muslim youths were ready to be used for propaganda work during the coming Corporation election. All of them were provided with uniforms, and some of them even had the initials ‘E. P.’ (East Pakistan) on their collars. The constitution of the All India Muslim League National Guards clearly stated that the aims and objectives of the organization were the same as that of the League. In August 1944, the police commissioner of Calcutta wrote a confidential letter to the additional secretary to the Government of Bengal, arguing that although the MNG was not very active in Calcutta, there was ‘a distinct possibility that they may become a menace to the public peace under certain conditions.’163 Armed presence of the MNG was always visible in the meetings and processions of the Muslim League in Calcutta and the rest of the province, and the MNG was also entrusted with the responsibility of recruiting as many Muslims as possible into the League.



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Another murky aspect emerged around this time. The Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha demanded more rations, especially atap rice (a finer quality of rice), for the Hindus from the government. This was needed because Hindus had to offer ‘Bhog’ (daily food offering) to their deities, and also for the consumption of Hindu widows. Radha Kishore Goswami, the secretary of the Santipur Branch of Hindu Mahasabha in Bengal, wrote a letter to S. P. Mookerjee in June 1944, telling him about the extreme scarcity of atap rice for bhog and consumption by widows, and requested him to immediately look into the matter.164 Similarly, the zamindar of Muggeria in Contai also wrote a letter in June to the secretary of the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha expressing anxiety as to what was being done to protect the religious rights of Hindus in these matters.165 An interesting letter was written to Mr Suhrawardy, the minister for Civil Supplies, by Srijib Nyayatirtha, the principal of Bhatpara Sanskrit College in the 24 Parganas, wherein he gave a long list of pujas and vratas that were mandatory in all Hindu households, and asked for rice to be supplied as bhog on all these occasions. He pointed out that the refusal to grant extra rations had wounded the sentiments of Hindus; the sooner the provisions be made, the better it would be for all ‘Hon’ble ministers.’166 When rationing was introduced in Calcutta in 1944, the Hindu Mahasabha went to the absurd length of demanding ration cards for Hindu deities! Suhrawardy refused to grant any such request of extra ration for bhog. The Muslim press satirically remarked that the question of bhog for Hindu deities could be easily solved, if leaders, instead of fanning religious fanaticism and mischief mongering, cooperated with the government. ‘Since in most cases worshippers themselves eat the bhog, it is not possible to see the ground for demanding extra rations.’167 The Communist Party of India (CPI), which was now in an informal alliance with the League ministry and cooperating in the British war effort,168 also levelled allegations against the Bengal Relief Committee. It accused the Hindu Mahasabha of using relief as a ‘mere cover’ to further its own ‘factional and communal political ends.’169 It alleged that initially, they themselves had sent their own collections to S. P. Mookerjee, believing that in order to be effective, relief must be consolidated. The party hoped that hunger and relief work would at last bring different political parties together. However, Mookerjee did not want anything to do with either the League or the communists. Whenever he sent money to various districts for relief work, his instructions were to use it to strengthen the Hindu Mahasabha and keep the communists and League members out.170

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In fact, the CPI claimed that S. P. Mookerjee had done the same with Congress relief workers before giving cash to them. In January 1944, P. C. Joshi, the communist leader, met some local Congress relief workers in Calcutta who complained that Mookerjee had laid down two conditions before he gave them cash – they should join the Hindu Mahasabha and carry out relief work through it, or at least, make the local relief committee a branch of the Bengal Relief Committee without communists or League supporters in it.171 Similarly, the MARS too had been handicapped because S. P. Mookerjee refused them funds. When the MARS committee at Rangpur appealed to Mookerjee for funds, it met with stern rejection. A paltry amount was sent to the Gaibandha Mahila Samity of Rangpur, with an enquiry as to whether they had any connection with the MARS.172 Two important aspects emerge from the study of relief processes during the famine. One is the massive presence of rural women in relief work as well as on the political platform. Relief, in all probability, was seen as an extension of household work, and perhaps because of this, there was a certain acceptance of so many rural women in this largely public activity. In this context, Gargi Chakravartty notes that this constructive and nurturing work, i.e. providing food, was helpful, even though it also restricted them and kept them in their traditional roles.173 Extending women’s traditional roles into the public arena enabled those women hitherto confined to domestic chores to work in public and political spaces.174 On the other hand, the numerous hunger marches and, later on, the attendance of so many women in the several conferences and cultural meetings of the CPI and the MARS shows that the conventional contention that the famine was met with a passive acceptance of death is not entirely valid. Absence of food riots, grain looting and other forms of violence associated with hunger does not necessarily mean the absence of anger. In this case, the activities and propaganda of the CPI, the MARS and the IPTA helped awaken the political consciousness of rural men and women, and slowly engage them in political action. But the simultaneous communalization of relief and rehabilitation by both the Mahasabha and the League retarded the scope of secular politics. With the Congress’s absence from the political scene for about two years, the only other political party in Bengal which could have directed the politics of the province into a secular terrain was the Communist Party. But its informal alliance with the League, due to the Second World War, unfortunately upset this delicate situation. Members of the CPI in Bengal regularly attended League meetings and propagated the validity of Pakistan



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on grounds of ‘national self-determination.’ Nonetheless, the Party did make enormous advances at this time to emerge as a real political force. In the first elections after 1947, it emerged as the major opposition party. In the scenario of death by hunger, when survival itself hung by a thread, community consciousness among the masses was aroused by the League and the Mahasabha, which then had far reaching ramifications for a hunger stricken province. Both parties managed to garner vast support for their respective causes. As all known anchors of social life vanished, a sense of community remained something that could provide sustenance and comfort. The political situation acted as a catalyst for a hardening of community identities, which soon turned irrevocably into communalized identities. ENDNOTES 1. This is the Bengali term for the famine of 1943, which corresponded with the Bengali year 1350. 2. See Paul R. Greenough, Prosperity and Misery in Modern Bengal, The Famine of 1943–44 (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1982); Amartya Sen, Poverty and Famines: An Essay on Entitlement and Deprivation (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1982); and Rakesh Batabyal, Communalism in Bengal From Famine to Noakhali, 1943–47 (New Delhi: Sage, 2005) among others. 3. Famine Inquiry Commission, Report on Bengal (Usha, New Delhi, 1984) p 25. Henceforth referred to as FIC. 4. Nanavati Papers, National Archives of India (hereafter NAI), Volume II, Testimony of B. R. Sen (Director General of Food, Government of India), p 440. 5. The FIC admitted that the removal of large number of boats from the delta, in which communications were almost entirely by river and not by rail and road, would cause considerable hardship and inconvenience. FIC p 26. 6. Satish Chandra Samata (et.al) August Revolution and Two Years’ National Government in Midnapore, Part 1 (Calcutta: Orient Book Company, 1946), p 7. Satish Samanta was the president of the Subdivisional Congress Committee of Tamluk. 7. Paul R. Greenough, Prosperity and Misery in Modern Bengal: The Famine of 1943–44 (New Delhi: Oxford University Press 1982), p 89. 8. Srimanjari, Through War and Famine: Bengal 1939–45 (New Delhi: Orient Black Swan, 2009), p 175. 9. FIC, p 27. 10. Ibid. 11. Bidyut Chakrabarty, Local Politics and Indian Nationalism, Midnapur 1919–1944 (New Delhi: Manohar, 1997), p 136. 12. Nanavati Papers, Volume II, Testimony of B. R. Sen (Director General of Food, Government of India), p 440.

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13. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), NMML, Subject File No. 116, p 5. Handwritten letter, dated Sevagram, 14.3.1942, from Rajkumari Amrit Kaur, to Commander in Chief in India. 14. Ibid, This particular file is replete with such tales of military atrocities. 15. Srimanjari, Through War and Famine, p 76. 16. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), NMML, Subject File No. 116, p 17–18. Letter titled ‘Military Atrocities in Feni Sub-division (Noakhali)’ dated Noakhali, 22nd April 1942, from Khitish Chandra Roychaudhury, Gopal Haldar, Parimal Majumdar and Rasamoy Mazumdar, Congress Workers, Noakhali, to Mahatma Gandhi (through the Bengal Provincial Congress Committee). 17. Account by a European Relief Volunteer, T. G. Davies of the Society of Friends Ambulance Unit, cited in Greenough, Prosperity and Misery, p 148. 18. See Greenough, Prosperity and Misery, Chapter 4. 19. Ishan Mukherjee, ‘The Elusive Chase: ‘War Rumour’ in Calcutta during the Second World War’, in Calcutta, The Stormy Decades, ed. Tanika Sarkar and Sekhar Bandyopadhyay. (New Delhi: Social Science Press, 2015), p 73. 20. Ibid, p 78. 21. There were also rumours that the Japanese were helpful and benevolent towards Indians. See, Ibid, pp 76–8. 22. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 6 July 1941. 23. Srimanjari, Through War and Famine, p 53. 24. For an assessment of the full extent of damage caused by the Japanese bombs, see Janam Mukherjee, ‘Japan Attacks’, in Calcutta, The Stormy Decades, ed. Tanika Sarkar and Sekhar Bandyopadhyay. (New Delhi: Social Science Press, 2015) p 100–105. 25. Ibid, p 104. 26. Ibid, p 110. 27. Ibid, p 111. 28. Ibid, p 110. 29. Ibid, p 113. 30. FIC Report, pp 38–39. 31. Batabyal, Communalism in Bengal: From Famine to Noakhali, 1943–47, p 80. 32. Nanavati Papers, Volume II, Testimony of B. R. Sen (Director General of Food, Government of India), p 446. 33. Greenough, p 159 34. Nanavati Papers, Volume II, Testimony of B. R. Sen (Director General of Food, Government of India), p 446. 35. Greenough, Prosperity and Misery, p 159 36. Nanavati Papers, Volume I, Memorandum submitted by the People’s Relief Committee, Bengal, before the Famine Inquiry Commission, August 1944, p 1. 37. T. G. Narayan, Famine over Bengal (Calcutta: The Book Company Ltd, 1944), p 116. 38. Ibid. 39. Ibid, p 117.



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40. Tapan Ray Chowdhury, Bangalnama (Calcutta: Ananda Publishers, 2007), p 126. 41. Bimal Kar, Dewal (Calcutta: Ananda Publishers, 2008), p 261–62. 42. Greenough, Prosperity and Misery, p 36–40. Greenough argues that amongst Bengalis, the source of mettle and strength was conceived physically through food and of all foodstuffs rice was the most suitable ‘for it alone invigorates the body, making it lustrous and capable of superior acts of conduct; rice provided vigour and it was associated with beauty, wealth and indulgence. 43. Tapan Ray Chowdhuri, Romonthon othoba Bhimrotiprapter Porocharitacharcha (Calcutta: Ananda Publishers, 2003) p 92. 44. This was obviously because most of these big and small restaurants and eateries which catered to the soldiers and the upper middle classes of Calcutta. These restaurants had their nexus in the rice black market and could obtain rice as and when they wanted. 45. Ray Chowdhury, Bangalnama, p127–128. 46. Ray Chowdhuri, Romonthon, p 92. 47. Kar, Dewal, p 271. 48. Ibid, p 272. 49. Ibid, p 279. 50. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 26 September 1943. 51. Ibid. 52. FIC Report, p 117. 53. Ibid, p 117. 54. S. P. Mookerjee Papers, NMML, II–IV Installment, Subject File no. 121, p 43. The Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti and its Fight for Food. 55. Renu Chakravartty, Communists in Indian Women’s Movement, 1940–50 (New Delhi: People’s Publishing House, 1980), p 45. 56. Ibid. 57. Ibid. 58. Ibid. 59. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 25 December 1943. 60. S. P. Mookerjee Papers, NMML, V–VII Installment, Printed Material - Serial No. 10, p 5. ‘Relief Organizations fight Bengal Famine’, Booklet published by the Relief Coordination Committee, Calcutta 1943. 61. Srimanjari, Through War and Famine, p 199. 62. Hasan Ajijul Huq, Agunpakhi (Dhaka: Ityadi Grantha Prakash, 2011), p 163. 63. Greenough, Prosperity and Misery, p 135. 64. Greenough, Prosperity and Misery,p 174; petition by a writer-teacher to a wealthy merchant in Bankura, September 1943. 65. Ibid. 66. T. G. Narayan, Famine Over Bengal, (Calcuuta: The Book Company Ltd., 1944), p 193. 67. Nanavati Papers, Volume V, Testimony by F. A. Karim, district magistrate, Faridpur, p 1375.

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68. Nanavati Papers, Volume I, Memorandum submitted by the Bengal Provincial Kisan Sabha, p 148. 69. Narayan, Famine Over Bengal, p 165. 70. FIC Report, p 73. 71. People’s War, 20 February, 1944. 72. Ibid. 73. Ibid. 74. Nanavati Papers, Volume I, Memorandum submitted by the All Bengal Mahila Atmaraksha Samity, p 84. 75. Narayan, Famine Over Bengal, p 198 76. Article published by Kalpana Dutt on the conditions at Arakan Road, Chittagong, in Janayuddha on 3 May 1945, also cited in Greenough, Prosperity and Misery, p 178. 77. S. P. Mookerjee Papers, NMML, II-IV Installment, Subject File No. 121, p 43. The Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti and its Fight for Food. 78. Article published by Kalpana Dutt on the conditions at Arakan Road, Chittagong, in Janayuddha on 3 May 1945, cited in Greenough, p 178. 79. People’s War, 9 January, 1944. 80. Ibid. 81. Nanavati Papers, Volume I, Memorandum submitted by the All Bengal Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti, p 83. 82. Ibid. 83. Ibid. 84. Nanavati Papers, Volume I, p 257. Memorandum for the Food Shortage Commission submitted by the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha. 85. FIC Report, p 128. 86. Ibid. 87. Ibid, p 125. 88. Ibid p 126. 89. FIC Report, p 128. 90. Ibid, p 70. 91. Ibid, p 129. 92. Ibid, p 130. 93. Ibid, p 129. 94. This was because the Government of Bengal felt that the worst part of the famine, i.e. possibilities of starvation deaths were over, and hence private relief organizations could handle the situation. 95. FIC Report, p 71. 96. Narayan, Famine Over Bengal, p 187 97. Ibid, p 169 98. People’s War, 23 January 1944 99. Manikuntala Sen, Sediner Katha (Calcutta: Navapatra Prakashan, 1982), p 73. 100. S. P. Mookerjee Papers, NMML, II-IV Installment, Subject File no. 121, p 28. The Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti and its Fight for Food. 101. Janayuddha, 24 April 1943.



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102. Chakravartty, Communists in Indian Women’s Movement, p 30–33. 103. S. P. Mookerjee Papers, II–IV Installment, Subject File no. 121, p 32. The Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti and its Fight for Food. 104. Nanavati Papers, Volume I, p 82. Memorandum submitted by the All Bengal Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti. 105. S. P. Mookerjee Papers, II–IV Installment, Subject File no. 121, p 34. The Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti and its Fight for Food. 106. Ibid, p 39. The Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti and its Fight for Food. 107. Since medical relief organised by the Government of India was grossly inadequate, the Bengal Medical Relief Coordination Committee (BMRCC) was started in 1943, with B. C. Roy as president. The PRC teamed up with the BMRCC on several occasions to coordinate medical relief. 108. Chakravartty, Communists in Indian Women’s Movement, p 46. 109. Ibid, p 36. 110. Indian People’s Theatre Association, www. www.ipta.in. 111. Sudhi Pradhan, ed., Marxist Cultural Movement in India: Chronicles and Documents (1936–47), Volume 1 (Calcutta: Pustak Bipani, 1985), p 244. 112. Aishwarj Kumar, ‘Visions of Cultural Transformation: The IPTA in Bengal, 1940–44,’ in Turbulent Times India 1940–44, ed. Biswamoy Pati (Mumbai: Popular Prakashan, 1998), p 176. 113. Pradhan, Marxist Cultural Movement, p 278 114. Ibid, p 2. 115. Manik Bandopadhyay, Manik Bandyopadhyay Upanyashsamagra, Volume III (Dhaka: Absar, 2010). 116. The Congress as an organization had been banned in 1942 after the launch of the Quit India Movement. Most of its prominent leaders were in jail. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 29 September 1943. 117. NAI File Number 87/43 – Poll (I), 1943, p 8, Roy’s Weekly, Sunday 5th December, 1943. 118. Ibid, p 6, Extract from Bombay Fortnightly report for the second half of November 1943. 119. S. P. Mookerjee (Uma Prasad Mookerjee) Papers, NMML, Serial Number 7 Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha Relief Committee – Report of Relief Work. 120. Nanavati Papers, Volume V, p 1331. Manoranjan Chaudhuri, secy. Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha and Professor Hari Charan Ghosh, secy. Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha, Calcutta, 5th September 1944. 121. Ibid, p 1337. Manoranjan Chaudhuri, secy. Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha and Professor Hari Charan Ghosh, secy. Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha, Calcutta, 5th September 1944. 122. SB File No. M 717/1944, p 11, Summary of the speech delivered by S. P. Mookerjee in the Bengal Legislative Assembly on 29 March 1944. 123. Nanavati Papers, Volume V, p 1337. Manoranjan Chaudhuri, secy. Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha and Professor Hari Charan Ghosh, secy. Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha, Calcutta, 5th September 1944.

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1 24. Ibid, p 1337. 125. The Statesman, 26 January 1944. 126. S. P. Mookerjee Papers, NMML, Subject File no. 119, p 10. S. P. Mookerjee’s Speech at the Town Hall Meeting on 6th June, 1943. 127. SB File No. PI 502/44, p 1B, ‘Hindu Affairs’, SB Report dated 11.1.44. 128. As mentioned before, Congress Party had been declared unlawful and banned all over India as a result of the Quit India Movement. All associated organizations had also been banned along with it. 129. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 14 February 1944. 130. Ibid, 10 September 1943. 131. Ibid. 132. Nanavati Papers, Volume I, p 69. Memorandum submitted to the Famine Enquiry Commission by the Calcutta Relief Committee through the Joint Honorary Secretary, Jnananjan Niyogi. 133. Ibid, p 70. 134. SB File No. M 717/1944, p 7, Review of printed Bengali book titled Panchasher Manyantar by S. P. Mookerjee published by Manoj Basu on behalf of the Bengal Publishers, 14 Bankim Chatterjee Street and printed by Bibhuti Bhushan Biswas at the Sripati Press, 14 B. L. Ray Street. First edition printed Paus 1350 B. S. Second edition printed Baisakh 1351 B. S. 135. SB File No. PH 550/44, p 9, ‘Hindu Affairs’, SB Report dated 22 March 1944 136. Ibid, p 13, Extract from Secret Weekly Summary of the superintendent of police, Rajshahi, for the week ending 6th April 1944. 137. Ibid. p 33, Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha – Hindu Shakti Sangha, SB Report dated 25.8.44. The Special Branch report regarding this particular issue noted that such obligatory rules did not exist before and the new arrangement about the membership fees provided for the financing of the Shakti Sangha from the Hindu Mahasabha fund. 138. Ibid, p 49, Oath of the Hindu Shakti Sangha. 139. Sekhar Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India: The Namasudras of Bengal, 1872–1947 (Surrey : Curzon Press, 1997), p 214. 140. SB File No. PI 502/44, 1944, p 17. ‘Hindu Mission’. 141. Ibid. 142. Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India, p 214. 143. SB File No. PH 510/44, 1944, p 4, ‘Bharat Sevashram Sangha’, SB Report dated 24 February 1944. 144. The issue of Bhog has been discussed in detail later in the chapter. 145. SB File No. PH 510/44, 1944, p 4, ‘Bharat Sevashram Sangha’, SB Report dated 24 February 1944. 146. Ibid, p 17, S. B. Report dated 12 August 1944. 147. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 10 June 1944. 148. Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India, p 210. 149. Proceedings of the Bengal Legislative Assembly, Vol. 65, 14 July 1943, p 418–421.



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150. Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India, p 214. 151. Ibid, p 215. 152. All India Hindu Mahasabha Papers, NMML, File No. C-59, Annual Report of the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha for 1943–44, p 2. See Appendix 3 for a list of District Sabhas which enrolled more than 1,000 members in 1943–44 153. Nanavati Papers, Volume V, p 1373. Hamidul Huq Chaudhury, M.L.C. Representative of the Bengal Provincial Muslim League, Calcutta, 16th September 1944. 154. NAI File Number 87/43 – Poll (I), 1943 p 12, Morning News 8.12.43, M. A. H. Ispahani on Savarkar’s Statement. 155. Nanavati Papers, Volume V, p 1373. Hamidul Huq Chaudhury, M.L.C. Representative of the Bengal Provincial Muslim League, Calcutta, 16th September 1944. 156. Dawn, 23 January 1944. 157. Star of India, 6 December 1943. 158. Ibid. 159. Ibid. 160. Henceforth referred to as MNG. 161. SB File No. PI 518/44 ‘A’ 1944, p 8, Circular Memorandum by Intelligence Bureau, Home Department, Government of India, New Delhi, dated 3 March 1944. 162. SB File No. PI 518/44 ‘A’ 1944, p 9, Muslim National Guards, Report submitted by Inspector, SB, dated 7 March 1944. 163. Ibid, p 37, Memorandum from commissioner of police, Calcutta, dated 9 August 1944, to additional secretary to the Government of Bengal. 164. SB File No. PH 501/44 Part IV C, p 1, Special Branch Report dated 3 July 1944. 165. Ibid, p 3. Special Branch Report dated 3rd July 1944. 166. S. P. Mookerjee Papers, NMML, VIII-IX Installment, Subject File No. 4, Papers Relating to the Bengal Famine, p 79. For the full text of this quite absurd letter, see Appendix 4. 167. Star of India, 25 January 1944. 168. Please see Chapter 3 for more details on this. 169. People’s War, 9 January 1944. 170. People’s War, 12 March 1944. 171. Ibid. 172. Ibid, 9 January 1944. 173. Gargi Chakravartty, ‘Emergence of the Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti in the Forties: Calcutta Chapter’, in Calcutta, The Stormy Decades, ed. Tanika Sarkar and Sekhar Bandyopadhaya, (New Delhi: Social Science Press 2015), p 185. 174. Ibid.

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3 From Community to Communal

The Bengal Secondary Education Bill and the Idea of Pakistan In culture, custom, faith, race and attire, Thou diff ’rest from them like black and white, And there lie differences grave and dire, Even in thy daily drink and dite. The worshippers of streams and rivers that flow, And of things in which awe or gain they see, ‘Malechha’ or meanest men of clan low, Indeed these learned Pundits term thee. Their dishonest hearts now lie quite bare, For by their objection to Pakistan, They verily deny the rightful share, Of hundred millions of Mussalmans. Like a limb from its body away, Thou lyest motionless in the foe’s camp, It is high time for thy real part to play, Come, light thy heart with Muslim League’s lamp. Excerpts from a poem published in The Star of India on 22 January 1946

I. CASTE AND COMMUNITY POLITICS AROUND THE ISSUE OF SECONDARY EDUCATION We have seen in the previous chapter how famine relief was used as a window for communal mobilizations. Bengal was still reeling under the impact of the famine, when a new political issue captured its imagination. This was the tabling of the Secondary Education Bill by the ruling party in the Bengal Legislative Assembly, which immediately intensified the communal divide.



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The Secondary Education Bill (henceforth referred to as SEB) was tabled by the Education Minister Tamizuddin Khan on the floor of the Bengal Legislative Assembly on 24 April 1944. Its objective was the ‘regulation, control and development of secondary education in Bengal.’1 According to the education minister, secondary education in Bengal was in dire need of reform, yet, no other attempt at reform ‘had met with greater opposition from certain particular bodies and certain particular sections of people.’2 The proposed Secondary Education Board was to consist of fifty-three members. The elected members of the board were to be returned by separate electorates of Hindus, Muslims and Scheduled Castes (hereafter referred to as SC). Scheduled Castes would have five representatives, to be elected through separate electorates, including the Special Officer for Scheduled Caste Education (who may or may not be a SC). It was primarily the insistence on separate electorates that resulted in outrage among the largely Caste Hindu opposition comprising the Congress and the Hindu Mahasabha. The acceptance of a separate electorate for Scheduled Castes and the constant reference to ‘Caste Hindus’ in the Bill reveals interesting undercurrents. It shows a shift in League politics towards a socialist and populist agenda. Desperate to find allies after its disastrous handling of the famine in 1943, the League found one in some of the leaders of the Scheduled Caste community. 3 Now it displayed itself as a champion of the cause of not just Muslims but also of Scheduled Castes. It projected both as common sufferers under Caste-Hindu domination from which liberation had to be sought, just as political liberation was being sought from British imperialism. Aware of the opposition of the Scheduled Castes to the former Secondary Education Bill of 1940, the League was careful this time to make overtures to the SC community.4 Controversies over the Bill revolved broadly around two aspects: the supposed communalization of education through the introduction of separate electorates and the Caste Hindus’ fear of a possible disintegration of the ‘Hindu’ community if separate divisions within the community were admitted as a reality. It also had deeper implications. Education had become a marker of the Hindu Bhadralok’s social superiority since early twentieth century, allowing them substantial control over privileged jobs and status. Any suggestion that this privilege might be diluted and distributed among ‘subordinate’ groups threatened the Bhadralok’s self-image of power. Moreover, franchise was still based on higher educational qualifications. In the debates that took place in the Bengal Legislative Assembly, members of the League Ministry and its supporters maintained that for almost a century,

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only a handful of Hindus, namely the ‘upper’ castes, with S. P. Mookerjee at their head, had been at the helm of managing secondary education with their centre at the Calcutta University.5 If the bill passed into law, it would only mean a ‘death blow to the Shyamaprasadian [sic] monopolistic control of education and certainly not a death blow to the cause of education in Bengal. . .’6 The League repeatedly said that the Caste Hindu bloc was trying to keep the Muslims and the Scheduled Castes under the ‘perpetual bondage of tutelage of the coterie ruling the destiny of Secondary and University Education in Bengal.’7 The crux of the attack was, . . .these Caste Hindus are occupying the key positions in the field of education and it is they who are controlling the Secondary Education through the agency of the Calcutta University. The representatives of the Caste Hindus . . . with the help of their sycophants and pet dogs consider the Calcutta University as their private property and when they find that attempts are being made to take away the secondary education from the clutches of the Calcutta University with a view to develop it and lead it through proper channel, this vested interest has raised alarm.8

Muslims and Scheduled Castes were projected as common victims of CasteHindu domination, deprived in the sphere of education and, hence, of better jobs. This was therefore a just fight for equality. The leftist vocabulary is clearly evident in what Maulvi Ahmed Ali Mridha said in his speech, A Doctor of the Calcutta University, a Zamindar born with a silver spoon in his lips, cannot conceive of better production from the soil and of converting raw products into an industrial element and cannot conceive of how sanitization and public health have gone down and how the poor economic condition is a handicap and is creating a vicious circle so that ill-health, disease and pestilences are taking a heavy toll on our life and energy and energy lost we stand so condemned and cannot acquire economic prosperity in agriculture, industries and trade. How an artificial barrier created in the way of propagation of education has created a cleavage between a class and a class and ultimately to a ruination of the society as a whole, we therefore must now have a change.9

The Muslim press was fully harnessed to take this socialist message of the League to the Muslim masses. Calling opposition to the SEB an ‘organised mischief,’ the Star of India claimed that the Calcutta University had been more or less the family concern of the ‘Hindu aristocracy.’ Matriculation and intermediate exams were projected as a rich source of patronage, which was then



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distributed among the relatives and friends of the proprietors of the university.10 In another article, it wrote that the bill only aimed at transferring control of secondary education from the Hindu-ridden Calcutta University Board to a new one that would contain 50 per cent Muslims. This could hardly count as ‘Muslim tyranny.’11 Letters written to the editor of this newspaper, in full support of the ministry’s endeavour, were widely publicized. They argued that the proposed SEB would destroy peace in the country only if ‘interested parties’ made it a point to deliberately bring about such an unwelcome situation through ‘malicious propaganda.’12 Meetings were organised in different parts of the province to whip up support in favour of the bill. On 12 May, there was a gathering at the local Juma Mosque in Noakhali, where local Muslims requested Muslim MLAs to support the bill so that education could be salvaged from the clutches of the Hindu monopoly.13 There was another gathering at Narayanganj on 25 May where Muslims pledged their full support to the Bill and reaffirmed their confidence in the leadership of the League.14 At the Dinajpur League conference organized on 4 June, apart from local Muslim leaders, important Bengal League leaders like Suhrawardy and Nazimuddin were also present to take the message of the SEB to the Muslim masses. Suhrawardy argued that no one could damage or destroy Hindu schools under the bill; all that the Muslims wanted was a 50-50 representation on the board.15 Nazimuddin pointed out that secondary education needed to be placed in the hands of a body which would solve the problems of education more efficiently than at present. He also stated that under the bill, enhanced grants would be given to high schools, and needy Hindu institutions too would derive all benefits from the bill. A large public meeting of the Muslims of Calcutta was held on 25 June 1944 at the Md. Ali Park, where important League leaders like Suhrawardy were again present. Resolutions were passed supporting the Bill. They declared that the education of the Muslims, Scheduled Castes, peasantry and the working classes, who formed 95 per cent of the population in Bengal, had been so far completely and criminally neglected. It is interesting to observe that the League did not defend Muslims alone, but it was widening its sociopolitical base to incorporate all oppressed communities, not necessarily always on religious lines. In such a politically divided climate, the bill obviously met with staunch opposition from the Caste Hindu bloc. At the forefront of this opposition was, as could be expected, the Hindu Mahasabha, which was now also supported by the Bengal Congress. The fact that the Congress sided with an

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unapologetically communal organization would also precipitate the League allegation that Muslims would not be safe in Congress-ruled India. As with the 1940 bill, the Congress demanded that this one should not be rushed through the Legislative Assembly, but be circulated for eliciting public opinion. The bill was projected as a retrograde measure aiming to establish Pakistan through the communalization of education. Surendranath Biswas of the Congress pointed out that the bill, if passed, would eventually lead to ‘a famine of education.’16 He also argued that it was an ‘ingenious attempt’ on the part of the League ministry to perpetuate, for their own communal purposes, divisions amongst people.17 In speeches made by the Hindu leaders in the Legislative Assembly, a tone of arrogance was starkly clear: The present Ministry are rushing an Education Bill through, when the question of solving all the problems together is taxing the brain of wise men. While the Ministry have no brain to solve any of the problems, they must wait for better men to solve them . . . Government should be advised to withdraw the Bill or to postpone its consideration till the time the right thinkers of the country sit together to find a solution to those burning problems . . .18 [Emphases mine.]

Ashutosh Lahiri, one of the most prominent leaders of the Bengal Hindu Mahasabha, even described the bill as an invitation to civil war. He stated that as long as Pakistan was the political goal of the Muslim League, every measure of the League was suspect, and there could not be any common ground between Hindus and Muslims. He argued that for centuries, only Hindus had made contributions towards education in the province, and they were not going to just hand over ‘this century-old edifice.’19 This proud assertion, in a way, validated the claims being made by the League leaders in support of the bill; it confirmed that Hindus had always controlled education. He also pointed out that the bill was an attempt to impose an educational forum based on Islamic traditions, and that was a direct challenge to the ‘manhood’ of ‘Hindu’ Bengal. While Lahiri waxed eloquent about the bill inviting civil war and communalism in education, he himself undoubtedly promoted the communal cause with phrases like ‘Hindu Bengal’ and the impossibility of a common ground between Hindus and Muslims. When he reiterated that ‘we value our culture more than our lives and we shall never allow this insidious move to poison the springs of our national and cultural existence,’20 the rather obvious subtext was that ‘national’ and ‘cultural’ were equivalent to ‘Hindu.’ The issue of a separate electorate for the Scheduled Castes led to even more fervent opposition. Lahiri thought that Scheduled Castes did not present any



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‘difficulty’, since there were no inherent differences between Scheduled Castes and Hindus in terms of culture and education.21 However, other Caste-Hindu leaders were not so confident. The fear that the League would divide the Hindu community was quite palpable. Atul Chandra Sen, another leader of the Bengal Congress, pointed out that the bill would not only divide Hindus and Muslims in the field of education, but would also divide Caste Hindus and the ‘so called’ Scheduled Castes, when culturally, they were one.22 Some leaders went to the extent of warning the Scheduled Castes that they would soon repent their opposition to ‘Caste Hindus,’23 that the Muslim League ministry was taking up their cause simply for garnering more votes.24 Protest against the bill was obviously not limited to the Legislative Assembly. Politicization sedimented into an equally vociferous protest from the Hindu community all over the province, especially from students and teachers. The All Bengal Secondary Education Bill Protest Day was organised on 30 April 1944. The advertisement in leading newspapers for this protest day, called by the immensely popular Acharya Prafulla Chandra Ray, president of the Bengal Education Council, read thus: BENGAL SECONDARY EDUCATION BILL, 1944 ALL BENGAL PROTEST DAY

SUNDAY, THE 30TH APRIL 1944

HOLD PUBLIC MEETINGS ALL OVER BENGAL PROTEST AGAINST REACTIONARY BILL, URGE WITHDRAWAL

ALL INTERESTED IN EDUCATION SHOULD JOIN25

Numerous public meetings were held on this day to urge an immediate withdrawal of the bill. Speeches by leaders of the Mahasabha and the Congress bordered on open threats. They were referred to as ‘highly communal’ by the Government of India and caused such alarm as to even consider prosecution.26 Presiding at one such meeting in north Calcutta, N. C. Chatterjee, a prominent leader of the Mahasabha, declared that if the ministry was determined to pass the Bill, Hindus would have no alternative but to follow a ‘scorch earth’ [sic] policy, where they would not hesitate to close down their schools rather than ‘make them over to the tender mercy of communalists.’27 A large gathering of students of Calcutta at the Shraddhananda Park on 3 May called the bill nothing but a bureaucratic measure. 28 Even the Marwari Association of Calcutta, which generally stayed out of political controversies, protested the bill,

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stating that it would lay a solid foundation for Pakistan. The association feared that it would place under ‘other communities’ control’ a system of education which Hindus had so far maintained by devotion and self-sacrifice.29 A similar meeting was held in Dacca on 30 April, presided over by Girish Nag, a retired district magistrate of the town. He called the SEB the ‘primary Pakistan Bill’ which was meant to undermine Hindu culture and tradition.30 Massive protest meetings were also organised by the Hindu Mahasabha in Jessore, Khulna, Barisal, Faridpur and Nadia among other places. The protests not only exposed and displayed the Caste Hindus’ communal presuppositions, they also fully exposed profound caste interests. The pro-Hindu daily, Amrita Bazar Patrika, published one editorial after another, carefully crafted to keep alive the fear of a Muslim takeover of the province. It called the Bill ‘a part of the Muslim League’s general strategy to take possession of new bases at vital points from which to launch attacks for extension of its power and authority in diverse spheres of national life.’31 Another editorial claimed that the League was out to achieve Pakistan in Bengal through ‘slow penetration’ and by ‘infiltration’ into one department of administration after another.32 Words such as ‘penetration’ and ‘infiltration’ were deliberately and carefully inserted at regular intervals to whip up a vivid physical image of a Muslim/League onslaught. The following excerpt from an article published by the same newspaper is worthy of note: Readers, we presume, are familiar with the story of the camel and the tentowner . . . Bengal has already admitted the nose of the Pakistan camel in accepting the communal ratio in the services . . . It is now shoving its hump in in the shape of the SEB [sic]. The education we have had in this province – and in the whole country too – has been nothing more than a clerk producing machinery, turning out boys and girls with a smattering of little English and much less common sense. It is now proposed to turn it into a machinery that would produce good Muslim Leaguers, militant Scheduled Caste men and disconsolate, defeatist Caste Hindus. It is the greatest coup in Bengal so far to establish on a statutory basis the two-nation theory of which the League’s Fuehrer is the most vocal exponent.33 [Emphases mine.]

A look at such phrases reveals a subtext of a two-pronged appeal towards ‘Hindus.’ On the one hand, it carried the message of a dire need of reform in education. At the same time, it launched a thinly veiled warning that there was brewing militancy amongst the Scheduled Castes, which had to be nipped. The juxtaposition of terms ‘good Muslim Leaguers’ with ‘militant Scheduled Castes’ and ‘disconsolate and defeatist’ Caste Hindus raised an alarm that



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‘good’ Muslim Leaguers would inevitably support the creed of the League and Pakistan; inaction on part of the Caste Hindus would only result in further rift in the ‘Hindu’ community due to the growing militancy of the SCs. However, interestingly, the article itself still used the terms Caste Hindus and Scheduled Castes, revealing that it practised what its ‘enemies’ accused it of. As with the Education Bill of 1940, the response among the Scheduled Castes of the Assembly was mixed. Representation in the sphere of education had been a major concern for the SC leadership, mostly composed of Namasudras in Bengal. Their primary grievance against first the Fazlul Huq government and later the Shyama-Huq ministry had been the neglect of their education, which they required in order to get better jobs.34 They were disappointed by the proposed SEB of 1940 when they felt that their representation was inadequate.35 The introduction of separate electorates for the Scheduled Castes obviously, then, held out a carrot for the SC leadership. Mukunda Behari Mullick, a minister in the Nazimuddin Ministry, said that all benefits of legislation have been so far enjoyed by only a few people of favoured castes and communities; the backward castes had always been ‘choked and gagged’ from expressing themselves and their grievances.36 He maintained that ‘the time for the people of a few favoured castes and communities to assume themselves to be the perpetual guardians of these innocent people must be taken to have come to an end.’37 Kshetra Nath Singha was all in favour of the separate electorates, as he felt that the SCs needed to have their own united voice in matters of education.38 Monmohan Das, another SC MLA, however, made a different and more thorough-going argument. Although he supported the bill, he argued that provisions for adequate facilities for the education of SCs had not been made in the bill, in that there was no provision for definite educational grants or an adequate sum earmarked for the SC education.39 He also had problems with the inclusion of only five SC representatives in the board comprising fifty-three members: The other point which appeals to us most is the question of representation of Scheduled Castes on the different bodies. First of all, I would like to point out that no proper provision has been made for the representation of Scheduled Castes. We find that in the main Board which is composed of 53 members, there would only be five representatives of the Scheduled Castes including the Special Officer for Scheduled Caste Education. Our representation is therefore very poor. With regard to other committees, so far as I remember, there is no representation of Scheduled Castes in the Finance Committee, nor is there any representation in the Arbitration Committee, Recognition

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and Grants Committee. In the Executive Council, no provision for the proper representation of the Scheduled Castes has been made. With regard to the Examination Committee only one member of the Scheduled Castes finds a place out of 20.40

However, he maintained that the Scheduled Castes would still support the Bill, because in a seventy-year-old institute like the Calcutta University, SCs had not been treated fairly, and he hoped that the present government would give them some concessions. Similar criticism of the composition of the board also came from Birat Chandra Mandal, who clearly declared that unless the demands of the SCs were addressed in the bill, they would not support it. Eventually, on 31 May, three prominent SC MLAs – Monmohan Das, Dhananjoy Roy and Shyama Prasad Burman – issued a joint letter addressed to Nazimuddin in the Assembly, intimating their inability to support the bill on the grounds that it introduced separate electorates without safeguarding the interests of the SCs in any way.41 The responses of various SC leaders show that there was no blind and uncritical support for the ministry. However, the ground reality presented a different and more complicated picture than the ministerial war in the Assembly. The year 1944 was marked by an increase in small-scale riots between Namasudras and Muslims across eastern Bengal, some of which assumed serious communal proportions. The previous chapter has referred to the increasing Hinduization attempts in the immediate aftermath of the famine, by various volunteer wings of the Hindu Mahasabha, like the Bharat Sevashram Sangha and the Hindu Mission. They tried to foster a consolidated ‘Hindu’ identity throughout 1944 and 1945. In the politically charged atmosphere in the context of the SEB agitations, such activities of the Sangha and the Hindu Mission obviously had a strong polarizing effect. The Bharat Sevashram Sangha held meetings in Calcutta denouncing the SEB. Speeches were delivered by various Hindu professors, teachers and swamis of the Sangha, reiterating that communalism was fostered through the bill in the sphere of education. At one such meeting held in Calcutta, Swami Jogananda of the Sangha observed that poverty and the present education system were responsible for the conversion of Hindus to Islam, and the meeting called for the revival and organizing power of the Hindus.42 Displays of dagger and lathi-play, boxing and other physical exercises were often carried out by members of Rakshi Dals at such gatherings. Stories of the valour of Krishna, Shivaji and even Guru Gobind Singh were narrated at these meetings. Hindus were urged to form a ‘national militia’ and revive the Kshatra (warrior) spirit through Hindu Milan Mandirs and Rakshi Dals.43



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At the Barisal Hindu Conference held on 9 September 1944, N. C. Chatterjee appealed for a reorientation of Hindu society by eliminating factors like untouchability, dowry and caste ‘separatism’. Sangathan, he argued, demanded not mere ‘lip homage to the under-dog’ but an active elimination of all that leads to internal mistrust and suspicion.44 Later, at the Murshidabad Hindu Conference on 27 November 1944, Chatterjee declared that the Barisal Conference had been a huge success because of the consolidation of ‘nationalist ranks’ and the closer identification of the ‘so-called’ Scheduled Castes with the Mahasabha movement.45 Opposition of the Mahasabha to the Rajagopalachari Formula, better known as the C R Formula (in August 1944), and the impending Gandhi-Jinnah talks, spread acute fears about the vivisection of Bengal.46 This, too, led to a proliferation of meetings and protest demonstrations organised by the Mahasabha, especially in rural Bengal. Opposition to the C R Formula further heightened the Mahasabha slogan of Hindu unity. On 8 August 1945, Manoranjan Chaudhuri, secretary of the All India Hindu Mahasabha, issued a questionnaire to all provincial sabhas. It expected to receive detailed answers by the time the provincial sabhas attended the Session of the All India Committee of the Hindu Mahasabha on 18 and 19 August, 1945, at Delhi. The questionnaire began with this instruction – ‘In order to effectively carry out the Hindu Sangathan work throughout Hindustan, following informations [sic] regarding your province are essentially necessary.’47 The points in the questionnaire had a distinct anti-Muslim content and a section regarding ‘grievances’ of Scheduled Castes. Some of the questions in the first section, which read as the ‘Muslim Problem’, were, 1. When did the first Mussalman enter your province from outside and in what connection? 2. When did the first Hindu of your province embrace Islam and under what circumstances? 3. Please mention the different periods in the history of your province when any important Hindu or an entire community, Caste or Subcaste, embraced Islam and under what circumstances.48 The section which dealt with the grievances of the Scheduled Castes also had some interesting points: 1. What are the grievances of the Scheduled Community of your Province and of the Depressed Classes as against the so-called Upper Classes, and also amongst themselves?

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2. What, according to you, is the bar to consolidation of the entire Hindu race into one compact whole and what programme, according to you, should be taken up by the A. I. Hindu Mahasabha for Hindu consolidation work in Hindustan.49

The section on the Scheduled Castes again reveals Mahasabha’s attaempts at tiding over differences within the Hindu community by using terms such as ‘so-called’. Moreover, the word ‘race’ is used for Hindus, which gave a much more universalist and organic claim of unity than the word ‘community’. Throughout 1944 and 1945, minor communal clashes between Muslims and Namasudras were reported from various parts of the province. In May, when the agitation around the bill was in full swing and representatives of the Mahasabha were touring the province extensively, a serious communal disturbance was reported from the Mollahat village in Khulna. A minor land dispute between a Muslim and a Namasudra quickly took on communal overtones. Despite intervention by the police, disturbances continued for a few days. The local police had to open fire and even ask for reinforcements. Initial reports from the police showed that the clash had resulted in burning down of some 60 Namasudra and Muslim houses.50 Soon, however, the governor produced figures showing that nearly 417 huts belonging to Muslims and 104 huts belonging to Namasudras had been destroyed.51 The air was ‘thick with rumours’ which caused panic and communal tension in the nearby villages.52 A similar case was also reported from the nearby district of Jessore. Here communal tension reached a high pitch when a Muslim was murdered by a Namasudra. The Hindu Mahasabha was eyed with suspicion by the Government of India, and the district magistrate of Khulna allowed the Party (The Hindu Mahasabha) to engage in relief work in the affected areas only on the condition that it would not disseminate political propaganda.53 In spite of repeated warnings, agitation by Mahasabha and Namasudra leaders in Calcutta regarding the Mollahat disturbances increased panic and apprehensions.54 Armed police had to be posted in several parts of the province in order to prevent further clashes. The suspension of the Hindu Conference by an order of the League ministry raised an uproar in Hindu circles. The conference, which was to be held on 3 and 4 June 1944 in Lora village in Barisal, was, interestingly, organized mainly by the Scheduled Castes, especially the Namasudras of the area. Maharajadhiraja Bahadur of Burdwan was to preside over the conference, and Pramatha Thakur, a prominent Namasudra leader, was chosen as the chairman of the Reception Committee. The objective of the conference



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was the social, economic and educational uplift of Hindus. Permission for holding the conference had been granted by the district magistrate of Barisal. Jogendranath Mandal, a member of the Nazimuddin Ministry, was then sent by the Government of Bengal to Lora to dissuade Namasudras from participating in it. Finally, the ministry ordered a ban on the conference under the Defence of India rules, on the plea that there had been communal disturbances in the neighbouring areas of Khulna and Jessore. Not only the Barisal Conference, but all public meetings in the subdivisions of Pirojpur, Bagerhat, Gopalgunj, Narail, Magura and Jhenidah were banned between 2 June and 16 June, 1944. The Scheduled Caste leadership was divided in its response to the ban.55 While members of the Nazimuddin ministry like Jogendranath Mandal and Pulin Behari Mullick fully supported the government’s move, there were others like Pramatha Thakur and Upendranath Edbar (with strong links with the Mahasabha), who were strongly opposed to it. Thakur opined that the ban was imposed to preclude any possible debate about the SEB, and that the League actually did not want any benefit for the Scheduled Castes but just used them to weaken the Hindus.56 His statement in the Assembly that ‘a great injustice had been done to the Hindus’ by banning the conference shows that there was a section of the SC community that clearly favoured the Hindu Sangathanist movement. The Hindu Mahasabha obviously made much political capital out of this event. It found a golden opportunity to consolidate the newfound affiliation with Namasudras of the province. According to the Bengal governor, the episode created a lot of ‘misinformed criticism’ in the press.57 The Amrita Bazar Patrika, which now had no qualms about expressing a pro-Hindu stand, ran an editorial on 8 June 1944. It said that since the conference was organized by the Scheduled Castes of the area, it spelt doom for the ministry. Hence, the ministry moved the government machinery to ban the holding of the conference.58 Similar responses also came from other Caste-Hindu leaders in the Assembly. Atul Sen argued that the real reason behind the ban was purely political and the Bengal government realised that, A conference of the Scheduled Castes and backward classes among the Hindus organised by a nationalist Scheduled Caste leader like Pramatha Ranjan Thakur and presided over by a Caste Hindu nobleman of a wide nationalist outlook like the Maharajadhiraja of Burdwan, would among other things, ask the Caste Hindus and Scheduled Castes to sink their petty differences and jealousies and align themselves with the progressive and unifying forces of the country.59 [Emphasis mine.]

