BENGAL DIVIDED
The Unmaking of a Nation 1905-1971
NITISH SENGUPTA
Academician, administrator, politician and author, Nitish Sengupta studied at Presidency College, Kolkata, securing first class in both BA (Hons) and MA and winning a gold medal for his master’s in history. He began his career as assistant professor of history in Presidency College and joined the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) in 1957. He held key posts in the Union government including Revenue Secretary and Member-Secretary, Planning Commission. He completed his doctorate in management from Delhi University and lectured at several universities and leading management schools in the country. After his retirement, he was director-general of the International Management Institute, New Delhi.
Nitish Sengupta has represented India at various UN bodies and was elected chairman of the UN Commission on Transnational Corporations. He joined politics in 1996 and was elected to the thirteenth Lok Sabha, where he served as member of several key committees, notably the Public Accounts Committee. He was also general secretary, All India Trinamool Congress. Currently, he is chairman, Board for Reconstruction of Public Sector Enterprises, New Delhi.
Sengupta has been a regular columnist in leading dailies and is the author of fifteen books, including several related to management. As a historian, his notable books are History of the Bengali-speaking People, Dr B.C. Roy: Biography and Land of Two Rivers: A History of Bengal from the Mahabharata to Mujib. His other books include Unshackling of Indian Industry, Government and Business, Inside the Street Frame and My Times: A Civil Servant Remembers.
He is based in Delhi.
PREFACE
There is no parallel in history to the paradox that while in 1905 a majority of the people of Bengal rejected the British-directed partition of their land and fought against it, only four decades later, in 1947, the same majority asked for a partition of Bengal between Muslim majority and Hindu majority areas. The explanation lies in nearly six decades of interaction between the Hindus and the Muslims of Bengal in the course of which the two communities, after coming close to each other on several occasions, eventually drifted apart and asked for partition.
The 1905 anti-partition nationalist movement in Bengal also led to heightened communalism. In a way it both hastened the end of British rule and laid the foundation for the second partition of Bengal in 1947. The annulment of the partition in 1911 was not to the liking of the majority of East Bengal Muslims. Along with the loss of Dhaka’s privileged position, the shifting of the imperial capital from Kolkata to Delhi was a big jolt to Bengali pride in general. What Berlin is to the Germans, Kolkata is to the Bengalis, both Muslims and Hindus.
Notwithstanding the ‘highs’ and ‘lows’ of the India-Bangladesh relationship, the cultural unity and interaction between the two Bengals have remained steady. Also, there is a fair amount of crossborder, often strictly illegal, movement of people, leading to peopleto-people contact. Interestingly, West Bengal has still kept the adjective ‘West’ in her name despite suggestions from time to time to follow the Punjab pattern of having an Indian Punjab and a Pakistan Punjab. Clearly, many Bengalis in West Bengal still like to
fondly cling to the vague idea that they constitute the western part of a greater Bengal in the cultural sense. In that belief while remaining as two political entities, Bangladesh and West Bengal can have close cultural links and freedom of movement among themselves. These issues will have to be addressed by the leaders of India, Bangladesh and West Bengal.
As a matter of fact, there is and always has been a great deal of cultural interaction between the two Bengals. Bangladesh is at present facing a serious challenge from Islamic fundamentalism. Hopefully the nationalist feelings, still very strong, will be able to overcome it. What is not noticed is that, despite the surface tension between the two countries–India and Bangladesh—from time to time, a great deal of fellow feeling and mutual understanding between the common people of the two Bengals remains beneath the surface. This is reflected from time to time in events like the wave of jubilation that prevails in Bangladesh when Amartya Sen, the economist, wins the Nobel prize, the joy and pride with which the news of Mohammad Yunus getting the Nobel peace prize is greeted by people at large in West Bengal, or the fact that Fazlul Huq’s centenary is celebrated with equal solemnity in West Bengal. Or the people of Bangladesh taking much pride in the achievements of Saurav Ganguly as a cricketer and also feeling sorry when his career crashlands. Television and radio channels treat the two Bengals as their common market and the same interaction is noticed in music and films. All this makes one feel that despite the fact that politically they are two different countries, culturally Bengal had always remained one and will ever remain. This author will consider his labour amply rewarded if this trend is strengthened as a result of the publication of this study,
It is well established that a sort of composite Bengali culture developed prior to the advent of the British and there was hardly any communal animosity. The unity of language was a key factor in the emergence of Bengal as a distinct political and cultural entity right from ancient times through the Turkish conquest and the Turkish phase of Bengal’s history, the period of Mughal rule to the British conquest in the eighteenth century and the period of British rule. It
was only after the advent of British rule in Bengal that a wide divergence developed on account of a variety of factors, the most important being the policy of divide and rule followed by the rulers. Paradoxically, the great Bengal Renaissance and Hindu Reformation Movement of the nineteenth century, which lifted up educated sections of Hindu society, accentuated the divide between the upwardly mobile Hindu community and the numerically larger, but ‘withdrawn’ Muslim community.
The nineteenth-century resurgence among the people of Bengal was, by and large, confined to the Hindus for a long time. The Muslims, smarting under their replacement as the rulers of Bengal, progressively withdrew to a kind of cocoon, not even wishing t accept the English language and the lifestyle induced by British rule. A kind of divergence was created between the mainstreams of the two communities. The promised ‘nation in making’ of the nineteenth century remained an unrealized dream and was, in fact, followed by a process of the unmaking of a nation. On the one hand, the Muslims’ contempt for English education as a passport to jobs under the government and, on the other hand, their disregard of modern professions like law, teaching and government jobs created a kind of duality or divergence of interests. The community’s subsequent romance with English education, thanks to reformers like Abdul Latif and Amir Ali, led to a clamour for government jobs, till then a preserve of the Hindu Bengalis. This further intensified the divergence.
There was indeed a high noon of Hindu–Muslim camaraderie in Bengal in the first two decades of the twentieth century climaxing under the charismatic leadership of Deshbandhu C.R. Das. Except for a handful of zamindar-type sections of Bengalis, Muslims and Hindus were, by and large, united under his leadership. His untimely death was a great tragedy, all the more so because the more vocal section of the Hindu public opinion repudiated his legacy, like the Bengal Pact. Thus, from this high noon, there was a climb down of substantial sections of Muslims to communalist positions, leading to the return of separatist politics which lasted until the tragic partition of 1947.
I am indebted to a large number of friends and professional academicians who have encouraged and helped me to undertake this study. I particularly remember that the suggestion to carry on after 1947 until the emergence of Bangladesh came from a large number of people from Bangladesh who were present at the launch of my book History of the Bengali-Speaking People at London School of Oriental and African Studies in 2006. I recall their suggestions with gratitude. I thank Mr Santosh Kumar Mukherjee, formerly of the Oxford University Press, for going through the first draft and giving some useful suggestions. I also thank my daughters Mekhala and Tamali for their unfailing assistance, my granddaughter Chandika Gupta for providing me invaluable computerized data for finalizing the maps, Professor Arindam Banik for helping me to get useful materials, my personal secretary Nirmaljit Singh for his secretarial assistance and Shri Ravi Singh and Ms Manjula Lal of Penguin Books India and Abantika Banerjee for their invaluable suggestions and assistance at every stage. Above all, I must recall with gratitude the fond memory of my late wife Sunanda, who encouraged my return from the world of management and economics to history as a subject. But for the turning point she gave me, the book may not have been there.
NITISH SENGUPTA
NEW DELHI
16 OCTOBER 2006
PART I
ONE BENGAL
Last Phase
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GENESIS OF SEPARATISM
Islam came to Bengal towards the end of the twelfth century, but spread rapidly in the next three centuries, so much so that the Muslims considered Bengal as a Muslim-dominated area. It is paradoxical that while the region around Delhi and Agra, which was the centre of Muslim rule in the subcontinent, never lost its predominantly Hindu character, the outlying Bengal province became a Muslim majority area, where the Muslim ruling elite came in close contact with the common people. After the initial few centuries of conquest and conversion, the rulers of Gaur from Hussain Shah onwards settled down to a policy of promoting a liberal national monarchy, treating both Muslim and Hindu subjects alike and appealing to the loyalty of both.
Meanwhile, Islam’s doctrine of universal brotherhood and direct communion with God together with reverence for a whole range of local deities and customs rapidly spread among the local people. Islamic preachers helped the Bengalis assimilate Islam in their life not by doing away with local traditions and practices but keeping them alive as far as possible, while inculcating among the common folk the essential religious, social and legal aspects of Islam. The large number of Buddhists in Bengal, already facing persecution by Hindu orthodoxy, found it easier to get assimilated into Islam.
In general, people dissatisfied with the oppression of a casteridden society and vulgar ritualism turned to the new faith which
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promised common brotherhood, liberation from the offensive yoke of Brahmanic oppression and considerable material incentives such as easier availability of government jobs. The process of conversion was facilitated by cruel practices of Hindu society such as closing the doors to anyone who had been forcibly fed beef or who had taken food or water from a Muslim or any woman who had been abducted by force and wished to return to her home and faith. Many members of the lower castes embraced Islam as the only way to get out of the concentration camptype of existence that Hindu society inflicted on them. There were also some special economic disabilities imposed on non-Muslims by the early Turko-Afghan rulers. These disappeared from Akbar’s time onwards.