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No stone was left unturned in promoting those SC leaders who sided with Caste Hindus as true ‘nationalists’. At the same time, care was taken to ensure that a ‘noble’ nationalist ‘upper’ -caste leader would preside over what the Scheduled Castes had organised. Sekhar Bandyopadhyay points out that the 1940s marked a new feature in the Namasudra–Muslim relationship in the countryside, ‘where local frictions over agrarian disputes were being fast tagged on the wider political conflict between the two religious communities.’60 By 1944–45, the Namasudra community identity appeared to have merged into a greater Hindu consciousness. Such articulations of Hindu identity by the ‘lower’ castes at the local level, in the context of existing political equations, could be linked up quickly with the crosscurrents of institutional politics at the top.61 However, Bandyopadhyay’s argument that communalism, in a narrow sense of the term, could hardly explain varied forms of action and intercommunity relationships between Muslims and Namasudras, and that the latter were, in most cases, motivated by a desire for self-respect62, underestimates the ability of communal politics to encompass within its fold diverse and multiple strands of identity articulation. Communal collective identities have the potential to relate in different ways to class, gender and caste affiliations. What need to be studied carefully are the vulnerabilities of such identities, the ways in which their ‘hardness’ has to mediate, compromise and suppress in order to produce ‘tentative unities’ that proclaim themselves to be bonded monoliths.63 Communal ideologies, then, constantly engage with various other forms of identity consciousness. In the aftermath of the famine (as seen in the previous chapter), hunger, desolation and death created crevices in the Bengalis’ perception of community, class and caste. Sustained communal propaganda around relief opened new windows for community-based collective consciousness. Added to this crucial juncture was the propaganda around the SEB and the intensified Hindu mass-contact programme launched by the Mahasabha and its various volunteer wings. These put special emphasis on the impending disintegration of the ‘Hindu’ and called for increasing militarization of the ‘lower’ castes. This, in turn, created the unique space in Bengal for the transformation of community perceptions into communal animosities. II.  THE PAKISTAN MOVEMENT Richard Casey, the governor of Bengal, wrote thus to the viceroy in October 1944, ‘There is little Muslim opinion in Bengal which does not favour Pakistan



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of some sort. The supporters of the Muslim League are of course most vocal about it, but even those outside the League are not in opposition. The real difference in Muslim opinion is with regard to the boundaries of Eastern Pakistan.’64 This section studies how the idea of Pakistan was able to capture the imagination of different Muslim groups and turn the League from an armchair organization into a mass organization in Bengal. It is also important at this juncture to study the pluralities within the idea of Pakistan itself and how the League responded to such diversities within their two-nation theory. The Lahore resolution of 1940 had rendered the idea of Pakistan vague. By 1944 this idea had already begun taking different shapes amongst different sections of Muslims. Interestingly, the very ambiguity of the idea was able to incorporate diverse opinions within the wide gamut of the concept itself. In Bengal, Pakistan went beyond just a religious or community-based concept, as we shall see later in this section. In tracing the roots of the Pakistan movement, it is important to understand the myriad socioeconomic and political strands existing in Bengal. Even during the Swadeshi Andolan in Bengal (1905–1908), despite an apparent syncretism, ‘social barriers and taboos remained sufficiently formidable for both communities to retain always a sense of separate identity even at the village level.’65 Disparities in middle-class development amongst Muslims and Hindus in education and, consequently, in appointment in government jobs also constituted a fertile source of divisions. When Muslims, under the influence of Syed Ahmad Khan, gradually began to take to ‘modern’ English education, far from contributing to secular nationalism, it stimulated in Muslims fears of being outrun in the race for jobs by Hindus, and of being politically dominated by them perpetually.66 Exposure to western education amongst Bengali Muslims began in the late nineteenth century. By this time, there was quite a sizeable English-educated Hindu middle class. ‘Hence the anxiety of the Muslim elite and their efforts to extract at least some concessions from the Government to counterbalance the advantages gained by the educated Hindus.’67 This further aggravated the ‘growing rivalry’ between the two communities.68 The Wahhabi and the Faraizi movements profoundly ‘Islamizised’ rural Muslim society. They denounced the rural Muslims’ participation in Hindu rites and festivals. During the Swadeshi movement, evocation of traditional Hinduism, with its purity-pollution notions, rites and philosophy was renewed on an unprecedented scale. Shivaji Utsav was celebrated in 1906 when the cult of Bhawani was introduced.69 Even nationalist Muslims felt apprehensive about the use of such explicit Hindu symbology.70 Bipin Chandra Pal propounded

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his theory of ‘composite nationalism’ whereby the future progress of India was dependent on the advance of particular communities along their own lines. He visualized a concept of ‘federal India’ in which units were not to be languagebased nationalities but the religious communities.71 Agrarian society in East Bengal consisted of a predominantly Muslim smallholding peasantry, tapering off into the landless stratum, with only a small percentage of mainly Hindu priveleged-caste rent-collecting and moneylending groups.72 Partha Chatterjee has studied the importance of the cultural perception of zamindars amongst peasants. He points out that landlordism in East Bengal was generally perceived as something practiced especially by ‘upper’ -caste Hindu landlords. Two reasons are cited for such a perception. Firstly, most of the bigger and more powerful landlords were Hindus. Secondly, even though several Muslim rent- receivers had rented out much of their land, they often continued to cultivate the land themselves and were thus, culturally a part of the peasant community.73 The legal rent collected by Hindu zamindars was not so much the bone of contention amongst the Muslim peasantry, but it was the large number of illegal exactions or abwabs by zamindars that caused trouble. Sometimes these abwabs exceeded the legal rent.74 By the 1920s, peasant opposition to abwabs started growing and took forms of a general resistance to zamindari domination.75 Closely associated with the collection of rent was the question of interest. Moneylenders, mostly Hindus, were, in most cases in East Bengal, closely tied with the jute trade. ‘In eastern Bengal, usurious and commercial exploitation of the peasantry was generally perceived as linked inseparably with feudal exploitation, typified in cultural terms by upper-caste or trading-caste Hindu domination.’76 From 1918, there was a decline in the price of raw jute and an increase in the price of grain. Consequently, peasant discontent against the zamindars’ and moneylenders’ oppression intensified, since their crops sold for less and their essential food items costed more. The price of jute had fallen sharply. The mahajans who had made advance payments to cultivators on the crop now lost out and they were not prepared to make advances again. There was a ‘money famine.’77 The demand for jute began to weaken and the latent tension between Muslim peasants and Hindu creditors began to surface. This manifested itself in sporadic attacks on Hindu fairs and festivals in 1926–28, largely in mofussils like Dhaka and Pabna. This was also the time when numerous Krishak Samitis came into existence to channelize peasant discontent into a more organized form. In the 1930s,



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during the depression decade, jute prices fell even more drastically, and from July 1930, there were peasant disturbances in Kishoreganj, Pakundia and Hossainpur thanas of East Bengal. The primary objective of the rioters was to destroy the debt bonds held by the Hindu moneylenders, and houses of prominent Hindu moneylenders were attacked. The district magistrate of Mymensingh reported that the Kishoreganj disturbances were ‘primarily economic with a necessary communal tinge because more than ninety percent of the tenants and debtors in the affected area are Mohammadans, while the large majority of the moneylenders are Hindus. Mohammadan moneylenders have, however, been proportionately threatened and looted.’78 The principal targets were obviously the Hindu moneylenders.79 The class nature of the Kishoreganj riot in 1930 was obvious – houses of Hindu Sahas and moneylenders were attacked and debt bonds torn up.80 The predominant characteristics of rural riots were the snatching of debt bonds. Sometimes there was plunder, loot and arson. Only when the mahajans resisted strongly were they killed. But deliberate murder or rape, which were a common feature in the Noakhali riots of 1946, were completely absent.81 Of the numerous Krishak Samitis, the Nikhil Banga Praja Samiti was the most organized one. In 1935, Fazlul Huq was elected as its president, and in 1936, this was renamed as the Krishak Praja Party (henceforth, the KPP). Some of the older members of the Nikhil Banga Praja Samiti still tried to continue as before, but the KPP by then had become immensely popular among the peasantry in East Bengal.82 The bulk of the peasantry accepted the leadership of Fazlul Huq, who was also the elected president of the KPP.83 At the same time, Muslim landlords’ interests in East Bengal, in reaction to the organization of the peasants, formed the United Muslim Party (UMP).84 But the KPP was far from united at this point of time. Two factions emerged in Noakhali – the so-called ‘moderates’ led by Rashid Ahmed and the ‘extremists’ led by Golam Sarwar. Sarwar and his extremist wing of the KPP were particularly influential in Ramganj, Raipur and Lakshmipur thanas of Noakhali.85 While Rashid Ahmed explained to the krishaks the value of Debt Settlement Boards and the supply of stud bulls by the government, Sarwar demanded a complete remission of debts and the elimination of mahajans from the boards. The elections of 1937 changed the political scene in East Bengal. The election propaganda of the Muslim League, the Congress and the KPP for the elections of 1937 went along radically different lines. The League stressed the need for Muslim solidarity as a prerequisite for making provincial autonomy

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meaningful to Muslims in Bengal.86 The main plank of KPP propaganda, by contrast, was the abolition of zamindari without compensation. The Congress mainly talked of Swaraj, political change and constitutional reforms. Soon, it became clear that the fight for Muslim support would be between the League and the KPP. The former, in order to secure its base, painted the KPP as opposed to Muslim unity87. The KPP, on the other hand, clearly had a mass appeal. While pointing out the advantages that the KPP had over the League in the election propaganda of 1936, Shila Sen argues that the illiterate voters of the villages in East Bengal easily appreciated their plans of economic relief. Since the KPP was also a Muslim organization, the League’s talk of Muslim unity failed to arouse Muslims to the extent that was expected. Moreover, a large number of Muslim youth and students also supported the KPP as a ‘progressive’ organization that was not limited by religious considerations. For the same purpose, the Bengal Congress also supported it.88 In the elections of 1937, Huq defeated Nazimuddin (the League candidate) and the KPP clearly emerged as the winning party.89 Negotiations opened between the KPP and the Congress to form either a coalition ministry or a KPP ministry with Congress support. But they broke down on the issue of the release of political prisoners versus a moratorium on agrarian debt. The KPP was left with no choice but to form a ministry with the League, with Huq as the chief minister. The insensitivity of the Congress to the crisis of peasant livelihood ensured this line-up. It thereby lost a very important opportunity. Important changes took place at this stage in the composition of the ministry and in the nature of KPP leadership in East Bengal. The ministry was a League-dominated one and it was impossible for Huq to carry out his election promises in such a scenario. The selection of the personnel of the ministry was strongly resented by KPP leaders.90 The tension gradually distanced Huq from the KPP and played an important part in the history which was yet to unfold, for Huq was an important leader with a very strong base amongst the peasants in East Bengal. With his distance from the KPP, the latter began to lose some of its popularity. Meanwhile, the Congress too began to attack Huq for the composition of the ministry and for going back on his electoral promises. Huq realized that in order to save his position and the ministry he would need the full support of the League. He joined it in October 1937. Thereafter, he too was drawn into the communal politics of the League.91 This precarious situation developed primarily because the Congress failed to support the KPP agenda of relief for the peasants. Jinnah quickly saw an opportunity for the League, now that Huq had entered their fold. Till then, remarks Shila Sen, the Muslim League hardly had any



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strong support in the Muslim majority provinces of Bengal and Punjab. The projection of the League as an all India Muslim party needed the support of provincial leaders like Huq in Bengal and Sikandar Hayat Khan in Punjab. The entry of Fazlul Huq within the League established its credentials as a strong Muslim political party in Bengal and set in motion the consolidation of the League in Bengal.92 Soon after the elections, the Congress, with the support of some Krishak Samitis in East Bengal, started its Muslim mass contact programme. This gradually began to bear some fruit. The Krishak movement in Tippera began to show signs of pro-Congress leanings.93 However, in Noakhali, Golam Sarwar remained very influential. He rallied the peasants for a total debt cancellation demand rather than conciliation, which the ‘moderate’ wing of KPP in Noakhali, under the influence of the Congress, demanded. Nazimuddin, an important League leader by now, realized the importance of Sarwar and the need to draw him into the ambit of the League. This was necessary if the League wanted to secure the peasant base at Noakhali. Seeing Sarwar as a threat, in May 1937, Syed Ahmed, an important KPP leader of Noakhali, along with some other KPP leaders like Ashrafuddin and Wasimuddin of Tippera and a few local Hindu Congressmen, tried to reform the Krishak Samitis on a non-communal basis.94 The League strove to combat Congress influence. Nazimuddin noted: ‘. . . we must get Golam Sarwar on our side so that we can fight Congressites like Wasimuddin and others who are trying to capture Noakhali Krishak Samitis. DM should try and bring about reconciliation between Gholam Sarwar and Maulavies Abdur Rashid, Ibrahim, Abdur Rezzak. If these four can work together there is no danger of Krishak Samitis going over to the Congress.’95 Sarwar, however, was a slippery fish. He kept dilly-dallying with both the Congress and the League, biding his time. During July and August 1937, both the Congress and the League intensified their activities amongst the peasants in East Bengal. Congress and League committees were set up at important local centres of Noakhali, like Ramganj and Begumganj. By this time, Sarwar was afraid that he might get into trouble with the Congress because he frequently created law and order problems as a result of his militant pro-peasant stand.96 This, in turn, brought him closer to the League. He spread the word that ‘the real aim of the Congress was to oust the Muhammadan ministry so as to establish a Hindu Raj in its place.’97 By this time, the ministry had effectively become a League ministry when Huq joined the League in October 1937. It now strove harder to wean the peasants away from the influence of the Congress. The Bengal Provincial Muslim League

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was formed in 1937, with Huq as its president and Suhrawardy as its secretary. The communal propaganda of the League gradually began to bear fruit in some areas of East Bengal, particularly in Noakhali (under the influence of Sarwar).98 There were cases of desecration of temples in Pabna. At Noakhali, local Muslim cultivators intervened to prevent a Muslim from presiding over a Congress meeting, leaving only Hindus to carry on their deliberations.99 Sugata Bose remarks that although in 1938–39, the Krishak movement in Noakhali continued to be vigorous, and its promoters, on the whole, supported the ministry.100 This had a lot to do with some important pro-peasant laws that were enacted by the ministry. The Bengal Tenancy (Amendment) Act passed in 1938 benefited the peasants substantially.101 Debt Settlement Boards were established in all districts. The Bengal Moneylenders Act of 1940 made it obligatory for all moneylenders to obtain trade licenses after registering themselves with the government and the maximum rate of interest was fixed at 6 per cent for secured loans and 8 per cent for unsecured loans102. These measures gave some relief to the peasantry and made the ministry popular among them. Since it was a League ministry in effect, the prestige of the League too grew in Bengal in general. A positive image of the League, as protector of Muslim peasant interests, was created. The ministry and the League became synonymous to them.103 Bose is correct in estimating that ‘the series of executive and legislative measures taken by Fazlul Huq’s ministry to ameliorate the condition of the peasantry . . . were beginning to take the wind out of the sails of the Congress and Krishak Praja mass campaigns . . . the psychological impact of Huq’s measures had made it increasingly difficult for the opposition to gain any further support from the Muslim peasantry.’104 In March 1940, the Muslim League in its Lahore session passed the momentous Pakistan resolution. Abul Mansur Ahmed, a member of the KPP, reflects in his memoir that after this, the League was no longer opposed to India’s freedom. At the same time, as a result of pro-peasant laws enacted by the ministry, most of the demands of the Krishak Samitis came to be subsumed under the League. Muslim public opinion too was inclined in favour of the League.105 The KPP gradually began to lose its popularity and base amongst the peasantry as the League slowly emerged as protector of the rural poor. From early 1939, East Bengal was subjected to intensified League communal propaganda. In March 1939, the League held a Conference at Sirajganj, after which an inflammatory booklet Muslim Jagarani was published by its president. It was proscribed by the government of India as it was likely to promote ‘feeling of enmity and hatred between different classes of His Majesty’s subjects.’106



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There were several cases of defilement of images of Hindu gods in April 1939 in Sirajganj. In some cases, they were garlanded with cow bones.107 There were also a few assaults on Hindus. Assessing the situation, the subdivisional officer of Sirajganj and the district magistrate of Pabna stated in their reports that most of the defilement cases were the results of ‘reckless and irresponsible speeches delivered by Muslim League leaders in huge gatherings attended by illiterates.’108 Sarwar continued to incite peasants against Hindu zamindars and moneylenders. The commissioner of Chittagong considered Sarwar’s activities to be dangerous, because he was the son of a local pir and he had a lot of goondas under his control. His speeches could, therefore, be detrimental to public peace.109 However, no action was taken against Sarwar, as the commissioner felt that it was the task of the League to do so. Meanwhile, interesting developments were on way inside the ministry. The Second World War began in 1939. Fazlul Huq was already worried about joining the communal Muslim League and also began to realize that he was no more than a tool in the ministry, in spite of being the chief minister. In July 1941, all three Muslim premiers of Assam, Bengal and Punjab were invited by the viceroy to the National Defence Council. When Fazlul Huq joined the council, Jinnah was not happy because Huq had not consulted him before taking the decision. Huq was asked to resign from the council. He retorted by resigning from the All India Muslim League instead.110 For the time being, however, Huq kept his peace with the All India Muslim League. However, the problems between Huq and other League ministers were too great for the compromise to last long. In December 1941, most League ministers resigned, and with that the Huq ministry fell.111 Huq was now quite keen to set his relations right with the Hindus and improve communal relations, which were steadily worsening. Even before the ministry fell, Huq and his supporters112 formed the Progressive Assembly Party in 1941.113 During 1941, communal relations deteriorated even further in East Bengal. There were riots in Dacca, Bakarganj, Khulna and Chittagong. The Dhaka riots were the most serious and their effects trickled into other neighbouring districts as well. The situation in Noakhali and Tippera was reported to be ‘ticklish.’114 All this drove home to Huq the need to restore good relations with the Hindus. After the fall of the ministry, he formed a new one with members of the Progressive Assembly Party in 1941. However, Sarat Bose, who was the prime mover apart from Huq in the coalition effort, was arrested on charges of sedition on the day the new ministry was sworn in. Consequently, Shyama Prasad Mookerjee, the Mahasabha leader who now took

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Bose’s place, became the most prominent Hindu voice in Bengal politics. The new ministry came to be known as the Shyama-Huq ministry.115 Nonetheless, it could not win the trust of the majority of the Muslims, as Mookerjee was a staunch representative of Hindu interests. Huq only made it easier for the Muslim League to establish itself as the sole representative of Muslims all over the country. Moreover, once the League leaders were ousted from power, they were ‘actuated by the need to mobilize Muslim opinion in order to bring about the downfall of the ministry.’116 League members toured different parts of Bengal in 1942. The pro-League newspaper Star of India carried out a prolonged campaign not just against Huq and his new ministry but also against those Muslims who had joined it. This was also the first time that the League leaders together visited different parts of Bengal, not as government spokesmen but as representatives of the League.117 Jinnah came to Bengal in February 1942 and this demonstrated the solidarity of the All India Muslim League with its provincial branches. The Muslim National Guard came to be formed not just in Calcutta but in different parts of the countryside as well. This increased the popularity of the League and spread its message to the people. By early 1942, Huq and his new ministry had lost their credibility even in Bakarganj, the home district of Huq and a strong KPP base. In January 1942, when Huq went to Bakarganj with a few members of his cabinet, he was greeted with a hartal and numerous protests. In several places, Huq and his ministers were greeted with black flags and rotten eggs.118 During the famine, the Fazlul Huq ministry frankly acknowledged that there was a shortage of food in the province, and wanted the central government to take responsibility for the situation. The latter was not willing to do this. It redirected the issue by saying that it was a matter to be dealt by the provincial government. The British government was obviously not happy with the ministry’s opposition. The Bengal governor wished to support a party that would not be openly antagonistic to colonial interests.119 The governor’s choice was obviously the Muslim League, with Nazimuddin as the leader.120 What favoured Nazimuddin was that he was not only in the good books of Jinnah, but also had close relations with British officials in Bengal.121 Once the Muslim League sensed that they had the support of the governor, they began their attack on the ministry with renewed vigour. On 28 March, 1943, Herbert, the governor of Bengal, suggested to Huq in a private meeting that he should resign. The decision was thus forced upon Huq, not even giving him the time to consult with his party. With the resignation of Huq, the ministry fell, and a new ministry, comprising predominantly the Leaguers came to power in March 1943. Nazimuddin was nominated the premier.



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The League ministry came to office in a very difficult scenario. The food situation in Bengal was assuming alarming proportions.122 The price of rice soared and there was a rapid deterioration in the food supply. Suhrawardy, who was then in charge of the Civil Supplies Department, regarded the famine as a problem of food availability. In order to increase the supply of food grains, the Civil Supplies Department decided to borrow grain from Bihar and Orissa. A ‘Food Drive’ was also launched, and the new ministry attempted to prepare a detailed report on the available supply of rice in the province and also locate supposedly hoarded food grains in the province.123 However, the ‘Food Drive’ did not work as had been anticipated; it resulted in the spread of more panic when the promised food did not become available.124 The new ministry obviously faced severe attacks from the opposition. It tackled the situation with an evocation of community and religion, trying to shift the focus away from the real issue to cover up its own inabilities.125 At the same time, the Quit India Movement, which was a serious anti-imperialist struggle on Congress lines, met with a lukewarm response in most of the province, except in Midnapore.126 This was partly due to the anti-Congress propaganda of the League. Moreover, there had been a long tradition of Congress indifference to peasant needs which allowed the League to compete better against it. The Muslim League organized its cadres and supporters against the movement, labelling it as a declaration of war against Muslims because the Congress was opposed to the demand for Pakistan.127 The Communist Party of India could have seriously taken the peasant struggle into a more organized and positive direction. As seen in the previous chapter, the CPI did commendable relief work on distinctly non-communal lines during the famine. This ensured their peasant base during the Tebhaga Struggle of 1946. But during the War, they too, like the League, collaborated with the British War effort. To avoid a class conflict, they even urged peasants to regard zamindars as their friends.128 Moreover, the Left was internally divided. The Congress Socialist Party under Jaya Prakash Narayan and the Radical Democratic Party of M. N. Roy were opposed to the CPI because of its pro-British policy after 1941. At the same time, some sections of the Left, like the CPI under P. C. Joshi and the Royists supported the League demand for Pakistan (as the right of Muslim self-determination) and campaigned against the Congress Quit India Movement.129 This only resulted in further strengthening the League image and the Pakistan demand amongst the Muslims.

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Owing to its internal divisions, the Left could not consolidate itself. Because of its slogan that the peasants should regard zamindars as their friends, the CPI, at that moment, could not create a stronger base amongst the peasantry in East Bengal. The KPP, as we have seen so far, gradually lost the race to the League, because most of their demands for the welfare of the peasantry had been already taken up by the League, which gave them a concrete shape in the form of positive legislation. In the aftermath of the famine and in order to make itself an organization with a greater mass base, the League in Bengal began to urgently reorganize itself. A new radical leadership emerged from the winter of 1943 under leaders like Abul Hashim, who began to adopt a powerful anti-landlord stance.130 Major propaganda and organizational efforts were launched in various districts of East Bengal focusing on the socioeconomic demands of the Muslim peasantry. Hashim toured different parts of north, west and East Bengal and established a direct relationship with League workers in different districts. The tours were undertaken to strengthen the League organization in Bengal and to enlist the support of Muslim youths. In several meetings, held in 1944 and 1945 at Dacca, Mymensingh, Narayanganj, Bakarganj, Khulna, Jessore and other places, democratization and a strong organization of the League were urged along with a pro-peasant stand. The leftist message of the League was projected mostly among students, who became the vanguard of the newly emerging socialist ideology of the League in eastern Bengal. In most districts of East Bengal, new offices of the League were set up at this time, which were then put under the leadership of the ‘progressive’ and young members of the party.131 At this point, certain constitutional developments at the all India level bore important consequences for provincial politics. In his broadcast speech on 14 June 1945 at New Delhi, Wavell, then the viceroy of India, declared: I have been authorized by His Majesty’s Government to place before Indian political leaders proposals designed to ease the present political situation and to advance India towards her goal of full self-government . . . His Majesty’s Government had hoped that the leaders of the Indian parties would agree among themselves on a settlement of the communal issue, which is the main stumbling block; but this hope has not been fulfilled.132

The Wavell Plan proposed the formation of a new Executive Council, entirely Indian, except for the viceroy and the commander-in-chief, who would retain his position as War Member. The council was intended to represent



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the main communities and to include equal proportions of Caste Hindus and Muslims. It was also proposed that the portfolio of the External Affairs would be placed in charge of an Indian member of the Council. In order to form such a council and deliberate on its functions, the viceroy invited the leaders of the Congress and the Muslim League, namely Gandhi, Jinnah, Rao Bahadur Shiva Raj (to represent the Scheduled Castes) and Master Tara Singh (to represent the Sikhs) to the Viceregal Lodge in Shimla. This, in effect, was what came to be known as the Wavell Plan and the Shimla Conference of 1945. The manifold reactions to the Wavell Plan make for an interesting study. Gandhi had problems with the language of the broadcast speech which ‘rigorously’ excluded the use of the word ‘independence.’133 The term ‘Caste Hindus’ was also offensive to him as this underlined division among Hindus. The Hindu Mahasabha raised objections to their exclusion from consultations in the conference. Shyama Prasad Mookerjee voiced his usual concern: Our worst suspicions have been confirmed by the announcement made by Lord Wavell in Delhi and Mr Amery in London. There can be no doubt that the main purpose of the scheme is further to placate the Muslim League and to crush the legitimate political rights of Hinduism. The Hindu Mahasabha which is acknowledged to be the only organization that can rightfully represent the Hindu cause has been excluded even from consultation . . . the only object of excluding the Mahasabha at this stage is that the British Government and Lord Wavell know that it will ruthlessly oppose any scheme which is intended to sacrifice the Hindus and the national cause at the altar of intransigent communalism .  .  . the Hindu Mahasabha will, therefore, unhesitatingly repudiate Lord Wavell’s new plan.134

The Congress and the League were again at loggerheads over the proposals. The Congress Working Committee, in its instructions to Congressmen attending the Shimla Conference, stated that it must be clearly understood that communal parity did not mean that all Muslim members of the national government would be nominated by the Muslim League; ‘The Congress cannot recognize the sole right of such nomination by a communal organization, nor can it reduce itself as a consequence to a limited communal field. The Congress, therefore, is of opinion that names may be proposed for Hindus, Muslims, Scheduled Castes etc. by all groups in the Conference and to be adopted by the Conference as a whole.’135 This became the main bone of contention between the Congress and the League. Explaining the League’s stand at the Shimla Conference on 29 June 1945, Jinnah stated:

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The Congress have already claimed the right to choose a member or members from the Muslim block and some other party or parties may make similar claims. While we have every desire to find a solution and come to an agreement, this point . . . is one which we cannot accept either on principle or on the facts as they are before us . . . And I do not think it can possibly be denied that ninety-nine percent of the Mussalmans of India are with the League.136

In a letter to the viceroy dated 7 July 1945, Jinnah clearly expressed his and the Muslim League Working Committee’s decision that there should a provision for the selection of all Muslim members of the proposed Executive Council by the Muslim League alone. It regarded this as one of the ‘fundamental principles.’137 Jinnah and the League had other problems with the Wavell Plan. His main disappointment came from the fact that the proposals did not recognize, or at least explicitly mention any guarantee to Muslims for the right of selfdetermination. Nor did it accept the scheme of Pakistan. He was also unhappy with the composition of the delegation that was invited to Shimla. He pointed out that Sikhs were already opposed to the division of India and their political goals were the same as those of the Congress, so ‘they are not likely to have any particular bias for us.’138 His response to the Scheduled Castes was even more striking, considering the lip service that the Bengal Provincial Muslim League had been paying for over a year to the rights of the Scheduled Castes as an ‘oppressed’ minority like Muslims themselves. He argued that their main problem was social tyranny and economic oppression in Hindu society, but with regard to political ideals, they were not a community divided from the rest of the Hindu community. They would eventually rally behind Hindu leadership. So, like Sikhs, they too would not have any particular sympathy for the Muslim League and its demands. The thrust of Jinnah’s argument was that in the given scheme of things, Muslims and the Muslim League would be clearly in a minority, and the composition of the Executive Council would therefore invariably enable the Congress and its supporters to command a majority at all times. At one point in his discussion with Wavell, Jinnah even said that the viceroy would have to give a commitment that he would accept no Muslims in the Council who were not members of the League. When the viceroy refused to give in to his demand and asked him to submit a list of names for the Council, Jinnah refused to do so till his claim was met. The viceroy described Jinnah’s position thus: ‘He was obviously under great pressure, and said more than once



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I am at the end of my tether.’139 Jinnah was getting more and more cornered and frustrated by the present scheme of things. Meanwhile, the Congress had already submitted to the viceroy a list of fifteen names, apart from the viceroy’s and the commander-in-chief ’s, for the Executive Council140. This added to the sense of urgency that Jinnah felt. The Wavell Plan did not work and the Shimla Conference eventually failed. The Muslim League, till the end, remained defiant and did not submit a list of names. When the viceroy himself selected a list of Muslim candidates, including some Muslim League names, the League did not accept that either. Once the conference ended, parties began their usual mudslinging and blaming each other for the failure. Maulana Azad, in a press report on 14 July 1945, clearly held the Muslim League responsible for the failure of the conference. Several pro-Hindu newspapers also condemned Jinnah for his unbending attitude. The Hindu, in its editorial on 15 July 1945, stated that it was a universal verdict that the League’s ‘persistently negative attitude’ was solely responsible for the failure of the conference.141 Others, like The Tribune and the Hindustan Times, also echoed the same note. The Tribune, however, also held Wavell partly responsible. It pointed out that it was not in Jinnah’s power alone to wreck the conference. If the viceroy had taken a firm stand then, the unwillingness of a single party would not have jeopardized the situation, given that all the other parties were willing to cooperate.142 The main plank of Jinnah’s argument had always been that in the viceroy’s Executive Council, they were reduced to a minority, and that the League had not been given the sole right to nominate all Muslim members. On 6 August 1945, he asserted at a meeting that the Congress and the League were not just two different parties, but they represented two different nations; the Congress and Gandhi wanted to establish a Hindu Raj, and unless they gave up this dream, the Muslim League would not bend.143 With the refusal of the Congress to come to any agreement with the Muslim League and the British government calmly playing the role of a passive bystander, Jinnah’s frustrations only increased. Asaf Ali, echoing the Congress’s stand of a united India, called the Pakistan dream a delusion: ‘Separation would render both the Pakistan states vulnerable. The proposed Pakistan would have to organize and maintain immense defence forces both in the north-west and the north-east unless the defence of Pakistan was to be made a responsibility of the whole of Hindustan or of some great power such as Britain.’144 The Akali Dal, which was representing Sikhs, also announced, at the Central Akali Dal Conference in September 1945, that the

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Sikhs would not allow Pakistan to be established and that ‘Hindustan will remain Akhand Hindustan.’145 After the failure of the Shimla Conference, the League stepped up its campaign for Pakistan in real earnest. In the mobilization around the Legislative Assembly elections scheduled for 1946, Pakistan became the central issue. Bengal was a primary area where the League organized urgent mass mobilization. Jinnah was now increasingly visible in public occasions organized by the Bengal Muslim League. He argued that Hindus and Muslims were different in everything, from religion to civilization, culture, history, language etc. Bringing Hindus and Muslims together at the ballot box alone would not solve the situation. He made it absolutely clear that ‘Muslim India’ would never accept any method of framing the Constitution of India by a single constitution-making body for the whole country, because in any such scenario the Muslims would inevitably be a minority.146 Abul Hashim, now secretary of the Bengal Muslim League, published a pre-election pamphlet titled Let Us Go To War in September 1945. It reflected the militant mood within League circles. Interestingly, the pamphlet declared that the idea of ‘Akhand Hindustan’ was the one under the ‘domination’ of Mouryas [sic], the Mughals and in the present, under the British; ‘Liberated India must necessarily be, as God has made it, a sub-continent having complete independence for every nation inhabiting it.’147 The idea of a multiplicity of ‘nations’ existing within the subcontinent was projected as the natural order of things, whereas the concept of India as an integrated whole was repudiated. This gave credence not only to the validity of Pakistan, but to a number of such other claims like those of the ‘Dalitsthan’ in the Central Provinces. Referring to the preparations of the Bengal Muslim League for the elections of 1946, the pamphlet urged: The Bengal Provincial Muslim League represents 35 millions of [sic] Muslims of Bengal and it has now record [sic] over 10 lacs of members. In such a democratic organization as this it is quite natural that there will be difference of opinion among its leaders, workers, members and supporters. I appeal to all in all sincerity and earnestness to bundle up all their differences and to preserve them if necessary in cold storage during the pendency of our common struggle. Our internecine conflict, either for power, personal likes or dislikes or for anything for that matter of that at this juncture would be suicidal . . . The head and the heart of the people as I have seen during my tour in Bengal are perfectly sound and they will not make any mistake unless the leaders at the top in their anxiety to secure their leadership create confusion in their minds.148



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The last line claims to represent popular perceptions, which League leaders are requested to respect. It urges the need to forget all internecine party squabbles. Service for the cause of Pakistan was put before everything else. Throughout the election campaign, an anti-Caste-Hindu rhetoric was freely propagated. The League used its mouthpiece, the Star of India, to preach a socialist agenda. It reiterated that Muslim hunger and poverty were bound to increase under a Hindu-dominated regime since Hindus would cater to interests of their community alone.149 League propaganda in Calcutta and all over the East Bengal countryside warned repeatedly that the coming elections would be ‘a question of life and death, freedom or slavery for the Muslims of India.’150 The League reposed its faith in not just their local leaders from Bengal, but mostly in Jinnah. The Star of India, in its editorial of 19 November 1945, said that Jinnah had been hailed as the ‘Quaid-e-Azam’ by Muslim India because he had served the cause of Muslim nation so steadfastly. It said that the present Congress leadership was caste-ridden and completely out of sympathy with the common man, so there was no possibility of a rapprochement with it: In league with capital and high finance, the only benevolence it is capable of is the benevolence of enlightened despots. Saturated with the spirit and doctrine of Varnashrama, the present leaders of the Congress are utterly ill-fitted to carry out the will of the common-man.151

So, Muslims’ and ‘lower’ caste interests were gradually merged. Several meetings were organized all over the province for the election campaign. At a gathering in Calcutta on 19 November 1945, Suhrawardy, then secretary of the Bengal Provincial Muslim League (hereafter BPML), pointed out that the elections of 1946 were going to be the first step to decide the future of the Muslim nation, that the Congress and the Hindu Mahasabha had declared war on Muslims and there was no hope left for any honourable understanding and cooperation.152 A large gathering of Muslims at the Tipu Sultan Mosque at Tollygunge on 2 December and of students at Ripon Street on 6 December passed resolutions reaffirming their faith in the League.153 Important League leaders like Suhrawardy, Nazimuddin and Hashim toured the province extensively. When they arrived at Chittagong in the last week of November 1945, the Star of India reported that more than 50,000 Muslims had gathered at the railway station to greet them. There was another huge gathering when they reached Noakhali. At both venues, more than 1, 25,000 rupees were collected for the election fund. Free distribution of Pakistan literature was arranged from Dacca. On completing his tour, Suhrawardy was convinced that Muslims

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were now determined to achieve freedom and liberate Islam wherever it was in bondage.154 The political object of Pakistan was reconfigured as a religious duty. Jinnah’s birthday on 25 December became an occasion of celebration. It was observed in a grand manner in Calcutta by the League. The Calcutta Muslim Students’ League organized a massive celebration at the Islamia College Hall, where League leaders from all over the province were present. Victory Day programmes were also organized in Calcutta to celebrate the success of the League in the Central Assembly elections.155 The reorganization of the Muslim National Guards (volunteer wing of the League) has already been discussed in detail in the previous chapter. Abul Hashim and Suhrawardy took particular interest in recruiting the Guards. Mujibur Rehman Khan, a well-known journalist and radical leader of that time, was also a member of the Muslim National Guard.156 Jinnah visited Calcutta in February 1946 and addressed a number of meetings, mostly at the Maidan, where he described Pakistan as the only way to rid Muslims from both Hindu and British domination. Commenting on the nature of the celebrations, which projected the League as a true ‘mass’ organization, the Star of India enthused: The vast majority of those who met to receive messages from their leaders were not capitalists, title holders and rich Zamindars – they form, according to Muslim India’s enemies, the majority of the League’s supporters – labourers, artisans and petty traders, who have realised that the establishment of Pakistan is the only way to improve the moral and material condition of the Muslims of Bengal . . . the memorable gathering should serve to nail to counter the lie often repeated by the Congress organs that the Muslim masses are not with the All India Muslim League.157

Abul Mansur Ahmed, a prominent leader of the Krishak Praja Party, recalls that after the famine, he too became enamoured with the idea of exclusively Muslims’ welfare. As the Congress was increasingly identified as a Hindu party, along with most Muslims he moved closer to the League.158 Eventually he came to embrace the Pakistan demand as a just cause and joined the League in 1944. However, he added that in order to make the idea of Pakistan a reality, it had to be given an ‘intellectual’ and ‘practical’ appeal. Simply demanding Pakistan on the basis of religion alone would not work. If that happened, Muslims would only move backwards under the influence of Mullahs.159 He became a member of the Purba Pakistan (East Pakistan) Renaissance Society, led by Mujibur Rehman Khan. The Society propagated a progressive, socialist nation for Pakistan, where the cause of the krishak (peasant) would be safe.160



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The East Pakistan Renaissance Society in Calcutta and a similar organization – Purba Pakistan Sahitya Sangsad – in Dacca built up a base amongst the Muslim intelligentsia largely with talks, debates and seminars and by publishing many books and pamphlets on East Pakistan.161 The vision of a strong and confident East Pakistan was put forward by Mujibur Rehman Khan in a pamphlet titled Eastern Pakistan, which was published from Calcutta in 1944 by the East Pakistan Renaissance Society and priced at eight annas.162 This book opened with a very appealing description of the geographical boundary of what should be Eastern Pakistan: The North East India where Muslims form an absolute majority of the total population and which has been the homeland of the Muslims for more than thousand years, is a geographically well demarcated area having distinct natural boundaries. This area is bounded on the north by the mighty Himalayas, on the east by the Patkai, Lusai, Chin and Arakan Hills and wide expanses of evergreen forests, on the south by the Bay of Bengal and on the west by the river Coosey, which originating from the Himalayas in the heart of Nepal, enters into Indian plains forming mainly the western boundary of the Purnea district in Bihar and joins the river Ganges which skirts the southern boundary of Purnea and enters the Murshidabad district of Bengal. Thereafter it branches to the south as the river Hooghly and enters the Bay of Bengal. The Coosey-Ganges-Hooghly therefore constitutes the western natural boundary of Eastern Pakistan. Within these natural boundaries, there is a total population of 624 lakhs, of which 362 lakhs are Muslims, 220 lakhs are Hindus and 41 lakhs are tribal people. Muslims constitute nearly 60% of the total population of this area.163

It also described future East Pakistan’s economic and human resources, which would ensure its strength.164 According to the East Pakistan Renaissance Society, East Pakistan would consist of the eastern part of Purnea (Bihar), the whole of Bengal except the Burdwan division, a small part of Murshidabad which fell to the west of the river Hoogly and the whole of Assam165. The Renaissance Society interestingly pointed out that just as Muslims were different from Hindus, Bengali Muslims were also different from their counterparts in West Punjab in terms of their language and culture.166 Thus, while Jinnah was arguing in terms of a ‘Muslim India’, there was a sizable section of Muslims in Bengal, who were already talking in terms of their differences with other Muslims. The sense of a ‘Bengali difference’, of a distinct identity for a Bengali Muslim Purba Pakistan was already in the air, contradicting the League’s image of a monolithic Pakistan.

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MAP 3.1: P  ublished in Mujibur Rehman Khan’s Pakistan (Mohammadi Book Agency, Calcutta, 1942)

In 1944, Abul Mansur Ahmed argued in one of the sessions of the Renaissance Society that religion could transcend geographical boundaries, but tamaddun (culture) would only flourish within a geographical limit; hence the ‘culturally different’ Muslims of Purba Pakistan were a different nation from the people of other provinces of India and from their ‘religious brothers’ of West Pakistan.167 The idea of a ‘nation within a nation’ was stressed repeatedly in the concept of Purba Pakistan. In fact, agitations for a culturally distinct Eastern Pakistan had begun from 1942, when Mujibur Khan published Pakistan from Calcutta. It was priced at three rupees and was written in a Bengali very different from the colloquial spoken language. Obviously, this aimed at an urban, solvent and intellectual Muslim readership. The idea of Pakistan was equated with the concept of the Soviet Union. It tried to identify the ideological similarities between the two: Ideological parallels can be drawn between the concept of Pakistan and the formation of Soviet Russia after the Russian Revolution. Soviet Union is a



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MAP 3.2: D  etailed map showing Muslim population in the different districts of Bengal, prepared by East Pakistan Renaissance Society in 1944 Source: Mujibur Rehman Khan, Eastern Pakistan, Its Population, Delimitation and Economics (East Pakistan Renaissance Society, Calcutta, 1944)

composite mix of a number of big and small nations. All of them have their own language, culture and distinctive national identity. Russia has accepted all the different claims of these different smaller nationalities within the Union. It is quite remarkable how the Soviet Union has maintained the distinctiveness of the various constitutive nations, an example quite unique in history. There is no difference between the conceptualization of Pakistan and the functioning of the Socialist Soviet Union.168 [Translation mine.]

The book also emphasized that Bengali would be the language of East Pakistan, just as Urdu would be the language of West Pakistan.169 The imposition of any language other than Bengali was anathema:

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The Muslim League for a long time argued that Urdu was the national language of India. But this claim was sustainable as long as the League believed in ‘Akhand Hindustan’. Now that the League has accepted Pakistan as its national goal, nothing but Bengali can be accepted as the language of eastern Pakistan.170 [Translation mine]

Such claims problematized Jinnah’s two-nation theory and the League’s projected image of Pakistan as a homogenous Muslim nation. However, the League leadership at the all India level or in Bengal did not openly repudiate such demands. In fact, in several of the meetings and programmes organized by the Renaissance Society, several League leaders like Abul Hashim, Nazimuddin and Suhrawardy were also present. In 1945, Ahmed became the propaganda secretary of the League. As the League stepped up its socialist agenda with overtures to the Bengali Krishak, he published an article in the weekly Millat which stated that the Muslim League had become the vanguard of the Krishak Praja movement.171 Both Ahmed and Suhrawardy made repeated attempts to coax KPP leaders to join the Muslim League.172 Suhrawardy even suggested the formation of a League-KPP united front. KPP leaders were assured that if they joined the Muslim League Parliamentary Board, they would be able to maintain their independent existence within it. Ahmed held numerous talks with his erstwhile KPP colleagues, where he strongly argued that as members of the Board, KPP representatives would not only continue working for the krishak, but also be an active part of the Pakistan movement.173 Eventually, their efforts paid off and several important KPP leaders, like the KPP Secretary Shamsuddin Ahmed, Nurul Islam Chowdhary and Giyasuddin Ahmed, joined the League. In a joint statement to the press which was published on 9 January 1946 in the Star of India, they declared that since the Muslim League in Bengal and Punjab had adopted the policy of abolition of zamindari, the Permanent Settlement as well as capitalism, there was practically no difference between the economic programmes of the KPP and the Muslim League174. With this the chequered history of the KPP came to an end. The complete details of the results of the 1946 elections is not relevant here, but it must be noted that the League won by massive margins in all Muslim constituencies. It won all seats in Noakhali and Tippera. In these two districts, all Krishak Samiti leaders who had not crossed over to the League lost their seats.175 The Muslim League won 115 of the 123 Muslim seats. The Congress won almost all the general seats and quite a few of the Scheduled Castes seats as well. After the elections, the Bengal Provincial Muslim League’s leader,



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Suhrawardy, tried to form a coalition with the Congress. But the imperatives of the central high commands of both parties dictated against a broad-based intercommunal ministry in Bengal.176 In Bengal, the League ministry took office, and Suhrawardy formed the Muslim League ministry in April 1946 with a purely Hindu opposition. He reduced the number of ministers from 13 under Nazimuddin to 11, and the number of Parliamentary Secretaries from 17 to 12. Moreover, in this new ministry, he inducted only three Hindu ministers, two of whom came from Scheduled Castes. At this stage, we must look at one more important development at the all India level which shaped subsequent politics both at central and provincial levels, and which eventually drove Jinnah to the desperate plan of Direct Action. The arrival of the British Cabinet Mission was announced in February 1946. The Mission stated that since no agreement had been reached between Indian leaders regarding the question of unity or division of India, ‘we feel that it is our duty to put forward what we consider are best arrangements possible to ensure a speedy setting up of the new constitution.’177 The main task of the Cabinet Mission was to make arrangements for the formation of a constituent assembly and an interim government, whereby Indians may decide the future constitution of India. The Mission however rejected the possibility of Pakistan. It felt that the creation of a separate sovereign state would not solve the communal question in any way. It did not see any justification for including within a sovereign Pakistan those districts of Punjab, Bengal and Assam in which the population was predominantly non-Muslim. However, it added, ‘This decision does not however blind us to the very real Muslim apprehensions that their culture and political and social life might become submerged in a purely unitary India, in which the Hindus, with their greatly superior numbers, must be a dominating element.’178 To solve the issue of Pakistan, on 16 May 1946, it proposed its famous ‘grouping’ scheme: the provinces were to be grouped into three categories, A, B and C. Group B was to comprise of the Muslim majority areas of Punjab, Sindh, NWFP and Baluchistan. Bengal and Assam were put in group C, because Muslims were not in a clear majority in these provinces. The grouping scheme was devised to satisfy the League and give it a substance of Pakistan, without an actual division of the country.179 Reactions to the Cabinet Mission Plan were, conceivably, mixed. Jinnah was disappointed. He said, ‘I regret that the Mission should have negatived Muslim demand for the establishment of a complete sovereign state of Pakistan . . .180 [sic]. He argued that the Mission’s proposals were calculated to hurt

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the feelings of Muslim India. He also was against the formation of only one constituent assembly, instead of two, which he had hoped for. The constituent assembly, according to him, would have a clear Hindu majority. In April 1946, Jinnah called a convention of Muslim League legislators of the central and provincial assemblies in Delhi. The demand for a single Pakistan state was reiterated. The convention passed a resolution, declaring that ‘the Muslim nation will never submit to any constitution for a united India and will never participate in any single constitution-making machinery set up for the purpose.’181 On 22 May, he again issued a statement against the Cabinet Mission at Shimla – not only did the Mission not consider the formation of a separate sovereign state of Pakistan, but the initial Muslim League proposal that the Pakistan group should have the right to secede from the Union of India after an initial period of ten years was also neglected.182 On 6 June 1946, the League Council passed a resolution that the attainment of the goal of a sovereign Pakistan still remained the ‘unalterable objective’ of the Muslims of India for the achievement of which they would, if necessary ‘employ every means in their power and consider no sacrifice or suffering too great.’183 However, the same resolution stated that although the Mission had given an ‘affront’ to Muslim sentiments, the League saw that the ‘basis and foundation’ of Pakistan were inherent in the Mission’s plan ‘by virtue of the compulsory grouping of the six Muslim provinces in section B and C.’184 So the League was willing to cooperate with the constitution making machinery. The Congress initially did not accept the Mission’s proposals. But on 6 July 1946, having pointed out that they fell short of immediate independence, it accepted them ‘because of their desire to find some peaceful settlement of India’s problem and the ending of the conflict between India and England’.185 The Congress made it clear that they did not accept the terms of the scheme and only agreed to participate in the Constituent Assembly and nothing else. However, trouble started again between the two parties regarding the question of parity and the composition of the interim government as suggested by the viceroy. Jinnah wanted a ratio of five Congress Hindus, five Muslims (only nominated by the League), one Sikh and one SC member. But the Congress rejected this composition, wanting the right to include Muslims and Harijans among its nominees.186 The other problem was that the Mission’s proposals, as expressed in May, stated that if either party did not accept the proposals of the interim government, the Mission would still go ahead with the party that had accepted them. This had turned out to be the Muslim League. However, the viceroy now altered his stand, and began insisting on the need for somehow



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getting the Congress into the interim government, even if the League stayed out.187 The Muslim League, arguing that the British government had gone back on their word and betrayed the Muslim nation, rejected the Cabinet Mission and the interim government ‘due to the intransigence of the Congress on the one hand and the breach of faith with the Muslims by the British Government on the other.’188 It now decided to resort to ‘Direct Action’ to achieve Pakistan and ‘assert their just rights and to vindicate their honour and to get rid of the present slavery under the British and contemplated future Caste-Hindu domination.’189 The undefined and ambiguous nature of Pakistan, as formulated in the Lahore resolution of 1940, therefore eventually came to have different dimensions for different groups within the Muslim community. By 1944, the League had clearly established itself as the sole representative of Muslims. The idea of Pakistan was a utopic vision for the peasants of Bengal, as the new leadership of the Muslim League stressed an anti-zamindari stand. After the horror of the War and the famine, the predominantly Muslim peasantry of the province was naturally looking for a political alternative which would be sensitive to their distress. In the extremely difficult scenario that existed for the peasants after the start of the Second World War, it was easy for the League to turn the Muslim peasants’ discontent against the exploitative Hindu zamindars and mahajans and give the class conflict a communal colouring. Sugata Bose sums up the situation best in these words: ‘During the wartime subsistence crisis communal relations had become more embittered, even though there had been little scope for violent protest. At a time of unprecedented material distress and psychological uncertainty for the peasant masses, the participants in the antiimperialist struggle had been removed from the scene. In this political vacuum, the Muslim League was able to consolidate its position.’190 On top of agrarian populism, the League also played the card of faith. The fine line between their identity as peasants and as Muslims became blurred. The peasant class and community identities were not necessarily separate; they existed on parallel yet intercutting planes. The Muslim League carefully merged these two jostling identities successfully. Partha Chatterjee has argued that the agrarian structure and the dynamics of agrarian change, together with a specific demographic distribution, laid down the conditions in which communalization of the peasants was a distinct possibility. ‘The particular cultural form of landlordism, and that of peasant-communal resistance to a landlord authority, then determined the specific political articulation of this struggle in the form of a communal conflict.’191

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Muslim students and the intelligentsia were also won over with socialist messages and more so, with the idea of East Pakistan. The existence of the concept of Purba Pakistan as a distinct Bengali entity, diffuses homogeneities in the idea of Pakistan. These heterogeneities revealed a different dimension of Muslim identity within sections of the Muslim community in Bengal, which went beyond religion and defined Purba Pakistan as a separate ‘cultural’ aspiration. The success of the Pakistan demand of the League was that it made space to incorporate such diversities. At the same time, the emphasis on diversity reveals that the idea of Pakistan as a Muslim nation was already in flux even though the League demand resonated with most Muslims at that time. ENDNOTES 1. Tamizuddin Khan, BLAP, Vol. 67, No. 5, p 104. 2. Ibid. Here, Khan is referring to opposition to the previous SEB tabled in the Legislative Assembly in 1940 and 1942, when Fazlul Huq was the Premier of Bengal. Then, as in now, the Bill had met with similar opposition from the Congress and the Mahasabha. Please refer to Chapter 1 for more details on the opposition to the Bill of 1940. 3. Under the Nazimudin Ministry, there were three Scheduled Caste members, two of whom were Namasudras. Jogendranath Mandal was put in charge of Co-operative Credit and Rural Indebtedness, Pulin Behari Mullick in charge of Publicity Department and Premhari Barma (a Rajbansi) was put in charge of Forest and Excise Department. This was the highest representation of SCs in the Bengal Ministry. See Sekhar Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India, The Namasudras of Bengal, 1872‒1947 (Surrey Curzon Press, 1997), p 199. 4. For a detailed discussion on the nature of SC protest against the SEB of 1940, see Chapter1. Also see Sekhar Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India. 5. Mirza Abdul Hafiz, BLAP Vol. 67, No. 5, p 453. 6. Ibid, p 455. 7. Maulvi Ahmed Ali Mridha, BLAP, Vol. 67, No. 5, p 400. 8. Maulvi Abdul Latif Biswas, Ibid, p 438. 9. Mridha, Ibid, p 403. 10. The Star of India, 26 April 1944. 11. Ibid, 3 May 1944. 12. Ibid, 20 May 1944. Letter to the Editor by K. M. Nasirul Huq 13. Ibid, 16 May 1944.