Contemporary literary pieces like Ramai Pundit’s Sunya Purana and Shekhasubhodaya by Halayaudha Misra (clearly a pseudonym) illustrate how large masses of people surrendered to the appeal of Islam with its monotheism, universal brotherhood and direct communion with God. It is quite clear that the Hindus in general gave unstinted loyalty to the rulers of Gaur and thereafter to the Mughal rulers up to the time of the nawabs of Murshidabad. Communal violence, as found during the British period, was
actically unknown. Also, there was extensive social mixing between the two communities until the nineteenth century. Vaishnava literature referred to King Hussain Shah as the incarnation (avatar) of Lord Krishna in the Kaliyuga.? Also, Hussain Shah protected Shri Chaitanya, the great Vaishnav saint, from both the kazis and also the orthodox Brahmans. His son and successor, Nusrat Shah, had the Mahabharat translated into Bengali. Many Muslim writers like Alaol wrote extensively on Hindu themes and motifs. Both the Sufis and the Vaishnav poets wrote on philosophical aspects which had a great deal of commonality and which appealed to both the communities. All over Bengal there are shrines where members of both communities offer prayers and seek blessings. They also shared common rituals such as worshipping Satyanarayan (Satya Pir for Muslims) or Dakshin Roy in the Sunderban areas. Liberal Muslims often participated in Hindu ceremonies like Durga Puja and Saraswati Puja just as Hindus participated in Muslim religious ceremonies like
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Id-ul-Fitr. The British divide and rule policy and the Hindu Reformation accentuated the divide between the upwardly-mobile Hindu community and the inward-looking Muslim community.
Roots of Muslim separatism
The roots of Muslim separatism in Bengal lay in the near-wholesale political, economic, social and educational downgrading that the Bengali Muslims suffered with the advent of British rule. Not only did they lose political power and the privileges and patronage that went with it, but the 1793 Permanent Settlement drastically reduced the number of Muslim zamindars and other large landholders. Without such exposure to commerce historically, the Muslims in Bengal could not take advantage of the economic opportunities the new era offered. Inherently suspicious and conservative, they also denied themselves the new English education, thereby leaving the stage free for the Hindu Bengalis, who were dominant in government jobs and professions like law, medicine and teaching. Slowly, they withdrew into a cocoon, having little to do with the British and with things modern. Both the Muslim aristocracy and professionals came to a precarious existence. Interestingly, Muslims in other parts of the country, including Bihar, did not quite share this experience. Nowhere else in the subcontinent were Muslims as badly off as in Bengal, just as, paradoxically, few other communities derived as much benefit from British rule as Bengali Hindus. The following true-to-life description of the state of affairs given by a famous Bengal civilian, Sir William Hunter, in his book Indian Musalman is worthy of note:
“My remarks apply only to lower Bengal, the province with which I am best acquainted and in which so far as I can learn, the Muhammadans have suffered most severely under British rule. I should be sorry to believe or to convey to the readers the belief that the following remarks were predictable of all the Muhammadans of India. If ever a people stood in need of a career, it is the Muslim aristocracy of Bengal. The
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administration of the imperial taxes was the first source of income in Bengal and the Musalman aristocracy monopolised it. The police was another source of income and the police was officered by Muhammadans. The courts of law were a third great source of income and the Musalmans monopolised them. Above all there was the army, an army not officered by gentlemen who make little more than bank interest on the price of their commission, but a great confederation of conquerors who enrolled their peasantry into troops, and drew pay from the state for them as soldiers. A hundred and seventy years ago, it was almost impossible for a well-born Muslim in Bengal to become poor. At present it is almost impossible for them to continue
rich. The publication of this book in 1870 was indeed a turning point in British policy. It took a 180-degree turn from a policy of encouraging Hindus and ignoring Muslims to one of appeasement of Muslims and discouragement of Hindus.
But a change in Bengali Muslim attitude was also underway. Like his Hindu neighbour, the Bengali Muslim was unaffected by the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857. But for him the Indigo Movement that started almost as soon as the guns of the Sepoy Mutiny fell silent was a great watershed. The peasants resisted pressure from planters to grow indigo, as it had become uneconomic in the export market. Prices had become depressed after the boom in the early nineteenth century. This carried on from 1859 to 1862, when the government took a stand in favour of the peasants. Both Bengali Muslims and Hindus shared a common platform in defying indigo planters about growing indigo. Unfortunately, this commonality was short-lived and did not become a tradition.
While Kolkata and urban Bengal were undergoing the great intellectual and cultural transformation of the nineteenth-century Bengal Renaissance and Hindu religious reformation, a massive demographic change was underway in rural Bengal—the ascendancy of the Muslims to numerical majority in relation to the Hindu community. Strangely enough, it remained largely unnoticed for a
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long time. It took both the British rulers and the dominant urban Hindu elite nearly three quarters of a century after 1800 to realize that the Muslims had become a majority in Bengal.
A typical observation was that of James Wise: ‘When the English magistrates first came in contact with the people of Bengal, they arrived at the conclusion that the Muhamadans only comprised one per cent of the population. A report on vernacular education by William Adams in 1839 revealed surprisingly that in Rajshahi district, there were only 450 Hindus for every 1,000 Muslims although officials had treated it as a Hindu district. Sambhu Chandra Mukherji, a journalist writing in 1882, found it hard to persuade his so-called educated Hindu brethren of districts like Rajshahi that in those districts the Mussalmans were more numerous than the Hindus.” It was the 1881 Census that convincingly showed for the first time that in the majority of the twenty-eight Bengali-speaking districts of undivided Bengal presidency, the Muslims numbered significantly more than the Hindus (48 per cent) and that in the three divisions of Rajshahi, Dhaka and Chittagong, they formed two-thirds of the population. It showed that the Muslims accounted for 48.7 per cent of Bengal’s population, a figure significantly larger than the Hindu population. The revelation of this momentous demographic change also marked the starting point of a series of new attitudes. For the British administration, there was a new appraisal of the importance of the Muslim factor. For the marginalized and inarticulate Muslim leadership, it was the realization of their own importance and an assurance that they could not be ignored any longer. Hunter’s pathbreaking book, Indian Mussalman, symbolized the first. The second phenomenon was illustrated by Nawab Abdul Latif’s Muhamadan Education Society (1863) and, a few years later, Syed Amir Ali’s National Muhammadan Association of Kolkata.