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14. Ibid, 27 May 1944. 15. Ibid, 7 June 1944. 16. Surendranath Biswas, BLAP, Vol. 67, No. 5, p 128. 17. Ibid. 18. Ibid. 19. Ashutosh Lahiri, Ibid, p 210. 20. Ibid, p 211. 21. Lahiri also pointed out that although some Scheduled Caste leaders were supporting the Bill, he did not take them seriously, as it was their practice whatever Ministry was in power, see Ashutosh Lahiri, Ibid, p 315. 22. Atul Chandra Sen, Ibid, p 221. 23. Sarat Chandra Mukherjee, Ibid, p 425. 24. Narendra Nath Das Gupta, Ibid, p 225. 25. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 29 April 1944. 26. IOR, File No. L/PJ/5/151, 1944, p 226. Confidential Report on the Political Situation in Bengal for the first half of May, 1944. 27. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 2 May 1944. 28. Ibid, 5 May 1944. 29. Ibid, 8 May 1944. 30. Ibid, 7 May 1944. 31. Ibid, 4 May 1944. 32. Ibid, 2 May 1944. 33. Ibid. 34. Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India, p 177. 35. In the proposed Secondary Education Board in 1940, out of 50 members, only 5 were to be SCs. Interestingly, the same number of SC members were also retained for the Secondary Education Board of 1944. 36. Mukunda Behari Mullick, BLAP, Vol. 67, No. 5, p 253. 37. Ibid, p 254. 38. Kshetra Nath Singha, Ibid, p 512. 39. Monmohan Das, Ibid, p 443. 40. Ibid, p 444. 41. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 1 June 1944. 42. SB File No. PH 510/45 1945, p 1, ‘Bharat Sevashram Sangha’, Special Branch Report, 1945. 43. Ibid, p 11(a). ‘Bharat Sevashram Sangha’, Special Branch Report dated 31.8.45. 44. Hindu Politics – The Message of the Mahasabha, Collection of Speeches and Addresses by N. C. Chatterjee, p 96. 45. Ibid, p 108. 46. For more details on this, see Batabyal, Communalism in Bengal: From Famine to Noakhali, 1943–47.

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47. All India Hindu Mahasabha Papers, NMML, File No. C-84, p 1. Letter from M. R. Chaudhuri, secy, All India Hindu Mahasabha to The general secretary, Provincial Hindu Mahasabha, dated 8th August 1945. 48. Ibid. 49. Ibid, p 2. Letter from M. R. Chaudhuri, Secy, All India Hindu Mahasabha to The general secretary, Provincial Hindu Mahasabha, dated 8th August 1945. 50. IOR, File No. L/PJ/5/151, 1944, p 219. Confidential Report on the political situation in Bengal for the second half of May 1944. 51. Ibid, p 205. Confidential Report on the Political Situation in Bengal for the first half of June 1944. 52. Ibid, p 219. Confidential Report on the political situation in Bengal for the second half of May 1944. 53. Ibid, p 188. Confidential Report on the Political Situation in Bengal for the second half of June 1944. 54. Ibid, p 181. Confidential Report on the Political situation in Bengal for the first half of July 1944. 55. For a detailed discussion of the different strands within the Namasudra politics during this time, see, Sekhar Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India. 56. Pramatha Ranjan Thakur, BLAP, Vol. 67, No. 6, pp 141–2. 57. IOR, File No. L/PJ/5/151, p 205. Confidential Report on the Political Situation in Bengal for the first half of June 1944. 58. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 8 June 1944. 59. Atul Chandra Sen, BLAP, Vol. 67, No. 6, p 147. 60. Bandyopadhyay, Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India, p 221. 61. Ibid, p 224. 62. Ibid, p 244. 63. Datta, Carving Blocs, p 10. 64. IOR, File No. L/PJ/5/151, 1944, p 64, Letter from Casey to Lord Wavell on 30 October 1944. 65. Sarkar, The Swadeshi Movement in Bengal, p 409. 66. Ibid, p 414. 67. Rafuddin Ahmed, The Bengal Muslims 1871–1906 A Quest for Identity (Delhi: OUP, 1981), p 133. 68. Ibid. 69. Sarkar, The Swadeshi Movement in Bengal, p 358. 70. Ibid. 71. Ibid, p 423. Sumit Sarkar remarks that if the ‘federal India’ of the future was to have religious communities as its constituents, a basic disagreement between them would open the door for a partition of the country on communal lines; only one short step thus logically divided Pal’s ‘composite patriotism’ from the two-nation theory.



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72. Bose, Agrarian Bengal, p 183. 73. Chatterjee, Bengal 1920–1947, Volume 1 – The Land Question, p 187. 74. Ibid, pp 187–8. 75. Ibid, p 188. 76. Ibid. 77. Final Report on the Survey and Settlement Operations in the District of Noakhali, 1914–1919 (Calcutta: Bengal Secretariat Book Depot, 1919), p 39. 78. WBSA, File Number 613/30 Home Political, district magistrate Mymensingh to chief secy, 18 July 1930. 79. For a more detailed description of the Depression decade, see Chapter 1. 80. Sarkar, The Politics of Protest, p 107. 81. Ibid. pp 107–108. 82. Abul Mansur Ahmed, Amar Dekha Rajnitir 50 Bachar (Dhaka: Nauroz Kitabistan, 1970), pp 111–112. 83. Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal, p 74. 84. This party, during the elections of 1937, joined hands with the Muslim League and was merged with it. 85. Bose, Agrarian Bengal, p 204. 86. N. N. Mitra (ed.), The Indian Annual Register, 1936, Vol. 1, p 301. 87. At this stage, the KPP enjoyed Congress support for the upcoming elections. 88. Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal, p 85. 89. For a detailed understanding of the results of the 1937 elections, see Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal and Bose, Agrarian Bengal. 90. 9 out of 11 members were from the Zamindar class. See Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal, p 95. 91. Ibid, p 98. 92. Ibid, p 100. 93. See Bose, Agrarian Bengal, p 206. 94. Ibid, p 208, DIB, CID, Noakhali to IG of Police, 4 May 1937, GOB Poll Confidential file 303/37 (WBSA) 95. Ibid, p 208. 96. His close connection with organized armed dacoity made him “veritable culprit” in the eyes of the district administration, Ibid, p 208. 97. Ibid, p 209. Fortnightly report from the commissioner of Chittagong to chief secretary, 10 August 1937, GB Poll Confidential File 10/37 (WBSA). 98. Ibid, p 211. 99. Ibid, p 209. 100. Ibid, p 212. 101. To know about the benefits accruing from the Act, see, Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal, p 102. 102. Ibid, p 103. 103. Ibid, p 104.

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104. Bose, Agrarian Bengal, p 213. 105. Abul Mansur Ahmed, Amar Dekha Rajnitir 50 Bachar, p 191. 106. Bose, Agrarian Bengal, p 117. 107. Ibid, p 117. 108. Ibid, p 117, WBSA, Government of Bengal, Home Political File 87/39. 109. Ibid, p 212. 110. Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal, p 128. 111. For more details on the ministerial intrigues in the Assembly, see, ibid. 112. By the time Huq had decided to come out of the League, he had managed to secure the support of some Congress and KPP leaders. 113. Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal, p 131. 114. Ibid, p 217. 115. Ibid, p 218. 116. Ibid, p 164. 117. Ibid, p 166. 118. Taj-ul-Islam Hashmi, Pakistan as Peasant Utopia, The Communalization of Class Politics in East Bengal, 1920–1947 (Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1992), p 221, DM Barisal to commissioner Dacca Division, 17 January 1942, WBSA, Home Political File number W-33/42. 119. Ibid, p 82. 120. The Muslim League at this point was in the good books of the Government of India and the Bengal governor in particular because of their support of the British War effort. 121. Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal, p 192. 122. Hashmi, Pakistan as Peasant Utopia, The Communalization of Class Politics in East Bengal, 1920–1947, p 82. 123. Ibid, p 89. 124. Ibid, p 91. While Suhrawardy claimed that the food drive had restored the confidence of the poor and created problems for the hoarders, Nalinaksha Sanyal spoke on behalf of the Congress that the policy was economically unsound, for there was no restriction put on large purchases by outsiders and removal of the stock to Calcutta and other industrial areas, see Proceedings of the Bengal Legislative Assembly, Vol. 65, p 293. 125. Proceedings of the Bengal Legislative Assembly, Vol. 65, p 339. 126. For more details on the Muslim opposition to the Quit India Movement, see Bidyut Chakrabarty, Local Politics and Indian Nationalism, Midnapore 1991–1944 (New Delhi: Manohar, 1997). 127. Hashmi, Pakistan as Peasant Utopia, The Communalization of Class Politics in East Bengal 1920–1947, p 222. 128. Bose, Agrarian Bengal, p 219. 129. Ibid, p 225.



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1 30. Ibid, p 219. 131. Abul Hashim, In Retrospection (Dacca: Mowla Brothers, 1974), pp 50–61. 132. Bimal Prasad (ed.), Towards Freedom, Documents on the Movement for Independence in India 1945 (ICHR, OUP), pp 337. 133. Ibid, p 339, Gandhi’s wire to Wavell, 15 June 1945, sent in reply to Wavell’s wire inviting Gandhi to the conference, also see, CWMG, Vol. 80, p 329. 134. Ibid, pp 348–349, Amrita Bazar Patrika, 17 June 1945. 135. Ibid, p 353, CWC Instructions to Congressmen attending Shimla Conference, 21–22 June 1945, AICC Papers, File Number 7/1945-II, NMML 136. Ibid, p 356, Statesman, Delhi, 30 June 1945. 137. Ibid, p 360. 138. Ibid, p 356. 139. Ibid, p 361. 140. For a full list of the names proposed by the Congress, see Ibid, p 358. 141. The Hindu, 15 July 1945. 142. The Tribune, 24 July 1945. 143. Bimal Prasad (ed.), Towards Freedom, Documents on the Movement for Independence in India 1945 (ICHR, OUP), p 386, NAI, Home Political, File Number 97/45 Poll (I), 1945. 144. Ibid, p 456, Interview of Asaf Ali with a representative of Orient Press of India, 1 October 1945, Bombay Sentinel, 2 October 1945. 145. Mitra (ed.), The Indian Annual Register, 1945, Vol. 2, p 170. 146. Bombay Chronicle, 7 December 1945. 147. Hashim, In Retrospection, p 97. 148. Ibid, pp 170–178. For a detailed discussion of internal factions and internecine party conflict within the Bengal Muslim League, see Shila Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal. 149. Star of India, 5 November 1945. 150. Ibid, 20 November 1945. 151. Ibid, 19 November 1945. 152. Ibid, 20 November 1945. 153. Ibid, 5 December 1945 and 7 December 1945. 154. Ibid, 15 December 1945. 155. The League had a spectacular success, polling 86.6% of the Muslim votes. It won all 30 reserved constituencies at the Centre and 442 of 509 Muslim seats in the provinces. See Sumit Sarkar, Modern India 1885-1947 (New Delhi, Macmillan, 2005) p 426. 156. In fact, he was the leader of the Gopalgunj sub-divisional Muslim National Guard, see Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal, p 191. 157. Star of India, 28 December 1945. 158. Ahmed, Amar Dekha Rajnitir 50 Bachar, p 192.

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1 59. Ibid, p 238. 160. Ahmed, Amar Dekha Rajnitir 50 Bachar (Dhaka: Khoshroz Kitab Mahal, 2010), p 185. 161. Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal, p 178. 162. Mujibur Rehman Khan, Eastern Pakistan, Its Population, Delimitation and Economics (Calcutta: East Pakistan Renaissance Society, 1944). 163. Ibid, p 3. 164. Ibid, pp 3 and 14–16. 165. Ibid, p 3. 166. Ahmed, Amar Dekha Rajnitir 50 Bachar, p 187. 167. Mohammadi, Sravan-Bhadra, 1351 (August-September 1944), also cited in Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal, p 179. 168. Mujibur Rehman Khan, Pakistan (Calcutta: Mohammadi Book Agency, January 1942), p 217. 169. Ibid, pp 163–6 170. Ibid, p 164. Interestingly, roots of the Bhasha-Andolan of East Pakistan in 1950s, against the imposition of Urdu, can be traced here. 171. Bose, Agrarian Bengal, p 220. 172. Ahmed, Amar Dekha Rajnitir 50 Bachar, p 188. 173. Ibid, p 188. 174. Star of India, 9 January 1946. 175. Bose, Agrarian Bengal, p 222. 176. Ibid, p 223. 177. AICC Papers, NMML, File Number 57/1946, p 1, Summary of the statement issued by the Cabinet Mission and the viceroy on 16 May 1946. 178. Ibid, p 9. Summary of the statement issued by the Cabinet Mission and the viceroy on 16 May, 1946. 179. I am not going here into the full details of the scheme. For the complete document of the Missions proposals, see AICC Papers, File Number 41/1946–47. 180. AICC Papers, File Number 57/1946, p 39. 181. Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal, p 205, Resolution passed by the Subjects Committee to be placed before the All India Muslim League Legislator’s Convention on 9 April 1946. Resolutions of the All India Muslim League from January 1944– December 1946 (Delhi). 182. Mitra (ed.), The Indian Annual Register, 1946, Vol. 1, p 180, Jinnah’s reaction to the Cabinet Plan, Shimla 22 May 1946. 183. Ibid, p 183. 184. Ibid. 185. Mitra (ed.), The Indian Annual Register, 1946, Vol. 2, p 132. 186. Sarkar, Modern India 1885–1947, pp 430–31. 187. Ibid, p 431. Sumit Sarkar notes that the reasons behind this insistence could be the fear of a possible mass action; there was a threatened all-India strike in the



188. 189. 190. 191.

From Community to Communal 147 railways and an actual postal walk out. The Director of Intelligence Bureau had pointed out that the Labour situation was becoming ‘increasingly dangerous’. With the Congress in the Interim Government, the tensions could be allayed. Mitra (ed.), The Indian Annual Register, 1946, Vol. 2, p 177. Ibid, p 177. Bose, Agrarian Bengal, p 221. Chatterjee, Bengal 1920–1947, Volume 1 – The Land Question, p 190.

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4 The Great Calcutta Killing, August 19461 One of the most astonishing experiences of the Calcutta riots, for me, was the morning of 16th August 1946. No doubt it will be said that it is so easy to be wise after the event, but I can honestly say that, if I ever felt tension in the city (that well-known communal barometer reading of this second city), it was then . . . There was a curious stillness in the air. Extract from the Diary of Major L. A. Livermore2

Starting with August 1946, India began to witness a wave of communal violence, particularly in Bihar, Punjab and Bengal. The Great Calcutta Killing constituted something like a holocaust, exceeding anything that the city of Calcutta has ever seen. It marked the beginning of what Suranjan Das has termed as the ‘Partition Riots’ of Bengal. This study concentrates more on the events of the riots, especially in terms of the rioters’ modes of participation, studying both violence and anti-communal peace efforts, and tries to explore their mutual dependence and relationship. We have already seen in the previous chapter how the constitutional deadlock regarding the Wavell Plan and the non-acceptance of Pakistan by the Cabinet Mission had frustrated Jinnah to the point of eventually issuing the war cry of Direct Action. The Direct Action Day program mainly comprised of a public meeting at the Maidan, an open public ground in South-Central Calcutta. Muslim League supporters expected to draw a crowd of five lakhs. ‘For the minority Muslims of Calcutta, many coming from the overcrowded and squalid slums of the city’s industrial wards, to physically occupy the city’s most hallowed civic space, en masse, was a bold expression of corporate power.’3 About a thousand Muslim National Guard volunteers were deployed to keep the crowd under control, and speeches were made by Chief Minister Suhrawardy, Sir Nazimuddin and other leading Muslims, all of whom reiterated the demand



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for Pakistan. Calling the Cabinet Mission a bluff, Suhrawardy pointed out that the Direct Action Day was the first step towards Muslim emancipation. Mills in Calcutta were closed down and all buses and trams came off the road.4 Life in the city was at a low ebb as the day was declared a holiday. But before beginning to analyze the nature of the violence and the resistance to it, let us look closely at the state of preparations before the riots and at what happened on the streets in the five days from 16 to 20 August 1946. I.  PREPARATIONS BEFORE DIRECT ACTION DAY Janam Mukherjee argues that during the famine of 1943–44, one of the first measures of famine relief had been to forcibly remove thousands of victims from the streets to ‘rehabilitation camps;’ the treatment of famine refugees had demonstrated that if necessary, force was a legitimate means of clearing the city of those who did not belong.5 In the summer of 1946, with the food situation deteriorating again rapidly, the question of who belonged to Calcutta and who should be removed was again becoming paramount. During the Calcutta Killings, that decision was taken into un-official hands. A psychological preparedness had therefore arguably emerged out of the brutalized collective consciousness of a city that had seen too much of death and destitution. In June, Sir Francis Tuker, the lieutenant-general in charge of the Eastern Command of the army, noted that although thus far the army had warded off grave communal conflict, Bengal was soon moving towards ‘the fatal thing.’6 He said that the army knew that a civil war was certain if Pakistan was not granted. Reports were flowing into the intelligence centres in Calcutta showing ‘the ever mounting emotions of the two communities.’.7 For the first half of August, speeches by both Congress and Muslim League leaders at various meetings in Calcutta were inflammatory.8 On 4 August, Suhrawardy and Nazimuddin had spoken ‘violently’ against the Cabinet Mission and the Congress, and had said that the latter was like ‘Hitler’s party’, and just as Hitler himself had been crushed, the Congress would also be crushed. On 15 August, a debate took place in the Bengal Assembly when the Muslim League government in Bengal announced that 16 August would be a public holiday. The Congress bitterly resented this decision, as till now it had more or less possessed a monopoly on declaring and enforcing hartals in Calcutta. ‘. . . They thus strongly resented the prospect of any other competitor, especially so formidable a bidder as the Muslim League, entering this highly coveted field of political exploitation.’9

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The Congress staged a walkout from the Bengal Legislative Assembly on 13 August in protest of the Bengal Government’s declaration of 16 August as a holiday. It charged that the government was using its authority to uphold the decision of a communal party.10 The Bengal Government argued that it was only in the interests of peace that a public holiday was declared.11 Morgan, leader of the European party in the Legislative Assembly, also condemned the Bengal Government’s action, saying that since people would have nothing else to do that day, they would be free to do as they pleased.12 He said that he failed to understand why banks, offices, workshops etc. should be closed ‘while more than half the population of the province consisting of Hindus, nationalist Muslims, Indian Christians and Anglo-Indians did not subscribe to the creed of the Muslim League and did not believe in non-participation in the Viceroy’s offer . . .’13 Speaking to a Muslim gathering on the 11 August, Nazimuddin reportedly said that the Interim Government, without the support of the Muslim League, would find on its hands a serious clash between the communities. Although final plans for Direct Action had not yet been settled, there were scores of ways well known to Calcutta Muslims by which the League could make a thorough nuisance of itself, not being bound to nonviolence as the Congress was.14 The Muslim National Guard, the volunteer organization of the Muslim League, officially opened its headquarters at Wellesley Street in Calcutta in August and announced the recruitment of volunteers to protect the interests of Muslims.15 On 4 August, a rally of around four hundred Muslim National Guards, met at the compound of the Calcutta Madrassa. About fifty of them wielded lathis and about twenty-five carried ‘imitation rifles made of wood’.16 On the same day another meeting was held at the Muslim Institute Hall, presided over by Suhrawardy. Speakers at this meeting criticized the British Cabinet Mission for breaking their pledge to Muslims. They attacked the Congress for its ‘preparations to dominate Muslims.’17 Copies of a printed Urdu leaflet titled Qaumi Jung Ka Tabl Baj Gaya (the Drum announcing the National Struggle Has Begun), issued by the Salar-e-Suba (head) of the Muslim National Guard, were circulated among Muslims of North Calcutta. It appealed to all Muslim youths to join the National Guards and be prepared for the National Struggle ahead.18 Muslim localities in Calcutta and the suburbs were commanded to make the Direct Action Day a success. On 9 August, about twenty Muslim League volunteers moved around in a lorry announcing the meeting at Maidan. They shouted slogans like ‘Larke Lenge Pakistan’ and ‘Pakistan Le Ke Rahenge’.19 Their language made it very clear that that they had appropriated the mantle of



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nationalism and had transposed it to ‘Muslim nationalist’ striving to create the Pakistan nation. Suhrawardy declared in the Council meeting of the League on 29 July that the Congress was ‘out to destroy Muslim resurgence in this country . . . Let the Congress beware that it is not going to fight just a handful of people fighting for power but a nation which is struggling for its life and will secure that life.’20 Jinnah claimed in his message of Direct Action that the Muslim League would now bid farewell to all constitutional methods of politics.21 Abul Mansur Ahmad recalls that Nazimuddin had declared openly before the Direct Action Day that their battle was not against the Indian government, but against Hindus.22 On the other hand, Kiran Shankar Roy, leader of the Congress Party in the Bengal Legislative Assembly, addressed a meeting at Ballygunge on the 14th August. He said that it was stupid to think that Direct Action Day was officially decreed as a holiday so as to avoid trouble.23 The holiday, with people at leisure, would invite trouble, for it was quite certain that those Hindus who wished to pursue their business, would be compelled to close them. This would certainly lead to violent disturbances. He advised Hindus to keep their shops open and not to submit to a compulsory hartal.24 So, Roy himself was setting the stage for the very clash that he feared. Surendra Mohan Ghose, another leader of the Congress, who had organized a rally in protest of the public holiday, also advised Hindus to keep their shops open at all costs. He made a very provocative speech: If Suhrawardy and Nazimuddin think that the people of Bengal will be cowed down by butchers’ knives and goondas’ lathis, they are very much mistaken . . . All shops will remain open . . . You keep your shops open and we will see what they do.25

Earlier, a private meeting of the General Council of the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha discussed ‘the necessity of starting immediately some effective direct action to force the Government, the Congress and the Muslim League to recognize the Hindu Mahasabha as the sole representative to the Hindu community in any future administration of India.’26 S. P. Mookerjee announced that if Muslims wished to live in Pakistan, they should simply pack their bags and leave.27 Sikhs too participated in this game. At the same meeting a prominent local Sikh leader, (Tuker does not name him) in a ‘fighting address’, recalled how in the communal riots of 1926 Muslims were soundly beaten. He announced that if rioting did start, Sikhs would back the Congress and between them, they would give Muslims ‘a good thrashing.’28 Hence,

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everyone was aware of the possibility of violence but no one was prepared to stem the tide. Numerous pamphlets, openly communal, were found to be in circulation. The Intelligence Department in Calcutta intercepted a Bengali handwritten pamphlet which read: Islamic faith is being established in the world for equality. The sword which was used by Hazrat Mohammad, Samar Faroque, Tarek Musa, Bhaktiar Khilji to conquer the world is to be used by Islam against evils, injustice, inequality, capitalism and idolatry. This election struggle which we are contesting is a part of that war. If we are successful Pakistan will be established in this country. We are announcing emphatically that Pakistan will establish the government for the poor . . . We shall be successful in the coming struggle of the Indian Muslims. This is our programme of equality.29

Copies of a Bengali leaflet titled ‘Muslim League-er Sakriya Karmapanthar Ahban’ (Call for Direct Action by the Muslim League) were circulated on 14 August, two days before the riot started. Positing Direct Action Day as a religious event, it said: The mercy of Allah comes down on earth on this holy month of Ramzan. It was in Ramzan that the holy Quran was revealed. The permission for Jihad was first obtained in this month. It was in this month that the battle of Badr and the conflict between Islam and Heathenism was won by 318 Muslims . . . It should be considered as a happy tiding for all Muslims that the struggle for freedom of ten crores of Muslims of India starts on this holy month.30

Similar provocative handbills and pamphlets were recovered from the outskirts of Calcutta, like Akra. An Urdu pamphlet, titled ‘Manifesto of the Calcutta Muslim League’ was supposedly issued by Md. Usman, the secretary of the Calcutta Muslim League. It urged Muslims to observe hartal on 16 August since ‘Muslims are determined to establish Pakistan in Muslim majority provinces and they will not tolerate the external domination of the British and the internal sway of Hindus.’ 31 Handbills and pamphlets, often of ‘objectionable’ character, were reported to be in circulation before the Direct Action Day and were distributed in different places by the local Muslim League members headed by Illias Mondal of Krishnanagore and Ashraf of Akra Puratan Bazar. 32 Active incitement of violence against Hindus in the name of Islam was ripe before the actual commencement of Direct Action Day.



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Tuker also reveals that different political parties had begun militant preparations from June. ‘The Hindu Mahasabha and the Rashtriya Swayam Sewak Sangh, a militant body of the Mahasabha, was naturally making headway, using the rising tide of Muslim opposition to induce more recruits to join the banner of Hindu bigotry.’33 The Mahasabha had been encouraging Hindus to prepare secretly against any future communal trouble; all, even the goondas, were to be trained in staff and dagger play.34 The Revolutionary Socialist Party of India spearheaded by J. P. Narayan began squad drills for volunteers from July.35 Sarat Chandra Bose too tried to revive the Forward Bloc and recruited its own batch of volunteers.36 The Muslim League itself did not lag behind. It intensified of the activities of the Muslim National Guards like holding regular drills and dagger and lathi play. An atmosphere of apprehension, fear, anger and even hatred, therefore, prevailed on the eve of the Direct Action Day in Calcutta. P. K. Ray, a Congressman, recalls in his memoir: ‘There were rumours all over India [that] the Muslims were collecting arms, mainly daggers and swords, for mass and concerted attacks on Hindus.’37 He goes on to say, ‘Indeed, as I still remember, there was great apprehension among the people in Calcutta as to the likely performance of the Muslim League after the latter had repudiated the Cabinet Mission Plan on 29 July.’38 Suranjan Das shows that at least seven days before the outbreak, people in Muslim bustees were ‘making weapons out of railings uprooted from public parks.’39 The Calcutta police commissioner and Intelligence Branch officials noted how ‘the League instructed the inmates of all Muslim hostels in the city to arm themselves with methylated spirit, kerosene oil and knives and take up strategic positions on 16 August to set ablaze tram, cars and military vehicles . . . the Pakistan Ambulance Corps was mobilized; a first-aid centre was established near the monument where the rally was to be held . . . This indicates that the League had anticipated trouble.’40 What is remarkable, however, is that although all non-League parties understood that the Direct Action Day would lead to clashes and violence, none worked for a peaceful resolution by allowing the hartal to take place. They deliberately aggravated the possibilities of violent clashes by resisting the hartal and stockpiling arms. Nariaki Nakazato offers an interesting insight: in the beginning, these leaders seemed confident that they could intervene to bring any kind of disorder under control if the situation started getting out of hand.41 However, as violence escalated to an unprecedented level, they realized that they had opened the proverbial pandora’s box.

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II.  THE CITY IN THE GRIP OF TERROR Violence terrorized Calcutta for five consecutive days between 16 August and 20 August 1946, although rioting continued in isolated pockets till 22 August. Tuker recalls that although the army had understood that Direct Action Day would be a day of ‘extreme stress’ in Calcutta, neither civil nor military officers were prepared for what came next, as they had not anticipated the scale of the violence.42 Manikuntata Sen, a member of the CPI and a MARS volunteer, recalls that everyone guessed that some trouble would occur on the Direct Action Day. So, Hindus too made preparations in different localities.43 Sikhs were also prepared. An intelligence officer mentioned that the coolie who used to fetch his food everyday had informed him on 15 August that there would be trouble the next day and so he would not come.44 Tension was at fever pitch even before the Maidan meeting. On 16 August, news of clashes began pouring into police stations and at police headquarters at Lalbazar from early morning. The Government of India pointed out that ‘disorders arose before 10 o’clock and increased in violence throughout the morning until it became evident early in the afternoon that the police will not be able to control the situation and that it would be necessary to call in the Army.’45 Earliest disturbances were reported from the north, which was initially much more affected an area than south. Violence spread to the south later in the day. Clashes started at 7 am in Maniktolla in NorthEast Calcutta.46 The Burtolla police station reported trouble at 7am and the Jorasanko Police station reported disturbances at 7:30 am, when the police heard that at Harrison Road and College Street crossing, groups of young Muslims were obstructing police lorries.47 Houses were burnt in northern and eastern Calcutta in the morning. Tuker notes that this was because local Muslim leaders compelled Hindu shopkeepers to close their shops, and the ‘rank and file pulling people off their bicycles and off the buses.’48 Hindus, on their part, tried to prevent Muslim processions from passing through their parts of the city and, predictably, this led to clashes in most areas. The first reports of disturbances in South Calcutta came from the Bhowanipore Police station, when at 1 pm, a Special Branch officer reported that a bus carrying about 40 to 50 Sikhs armed with swords was passing through the Chowringhee area.49 In Central and North-East Calcutta, around the Ballygunge police station, looting and arson were reported at around 5:45 pm from Syed Amir Ali Avenue.50 All kinds of shops were looted – cigarette shops, garment shops, shoe shops, eateries – nothing was spared.51 The army had to be called out for picket duty



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from midnight. Curfew was ordered in Calcutta from 9 pm to 4 am.52 The house of Dr B. C. Roy, a Congress leader, was set on fire and it was heavily stoned and damaged. B. C. Roy, being out of the city, escaped getting hurt. Although the personnel at the police headquarters at Lal Bazar, at 9 am, were not ‘unduly’ perturbed and did not anticipate widespread communal violence that would go out of hand, by 3 pm, Brigadier Sixsmith described the situation as ‘out of hand’.53 The police at Sealdah and Bow Bazaar had had to open fire and use tear gas to disperse violent crowds. Brigadier Sixsmith, however found that whenever the police dispersed the crowds, they reassembled as soon as the police patrol had passed on.54 In the evening, troops saw the College Street market ablaze, and the few unburnt houses and shops had now been completely sacked. Though the League rally at the Maidan was supposed to start not before 3 pm, riots began much before that. Police officers moving around the city noted that the crowd, which was collecting at the Maidan for the meeting, included a large number of Muslim goondas.55 By the time the meeting ended, their ranks were considerably swollen. Police patrols reported that between 1 pm and 4 pm, three batches of Muslims had reached the Sealdah station by train, among whom were about 400–500 Muslim National Guard volunteers in uniform and some of them carried daggers and knives; most were reported to have come from outside Calcutta, i.e. Hazinagore, Gouripore, Gurulia and Kankinara.56 The police reported that at 12:30 pm, an armed League procession comprising about 1500 people went towards the Maidan with ‘flags mounted on bamboo lathis and iron rods’ and also had ‘war’ drums and daggers with them.57 Phanindra Chatterji, an officer of the Intelligence Department of Calcutta, came across Muslim processionists armed with iron rods with flags mounted on them, and all were shouting League slogans.58 Inspector K. C. Bose noted that ‘the processionists had lungis or pyjamas and vests or shirts or kurtas and caps on. It appeared from their dress that they came from lower, middle as well as upper class Muslims.’59 Shouting slogans like ‘Larke Lenge Pakistan’ and ‘Qaid-e-Azam Zindabad ’, the procession was obviously tuned for a clash. At around 4 pm, a severe riot broke out in the College Street area in Central Calcutta and the officer-in-charge reported to Headquarters that the crowd was ‘quite unmanageable.’60 The para, or neighbourhood, itself became the microcosm of the desirability or non-desirability of Pakistan; para-wise attack only meant how, through a victory over a certain para, the rioters would draw a personal and collective connection with the larger envisioned idea of Pakistan/

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Hindustan. At about noon, large Hindu crowds began to gather in this area, and having heard rumours of Muslims looting shops in other parts of the city, they looted Muslim shops.61 On Tarachand Datta Street and Zakaria Street in the north, rioting and looting continued throughout the afternoon, and the officer-in-charge reported to Lalbazar that the mob in the area was ‘uncontrollable.’62 At Chitpur Road and the Mechuabazar crossing in North Calcutta, ‘rumours of Muslims being murdered were circulating and inflaming the Muslims who were of the belief that the community further down the road was in imminent danger of being killed.’63 Jorasanko was one of the most disturbed areas in North Calcutta. The fire pump at the police headquarters at Lal Bazar answered a call from Jorasanko and had to deal with three more fires in the same area during this visit. Out of a total 41 calls to the fire department at Lal Bazar, 12 came from Jorasanko alone.64 Near the Metiaburuz police station, intelligence officers reported that Nawab Begg, a local goonda, had told his friends and followers that Pakistan must be established by looting and killing Hindus or by driving away Hindu families from that area.65 Immediately after this, there were two stabbing cases here and both victims were Hindus. In South Calcutta, however, Muslim casualties were higher. In Tollygunge, when a group of Muslims walked towards Maidan to attend the meeting, they were stopped by local Sikhs and a few casualties were reported.66 Hindus also attacked Muslim processionists. A Muslim League procession passing from the Bhawanipur area to Gagan Babu’s bazaar was assaulted with brickbats and stones which were hurled upon the processionists from the rooftops of adjacent houses; it was later attacked again by Hindus and Sikhs armed with lathis and daggers.67 Weapons used appeared to be chiefly brickbats, but in a number of cases, shot guns were also used by members of both communities and some cases of stabbing were also reported.68 17 August saw the whole city in the grip of even worse forms of terror. The governor, while making a tour along with local army commanders in the morning, was ‘appalled by the amount of carnage and destruction which he saw, and by the bestiality of the mobs participating in them.’69 South Calcutta was now as badly affected as North. From midnight, there were reports of rioters in many quarters ‘terrorizing’ householders, and there was ‘some looting and arson and much stabbing.’ 70 At around 6 am, intelligence officers reported that a crowd of Muslims, most of them wearing green caps and what the officers called a ‘uniform’ and armed with lathis, were hammering dustbins and lampposts and intimidating coolies.71 At 7 am, a Muslim League procession



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armed with lathis, iron rods, daggers and some swords, attacked and looted Hindu shops in north Calcutta. Another armed Muslim mob attacked Hindu shops near Howrah. A little later, around 8:30 am, Muslim National Guards were seen assembling at the Muslim Institute with lathis. Officers also observed that around 11 am, a ‘regular fight’ had ensued between the two communities opposite the Campbell Hospital.72 The wide array of weapons is remarkable: some were clearly lethal, others were instruments of labour, like iron rods, which were turned into instruments of attack. At around 8 am, a big Muslim mob gathered at the Syed Amir Ali Avenue in Central Calcutta. Armed with lathis and iron rods, it broke open the shops and clinics on the Avenue and looted them. Later, they again broke open some Hindu houses adjoining the Amir Ali Clinic and looted trunks, radios, gramophones, valuable clothes, etc. from these houses. They also piled up a lot of furniture and other odds and ends on Syed Amir Ali Avenue and set fire to them.73 Destruction of Hindu property was as much a motive as was greed for loot. At 10 am, the Intelligence Bureau reported that a gun was fired from a Muslim locality in Tollygunge injuring 10 or 12 Hindus.74 Trams did not run and buses only plied in certain areas of South Calcutta, which was relatively quiet. Violent clashes took place at Central Avenue, Park Street, Upper Circular Road near Dharamtolla Street. Around the Burra Bazar police station, in the afternoon, the officer-in-charge reported to the control room that a lorry full of Sikhs was going towards the east of Chitpur Road and it was followed by ‘hundreds of people armed with lathis.’ 75 He also reported that since he and the divisional detective inspector were Muslims and since another Muslim police inspector had taken shelter with his family in the police station, he had been told that the thana would be attacked in the course of the evening by a mob comprising Hindus and Sikhs.76 Around the Burra Tolla Police Station, information was received at 8 am that a violent Hindu mob at Nandan Bagan had set fire to Muslim houses in the locality and was trying to murder the inmates. When the police reached the site and sought to rescue the Muslim inmates, the crowd, numbering about a thousand, resisted them. The police eventually had to open fire to disperse the crowd.77 A similar incident occurred earlier in the afternoon in the Ram Chandra Ghose Lane. The governor noted that looting and murder were widespread and in some areas intense during the night.78 From 17 August onwards, refugees had to be taken to government destitute camps or into new refugee camps opened ad hoc. Six government relief camps accommodating

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more than 515 displaced people were opened; rice, atta, dal and salt were supplied to these centres.79 By 18 August, the Gurkha regiment of the army had moved into the Dock area.80 Military occupation of the city was expanded to bring the situation under control. But outside areas patrolled by troops, the situation continued to worsen, with rioters still adopting ‘guerrilla tactics’; they were able to evade the mobile patrols and it became difficult to find men to supplement the mobile patrols with fixed posts at important crossings.81 Buses and taxis were charging about loaded with Sikhs and Hindus armed with swords, iron bars and firearms.82 At midday, the governor and the army commander toured the city along with Suhrawardy. The area beyond the Vivekananda Road in North Calcutta was very badly affected. In the words of Francis Tuker, the scene ‘beggared description.’83 Corpses were so thick on the ground along the Gray Street–Chitpur Road that tanks had to stop so that troops could move some of the bodies to give room to the vehicles to pass. Over 150 bodies were cleared from this area by 19 August.84 On the Central Avenue, next to a Hindu temple and in the surrounding street entrances, another 40 lay dead. In the evening, on Bag Bazaar Street, a Muslim bustee had been completely burnt down. What Tuker notes as ‘an interesting part of the incident’ was the rumour that the burning of the bustee was the work of 9 goondas who had been paid by a named person living in the neighbourhood.85 At 7 am on the 19 August, a Muslim mob of about 300 to 400 raided 20 Hindu houses at Tekopara and Jagannathnagar, set fire to 10 houses, looted or damaged property amounting to Rs 50,000. They killed one and injured some, and 9 people received gunshot wounds.86 On the same day, around 1 pm, about 500 Muslims armed with lathis, daggers, swords etc, led by a local goonda Seraj and his son, attacked some Hindu houses near Akra. They set fire to many Hindu shops and houses, killed many and looted their properties. Some of the dead bodies were reportedly thrown into the Hooghly river.87 20 August saw the city strewn with dead bodies and life showed no signs of returning to normalcy. Markets were closed, shops not yet looted kept shutters down, the telephone system did not work, transport services and trains were suspended. Life in the city remained at a standstill.88 So the hartal that the League had called did happen on a grand scale with huge costs on both sides. There were ‘odd bodies’ in sacks and dustbins and the troops discovered a ‘wholesale slaughter’ in the Shobhabazaar Market.89 The market was strewn with corpses. At the rickshaw stand at the west end of the bazaar, all the rickshaw pullers had been massacred.90 Ballygunge,



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the Lake Market area and Gariahata Road were among the worst affected places in South Calcutta. Even on 21 August, the city remained filled with stinking corpses. Telephone services were, however, partially restored and tram services resumed in one section of south Calcutta on Monday afternoon. Arrangements were made by the Government of Bengal to take government servants to the Writer’s Buildings from different centres. No trains from main lines arrived on Monday at Sealdah and no trains left the station. Although the situation was improving, it was far from normal. By the 28 August, about 2,322 Hindus and 1,832 Muslims had been admitted to different hospitals in the city.91 Hospital reports placed the death toll at 151 Hindus and 138 Muslims (11 Hindus and 12 Muslims had been brought in dead), and there was an ‘unclassified’ category of casualties of which 174 were ‘brought in dead.’92 But this did not include the countless people who lay dead on the streets. The Government of India noted that there were around 4,000 dead and around 11,000 seriously injured.93 A memorandum by the secretary of state for India on 11 November 1946 mentioned: Riots of an unprecedented gravity occurred in Calcutta between 16 and 19 August. The proximate cause of the outbreak was the decision by the Muslim League Council to celebrate 16 August as Direct Action Day. The most recent estimate of casualties during the four days is given as roughly 4,000 dead and 10,000 injured.94

Professional criminals took charge of the city during the days of violence. There are accounts of a certain Gopal ‘Patha’ Mukherjee, who was a butcher by profession. He was amongst the most feared of Calcutta’s musclemen at that time, commanding about 800 boys.95 He got his name (patha or goat) because he had a meat shop in College Street and because during the riot, he organized killing of Muslims. In an interview with him, journalist Andrew Whitehead found that Gopal relished reminiscing about his feat. He said that it was a very critical time for the country, because if the ‘whole area’ became Pakistan, there would be more torture and killing – now was the time to retaliate.96 His boys were given orders that if they saw the murder of one Hindu, they should kill ten Muslims.97 Gopal points out that people had all sorts of weapons ranging from knives, choppers, sticks, rods to guns and pistols. He himself had two American pistols. He got some of the weapons during the 1942 Movement and during the War, more were received from American Army soldiers, in return for ‘Rs 250 and a bottle of whiskey.’98

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Gopal also had an akhara (gymnasium) to train his boys. He himself was a wrestler. He recalls that he was paid to kill – ‘They paid up. Then I declared: for one murder, you get Rs 10 for a half murder Rs 5.’99 He does not explicitly state who paid him. Gopal was not the only such goonda who was in charge of the streets; there were several others who were involved. Another name that came up was that of Habibur Rehman or Habu Goonda, who not only led large League processions on 16 august, but also later got prominently involved in rioting, only to die a ‘grisly death’ on the streets a few days later.100 Eyewitness accounts describe the insane horror that gripped the city for five days. Abul Mansur Ahmed, then a Muslim League member, recalled that some people literally lost their sanity, being continuously exposed to gruesome murders on the streets. The will to kill became an instinct, while compassion was an unacceptable sentiment.101 Begum Shaista Suhrawardy Ikramullah, in her biography of H. S. Suhrawardy, recalls, ‘I have a clear recollection of the fear that I might not be able to get back to Calcutta.’102 As soon as she arrived at the Dum Dum Airport, she was warned that there was serious rioting in the city, that roads were dangerous, airline buses had been cancelled and no private cars could come through. There was ‘some sort of improvised military protection’ with which they managed to get out of the airport, but she clearly remembered the horror she felt while moving out of the airport. She recounts, ‘On the road lay charred remains of cars and rickshaws, and abandoned cycles littered on the road. As we entered the town, further ghastly sights of violence met our eyes, dead bodies lay strewn everywhere.’103 The circulation of rumours played a critical role in expanding the scope of attacks and counter attacks. Tapan Ray Choudhury writes that even before the riots started, rumour mills began to work. He heard that in the Rajabazar bustee, Muslims were apparently sharpening their knives. The news was spread by some alleged ‘eyewitnesses.’104 ‘Eyewitnesses’ form a particularly interesting category in rumour mongering, rendering a sense of authenticity, an impression of verifiability to the rumour. All of a sudden, Choudhury’s fellow students (who were earlier inclined to leftist politics) turned into staunch Hindus, with burning hatred for Muslims. ‘Offence is the best means of defence’ became the order of the day.105 Goondas became leaders of society. As soon as riots showed some signs of abating, some Hindu youths came over to the home of one of his relatives, saying that they were organizing an ‘Atmaraksha Samiti’ under local goondas. Nikhil Chakravarty, another eyewitness, said in an interview with the historian Joya Chatterji on February 1989 that the Great Calcutta Killing was not a riot, but a civil war:



The Great Calcutta Killing, August 1946 161 There was cold-blooded killing on both sides. The riot was well organized on both sides. Suhrawardy organized the riot ruthlessly to show that . . . [the Muslims] will retain Calcutta. On the Hindu side it was part of the campaign for the partition of Bengal. Its organizers included members of the Hindu Mahasabha and the Congress, particularly old terrorist Congressmen who had not joined the Communists. The Marwaris helped a lot, they gave finance and collected funds for the campaign for partition. The campaign hadn’t then officially started, but everybody knew it was for that.106

A child of nine when the Calcutta riots began, Ashis Nandy recalls how, on the morning of 16 August, their domestic help came to tell them that Muslims in the slum in front of their house were sharpening knives and sticks. Late morning, mobs collected in front of the slums and began beating up Hindus; ‘in the distance we could see houses being set on fire and looted.’107 The streets now belonged to the mobs and among them he could see familiar faces, which now, all at once tried to look heroic, having found a chance to ‘give petty greed a new ideological packing and a new, more ambitious range.’ He says that for the first time, they were treated to the spectacle of a Hindu nation emerging in Calcutta.108 The Badurbagan Sporting Club, which was a neighbourhood football club, playing friendly matches with the YMCA (Young Men’s Christian Association), on the compound of which Nandy lived, now turned into a new organizational space. The club, which was largely comprised of Hindu teenagers, overnight became the protectors of their community and some of them ‘openly and proudly’ turned into killers.109 Hindus, on their part, looked upon these young men as ‘self-sacrificing heroes.’ The radio worsened the situation; being government-controlled, it broadcasted censored news.110 People knew that it censored information, which made matters worse, for they now relied on rumours. Rumours further intimidated people in mixed localities. The minorities began to move out, ‘ghettoizing the city even more’. Being Christian, Nandy’s family could opt for a more distant, non-partisan and ‘moral position.’111 Even then, when his brothers walked to school, the entire family felt nervous. It was Nandy’s ‘suspicion’ that Suhrawardy wanted a ‘controlled mayhem’ to demonstrate his political power to British authorities, the Congress and even to the Muslim League leadership. But it spun out of control and turned into a full-scale massacre.112 Memories of the Great Bengal Famine were still fresh in Calcutta. People still begged on the streets and occasionally died there as well. Most famine victims had been Muslim peasants – they had resigned to their fate without any agitation, let alone aggression. Therefore, writes Nandy, it was unexpected