The great intellectual awakening in Bengal in the nineteenth century left the Muslim community untouched except in the fringes. In the galaxy of famous names in early Bengal Renaissance we scarcely come across Muslim names before the twentieth century arrived. The century from the Battle of Plassey in 1757 to the 1857 Mutiny saw the Muslims in Bengal as a sullen, withdrawn
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community, unreconciled to the loss of political power and withdrawing itself, so to say, in a shell of suspicion of both the British rulers and the new Hindu meritocracy. As the Hindu upper and middle classes vigorously embraced western education and new economic and professional opportunities, the Muslims withdrew more and more. The early British strategy of making friends with the Hindus and keeping Muslims at a distance further accentuated this divide. Also, the fact that the revivalist Wahabi Movement of upper India cast a deep influence among a section of downtrodden Bengali Muslim peasantry made the Muslims suspect. Some of the leaders of the Indigo Movement were Wahabis. One of them, Amiruddin, was imprisoned for sedition in 1871. On 20 September 1871, the chief justice of Kolkata was assassinated by a Wahabi, B. Abdullah. The well-known Barasat uprising led by Titu Mir illustrated a pronounced anti-British trend among sections of Muslims in Bengal. All this alienated the British rulers. Also, the Bengali Muslims, despite their lack of support for the great 1857 uprising, had suffered from the hostility and displeasure of the British Raj for the sins of disloyalty of their co-religionists in upper India. The authorities shunned them. They also, in their turn, withdrew into a shell, so to say, keeping only a minimal unavoidable interaction with an unfriendly Raj.
A subtle change in the official attitude, as already discussed, was underway. Hindus were gradually turning seditious and, therefore, the British Raj needed to look for new allies. Only Muslims could provide this. This community could be won over through patronage in the form of job opportunities and educational support. Thus began a new policy of appeasement of Muslims. In a government resolution in 1871, Governor-General Lord Mayo regretted that ‘so large and important a class possessing a classical literature replete with works of profound learning and great value, and counting among its members a section specially devoted to the acquisition and diffusion of knowledge should stand aloof from active cooperation with our educational system and should lose the advantages both material and social which others enjoy’s This coincided with the Aligarh Movement led by Syed Ahmed Khan,
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who established the Aligarh College in 1874, and encouraged Muslims to take to western education and come to terms with British rule. Syed Ahmed was of the firm opinion that there had been uneven development of the two communities and that this had led to Hindu domination. He further believed that political emancipation without adequate safeguards for the weaker community could only mean further subjugation of the latter. This line of thinking inevitably found an echo among Bengali Muslims, whose leaders like Syed Amir Ali encouraged Muslim separatism.
Meanwhile, the Bengali Muslims remained steeped in ignorance and illiteracy. So great was their apathy to modern education that in Hooghly College, an institution started with a large endowment fund left by Haji Mohammad Mohsin, a great philanthropist, in 1836, there were only five Muslim students out of a total of 409 as late as 1850. Both the Indian Education Commission (1882) chaired by Hunter and a committee appointed by the government of Bengal in 1885 dwelt extensively on the educational backwardness of the Muslims in Bengal and recommended generous and special measures. A memorandum submitted to Lord Ripon on 6 February 1882 is of special significance. It was circulated by the Government of India to all provinces and ‘assumed a kind of national significance’, to quote a contemporary source and was ‘deeply pathetic as coming from former conquerors and rulers. The government responded by stating in a resolution (15 July 1885) that ‘the very fact that a memorandum like that has been presented with the concurrence and approval of so many leading gentlemen in Bengal and elsewhere indicates that the Muhammadans themselves have come to appreciate fully the necessity of moving with the times?? While the Bengal government had reservations about the Education Commission’s recommendation for exclusive schools or scholarships for Muslim students, the Government of India was more generous in its attitude and accepted most of the recommendations.
Unfortunately, the Bengal Hindu leadership, flushed with the new glory of the Bengal Renaissance and the new political awakening, remained non-responsive. It failed to appreciate that the newly revealed numerical superiority of the Muslims in Bengal had
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introduced a new element of great significance in the situation and that it was necessary to carry the Muslims with the process of awakening if it were to mean anything for the bulk of the common people. The comments of the Hindu Patriot on the Education Commission’s recommendations suggesting special measures for special classes reflect this impervious attitude:
But the bulk of the Hindus who pay for the whole machinery of government administration and education or, in other words, those who contribute the most and have done most for self-help should be denied the helping hand of the government, and their revenue contributions and savings to be affected by abolishing or reducing the educational staff of the colleges their children frequent must go to the benefit of the indolent, the discontented and the specially favoured. This is the upshot for which the Hindu population in India are to thank the government and the Education Council.