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that the same people would fight ‘like tigers’ when it came to religious nationalism.113 As negotiations for the transfer of power began to gather strength, Muslim slum dwellers turned into active supporters of the Muslim League. ‘They began to fly the green flag of the party and, sometimes, take out small processions accompanied by much frenzied drum beating. Many of the enthusiasts were middle aged and looked very poor and innocuous in their tattered clothes, even while shouting aggressive, martial slogans.’114 Suranjan Das points out that clashes assumed two forms: ‘large crowds fighting each other in open streets and looting shops and houses; and small roving groups indulging in sporadic violence.’115 The distinguishing aspect of the 1946 violence in Calcutta was its highly organized nature and direct links with institutional politics.116 Groups of rioters assembling immediately after the police party had retreated bears testimony to this. Tuker wrote, At 11.30 a.m. the escort to the Governor stopped at the junction of Harrison Road and Amherst Street. There was a large crowd to the south in Amherst Street which dispersed as troops and police debussed and advanced towards them. To demonstrate to the Governor how the mobs re-formed, the police and troops withdrew to their vehicles, out of sight in Harrison Road, upon which the people came out of the side streets again and advanced to within thirty yards of the Governor’s party. Troops and police appeared once more and the mob rapidly retreated, leaving a freshly-stabbed man in the middle of the road where they had been standing.117

Mobs were large and organized. Police officers noted that in most places crowds numbered over 1,000. On main streets and even in alleyways, groups of rioters were often very large; obviously, they had been worked on by communal groups for quite some time. Simple lathi charges were often not enough in most cases. Rioters stopped only after the police used gun shots and tear gas shells. Police inaction was striking, a feature that we shall notice during the Noakhali riots as well. The police claimed that often they were short of reinforcements, as they had not anticipated trouble of such magnitude. But their callousness was evident. When questioned by the Calcutta Disturbances Enquiry Committee on 29 January 1947, P. K. Chatterji, assistant commissioner of police, North Town, confessed that they had anticipated trouble before 15 August, but only of the usual hartal type like closing of shops.118 Since he was busy quelling disturbances at the Jorasanko area, he was unaware that disturbances were taking place in other parts of the north. He did not know why no information reached him.119 On being repeatedly questioned about



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this, he defiantly retorted that it was not his duty to find out about other places under his jurisdiction; in fact, it was up to his subordinates to notify him. He also claimed to be unaware of the presence of military patrols, although the nearest patrol was quite close to the area that he supervised.120 There were debates about summoning the army. When H. N. Sircar, deputy commissioner of police (Detective Department), called the Lalbazar headquarters at 7 pm on 16 August requesting military help, he was bluntly told by the commissioner that there was no need for it.121 Sircar told the Enquiry Committee that he had had personal discussions with the police commissioner about mobilization of more troops and taking help from the military right away, but the commissioner had replied that although there were ‘some apprehensions’ but he had had ‘assurances from high level.’122 Sircar’s own actions during the riot were not above suspicion. On 19 August, around 8 am, while patrolling the Bhowanipore area, he saw several taxis, belonging mostly to Sikhs, parked on the side of roads. Inside, he found several iron rods and other weapons, which the Sikhs claimed were ‘starting handles.’123 However, on inspection, he found that these rods had sharpened edges. The police personnel under him, however, did not make any precautionary arrests, nor did they follow up on this case later. The timing of curfew hours was also strange – from 9 pm to 4 am. An overview of the riot events reveals that the worst phase of rioting was in the morning. Nonetheless, curfew hours were never extended. Calcutta became a kind of a no-man’s-land. The Muslim League ministry was in power here, whereas at the center it was still the British government. The process of decolonization had already begun. The attitude of British high officials, such as the Police Commissioner Donald Ross Hardwick, is, therefore, not too difficult to understand. There was a general apathy among British officers, and an equally smug attitude characterized their depositions to the Enquiry Commission when questioned by Indian members of the commission. Important Hindu officers like Mr P. K. Chatterji, who was the assistant commissioner of North Town, also showed indifference and a lack of alertness, probably because the Direct Action Day was the result of a League initiative and the blame of the riot could be easily put on the League. Nariaki Nakazato, however, cites a ‘deep hidden fear’ on the part of the Raj about an anti-British civil disturbance which would upset the ‘delicate and complicated process’ of its withdrawal from India.124 He writes, Even for a legitimate, popular government, ordering the military to take actions against civilians is always a highly sensitive matter requiring careful

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consideration. It must have been all the more so for a foreign colonial administration, especially for the Raj, which in August 1946 was already an ailing body which had reached the final stage of life, whose legitimacy to rule India had been relentlessly on the wane.125

III.  THE BLAME GAME On 17 August, in an article in the Dawn, Jinnah ‘unreservedly’ condemned the violence. He claimed that he did not know who was responsible, but he assumed that the guilty would be dealt with ‘according to law’ as their actions were ‘contrary to expressed instructions and they have only played into the hands of the enemies of the Muslim League.’126 Later, however, he accused the viceroy, the Congress and even Gandhi for their primary responsibility in creating the Calcutta situation.127 Calling the Calcutta violence an ‘organized plot’ by Hindus to discredit the Muslim League ministry, Jinnah warned: ‘If Congress regimes are going to suppress and persecute the Mussalmans, it will be very difficult to control disturbances.’128 In a later interview with Pethick Lawrence he said that the riots were mainly started by Hindus and were ‘fomented and organized’ by Congress leaders; in no way was the Muslim League responsible.129 Shamsuddin Ahmed, a League member and an MLA, argued, Everybody knows that the carnage over which we are debating here was the result of the fact that the Muslims in this country want that they should have Pakistan in this country while our Hindu friends oppose tooth and nail that demand of Pakistan which they say we could never have.130

Tafazzal Ali, another League MLA, claimed that the riot was deliberately engineered by people opposed to the League Ministry, in order to ‘discredit the Ministry before the bar of world opinion.’131 Muhammad Rafique blamed the Hindu press for whipping up propaganda against Direct Action Day, in order to ensure that Pakistan could not come into being.132 Suhrawardy argued in the Legislative Assembly that Muslim India had been betrayed by the Cabinet Mission, which handed over power to the Congress. Thus, ‘Muslims in desperation decided rather to tread the thorny path of sacrifice, even of annihilation, through direct action, than bury forever their cherished goal of Pakistan.’133 Begum Shaista Suhrawardy claims that when rioting began, Hindus had an initial advantage over Muslims, because Muslim men were away from their



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homes to attend the Maidan meeting. So, the slaughter of Muslim women and children went on ‘without any let or hindrance.’134 But she hastens to add that undeniably the Muslims retaliated in kind. In what seems like a desperate attempt to cleanse Suhrawardy of blame, she says, His face was grey and haggard and his eyes were bloodshot from lack of sleep for he had spent day and night round the clock doing whatever was humanly possible to stop the carnage. He had moved to the Lal Bazar Police Headquarters to be able to get information and direct operations better . . . he was a most compassionate man and violence was abhorrent to him . . . the carnage of the second Calcutta riots led him to seek Gandhi’s help in preventing a repetition of it and thus eventually cost him his future in the state which he had helped to create.135

She claims that he engaged in hand to hand fights to combat rioters and pulled out blood-stained swords from the hands of ‘hate-crazed individuals.’ However, Suhrawardy’s move to station himself at the Lal Bazar Police Headquarters has also been interpreted in quite the opposite light. The Calcutta Police Commissioner, Donald Ross Hardwick, said that he had ‘very little time to study the situation’ because Suhrawardy was constantly in the Control Room and entered into ‘discussions’ with him.136 Other British officials also agreed that he caused unnecessary confusion by bombarding them with questions and impractical suggestions.137 Hindus, obviously, blamed the Muslim League and the ministry. In debates that followed in the Bengal Legislative Assembly, allegations and counter-allegations were furiously made. The Assembly turned into a scene of communal bickering as leaders fought bitterly over responsibility and the fate of Pakistan in Bengal. Dhirendra Nath Datta of the Congress moved the motion for no-confidence in the Assembly, arguing that instead of being the custodians of law and order, the League ministry itself became law breakers and asked people to become the same.138 Mr Jalan displayed pamphlets and leaflets with which the League had carried on violent propaganda against the Congress and the Hindus before the Direct Action Day.139 Congressmen unanimously condemned the League Ministry and demanded its removal: not only had the ministry failed to protect innocents, but it had also openly incited communal sentiments and allowed the riot to go unhindered for days. The Hindu Mahasabha stood with the Congress. Shyama Prasad Mookerjee accused League leaders of planning a civil war to make Pakistan a reality. The Government of Bengal, he said, had failed to protect the life and property of

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the residents of Calcutta. Hence, the chief minister, along with his ministry, must bear full responsibility. The Ajmer Hindu Mahasabha demanded that the Bengal ministry should be put on trial. It said that the role of Muslim goondas in Calcutta clearly showed that the Bengal ministry was entirely incompetent and was surely responsible for the communal carnage. It went on to urge all Hindus to organize themselves and not depend on the government, police and the army for help. This in itself amounted to an incitement to violence. The alleged culpability of Suhrawardy became received wisdom among Hindus, something that has also been reflected in popular Bengali fictional writings. In Adim Ripu (The Primeval Enemy) a novel by Saradindu Bandyopadhyay,140 Suhrawardy and his police are held responsible for the ‘cheapness’ of human life in the city during this time. The novel, based against the backdrop of the Calcutta riots of August 1946, says that in the war waged by Jinnah, Bengalis were made to embrace ‘Mrityudevta,’ the god of Death.141 The Communist Party of India, represented by Jyoti Basu in the Assembly, however, maintained that British imperialism alone was to blame. The British had once again forced bondage upon Indians with the violence. Nevertheless, Basu, also pointed out the responsibility of both the League and the Congress, who had both become pawns in the imperialist game. He mentioned instances of active propaganda by the League before the Direct Action Day. Given that, no wonder a section of Muslims took their leaders seriously and made ‘practical preparations’ for the Direct Action Day.142 IV.  THE ‘CROWD’ IN THE GREAT CALCUTTA KILLING Before we look into crowd behaviour in the Great Calcutta Killing, let us first look at the composition of the population living in Calcutta. According to the Census Report of 1941, Calcutta had a clear Hindu majority, although Muslims also formed a substantial minority. Hindus formed 73 per cent of the population of the city, while Muslims formed 23 Per cent. Most Muslims were clustered in North Calcutta, while South and Central Calcutta were dominated by Hindus. Calcutta’s Muslim population mostly comprised of poor people – artisans, rickshaw pullers, domestic servants and factory workers. The Muslim middle class was quite small compared to rich Marwari Hindus. Suhrawardy, nonetheless, had a big following amongst these poor Muslims as well as among rich Muslims in the city.143 Suranjan Das points out that the Muslim ‘crowd’ in the riot was mostly composed of the poor, especially migrants from north India. A large number of kasais (butchers) of Central and North Calcutta were



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convicted for violence in the Presidency magistrate’s Court. Coolies, factory workers, rickshaw pullers, masons, petty shopkeepers all participated in the riot. The Muslim League, claims Das, had also mobilized students for their rally on 16 August. As one police inspector noted on the morning of 16 August, the processionists ‘came from lower, middle and upper class Muslims [sic].’144 There was also evidence that Bengali Hindu potters, goalas, domes and kalwars (artisans working with scrap metals) participated in the riot. Das talks about Bengali Hindu businessmen, ‘influential merchants’ and students who were arrested on charges of rioting.145 The overwhelming presence of students, both Hindu and Muslim, was a new feature. Joya Chatterji draws attention to the differences between Hindu and Muslim crowds. While Muslim rioters consisted of up-country migrants, a ‘surprisingly large number’ of Bhadralok Hindus were arrested on charges of rioting. There is the example of Dr Mahendranath Sarkar of Burdwan, who had formerly been a member of the Hindu Mahasabha, but was now a Congressman. He joined the ‘movement’ because he favoured the partition of Bengal. He was arrested for hurling a bomb at a Muslim crowd. There were also released Indian National Army soldiers who were active in the riot. Chatterji remarks, ‘It was this improbable alliance between students, professional men, businessmen and ex-soldiers, Congressmen, Mahasabhites, shopkeepers and neighborhood bully boys, that led the Hindu crowd to its bloody victory in the streets of Calcutta in 1946.’146 Nakazato reveals an interesting cross-section of the crowd. Members of various volunteer organizations like the Hindustan National Guards and the Muslim National Guards were quite visible from early morning on 16 August. They were responsible for ‘organized’ acts of violence on that day. However, from the 17th onwards, their activities were no longer reported by the police. Street violence, argues Nakazato, came to take on a more ‘amorphous and fragmented’ character, despite gaining momentum.147 Middle-class participants, including students, also withdrew from the streets after the evening of the 16th. Although some members of the volunteer groups and students continued to be active, it became difficult for the police to distinguish them from the ‘mobs’.148 Tuker refers to the presence of Muslim goondas in the crowd at the meeting on 16 August. They slipped away from the meeting from time to time, their ranks swelling as soon as the meeting ended. It is not unlikely that they ordered their ‘own’ boys to start rioting. Often local goondas would have a number of boys at their disposal, and the example of Gopal ‘Patha’ Mukerjee is important.

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He had about 800 boys with him. They, in turn, often had their own ‘contacts,’ who were mobilized in such situations. Gopal had formed the Bharat Jatiya Bahini during the riot.149 It assumed the form of a ‘private army’ and was also trained in the use of explosives and firearms.150 The novel Adim Ripu dwells upon one such goonda, Batul. During the days of tension in Calcutta, Batul’s prestige among the Bhadralok of the para had increased, because only he could rescue them from the other goondas. In return, Batul extracted a salami (donation) from the local Bhadralok, which was a token of respect. Tuker also mentions that the underworld of Calcutta took charge of the city151 – Sheikh Habu alias Rahman, also known as Habu Budmash in Lalbagan, led a procession in Central Calcutta on 16 August. Mina Punjabi alias Nabi Bux of Cornwallis Street bustee led a Muslim procession with a gun in hand. An Intelligence Bureau report contains details of how the Muslim League National Guard recruited volunteers from the 24 Parganas, Hooghly and other outlying districts.152 Ashis Nandy recalls that the slum opposite his home in the YMCA compound was already a den of ‘criminals.’153 The riot gave them an opportunity to enlarge their activities. Local goondas now emerged as heroes and protectors of their own communities. The term ‘goonda’ is often used as the other of ‘bhadralok’ among the elites of Calcutta. In the riot, this connotation changed. The local goonda was no longer an outcast, he was accepted and revered as the saviour of the community. In one of the League’s leaflets titled Mugur circulated before Direct Action Day, the following call was given: Those who are thieves, goondas, those without the strength of character and those who do not say their prayers all come. The shining gates of heaven have been opened for you. Let us all cry out victory to Pakistan victory to the Muslim nation and victory to the army which has declared a Jihad. 154

There was, thus, newfound intermixing among various strata of society. Students, bhadralok, meatsellers, goalas, all came together in the crowd of rioters. Sudhir Kakar has argued that a search for self-transcending experience, to lose one’s self in the larger group, suspends judgement and reality testing. It is the primary motivational factor for both religious assembly and violent mob, even though the stated purpose is spiritual uplift in one and mayhem and murder in the other.155 Kakar’s argument as to why people are tempted to join a ‘crowd’ and more importantly a rioting crowd, is important for us. It is the monolithic-ness of the crowd that makes popular participation, especially in the case of riots, so attractive. Even though it



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is important for a historian to not see the crowd as abstract or faceless, it is precisely this facelessness that apparently characterizes the crowd that makes people join it. The sense of an engulfing wholeness makes rioting a kind of carnival where ordinary social differences can be left behind and daily problems forgotten. Once emotions subside, it is this anonymity of a crowd that makes it easier for its participants to dissolve their links and absolve themselves of all blame for its action. Goondas are generally placed the outskirts of ‘civilized society’. But they did not necessarily belong to the category of ‘labouring poor’. Nor did all those categorized as goondas come from marginalized social groups – Lal Mia, who was active in the Calcutta disturbances, was the son of a petty landlord in Mymensingh and had trading interests in jute, rice and sugarcane.156 After a riot, it is easy for more ‘respectable’ participants to pin blame upon goondas. The othering of criminals, done in normal times, comes back to restore order in society after a temporary suspension. Suranjan Das mentions that Gopal Patha’s Jatiya Bahini received financial support from prosperous Hindus during the riot, but once the tension passed, the support was withdrawn.157 That led Gopal and his ‘followers’ to take to ‘organized crime’ as a means of livelihood.158 They participated in armed dacoities, house burglaries and even smuggling. A section of Gopal’s Bahini was closely associated with the Congress, and one of them, Ram Chatterjee, later became involved with Left politics and served as a minister in the Left Front government in Calcutta for several years.159 This is not to suggest that such goondas were helpless pawns of the elite’s manipulation. They were equal and willing partners in violence. They even became leaders at such time. The death of Habibur Rehman was actually reported in the League mouthpiece Dawn with all the grisly details. Nakazato notes that the Muslim League thereby tried to project him as a local hero who had bravely fought and sacrificed his life for Pakistan.160 Some participated in goonda activities for personal objectives. Lakshminarayan Porel alias Lakha joined Gopal’s Jatiya Bahini to ‘acquire an expertise in the manufacture of unlicensed firearms.’161 Popular perceptions of some goondas remained positive even after the Great Calcutta Killing was over. Gopal was, and still is, viewed by his neighbours as the grandson of the ‘great revolutionary’ Anukul Mukherjee, as one who had protected Hindu women in Calcutta in 1946, and as one who helps in organizing ‘national celebrations’ like Netaji’s birthday in Calcutta.162 Das argues that like any other member of society, a goonda also possesses multiple identities, ‘one form gaining precedence over others at particular historical

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conjunctures.’163 The fluidity of popular perceptions makes the study of goondas interesting in the context of a riot. Let us now look at the reactions of the rioting crowd to symbols of authority, especially the Calcutta police and the military. Often fire brigades were prevented from putting out fires. The Police Commissioner of Calcutta, Mr Hardwick, mentions that within a few hours of the outbreak of rioting, it became necessary to supply police escorts to fire engines. Often, fire brigade staff without escorts were prevented by mobs from functioning.164 On 16 August itself, there were reports, mainly from North Calcutta, that Muslim processionists were preventing police lorries from passing through their localities. At the Mirzapur Street and Circular Road crossing of central Calcutta, when the police arrived to quell a disturbance, they were met with a shower of brickbats from the Muslim rioters assembled there.165 Policemen were often injured in clashes. The police station at Central Avenue saw rioting in its vicinity at around 10 am on 16 August.166 On the 17th, August, the Jorabagan police station in north Calcutta was attacked at 7am by a crowd of Hindus, as several Muslims were sheltered there. Often the arrival of a police party and subsequent lathi charges on the ‘mob’ were not enough to stop the violence and tear gas shells had to be used. In several cases, the police also opened fire. Rioters were convinced that the British were leaving; police and military authorities, seen as adjuncts of British power, lost their legitimacy, and it was now up to them to take into their own hands whether to make or mar the prospect of Pakistan. How does the rioting ‘crowd’ perceive its own violent acts? For Patricia Gossman, violence is an effective tool for political mobilization because it cuts across other divisions in a plural society. It gives the feeling of cohesiveness to the community.167 She goes on to argue that violence in communal riots is usually deliberate and planned rather than spontaneous. Violence becomes the cementing factor, the symbol of community activism that, in turn, justifies collective action and motivates the crowd. A notion of collective justice – usually revenge – often lies at the heart of collective violence.168 As intelligence officials noted, rioters were armed with lathis, rods and sometimes even swords and daggers. Possession of arms translated ‘mob’ action into a legitimate war for religion and nation and translated criminal offence into a moral act in their self-perception. The fact that the initial violence is bound to provoke retaliatory violence on the other side strengthens the sense of legitimacy, turning aggression into self-defence. The initial or originary moment draws strength from a motif of sacred mythology of Holy (or patriotic) War.



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V.  ANTI-COMMUNAL RESISTANCE Resistance to communal violence is as integral to a riot situation as the acts of violence. Amidst this terror of August 1946, there emerged instances of solidarity and friendship that transcended communal boundaries and overcame the power of communal ideology. Rescue and relief operations were carried out, and government as well as non-government machineries worked hard to restore peace and rescue victims. On 16 August itself, local leaders of both communities met at Upper Circular Road to form peace parties. On 20 August, a procession went out consisting of Hindus and Muslims, with Congress and League flags joined together and slogans of Hindu-Muslim Ek Hauk being shouted. It started from Moulali and went towards Taltola in the morning, and had some reassuring effect on the local people. Moulali and Taltola were among the worst affected areas in central Calcutta. Reports from the working-class belt indicated that hysterical frenzy had not yet invaded it; the jute belt from Hajinagar and Kankinarah was quiet. Hindus and Muslims risked their own lives to save others. Manikuntala Sen recalls, ‘Still, in those dark times, some ray of hope came from the workers of the Communist Party and some Hindu and Muslim families who had retained their sense of sanity.’169 Several CPI members along with Muslim workers had been stranded in ‘danger zones’ in the city, and local Hindus, risking their own lives, moved them to safety. It was impossible to travel in broad daylight, so several Muslim ‘comrades’ had helped Jolly Kaul and other CPI members to escape at night – ‘There was no way in which we could have travelled through the usual roads. Therefore, with their help, we came back using a lot of by-lanes which ran through Muslim bustees.’170 The Hindusthan Standard referred to the example of Durgadas Khanna, secretary of Calcutta Bullion Association, who did ‘yeoman’s service in organizing peace moves in central Calcutta and received gunshot wounds in trying to pacify an unruly mob on Friday night 16 August in Ripon college area.’171 Manick Mullick, honourable magistrate of the city, who lived on Grey Street, gave shelter to six Muslims, and incurred the wrath of a Hindu mob.172 A Gujarati Muslim leather businessman gave shelter to some Hindu CPI members, including Ajit Ray, Gita Mukherjee and Annada Shankar Bhattacharya. He hid them in his house for three days, although, as Manikuntala Sen recalls, he was not a party member. Abdul Momin also sheltered Hindu CPI members when they had had to run away from their earlier hiding place. He and his wife risked their own lives and eventually had to leave their own home, because local Muslims began to harass them.173 Dr

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Ghani transported Hindus to safety in Ballygunge. His efforts served as an example to other Muslims in the Park Circus area, and they too gave shelter to Hindu families during the riot174. Sen writes in her memoir, ‘It’s easy to imagine the plight of the victims who were stranded. But, the way the rescuers suffered and risked their lives, is very difficult to understand.’175 On 18 August, a Hindu gentleman at Dinabandhu Lane gave shelter to 20 of his Muslim employees, and they were later moved by the police to the safety of Muslim majority localities like Zakaria Street.176 At Garcha Road in Ballygunge, Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs held a joint meeting and decided to guard the entire area from mobs. On the 18th, they realized that local Muslims would no longer be safe there, so they evacuated them to ‘safety zones.’177 In Baithak Khana area, about 300 Muslim mochis (cobblers) saved the lives of a group of Hindu tram workers from a riotous mob.178 There were several cases in Belgachia, Park Circus and Central Calcutta (all Muslim dominated areas), where Muslims sheltered Hindus.179 Professor Tarak Das of Calcutta University heroically barred the way of a Hindu mob that was trying to loot the house of his colleague Dr Ahmed.180 Surendra Mohan Ghose, a leader of the BPCC, when attacked by a Muslim mob on the 16th, was rescued by a Muslim, who not only drove away the miscreants but also escorted him to a place of safety.181 Elsewhere, a Hindu man sheltered his Muslim servant, and did not surrender him to bloodthirsty Hindus who threatened his life along with the servant’s. Ultimately, Mrs Dutt, an erstwhile Congress president, had to intervene and prevent the mob from them.182 Rescue and relief operations were carried on by people undaunted by the riots and this included both governmental and non-governmental organizations. Relief work often proved to be a daunting task, considering the steady increase in the number of victims and refugees, who had to be housed, fed, clothed and then moved to safety. The Hindustan Standard claims that on 17 August, the Bengal Provincial Congress Committee, along with Congress workers and some Sikh workers, took out an ambulance squad and visited affected areas in Mechuabazar, Rajabajar and Harrison Road.183 On 16 August, the secretary of the BPCC, with the Muslim League High Command in Bengal and the Muslim mayor of Calcutta, proposed to take out a peace squad to move about in the disturbed areas and try to restore peace. The same afternoon, a peace squad comprising Kalipada Mukherjee (secretary, BPCC), Md. Usman (the mayor of Calcutta) and other Congress and League workers, took out an improvised ambulance van fitted with a microphone and moved about in the disturbed areas appealing for peace.



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On 20 and 21 August, even Suhrawardy joined the peace convoy that toured some of the worst affected areas of the city. The president of the All India Trade Union Congress, M. K. Bose, issued an appeal to the working classes on 21 August to try their utmost to stop the civil war and applauded them for not participating in the riots.184 The Communist Party of India campaigned extensively in the industrial belt around Calcutta for maintaining peace and to fight against British imperialism, which, they said, was the real enemy.185 The People’s Age cites numerous examples of workers’ and common people’s heroism against the rioters. In Tittaghur, Hindu and Muslim workers brought out a joint peace procession and in Budge Budge, where Hindu and Muslim workers held a public meeting and pledged to stand firm against riots.186 Several rescue centres came up in different parts of the city. The Government of Bengal reported 307 individual establishments in different parts of the city, and the total number of refugees cared for in these centres, according to official figures, was 1,89,015.187 The Government of Bengal reported that the main problem was feeding and housing them as numbers kept on increasing at a steady pace. This was because of the large exchange of population that took place within 48 hours of the riot, as people left their homes for the safety of those zones where there was a preponderance of people of their own community. Amongst the earliest to function were the relief centres at St. Xavier’s College, with accommodation for 600, and Lady Brabourne College, with accommodation for 2,500. On the initiative of Ward No. 2 Congress Committee, a rescue party was formed, and a large number of Hindu and Muslim families were rescued from different areas by police vans.188 The same rescue party also provided transport for a number of families stranded at the Sealdah station. Another important relief centre was opened at Ashutosh College which provided food and medical aid to the injured victims189. Most of these centres never distinguished between Hindu and Muslim victims and provided aid to both. A First Aid Home was opened in Canning Hostel on 17 August, and it admitted nearly 50 injured people, both Hindus and Muslims. The hostel later opened a shelter home, which accommodated women and children of both communities who had been brought over from Sealdah station. Civil hospital resources were used up by 17 August, and casualties were then transferred to military hospitals.190 Food supplies to the hospitals were maintained by the Civil Supplies Department; ambulance work was carried out by the Bengal Red Cross, the Friends’ Service Unit and the Peoples’ Relief Committee.191 The total number of victims admitted in 12 hospitals

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from 16 to 28 August, as stated in the Report of the surgeon general (of the Government of Bengal) on Medical Arrangements was 2,322 Hindus and 1,832 Muslims.192 The Calcutta Emergency Relief Organization was set up by the Government of Bengal on 17 August to deal with refugees who had accumulated in different parts of the city, particularly at the compound of the Calcutta police headquarters at Lalbazar.193 The main government camp was the Destitutes’ Home. It had been established during the Bengal Famine in 1943 at the Bahir Sura Road, with a capacity of more than 2,000 people. About 400 refugees from Lalbazar and Bhawanipur thana were moved to the Destitutes’ Home on 17 August itself. The Amrita Bazar Patrika reported on 20 August 1946 that under instructions from the Government of Bengal, a rescue station was opened on the 19th by the military at the foot of the Ochterlony monument at Maidan. Its main work was to send relief parties where necessary to move Hindus from Muslim populated areas and vice versa A relief committee was opened by the Sabuj Chakra (a voluntary relief organization) from 20 August onwards, doing a yeoman’s work in rescuing people from affected areas. The Puddapukur Relief Centre operated in Bhawanipur area, housing refugees and evacuees. The number of refugees here was between 3,000 and 4,000. In North Calcutta, a refugee camp was opened in Rani Bhawani school, near the junction of Vivekananda Road and Cornwallis Street, providing shelter to stranded refugees.194 The Bharat Sevashram Sangha opened three relief centers at Rashbehari Avenue in South Calcutta, feeding and housing refugees, and arrangements were also made for rescuing people from affected areas. Two large relief centers accommodating Muslim refugees were opened at the League Headquarters in Zakaria Street and at the Islamia College Muslim Institute. The Indian Red Cross Society provided supplies of milk and postcards to the different relief organizations in the city. The National Red Cross Brigade of the Central Calcutta Seva Samiti, rendered first aid to victims, transported some to hospitals and also rescued stranded families from the various ‘danger zones.’ What impact does anti-communal resistance have on a rioting ‘crowd’? How does such resistance negotiate with the power of communal violence? Resistance and communal violence stand in direct confrontation to each other on the battlefield of a riot. This explains the attacks of a rioting ‘mob’ upon those who resist their attempts at murder and destruction, even if they include members of their own community. Those who offered resistance during those five days of rioting, or even immediately afterwards, were often considered to be abnormal and traitors to their own community. Once resistance sets in,



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however, it provides an alternate rationality to even those who had participated in a riot. Resistance offers an exit out of violence, a new way of perceiving the community relations in the long run. Resistance to violence is also a tremendous show of strength, proving to rioters that theirs’ is not the only brave act on behalf of the community. Once resistance begins to secure a legitimate ground against violence and more and more people begin to join in, communal violence and the hold of communal ideology over the masses begin to lose their ground. Resistance then assumes a direct confrontation with communalism and outlines the limits of the worst manifestation of communalism. That is why the study of riot only from the point of view of violence would mean an incomplete understanding of the manifold ways in which power plays itself around in a plural society. The bodies of the rioter, the victim and the resister, all get invested with different orders of power during a riot. Roberta Senechal de la Roche has argued that ‘the greater the relational distance between parties to a conf lict, the greater is the likelihood and severity of collective violence – ‘Collective violence varies directly with relational distance.’195 She goes on to say that regular contact in a workplace, organization or neighbourhood increases intimacy and makes mutual collective violence less likely. Hence, changes in community conduct that increase relational distance between groups and individuals also increase the probability of collective violence. This argument is interesting in the light of the Great Calcutta Killings. In everyday existence, people of both the communities in Calcutta had survived peacefully over the decades, although latent internal tension had been brewing soon after the annulment of the first partition of Bengal in 1911, when several groups of Muslims had felt that their interests were subjugated to those of Hindus.196 Changes in mutual perceptions became particularly pronounced after the famine and the issue of secondary education, when communalism was openly propounded by the Muslim League, Hindu Mahasabha and even the Bengal Congress. I shall, however, problematize Roche’s argument. I believe that increase in ‘relational distance’ that occurs through changes in communities can take place even when there is regularized contact in a workplace, organization or neighbourhood. Roche’s argument seems to imply that changes in mutual relations are sudden and abrupt, which, in turn, make the alteration in the ‘relational distance’ equally sudden. ‘Relational distance’ is an extremely complex internal phenomenon. People from two communities living in the same neighbourhood can have everyday interactions, without any apparent relational distance. That is what makes the psychology of a rioter so much more interesting.

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ENDNOTES 1. In this chapter, as elsewhere, Calcutta has been used, instead of the new name for the city, i.e., Kolkata. 2. Sir Francis Tuker, While Memory Serves (London: Cassell and Company Limited, 1950), p 597. (Henceforth, While Memory Serves) Major Livermore had been posted at Fort William in Calcutta during the time of the disturbances. 3. Janam Mukherjee, Hungry Bengal, War, Famine, Riots and the End of Empire (India:Harper Collins Publishers, 2015), p 215. Henceforth, Hungry Bengal 4. NAI, Home Political, File no. 18/8/46 Poll (I), 1946, Secret report on the political situation for the second half of August 1946. 5. Hungry Bengal, p 214. 6. While Memory Serves, p 137. 7. Ibid, p 153. 8. Ibid. 9. Ibid, p 154. 10. Hindusthan Standard, 14 August 1946. 11. Ibid, 14 August 1946. 12. Ibid, 17 August 1946. 13. Ibid. 14. While Memory Serves, p 154. 15. Ibid, p 144. 16. WBSA, IB File Number 634/44 (Calcutta), p 20 – ‘Muslim Affairs’ Special Branch Report of 10 August 1946. 17. Ibid, p 20. 18. Ibid. 19. SB File Number PI/511/46 II, 1946, p 8, S.B. Report dated 12.8.46, ‘Muslim League-Direct Action Day on 16.8.46’. 20. Resolution no. 2 passed at the meeting of Council on 29th July 1946. Resolutions of All India Muslim League, n. 5, pp 65–66, cited in Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal, p 211. 21. Abul Mansur Ahmad, Amar Dekha Rajnitir Panchash Bachar, p 253. 22. Ibid. 23. While Memory Serves, p 154. 24. Ibid, p 156. 25. Oral History Transcript, NMML, Surendra Mohan Ghose, p 287. 26. WBSA, IB File Number 660/45, p II, Govt. of Bengal, Office of the DIG of Police, Intelligence Branch, SS (1) Report dated 26.7.46. 27. Das, Interrogating Politics, p 28. 28. While Memory Serves, p 156. 29. WBSA, IB file no 717-46 (24 Parganas), p 2 – Copy of a DIB Officer’s report dated 25 August 1946: handwritten Bengali leaflet published by the Propaganda secy, Bengal Provincial Muslim League, Md. Habibullah.



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30. SB File Number PI/511/46 II, 1946, p 15 – Special Branch Report on 30 August 1946. 31. Ibid, p 7. Special Branch Report dated 9.8.46 – ‘Muslim League’. 32. WBSA, IB Branch, file no 717-46 (24 Parganas), p 1 – Copy of a DIB Officer’s Report dated 4 August 1946. 33. While Memory Serves, p 143. 34. Ibid. 35. Ibid. 36. Ibid. 37. P K. Ray, Down Memory Lane: Reminiscences of a Bengali Revolutionary (New Delhi: Gyan Publishing House, 1990), p 267. 38. Ibid, p 268. 39. Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 177. 40. Ibid. 41. Nariaki Nakazato, ‘The Role of Colonial Administration’, ‘Riot Systems’ and Local Networks during the Calcutta Disturbances of August 1946’, in Tanika Sarkar and Sekhar Bandyopadhyay (eds.), Calcutta, The Stormy Decades, p 295. 42. While Memory Serves, p 153. 43. Sen, Sediner Katha, p 170. 44. WBSA, IB Branch, file no 717/46 (6), p 31 – S. S. I. / O. S. , Report dated 23/8/46. 45. IOR/L/PJ/8/576, p 19, The Calcutta Riots Summary of Events. 46. IOR/L/PJ/8/577, p 52, Confidential Code Telegram from the governor of Bengal to the secretary of state for India, dated 16 August 1946. 47. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), NMML, file no 148 – Government of Bengal, Home Dept, Political-Part 2 – Report of the commissioner of police on the Disturbances and the Action taken by the Calcutta Police between 16th and 20th August 1946 inclusive, p 7. 48. While Memory Serves, p 157. 49. Ibid, p 93. 50. Ibid. 51. Dawn, 17 August 1946. 52. IOR/L/PJ/8/576, p 20, The Calcutta Riots Summary of Events 53. While Memory Serves, p 157. 54. Ibid. 55. Ibid, p 158. 56. WBSA, IB Branch, file no 717-46 (24 Parganas), p 10 – Copy of the DIB Officer’s Report dated 26 August 1946. 57. WBSA, IB Branch, file no 717/46 (6), p 1 – Report of IB Officers regarding observance of Direct Action Day on 16 August 1946. 58. Ibid, p 19. Report regarding Direct Action Day by Phanindra Chatterji, Inspector, I. B., dated 23.8.46.

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59. Ibid, p 49. Report by Kanai Charan Bose, Inspector of Police, I. B. Bengal, dated 4.9.46. 60. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), file no 148 – Government of Bengal, Home Dept., Political-Part 2 – Report of the commissioner of police on the Disturbances and the Action taken by the Calcutta Police between 16th and 20th August 1946 inclusive, p 11. 61. Ibid, p 1. 62. Ibid, p 10. 63. Ibid, p 9. 64. Calcutta Disturbances Commission of Enquiry, Record of Proceedings, Vol. 5, p 277. Statement by Pulin Kumar Chatterji, assistant commissioner of police, North Town, examined as a Police Witness, 30th January, 1947. 65. WBSA, IB Branch, file no 717-46 (24 Parganas), pp 29–38. Office of the Supdt. Of Police, 24 Parganas, Special Report case no. 225/46, Report 1, dated 6th September 1946. 66. Ibid. 67. WBSA, IB Branch, file no 717-46 (6), p 22 – Reports of the IB officers and assistants regarding the incidents they witnessed during Direct Action Day declared by the AIML – Office of the DIG, IB, CID, West Bengal. Statement dated 24.8.46 by Md. Rafiquddin, Assistant. 68. IOR/L/PJ/8/577, p 52, Confidential Code Telegram from the governor of Bengal to the viceroy and the secretary of state for India, dated 16th August 1946. 69. IOR/L/PJ/8/576, p 20, The Calcutta Riots Summary of Events. 70. IOR/L/PJ/8/577, p 51, Confidential Code Telegram from the governor of Bengal to the viceroy and the secretary of state for India, dated 17th August 1946. 71. WBSA, IB Branch, file no 717/46 (6), p 1 – Report of IB Officers regarding observance of Direct Action Day on 16 August 1946. 72. Ibid, p 1. 73. Ibid, p 37, Reports of the IB officers and assistants regarding the incidents they witnessed during Direct Action Day declared by the AIML – Office of the DIG, IB, CID, West Bengal. Secret Report dated 24.8.46 74. Ibid, p 1. 75. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), file no 148 – Government of Bengal, Home Dept., Political-Part 2 – Report of the commissioner of police on the Disturbances and the Action taken by the Calcutta Police between 16th and 20th August 1946 inclusive, p 22. 76. Ibid. 77. Ibid, p 21. 78. IOR/L/PJ/8/577, p 50, Confidential Code Telegram from the governor of Bengal to the viceroy and the secretary of state for India. 79. NAI, Home Political, file no. 18/8/46 Poll (I), 1946 – Secret report on the political situation of Bengal for the second half of August 1946. 80. While Memory Serves, p 161.



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81. IOR/L/PJ/577, p 47, Confidential Code Telegram from the governor of Bengal to the viceroy and the secretary of state for India, dated 18th August 1946. 82. While Memory Serves, p 161. 83. Ibid, p 162. 84. Ibid. 85. Ibid, p 163. Tuker however does not mention who this ‘named’ person was. Obviously the rumour could not be verified. 86. WBSA, IB Branch, file no 717-46 (24 Pargana), pp 29–38. Office of the Supdt. Of Police, 24 Parganas, Special Report case no. 225/46, Report 1, dated 6th September 1946. 87. WBSA, IB Branch, file no 1138/46, p 55 – Govt. of Bengal, Office of the DIG of Police, Intelligence Branch – A Brief History of the Communal Incidents in 24 Parganas district following the ‘Direct Action Day’. 88. Amrita Bazaar Patrika, 20 August 1946. 89. While Memory Serves, p 163. 90. Ibid. 91. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), NMML, File no 148 – Government of Bengal, Home Dept., Political-Part 4 – Miscellaneous Reports on the Calcutta Disturbances, August 1946, p 6. 92. Ibid. 93. IOR/L/PJ/8/576, p 21, The Calcutta Riots Summary of Events. 94. Nicholas Mansergh and Penderel Moon (eds.), The Transfer of Power 1942–47, Constitutional Relations between India and Britain Vol. 9, p 46. ‘Communal Riots in India’ Memorandum by the secretary of state for India, India Office, 11th November 1946; Appendix. 95. The Indian Express, 1 July 1997, article by Andrew Whitehead. 96. Ibid. 97. Ibid. 98. Ibid. 99. Ibid. 100. See, Nariaki Nakazato, ‘The Role of Colonial Administration’, ‘Riot Systems’ and ‘Local Networks during the Calcutta Disturbances of August 1946’, in Tanika Sarkar and Sekhar Bandyopadhyay (eds.), Calcutta, The Stormy Decades (New Delhi: Social Science Press, 2015), p 292. 101. Abul Mansur Ahmed, Amar Dekha Rajnitir Panchash Bachar, p 252. 102. Begum Shaista Suhrawardy Ikramullah, Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy: A Biography (Oxford University Press, 1991), p 54. 103. Ibid, p 55. 104. Tapan Ray Choudhury, Romonthon othoba Bhimrotiprapter Paracharitcharcha (Calcutta: Ananda Publications, 2007), p 94. 105. Ibid, p 94. 106. Joya Chatterji, Bengal Divided: Hindu Communalism and Partition 1932–47 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), p 232.

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107. Ashis Nandy, The Death of an Empire, Sarai Reader no 2 (2002), pp 14–21, http:// www.sscnet.ucla.edu/southasia/History/Independent/deathofempire.html 108. Ibid. 109. Ibid. 110. Ibid. 111. Ibid. 112. Ibid. 113. Ibid. 114. Ibid. 115. Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 172. 116. Ibid, p 176. 117. While Memory Serves, pp 160–161 118. Calcutta Disturbances Commission of Enquiry, Record of Proceedings, Vol. 5, p 237. Statement by Pulin Kumar Chatterji, assistant commissioner of police, North Town, examined as a Police Witness, 29th January, 1947. 119. Ibid, p 247. Statement by Pulin Kumar Chatterji, assistant commissioner of police, North Town, examined as a Police Witness, 29th January, 1947. 120. Ibid, p 269. Statement by Pulin Kumar Chatterji, assistant commissioner of police, North Town, examined as a Police Witness, 30th January, 1947. 121. Ibid, p 61. Statement by Hirendra Nath Sircar, deputy commissioner of police, Detective Dept., examined as a Police Witness, 21st January, 1947. 122. Ibid, p 73. Statement by Hirendra Nath Sircar. 123. Calcutta Disturbances Commission of Enquiry, Record of Proceedings, Vol. 5, p 103. Statement by Hirendra Nath Sircar, 22nd January 1947. 124. Nariaki Nakazato, ‘The Role of Colonial Administration’, ‘Riot Systems’ and Local Networks during the Calcutta Disturbances of August 1946’, in Tanika Sarkar and Sekhar Bandyopadhyay (eds.), Calcutta, The Stormy Decades, p 282. 125. Ibid. 126. NAI, Home Political, file no. 17/1/46 (Poll I), Newspaper cutting of Dawn, 18 August 1946. 127. Ibid, Also see, The Hindustan Times, 5 September 1946. 128. Ibid. 129. Nicholas Mansergh and Penderel Moon (eds.) The Transfer of Power 1942–47, Vol.9, p 247. Note by Pethick-Lawrence of his interview with M. A. Jinnah and Mr. Liaqat Ali Khan on 3rd December 1946. 130. BLAP, Second Session, 1946, Volume LXXI, No 3 (Bengal Government Press, Alipore, Bengal 1947) p 108 – Shamsuddin Ahmed. 131. Ibid, p 115 - Tafazzal Ali. 132. Ibid, p 119 – Md. Rafique. 133. Ibid, p 154 – H. S. Suhrawardy. 134. Begum Shaista Suhrawardy Ikramullah, Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, p 55. 135. Ibid.



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136. Calcutta Disturbances Commission of Enquiry, Record of Proceedings, Vol. 2, p 119. Statement by Donald Ross Hardwick, commissioner of police, Calcutta, examined as a Police Witness, 19th November 1946. 137. Nariaki Nakazato, ‘The Role of Colonial Administration’, ‘Riot Systems’ and ‘Local Networks during the Calcutta Disturbances of August 1946’, in Tanika Sarkar and Sekhar Bandyopadhyay (eds.), Calcutta, The Stormy Decades, p 277. 138. BLAP, Second Session, 1946, Vol. 71, No. 3, p 96 – Dhirendra Nath Datta. 139. Ibid, p 105 - Jalan. 140. Saradindu Bandyopadhyay, ‘Adim Ripu’, Saradindu Omnibus, Vol. 2 (Calcutta: Ananda Publications, 2004). 141. Ibid. 142. BLAP, Second Session, 1946, Vol. 71, No. 3, p 127 – Jyoti Basu. 143. For a more detailed discussion on the rise of Suhrawardy in Calcutta, see Sen, Muslim Politics in Bengal. 144. WBSA, IB Branch, file no 717/46 (6), p 49. Office of the DIG, IB, CID, West Bengal – Report by Kanai Charan Bose, Inspector of Police, I. B. Bengal, dated 4.9.46. 145. Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 183. 146. Chatterji, Bengal Divided, p 239. 147. Nariaki Nakazato, ‘The Role of Colonial Administration’, ‘Riot Systems’ and ‘Local Networks during the Calcutta Disturbances of August 1946’, in Tanika Sarkar and Sekhar Bandyopadhyay (eds.), Calcutta, The Stormy Decades, p 288. 148. Ibid. 149. Das, Interrogating Politics, p 168. 150. Ibid. 151. While Memory Serves, p 160. 152. Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 184. 153. Ashis Nandy, The Death of an Empire, published in Sarai Reader no. 2 (2002). http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/southasia/History/Independent/deathofempire.html 154. See Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 184. 155. Veena Das (ed.) Mirrors of Violence: Communities, Riots and Survivors in South Asia (Delhi: OUP, 1990), p 25. 156. Das, Interrogating Politics, p 168. 157. Ibid, p 169. 158. Ibid. 159. Ibid. 160. See, Nariaki Nakazato, ‘The Role of Colonial Administration’, ‘Riot Systems’ and ‘Local Networks during the Calcutta Disturbances of August 1946’, in Tanika Sarkar and Sekhar Bandyopadhyay (eds.), Calcutta, The Stormy Decades, p 294. 161. Das, Interrogating Politics, p 169. 162. Ibid, p 172. 163. Ibid.

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164. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), file no 148 – Government of Bengal, Home Dept., Political-Part 2 – Report of the commissioner of police on the Disturbances and the Action taken by the Calcutta Police between 16th and 20th August 1946 inclusive, p 120. 165. Ibid, p 16. 166. Ibid, p 8. 167. Patricia A. Gossman, Riots and Victims: Violence and the Construction of Communal Identity Among Bengali Muslims, 1905–1947 (Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1999), p 102. 168. Roberta Senechal de la Roche, ‘Violence as Social Control’, Sociological Forum, Vol. 11, no. 1 (March 1996), p 98. 169. Sen, Sediner Katha, pp 170–171. 170. Ibid. 171. Hindustan Standard, 27 August 1946. 172. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), file no 148 – Government of Bengal, Home Dept., Political-Part 2 – Report of the commissioner of police on the Disturbances and the Action taken by the Calcutta Police between 16th and 20th August 1946 inclusive, p 2. 173. Sen, Sediner Katha, p 171. 174. Ibid, pp 172–173. 175. Ibid, p 172. 176. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), file no 148 – Government of Bengal, Home Dept., Political-Part 2 – Report of the commissioner of police on the Disturbances and the Action taken by the Calcutta Police between 16th and 20th August 1946 inclusive, p 34. 177. People’s Age, 1 September 1946. 178. Ibid. 179. Ibid. 180. Ibid. 181. Oral History Transcript, NMML, Surendra Mohan Ghose, pp 288–9. 182. Ibid, p 293. 183. Hindustan Standard, 23 August. 184. Amrita Bazaar Patrika, 21 August 1946. 185. People’s Age, 25 August 1946. 186. Ibid, 1 September 1946. 187. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), file no 148 – Government of Bengal, Home Dept., Political-Part 2 – Report of the commissioner of police on the Disturbances and the Action taken by the Calcutta Police between 16th and 20th August 1946 inclusive, p 21. 188. Amrita Bazar Patrika, 21 August 1946. 189. Ibid. 190. IOR/L/PJ/8/576, p 22, The Calcutta Riots Summary of Events. 191. Ibid, p 22.