A recurring controversy on whether Muslim school students should receive their education in ordinary Bengali-medium primary schools or in maktabs where Urdu was the medium of instruction also obstructed the progress of education among Muslims. There was a clear divergence of interest, on the one hand, between upper-class Muslims, most of whom spoke Urdu, and the Bengali-speaking peasantry and lower classes and, on the other hand, between the largely Urdu-speaking West Bengal and Kolkata Muslims and the overwhelmingly Bengali-speaking East Bengal Muslims. As Muslim religious books were generally in Urdu, there was a natural pull towards it, all the more so because Bengali literature in the nineteenth century was overwhelmingly loaded with Hindu polytheistic expressions, motifs and myths. Also, unlike the pioneers of Bengali literature like Rammohun Roy and Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, some of the subsequent literary stalwarts like Bankim Chandra came to be widely perceived as essentially anti-Muslim in nature. In particular, Muslims found it difficult to appreciate some of the comments, observations or attitudes in Bankim Chandra’s Anand
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Math, Rajsingha and Sitaram where uncomplimentary references to yavanas or Muslims were made. This created scope for fundamentalist forces among the Muslims to create a prejudice among orthodox sections against Bengali literature of that epoch, which was described primarily as Hindu literature. Nonetheless, the fact remains that their efforts to make the Bengali-speaking Muslims learn the unfamiliar Urdu script and language did not succeed. Bengalispeaking Muslims did not get over their psychological inhibition to learn Urdu and, on the whole, stuck to the line of learning Bengali. Some of them concentrated on producing Islamic literature in Bengali to counter both Urdu-based Islamic literature and the predominant Hindu influence in Bengali literature. Works of Musharraf Hussain, the author of Bishad Sindhu, played a significant role in filling this vacuum. Another part of this controversy was the predominantly Hindu character of the district boards, which did not spend enough money on Muslim education. Also, the educational backwardness of the Muslims was reflected in their poor representation in government service. This became yet another sore point.
There was also a deep-rooted social cause. Socially the Bengali Hindu bhadralok looked down upon their Muslim neighbours. ‘Muslims were in most respects untouchable to the Hindus’, states Tamizuddin Khan. Not only was all cooked food thrown away as unclean if a Muslim entered the room but Muslim tenants were seated only on the floor on piris (low wooden seats) when they visited landlords’ offices, and not even allowed to smoke from the same hookahs as the Hindus. But in fairness it must be pointed out that the same treatment was meted out to Hindu lower castes by the Hindu bhadralok upper castes. “They were as good as two distinct peoples in spite of fraternisation in certain fields of action.’10 The Muslims resented this unequal social treatment and the resultant anguish was to lead to an inevitable backlash as and when more and more Muslims joined the educated ranks and got the upper hand politically. Thus the entire movement of Syed Ahmed Khan in north India, where Muslims were much better off, had little or no effect in Bengal. Although Sir Syed spoke on behalf of the Muslims of the
whole of India, his voice had little impact in far-off Bengal. It was only after the Muhammadan Educational Conference in north India held its first session in Kolkata in 1899 under Amir Ali’s chairmanship that the awareness for reorienting the education of Muslim youth in madrassas on western lines dawned on Bengali Muslims. Muslims, therefore, along with the Hindus, opposed Curzon’s educational reforms, but for different reasons.
There was also a deep economic basis for Muslim separatism. The new zamindar class that Cornwallis created in Bengal was dominated by the Hindus. So also were the two other classes that British rule brought about, namely, the native bourgeoisie that sprang up with the growth of modern industry and commerce and the new professional groups: the teachers, lawyers, doctors, engineers, government officials and employees. Muslim zamindars were few, but the overwhelming number among the downtrodden peasantry were Muslim. The 1881 Census showed that cultivators constituted 49.28 per cent of the Hindu population while the percentage was 62.81 for Muslims. Hence any zamindar-ryot issue inevitably tended to take on a communal colour. Also the fact that Muslims had by and large avoided western education, industry and commerce only meant that Muslims in the new bourgeoisie and professional classes were exceptions, not the rule. Muslims, in general, seldom felt an identity of interest with the Hindu aristocracy and meritocracy clamouring for reforms and more rights. There was, therefore, an underlying class basis behind early Muslim separatism.
Inevitably the strained relationship between the oppressive zamindar and the oppressed ryot took a communal overtone. The first serious attempt by the government to offer rights and safeguards to the ryots was criticized by the zamindars vociferously through their mouthpiece-the British Indian Association. Due to their educational backwardness and general attitude of withdrawal, the Muslims remained outside the four important movements that swept over Bengal in the nineteenth century–the Renaissance, the religious reformation, the social reforms and the growth of political agitation. The British Indian Association (1851) was a landlords’ body to protect their interests. On 26 July 1876, Surendranath
Banerji founded the Indian Association to form the views of the educated middle classes. Despite declaring the promotion of friendly feelings between Hindus and Muhammadans ‘as one of the objects of this association and including a Muslim aristocrat, Mir Mohammed Ali, as a committee member, the association remained primarily a Hindu association. The Bengal Muslim middle class was still in slumber. ‘Consequently, for a period, the community became apathetic and indifferent, and did not exert itself towards any kind of social or political activity, lest it should arouse the suspicion of the rulers. The Muslims were at this time in the deepest depths of degradation and decay.’!!