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192. Ibid, M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), file no 148 – Government of Bengal, Home Dept., Political-Part 4 – Miscellaneous Reports on the Calcutta Disturbances, August 1946, p 6. 193. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), file no 148 – Government of Bengal, Home Dept., Political-Part 2 – Report of the commissioner of police on the Disturbances and the Action taken by the Calcutta Police between 16th and 20th August 1946 inclusive, p 21. 194. Ibid, p 22. 195. Roberta Senechal de la Roche, ‘Violence as Social Control’, Sociological Forum, Vol. 11, no. 1 (March 1996), p 106. 196. For a more detailed discussion on this topic, see Joya Chatterji, Bengal Divided.

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5 Noakhali Riots, October 1946 The next place where the communal drama unfolded was at Noakhali and Tippera districts in East Bengal.1 More prolonged than the Calcutta riots, they started on 10 October 1946 and continued in a sporadic form till December 1946. In several ways, they seemed like a spill-over from the Calcutta Killings, a vengeance for the killing of thousands of Muslims in Calcutta. Nirmal Kumar Bose2 points out that although the ‘battle of Calcutta’ might not have proved decisive, ‘enthusiastic followers of the two-nation theory felt that the war had to be carried on further and a decisive victory gained at some other advantageous point in Bengal.’3 However, a deeper look would reveal that it was not just a simple reaction. We have seen in the third chapter how the peasant-moneylender-zamindar conflict in East Bengal aided the growth of community-based consciousness and made Pakistan a dominant issue. We have studied the complex socio-economic and political factors and their impact when they were combined with communal nationalism in the 1940s. Noakhali was no different. The causes of the riot were tied to these deeper and longer roots. The famine of 1943 had led to massive devastation in Noakhali. It was one of the main areas where the Denial Policy was in operation, turning it into one of the most rice deficit districts in the province. About 75,000 people had been evacuated from Noakhali and 20,000 from Tippera after the Japanese victories at Singapore and Malaya.4 Noakhali and Tippera were also jute growing districts. During the War, the price of the crop had plunged drastically. With the rise in the price of foodstuff, the gap between revenue from agricultural products and the expenditure on food stuffs, increased.5 This further wrecked the peasant household economy in these two districts. The economic crisis continued till the end of 1946. Even in September 1946, the price of rice remained high, selling at Rs 28 per maund in Noakhali and Rs 30 per maund in some parts of Tippera.6 By October, prices had risen above Rs 30. As Sugata Bose remarks, ‘This was considerably higher than the provincial average of Rs 17 annas 11 on 9 October at the principal district marketing centres’.7



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Noakhali was the stronghold of Gulam Sarwar, the erstwhile KPP leader who had so far maintained his independence from the League. In the provincial elections of 1946, he contested as a Muslim Parliamentary Board candidate. He was however defeated by the League candidate Fazlul Karim by about 20,000 votes. Batabyal argues that the victory of the League candidate reveals the strength of the Pakistan demand amongst Muslim peasants of East Bengal.8 After his defeat, Sarwar finally joined the Muslim League. He now brought to the fore the anti-Hindu rhetoric latent in his hitherto anti-landlord and anti-moneylender position.9 We have seen in the third chapter that Sarwar had quite a following amongst the Muslim peasants of Noakhali and Tippera. When he joined the League and reiterated its communal rhetoric, the League base in Noakhali and Tippera was complete. Sarwar’s ideas found fertile ground amidst Muslim peasants, who were repeatedly told that their destruction at the hands of Hindus was inevitable unless Pakistan was established.10 The situation deteriorated rapidly after the Great Calcutta Killings in August 1946. Several pamphlets bearing the Muslim League seal circulated in Noakhali before the troubles began. They posed statements like: ‘With Pakistan established, whole of India should be conquered,’ ‘All non-Muslims of India should be converted to Islam,’ ‘All factories, shops and establishments owned by Hindus should be burnt, destroyed and looted, and where possible the booty should be distributed among Muslims,’ ‘All temples and places of worship are to be destroyed,’ ‘All Congress leaders should be murdered one by one for the speedy achievement of Pakistan.’11 Another pamphlet urged Muslim League volunteers to ‘force an intense communal feeling by breeding hatred against the Hindus,’ ‘to learn the scientific method of destroying Hindu properties and dislocating telegram communications, destroying railway lines and all other conceivable means of transportation and communication,’ ‘to form a suicidal squad whose duty will be to murder Hindu ring leaders and non-League Muslims.’12 Both commanded that Pakistan should be founded by force. In the Nilfamari subdivision of Rangpur, an explosive leaflet circulated widely. It was issued by the Nilfamari Subdivisional Muslim League on 20 September 1946, less than a month before the Noakhali and Tippera riots. It declared that the Muslim community was in grave danger because of the injustice of the Congress and of British imperialists in the form of the Interim Government. The leaflet read: As a community, the demand for Pakistan by the Muslims is a completely lawful and logical one. Every Muslim firmly believes in this. Even then,

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the fascist, bourgeois caste Hindu Congress in alliance with the bourgeois imperialist British, in complete ignorance of the Muslim demand, have undertaken secret and evil plan to establish ‘Akhanda Varnahindu Raj’. Not just in India, all Muslims all over the world are now living in imminent danger.13 [Emphasis mine.]

Another leaflet was issued around this time by the Bogra district Muslim League, which declared, Our community is always being hit by our enemies who made conspiracy to cripple the influence of the Muslims in all respects in trade, commerce and education. The British imperialism and Barna Hindu Congress jointly took up the matter earnestly and stood as a bar on the way of establishing Pakistan by the Muslims and also stood against the movement launched by the Scheduled Caste Hindus . . .14

A letter from Dacca, dated 14 September, was intercepted by the Intelligence Department in Calcutta on 18 September. It called upon Muslims to follow a programme of Jihad against Hindus and arrange for bricks and ‘weapons of offence’ such as spears, daggers etc. ‘and to keep them out of sight of the Hindus till the hour to strike. Petrol should be supplied to the mob for acts of arson . . .’15 In most districts of East Bengal attempts were made to strengthen the Muslim National Guard. In the name of a ‘dying’ Islam, Muslims were asked to join this organization. Burrows, the Bengal governor, wrote to Sir Pethick Lawrence on 16 October 1946 that a strong movement of economic boycott of Hindus had developed in Noakhali, and Muslims buying from Hindus were beaten up.16 The People’s Age reported that for nearly a fortnight before the actual outbreak of the riot, organized bands of ‘hooligans’ were openly collecting arms and in many villages blacksmiths were collared and forced to make weapons for them.17 Looting of passing boats carrying Hindus also took place.18 I.  THE RIOTS Riots broke out in several Noakhali villages on 10 October 1946. The worst affected were the thanas of Ramganj, Begumganj, Raipur and Lakshmipur (see map). The Government of India reported that the immediate cause was the looting of a bazaar in the Ramganj police station following a mass meeting



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MAP 5.1: Map showing Noakhali, Tippera and adjoining regions. The list of police stations of Noakhali and Tippera are mentioned below, corresponding to the numbers shown on the map. The police stations worst affected by the riots are marked in bold: 1. Brahmanbaria 6. Bancharampur 2. Sarail 7. Muradnagar 3. Masirnagar 8. Debiduar 4. Kasba 9. Daudkandi 5. Nabinagar 10. Bomma 21. Sudharam 22. Companyganj 25. Matta 26. Ramgati 29. Raipur 30. Sandwip 33. Chhagalmaya 34. Pashuram Source: Census of India, 1931.

11. Comilla 16. Hajiganj 12. Burichang 17. Kachga 13. Chandima 18. Chandpur 14. Chaudagram 19. Faridganj 15. Laksam 20. Matlabbazar 23. Begamganj 24. Senbagh 27. Ramganj 28. Lakshmipur 31. Feni 32. Sonagati

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and a provocative speech by Gulam Sarwar.19 On 10 October, Gulam Sarwar addressed around 15,000 Muslims at the Sahapur English High School in the Ramganj police station area. Immediately after that, a Muslim crowd looted the local bazaar. Then, under Sarwar’s instructions, they attacked the houses of the two richest Hindus of the locality – the Narayanpur Zamindar and Rai Saheb Rajendra Lal Chowdhury of Karapara.20 10 October, the day chosen for starting the riot, was the day of Lakshmi Puja, the festival where Hindus worship their goddess of wealth. First reports of the riot appeared in the press on 14 October. Hindustan Times reported that troops had been called out in Noakhali district and a large armed police force was also sent there following preliminary reports of serious lawlessness. The report added, Riotous mobs with deadly weapons are raiding villages, and looting, murder and arson are also continuing since Thursday, October 10, on a very large scale. Forcible mass conversion, abduction of women and desecration of places of worship are also reported . . . approaches to the affected areas are being guarded by armed hooligans.21

On 15 October, a telegram reached the office of the Bengal Provincial Congress Committee (BPCC), sent jointly by Kamini Kumar Dutta (a leader of the Congress Party in the Upper House) and Dhirendra Nath Dutta (deputy leader of the Assembly Party) from Tippera. Extracts read: Serious Communal Conflagration Destroyed Lives and Properties of Hindus Of Ramganj Thana Disturbance Affected Some Part Of Begumgunj and Lakshmipur Thana . . . Hindus Compelled To Slaughter Cows and Eat Cooked Beef . . . Hindu Houses Burnt On Mass Scale . . . Large Number Hindu Girls Forcible Married To Moslems And Abducted All Hindu Temples And Images Desecrated Helpless Refugees Coming To Tippera District . . .22

Reports received by the BPCC on 16 October show that the situation had worsened and the conflagration had begun to spread to the neighbouring district of Tippera. In a letter to the viceroy, the BPCC president requested immediate intervention with martial law and also for escort facilities for the Congress and other relief workers.23 On 17 October, a week after riots began, the first batch of outsiders, a team under Professor Samar Guha and Ardhendu Bhattacharya of the National Service Institute in Calcutta, managed to visit Chandpur (Tippera) and Noakhali.24 On reaching Chandpur, they found the entire town gutted with refugees. All large public buildings, government



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houses, school buildings, station compound and godowns were filled with them.25 The rioters did not to let outsiders enter Noakhali and provide any sort of relief to the victims: Villages were cordoned off; communications with the outside were obstructed by cutting deep ditches across the approach roads and blocking accesses to boat-landing places. Muslim employees in Post and Telegraph offices held up Hindu telegrams asking for urgent help.26

Groups of hooligans, who posed as ‘volunteers,’ wearing Red Cross badges, were on watch duty at crossroads or ferry-ghats to pass on information about newcomers.27 The train route to Noakhali via Choumuhani was also watched by rioters, making it almost impossible for any outside rescue or fact finding team to approach the interior. Another batch of volunteers which preceded this team had been assaulted and forced to turn back. Train routes to Noakhali were cut off, and it was only on the 19th that a few trains managed to run with the help of the Anglo-Indian staff. However, any outside team which tried to enter Noakhali was surrounded by angry mobs and interrogated. No team had yet managed to enter Noakhali without police escorts. Wherever waterways were available for transport, barricades were set across streams, built of banana leaves and water hyacinth.28 Villagers did not dare name any of the culprits, because they found that copies of written ejahars (complaints) submitted to the thana reached village Muslims within twenty-four hours.29 On 18 October, Hindustan Times reported that nearly 5000 people had been killed in Noakhali and Tipperah since 10 October. Nearly 50,000 others faced forced conversions, abductions and forced marriages and about 25000 refugees had already fled the area. 30 However, the All India Hindu Mahasabha definitely exaggerated reports of conversions and forced marriages. Ashutosh Lahiry, the general secretary of the All India Hindu Mahasabha, issued a statement that thousands of women had been carried away and at least 10,000 Hindus had been forced to embrace Islam. 31 On the other hand, the Government of India, like the Government of Bengal, tried to play down the seriousness of the attacks. The Under-Secretary for India, Mr Arthur Henderson, read a report in the House of Commons on 21 October stating that Frederick Burrows, the governor of Bengal, had mentioned that the number of casualties was expected to be only in the three-figure category. 32 Mr Henderson also said that the conservative opposition in the house had to understand that law and order was a provincial subject and its

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responsibility primarily rested with the Bengal ministry and the legislature.33 Suhrawardy, the chief minister of Bengal, declared that in Noakhali events were nothing but ‘lawlessness.’34 The League mouthpiece Dawn published a report on 25 October by the Working Committee of the Bengal Provincial Muslim League, saying that the estimated number of deaths in both the districts of Noakhali and Tippera was not more than 115. 35 The committee added that there was no case of rape and abduction, no general killing and arson. 36 It also declared that the ‘Hindu press’ propaganda was a ‘monstrous lie’ deliberately organized. It appealed to the Hindu press to stop this sort of ‘vandalism’, otherwise the ensuing tragedy would be terrible as the whole of Bengal would be on fire. 37 On 26 October, Dawn published another statement by Abul Hashim, the secretary of the Bengal Provincial Muslim League. It said that the ‘Hindu press’ propaganda was deliberately organized to humiliate the Muslim League in public eyes.38 Its aim was to discredit the League ministry of the province ‘which has become a constant target of Hindu jealousy as the Ministry becomes more and more independent and powerful without the Caste Hindu Congress co-operation.’39 In blowing the Noakhali riots out of proportion, the Hindu press aimed to fan trouble in other parts of the province and country where Hindus were in a majority to provoke reprisals, so that ‘the whole country may turn into a holocaust and Hindu astuteness may get entrenched in the leadership of the country, at the expense of the Muslim League.’40 On 10 November 1946, Dawn again reported that the ‘Hindu’ press manufactured nothing but lies about the Noakhali disturbances, and a minor communal riot involving only a few casualties has been magnified to ‘wild proportion.’41 The newspaper blamed the Congress of fomenting trouble in Bihar42, which was the direct result of exaggeration of Noakhali facts by its leaders who had visited the affected areas. As a result, Bihari Hindus now indulged in all possible acts of revenge and retaliation. Maulvi Hamiduddin Ahmed, the parliamentary secretary of the Muslim League, published a statement in Azad on 14 December 1946 saying that during the disturbances, less than a hundred people were killed in the whole district of Noakhali; none were wounded and there were only a few cases where miscreants set fire to houses, but those were only the houses of wealthy Hindus, and none of the poor had suffered.43 The League emphasized the class aspect and deflated the actual numbers of casualties, to suggest that there was nothing new about this riot. It was projected as a continuation of earlier communal disturbances in Bengal, where the class antagonism between richer Hindu landlords and poor Muslim peasants would take a communal shape.



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The first reports of large scale evacuation and arrival of refugees to ‘safer zones’ in East Bengal and Calcutta began to appear in the press from 19 October. Hindusthan Standard reported that about 2,000 refugees came to Comilla and local authorities had arranged for the dispatch of 1,000 more from Choumuhani to Comilla.44 The district magistrate of Noakhali reported that 8,000 refugees were present at Ramganj on 16 October, many of them panic stricken.45 About 10,000 refugees were also reported to have arrived at Chandpur, most of them having come out of sheer fear from areas not actually affected by the disturbances.46 On 21 October, Walter Gurner, the commissioner of Civil Relief, Bengal Government, said at a press interview that according to the latest information in possession of the government, more than 20,000 refugees had taken shelter in the three relief camps opened by the government in the affected areas of Noakhali and Tippera.47 Hindusthan Standard reported on 25 October that 1626 refugees had reached Sealdah station between 23 and 24 October and the total number of refugees to have reached Calcutta so far was 12,626.48 Rabindranath Nabis, assistant secretary of the district Congress Committee of Gauhati, Assam, wrote a letter to Gandhi on 18 December 1946 stating that the number of refugees at the Congress relief centre at Gauhati till then was 1,029. The refugees were mostly from the thanas of Begumganj, Ramganj and Lakshmipur.49 On 24 October, a team under the Congress President Acharya Kripalani, his wife Sucheta Kripalani, and Dhirendra Nath Datta went to Dattapara and Khilpara of the Begumganj Thana area on a military truck under the command of Captain Yusuf Ali.50 The reports they obtained from the Begumganj Thana indicated that in the Hindu village of Jayag (17 miles from the Thana), 7 to 8 houses had been completely gutted and the police had been forced to open fire on the night of 12 October. In Panchagaon (1 mile to the west of village Jayag) the whole village, consisting of nearly 1,000 huts, had been burnt down.51 On the evening of 12 August, a mob of about 10,000 had attacked the village around 4 or 5 pm, and the police picked up Hindus and Muslims with gunshot wounds. The party comprising Congress members could not go beyond Battali on truck and had to walk, ‘as the branch road to Dattapara had been cut up at five places by the goondas.’52 Once the team reached Dattapara, they noted that the number of refugees there ran into thousands. Some had no food, water and clothing. They showed the Congress team the caps ‘that have been distributed in thousands to these new converts with a stamp of the Pakistan flag, a map of Pakistan India and the slogan “Pakistan Zindabad”.’53

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Ashutosh Lahiry, the general secretary of the All India Hindu Mahasabha, said that the Noakhali and Tippera riots made it abundantly clear that the Muslim League’s fight for Pakistan was actually a fight against Hindus. He said, The main brunt of the fight has fallen on the Hindus of Bengal because here the Muslim League has the solid backing of the Muslim masses behind it and there is no opposition worth the name amongst the Muslims against the League . . .54

Lahiry criticized the Hindus of Bengal saying that the Muslim League was successful because Hindus were politically divided. The All India Hindu Mahasabha, finding this an opportune moment, once again raised the banner of organization and self-defence and made highly provocative remarks: The Hindus are in a position of advantage in as much as they have superior brain, scientific knowledge and financial resources .  .  . There was a time when the name of a Bengali youth used to instil fear into the heart of a goonda element. Those days have gone by but these have to be brought back.55

It is amply clear that here the term ‘Bengali youth’ implies Hindus and ‘goonda’ implies a Muslim. It explicitly claimed the superiority of Hindus over Muslims, and rendering the Muslim an outsider to the ‘Bengali’. In another such statement, Ashutosh Lahiry insinuated that the Muslim League ministry pursued a deliberate policy ‘of giving every possible latitude and encouragement to those who are making organized attempts to rouse the fanatical masses against the Hindus.’56 Such comments, published extensively in all pro-Hindu newspapers in the province, furthered the spiral of bitterness. II.  PATTERN OF VIOLENCE Nirmal Kumar Bose notes that ‘The Congress in Bengal, as well as those who believed in Gandhiji’s ideas, had (however) failed in the communal riots. The challenge of communalism which threatened to sweep aside the sense of nationalism was there in an intense form before them.’57 Eyewitnesses claimed that riots were marked by a ‘striking similarity.’58 Everywhere, groups of local Muslims numbering 500 to 10,000 attacked Hindu houses with cries of Allahhoo-Akbar, Pakistan Zindabad, We want revenge for Calcutta and so on. Hindu villagers were asked if they accepted Pakistan. If the answer was yes, then the



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mob immediately took them to a nearby mosque to convert them and extort money out of them in the name of the Muslim League. It proclaimed that only Muslims would be allowed to live in Pakistan. If Hindus refused conversion, they were killed, their property looted and the women of their households were abducted. Muslim League flags were hoisted in front of all ‘conquered houses’ as a mark of triumph of Pakistan.59 Hindu homes were looted, and most villages had been burnt down. Conversions were carried out on a large scale – ‘As regards forced conversion the true facts will never be known because of the reluctance of Hindus to admit that they have ever been converted, but there is no doubt that forced conversion has taken place on a large scale.’60 Killings were done with domestic weapons like Ramdas and Chhenis. Priyanath Chakravorty, an inhabitant of Nandigram was killed with a multimouthed lance called a Teata. Often people were burnt alive. Women and children were locked in a room and set on fire. Two very old men, Nabin Chandra Bhowmik (80) and Indra Kumar Bhowmik (70) were first wrapped with a thick covering of clothes, kerosene was then poured on them and finally they were set on fire. Bharat Bhowmik, who was the head pundit of the village school, along with other members of his family, was belaboured to death. The corpses were then thrown into fire. The zamindar Surendra Babu’s head was severed, and the murderers ran away with the head ‘making a terrific shriek of joy’ and presented it to Gulam Sarwar, who had watched the entire scene from a short distance.61 The team of the National Service Institute found half burnt bones strewn all over the place. Hindus often hid under water hyacinths in ponds, but they were pulled out and murdered. Even people who had escaped and taken shelter in police stations were not spared. On 14 October, Nabadwip Pandit of the village Bammi had rushed away from his attackers to the Raipur Thana, but he was dragged away from there and stoned to death. He was one of the few Hindus who refused to be converted, hence the ultimate punishment. Often Muslim youths promised help to terrified victims, but only after a promise of embracing Islam had been extracted from them.62 Ashoka Gupta, a member of the All India Women’s Conference (AIWC), toured Noakhali from 7 to 13 November, along with some other members of the AIWC. Everywhere, they saw ‘a large number of houses including handlooms burnt to ashes and houses that had escaped destruction by fire thoroughly pillaged. Many have left their villages but those who could not do so lived under impoverished sheds.’63 Murder in a spirit of vengeance becomes clear from the following incident. On 9 November, Subedar Narayan Hande was traveling on a train

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from Chandpur to Chaumuhani when he overheard some Muslim civilians conversing in Bengali. The gist of the conversation was that a ‘good job’ had been done in Calcutta but they had made a mistake in Noakhali; they had spent too much time on looting and arson instead of killing Hindus. Once the military departed from Noakhali, this error would have to be rectified.64 Desecration and destruction of temples was a new feature. It is not that such destruction had not taken place in earlier riots, but their scale and planned nature made Noakhali-Tippera striking: Not a single place of worship, nor a temple, not even a picture of any Hindu god or goddess was spared by the hooligans. Shitala and Kali trees – all were cut to pieces. Barabari of Amishapara, Rathbari of Raspura and Jugannath Akhara in Raipur thana, some of which were as old as the days of Muslim Nawab, had been completely desecrated and destroyed.65

As Suranjan Das points out, the crowds intended to terrorize the Hindus by looting their property, desecrating their idols, raping their women, and forcibly converting them to Islam.66 Violence was highly organized. ‘Only Hindu portions of villages were attacked. Floors and courtyards of Hindu houses were dug up and furnishings either carried away or thrown into adjacent ponds.’67 Memories of the famine inspired looting of shops in the bazaars. The exploitation of poor peasants by grain dealers was now avenged in a horrific fashion. The governor, who toured the Charhaim area of Tippera in December, reported to the viceroy that in the course of looting local bazaars, the Revenue Office and Muslim shops were untouched. But the rest of the bazaar was completely gutted. He wrote, ‘It is worth recording that many of the shopkeepers had made fortunes in the 1943 famine, at the expense of the Muslim peasantry.’68 Groups of Muslims approached particular Hindu houses from various directions. If they were defended and resistance was offered, the group would disperse only to be replenished and return sometime later or the next day. Local Maulvis accompanied groups of rioters with copies of the Koran. Conversion was a premeditated action and not a spontaneous decision. The inaction of the police and the Bengal government was another noteworthy feature. The secretary of the All India Hindu Mahasabha issued a statement where he stated that a few days before the riots started, he had apprised the governor of Bengal of the ‘explosive situation.’ However no preventive measure was taken.69 He also pointed out that an ex-MLA70 had been, for some time, inciting the people to violence in several public meetings. Once again, no action had been taken to check such activities.



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Swadhinata, in an article published on 3 November 1946, referred to the same police indifference before the riots began. Mr Walker, chief secretary to the Government of Bengal, was asked to comment in the third week of September about the ‘alarming reports’ from Noakhali. He simply stated that there was no reason to worry and that all necessary action was being taken.71 The same article mentioned that on 7 October, i.e. three days before the riots started in the district, the superintendent of police had stated that reports about the apprehension of a serious breach of peace reached him and that drastic measures such as imposition of collective fines, holding of leaders responsible etc. would be taken.72 Nothing of the sort was actually done. Not only were the police grossly understaffed, they also often acted in compliance with rioters. Wavell himself remarked that there had been a ‘deplorable indecision and delay’ in arresting Golam Sarwar, that the police were demoralized and ineffective, the subinspectors and lower ranks ‘seemed to be openly taking sides in favour of their community,’ and that people at large had little confidence in their impartiality and did not expect security from them.73 The district magistrates of Noakhali and Tippera admitted to Wavell that the police were demoralized and that subinspectors were not doing their jobs and were ‘afflicted with communalism.’ 74 When the team from the National Service Institute asked for armed escorts to approach the interior of Noakhali, the additional district magistrate refused to comply with their request, claiming he had only 25 armed policemen under him. The officerin-charge of the Ramganj thana area told the same team that he had only 70 armed policemen and therefore, he could cover only four square miles around Ramganj. The officer-in-charge of Raipur thana was able to rescue only two families from the interior of the affected areas under the thana.75 Dr Ashwini Kumar Saha of Gomatuli village recounted how a party of 186 Hindus of the village was going towards Dattapara, with two armed policemen as escorts, when a group of Muslims attacked. The policemen promptly fled, leaving the Hindus at the mercy of the attackers.76 The Bengal Press Advisory Committee released a telegram from Kamini Kumar Dutta (the leader of the Congress in the Bengal Legislative Council) and Dhirendra Nath Dutta (deputy leader of the Congress in the Bengal Legislative Assembly). It stated that the district magistrate and the police superintendent of Noakhali took no steps to prevent the destruction of properties and lives of innocent villagers.77 A correspondent from Comilla, in a dispatch released for publication on 19 October evening by the Bengal Press Advisory Committee, wrote, ‘According to the refugees, not a single arrest

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was made during all the five days of lawlessness in Noakhali, nor was a single shot fired except in one case. The military and armed police since posted are extremely inadequate.’78 When asked about the activities of the military in the district by press representatives, the superintendent of police told them that the task of the military was to patrol and not to make arrests.79 A Special Branch (Calcutta) report also stated that an officer of a police station situated on the border of Noakhali and Comilla demanded bribes for protecting a Hindu family. When the family refused, the officer turned a blind eye to the goondas and allowed their house to be looted. Another officer, who was instructed over the wireless to go to the border region and arrest troublemakers, refused to go, claiming that his name was not mentioned in the instructions.80 Dhirendra Nath Dutta said that the authorities were very anxious to hide the whole affair from public inspection, ‘lest their criminal inefficiency will then be fully established. No force was sent to the affected area till October 14th. There was a mockery of some police officers visiting the area before 14th, but by their inactivity they encouraged depredation.’81 The local administration was not at all keen to send the army out to potential trouble spots. When a Company of the 4/2nd Gurkhas arrived in Comilla from Calcutta apprehending trouble, the commissioner of Chittagong actually protested their dispatch.82 According to Francis Tuker, who was posted there, some subordinate officials were ‘for communal reasons obstructing us in tracing and arresting Muslim evildoers.’83 In some places, he reports, local officials encouraged false complaints against the troops in the hope that they would be removed. Captain Wimbush, who commanded one of the Companies of the 4/2nd Gurkhas that had been sent out to East Bengal, reported that when he went to meet Superintendent of Police Mr. Price and District Magistrate Mr. Devlali, both of them were extremely surprised to hear that the army had been sent to Comilla. They argued that there was absolutely no need for the army there, because there was no communal tension, everything was ‘perfectly peaceful and always has been,’ and that no troubles of any sort were expected.84 Wimbush also writes in his personal account that they hardly got any help from the police because the latter were communally inclined and often tended to shield the goondas: What was even more discouraging was that when we occasionally did catch red-hot goondas and send them to Chandpur for the case to be tried, nine times out of ten the local Sub-Divisional Officer would release them on bail . . . Like it or not, the whole civil administration from top to bottom was communally minded.85 [Emphasis mine.]



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There was a serious lack of jail accommodation.86 Suggestions given by E. S. Simpson, an ICS officer of the Home Department, to the additional secretary to the government of Bengal along the lines that ‘there must be military posts throughout the area to establish confidence’ and that ‘a few posts here and there with patrols will not suffice’ show that the military found it difficult to restore order.87 Lakshmi Babu, another eyewitness and victim, recalls that on receiving information of approaching danger, he had sent an ‘urgent wire’ to the district magistrate and the superintendent of police for protection and safety. However, that very afternoon, a mob comprising mainly local Muslims with a ‘threatening attitude’ attacked their house. The family was taken to a nearby mosque and when they returned, he found his house ablaze and his property looted. He says, ‘It is mysterious how all these things could have happened when SP and SDO were present though we could protect our house with two guns only on the previous day.’88 The police once again had had sufficient warning, but had failed to act. Moreover, after the Calcutta carnage of August, East Bengal was electrified with rumours. Maulvi Mukkbul Mia of the League distributed ‘inflammatory leaflets’ and meetings were held in the interior of the towns and villages. A local Congress MLA issued an appeal to the ‘authorities’ apprehending trouble, and the superintendent of police of the Noakhali District himself issued pamphlets to the villagers asking them ‘not to allow themselves to be carried away by the whirlpool of communal troubles.’89 This was issued on 7 October and trouble broke out simultaneously in several districts on 10 October. Tuker recalls, ‘In the third week of August we had sent the 1/3rd Gurkhas to Chittagong to reinforce Eastern Bengal. A note of alarm had been sounded from there and we wanted to be ready to meet the probable repercussions of the hideous work in Calcutta.’90 He pointed out that ever since the Calcutta events, both civil and military authorities were anxious about communal tension in East Bengal. Reports received at the military headquarters of the Eastern Command almost six weeks before the trouble actually started, indicated the presence of tension, especially in Noakhali and Chittagong. The police and the government therefore had sufficient inkling of the storm to come, yet they chose to remain passive bystanders. In a letter to Lord Pethick Lawrence, on 18 November 1946, the governor admitted, The preliminary examination of the information available to the local officers in Noakhali in the predisturbance period confirms the view that the district had been in a particularly disturbed state for some time previous to the date

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of the outbreak of the disturbance. The preliminary reactions are that the evidence of disturbed conditions in that district should have been sufficient to provide a clear warning to the officers on the spot and would appear to have fully justified the taking of preventive and precautionary measures.91

On 17 October, in a letter to the president of the Indian National Congress, a local Congressman Sanat Kumar Banerjee, mentioned the ‘apathetic’ attitude of the Bengal Government and lamented that hardly any help was forthcoming from the latter. ‘By the time the so-called help or any assurance comes from the Bengal Government, the entire Hindu population from that area will die helplessly.’92 The Bengal Provincial Congress Committee (BPCC) sent a batch of volunteers under Girija Prasanna Chakrabarty, a member of the BPCC and also a local inhabitant, to survey the situation and start relief work. But the team could hardly penetrate into the interior as the authorities had made no necessary arrangements for their safe journey and work. Acharya Kripalani noted that by 25 October, only about 50 arrests had been made.93 The Statesman reported on 18 October that so far, the government had not organized any relief work.94 Even as late as 24 October, 15 days after the outbreak of the violence, the Government of Bengal had failed to organize any noteworthy relief and rescue work.95 Members of The Eastern Chamber of Commerce wrote in a letter to the chief secretary of the Government of Bengal that the entire matter was complicated and worsened by the ‘miserable failure of the Provincial Ministry to take adequate steps . . .’96 Conversions particularly distinguished the Noakhali riots. Suhrawardy himself gave the number of converts to Islam as 9895 in Tipperah alone.97 However, the Simpson Report (an unpublished enquiry report) put the number of conversions in Faridpur, Chandpur and Hajiganj at around 22, 550.98 Ashoka Gupta, an AIWC relief worker who stayed at Noakhali for relief work, also mentions cases of conversions. She cites instances where after the conversion, Hindus were forced to marry their first and second cousins.99 In the village of Mirjapur, all Namasudras were also forcibly converted.100 Conversions had happened earlier in riots, but the scale in 1946 was unprecedented. Conversions, according to eyewitness reports, followed a similar pattern everywhere. A maulvi generally accompanied the crowd of rioters. He administered the kalma and the to-be convert was made to touch one end of a chadar (cloth).101 New converts were taken then to the mosque to offer namaz, and on Fridays, they were brought there for jumma prayers. Often, the new converts were made to cook and eat beef in their own house. Even women were not spared and were converted behind the purdah.



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Although accurate figures of abduction and rape cases are not available for understandable reasons, it was no secret that women were abducted. But exact numbers remained elusive. Ashoka Gupta remarks, almost in a tone of frustration, that she never found the abducted girls, as villagers managed to hide them.102 Even if they did return, they never admitted to the fact that they had been abducted or, worse, raped, for fear of social stigma. Families whose girls were abducted did not wish to take help from relief workers. Ashoka Gupta also pointed out that they saw more than twenty forcibly married girls, some of them far too young to be married – ‘We came across a large number of women who were raped or molested. Sometimes, we had to talk to them alone for a long time before they dared come forward with their pitiful story.’103 Since women always signify community honour and purity, their defilement signified the ultimate act of vengeance. It is quite evident that the riot was not a simple and spontaneous spill-over from the Great Calcutta Killing, although the latter did act as a potent catalyst. Rioting indeed was premeditated, and the League had considered Noakhali to be the ground for experimenting with the form of Pakistan. It is doubtful whether the scale of the riot was premeditated or not. As I have mentioned earlier, Noakhali had been extremely tense for a while. The police had received warnings that in different parts of East Bengal, fiery speeches were made by maulvis and other local Muslim leaders to incite the local population. Pakistan signified Islamic purity as well as dreams for radical land reform. Hindus – seen as local oppressors – had no place here. Violence was not spontaneous or a sudden aberration in peasant behaviour. As with all other preceding riots in the province, the class aspect cannot be ignored here. Looting of Hindu property and the killing of Hindu zamindars by Muslim peasants revealed the desire to overthrow, by force, Hindu economic domination of centuries. But community consciousness was what decided the form of violence. Violence was normalized and legitimized by a particular interpretation of Islam. It became a form of an alternative rationality, as well as a means towards an end. Muslim peasants of East Bengal became active agents in the strife to, beyond securing class interests, achieve a religion based political vision. This gave the ordinary Muslim a chance to act, to be a part of that larger politics. The riot then became a moment when the gap between leaders at the top and the players at the bottom narrowed and coalesced. Moments of absolute flux which characterize a riot, also give rise to new identities. At the same time, they dissolve old identities and boundaries. The categories of Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs became absolute, and boundaries

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between class and caste were temporarily dissolved. The ‘imagined community’ of Pakistan, to borrow Benedict Anderson’s term, projected the image of a new, horizontal comradeship overshadowing the various internal differences that continued to exist. This sort of an imagination created a new fraternity, a new community, of which every Muslim could be a part. Violence, or the forceful overthrow of the Hindu domination, became a way in which they could become one with the League propaganda about Pakistan. Violence, in this particular case, became capable of soliciting a new collective emotion to realize a new collective future. III.  RELIEF AND RESISTANCE Relief work began a little late, because the news of the riots came out of the district some days after the riots began, and owing to difficulties in accessing the district. However, it did begin in earnest among all organizations, and political parties and volunteer organizations also chipped in. Of course, the most important beacon of hope was Gandhi, who truly redeemed his ‘Mahatma’ stature during his stay in Noakhali. However, we shall look at Gandhi and his contribution to Noakhali in a separate chapter. Official reports gave a count of at least 50,000 relief camps that were set up by 29 October, including 10,000 in Agartala in Tippera.104 A Special Branch report dated 28 December 1946 showed that volunteers from the All India Women’s Conference (AIWC), Indian National Army and the Gandhian Harijan Sevak Sangh were already in the interior of the villages helping in the rehabilitation of refugees. The Ramkrishna Mission at Haimchar also coordinated relief work of that area.105 Every evening, Mr Thakkar (also known as Thakkar Bapa) of the Harijan Sevak Sangh would hold a mass prayer meeting, similar to what Gandhi was holding in different places, and this was attended by relief workers from most organizations. The Bharat Sevashram Sangha carried on with its usual pattern of relief work, with an aggressive and militant ring to it. Their peace committees were called ‘Rakshi Dals,’ literally, Defence/Protection Groups. These groups organized reconversion of forcibly converted Hindus. Hindusthan Standard published a statement by Swami Atmananda, assistant secretary of the Bharat Sevashram Sangha, on 22 October 1946 which read thus: ‘In view of the abnormal situation, special arrangements have been made by the Bharat Sevashram Sangha to reconvert in the Sangha’s Calcutta and mofussil centres, those Hindus who had been forcibly converted to an alien faith.’106 The Sangha



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workers were posted at Ramganj, Lakshmipur, Chaumuhani and Chandpur Relief centres. The Sangha asked for courage and self-reliance and told Hindus not to flee their own village, urging that it is far better to court death fighting like a hero.107 This message would be later reiterated by Gandhi. The Hindu Mahasabha opened its relief centres in several villages in Noakhali and Tippera. Makhan Lal Biswas, secretary of the Hindu Mahasabha, in a statement on 2 February 1947, enumerated the obstacles that plagued relief workers. The grants promised by the Bengal Government for reconstruction of houses were inadequate and the quality of tin supplied for the purpose was poor. He proposed that blacksmiths, goldsmiths, weavers and physicians in affected areas should be provided with money early so that they could buy their necessary tools to get back to their normal lives.108 S. P. Mookerjee, talking about the refugee problem in riot stricken areas, proposed that the matter can be solved by forming ‘pockets of resistance,’ by concentrating Hindus in one sector in a village or by planning new colonies of settlers consisting entirely of Hindus: ‘When a particular community is in microscopic minority they should be helped to remove to the neighbouring villages, where the people of their community live in large numbers.’ We shall see later that this was a line that Gandhi specially disapproved of when he came to Noakhali, as this would only increase mutual segregation and bitterness. Apart from starting relief centres in all the affected districts, the Bengal Congress Relief and Rehabilitation Committee opened a camp at Sealdah station for refugees coming from Noakhali. Milk and biscuits were given to children and sick people and refugees were taken to different relief centres in Calcutta. Evacuees were accommodated in houses where proper arrangements had been made by the committee.109 It also proposed the formation of defence committees not just in Bengal but all over the country to bring about an improvement in the communal atmosphere. It appointed Niharendu Datta Mazumdar of the BPCC to form such a committee called National Emergency Defence Force. This was to be non-communal in character and would function along lines of ‘non-aggressive defence’. In a statement published in Hindustan Standard on 30 October, Majumdar explained on behalf of the BPCC that since there was a lack of coordination among various volunteer organizations, it was imperative to have a single trained and organized corps through which all volunteer efforts could be channelled.110 The Nationalist reported on 2 November that a recruiting centre of the force for East Bengal had been opened at Kishoreganj, in Mymensingh. Nalinaksha Sanyal, another prominent member of the BPCC, wrote on 5 November that the present situation was akin to a civil war between nationalism

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and communalism, and a solution to the problem should be ‘on the basis of a real and fairly long term solution . . . and not on finding out a sort of temporary palliative for the passions roused.’111 It is interesting that he posed it as war of ideologies, not between communities. He also completely ignored the parallel nationalism that the Pakistan idea formulated. As an immediate measure, he suggested the formation of village and mohalla peace committees. He further stated that if a Central Peace Committee is formed, it should be presided over by the governor himself, failing which his position should be taken by ‘a person of the rank of a High Court Judge.’112 This last suggestion of relying more and more on external agencies, was radically different from the peace measures proposed by Gandhi when he stayed in East Bengal. The All India Women’s Conference (AIWC) did commendable relief work at Noakhali and other riot torn areas. Volunteers of Calcutta branch of the AIWC worked at the Sealdah station to help the thousands of refugees who had fled the affected areas. The Lahore branch of the AIWC, at its annual conference, demanded ‘swift and severe punishment to the Noakhali, Tippera and Calcutta criminals who have committed shameless deeds of tyranny and butchery.’113 The AIWC first set up a relief committee with Ashoka Gupta as its convener. It distributed relief material like medicines and clothes amongst the people who had arrived at the railway station. Ashoka Gupta recalls that they would collect the relief material, organize themselves into several groups and go into various districts like Feni or Ramganj or Choumuhani. They met refugees en route and distributed the resources. She lamented that even though they tried to persuade them to return to their villages, they refused to do so.114 The proposed relief committee was set up by linking the Calcutta branch of the AIWC with other branches and with other relief organizations. There were about 33 different organizations working in Noakhali at that time, and relief efforts were coordinated through the Noakhali Rescue and Relief Committee. The Bengal Government was not completely uncooperative, despite its marked partiality. In February 1947, it arranged to give every household Rs 250 as compensation, and Rs 200 to every weaver, fisherman or peasant for his tool and equipment, on furnishing proof of damage.115 AIWC volunteers felt that the compensation was very unsatisfactory. Ashoka Gupta personally went to meet the Additional District Magistrate Mr Akhtaruzzaman, with her complaint, and he heard her out and agreed to a fairer distribution. This was done at Charamandal and AIWC volunteers arrived there from their base camp at Tumchar, to supervise it. After that, the relief officer Mr Rahman went with the AIWC workers to their camp at Tumchar to hand out the



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compensation money. But Ashoka Gupta recalls, there was suspicion and mistrust amongst victims even when they received compensation – ‘Those who had suffered were quite sceptical about the real goodwill of the Muslim League Government.’116 With the resources in hand and some amount of government aid, the AIWC workers started mending huts with new sheets of tin, some old burnt material and bamboos. Another important task undertaken by the AIWC under the leadership of Ashoka Gupta was the rescue of abducted girls. On 20 October, she arranged a meeting with the district commissioner and requested him to provide protection to AIWC volunteers for this. The response of the commissioner was tardy. By 26 October, AIWC volunteers began to go out in batches into the affected villages of Noakhali, distributing relief materials, but most importantly, looking for abducted girls. But Gupta ended up frustrated – ‘we did little more than distribute relief material. We did not really get a chance to talk to the affected villagers. We never found the abducted girls . . . The local people did not trust us, nobody told us anything. And if ever a girl did return, she claimed that she had escaped unscathed.’117 Once again, rape remained a strong and pervasive rumour, impossible to quantify or even identify. Distrust on the part of the local people was the biggest hurdle in restoring confidence. Even after a month of carrying out relief work in Noakhali, volunteers were unable to prevent panic stricken people from leaving their villages or persuading the evacuees to return. Ashoka Gupta poignantly reminisces, I felt we were unable to win the confidence of the people. They were repairing their houses, but they seemed unable to make up their minds to stay .  .  . The two communities had made no overtures to each other. We found that Hindus came and attended our prayer meetings because they were hoping to get something. But Muslims did not care to come to them at all, or their attendance was lackadaisical. They seemed to think that all our work was only for the Hindus.118

On 9 November 1946 Ashoka Gupta wrote in her diary that Hindus were paralyzed with fear and they did not find the courage even to disclose names of hooligans let alone file complaints against them. She reflected that if Hindus had to stay on in their villages, they might not be able to file complaints ever.119 During their tour, AIWC workers would visit the houses of both the communities. In Hindu houses, there were hardly any women or children around. In Muslim families, they faced the allegation that they had come

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to work only for ‘them’ (the Hindus). Volunteers tried hard to convince them otherwise, but in most cases, they were not very successful. Even if Muslim women sometimes took the offer of clothes and medicines that volunteers distributed, ‘the men were supremely indifferent to our appeals for peace.’120 AIWC workers distributed resources amongst the Muslims as well, to show that they did not distinguish between Hindus and Muslims; if poor Muslims were in need of resources, they would distribute it. Ashoka Gupta and her batch of AIWC volunteers counselled women victims who seemed to have been abducted or raped. They also spoke to their families. In some cases, a young girl often denied her traumatic experiences and then was accepted by her family and the society in general. In such cases, Gupta felt the situation was positive; at least the girl was taken back. But there were countless other cases where the family rejected her. When such victims and their families were counselled, there was hardly any positive outcome. Abducted women faced a double oppression – first from Muslim assaults and then from their own families. Gupta points out one bright exception: she came across a young married couple, where the wife had been carried away and sexually assaulted for the night and then let free the next day. The husband did not abandon her, stating that it was not her fault.121 Ashoka Gupta wished there were more like him. The army maintained a very tight grip on the situation and would not allow volunteers to go into the interiors of the villages.122 Gupta pointed out that there were some unpleasant experiences when volunteers clashed with local Muslim leaders. They were extremely unwilling to allow volunteers to go into the interiors. Once, her jeep was stopped from entering one village and she was questioned about her activities. She noted that local Muslim leaders like MLAs and Gulam Sarwar’s men constantly suspected them.123 Once, their car got stuck on a muddy road on their way to Haimchar and Muslim construction workers, realizing that they were relief workers, refused to come to their aid.124 Muslims also terrorized Hindus saying that the military and the volunteers would not be there for their protection for ever; they (the Hindus) were at the mercy of the Muslims.125 The Communist Party of India revived the People’s Relief Committee to carry out relief work. Muzaffar Ahmed, Gopal Haldar and Khoka Roy, along with Abdulla Rasool (a Kisan Sabha leader), went to Noakhali with a squad of volunteers soon after news of violence reached Calcutta. The People’s Relief Committee, under the leadership of Muzaffar Ahmed, sent relief volunteers and medical attendants for all affected areas of Noakhali and Tippera. Issuing



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an appeal to the people of Bengal, Muzaffar Ahmed and Bhowani Sen stated, ‘Of all the people, it is the Muslim League leaders who have to take up the work of rescuing the helpless in distress, because it is they who run the Ministry and because the majority of the people in the disturbed area follow the flag of the League.’126 Lal Mohan Sen, who had participated in the Chittagong Armory Raid and was now a member of the CPI, went to Sandwip, a village in Noakhali, and carried on rescue and relief work there. He was ultimately killed by Muslim hooligans. Since the CPI had Muslims among top ranking leaders, their work in Noakhali carried special resonance. Other Armory Raid comrades, Ambika Chakravarty, Ananta Singh and Ganesh Ghosh, all now members of the CPI, led anti-riot campaigns and held meetings in different parts of Chittagong, so that the flames of Noakhali did not spread there.127 P. C. Joshi, the general secretary of CPI, issued a statement that read: ‘I earnestly appeal to the justifiably shocked Hindu brothers not to get provoked. The spirit of revenge can only intensify mutual killing to the greater delight of the British imperialists alone. The best way to help the Hindus in East Bengal is not to stab but guarantee absolute safety to Muslims where they are a minority.’128 The Communist Party maintained that the League must win back Hindu confidence and it suggested ways to achieve it. It demanded that the League take the initiative of punishing all the guilty and establish joint committees for rescue and relief. The CPI also pointed out to the Congress that simply condemning the riots and holding the League Ministry responsible was not enough. It had to unconditionally support Muslim national self-determination. Otherwise ‘the Muslim masses would not see any alternative to the separatist and religious Pakistan of the League.’129 The Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti (MARS), which had been on the forefront of relief work from the time of Bengal famine of 1943, sent a batch of volunteers for relief work. Important among them were Manikuntala Sen, Renu Chakravartty, Kamala Chatterjee and Bela Lahiri. MARS volunteers were divided into two groups – one group went to the relief camp at Choumuhani and the other coordinated its relief work with the AIWC wing at Chandpur. Renu Chakravartty recalls that there was some friction between the members of the AIWC and the MARS; while AIWC volunteers like Ashoka Gupta and Renuka Ray got jeeps for moving from place to place, MARS volunteers had to travel on foot. She says that although the steadfastness of purpose was strong in their hearts, resources for relief were scarce. The MARS team mainly undertook the task of distributing milk in the interior of the villages,

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particularly at Haimchar, which was a very badly affected area. Before they started for Haimchar, Pankajini, who was the AIWC member in charge of the relief center at Chandpur, insisted on sending an armed British soldier with them, as it was extremely risky for women to travel alone.130 Renu Chakravartty recalls her horror as she travelled to Haimchar. As they passed through a village, occasionally an elderly woman would come out of the house, and seeing that the volunteers were Hindu women, she would burst into tears. One woman kept repeating what a goonda had warned her: ‘Kichu koiba to kaita falaimu’ (if you say a word I will cut you into pieces).131 She too faced the same problem as Ashoka Gupta about providing relief to women who had been kidnapped or molested. Women would often talk of the abduction of their children and of cases of forcible conversions, but about their own molestation they were reticent.132 This reminds us that even though rape is strongly and pervasively associated with Noakhali events, it largely exists as an assertion, not an established fact. On their way to Haimchar, they stayed the night at a tin roofed house along with some members of the Red Cross Society, who were also distributing milk in the area. When they reached Haimchar the next morning, they saw that the whole market place had been burnt and gutted and a few human skulls were lying around. Everyone had fled the place. When they came back to Chandpur camp, Renu Chakravartty decided that they needed help. If the government did not provide it, then it had to be coordinated with the relief work organized and carried out by Sucheta Kripalani on behalf of the Congress. Even government relief efforts were coordinated at different relief centres through her. She remarks that the Muslim League government hardly gave any direct help to the relief workers.133 Later, Manikuntala Sen and Maya Lahiri, who were earlier working at Choumuhani, also came over to Chandpur, where there was a big camp of women who had fled from their villages. Men were housed at a separate camp. MARS volunteers carried on work at the women’s camp.134 Given that there was widespread information about assaults on Hindu women, it is remarkable that AIWC and MARS representatives worked so extensively in Noakhali villages on their own. Riots, ironically, expanded the scope of women’s activism enormously. Perhaps the brightest example of anti-communal resistance came from Hasnabad in Tippera district, on the border of Noakhali, which stood ’like a mountain barrier preventing the hell fire from spreading.’135 When riots began in Noakhali, refugees rushed into Hasnabad. But under the guidance of the Communist Red Flag, Hindu and Muslim peasants refused to succumb



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to communal appeals and peasants organized relief kitchens and sheltered thousands of refugees.136 Communist Kisan leaders like Yakub, Chandrasekhar Das, Phani Mazumdar and Ebadatullah, went from village to village recruiting volunteers for relief work. They marshalled boats to go into the villages in Noakhali and rescue stranded victims. Thousands of Hindu and Muslim volunteers guarded the roads into Hasnabad and prevented the communal discord from spreading there. When goondas attacked these volunteers, they were beaten back. Peasants of Hasnabad, organized under the Red Flag, stood firmly on their guard and served as a shining example of communal harmony, even when the worst of riots occurred just on their borders. The People’s Age saluted them thus: ‘If Noakhali is our shame, Hasnabad is our pride!’137 It seems rather remarkable that inter-communal friendship was so strong under the banner of the Red Flag. While the two districts of Noakhali and Tippera burnt in the communal fire, Hasnabad strengthened the bond between Hindus and Muslims. Partha Chatterjee asks if there was an ideological change among rural Muslims and if the widespread demand for Pakistan amongst the Muslim peasantry of East Bengal was any different from or anything more specific than their desire to free themselves from zamindari’s domination.138 This is an important question. It has to be understood that the ideological change among Muslim peasants (making them rally behind the Pakistan demand) and their desire to free themselves from zamindari domination might not have existed as such distinct binaries, as Chatterjee sees them. Identities do not necessarily exist as such hard-bound entities, they are constantly changing and evolving. Moreover, communalism is not a standalone thing. It requires a particular historical conjuncture and a specific intermix of multiple identity elements to triumph to the extent that it did at Noakhali. That specific historical conjuncture occurred between August and October 1946. But things changed the same year, when during the Tebhaga struggle, the same Hindu and Muslim sharecroppers came together against oppression of landlords and the new conflict clearly developed on class lines. So, identities are unstable and their relative weight depends on the strength of different sociopolitical crosscurrents. Agrarian tensions that had been latent so far were prodded into full-fledged life by Muslim League propaganda based on agrarian populism since 1943. Following the famine, this potent agrarian discontent was then mapped onto communal divisions. Given that Noakhali and Tippera were two of the worst affected districts during the War and the famine, they became an ideal ground for experimenting with the possibility of Pakistan. It was the complex intermix

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of economic factors with religious rhetoric that made the Noakhali riots a possibility. The preceding Great Calcutta Killings only made it inevitable. The refugee situation and the rehabilitation programme anticipated the future course of events in the immediate aftermath of partition. Noakhali, in many ways, was then a dress rehearsal for partition and Pakistan. At the same time, communist activism at Hasnabad made it clear that even the Pakistan demand need not necessarily contain active anti-Hindu violence. The CPI did see a certain legitimacy in the Pakistan demand, and the Hasnabad peasants might also have wanted it. But because of the alternative framework of communist secularism, they would not associate it with communal violence. ENDNOTES 1. Throughout the chapter, for the sake of convenience, the Noakhali and Tippera riots have been called Noakhali Riots. 2. He was Gandhi’s close companion during the latter’s Noakhali peace tour in 1946–47. 3. Nirmal Kumar Bose, My Days With Gandhi (Calcutta: Nishana, 1953), p 33. 4. AICC Papers, NMML, File Number G 31 (Part 2), 1942, p 29, P. C. Ghose to Jawaharlal Nehru, 24 April 1942. 5. Batabyal, Communalism in Bengal, From Famine to Noakhali, 1943-47, p 312. 6. Bose, Agrarian Bengal, p 224. 7. Ibid, p 225. 8. Batabyal, Communalism in Bengal, From Famine to Noakhali, 1943-47, p 316. 9. Ibid. 10. Ibid. 11. S. P. Mookerjee Papers, NMML, II-IV Installment, Subject File no 150. Pamphlet issued by the Propaganda Department of the Muslim League, Bengal, 1946. 12. Ibid. 13. WBSA IB File No 717 D/46, p 99. Bengali leaflet dated 20.9.46, printed at Madhabi Press, Nilphamari, by Maulvi Dabiruddin Ahmed, President, SubDivisional Muslim League, Nilphamari. 14. WBSA IB File No 717 D/46, p 64. D. I. B. Report dated 25.11.46 – English translation of a Bengali printed leaflet titled ‘To the Muslim Brothers and Sisters’ issued under the signatures of B. M. Elias, MLA, secy. Bogra District Muslim League and Fazlul Bari, secy. District Muslim League Relief Committee. 15. SB File No PM/506/46 Part IV 1946, p 24. ‘Communal Disturbances’, S.B. Report, (date illegible) 1946. 16. Bose, Agrarian Bengal, p 225. 17. Sumit Sarkar (ed.), Towards Freedom, 1946 (ICHR, OUP), p 713, (Henceforth referred to as TF), Article in People’s Age, 27 October 1946.



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18. Ibid, p 713. 19. Nicholas Mansergh and Penderel Moon (eds.), The Transfer of Power 1942–47, Vol.9, p 98. Burrows to Pethick-Lawrence 18th November 1946. 20. Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 196. 21. TF, 1946, p 706. Extracts from a news report, ‘Many persons burnt alive: governor’s intervention urged’ Hindustan Times, 15th October 1946. 22. TF, 1946, p 709. Enclosure ‘A Short Report of the Communal Devastations in the District of Noakhali (Bengal)’; Letter by Sudhir Ghose, asst. secy. BPCC to the general secy. AICC, Allahabad, Calcutta 18th October 1946. 23. Ibid.p 709. 24. S. P. Mookerjee Papers, NMML, II-IV Installment, Subject file no 149, Versions Of Eyewitnesses, p 18. (Henceforth referred to as Versions of Eyewitnesses) Report from Prof. Samar Guha and Shri Ardhendu Bhattacharya of National Service Institute, who had been the first batch of outsiders to enter into the interior of Noakhali. 25. Ibid, p 18. 26. Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 199. 27. SB File Number Py/660/46 1946, p 104. ‘All India Women’s Conference’, Newspaper Cutting of Hindusthan Standard 25.11.46. 28. Versions Of Eyewitnesses, p 45. ‘Statement by the police of damage, murders etc. as extracted from first information reports’ appendix to the Letter dated 5th November, 1946, from E. S. Simpson, Special Officer, Home Department to the additional secretary to the Govt. Of Bengal, Home Department. 29. SB File Number Py/660/46 1946, p 104. ‘All India Women’s Conference’, Newspaper Cutting of Hindusthan Standard 25.11.46. 30. Hindustan Times, 18 October 1946. 31. Ashutosh Lahiry, Papers, NMML, Speeches and Writings by Him, Serial Number 21, pp 56–57. Statement on Communal Troubles in Noakhali District (undated). 32. Mitra (ed.), The Indian Annual Register, 1946, Vol. 2, p 197. 33. Ibid. 34. Hindusthan Standard, 22 October 1946. 35. Dawn, 25 October 1946. 36. Ibid. 37. Ibid. 38. Dawn, 26 October 1946. 39. Ibid. 40. Ibid. 41. Dawn, 10 November 1946. 42. Communal riot of a very serious nature broke out in Bihar in November 1946, where Muslims were victims. 43. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), NMML, Subject file number 40 (a), 1946, p 12, Maulvi Hamiduddin Ahmed’s statement in the Azad on 14 December 1946. 44. Hindusthan Standard, 19 October 1946.

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45. Ibid. 46. Ibid. 47. Ibid, 23 October 1946. 48. Ibid, 25 October 1946, Statement given by the president of the Central Relief Co-ordination Committee. 49. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection), NMML, Subject File number 118, 1946, p 176. Letter from Rabindranath Nabis, assistant secretary, District Congress Committee of Gauhati, Assam, to Gandhi, 18 December 1946. 50. AICC Papers, NMML, File number P5, 1946. Report dated 31st October 1946 of a tour of Dattapara and Khilpara, Noakhali, by Sucheta Kripalani, Dhirendra Nath Datta and Acharya Kripalani. 51. Ibid. 52. Ibid. 53. Ibid. 54. Ashutosh Lahiry Papers, NMML, Speeches and Writings by him, Serial No 17, pp 45-47. Statement on Communal Problem (undated). 55. Ibid, pp 45–47. 56. Ashutosh Lahiry, Papers, NMML, Speeches and Writings by him Serial No 21, pp 56–57. Statement on Communal Troubles in Noakhali District (undated). 57. Nirmal Kumar Bose, My Days With Gandhi (Calcutta: Nishana, 1953) p 37. 58. Versions of eyewitnesses, p 20. Report from Prof. Samar Guha and Shri Ardendu Bhattacharya of National Service Institute, who had been the first batch of outsiders to enter into the interior of Noakhali. 59. Ibid, p 21. Report from Prof. Samar Guha and Shri Ardendu Bhattacharya of National Service Institute, who had been the first batch of outsiders to enter into the interior of Noakhali. 60. Nicholas Mansergh and Penderel Moon (eds.), The Transfer of Power 1942–47, Vol. 9, p 100. Burrows to Pethick-Lawrence, 18th November 1946 61. AICC Papers, NMML, File No. G65, p 18. Mahendra Mohan Roy, Village Karpara, Noakhali to the district magistrate, Noakhali, 18th November 1946. 62. Ibid, p 24. 63. SB File Number Py/660/46 1946, p 104. ‘All India Women’s Conference’, Newspaper Cutting of Hindusthan Standard 25.11.46. 64. SB File No PM/937/46 (A), p 132. Letter dated 23rd November 1946 from Brigadier, general staff, Eastern Command, to The commissioner of police, Calcutta and the I.G. of Police, Bengal. 65. AICC Papers, NMML, File No. G65, p 28. 66. Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 196. 67. Ibid. 68. Bose, Agrarian Bengal, p 227. 69. Mitra (ed.), The Indian Annual Register, 1946, Vol. 2, p 195. 70. He does not mention the name, but when corroborated with other reports, it seems most likely to be Golam Sarwar.



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71. SB File No PM/937/46 (A), pp 68-69, Gist of an article published in ‘Swadhinata’ dated 3 November 1946. 72. Ibid, pp 68-69. 73. IOR/L/PJ/8/577, p 22, Wavell’s note on31 October 1946, regarding his interview with the district magistrate of Noakhali and the district magistrate of Tippera. 74. Ibid. 75. Versions of eyewitnesses, p 30. Report from Prof. Samar Guha and Shri Ardendu Bhattacharya of National Service Institute, who had been the first batch of outsiders to enter into the interior of Noakhali. 76. Ibid, p 24. Report from Prof. Samar Guha and Shri Ardendu Bhattacharya of National Service Institute, who had been the first batch of outsiders to enter into the interior of Noakhali. 77. Mitra (ed.), The Indian Annual Register, 1946, Vol. 2, p 195. 78. Ibid, p 197. 79. SB File no PM/937/46 (A), p 70. p 69, Gist of an article published in Swadhinata dated 3.11.46. 80. Ibid, p 69. 81. Mitra (ed.), The Indian Annual Register, 1946, Vol. 2, p 198. 82. While Memory Serves, p 171. 83. Ibid, p 178. 84. Ibid, p 606. 85. Ibid, p 610, From the personal account of Captain Wimbush who was commanding ‘A’ Company of the 4/2nd Gurkhas. 86. Versions of Eyewitnesses, p 43, Report by E. S. Simpson, I.C.S, Special Officer Home Department, to the additional secretary to the Govt. of Bengal, Home Department, dated 5th November 1946. 87. Ibid, p 46. 88. Versions of eyewitnesses, p 66. Letter dated 30th November 1946, Calcutta, from Sri Kumar Banerjee, Professor, Calcutta University and president, Birbhum Association, to Sj. Sankar Rao, secretary, Congress Delimitation Committee, Ananda Bhawan, Congress Office, Allahabad. 89. Ibid, p 30. Report from Prof. Samar Guha and Shri Ardhendu Bhattacharya of National Service Institute, who had been the first batch of outsiders to enter into the interior of Noakhali. 90. While Memory Serves, p 170. 91. Nicholas Mansergh and Penderel Moon (eds.)., The Transfer of Power, 1942–47,Vol. 9, p 98. Burrows to Pethick-Lawrence, 18th November 1946. 92. AICC Papers, file no P 5, 1946. Letter from Sanat Banerjee to the President, Indian National Congress, dated 17th October 1946. 93. Ibid, Diary of events – Acharya Kripalani’s Tour of Noakhali. 94. The Statesman, 18 October 1946. 95. Versions of Eyewitnesses, p 30. Report from Prof. Samar Guha and Shri Ardhendu Bhattacharya of National Service Institute, who had been the first batch of outsiders to enter into the interior of Noakhali.

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96. AICC Papers, File No G 65, pp 16–18, ‘Restoration of Normal Conditions in Calcutta and East Bengal’ – Letter dated 14th November 1946 from P. Das Gupta, secy. Eastern Chamber of Commerce, Calcutta, to the chief secy. Govt. of Bengal, Writers’ Building, Calcutta. 97. See Batabyal, Communalism in Bengal: From Famine to Noakhali, 1943-47, p 283. 98. Versions of eyewitnesses, pp 52–53, R. Gupta’s account dated 3-11-46 & 4-11-46. 99. Ashoka Gupta Papers, NMML, Speeches and Writings by her, File number 1, Noakhali Diary, p 12. 100. Ibid, p 13. 101. Versions of eyewitnesses, p 27. Report from Prof. Samar Guha and Shri Ardhendu Bhattacharya of National Service Institute, who had been the first batch of outsiders to enter into the interior of Noakhali. 102. Ashoka Gupta, In the Path of Service – Memories of a Changing Century (Calcutta: Stree, 2005), p 94. 103. SB File Number Py/660/46 1946, p 104. ‘All India Women’s Conference’, Newspaper cutting of Hindusthan Standard dated 25.11.46. 104. See Das, Communal Riots in Bengal, p 198. 105. SB File No PM/937/46 (A), p 140, Extract from the weekly confidential report of Tippera District for the week ending 28 December 1946. 106. Hindusthan Standard, 22 October 1946. 107. SB File No PH/510/46, pp 30–32, English translation of a Bengali leaflet ‘Om’ Special Branch Report on 15.2.47. 108. SB File No PM/937/47 (A) 1947, pp 6-7, Special Branch Report dated 7.2.47, Rehabilitation of riot affected sufferers of Noakhali and Tippera – Statement of Makhan Lal Biswas, secy, Hindu Mahasabha, on obstacles. 109. Hindusthan Standard, 25 October 1946. 110. WBSA IB File No 1065/46, p 56. Note on the National Emergency Defence Force (BPCC) of Niharendu Datta Majumdar, Report dated 20.1.47. 111. AICC Papers File No G 53 1946, p 1. Enclosure dated 5.11.46 to Circular Letter by Nalinaksha Sanyal, Calcutta, 7th November 1946. 112. AICC Papers File No G 53 1946 p 3. 113. SB File Number Py 660/46 1946, p 103, Report published in Amrita Bazar Patrika dated 29 October 1946. 114. Ashoka Gupta, In the Path of Service- Memories of a Changing Century, p 90. 115. Ibid, p 104. 116. Ibid, p 105. 117. Ibid, p 94. 118. Ibid, p 99. 119. Ashoka Gupta Papers, Speeches and Writings by her, NMML, File number 1, ‘Noakhali Diary’, p 15. 120. Ashoka Gupta, In the Path of Service- Memories of a Changing Century, p 106. 121. Ibid, p 108. 122. Ibid, p 91.



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1 23. Ibid, p 93. 124. Ibid, p 102. 125. Ashoka Gupta Papers, NMML Speeches and Writings by her, File number 1, Noakhali Diary, p 20. 126. TF, p 712, Article in People’s Age, 27 October 1946. 127. People’s Age, 15 December 1946. 128. Ibid, 27 October 1946. 129. Ibid, 3 November 1946. 130. Renu Chakravartty, Communists in Indian Women’s Movement, 1940–1950 (New Delhi: People’s Publishing House, 1980), p 105. 131. Ibid, p 105. 132. Ibid. 133. Ibid, p 106. 134. Ibid. 135. TF, p 719, People’s Age, 3 November 1946. 136. People’s Age, 3 November 1946. 137. TF, p 719, People’s Age, 3 November 1946. 138. Chatterjee, Bengal 1920–1947, Volume 1- The Land Question, p 170.

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1

6

A Test of Faith

Gandhi in Noakhali and Calcutta 1946–47 In an atmosphere of utmost despair Gandhi came to Noakhali. Even before the Noakhali riots began, he had anticipated them. He wrote in Harijan after the Calcutta riots, ‘We are not yet in the midst of a civil war, but we are nearing it.’2 With Noakhali riots, Gandhi suffered from deep self-doubt, not about the principles of nonviolence and truth, but about himself as an adequate embodiment of these two values. He saw the riots as a personal failure. Even before he actually went to Noakhali, he said in a prayer meeting at Delhi that making peace had been his ‘vocation’ since early youth. He never believed that peace was impossible for the two warring communities. Calling himself an optimist, he said that he saw a ‘ faint ray of hope’ for peace3 (italics mine). He knew that his visit to Noakhali was inevitable as nothing else had so far worked to bring about normalcy. Hindusthan Standard reported on 19 October that at an after-prayer address he said that what hurt him more than the killings was the abduction of women.4 Female chastity was a vital matter for him. He received messages from Bengal, asking him to quell the raging fury. He was anxious to go to Bengal, but felt that it was his duty to wait till Nehru returned to New Delhi from Afghanistan and the meeting of the Congress Working Committee discussed developments in Bengal. Meanwhile, he deputed Sudhir Ghose, an eminent Congress leader, to visit East Bengal, especially Noakhali, and bring him first hand reports. On 19 October, he made up his mind to go.5 He left for Calcutta on 28 October. However, his visit to Noakhali was delayed because transportation could not be arranged by the Bengal Government for a long time. Suhrawardy also pleaded with Gandhi to delay his departure to Noakhali till conditions were safer there. So, until such arrangements could be made, Gandhi had to stay at Sodepur near Calcutta, where he decided to help the riot-ravaged city. He impressed upon Suhrawardy



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that the popularly elected League ministry held the primary responsibility for restoring peace and order in Bengal. He also emphasized that there should be no further reliance on the British government. But his heart was in Noakhali. Nirmal Kumar Bose, his constant companion in those days, noted that ‘there was a prevailing feeling of helplessness before the magnitude of the forces of evil which were stalking the land; and perhaps all this left Gandhiji in a lonely, and maybe, also in a slightly disturbed frame of mind.’6 Gandhi confessed that he could not see how to bring the two communities together. He had come to East Bengal to find a way out. Bengal was a large province, and if the communal question could be resolved here, the solution could be applied to the rest of India as well.7 Noakhali was the ultimate testing ground because he had to persuade inflamed Muslims there. This was the biggest challenge to his perpetual claim to represent the entire nation, including Muslims. It was also probably a last-ditch attempt to prevent the partition of India: ‘If Bengal, at this critical juncture, plays the game, the whole of India is saved. That is why I have become a Bengali today.’8 His tour of Noakhali was also a personal attempt to test his own moral resources. He remarked, ‘I don’t want to die a failure.’9 It is no wonder, therefore, that he labelled his stay in Noakhali as the ‘Noakhali Experiment.’ Communal antagonism in Bengal, as elsewhere, was also for him a failure of the project of freedom, a sense of failure that was beyond articulation. The Calcutta situation was still bad and from 26 August, sporadic riots had once again broken out. There was even a mild attack on Gandhi when an iron ring was hurled at his car.10 In prayer meetings, he constantly urged Calcutta that lasting peace had to come from within and looking to the viceroy or to the army for help and protection would not achieve real and lasting normalcy. That required a change of heart. He also warned them against retaliation, which only created a vicious circle. He argued that if Indians had to rely on the military to protect the minorities in their respective provinces, it would only mean that the Congress and the League hardly exercised any control and influence on their own people. That would in turn mean inviting the British to stay on in India. This was his biggest anxiety and it was well founded: if reliance on colonial institutions was unavoidable, then the anti-colonial struggle lost its legitimacy. In fact, when Governor Burrows asked him in Calcutta what he could do to restore peace in Bengal, Gandhi promptly replied that the British governor could help best by quitting as soon as possible.11 His message to the people was therefore loud and clear. Self-reliance was the key to normalcy. Nobody could harm the brave, who alone were truly

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nonviolent. People should be brave enough to die, without any retaliation. The effect of Gandhi’s prayer meeting in Calcutta has been best described by Kazi Abul Kasim, in his memoir: That day, while coming back home from Gandhiji’s prarthana sabha, it struck me that just like my backache, the communal hatred that had plagued us all these days has also suddenly disappeared. After many days, again, I was able to walk back home without fear in my heart.12

Meanwhile, riots started in Bihar in late October, in retaliation against the Noakhali killings. Victims were overwhelmingly Muslims and the government was in the hands of the Congress. This was an exact reversal of the Bengal situation. The Bihar riots halted the peace programme that Gandhi had drawn up for Noakhali. Nehru and other Congressmen had rushed to Bihar, but Gandhi still believed that his place was in Noakhali, and under no compulsion would he alter his programme. He believed that Bihar was in able hands. It was not that Gandhi was not perturbed about Bihar. A constant flow of information from Nehru about the grave and tense situation told him that his peace message had definitely failed among Bihari Hindus. Hindustan Standard, on 5 November, quoted Vallabhbhai Patel, ‘We warned the viceroy that if Bengal outrages were not stopped, Bihar might start trouble which might be followed by the whole of India and the situation then would get entirely out of control. So far as Bihar is concerned, our fears materialized.’13 Gandhi however, could not accept this logic of inevitable counterviolence. He wanted to make Muslims in Bengal listen to him. A Hindu Congress leader could manage Bihar; Gandhi alone could have swayed Muslims in Noakhali. Nonetheless, the Bihar situation made Gandhi even more morose. He felt that Bihar had set the clock of India’s independence back. The independence of India today, he said, was at stake in Bengal and Bihar.14 Bihar was a Congress ruled province and it showed the communal limitations of the rulers-to-be of free India. Once again, finding himself in darkness, Gandhi felt that the only way was to resort to a fast unto death. His message bore almost a threatening note, Predominantly for reasons of health, I had put myself on the lowest diet possible soon after my reaching Calcutta. The diet now continues as a penance after the knowledge of the Bihar tragedy. The low diet will become a fast unto death, if the erring Biharis have not turned over a new leaf . . .15 [Italics mine.]



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Sorrowfully he told Pyarelal: ‘If people refuse to see what is clear as daylight and pay no heed to what you say, does it not mean that your day is over?’16 He always saw fasts as a means of self-purification. Always believing that he was India itself, he felt that his own purification would also cleanse India. On 5 November, Gandhi gave a twenty-four-hour ultimatum to Bihar to stop the riots, failing which he would go on a fast, he said. However, this did not ring well with Hindu nationalist politicians of Bengal. On 5 November, Shyama Prasad Mookerjee said: ‘Mahatma Gandhi will only help in creating chaos and confusion, indeed he will cause the greatest possible disservice to the Hindus at this crisis, if he does not desist from his proposed fast unto death . . .’17 As a leader of the communal Hindu Mahasabha, he was disturbed by the prospect that the fast may lead to a withdrawal of violence in Bihar, a violence that the Hindu communalists believed to be just. GANDHI’S NOAKHALI SOJOURN Gandhi’s Peace Strategy Gandhi left for Noakhali on 6 November, 1946 on a special train arranged by the Bengal Government. His proposed visit had already raised hopes in Noakhali. When his train reached Kushtia station, a crowd had already gathered there for the Mahatma’s darshan. At the Goalundo Ghat, from where the party would leave for Chandpur, another large crowd waited for him.18 There were similar gatherings at Naihati, Ranaghat and Chuadanga. At the Kumarkhali station, the train was stopped by people standing on the railway track. Nirmal Kumar Bose recalls: ‘Huge crowds of men and women came to see Gandhiji at almost every station, but at Laksam Junction, he had to address the meeting because many of the people were actually evacuees from the riot stricken villages.’19 There did seem to be an instant lessening of fear. Gandhi stayed in Chaumuhani from 7 to 9 November, 1946, and then went to a village called Dattapara. Thereafter he went to Srirampur village, where he stayed till the beginning of January 1947. This became a regular routine. He would stay in a particular village for some days and spend time with Hindu victims, and also with Muslims. He never travelled in a car, but always insisted walking, no matter how tiresome the journey, or how difficult the route. He did not think in terms of casualties but of the moral implications of even a single event of rape or forced conversion. However, he constantly maintained that he was groping in the dark, he did not have a ready remedy. He had come

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to Noakhali for self-introspection and ‘for going through a severe and honest test of (my) courage in the true concept of non-violence’.20 In another letter, he remarked, ‘My firmness is at present on its greatest trial. Shall I be able to stick to truth and nonviolence in word, deed and thought in the midst of the greatest suspicion, distrust and exaggeration?’21 He wrote in despair that for the time being, he had given up searching for a nonviolent remedy that would save the masses. Instead, he was seeking for a nonviolent solution for his own sake alone. He was yet to see if nonviolence would prove successful in the present crisis or not 22 and his life’s meaning depended on that. He confessed, ‘I have not come here to do a good turn to this community or that. I have come to do a good turn to myself . . . Has my ahimsa become bankrupt? If I fail here .  .  . it will simply mean that my sadhana has been imperfect, that there is some fault somewhere in my technique.’23 This sense of a personal failure was not new.24 However, it was most profound in Noakhali and it had huge implications for the way of life that Gandhi chose during his stay in Noakhali: not just to restore peace, but also in the way he behaved with his close associates, especially the women. To Sardar Niranjan Singh Gill, who had come to stay and work with him at Noakhali, he said emphatically, ‘. . . as Sikhs, as warriors, I cannot expect you to accept nonviolence as a creed, but while you are here, you must accept it as a policy. Therefore, you must go without any stick, leave alone arms, and you must accept that if somebody hits you, abuses you, shoots you, you have not to retaliate.’25 Soon after his arrival, he laid down the pattern for relief work. He decided to ask his co-workers, including women, to settle down in affected villages and make himself or herself hostage for the safety and security of the Hindu minority. His main hope was to locate one good Hindu and one good Muslim in each village of Noakhali and Tippera, who could together act as the defender of the two communities. However, he was not completely sure about the efficacy of this strategy: ‘If I succeed cent per cent in my own plan, then conditions will improve. But of this there does not seem to be any prospect at the present moment. Yet as a man of hope, I continue to hope against hope.’26 Sushila Nayar, Sushila Pai, Pyarelal and A. V. Thakkar (also known as Thakkar Bapa) were posted in different villages, with Bengali interpreters, for relief work. Abha Gandhi was also sent to work along with Thakkar. Sucheta Kripalani met him from time to time regarding the progress of relief work. Representatives from a number of other relief organizations like the Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti and the All India Women’s Conference (AIWC) also settled down in Noakhali to work with Gandhi. Important amongst them



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were Renu Chakravartty, Manikuntala Sen and Kamala Chatterjee of the Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti and Ashoka Gupta of the AIWC. Nirmal Kumar Bose and Parasuram (Gandhi’s stenographer), along with Manu Gandhi (his grandniece, who joined the entourage on 19 December 1946), were his constant companions. When a relief worker asked him what his idea of rehabilitation was, he said that the idea was not to send them to Assam or elsewhere, but to infuse courage in them so that they would not be afraid to stay on in their original homes.27 An important component of his peace message was his decision to go and live alone, in each and every affected village, to make of himself an example of fearlessness. Gandhi declared that he was going to test his own ahimsa and courage.28 If he himself lacked them, how could he propound them to the people? On 20 November, after the evening prayer meeting, Gandhi met several MLAs of the Muslim League and some Hindu political workers regarding the Bengal Government’s proposal for the formation of peace committees. The League and Mahasabha representatives disagreed about arresting miscreants. Manoranjan Chaudhuri, a Hindu Mahasabhite from Noakhali, argued that he and his associates would not be a party to the peace committees until miscreants were arrested.29 However, Gandhi was against this. The next day, to some Hindu political workers, he opined that first the committees should be formed, only then should they be entrusted with the task of dealing with the miscreants; else it virtually meant the rejection of the peace offer made by the League leaders, and would further embitter feelings.30 When Manoranjan Chaudhuri pleaded for postponing the peace committees on the grounds that most Hindu leaders had left the district and the ‘poor weavers, blacksmiths or farmers’ who were left behind would be no match for the ‘educated Muslim representatives’, Gandhi categorically said that if Hindus had fled, they had behaved as cowards and did not deserve to be called leaders.31 Nirmal Chatterji and Debendranath Mukherjee, respectively the president and the secretary of the Bengal Hindu Mahasabha, visited him on 5 December to discuss the Mahasabha project of segregating the Hindu population of Noakhali for safety concerns. Gandhi argued against such a scheme saying that it would be interpreted as preparation for war. 32 He said that if the two communities started living in separate clusters, it would really mean accepting the Muslim League’s two-nation theory – ‘I am not going to be a willing party to Pakistan. Even if I fail to prevent it and all Hindus go away, I shall still remain here; and shall not make a single change in my religious practice.’33

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Gandhi pointed out that fear would only worsen matters. If a sense of helplessness persists, then even a few individuals were enough to terrorize a whole mass of people. The trouble did not lie in the numerical inferiority of Hindus but in their feeling of fear and helplessness.34 During a talk to relief workers at Chandpur, he said, What goes against my grain is that a single individual can be converted or a single woman can be kidnapped or raped. So long as we feel we can be subjected to these indignities, we shall continue to be so subjected. If we say we cannot do without police or military protection, we really confess defeat even before the battle has begun. No police or military can protect people who are cowards. Your trouble is not numerical inferiority but a feeling of helplessness that has seized you and the habit of depending on others . . . that is why I am opposed to the idea of your evacuating East Bengal en masse. It is no cure for impotence or helplessness.35

Carefully he wove religion into this creed of fearlessness: ‘To run away from danger instead of facing it is to deny one’s faith in man and God and even one’s own self. It were better for one to drown oneself than live to declare such bankruptcy of faith.’36 He told them that they should not be afraid of the Muslims and their slogan of Allah-hoo-Akbar, because the Allah of Islam was the protector of all the innocent. Gandhi’s message was to ‘bravely’ give oneself to death. At Chaumuhani, when a relief worker asked him about what should be done to create a sense of security and confidence, Gandhi’s replied, ‘By learning to die bravely.’37 He said that the main tragedy of East Bengal was not that Muslims had committed acts of depredations, but that Hindus had been witness to such acts. He referred to the Rajputs dying bravely: Do you know what the Rajputs did? They killed their womenfolk when they issued forth to sacrifice themselves on the battlefield. The surviving ones immolated themselves by mounting the funeral pyre before the fortress fell rather than allow themselves to be captured and dishonoured. There is nothing courageous in thousands of Mussalmans killing out a handful of Hindus in their midst, but that the Hindus should have degraded themselves by such cowardice, i.e., being witness to abduction and rape, forcible conversion and forcible marriage of their womenfolk, is heartrending.38

By teaching them how to die an ideal death, he was trying to preach the meaning of an ideal life. To die in a nonviolent manner, protecting the cause



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of ahimsa, was to him the perfect state of spiritual upliftment and one that could be done only by the purest of the souls. At the same time, the analogy that Gandhi draws between Rajput men killing their womenfolk and the surviving ones committing jauhar vis-a-vis the notion of dying fearlessly, is extremely problematic with respect to women. Here, Gandhi actually endorses a particular form of violence against the self by advocating the killing and self-killing of women in the name of honour. For the same reasons, he opposed the formation of Rakshi Dal or bands of protectors. He argued that nobody could be the protector of another. Each person, whether a child or a grown up, had to learn the art of self-reliance and self-defence. He advised relief workers to turn themselves into sevaks or servants rather than ‘protectors’.39 His advice to the Hindus was to trust the elected Muslim government and give it a fair trial, despite everything. He pointed out that he did not know whether Suhrawardy was a good or a bad man, but he knew that he had been elected by the people of Bengal; if the people did not like a particular government, the electorate had the power to change it. But for the time being, they had to trust this government.40 At a mammoth meeting on 7 November 1946, with both Hindus and Muslims, who had gathered to seek his darshan at early morning at the Laksham junction, Gandhi said, ‘I have vowed to myself that I will stay on here and die here if necessary, but I will not leave Bengal till the hatchet is finally buried and even a solitary Hindu girl is not afraid to move freely about in the midst of Mussalmans.’41 At a later meeting, he said, ‘. . . even if every Hindu of East Bengal went away, I will still continue to live amidst the Muslims of East Bengal . . .’42 Gandhi was hoping that if nothing happened to him and to Hindus who were with him, it may convince Hindus elsewhere in riot situations, that there was no need to fear Muslims. He offered a novel formula. He refused to weaken victims with self-pity and put the onus for resolving the crisis on their shoulders, rather than on the aggressors. This is where his strategy was different from the ones adopted by other political leaders who constantly advocated the increase of military provisions to safeguard lives of people. Some Congress leaders like Nalinaksha Sanyal advocated that there must be a Central Peace Committee under the governor himself or a High Court judge.43 But Gandhi believed that only if the local people had courage, would such a calamity be averted in future. If people began to leave Noakhali and an exchange of population took place, the logical consequence of it all would be that India would be divided into too many ‘religious zones’ which was ‘unthinkable and impractical.’44

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Evacuation, for Gandhi, was the final alternative, and he would not consent to it till the majority community proved to be irrevocably hostile. But he himself would never lose hope of winning over the opponent through nonviolence and love, and he advised the people of Bengal to do the same. Although he accepted the possibility of evacuation, his experience told him that friendly relations between Hindus and Muslims were not impossible. ‘To run away from danger instead of facing it is to deny one’s faith in man and God and even one’s own self. It were better for one to drown oneself than live to declare such bankruptcy of faith,’ he said.45 When Jagneswar Ghosh from Chinsurah, wrote to say that Bengal should be partitioned because the cultures of Hindus and Muslims of Bengal were mutually incompatible, Gandhi firmly replied against the redistribution of population on the basis of religion: That would mean an admission that people of different faiths cannot live on friendly terms within the same State. The Muslim League has suggested a similar remedy for the present Hindu-Muslim tension . . . This would amount to an armed truce and not peace on terms of equality, friendship and mutual trust.46

However, he still found it difficult to make much progress. He wrote to Suhrawardy: ‘The work here is more difficult than I had imagined .  .  . Is cooperation between Hindus and Muslims an utter impossibility? If it is so, what will be the plight of Bengal and Hindusthan? What will happen to Noakhali and Tippera?’47 As late as December, he believed that he still did not see a way out. Bose recalls that throughout the day, he heard Gandhi muttering to himself: ‘Kya Karun, Kya Karun?’ (What should I do?)48 On the night of 22 December, during his stay at Srirampur, Gandhi said to Manu Gandhi, My ideas of truth and non-violence are at present being weighed in a delicate, sensitive balance, like the one used for weighing pearls . . . I am certain that the principle of truth and non-violence can never be wrong or defective; but this case (of Noakhali) may show up the deficiency of its exponent and avowed representative, i.e. myself.49

His walk through the villages of Noakhali without any police or military assistance, personally meeting victims and aggressors, was to show villagers that he was not afraid. This body politics of offering up himself to the aggressors helped in restoring confidence in the minds of victims. They slowly started



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to return home. He showed villagers that he had come to live as one of them, unlike former fact-finding teams, which had moved around the villages, but had never dared to enter them alone, let alone stay there with the affected villagers. He said, ‘During this tour I shall try my best to convey to every villager that there is no impurity in my heart at all. I can prove all that only when I live and move among those who distrust me.’50 When Gandhi talked to people gripped with fear, malice or hatred, it was almost as if he became a storyteller to a curious child. His tone was gentle and patient, he answered all questions put to him, not once losing his temper. Using examples from his own life and day-to-day existence, often from his childhood, he kept the message simple, vivid and appealing: Gandhiji touchingly described to them how as a little boy he used to be usually timid and afraid of even shadows and how his nurse Rambha had taught him the secret of Ramanama as an antidote to fear. ‘When in fear take Ramanama. He will protect you,’ she used to tell him. Ever since then Ramanama had been his unfailing refuge and shelter from all kinds of fear.51

Kamala Das Gupta, who came to Noakhali for relief work, talks of the charm exuded by Gandhi – ‘I did not know how the charm worked. But I lost my nervousness, as though I had been moving in the company of my mother, talking to her whatever might come to my head at the moment. I seemed hardly aware of the fact that I was walking by the side of a superman, one of the greatest figures of history,’52 (emphasis mine). Ashoka Gupta recalls, ‘The few meetings I had with him, the hours spent in his company, are unquestionably a treasured chapter in my own life.’53 The message of dying with self-respect rather than live with dishonour was directed particularly towards Hindu women. ‘The sacrifice of myself and my companions would at least teach them the art of dying with self-respect’, said Gandhi when he was asked how women could defend their honour in case they were attacked by the Muslim hooligans. To him, dying was an art; it had to be learnt and practiced. Dying was not something that should be thrust upon the weak by the powerful. By courting death in the cause of morality, the dead would produce a moral surplus that would then overcome the cowardice of the oppressor. He advised them to take poison before they could be dishonoured or even kill their assailants: yet another surprising instance of his espousal of violence. He pronounced that women could always save themselves from rape if they were truly virtuous.54 He said that Indian women were not abalas (helpless); rather they were famous for their heroic deeds in the past, they

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should behave like Draupadi and Sita and have more confidence in their own strength, rather than rely on men. With such comparison with Draupadi and Sita, Gandhi actually blamed women for their ‘dishonour’ and made that loss more important than their lives. They had allowed themselves to be dishonoured, and since dishonour was worse than death, they should now die. Before he came to Noakhali, he had said at a prayer-meeting at New Delhi that women must remember the incomparable power of Sita, whom all the physical might of Ravana had not been able to defile. ‘Women must learn how to die before a hair of their head could be injured.’55 He said that honour knows no surrender and every woman must take poison before she can be dishonoured. He referred to rape victims as ‘blemished’ women.56 So, not only did he advise active violence against the ‘blemished’ self by taking poison, but he also made women responsible for their own condition in an extremely hard display of the worst form of patriarchy. This piece of advice earned much anger from a large number of Bengalis. Angry and sarcastic letters were sent to him from different parts of the country. One letter dated 23 October 1946 warned him that if his advice was followed, the condition of Bengali Hindu families would be indescribable. Another remarked that Gandhi should provide all women with vials of potassium cyanide for times of need.57 Gandhi maintained a very clear stand on the issue of conversions. He stated that forced conversions were the worst thing imaginable58, the whole idea was ‘sickening’ to him and the acceptance of Islam under the threat of force was never valid. Conversion, to be real and valid, should be wholly voluntary and must be based on a proper knowledge of the two faiths, one’s own and the one presented for acceptance.59 Islam, he said, was much superior to how it had been projected in the last couple of months. Mere recitation of the kalma under duress was not Islam but its travesty. Conversion was good if it came from within; but what had happened was very far from that.60 He therefore left it to Muslim leaders to declare that the enforced recitation of a formula could not make a non-Muslim into a Muslim, such an act only shamed Islam.61 He thought that the idea of forced conversions might have emanated ‘from the highest quarters in the League command, the political intention being to free a portion of India from non-Muslims, and if possible even to place India itself under Islamic domination as in Mughal times.’62 A difference in Gandhi’s attitude towards violence against women vis-à-vis forced conversions should be noted here. The violence that Gandhi advises



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women to commit on themselves if violated, is quite pronounced. He sees rapes as the responsibility of rape victims. But those forcibly converted were ‘victims’ to him and he lost his patience with the League on this issue. The sanctity of Hindu religion perhaps meant more to him than the violation of women. He blamed the League for conversions, but not for incitement of violence against women. Even though he otherwise asked Hindus to trust the League, on the question of conversions, his patience broke down. His prayer meetings were an important part of his Noakhali experiment. They provided space to both communities to come out and sit together peacefully. Hindus were encouraged to come because it would instil courage in them to face their aggressors. Muslims had to be persuaded and encouraged even more, because it would enable them to shake off the stigma of having resorted to violence and help to instil in their minds the desire for peace. Both the Ramanama and verses from the Koran were recited. However, often, when the Ram-dhun was sung, Muslims would get up and leave the meeting.63 ‘His stout defence of his Ram-dhun and his prayer meetings testified to his fight for religious freedom; prayer for him broke all religious and communal boundaries and, in addition, it even gave voice to the protesting soul. The prayer meetings brought people out into the open for the first time after 10 October 1946, and thereby, broke the tyranny of fear.’64 Kamala Das Gupta talks of women who had attended Gandhi’s prayer meetings, ‘That night Hindu women of all stations of life walked back to their homes without fear. The roads of Noakhali had become safe again on that night. The presence of one man had worked the miracle . . .’65 At his prayer meeting of 28 December, Gandhi introduced Jawaharlal Nehru to the congregation. Nehru had come to visit him that morning to request him to return to Delhi, to guide the Congress on matters regarding the interim government. Gandhi, however, refused to budge. At the meeting, he said that some suspected that Congress leaders had come to consult him about Hindu safety alone. Gandhi dispelled such a notion by arguing that the Congress leaders were troubled at the state of communal affairs and since he was an ‘expert on the Hindu-Muslim question’, they had come to consult him on how to remedy matters.66 He was anxious to convince Muslims that the Congress was not a Hindu organization, as the Muslim League claimed, and it was committed to the interests of the Muslims as well. At the same time, he also pointed out that the League was the elected government in Bengal and if Hindus of Bengal believed in democracy, they would have to learn to respect the League.67

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GANDHI’S IMPACT ON MUSLIMS Gandhi was totally distraught at his lack of hold over the Muslims. Just before he undertook his ‘pilgrimage’ on foot in the villages of Noakhali, he remarked to Sushila Nayar: ‘Muslims had been taught to regard me as an arch enemy of Islam. If I was to overcome that feeling, I could only do so by entering into their midst in the most unprotected condition possible. I would have to depend on them completely for all my needs and they would be free to do with me what they liked.’68 He told Sarat Bose that the Muslims were not very forthcoming in the peace efforts that he had initiated, and that he would have to carry on with Hindu workers alone.69 When some press reporters came to him for an interview on 19 December, he asked them to find out about the effect of his presence was on the Muslim villagers of Noakhali.70 ‘Through his attempt to live among the Muslim peasants in their own villages, was to convince them by his friendly acts that he was as much concerned about their welfare as of the Hindus.’71 Nirmal Kumar Bose also found that Gandhi’s appeal to Muslims seemed to bear less fruit than it did among Hindus of East Bengal.72 At a speech at a prayer meeting at Srirampur, on 26 December 1946, he said that he was sad that a community that had earlier been his friend, now regarded him as his enemy. He was out to prove that he was a ‘real friend’ of the Muslims and so he had chosen for his ‘greatest experiment’ a place where Muslims were in a majority.73 At the beginning of his stay at Noakhali, he was not welcome except in a few areas. Ismail Khondkar, a Muslim farmer who lived near Srirampur, welcomed him when he visited his house and agreed that what had happened at Noakhali was truly evil. Another maulvi, Waliullah Kari, also came to him to pay his respects.74 Kamala Das Gupta recalls, ‘As we walked down some Muslims and a very small number of Hindus were found to be standing on the road-side. Bapu was making salam to the Muslim and namaskar to the Hindus. The Muslims however rarely returned Gandhiji’s salute.’75 He received ‘threatening letters’ from Muslims asking him to leave for Bihar.76 Hamiduddin Chaudhury, the parliamentary secretary of the Muslim League Ministry issued a statement in Azad on 14 December 1946. It said that Gandhi did not intend to go to Bihar and insisted on staying at Noakhali only to focus attention of the world on the happenings at Noakhali and push the Bihar tragedy to the background.77 Hamiduddin went on to suggest that Gandhi’s presence was not needed in Bengal, as once the victims were free from any ‘outside propaganda’ they would once again repose confidence on their Muslim neighbors.78 Nirmal Bose reflected in his diary on 25 December



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that the Muslim League seemed to be carrying on a ‘systematic campaign’ to drive Gandhiji out of Noakhali.79 A postcard was sent to him on the same day from the office of the Feni subdivisional Muslim League which pointed out that Gandhi’s place was in Bihar because Noakhali was now normal.80 Gandhi often became an object of ridicule in the League newspapers (See, Figures 6.1, 6.2 and 6.3).

Fig. 6.1: Cartoon in Dawn, 3 November 1946

In response, Gandhi said that the statement had ‘staggered’ him because he was under the impression that the League believed in the sincerity of his programme. He said: I have not come to East Bengal to hold an enquiry. I have come to make my humble contribution to a lasting and heart peace between the two communities . . . Perhaps on reflection, you will discover in your very article valid reason for my longing to be in Noakhali in preference to Bihar. How can I test the efficacy and soundness of my ahimsa except in a place where even the loudest protestations of trust in my professions can be so short-lived as in your case?81

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Fig. 6.2: Cartoon in Dawn, 2 November 1946. The image shows the viceroy looking through a special microscope, provided by Gandhi that magnified the Noakhali casualties thousand times. Under such an influence, he ignores the plight of Muslims in Bihar

Fig. 6.3: Cartoon in Dawn, 22 October 1946. The Cartoon depicts Gandhi using a ‘Book of Tricks’ to win over Muslims of Noakhali.