A small undercurrent of Muslim awakening was, however, developing outside the mainstream of the nineteenth-century’s dominantly Hindu Bengal Renaissance. One of the earliest to realize the damage that the withdrawal syndrome was doing to the community was Nawab Abdul Latif (1828–83), originally from Faridpur, who founded the Muhammadan Literary Society (1863) in Kolkata in which he gathered all the upper- and middle-class Muslims of Kolkata. The society propagated that British rule was too powerful to be resisted and too useful to be ignored. He realized the great value that western education and loyalty to the government offered to his community. His role in Bengal was somewhat similar to that of Sir Syed Ahmed Khan’s in north India. This society met once a month for many years at Abdul Latif’s house and freely discussed various questions of the day. It also held annual conventions where leading scholars, both European and Indian, were invited to present results of scientific experiments. The purpose of these gatherings was two-fold: to create among educated Muslims an interest in the subject and second, to provide an opportunity for friendly social gathering for all classes of Muslims. At times the Viceroy, the Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal, judges of the high court and the elite of Kolkata society-European and Indian–were in attendance. Oriental artifacts would sometimes be exhibited. The Lieutenant-Governor became the society’s patron in 1870 and continued to be so till 1895. The society was overtly loyal to the British government and took special care to promptly remove any
trace of sedition anywhere. It was because of this that it never came anywhere near the Indian Association. But towards the close of the century, it inevitably started expressing views on important political issues of the day. Thus, it petitioned the Secretary of State strongly supporting the Indian Councils Bill, but opposing the principle of election which, in its opinion, would harm the interests of the backward Muslim community. Nawab Abdul Latif also helped in the founding of the famous Presidency College of Kolkata (1855) and helped in the reorganization of Hooghly College and his own alma mater, the Kolkata madrassa. In fact, his educational work continued till his death in 1893, after which the society gradually petered out.
Unlike the Muhammadan Literary Society, there was considerable political orientation in the next Muslim body that came up, namely, the National Muhammadan Association, founded in 1878 under the leadership of Syed Amir Ali (1849–1928), barrister and honorary magistrate. It declared that there was need for a bona fide political body among the Mohammedans, to represent faithfully and honestly to government, from a loyal but independent standpoint, the legitimate wants and requirements of the Mussalman community’. To Amir Ali, therefore, goes the credit for initiating Muslim Bengal into some sort of rudimentary politics, although he himself remained loyal to the British government. His association also had the support of the Hindu elite. Amir Ali acknowledged the great assistance he received from influential Hindus.12 One of the honorary vice-presidents of the association was Raja Indra Chandra Singh of Paikpara. There were six Hindus among the honorary members, including Surendranath Banerji, Kristo Das Pal and Maharaja Jatindra Mohan Tagore, and there were twenty-nine Hindus among the subscribing members. Two even served on the management committee. Unfortunately, this healthy trend was not followed by other Muslim associations in Bengal, thereby preventing the possibility of Hindu-Muslim unity on a common social and political platform. The organizers of the association felt that the welfare of the Mohammedans is intimately connected with the wellbeing of the other races of India’. The association directed its
attention to social liberation and educational activities of the Muslims. It achieved a crowning success when its memorandum on education of 6 February 1882, submitted to Lord Ripon, provided the basis for Lord Dufferin’s famous resolution of 15 July 1885 on Muslim education and Muslim employment in public services. In 1883, in the Bengal Council, Mohammad Yusuf demanded reservation of seats for Muslims, but Amir Ali’s association suffered an eclipse when its moving spirit was appointed a judge of the Calcutta High Court in 1890 and was forced to withdraw from public activities.
Several other organizations were formed, like the Muhammadan Reform Association (1896) devoted to the education of Muslims. With the founding of the Indian National Conference (1883) and of the Indian National Congress on 28 December 1885, it was evident that the Hindu upper and middle classes were willing to plunge into direct political action. A few like Amir Ali did feel that unless the political activities of the Muslims ‘ran on parallel with that of their Hindu compatriots they were certain to be submerged in the rising tide of the new nationalism. But, on the whole, it became clear that few Muslims in Bengal were willing to give up their loyalty to British raj and come out in support of the Congress. Most of them had become more attuned to Syed Ahmed’s line of total support to British authorities and even followed Ahmed’s Patriotic Association (formed in 1885) to oppose the Congress. Abdul Latif, on behalf of the Muhammadan Literary Society, regretted their inability to accept the invitation to join the Congress session in Kolkata in 1886 ‘as they do not anticipate any benefit to be derived from the deliberations of the Congress’. The National Muhammadan Association also sent a similar reply of regrets. Some Muslims like Abdul Hamid Khan Yusufzai, editor of the Bengali paper Ahmadi, criticized this attitude, but Lord Dufferin appreciated this refusal. Thus there was a clear divergence of opinion among Hindus and Muslims in Bengal on joining the Congress. “The Muslims were conscious of the fact that the Hindus were far more advanced than themselves in every sphere of life. Hence it will be unwise for them to join hands with the Hindus in political affairs,’13
One important reason why the on-going process of the creation
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of a ‘nation in making’ was frustrated was the close identification of the activities of extremist Congress groups with Hindu motifs, deities and rituals. This started with the Hindu Mela—no one knows why it had to be called that rather than Bengal Mela–and went on with Bal Gangadhar Tilak starting the Ganapati and Shivaji festivals, both of which had repercussions in Bengal. There was a general move to organize them on Hindu lines. The target was no doubt British rule, but inevitably there was an unintended antiMuslim fallout. All appeals to the past could only mean the Hindu past. Patriotic writers invariably glorified not merely ancient Indian culture, but its predominantly Hindu texture. They also began to dwell upon the struggles of the Rajputs, the Marathas and the Sikhs as instances of early urges for freedom. As it happened, all these people had as their adversaries Mughal rulers, and the Hindu trend in the national sentiment was, therefore, intensified with very unhappy consequences. The report of the Sedition Committee (1918) commented that the religious practices of the Ganapati festival were similar to those of Muharram. Whether in this and in promoting the Shivaji festival, which revived bitter memories of Shivaji battling the Mughals and other Muslim powers, Tilak deliberately wanted to hurt the Muslims is doubtful; but clearly these had the unintentional effect of driving the two communities apart. Muslim sentiments were hurt by Tilak justifying Shivaji’s killing of Afzal Khan, and his strong support to the movement against cow slaughter. When no less a patriotic leader than Bipin Chandra Pal could announce that ‘in honouring Shivaji we were honouring the Hindu ideal’, Bengali Muslim sentiment found it difficult to work on a common platform. They felt impelled to go along with leaders like Nawab Salimullah to think that their path was different from that of the Hindus, and that they must strive for separate safeguards for their community.
Thus a great divide had already been created when the partition of Bengal, a sinister move to curb the influence of the anti-British Hindu elite, took place on 16 October 1905. No doubt the antipartition agitation was the first of the great people’s movement against colonial rule. But, paradoxically, except for a handful like barrister Abdulla Rasul, the majority of the Muslims in East Bengal
supported partition and viewed the great anti-partition agitation as an attempt to deny them an opportunity to have a Muslim majority province and as an all-out effort by the Hindus to continue their dominanceman aspect that has been ignored by Indian national historians. In 1904, Lord Curzon toured East Bengal and appealed to Muslim separatists. In retrospect, the anti-partition agitation, the Swadeshi movement and even the overtly Hindu armed revolutionary movement aggravated the ill will between the two communities and accentuated the great divide. It made the Bengali Muslims line up with the Muslims of upper India and the Aligarh movement, something they had not done till then. Anti-partition agitators and the terrorists were by and large Hindu bhadralok, who at times unwittingly took an anti-Muslim stance. Bengali Muslims wanted to include among the Aga Khan deputation demands that the 1905 partition of Bengal must continue. Nawab Salimullah and Nawab Ali Chaudhury threatened that in case this was not agreed to, Bengal would not cooperate with the deputation.14
In fact, a subtle difference between the Bengali Muslims and the upper India Muslim leadership now appeared. The latter wanted to avoid taking sides on a controversial issue like the partition of Bengal, while for the Muslim leadership of East Bengal, the continuance of the partition was necessary for protecting the interests of Muslims. Eventually, the Aga Khan deputation to Lord Minto at Shimla on 10 October 1906, comprising nobles, ministers, great landlords, lawyers and merchants, only raised the demand for separate electorates and weighted representation for Muslims in all elected bodies, and did not raise the question of partition of Bengal at all. This somewhat peeved the East Bengal Muslims.15 The Aga Khan deputation was primarily championing the cause of the Muslim landed aristocracy and Muslim soldiers in the army. Bengali Muslims were insignificant both as zamindars and as army recruits and could thus be ignored. The Aga Khan deputation to Minto pleading for a separate electorate and larger representation in services included only five members from Bengal and one from East Bengal and Assam, all of them aristocrats
Leaders like Salimullah now turned to other political experiments.