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Muslims at Dattapara avoided his prayer meetings. Sometimes, even when they attended the prayer meetings, they would leave once the Ramanama began to be recited. On one occasion, some young Muslim boys had deliberately soiled the path that Gandhi walked upon. Gandhi cleaned the dirt and excreta himself, while villagers simply stood by watching him. Gandhi remarked that he was actually teaching the wrongdoers a lesson. This continued for some days, but then villagers themselves came forward to clean the path along with Gandhi.82 He told Muslims that he himself believed that Hindus and Muslims could be friends and live together peacefully. If they believed that was impossible, then Gandhi would confess himself defeated.83 His statement, ‘I shall advise the Hindus accordingly,’84 reveals his old tactic once again, i.e. of throwing the onus of reparation upon the shoulder of the wrongdoer, to give the latter the opportunity and also the responsibility of restoring the relations that they themselves had ruptured. Likewise, he told the Muslims that he had come to serve both communities, but just as he did not want to parade his religion, he would also not forgo his beliefs. He pleaded for tolerance from the majority community and simultaneously urged the minority community not to give up their beliefs out of fear. Gradually, from January 1947, the mood began to change. On his tours, Muslims began to acknowledge his presence. They now returned his greetings. It was a very slow process but change did come about bit by bit. Some Muslims approached him to seek advice as to which the right path was. On one occasion in January 1947, when Gandhi installed an idol back in a temple, in the presence of a number of Muslims in Bhatialpur, the latter took the vow of protecting the temple.85 Gandhi himself noted the change – ‘I have observed distinct signs of Hindus now venturing to come forward and showing their courage to some degree, or to put it better, they have shed off some of their weakness. So also, the Muslims, whose attitude has undergone a perceptible change.’86 Renuka Ray, then at Noakhali with Gandhi, wrote: Some of these Muslims, in fact, helped him to restore the confidence of the minority community of that area. It was a wonderful thing to see how people first came to him, defied him very often and were unwilling to listen to what he had to say. Then in half an hour or so he would convert them completely and they would become persons to serve him perhaps better than the followers whom he already had with him.87

The fact that Gandhi walked alone, without the protection of any military or police, or for that matter without a whole host of Congressmen at his disposal,

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did work something like a miracle. It showed that he fully trusted Muslims with his life. That trust was a responsibility that they learnt to accept. Sardar Niranjan Singh Gill, at Noakhali with his party of Sikhs, said, ‘When they saw the Sikhs moving about from place to place; the Sikhs who are known as warriors with folded hands, following Gandhiji’s principles, it had some impact on both the Hindus as well as the Muslims.’88 Manuben Gandhi, on a more positive note, remarked that by February 1947, after about four months of having Gandhi amidst them, the change became distinctly visible. Muslims now insisted that he should stay in their houses. When Gandhi arrived at Raipura, the people of the town, including Muslims, welcomed him and presented him with a beautifully carved wooden casket.89 When Gandhi finally left Bengal by boat, Manuben recalls that the banks were lined with crowds of spectators. Women, both Hindu and Muslim, put vermillion marks on Gandhi’s forehead and wished him good luck with his mission in Bihar.90 When Gandhi reached Chandpur, women clad in ‘rich’ saris, which would otherwise be reserved only for festive occasions, showered flowers and rice grains on him from their windows and the entire road was strewn with flowers.91 It was a spectacle, as if all auspicious preparations had been made to acknowledge a saint amidst them. GANDHI’S PERSONAL LIFE AS AN ‘EXPERIMENT’ Gandhi’s personal life and his peace mission at Noakhali came to be intricately interwoven. Since he believed that it was not the ideology of nonviolence that was itself a failure, but rather he himself, as its principal champion, who had failed, he began to experiment with his other ideals at this crucial juncture. He asked Manu Gandhi, to share his bed at night and also the sheet with which he covered himself. He then tried to ascertain if there were the least traces of sensual arousal in him or her.92 Even earlier, whenever he had been afraid of political futility, he had set out to test himself in different ways. The ‘experiment with Bramhacharya’ (celibacy) as he called it, did not originate in Noakhali. It also happened in 1944, before the failure of his talks with Jinnah. He had then asked Abha Gandhi to sleep naked with him. As Tidrick remarks, he was possibly trying to gain moral strength to convert Jinnah by putting himself through an ordeal.93 Purity, celibacy and politics always went hand in hand for him, and a failure of one necessarily implied that the other parameters would also fail. They therefore needed constant testing. At Noakhali, where he faced one of the toughest challenges of his life, he needed to be absolutely sure of his sexual ‘purity.’



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This caused great consternation for some of his colleagues. Nirmal Kumar Bose recalls that whatever be the value of this prayog in Gandhi’s own case, it often left a negative impact or ‘a mark of injury’ on those who were not of the same ‘moral stature’ as Gandhi himself.94 Often such women, used by Gandhi for his ‘experiment’, became increasingly possessive, and this invariably took up a lot of Gandhi’s time. Parasuram, who was also a close associate, shared this view. He told Gandhi that he could not afford to be distracted by his women associates when a national duty was calling upon him. The associates seemed to have worried more about what the experiment would cost Gandhi than about what it could do to very young girls whom he used for his tests. Gandhi argued that he did not inferiorize the women whom he drew into the experiment because neither he, nor the girls who shared his bed, felt any lust towards each other. The women were always willing partners who shared his views. When Gandhi lay down with them, he conceived them to be his sister, and therefore the question of lust never arose, he said. Gandhi categorically maintained that the word experiment was ill chosen, and that the women in his bed did not suffer in any way, ‘they were before the experiment what they are today . . .’95 Gandhi’s response again reveals complex and violent undertones. He was no doubt trying to generate a moral surplus within himself which would enable both the aggressor and the victim in Noakhali to appreciate his philosophy of nonviolence. Testing his Brahmacharya vow recalls the Tantric ritual of putting the body through extreme sexual ordeal by deferring the actual act of consummation till the end. ‘Fasts and sexual tests became his last experiments with Truth. They made his body a site of self-inflicted ordeals, an instrument of torture that was turned against itself ’.96 This torture of the self was extended to women who were asked to share his bed. Joseph Alter, however, argues that the question was not so much about Gandhi’s faith in his own convictions and his experiments with Manuben were not borne out of a sense of personal crisis, but it was more a matter of confronting absolute violence with absolute nonviolence.97 Amidst the consuming crisis in Noakhali was how he took a great and personal interest in the lives and the day to day activities of his close associates who worked with him in different camps. Renuka Ray relates one such incident. She was not a very good walker and therefore had trouble walking on the narrow bridges which Gandhi crossed often on his tour. So, she would stay behind and often have other people help her. When Gandhi came to know about this, he persuaded her to gather courage, till she eventually managed to cross the bridge all by herself without any help.

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This ‘personal contact’ was most evident in the case of Manu Gandhi. Gandhi called himself as Manu’s mother, and interacted at an extremely intimate level with her, even deciding on the clothes that she should wear, noticing how she recited her prayers and was meticulous about the time she went to bed so that she did not fall ill. He bid her to tell him all her thoughts, demanding that she should always give him the whole truth.98 Gandhi’s, obviously, was an oppressive notion of motherhood, and he was most demanding and possessive in his relationship with her. He told Manu soon after she arrived at Noakhali, ‘. . . all you have to do now is to serve me in all possible ways. You shouldn’t pay attention to anything else.’99 She was not supposed to assist at the peace effort; serving Gandhi became synonymous with serving peace. THE LAST WEAPON OF THE SATYAGRAHI – GANDHI AND THE CALCUTTA FAST, 1947 In spite of all his efforts, it was a fragile peace that Gandhi had managed to establish and Bengal was once again one of the chief sites for violence soon after independence. Sporadic riots broke out in Noakhali from May, and Gandhi decided to go there yet again. However, the deteriorating communal situation in Calcutta in May forced him to spend a few more days there. This time the initiative for violence came from Hindus.100 Gandhi toured Calcutta for nearly two hours and visited the affected areas. When he returned from his tour, Suhrawardy requested him not to leave for Noakhali but to stay in Calcutta to restore peace. Gandhi agreed to this proposal but laid down a condition: I would remain if you and I are prepared to live together . . . We shall have to work as long as every Hindu and Mussulman in Calcutta does not safely return to the place where he was before . . . the implication of what I mean is that the old Suhrawardy will have to die and accept the garb of a mendicant.101

Suhrawardy agreed. Pyarelal has noted that in August 1947, after his dethronement from the Council of the Muslim League, Suhrawardy ‘was a different man from the power conscious chief minister of Bengal, playing for nothing less than the leadership of a Sovereign United Bengal.’102 The place for this joint enterprise was a vacant Muslim residence at 150 Beliaghata Main Road. Beliaghata was a locality with mixed demographics. This and the surrounding areas of Maniktala, Kankurgachi and Ultadanga were worst affected in the recent riots. However, when Gandhi arrived at his new residence in Calcutta, he met with immediate resistance. At the gate, a number of young



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men had gathered with black flags and posters which said that Gandhi should go back and ‘rather settle in a quarter like Kankurgachi or Ultadanga form where Hindus had been driven away, instead of coming here to look after Muslim interests.’103 They asked Gandhi he had come: ‘You did not come when we were in trouble. Now that the Muslims have complained, all this fuss is being made over it.’104 Cries of ‘Gandhi Go Back’ resounded. Immediately after Gandhi went inside the house, stones were thrown through windowpanes. Every day Gandhi met such Hindu protestors to answer their numerous grievances. He reasoned with them that he had come to Calcutta to serve Hindus and Muslims alike. How could he, who was a Hindu by birth, by creed and by way of living, be an enemy of Hindus? He said that he was putting himself under the protection of the people of Calcutta. The tactic was similar to Noakhali: to turn the tables upon the perpetrators of violence and make them responsible for his life. He gave the people of Calcutta a stern ultimatum that if they went ‘mad’ again, he would not live to see such madness. However, it was no easy task to placate the hate ridden people. At a prayer meeting on 14 August, the crowd became unruly and demanded Suhrawardy. They began to shout for his blood and stone pelting began again. It stopped only when Gandhi appeared in person in front of the violent crowd. Pyarelal recalls that ‘Rapidly the tumult subsided. There was total silence.’105 Suhrawardy then admitted before the crowd that the Great Calcutta Killing had been his responsibility.106 This was a momentous confession and Gandhi’s presence emboldened him to take such a step. Pyarelal notes that this ‘unequivocal, straight and candid confession of his guilt by one who had made arrogance and haughtiness his badge and never known humility, had a profound effect on the crowd.’107 As at Noakhali, so with Suhrawardy, Gandhi could indeed, sometimes, change hearts of men and women to produce repentance in place of hatred. Communal tension began to die down gradually; news arrived of a mixed gathering of Hindus and Muslims numbering about 5,000 having come out on the streets to appeal for unity.108 Suhrawardy said that it was Gandhi’s presence that had worked this ‘miracle’ in a single day.109 On Independence Day, people gathered in front of Gandhi’s house to seek his darshan. Members of the West Bengal cabinet also came for his blessings. There were scenes of Hindu-Muslim fraternization throughout the city. On the same day, which also happened to be Id, a number of Muslims gathered in front of the house to see him and break their Roza (fast). A local newspaper reported: ‘From early morning people began to pour in to Gandhiji’s residence and as the day advanced their number swelled into a big crowd.’110 Gandhi

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came out of his residence, thanked Muslims and later distributed fruits among his Muslim friends to celebrate the festival.111 The prayer meeting that evening consisted of more than 30,000 people, all of whom had come for darshan. However, Gandhi had doubts about this sudden wave of friendship and suspected that this could be a short-lived phenomenon. He wrote to Rajkumari Amrit Kaur, ‘For the moment I am no enemy. Who knows how long this will last! Hindus and Muslims have become friends practically in a day. Suhrawardy has become transformed, so it looks.’112 On 16 August, when about ten thousand people gathered at the compound of his residence to seek darshan, Gandhi was irritated by the ruckus they made. He rebuked the crowd and said that independence would lose its significance if people indulged in acts of indiscipline.113 On 18 August, Gandhi held a prayer meeting at the Maidan, which was attended by lakhs of people from both communities. The choice of the Maidan was symbolic – exactly a year earlier, it had been the site for the August carnage of 1946. Long before the scheduled hour of the prayer meeting, thousands made their way to the Maidan, shouting ‘Jai Hind ’ and ‘Hindu-Muslim ek ho.’114 In prayer meetings, he congratulated the people of Calcutta for maintaining peace. Calling the sudden example of friendship a ‘delirious fraternization’ Gandhi said that if this was permanent, then the noble example of Calcutta would affect Punjab and other parts of India as well. Suhrawardy again noted that ‘by God’s will and Mahatmaji’s kripa [grace] what only three or four days before was considered an impossibility has miraculously turned into a fact.’115 At night when Gandhi and Suhrawardy toured the city, they witnessed deafening cries of ‘Mahatma Gandhi Zindabad.’ Some sprinkled rose water (a sign of auspiciousness) on him. Even Suhrawardy, who only about a week ago, was considered to be an arch enemy of Hindus, could move about freely, as he sat next to Gandhi in a car. On their way back home from the mosque, Muslims exchanged greetings with Hindus, sprinkled rose water on them and offered them atar. Sweets were sent to mosques by Hindus. Later, numerous processions composed of large numbers of Hindus and Muslims paraded the streets raising ‘deafening shouts’ of ‘Hindus and Muslims unite.’116 There were a number of such peace marches on subsequent days. On 26 August, there was a three mile long peace procession comprising members of both communities. Suhrawardy led the procession. When it crossed Gandhi’s residence, he came out and acknowledged the crowd. Members of the Muslim National Guard and the Hindustan National Guard marched side by side, with slogans of unity.117



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But all this turned out to be short-lived, just as Gandhi had feared. The situation suddenly took a turn for the worse and Gandhi was attacked at his Beliaghata residence. On 31 August, the night before Gandhi and Suhrawardy were to leave for Noakhali, a Hindu mob started demonstrating outside his residence.118 Windowpanes were smashed, some of them even entered the house and began smashing up pieces of furniture and picture frames. Gandhi appeared at one of the doors, demanded the reason for the disturbance and pleaded with the crowd to depart. But the crowd wanted Suhrawardy.119 It was only when the police came in that the rowdy crowd dispersed. For Gandhi, police help was an ultimate and humiliating defeat. On 1 September, news arrived that anti-Muslim riots had started in Central Calcutta.120 Some of the poorer Muslims in Miabagan and other quarters of Beliaghata had already returned to their homes on the assurance of Gandhiji’s presence in their midst. But on that day, as the news of fresh riots poured in, one batch of them boarded a truck belonging to a Hindu merchant to escape to Rajabazar which was the nearest Muslim neighbourhood.121 The panic and ghettoization that the city had seen during the Great Calcutta Killing resumed as people began migrating from one part of the city to another. The Hindusthan Standard reported on 2 September 1947: Calcutta’s peace was disturbed by a regrettable flare up of communal trouble on Monday. Trouble suddenly broke out shortly after mid-day in the central part of the city. In course of the afternoon and evening, sporadic incidents occurred in different parts of the city.122

Night curfew starting at 6pm and ending at 6am, was imposed in some parts of the city, like Burra Bazar, Jorasanko, Amherst Street, Beliaghata, Manicktolla, Bowbazar and Taltola. These were some of the badly affected areas and potential tension zones. An open truck with about thirty passengers crossed Gandhi’s residence and as soon as it crossed a nearby graveyard, hand grenades were hurled upon it from the roof of a building inside the graveyard. Two Muslims were instantly killed. Gandhi immediately rushed there. Nirmal Bose remarks, ‘His face hardened . . .’123 At that moment, Gandhi once again decided to go in for a fast unto death ‘for the return of the sanity among the people of Calcutta.’124 Raja Gopalachari argued with Gandhi against the fast but the latter was adamant. He said that it was the responsibility of the governments of India and Pakistan both to pursue their own course of action for the restoration of peace, but he had to fulfil his own duty. He said that he had received urgent messages calling him to Punjab, and lamented,

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But now that the Calcutta bubble seems to have burst, with what face can I go to Punjab? The weapon which has hitherto proved infallible for me, is fasting . . . it may touch the hearts of all the warring elements even in Punjab, if it does in Calcutta.125

He argued that his duty was to reach out to each and every Hindu in Calcutta. Since he had still not found a permanent solution to communal violence, he decided on the final alternative of the fast. He started the fast on 1 September and it lasted for three days. He called it off on the evening of 4 September only after he felt that he had assurance enough from the residents of the city that they would lay down their lives, if necessary, to restore peace in Calcutta. Before breaking his fast, he laid down certain strict conditions in a document which was signed by leaders of different communities. He threatened that if communal frenzy broke out in Calcutta again, he would go on an ‘irrevocable’ fast.126 As always, Gandhi’s fast soon had its desired effect: ‘. . . the government as well as the public were able to report to Gandhiji that not one incident had taken place during the last twenty-four hours. Group after group came to Gandhiji either with reports or with promises . . .’127 They came to see him with the promise that they would do everything to quell violence and that unless he ends his fast, they would go on a sympathetic fast with him.128 Manu Gandhi, who was still a part of Gandhi’s entourage, reflects, ‘it was thus on the eve of the second day of the fast that the foundation of the hope for peace was laid by Hindus and Muslims by pledging themselves to Bapu.’129 Gandhi’s fast had a similar effect even upon the goondas of the city. On the afternoon of 4 September, the third day of the fast, a party of thirty-five goondas visited Gandhi and surrendered some arms in front of him. Manu Gandhi recalls that it was a ‘vivid picture of the victory that a small frail human being had been able to achieve, through sheer love, over goondas, who always perpetrated inhuman crimes .  .  .’130 On 5 September, several young men came to him again and surrendered some country made arms, guns, swords and cartridges, promising that they would never use them again. Gandhi looked at these arms with great interest and said, ‘I see some of these for the first time in my life.’131 Before we analyze what Gandhi’s fast meant and proved to be, let us look at how Gandhi himself understood fasting. Fasts were nothing unusual for him. His mother had left an ‘outstanding impression’ on his mind. His earliest recollections of her were those where she would take the hardest vows and keep them without flinching. He recalls how ‘to keep two or three consecutive fasts was nothing to her.’132 He referred to Buddha, who fasted and prayed



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whenever he saw oppression, injustice and death around him. Gandhi had long seen fasting as a method for penance for communal conflict.133 He believed that fasting was a method of penance in Islam as well. Fasting was also seen as a way by which the ‘guilty parties’ could be made to realize his distress and the depth of their own fall134; it was a way in which he could reach out to people directly. Calling the fast a ‘drastic remedy’ Gandhi believed that dire occasions called for such a measure.135 While on fast in Delhi in 1948, he said that there comes a time, when ‘a votary of non-violence is obliged to undertake a fast to protest against a social injustice. He can do so only when he has no other ways open to him in his capacity as a votary of nonviolence. I am now facing such a situation.’136 According to him, a Satyagrahi should fast only as a last resort when all other avenues of redress have been explored and have failed.137 Fasts, according to him, were an integral part of ahimsa. After his fast in 1933, a co-worker had told him that some of them felt that his ‘fasting unto death’ may mean a conscious or unconscious loss of faith in the efficacy of nonviolence. Gandhi had replied that fasting unto death was not due to loss of faith in nonviolence; on the contrary, it was the final seal upon that faith: ‘Sacrifice of self even unto death is the final weapon in the hands of a non-violent person.’138 He lamented that fasting had not been accepted as a recognized part of satyagraha: ‘It has only been tolerated by politicians. I have however been driven to the conclusion that fasting unto death is an integral part of Satyagraha programme, and it is the greatest and most effective weapon in its armoury under given circumstances.’139 He however, was quick to caution that not everyone was qualified for undertaking a fast without a proper course of training. The fasts were not just a personal penance. They were intimately connected with his idea of self-restraint. Self-denial and self-restraint produced selfpurification: ‘Fasting and prayer . . . are a most powerful process of purification and that which purifies necessarily enables us the better to do our duty and to attain our goal.’140 The fast could only be undertaken by a person who is completely ‘pure.’ He considered himself to be worthy of the undertaking as he had dedicated his life and work to the restoration of communal peace and harmony amidst warring communities – ‘Just think for a while how much pollution has crept into our beloved India. Then you will be glad to see that an upholder of the dignity of India, who possesses the necessary strength and perhaps the necessary purity, is out to put an end to this pollution.’141 (Emphasis mine.) When asked whether his fast was against Pakistan, Gandhi pointed out that

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his fast was against everybody, ‘All should purify their souls.’142 The fast was also a challenge thrown at warring masses of Calcutta: ‘If the Muslims really love me and regard me as an asset, they can demonstrate their faith by refusing to give way to the instinct of revenge and retaliation even if the whole of Calcutta goes mad. In the meantime, my ordeal must continue.’143 In a way Gandhi had woven his own world around him where he was the focal point; personal triumph and national liberation were a complicated concoction in his belief system. It is important to understand how historians have analysed Gandhi’s fasts.144 Tim Pratt and James Vernon argue that so embedded was fasting in Gandhi’s everyday life that it becomes difficult to neatly separate its practice as a regime of the self from its performance as an act of national significance. This, the scholars argue, was precisely the point, ‘to inscribe the self upon the nation, and the nation upon the self, in ways that elevated Gandhi’s claim to moral leadership.’145 Robert Klitgaard views Gandhi’s fasts as ‘coercive threats’, which compelled his opponents to obey quickly, or else have his death on their hands.146 ‘These fasts,’ writes Klitgaard, ‘committed Gandhi to a course of action and left the next move – and the responsibility for his life – to the opponent.’ Bhikhu Parekh argues that for Gandhi, the individual was the sole social reality, and groups were mere collection of individuals. ‘The conflicts between them were ultimately like and reducible to those between individuals, and capable of being resolved in the same way as those between friends or members of a family. His approach prevented him from appreciating their autonomous dynamics.’147 Believing that human conflicts owed their origin to the fact that men have ‘narrow hearts’, Gandhi sought to unite hearts by means of moral appeals and voluntary, self-imposed suffering.148 David Hardiman points out that Gandhi knew that in many cases reason alone could not win an argument; it had to be supplemented and reinforced with emotional and political pressure, for people tend to be swayed as much by emotion as by rational argument.149 Hardiman notes that many of Gandhi’s fasts were directed against those with whom he believed he had a strong emotional bond and his fasts were meant to make those who loved him reconsider his actions; ‘He never used a fast to gain political concessions from the British.’150 At the same time, Gandhi did not wish the people of Calcutta to go on a sympathetic fast with him. They were to go forth among the victims, assure them that they were safe and rebuild life. The challenge that Gandhi’s espoused with his fast was also evident when he said, ‘. . . my blood will be upon your head if you say one thing and mean another . . .’151 Hardiman considers



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Gandhi’s fast to be ‘the most practical and effective strategy of all.’152 What Gandhi preached, according to Hardiman, was not impractical or utopian but was a real way out of the impasse of division and hatred. Gyan Pandey, in the context of Gandhi’s fast in Delhi in 1948, says that after Gandhi’s successful fast in Calcutta, Delhi looked up to him with new hope. Gandhi’s fast in Delhi (and his subsequent martyrdom) ‘did work something like a miracle.’153 The effect of the fast in and outside Delhi was electric. People made anxious enquiries about his health and politicians like Nehru and Arthur Moore went on sympathetic fasts with him. Manubehn Gandhi recalls that even people from Pakistan wanted to know what they were to do to wean away Gandhi from his fast.154 Assurances of peace came from all quarters and in these circumstances Gandhi decided to end his fast. Pandey notes that Gandhi’s success at this juncture, ‘conveys an unusual message about the meaning of politics and the possibility of a new kind of political community.’155 He sees it as an improbable story of how a certain kind of ‘bodily sacrifice’156 in the public sphere, and a refusal by one outstanding leader to give his consent to the particular conception of the political community that was emerging changed the nature of sociality at the local level. The bodily sacrifice that Pandey talks about, however, did not and could not have brought about ‘a new kind of political community’ in those trying circumstances of 1946–47. The time was too short for such a radical change. What possibly mattered more to people of Calcutta and Delhi was the prospect of forever harbouring the guilt of having caused Gandhi’s death with their acts of violence. His life, for the time being, was more important to them than his actual cause. This was the reason for the fragile peace that Gandhi established at Noakhali and at Calcutta. The visible presence of Gandhi amidst them was what made them repent and temporarily refrain from communal bloodshed, not because people had genuinely subscribed to non-violence as a policy. Gandhi was aware of this limitation: Fasts undertaken according to the rules governing them are truly non-violent. There is no room there for coercion. If a friend of mine is going astray, and if I impose suffering on myself by fasting in order to awaken his better instincts, it can only be out of love. If the friend for whom I fast has no love in him, he will not respond. If he has it and responds, it is all to the good . . . he valued his love for me more than his bad ways. There is a possible risk, I admit, namely that as soon as the effect of the fast is over, he would be tempted to go back to his old ways. But then I can fast again.157 [Emphasis mine.]

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At Calcutta, Dr Dinshaw Mehta, Gandhi’s personal physician, issued a statement to The Statesman that acidosis would soon set upon Gandhi and due to his high blood pressure and advanced age, that would pose a great danger.158 The governor of West Bengal issued a similar statement: ‘The hours are steadily, and not too slowly, wearing Mahatma Gandhi away.’159 He pointed out that this time the people of Calcutta ‘can throw the blame on no outsider or foreign government if his precious life ebbs away in Calcutta.’160 The daily press and scientific medical information were thus harnessed to enhance the effects of the fast. Sumit Sarkar views Gandhi’s fast in a more nuanced way. He argues that although the fast was ‘intensely moving and heroic,’ the Gandhian way in 1946–47 ‘was no more than an isolated personal effort with a local and often rather short-lived impact.’161 Its short term and localized character was what made it successful, and it was Gandhi alone who was capable of putting in such a personal effort. It is true that others offered to go on ‘sympathetic fasts’ with him, but none had the ‘Gandhi’ effect. It was a weapon that only he could wield, so it was not a general political strategy that would be as effective when performed by others. Therefore, in the long run, it failed to reverse the communal process. The impact was short-lived, because there always remained a gap between his profession of nonviolence and how people conceived of him and capitulated to him. Here, the distinction between Gandhi as the political worker and how he was conceived as a mahatma becomes necessary, and the study of ‘the cult of the Mahatma’ assumes importance. In effect, there always remained a stumbling block in the way in which his mahatma-hood percolated down to his followers, who more often than not capitulated largely to please him, although he attributed it to their change of heart.162 Calcutta, Noakhali and Delhi hence sadly remained only a transient miracle. All said, Gandhi’s philosophy of nonviolent resistance was relatively successful in certain occasions in independent India. The struggles of the Chipko Movement under Sunderlal Bahuguna, the Narmada Bachao Andolan under Baba Amte and Medha Patkar and Irom Chanu Sharmila’s fast against army oppression in the north east, have remained nonviolent in the face of violent repression by the state and national governments. The fast to death by Potti Sriramulu for the unity of Andhra Pradesh in 1952 and in more recent years, fasts undertaken by Anna Hazare for the implementation of the Lokpal Bill show that the Gandhian technique of fasting has, in some cases, also become institutionalized in Indian politics. However, in fighting communal incendiaries, such an effort has been relatively limited, the only example being that of the Shanti Senas formed immediately after independence in



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1950 under Vinoba Bhave. Throughout the 1960s and to some extent in the 1970s, they continued their peace-keeping efforts.163 But their decline due to the lack of organization, largely abandoned such efforts. Over the decades, fundamentalists have continued to stir up community based hatred on both sides, and a struggle against them needs to be a continuous and ongoing process. ENDNOTES 1. A version of chapter 6 was previously published as ‘A Test of Faith? The Mahatma and his Tryst with Bengal, 1946-47’ in David Hardiman ed. Non Violence in Modern Indian History (New Delhi, Orient BlackSwan 2017). 2. Harijan, 15 September 1946, Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol. 92, p 144 (Hereafter referred to as CWMG). Please note that for referencing the CWMG, the electronic pdf version has been used. 3. Hindusthan Standard, 1 November 1946. 4. Ibid, 19 October 1946. 5. Ibid, 22 October 1946. 6. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 37. 7. CWMG, Volume 93, p 31. Speech at Prayer Meeting, Kazirkhil, 14th November, 1946. 8. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, pp 70–71. 9. Ibid, p 97. 10. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 35. 11. Ibid, p 36. 12. Kazi Abul Kasim, Puber Janala (Bangalee Shamagra Museum), p 44. 13. Hindustan Standard, 5 November 1946. 14. CWMG, Volume 93, p 4. Talk to Relief Workers, Chandpur, 7th November 1946. 15. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 42. 16. Ibid. 17. Hindustan Standard, 6 November 1946. 18. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 44. 19. Ibid, p 46. 20. Manubahen Gandhi, The Lonely Pilgrim: Gandhiji’s Noakhali Pilgrimage (Ahmedabad: Navjivan Publishing House, 1964), p 23. 21. M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Papers) NMML, Subject File no 40 (a), p 14. Letter dated 23-12-46, Srirampur, Noakhali District, from M. K. Gandhi to J. Askelton. 22. CWMG, Volume 93, p 125, Interview to Deobhankar, 9th December 1946. 23. Ibid, p 63, Discussion with S. C. Bose and others, Srirampur, 24th November 1946. 24. Everytime a ‘non-violent’ movement would fail, or people would resort to violence, Gandhi would consider it to be a personal failure, his own incapacity to be perfectly

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pure in his practice of ahimsa. For more details on this aspect of Gandhi’s political life, see Kathryn Tidrick, Gandhi, a Political and Spiritual Life (Verso, London, New York, 2013). 25. Oral History Transcript 168, NMML, Sardar Niranjan Singh Gill, p 127. 26. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 60. 27. CWMG, Volume 93, p 12, Talk to Relief Workers, Chaumuhani, on or after 7th November 1946. 28. Ibid, p 42, Interview to The Hindu, Kazirkhil, 19th November 1946. 29. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 58. 30. Ibid, p 60. 31. Ibid, p 62. 32. Ibid, p 96. 33. Ibid, p 97. 34. CWMG, Volume 93, p 1. Talk to Relief Workers, Chandpur, 7th November 1946. 35. Ibid, p 1. 36. CWMG, Volume 93, p 9. Talk to Refugees, Laksham, 7th November 1946. 37. Ibid, p 11. Talk to Relief Workers, Chaumuhani, On or after 7th November 1946 38. Ibid, p 11. 39. CWMG, Volume 93, p 138, Advice to workers, Srirampur 13 December 1946. 40. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 66. 41. CWMG, Volume 93, p 8. Talk to Refugees, Laksham, 7th November 1946. 42. Ibid, p 18. Speech at Prayer Meeting, Dattapara, 10th November 1946. 43. AICC Papers, NMML, File No. G 53 1946, pp 1–3. ‘Short Note on the communal situation in Bengal and its possible remedies, submittedfor the consideration of Mahatma’ by Nalinaksha Sanyal, dated 5-11-46. 44. CWMG, Volume 93, p 91, Srirampur, 2nd December, 1946, Interview to Press 45. CWMG, Volume 93, p 9. Talk to Refugees, Laksham, 7th November 1946. 46. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, pp 105–106. 47. CWMG, Volume 93, pp 16–17, Letter to Suhrawardy, 10 November, 1946, Dattapara 48. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 100. 49. Gandhi, The Lonely Pilgrim: Gandhiji’s Noakhali Pilgrimage, p 24. 50. CWMG, Volume 93, p 243, Speech at Prayer Meeting, Chandpur, 6th January 1947. 51. CWMG, Volume 93, p 8. Talk to Refugees, Laksham, 7th November 1946. 52. Oral History Transcript 95, NMML, Kamala Das Gupta, p 27. 53. Ashoka Gupta, In the Path of Service- Memories of a Changing Century (Calcutta: Stree, 2005), p 99. 54. Tanika Sarkar, ‘Gandhi and Social Relations’ in Judith Brown and Anthony Parel (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Gandhi (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011), p 186. 55. Hindusthan Standard, 19 October, 1946. 56. For a clearer understanding of Gandhi’s attitude towards women who have been raped, see Tanika Sarkar, ‘Gandhi and Social Relations’ in Judith Brown and Anthony Parel (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Gandhi, pp 184–192.



A Test of Faith 243

57. M.K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Papers) NMML, file no 424, pp 444–5. Letter dated 18.10.46 from Aruna Sen, Kalighat, Calcutta to M. K. Gandhi, Delhi. 58. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 69. 59. CWMG, Volume 93, p 262. Speech at Prayer Meeting, Jagatpur, 10th January 1947. 60. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 69. 61. D. G. Tendulkar, Mahatma, Life of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Volume 7 1945–1947 (Vithalbhai K. Jhaveri and D. G. Tendulkar, Bombay 1953), p 305. 62. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 69. 63. CWMG, Volume 93, p 247, Speech at Prayer Meeting, Masimpur, 7th January 1947. 64. Batabyal, Communalism in Bengal, From Famine to Noakhali, 1943–47, p 355. 65. Oral History Transcript 95, NMML, Kamala Das Gupta, p 33. 66. CWMG, Volume 93, p 207. Speech at Prayer Meeting, Srirampur, 28th December 1946. 67. Ibid, p 207. 68. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, pp 116-117. 69. Ibid, p 71. 70. CWMG, Volume 93 p 161, Instructions to Press Representatives, 19th December 1946. 71. Bose, My Days with Gandhi, p 138. 72. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 149. 73. CWMG, Volume 93, p 197. Speech at Prayer Meeting, Srirampur, 26th December 1946. 74. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 57. 75. Oral History Transcript 95, NMML, Kamala Das Gupta, p 32. 76. CWMG, Volume 93, p 35, Kazirkhil, 16th November 1946, Speech at a prayer meeting. 77. Azad, 14 December, 1946. 78. Ibid. 79. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 122. 80. Ibid. 81. Ibid, p 124. 82. Manubahen Gandhi, The Lonely Pilgrim : Gandhiji’s Noakhali Pilgrimage, p 114. 83. CWMG, Volume 93, p 17. Speech at Prayer Meeting, Dattapara, 10th November 1946. 84. Ibid. 85. Manubahen Gandhi, The Lonely Pilgrim : Gandhiji’s Noakhali Pilgrimage, p 180. 86. Ibid. 87. Oral History Transcript 68, NMML, Renuka Ray, p 16. 88. Oral History Transcript 168, NMML, Sardar Niranjan Singh Gill, p 129. 89. Manubahen Gandhi, The Lonely Pilgrim: Gandhiji’s Noakhali Pilgrimage. p 203. 90. Ibid, p 261.

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91. Ibid, p 263. 92. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 174. 93. Kathryn Tidrick, Gandhi, a Political and Spiritual Life (Verso, London, New York, 2013), p 303. 94. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 175. 95. Ibid, p 177. 96. Tanika Sarkar, ‘Gandhi and Social Relations’, in Judith Brown and Anthony Parel (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to Gandhi, p 191. 97. Joseph Alter, Gandhi’s Body: Sex, Diet and the Politics of Nationalism (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000), p 48. 98. Gandhi, The Lonely Pilgrim: Gandhiji’s Noakhali Pilgrimage, p 12. 99. Ibid, p 14. 100. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 255. 101. Ibid, p 259. 102. Pyarelal, Mahatma Gandhi – The Last Phase, Volume 2 (Ahmedabad, Navjivan Publishing House, 1958). 103. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 262. 104. Pyarelal, Mahatma Gandhi – The Last Phase, p 365. 105. Ibid, p 368. 106. Ibid, p 369. 107. Ibid. 108. Ibid. 109. Ibid. 110. Hindusthan Standard, 19 August 1947. 111. Ibid. 112. Pyarelal, Mahatma Gandhi – The Last Phase, p 372. 113. Hindusthan Standard, 17 August 1947. 114. Hindusthan Standard, 19 August 1947. 115. Pyarelal, Mahatma Gandhi – The Last Phase, p 371. 116. Hindusthan Standard, 19 August 1947. 117. Ibid. 118. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 272. 119. Ibid. 120. Ibid. 121. Ibid. 122. Hindusthan Standard, 2 September 1947. 123. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 273. 124. Ibid. 125. Hindusthan Standard, 2 September 1947. 126. Ibid, 6 September 1947 127. Bose, My Days With Gandhi, p 279. 128. Ibid, p 280. 129. Manubehn Gandhi, The Miracle of Calcutta (Ahmedabad: Navjivan Publishing House, 1959), p 88.



A Test of Faith 245

1 30. Ibid, p 91. 131. Hindusthan Standard, 6 September 1947. 132. M. K. Gandhi, The Story of My Experiments With Truth, (Ahmedabad: Navjivan Publishing House, Reprint Edition 2003), p 14. 133. Altogether Gandhi had undertaken 15 fasts, the fast in Delhi in 1948 being his last one. For more details, see Manuben Gandhi, Last Glimpses of Bapu (Agra, Shivalal Agarwala & Co Ltd. 1962). 134. M. K. Gandhi, The Story of My Experiments With Truth, p 209. 135. Ibid, p 209. 136. Manuben Gandhi, Last Glimpses of Bapu, p 107. 137. M.K. Gandhi, Fasting in Satyagraha (Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House, 1965), p 66. 138. Ibid, p 26. 139. Ibid, p 31. 140. M. K. Gandhi, Fasting in Satyagraha, p 9. 141. Manuben Gandhi, Last Glimpses of Bapu, p 110. 142. Ibid, p 114. 143. CWMG, Volume 96, p 328 - Discussion with Hindu-Muslim Representatives, 3rd September 1947. 144. Here I am going beyond the Calcutta fast of 1947; his previous fasts and also the Delhi fast of 1948 will be taken into consideration. 145. Tim Pratt and James Vernon, ‘“Appeal From This Fiery Bed.  .  .”: The Colonial Politics of Gandhi’s Fasts and their Metropolitan Reception’ The Journal of British Studies, Volume 44, No 1 (January 2005), p 95. 146. Robert E. Klitgaard, ‘Gandhi’s Non Violence as Tactic’, Journal of Peace Research, Volume 8, No 2 (1971), p 5. 147. Bhikhu Parekh, Gandhi’s Political Philosophy: A Critical Examination (Palgrave Macmillan, UK, 1989), p 185. 148. Ibid. 149. David Hardiman, Gandhi in His Time and Ours (New Delhi: Permanent Black, 2007), p 52. 150. Ibid. 151. M. K. Gandhi, The Way To Communal Harmony (Ahmedabad, Navajivan Publishing House, 1963), p 237. 152. Ibid, p 191. 153. Gyan Pandey, Remembering Partition: Violence, Nationalism and History in India (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), p 143. 154. Manuben Gandhi, Last Glimpses of Bapu, p 141. 155. Gyan Pandey, Remembering Partition, p 145. 156. Pandey uses the term ‘bodily sacrifice’ to denote both the fast and the assassination of Gandhi. 157. M. K. Gandhi, Fasting in Satyagraha, p 36. 158. The Statesman, 4 September 1947.

246 1 59. 160. 161. 162. 163.

Making Peace, Making Riots The Statesman, 3 September 1947. Ibid. Sumit Sarkar, Modern India, 1885–1947, p 438. Bhikhu Parekh, Gandhi’s Political Philosophy, p 185. For a more detailed analysis of the work of the Shanti Senas, see, Thomas Weber, The Shanti Sena – Philosophy, History and Action (New Delhi: Orient Black Swan, 2009).



Concluding Remarks 247

Concluding Remarks It is important that for a study of communalism, the focus should be on how, at given historical conjunctures, different subjectivities and the dynamics of identity formation relate to one another. The given-nes or the fixity of the nature of communalism is what needs to be contested. In violence of such magnitude, as were witnessed in the Great Calcutta Killing and the Noakhali riots, it is difficult to pinpoint a definite causal connection. An intermix of multiple factors operated at specific historical conjunctures to make up a potent combination that took communalism to its peak and made riots of such magnitude possible. It was interesting to observe how the Muslim peasants of East Bengal came out in support of the Pakistan movement generated by a party which had to acquire a mass base to be successful. The idea of Pakistan embodied the peasant needs and acquired a millenarian appeal by 1946. The fluid process of identity formation, where multiple jostling identities coexisted in the consciousness of the peasant community, relates to the Gramscian concept of ‘contradictory common-sense’ of subalterns1. Simply put, it means that the structure of ordinary, quotidian ‘common sense’ is contradictory in character: protests yesterday and subordination today, social satirization of upper-class norms, even when subjected to their control, millenarian hopes entwined with fatalistic submission and so on.2 A crucial element of this complex subaltern consciousness is its originality, which is a part of the creative thought process of the subaltern groups. Even when rationalizations of the caste/class system are accepted by the ‘lower’ castes/lower classes, there is discontent and resentment about their subordination. Contradictions are thus embedded in this structure of thought.3 We have seen how the self-conceptualization of the peasantry as a religious group (Muslims) and that as a class co-existed and constantly interacted with each other. Even when sectarianism replaced class consciousness as the context of mass violence, some of the distinctive traces of class still remained, which was why indeed there was often an overlap between anti-landlord jacqueries

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and Hindu–Muslim riots4. Even while supporting the millenarian idea of Pakistan, with which the peasants hoped to overthrow the Hindu zamindari opposition, they accepted the social hierarchies that Pakistan might bring to them. At the same time, the desire to attain a better world free of oppression manifested itself in the Tebhaga Movement from 1946, under the organized leadership of communists; both unfolded within an identical time frame. The success of the Muslim League lay in the way it was able to tap into this contradictory consciousness of the peasant world. It was able to emerge as the benefactor of the peasants of East Bengal, by appealing to the religious as well as to the class consciousness of the peasants, when it temporarily coupled Pakistan with Islam and a socialist outlook. Moreover, the League also made space for the schisms within the very idea of Pakistan, as we have seen in the case of the demand for a distinct Bengali identity in East Pakistan. In this way, it was able to emerge as a ‘radical mass party’, which ensured the appeal for Pakistan amongst different sections of Bengal Muslims. The famine provided a most important window of opportunity for developing community consciousness and community based mobilization, through the politics of relief and rehabilitation. Different right wing Hindu groups – from organized political parties like the Mahasabha to various volunteer organizations like the Bharat Sevashram Sangha and the Hindu Mission – managed to make deep inroads into the Hindu ‘subaltern.’ The Shuddhi and Sangathan of the Mahasabha on the one hand and the desire of the Namasudras and other ‘lower’ castes of Bengal for a distinctive social identity on the other began to merge in the aftermath of famine politics. The politics around hunger, then, presents one of the most crucial factors in the rise of communal politics in late colonial Bengal. Sectarianism continues to shape politics in independent India and communal riots – or pogroms against minorities - have remained a recurrent feature. It is primarily based on the majoritarian politics of contemporary Hindutva. The most important point, however, is that this sort of majoritarian communalism ‘has the tremendous advantage of being able to masquerade as democratic and national.’5 It is no longer restricted to Hindu–Muslim riots. Christians or any other community which falls outside the definition of the ‘Hindu’ is a threat to the nation. The biggest example of communal contestations of shared spaces, sacred or otherwise, in independent India can be seen in the continuing trouble over the Babri Masjid/Ram Janmabhoomi issue. Pradip Kumar Datta talks about how during his visit to Ayodhya in 1990, he saw small shops selling Ram mementos and numerous processions of ‘satyagrahis’ wearing saffron



Concluding Remarks 249

coloured ‘Ram-headbands’, chanting Ram slogans.6 Some of the ‘satyagrahis’ he interviewed interestingly stated that they did not believe in religion, but were inspired by the prospect of unifying Hindus.7 The use of these props at a contested space is symbolic of the projection of an overarching Hindu solidarity, where community becomes more important than faith. It is also interesting how these volunteers refer to themselves as ‘satyagrahis’ signifying to themselves – and to their audience – the essential ‘truth’ of Hinduism, as personified in Ram. The colour saffron itself has become a visible marker of militant Hinduism and a symbol of its projected unity. Any other interpretation of Hinduism or any contestations/multiplicities such as those of caste, class or gender are either strictly shoved under the umbrella of this ‘unity’ or, worse still, deemed ‘anti-national.’ The RSS wants an aggressive and valorous Hindu. It herds together young boys and instils in them total discipline and martial spirit through paramilitary drills, carefully devised games and indoctrination through a ‘Hindu’ history.8 Historicity is one of the fundamental tenets here: at the heart of Hindutva lies the myth of a continuous thousand-year-old struggle of Hindus against Muslims as the structuring principle of ‘Indian’ history.9 ‘Hindutva’ in independent India is more of a cultural endeavour, yet this is precisely how Hindu right wing groups like the RSS manage to maximize their influence on politics – ‘Its object is to reform the Hindu self, to create a Hindu identity aware of its cultural heritage. This cultural heritage is however deeply political. It extends the reach of politics to every sphere of society.’10 The politics of cultural nationalism of the Mahasabha involving the ‘lower’ castes has also taken a more concrete shape in post-Independence India, with the formation of the Patita-Pawan group in 1967 in Maharashtra11 and the continued existence in Bengal of Bharat Sevashram Sangha with its emphasis on the physical regeneration of the Hindu community. More recently, Hindu right wing groups have embarked on Ghar Wapsi (homecoming) for reconverting those who had ‘strayed’ out of the Hindu fold, invariably implying the Dalit converts. Sectarian politics with its focus on acculturation of ‘lower’ castes, in order to project a unified and fixed Hindu community, continues to be an ongoing process. ENDNOTES 1. See, Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks (New Delhi: Orient Blackswan, 2010).

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2. Arun K. Patnaik, ‘Gramsci’s Concept of Common-Sense: Towards a Theory of Subaltern Consciousness In Hegemony Process’, Economic and Political Weekly, Volume 23, No 5 (January 30, 1988) p 4. 3. Ibid. p 7. 4. Ranajit Guha, Elementary Aspects of Peasant Insurgency in Colonial India (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1983), p 335. 5. Tapan Basu et al, Khaki Shorts and Saffron Flags, Tracts for the Times (Orient Longman, 1993), p 1. 6. Pradip Kumar Datta, Heterogenities, Identity Formations in Modern India (New Delhi: Tulika Books, 2010) p 73. 7. Ibid. 8. Sumit Sarkar, Beyond Nationalist Frames: Relocating Postmodernism, Hindutva, History (Delhi: Permanent Black, 2002), p 200. 9. Tapan Basu et al., Khaki Shorts and Saffron Flags, Tracts for the Times (Orient Longman, 1993), p 2. 10. Ibid, p viii. 11. The Patita-Pawan has, since its inception, persevered towards drawing non-Brahmin groups into the Sangh Parivar. For more details, see, Thomas Blom Hansen, The Saffron Wave, Democracy and Hindu Nationalism in Modern India (New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1999).



Appendix 1 251

Appendix 1 Source: Hindusthan Standard, 8 September 1940, p 6 Full text of the letter written by P. R. Thakur to Chief Minister, Fazlul Huq, tendering his resignation from the Select Committee on Bengal Secondary Education, 1940: You may remember that I had supported the motion for circulation of the Bill for eliciting public opinion thereon. But I did not decline to serve on the Select Committee as I thought that I might thereby help to offer constructive suggestions for improving the Bill which had admittedly many highly objectionable features. During the debate however I was greatly disillusioned specially by reason of your open declaration that if the Bill were not passed into law, you and your supporters would consider yourselves untrue to Islam. The apprehension of the opponents of the Bill based on communal considerations could not have been more fully substantiated than by this amazing admission on your part. It has also been noted that you and some other supporters of the Bill have been openly stating that only a small fraction of the Hindu community belonging to the Caste Hindus is opposed to the Bill which has the support of the Scheduled Castes. Let me tell you clearly that although we the Scheduled Caste members have welcomed the inclusion of some Scheduled Caste members as such on the proposed Board and the formation of a Scheduled Caste Education Committee, we are not at all oblivious of the grave danger which threatens the cause of the future of education in this province affecting the interests of all Hindus including Scheduled Castes, if the Bill is passed into law. The Scheduled Castes have suffered a lot in the past; but it is absolutely untrue to suggest that they want to regard themselves as outside the great Hindu community. They will be untrue to their religion and to the best interests of their country if they permit themselves to be treated as mere pawns in the hands of reactionaries such as controlled the destinies of the present Government whose only object is to see the Hindus divided and weakened as far as possible.

252

Appendix 1

Please take note of the fact that our political activity is meant to make active the paralysed part of the Hindu community. Scheduled Castes can never think of separation from the Caste Hindus. It is the height of folly for other communities to contemplate of taking advantage of any internal differences among members of the great Hindu community. During the last few days I have received communications from my constituency demanding that I should not serve on the Select Committee but combine with all other sections of Hindus to resist the passing of this pernicious measure. For these reasons, please accept my resignation. I do not know if it is too late for you to mend your ways even at this stage. If you really want to serve the cause of education, my humble advice to you is that you should drop this Bill and formulate a new measure, which will be fair and just to all and above all, pave the way for furthering the cause of education in this province on a proper and more efficient basis than ever before. Forgetting past controversies if you do this even now, you may rely on the willing cooperation of all progressive sections of the public of Bengal. P. R. Thakur

Appendix 2 Source: S. P. Mookerjee Papers, NMML, V-VII Instalment, Printed Material, Serial No. 10, pp 24-29 The following figures and tables provide an estimate into the deep inroads that the Bengal Mahasabha was able to make in the famine relief system of Bengal. Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha Relief Committee President: Dr. Shyama Prasad Mookerjee Secretaries: Manoranjan Chaudhuri and Professor Hari Charan Ghose Total funds collected: Rs. 4, 70, 107-5-0 Total expenditure: Rs. 3, 76, 946-0-1

Free Kitchen

Calcutta – 1.  Behala Thakurpukur 2. Paikpara

Murshidabad – Jemokandi Maldah – Beraghoria

Mymensingh – Mymensingh Town Faridpur – Amgram Noakhali – 1.  South Satara 2. Manipur

Dinajpur – Parbatipur Khulna – Beenerpota

Number of People Served 750 1000 828 185 200 500 124 100 400 200

24 Parganas – 1. Jhinkihat 2. Phulbani

1000 100

Hoogly – Mayapur Rasulpur

300

Burdwan – Ketugram

60

254

FREE RATION

Appendix 2

Barisal

Place

No. of people served

Khayrabad

67

Chandrahar

88

Gobindpur

42

Rahamatpur

76

Barisal Town

388

Sreemantakati

50

Kalaskati

122

Patuakhali

44

Doulatkhan

56

Peerojpur

250

Banaripara

50

Raghuarchar

50

Larua

50

Bhutsala

50

Mahilara

200

Khalisakota

125

Guthia

50

Baghda

50

Lashkarpur

50

Patarhat

50

Dehergati

50

Jaguarupatali

50

Nalchira

75

Bhola

FREE KITCHEN

262

Total: 2343

Mymensingh

Place

No. of people served

Tangail

2500

Naska

100

Charpara Bajitpur

20

100

Total: 2720



Appendix 2 255

FREE KITCHEN

Dacca

Place

No. of people served

Chawkmirpur

22

Malikanda

15

Nali

125

Manikganj

125

Nayabari

125

Tara

125

Sreebari

125

Singjuri

125

Aminpur

1004

Furshail

50

Hiramara

80

Narsingdi

75

Hasara

FREE KITCHEN

500

Total: 2496

Faridpur

Place

No. of people served

Faridpur town

112

Mehendradi

105

Madaripur

1400

Shirkara

250

Birmohon

100

Megna Union

100

Chappa

FREE KITCHEN Place

Feni

Noakhali

100

Total: 2177

Noakhali No. of people served 238 625

Total: 863

256

FREE KITCHEN

Appendix 2

Tippera

Place

No. of people served

Brahmanbaria

500

Gobindia

225

Bajapti

225

Boalia

225

Paikpara

225

Meher

225

Muradnagar

75

Jatrapur

75

Elliotgunje

75

Saripur

75

Jethagram

97

Chandpur

FREE KITCHEN

625

Total: 2647

Pabna

Place

No. of people served

Badal

230

Pabna town

750

Shahjadpur

50

Bera

939

Dembra

177

Puranbharanga

100

Dhopadaha

64

Sthalnawhata

250

Brahmangram

FREE KITCHEN Place

Garibpur

Haldiabunia

50

Total: 2610

Khulna No. of people served 52 95



Appendix 2 257 Place

No. of people served

Mulghar

100

Gangachana

160

Magura

256

Bagerhat

300

Beladah

50

Dumuria

250

Khulna town

750

Raruli

25

Mitratentulia

100

Total: 2088

The following relief centres were also helped by the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha Relief Committee:

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19.

Chandpur Seva Samity (Tippera) Kustia Sevak Sangha (Nadia) Ram Krishna Mission, Sagoon Bagan (Dacca) Ram Krishna Mission, Sonargaon (Dacca) R. K. Seva Samity, Kalma (Dacca) R. K. Sevashram, Vikrampur – Paikpara (Dacca) Sri Sri Bejoy Krishna Ashram, Manbhum Jessore-Khulna Seva Samity Behrampore Silpa Mandir (Murshidabad) Lake Buddha Mandir Relief Committee (Calcutta) Marwari Hospital (Calcutta) Shibalaya Relief Committee (Barisal) Basupukur Relief Committee, Dhakuria, 24 Parganas Astanga Ayurveda Ausadhalay and Hospital (Calcutta) Hindu Nari Prasuti Seva Bhawan (Calcutta) South Vikrampore Relief Committee (Faridpur) Santipur Relief Committee (Nadia) All India Women’s Conference Ariadah Anathbhandar (24 Parganas)

Cheap ration was provided to:

1. Barisal 2. Mymensingh

8005 people 3000 people

258



3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

Appendix 2

Dacca Faridpur Noakhali Tippera Khulna Midnapore

4125 people 5180 people 1875 people 6542 people 4650 people 3650 people

In addition, the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha Relief Committee opened an orphanage at Pabna, Destitute Homes at Calcutta, Barisal, Khulna, Hoogly and Midnapore and a paddy husking centre at Pabna.

Appendix 3 Source: NMML, Akhil Bharatiya Hindu Mahasabha Papers, File Number C-59 Annual Report of The Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha for 1943-44 District Hindu Sabhas which enrolled more than 1000 members in 1943-44: Name of the Sabhas

Number of members enrolled

Bhola

4800

Barisal Sadar

3200

Ward No. XIX, Calcutta

2400

Dacca Sadar

2096

Garden Reach

1805

Noakhali Sadar

1686

Madaripur

1636

Munshiganj

1617

Brahmanbaria

1430

Tangail

1335

Narayanganj

1135

Bagerhat

1072

Mymensingh (South Sadar)

1066

Serajgunj

1016

Dinajpur Sadar

1003

Appendix 4 Source: S. P. Mookerjee Papers, NMML, VIII- IX Instalment, Subject File No. 4, 1943-44, page 79 Full text of the letter sent by Srijib Nayatirtha, Principal of Bhatpara Sanskrit College, 24 Parganas, to the Minister of Civil Supplies, Government of Bengal, 1944 Sir, In pursuance of the debate held on 14th instant in your assembly room regarding the question of bhog puja of deities within the rationed area of Bengal, I have the honour to state that the idea of worshipping deities with offerings of flowers, fruits and rice etc. among the Hindus is prevalent from very ancient times. This kind of worship is a part and parcel of Hindu civilization, and worth maintaining in consideration of its antiquated practice. The want of provision of bhog puja of deities in the rationing area of Bengal has created a vital problem and wounded the religious feeling of the Hindu public. The sooner the provision is made, the less would be the trouble of both the Hon’ble ministers and the Hindu public of Bengal. If we analyse the whole demands for bhog puja, they will come under four broad classifications: i. Daily worship of household deities ii. Deities and rites within endowments iii. Occasional Pujas and Vratas iv. Sradha ceremonies

Regarding (i) Class or household deities, there are two classes: (1) with temple and (2) without temple. Wherever there is a temple, the offering of rice is invariably given to the priest, the owner is not permitted to use the offered rice, and as the priest has generally no other means of living, so he has to depend upon that offering to maintain himself and his family. The priest



Appendix 4 261

has to perform pujas in many temples every day. Consequently, if his ration card is taken for offering rice in one temple, the question of providing other temples remains unsolved. There are deities installed in one of the rooms of the house, who are worshipped every day and offered rice. In the houses of Brahmans the deities are allowed to be worshipped by the house-holder himself, and in such cases only the offered rice may be utilised. But few Brahmans do so. But in cases of non-Brahmans (except a few deities) all are worshipped by other Brahmans of priest class, to whom the offering of rice (Naivedya) must be given without exception. So, a householder would either starve or meet the want required by the worship of deities by dispensing his own ration card. Provision for each class of deities should be made by sanctioning at least the amount of ration of an adult person. In the houses, where both kinds of deities are installed (with temple and without temple) the amount of ration should be double. (ii) In the deed of endowment – the intention of the donor should be faithfully followed. The quantity and quality of rice or other foodstuffs meant for deities should be maintained. The food being offered to deities is distributed among the needy men of the locality or among the beggars present. There are many poor men who, in spite of having ration cards, will not be able to purchase rice at this high rate from the ration shops for want of money. But if the endowment is kept alive, the poor will be maintained, many institutions like tols will be helped. In order to avoid reduplication of rations, there should be a strict principle of giving declaration of the amount of rice hoarded and its monthly return showing expenditure, to the officer-in-charge of Civil Supplies of the locality. The public and semi-public endowments – like Kalighat and Dakhineswar etc. should have enjoy their customary amount of Bhog, which for centuries feeding the poor and needy middle class people without distinction of caste and creed. (iii) As regards occasional Pujas and Vratas, the amount of rice to be offered varies according to the financial condition of the performer. A table of Pujas and Vratas is shown below with minimum amount of rice: Pujas 1. Durga

5 mds.

2. Kali

2 mds.

3. Jagadhatri

3 mds.

4. Kartik

20 seers

262

Appendix 4

5. Ratanti Kali

2 mds.

6. Saraswati

1 mds.

7. Dolejatra

20 seers

8. Annapurna

1 mds.

9. Basanti

4 mds.

10. Phalaharini

1 mds.

11. Rathajatra

1 mds.

12. Lakshmi

1 mds. (4 times a year)

13. Jhulana

20 seers



Vratas 1. Ananata

2 mds.

2.  Talnavami

1“

3. Panchami

2“

4. Sivaratri

10 seers

5. Ramnavami

10 “

6. Janamashtami

10 “

7. Sankranti

10 seers

(iv) Sradha Ceremonies: There are four classes of Sradhas: (1) Parvana (2) Ekodista (3) Adyasradha. Under the Parvana class – Mahalaya, Astaka, Navana, Nandimukh, Navadaka and Sapindi Karan – all these require not less than 10 seers of rice for each. Under Ekadista – Masika, Varsika of father, mother, grandfather, grandmother, great grandfather and great grandmother etc. – these require five seers of rice for each. (3) Under Adyasradha – Vrisotsarga is also included – this will require 15 seers of rice. It is worth mentioning here that all the rice to be provided for the above Puja and rituals should be of a dried kind and not of boiled rice. I hope you will seriously consider the question of Bhoga and Puja to make success of the rationing system, introduced recently in India. I have the honour to be Sir, Your most obedient servant, Srijiba Nyayatirtha



Bibliography 263

Bibliography MANUSCRIPT SOURCES Private Papers

• • • • •

Ashoka Gupta Papers (NMML) Ashutosh Lahiry Papers (NMML) M. K. Gandhi Papers (Pyarelal Collection) (NMML) Nanavati Papers (National Archives of India) Shyama Prasad Mookerjee Papers (NMML)

Oral History Transcripts

• Kamala Das Gupta (NMML) • Renuka Ray (NMML) • Sardar Niranjan Singh Gill (NMML)

Records of Political Organizations

• Akhil Bharatiya Hindu Mahasabha Papers (NMML) • All India Congress Committee Papers (NMML)

OFFICIAL RECORDS

Government of India

• Home Political Proceedings (National Archives of India, New Delhi)

Government of Bengal

• Home Political Proceedings, West Bengal State Archives, Kolkata • Police Records, Special Branch (SB), Kolkata Police Museum • Intelligence Branch (IB), Kolkata

India Office Records, British Library, London

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264

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PUBLISHED OFFICIAL SOURCES Survey and Settlement Reports

W. H. Thompson. 1919. Final Report on the Survey and Settlement Operations in the District of Noakhali, 1914–1919. Calcutta: Bengal Secretariat Book Depot.

District Gazetteers

Eastern Bengal and Assam District Gazetteers, Noakhali (The Pioneer Press, Allahabad, 1911). Eastern Bengal District Gazetteers, Dacca (The Pioneer Press, Allahabad, 1912).

Legislative Assembly Proceedings

Assembly Proceedings, Official Report, Bengal Legislative Assembly, 1941, 1942, 1944, 1945, and 1946.

Unpublished Official Sources

Calcutta Disturbances Commission of Enquiry, Government of Bengal, Volumes I–X. Report of the Dacca Riots Enquiry Committee, Government of Bengal, Home Department.

Other Published Sources

Mansergh, N. and P. Moon. eds. Constitutional Relations between Britain and India: The Transfer of Power 1942–47, Volumes I–XII. London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office. Bimal Prasad. 1945. Towards Freedom: Documents on the Movement for Independence in India. Indian Council of Historical Research, Oxford University Press. The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi Mitra, H. N. and N. N. Mitra. eds. The Indian Annual Register 1919–1947, Volumes 58. New Delhi: Gyan Publishing House. Famine Inquiry Commission. 1984. Report on Bengal. New Delhi: Usha. Chatterjee, N. C. 1945. Hindu Politics. The Message of the Mahasabha. Collection of Speeches & Addresses by Sj. NC Chatterjee. Ramesh Chandra Banerjee.

Newspapers, Periodicals and Journals 1. Amrita Bazar Patrika 2. Dawn 3. Hindusthan Standard 4. People’s Age 5. People’s War 6. The Statesman 7. The Indian Express



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8. Star of India 9. Janayuddha (Bengali) 10. Dacca Prakash (Bengali) 11. Modern Review

MEMOIRS, AUTOBIOGRAPHIES, BIOGRAPHIES AND DIARIES Ahmed, A. M. 1970. Amar Dekha Rajnitir Panchash Bochor 2nd ed. Dhaka: Nauroz Kitabistan. Basu, Jyoti. 1997. With the People; A Political Memoir Volume 1 . Translated and adapted by Surabhi Banerjee. New Delhi: UBSPD. Bose, Nirmal K. 1953. My Days With Gandhi. Calcutta: Nishana. Chakravartty, Renu. 1980. Communists in Indian Women’s Movement 1940–1950. New Delhi: People’s Publishing House. Gandhi, Manubehn. 1962. Last Glimpses of Bapu. Agra: Shivalal Agarwala & Co Ltd. . 1959. The Miracle of Calcutta. Ahmedabad: Navjivan Publishing House. Gandhi, Mohandas K. 1965. Fasting in Satyagraha. Ahmedabad: Navajivan Publishing House. . 2003. The Story of My Experiments With Truth reprint ed. Ahmedabad: Navjivan Publishing House. Gupta, Ashoka. 2005. In the Path of Service – Memories of a Changing Century. Kolkata: Stree. Hashim, Abul. 1974. In Retrospection. Dacca: Mowla Brothers. Ikramullah, Begum Shaista Suhrawardy. 1991. Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy: A Biography. Pakistan: OUP. Khan, Mujibur Rehman. 1944. Eastern Pakistan. Calcutta: East Pakistan Renaissance Society. . January 1942. Pakistan. Calcutta: Mohammadi Book Agency. Narayan, T. G. 1944. Famine over Bengal. Calcutta: The Book Company Ltd. Pyarelal. 1958. Mahatma Gandhi – The Last Phase Volumes 1 and 2. Ahmedabad: Navjivan Publishing House. Ray, P. K. 1990. Down Memory Lane: Reminiscences of a Bengali Revolutionary. New Delhi: Gyan Publishing House. Ray Chowdhury, Tapan. 2007. Bangalnama. Calcutta: Ananda Publications. . 2003. Romonthon Athaba Bhimroti Prapter Porocharitcharcha. Calcutta: Ananda Publications. Samata, Satish Chandra, et al. 1946. August Revolution and Two Years’ National Government in Midnapore, Part 1. Calcutta: Orient Book Company. Sen, Manikuntata. 1982. Sediner Katha. Calcutta: Nabapatra Publication. Sengupta, Amalendu. 1989. Uttal Challish, Asamapta Biplab. Calcutta: Pearl Publishers. Thomas, K. P. 1955. Dr. B. C. Roy. Calcutta: West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee. Tuker, Francis. 1950. While Memory Serves. London: Cassell and Company Limited.

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Novels and Plays

Bandyopadhyay Bibhutibhushan. 1959. Asani Sanket. Calcutta: Mitra & Ghosh Publishers. Bhattacharya, Bimal. 2004. Nabanna. Calcutta: Dey’s Publication. Huq, Hasan Ajijul. 2011. Agunpakhi. Dhaka: Ityadi Grantha Prakash. Kar, Bimal. 2008. Dewal. Calcutta: Ananda Publishers. Bandyopadhyay, Manik. 2012. Shrestha Golpo. Calcutta: Bengal Publisher’s Pvt. Limited, 2012). . 2012. Upanyashsamagra, Volume III. Dhaka: Absar.

Secondary Readings

Books

Ahmed, Rafiuddin. 1981. The Bengal Muslims 1871–1906 A Quest for Identity. Delhi: OUP. Alter, Joseph. 2000. Gandhi’s Body: Sex, Diet and the Politics of Nationalism. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Bagchi, Jasodhara and Subhoranjan Dasgupta. 2003. eds. The Trauma And The Triumph: Gender And Partition In Eastern India. Kolkata: Stree. Bandyopadhyay, Sekhar. 2004. Caste, Culture and Hegemony, Social Domination in Colonial Bengal. New Delhi: Sage Publications. . Caste, Protest and Identity in Colonial India: the Namasudras of Bengal, 1872– 1947. Surrey: Curzon Press. . 2009. Decolonization in South Asia – Meanings of Freedom in Post-independence West Bengal. London and New York: Routledge. Basu, Tapan, et al. Khaki Shorts and Saffron Flags, Tracts for the Times. Delhi: Orient Longman. Batabyal, Rakesh. 2005. Communalism in Bengal: From Famine to Noakhali, 1943-47. New Delhi: Sage Publications. Blom Hansen, Thomas. 1999. The Saffron Wave, Democracy and Hindu Nationalism in Modern India. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. Bose, Sugata. 1986. Agrarian Bengal: Economy, Social Structure and Politics, 1919–1947. Hyderabad: Cambridge University Press, in association with Orient Longman. Butalia, Urvashi. 1998. The Other Side Of Silence, Voices from the Partition of India. New Delhi: Penguin Books. Chakrabarty, Bidyut. 1997. Local Politics and Indian Nationalism, Midnapur 1919–1944. New Delhi: Manohar. Chakravartty, Gargi. 2005. Coming Out Of Partition: Refugee Women of Bengal. New Delhi: Bluejay Books. . 1987. Gandhi: A Challenge to Communalism, A Study of Gandhi and the HinduMuslim Problem 1919–1929. New Delhi: Eastern Book Centre. Chandra, Bipan. 1987. Communalism In Modern India. New Delhi: Vikas Publishing House. Chatterjee, Partha. Bengal 1920–1947, Volume 1, The Land Question. Calcutta: K. P. Bagchi & Company.



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Chatterji, Joya. 1955. Bengal Divided: Hindu Communalism and Partition 1932–47. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Datta, Pradip Kumar. 1999. Carving Blocs: Communal Ideology In Early Twentieth Century Bengal. New Delhi: OUP. . 2010. Heterogenities, Identity Formations in Modern India. New Delhi: Tulika Books. Das, Suranjan. 1991. Communal Riots in Bengal, 1905–1947. New Delhi: OUP. . 2014. Interrogating Politics and Society: Twentieth Century Indian Subcontinent. New Delhi: Primus Books. Das, Veena. ed. 1990. Mirrors of Violence: Communities, Riots and Survivors in South Asia. Delhi: OUP. Devji, Faisal. 2012. The Impossible Indian: Gandhi and the Temptation of Violence. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. Dixit, Prabha. 1974. Communalism – A Struggle For Power. Orient Longman. Freitag, Sandria, B. 1999. Collective Action And Community: Public Arenas and the Emergence of Communalism in North India. New Delhi: OUP. Gossman, Patricia, A. 1999. Riots and Victims: Violence and the Construction of Communal Identity among Bengali Muslims 1905-1947. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1999). Gramsci, Antonio. 2010. Selections from the Prison Notebooks. New Delhi: Orient Blackswan. Greenough, Paul. R. 1982. Prosperity and Misery in Modern Bengal: The Famine of 1943–44. Delhi: OUP. Guha, Ranajit. 1983. Elementary Aspects of Peasant Insurgency in Colonial India. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Hardiman, David. 2007. Gandhi in His Time and Ours. Delhi: Permanent Black. Hashmi, Taj-ul-Islam. 1922. Pakistan as Peasant Utopia: The Communalization of Class Politics in East Bengal, 1920–1947. Boulder, CO: Westview Press. Husain, S. Abid. 1969. Gandhi and Communal Unity. Bombay: Orient Longman, On Behalf of Gandhi Peace Foundation. McPherson, Kenneth. 1974. The Muslim Microcosm: Calcutta, 1918– 1935. Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner Verlag. Mukherjee, Janam. 2015. Hungry Bengal, War, Famine, Riots and the End of Empire. Noida, Uttar Pradesh: Harper Collins Publishers India. Pandey, Gyan. 2001. Remembering Partition: Violence, Nationalism and History in India. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. . 2006. The Construction Of Communalism In Colonial North India. New Delhi: OUP. Parekh, Bhikhu. 1989. Gandhi’s Political Philosophy: A Critical Examination. Basingstoke, Macmillan. Pradhan, Sudhi. ed. 1985. Marxist Cultural Movement in India, Chronicles and Documents (1936–47) Volume 1, 2nd ed. Calcutta: Pustak Bipani. Sarkar, Sumit. 2005. Modern India 1885–1947. Delhi: Macmillan.

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. 1973. The Swadeshi Movement in Bengal 1903–1908. Delhi: People’s Publishing House. . 2002. Beyond Nationalist Frames: Relocating Postmodernism, Hindutva, History. Delhi: Permanent Black. Sarkar, Tanika. 1987. Bengal 1928–1934: The Politics of Protest. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Sen, Amartya. 1982. Poverty and Famines: An Essay on Entitlement and Deprivation. Delhi: OUP. Sen, Shila. 1976. Muslim Politics in Bengal 1937–1947. New Delhi: Impex India. Srimanjari. 2009. Through War and Famine, Bengal 1939–45. New Delhi: Orient Black Swan. Tendulkar, D. G. 1953. Mahatma, Life of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Volume 7 1945–1947. Bombay: Vithalbhai K. Jhaveri and D. G. Tendulkar. Tidrick, Kathryn. 2013. Gandhi, a Political and Spiritual Life. Verso, London, New York: IB Tauris. Weber, Thomas. 2009. The Shanti Sena – Philosophy, History and Action. Delhi: Orient Black Swan.

Articles Bayly, C. A. 1985. ‘A Pre-History of ‘Communalism’? Religious Conflict in India, 1700–1860.’ Modern Asian Studies 19 (2): 177–203. Chakravartty, Gargi. 2015. ‘Emergence of the Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti in the FortiesCalcutta Chapter.’ In Calcutta, The Stormy Decades, edited by Tanika Sarkar and Sekhar Bandyopadhyay, 177–203. New Delhi: Social Science Press. De la Roche, and Roberta Senechal. 1996. ‘Violence as Social Control.’ Sociological Forum 11 (1): 97–128. Klitgaard, Robert E. 1971. ‘Gandhi’s Non Violence as Tactic.’ Journal of Peace Research 8 (2): 143–153. Kumar, Aishwaraj. 1988. ‘Visions of Cultural Transformation: The IPTA in Bengal, 1940– 44.’ In Turbulent Times India 1940–44, edited by Biswamoy Pati, 167–184. Mumbai: Popular Prakashan. Mukherjee, Ishan. 2015. ‘The Elusive Chase: ‘War Rumour’ in Calcutta during the Second World War.’ In Calcutta, The Stormy Decades, edited by Tanika Sarkar and Sekhar Bandyopadhyay, 65–92. New Delhi: Social Science Press. Mukherjee, Janam. 2015. ‘Japan Attacks.’ In Calcutta, The Stormy Decades, edited by Tanika Sarkar and Sekhar Bandyopadhyay, 93–120. New Delhi: Social Science Press. Nakazato, Nariaki. ‘“The Role of Colonial Administration”, “Riot Systems” and “Local Networks during the Calcutta Disturbances of August 1946.”’ In Calcutta, The Stormy Decades, edited by Tanika Sarkar and Sekhar Bandyopadhyay, 267–319. New Delhi: Social Science Press.



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Patnaik, Arun, K. 1988. ‘Gramsci’s Concept of Common-Sense: Towards a Theory of Subaltern Consciousness In Hegemony Process.’ Economic and Political Weekly 23 (5): 2–5, 7–10. Pratt, Tim and James Vernon. 2005. ‘“Appeal From This Fiery Bed. . .”: The Colonial Politics of Gandhi’s Fasts and their Metropolitan Reception.’ The Journal of British Studies 44 (1): 92–114. Sarkar, Tanika. 2011. ‘Gandhi and Social Relations.’ In The Cambridge Companion to Gandhi, edited by Judith Brown and Anthony, 173–195. New York: Cambridge University Press.



Index 271

Index Abhay Ashram of Comilla, 88 abwabs, 118 Adim Ripu, 168 agrarian society in East Bengal, 118 Agunpakhi (Hasan Azizul Huq), 76 Ahmad, Khan Bahadur Sharifuddin, 41 Ahmed, Abul Mansur, 122, 132, 134, 151, 160 Ahmed, Giyasuddin, 136 Ahmed, M. U., 75 Ahmed, Muzaffar, 204 Ahmed, Rashid, 119 Ahmed, Shamsuddin, 136, 165 Ahmed, Syed, 121 Aj Kal Porshur Golpo (Manik Bandyopadhyay), 86 Akali Dal, 129–130 ‘Akhand Hindustan,’ idea of, 130 Ali, Asaf, 129 Ali, Captain Yusuf, 191 Ali, Tafazzal, 165 All Bengal Muslim Students League, 55 All Bengal Secondary Education Bill Protest Day, 109 All India Muslim League, 123 All India Spinner’s Association, 88 All India Women’s Conference (AIWC), 202–203, 205, 218 Amrita Bazar Patrika, 32, 38, 41, 45, 72, 88, 110, 115 Amte, Baba, 240 Anjuman Mofidul Islam, 73

anti-communal resistance, 22, 171–175 Arya Samaj Relief Society, 80 Azad, Maulana, 129 Aziz, Mr, 44 Babri Masjid/Ram Janmabhoomi issue, 248–249 Badrudduja, Syed, 35 Badurbagan Sporting Club, 161 Bagchi, Jasodhara, 16 Bahadur, Maharaja Manikya, 57 Bahuguna, Sunderlal, 240 Bandyopadhyay, Manik, 85 Bandyopadhyay, Sekhar, 92 Bandyopadhyay, Tarashankar, 85 Banerjee, Sanat Kumar, 198 Bannerjee, Ashalata, 82 Barman, Upendra Nath, 36 Basu, Jyoti, 166 Batabyal, Rakesh, 14, 19 Bayly, C. A., 13 on pre-history of communalism, 2–3 Bell, F. O., 76 Bengal cost of living in, 31 political scenario of, 30–31 short-term changes in population and prices, 31 Bengal famine. see famine of 1943-44 in Bengal Bengali Hindu identity, 1 Bengali Hindus, 32, 72 Bengali language, 135

272

Index

The Bengali Merchants Association, 56 Bengal Money-lenders Act of 1940, 31, 122 Bengal Provincial Congress Committee (BPCC), 15, 172, 188, 201 Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha, 86, 89, 95, 102n137, 151 Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha Relief Committee, 80 Bengal Provincial Muslim League, 46, 93, 121–122, 128, 130–131, 136, 190 Bengal Provincial Students Federation (BPSF), 55 Bengal Relief Committee, 80 Bengal Scheduled Caste Party, 61n70 Bengal society, 15 Bengal Tenancy (Amendment) Act, 1938, 31, 122 Bengal Women’s Food Committee, 80 Bhadralok Hindus, 15 Bharat Sevashram Sangha (BSS), 19, 33, 38, 56, 90–91, 112, 174, 200–201, 248–249 protest against Civil Supplies Department, 91 unification and militarization of Hindus, role in, 91 Bhattacharya, Annada Shankar, 171 Bhattacharya, Ardhendu, 188 Bhave, Vinoba, 241 Bihar riots, 216 Biswas, Makhan Lal, 201 Biswas, Rasik Lal, 35 Biswas, Rasiklal, 61n70 Bose, K.C., 155 Bose, M. K., 173 Bose, Nirmal Kumar, 215, 217, 219 Bose, Sarat Chandra, 153 Bose, Sugata, 28, 122, 139 British Cabinet Mission, 137–139, 149 Burman, Shyama Prasad, 112 Butalia, Urvashi, 15–16

C. R. Das’ Hindu-Muslim Pact, 1923, 12 Calcutta Emergency Relief Organization, 174 Calcutta Relief Committee, 80 census operations of 1941-42, communal animosities, 39–41, 43 Chakravartty, Gargi, 17 Chakravartty, Renu, 82, 205–206, 219 Chakravarty, Ambika, 205 Chakravarty, Nikhil, 160 Chandra, Bipin, 4 masses, attraction to communalism, 4 on nationalism, 5 participants in and victims of a communal riot, 5 view of communalism, 4–5 Chatterjee, Kamala, 205, 219 Chatterjee, N. C., 39, 109, 113 Chatterjee, Partha, 118, 207 Chatterjee, Ram, 169 Chatterji, Joy, 14 Chatterji, Joya, 167 Chatterji, Nirmal, 219 Chatterji, Phanindra, 155 Chatterji, P.K., 162–163 Chattopadhyay, Sarat Chandra, 1 Chaudhuri, Manoranjan, 113, 219 Chaudhury, Hamidul Huq, 93 Chintamani (Manik Bandyopadhyay), 86 Chipko Movement, 240 Choudhury, Ray, 75 Choudhury, Tapan Ray, 74 Chowdhary, Nurul Islam, 136 Chowdhury, Leela, 82 collective violence, 175 communal animosities, 13 Hinduization of caste politics during relief work, 91–93 communal antagonism, waves of census operations of 1941-42, 39–41, 43 educational reconstruction, 35–37 Hindu Mahasabha activities, 37–38



Index 273

on Holi celebrations, 43 pro-Hindu and pro-League newspapers, 41–42 Communal Award of 1932, 15 communal collective identities, 116 communal identities, 13 communalism, debates around, 2–7 in Bengal, 10–15 communalism, transformation of and Bengali Hindu Bhadralok, 15 forms and phases, 14 through riots and collective violence, 14 Communist Party of India (CPI), 74, 95– 96, 125–126, 166, 173, 204–205 composite nationalism, theory of, 11 Congress, 30–31 Congress Constructive Workers Association, 56 Congress Socialist Party, 125 Congress Working Committee, 127 ‘contradictory common-sense’ of subalterns, 247 conversions, during riot, 51–52 C R Formula, 113 Dacca communal disturbances of 1926 and 1930 and related violence, 27–28 Debt Settlement Boards, 30 factors contributing to violence in, 26–29 jute industry, 28 Krishak Samiti Activities, 29–30 Muslim and Hindu population of, 26 pattern of violence in, 28–29 political scenario, 30–31 rate of transfers of raiyati holdings, 28 rural credit system, 28 socio-economic statuses of Hindus and Muslims, 26–27 Wahabi and Faraizi movements, influence of, 26 Dacca Anushilan Party, 48

Dacca riot of 1941, 18, 22, 26, 33–34, 123 attacks on Hindus, 47 attacks on mosques and temples, 45 attacks on police and armed forces, 52 attacks on women, 29 background, 26 cases of conversions, 51–52 cases of stabbing, looting and arson, 27, 44–45, 47, 50–51 casualties, 48–49 characteristics, 50–55 disturbances, 43–49 Enquiry Committee on, 53–55 impact of, 49 looting of hats or bazaars, 29 pattern of violence, 29, 31–32 relief and rehabilitation, intercommunity solidarity and goodwill, 55–58 rumours, role in spreading attacks and counter attacks, 44–45, 49, 56 in rural areas, 46 scale of violence and level of organization, 54 signs of escalation of conflict, 34 slogans during, 44, 47, 51–52 Das, Monmohan, 61n70, 111–112 Das, Noni Gopal, 48 Das, Suranjan, 13, 18, 153, 162, 166–167 communal animosities, 13 communal identities, 13 difference between riots of 1940s and ones that preceded them, 13 religious identity, 13 short-term changes in population and prices, 31 study of riots in Bengal from 1905 to 1947, 13 Dasgupta, Subhoranjan, 16 Datta, Dhirendra Nath, 165, 191 Datta, Pradip Kumar, 7, 248 communal collective identities, 7 identity formation, 7

274

Index

study of riots, 10 understanding of communalism, 7 Dawn, 190 Denial Policy, 69–70 Depressed Classes of Bengal, 20, 59n50 ‘Hindu unity’ amongst, 19 Sangathan activities, 18 Dewal, 75 Dhaka riot of 1941, 13 Direct Action Day program, 10, 148–153, 166, 168 Dixit, Prabha development of communal organizations, 5–6 Muslim communalism, 6 understanding of communalism, 5–6 Dutta, Dhirendra Nath, 188 Dutta, Kamini Kumar, 51, 53, 57, 188 East Bengal, 122–123, 126, 131 East Pakistan, 133, 135, 140 Edbar, Upendranath, 92, 115 elections of 1937, 119–120 elections of 1946, 136–137 Famine Enquiry Commission, 70 Famine Enquiry Commission Report, 75–76 famine of 1943-44 in Bengal, 19, 68, 126 affected people, 77 attacks on villagers and assaults on women, 70 begging, cases of, 74 cases of prostitution, 79–80 causes of, 70 cyclone, effect of, 71 death rates, 75–77 destitutes, cases of, 75, 78–79 diseases, incidence of, 76 economic crisis, 73, 75, 77, 125, 184 famine corpses, 73 famine relief system, 253–258 food crisis and epidemics, 76 impact on fishing, 69–70

looting, cases of, 73 middle-class families, effect on, 77 plight of women, 78–79 politics of relief and rehabilitation, 80–97 relief organizations, 73 rising price of rice, 73, 75, 77, 125, 184 rural education, impact on, 78 signs of starvation, 77 trafficking in women, 79–80 withdrawal of boats and its impact, 69 fasting, analysis of, 236–241 Food Drive, 125 Freitag, Sandria B., 8 analysis of riots, 8 collective action, 8 Gandhi, 127, 200–201 attitude towards violence against women, 224–225 on Bihar situation, 216–217 Calcutta fast, 1947, 232–241 comparison of Draupadi and Sita, 224 fast in Delhi in 1948, 239 impact on Muslims, 226–230 issue of conversions, 224–225 message of dying with self-respect, 223 message to the people, 215–216 mild attack on, 215 peace strategy, 217–225 personal life and his peace mission at Noakhali, 230–232 philosophy of nonviolent resistance, 239–240 visit to riot affected areas, 214–215 Gandhi, study of, 22–23 Gandhian nonviolence, 22 ‘Ghar Wapasi’ (homecoming), 2 Ghar Wapsi (homecoming), 249 Ghose, Surendra Mohan, 151, 172 Ghosh, Ganesh, 205 Gill, Sardar Niranjan Singh, 218 ‘given-ness’ of communalism, 7 go-korbani (cow-slaughter), 10



Index 275

Gopalachari, Raja, 235 Gossman, Patricia, 170 pirs and religious leaders, role in communalism, 8–9 rise of communalism amongst Muslims in East Bengal, 8 violence, role in political mobilization, 9 Goswami, Snehalata, 82 Great Calcutta Killing of 1946, 1, 5, 8, 10, 13, 18, 26, 148, 199, 208, 233, 235, 247 anti-communal resistance, 171–175 arson and stabbing incidents, 156–157 blame game, 164–166 cases of looting, 154–158 crowd behaviour in, 166–170 differences between Hindu and Muslim crowds, 167 earliest disturbances, 154 fire incidents, 156 goondas categorized as heroes and protectors, 168–169 guerrilla tactics, 158 middle-class participants, 167 Muslim casualties, 156 para-wise attack, 155–156 peace moves, 171–172 police actions, 162–163, 170 professional criminals, 159–160 rescue and relief operations, 171–173 rescue centres, 173 rumours, role in spreading attacks and counter attacks, 153, 156, 158, 160–161 weapons used, 156–157 workers’ and common people’s heroism against rioters, 173 Guha, A. B., 50 Guha, Samar, 188 Gujarat massacres, 2002, 2 Gujrat Seva Samity, 80 Gupta, Ashoka, 198–199, 203–204, 206, 219, 223

Gupta, H. K., 77 Gupta, Kamala Das, 223, 225 Gurner, Walter, 191 Habu, Sheikh, 168 Haldar, Gopal, 204 Hande, Subedar Narayan, 193 Hardiman, David, 238 Hardwick, Donald Ross, 165 Hashim, Abul, 126, 130–131 Hazare, Anna, 240 Herbert, John, 43 Herbert, Sir John, 33 Hindu, 129 Hindu Bhadralok communalism, 13–14 Hindu Conference, 40 Hindu Mahasabha, 1, 32, 56, 89, 107, 114, 127, 153, 165–166, 201 attitude towards Muslims, 32–33 on census operations of 1941-42, 39–41 Hinduization attempts, 112 movement for physical regeneration, 38 physical training camps, 38 post Dacca riot, 49 relief work, 86–87, 92 rise in membership, 37 Sangathan activities, 2, 38, 113, 115 Hindu Mahasabha Relief Committee, 80 Hindu Mahasabha’s Sangathan movement, 2 Hindu Milan Mandirs, 112 Hindu Militia, 33 Hindu Mission, 19, 90–91 Hindu–Muslim relations, 1–2 Hindu-Muslim-Sikh divide, 2 Hindu-Muslim unity, 11 Hindus, unification and militarization of, 91–93 Hindu Satkar Samiti, 73 Hindu Shakti Sangha, 89–90 Hindustan National Guards, 167, 234 Hindustan Standard, 172, 216 Hindustan Times, 129

276

Index

Hindusthan Standard, 38, 41, 171, 191, 200, 214, 235 hunger, impact on Bengal society, 68 Huq, Fazlul, 30–31, 39–40, 56, 119–124 Ibrahim, 121 Indian People’s Theatre Association (IPTA), 84 Indian Red Cross Society, 174 Islamia College Muslim Institute, 174 Ispahani, M. A. H., 93 Japanese invasion physical damages, 72 treatment of the corpses, 72 War rumours of, 71–72 Jinnah, 120, 124, 127–132, 136, 151, 165 Jogananda, Swami, 112 Joshi, P.C., 78, 125 jute demand, 118 Kakar, Sudhir, 169 Kar, Gobinda, 48 Karim, Fazlul, 185 Kasim, Kazi Abul, 216 Kaur, Rajkumari Amrit, 234 Khadi Pratishthan, 88 Khan, Faiz, 44 Khan, Maulana Akram, 40 Khan, Mujibur Rehman, 132–133 map of Pakistan, 134 Khan, Sikandar Hayat, 121 Khan, Syed Ahmad, 11, 117 Khan, Tamizuddin, 93, 105 Khanna, Durgadas, 171 Khilafat movement, 12 Kishoreganj riot, 1930, 118 Klitgaard, Robert, 238 Kripalani, Acharya, 191, 198 Kripalani, Sucheta, 191, 206, 218 Krishak Praja Party (KPP), 30, 119–120, 126, 132, 136 Krishak Samitis, 29–30, 118 Muslim mass contact programme of, 121

Lahiri, Ashutosh, 89, 108 Lahiri, Bela, 205 Lahiri, Maya, 206 Lahiry, Ashutosh, 192 Lahore resolution of 1940, 21, 117, 122, 139 land wars, 3 Latif, Abdul, 44 Lawrence, Pethick, 164, 197 Lokpal Bill, 240 Mahasabha, 18 Mahasabha Conference of 1939, 32–33 Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti, 80 Mahila Atmaraksha Samiti (MARS), 80, 82–84, 96, 205 Mandal, Birat Chandra, 112 Mandal, Jogendranath, 61n70, 115 Manwantar (Tarashankar), 85 Marwari Relief Society, 56, 80 McPherson, Kenneth, 12 Mehta, Dinshaw, 240 Mia, Maulvi Mukkbul, 197 Milan Mandirs, 92 military atrocities of 1942, 71 Modern Review, 41 Mookerjee, Shyama Prasad, 1, 36, 38–39, 42, 52–53, 57, 80, 89, 95–96, 106, 123–124, 127, 151, 201, 217 Panchasher Manwantar, 89 Mridha, Maulvi Ahmed Ali, 106 Mukerjee, Gopal ‘Patha,’ 167 Mukherjee, Anukul, 169 Mukherjee, Debendranath, 219 Mukherjee, Gita, 171 Mukherjee, Gopal ‘Patha,’ 159 Mukherjee, Ishan, 71 Mukherjee, Janam, 72–73 Mukherjee, Kalipada, 56, 172 Mukherjee, Kanak, 79 Mukherjee, Phanindranath, 40 Mullick, Manick, 171 Mullick, Mukunda Behari, 19, 92, 111



Index 277

Mullick, Pulin Behari, 115 multiplicity of ‘nations,’ idea of, 130 Murapara incident, 34 Muslim Chamber of Commerce Relief Committee, 93 Muslim communalism in India, 6 Muslim separatism and, 10–11 Muslim Jagarani, 122 Muslim League, 30–31, 87, 94, 124 breeding of hatred against the Hindus, 36, 153, 160, 185–186 Conference at Sirajganj, 122–123 on Direct Action Day, 10, 148–153 as a true ‘mass’ organization, 132

causes, 184 evacuation and arrival of refugees to ‘safer zones,’ 191 first reports of, 187 inaction of police and Bengal government, impact of, 194–197 lack of jail accommodation, 197 patterns of violence, 192–200 press reports, 190–191 relief work, 200–208 riot situation, 186–192 slogans during, 192 weapons used, 193 Non-Cooperation movement, 12 Nyayatirtha, Srijib, 95

Muslim National Guards, 94, 124, 132, 150, 167–168, 234

‘othering’ of violence, 9

Nag, Girish, 110 Nakazato, Nariaki, 153, 163 Namasudras, 20, 33 Nandy, Ashis, 161, 168 Narayan, Jaya Prakash, 125, 153 Narayan, T. G., 74, 77 Narayanganj-Dacca Hindu Relief Committee, 56 Nari Seva Sangha, 83 Narmada Bachao Andolan, 240 Nationalist, 201 National Red Cross Brigade, 174 national self-determination, 97 ‘nation within a nation,’ idea of, 134 Nayar, Sushila, 218 Nazimuddin, Sir, 88, 107, 124, 136, 150 Nehru, Jawaharlal, 225 Nikhil Banga Praja Samiti, 119 Niyogi, Jnananjan, 88 Noakhali Krishak Samitis, 121 Noakhali riots, 1946-47, 1, 8–9, 13, 16–18, 21–22, 26, 118, 162, 214, 247 affected thanas, 186–187 cases of looting, 194, 197, 199 casualties, 190

Pabna College incident, 33 Pai, Sushila, 218 Pakistan, formation of British Cabinet Mission, 137–139 Lahore resolution of 1940, 117, 122, 139 as a Muslim nation, 131, 136, 138–140 role of Muslim League, 124–140 Wavell Plan, 126–129 Pakistan movement, 116–140 Pakistan resolution, 122 Pal, Bipin Chandra, 11, 117 Panchasher Manwantar, 68 Pandey, Gyan, 239 relationship between nationalism and communalism, 6 study of violence, 9 subjective conceptualization and construction of nationalism, 6–7 Parasuram, 219 Parekh, Bhikhu, 238 Park, Md. Ali, 107 Partition Riots, 13 Patita-Pawan group, 249, 250n11 Patkar, Medha, 240 patriotism, 11

278

Index

Paundra-Kshatriyas, 33 Peace Committee, 34 People’s Age, 173 People’s Relief Committee, 74 People’s Relief Committee (PRC), 82 Poona Pact, 34, 40 Pradhan, Gairuddin, 55 Pratibimba (Manik Bandyopadhyay), 86 Progressive Assembly Party, 123 Progressive Writers’ Association (PWA), 85 Provincial Hindu Sabhas, 33 ‘psychological crystallization’ of communal identity, 13 Puddapukur Relief Centre, 174 Punjabi, Mina, 168 Punjab Relief Committee, 80 Purba Pakistan (East Pakistan) Renaissance Society, 132–134 Pyarelal, 218, 232 Quit India Movement, 125 Radical Democratic Party, 125 Rafique, Muhammad, 165 Rahman, Fazlur, 35 Raj, Rao Bahadur Shiva, 127 Rakshi Dals, 92, 112 Ramakrishna Mission, 56, 80, 82, 93, 200 Rashid, Abdur, 121 Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), 2 Rashtriya Swayam Sewak Sangh, 153 Rasool, Abdulla, 204 Ray, Acharya Prafulla Chandra, 109 Ray, Ajit, 171 Ray, P. K., 153 Ray, Ranen, 89 Red Cross Society, 206 Rehman, Habibur, 169 relief and rehabilitation, post Dacca riot, 55–58 Congress activities, 56–57 Maharaja Manikya Bahadur relief work, 57 Relief Committees, 56

student efforts, 55 relief and rehabilitation, post famine of Bengal, 80–97 bleaching powder, shortage of, 81 communal politics around, 88–89 Communist party’s relief work, 82–83 Communist womens’ relief work and service, 82 Congress workers’s relief work, 86 contributions by Bengal Cultural Squad and IPTA, 84–85 free kitchens, 81 Government of India’s contribution, 87 gruel supplied, 81–82 Hindu Mahasabha’s relief work, 86–87 ‘Khichuri’ kitchens and milk canteens, 83 milk distribution, 81 monetary relief and service, 82 non-governmental relief organizations, 88 organizations involved, 80–84 press reports, role in communalizing relief measures, 93 problems around relief work, 81 relief centres, 80 relief work by and among women, 82–83 sanitary conditions and epidemics, 81 religious identity, 13 rent-collecting and moneylending groups, 118–119 Rezzak, Abdur, 121 riots and collective violence, 8–10 rights over ‘sacred space’ and, 10 transformation of communalism through, 14 riots between Namasudras and Muslims, 112, 114–115 riots of Bengal in 1946-47, 9 Roy, B.C., 155 Roy, Dhananjoy, 112 Roy, Khoka, 204



Index 279

Roy, Kiran Shankar, 56, 151 Roy, M. N., 125 Roy, Patiram, 38, 92 rumours, role in spreading attacks and counter attacks, 17, 44–45, 49, 56, 71–72, 114, 153, 156, 158, 160–161, 197 Sabuj Chakra, 174 saffron wave, 2 Sangathan movements, 12, 18 Sankharis, 32 Sarkar, Nalini Ranjan, 56 Sarkar, Sumit, 10–11, 240 Sarkar, Tanika, 28 Sarwar, Golam, 8, 119, 121, 123 Savarkar, Veer, 32, 37, 93 Scheduled Castes, 19–20, 33–34, 43, 61n70, 89 as an ‘oppressed’ minority, 128 communal tensions between Muslims and, 93 differences between Hindus and, 109 famine and, 92 grievances of, 113–114 introduction of separate electorates for, 105, 108–109, 111 within Mahasabha movement, 113 militant, 110 on Secondary Education Bill, 35, 105, 111–112 suspension of Hindu Conference, 114–115 as victims of Caste- Hindu domination, 106 Scheduled Caste Secondary Education Committee, 35 Scheduled Castes of Bengal, 20 Secondary Education Bill (1940), 34–36, 251 caste and community politics around, 104–116 Caste Hindu bloc’s opinion, 36 Caste-Hindu domination in, 105

Congress opinion, 36 controversies over, 105–106 Hindu Mahasabha leaders’ opinion, 37 Muslim opinion, 34–35 pro-Hindu and pro-League newspapers, 41–42, 106–107, 110–111 public protests, 109–111 as a retrograde measure to establish Pakistan, 108 Scheduled Caste leaders’ opinion, 35, 111–112 Secondary Education Bill (SEB) of 1944, 20 Secondary Education Board, 105 self-restraint, idea of, 237 Sen, Atul, 36, 115 Sen, B. R., 73–74 Sen, Lal Mohan, 205 Sen, Manikuntala, 82, 171, 205–206, 219 Sen, Shila, 31 Sengupta, Kedareswar, 49 Sharmila, Irom Chanu, 240 Shimla Conference, 127, 130 Shivaji Utsav, 117 Shuddhi movement, 12 Sikh massacres, 1984, 2 Simpson Report, 198 Singh, Ananta, 205 Singh, Guru Gobind, 112 Singh, Tara, 127 Singha, Kshetra Nath, 111 Sircar, H. N., 163 Soviet Union, 134–135 Sriramulu, Potti, 240 Star of India, 42, 46, 93, 106, 124, 131–132, 136 Statesman, 42 Stock Exchange Relief Committee, 80 Suhrawardy, Begum Shaista, 164–166 Suhrawardy, H. S., 107, 131, 136–137, 149–151, 160, 164–166, 198, 215, 232–235

280

Index

Swadeshi Andolan in Bengal (1905-1908), 117 Swadeshi Movement in Bengal 1903-08, 10 Tagore, Rabindranath, 1 Tebhaga Struggle of 1946, 125, 207, 248 Thakkar, A. V., 218 Thakur, Pramatha Ranjan, 35, 41, 61n70, 115 Tippera riot, 21–22, 28, 49, 77–78, 121, 184–185, 188, 207 Tuker, Sir Francis, 149 two-nation theory, 136

United Muslim Party (UMP), 119 unity of India, 6 untouchability, 33, 59n50 Urdu, 135 Urdu-Nagari controversy, 11 violence during riots, 9 violence in communal riots, 170 Wahhabi and Faraizi movements, 117 Wavell Plan, 126–129 Whitehead, Andrew, 159 women, experiences during partition, 15–17