He successfully converted an All India Muslim Educational Conference convened at Dhaka in December 1906 into a political conference out of which was born the All India Muslim League. He had issued invitations to all members to continue sitting after the Educational Conference was formally over and circulated the outlines of a plan for a Muhammadan Confederacy and requested them to consider it. The resolution adopted at this meeting announced the following objectives:
a) To promote among Musalmans of India feelings of loyalty to the British government and to remove any misconception that may arise as to the intentions of the government with regard to any of its measures.
b) To protect the political rights and interests of Musalmans of India and respectfully to present their needs and aspirations to the government.
c) To prevent the rise among Musalmans of India of any feeling of hostility towards other communities without prejudice to the objects of the League. On 30 December, at a Muslim Educational Conference held in Dhaka, Nawab Salimullah moved a resolution for establishing a Muslim political association–the All India Muslim League-to respectfully present their needs and aspirations to the government. The resolution also pledged loyalty to the British government. The League had its next session at Karachi in December 1907. The headquarters were shifted to Lucknow in 1910. “Thus what was born in the soil of East Bengal came to be nurtured in the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh under the Urdu group.’16 The seeds of separation in politics had been sown, obstructing the growth of inter-communal nationalism.
While a generally non-communal Amir Ali undertook the task of providing leadership to the London branch of the Muslim League from 1908 onwards, Muslim leaders in the Congress tried their best to thwart this growth of separatism in Muslim politics. They met in Kolkata after the Congress session held there in 1906 and formed a political association named the Indian Mussalman Association to
counteract the League’s separatism. One of the vice-presidents was Muhammad Ali Jinnah, a staunch nationalist at that time.
For Salimullah and his followers, the annulment of the partition in 1911 was a great blow. Obviously, for the upper Indian Muslim leadership, this was not important. In disgust Salimullah, in quest for a Muslim federal political body, persuaded Fazlul Huq, who had joined government service as a deputy magistrate, to resign and join politics. This marked the advent on the stage of a great leader who was destined to be called Sher-e-Bangal or Bengal Tiger in later years, and who was destined for four decades to play a major role in Bengal politics and thereafter in the politics of East Pakistan. Fazlul Huq, like so many others, joined both the Congress and the League and, in fact, at one time became a general secretary of the Congress. In April 1914, in the Bengal Legislative Assembly, Huq expressed his bitterness over the annulment of partition and warned that for the Muslims there may be a parting of ways. But he was soon to outgrow this phase and turn more radical. With the death of Nawab Salimullah, who had almost retired from politics after the annulment of the partition, in January 1916, the age of courtier upper class Muslim politicians’ was over. The new, more modern type of politician was typified in Fazlul Huq. They never had much fondness for the politics of the Aligarh School, which comprised nobles, the landed aristocracy and titled gentlemen.
The growing assertiveness of Muslims in Bengal found reflection in increased quotas for Muslims in government jobs and in making a show of observing religious customs not acceptable to the Hindu community, in particular cow sacrifice in public on religious occasions. Not to be outdone, Hindus would also insist on taking their Durga immersion processions along routes where mosques stood and even played loud music near those mosques. This contributed enormously to dividing the two communities, at times erupting in communal violence. Agent Provocateurs started such violence and anti-social elements took advantage. There are many theories to explain the growth of Muslim separatism. These range from the rationalist historians attributing it to the British policy of divide and rule, to the fundamentalist Islamic historians emphasizing
the absurdity that the Muslims had been a separate nation from the time the Arabs came to India under Mohammed Bin Qasim in the eighth century. But there were clearly, as already noted, deep-seated economic, social and political reasons. These were not appreciated by Indian nationalists who ignored them and simplified things by pretending that these differences did not exist. But, interestingly, separatism in the political sense was unknown till the 1930s.
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2
FROM CAMARADERIE TO CONFLICT
Belying signs of separatism, there was a thaw in Hindu-Muslim relationship during the second decade of the twentieth century. Following the reunion of the two Bengals in 1911, there was a new phase of rapprochement and a new attitude of acceptance of each other, with their differences and differing interests. For several years during the First World War (1914-18) and afterwards, the Congress and the League used to hold their sessions one after another in the same town, enabling common delegates to attend both. Fazlul Haq was one such. The Congress-League scheme forged at the 1916 Lucknow session of the Congress by a group of experts headed by Motilal Nehru and Jinnah was a new beacon-light for the future. From the widely accepted scheme (1916) through the NonCooperation-Khilafat Movement there followed an unprecedented Hindu-Muslim togetherness in Bengal, which lasted for about ten years until the drafting of C.R. Das’s Bengal Pact, the high noon of Hindu-Muslim camaraderie in Bengal. Chittaranjan Das was one political leader who was acceptable to both Muslims and Hindus. A major section of Muslim leaders respected him. Despite Congress’ non-cooperation movement (1920–24), dyarchy as envisaged by the Montague-Chelmsford reforms came into force and elections were held to elect the legislature where ministers were to deal with the ‘transferred subjects while the reserved’ subjects stayed with the Governor. The working of the dyarchy for about a decade providedan opportunity for Hindus and Muslims, despite the strain, to work together.
No Congress candidate contested for the Bengal Legislative Council in 1920 in pursuance of the party’s boycott decision. The liberals (formerly moderates) had a free run. In a house of 140 in which officials and nominated members numbered twenty-six, there were fifty-seven elected Hindus and thirty-nine elected Muslim members. Governor Lord Ronaldshay appointed Surendranath Banerji, Pravash Chandra Mitter and Nawab Ali Chaudhury of Mymensingh as ministers to deal with the transferred subjects. They served the full term of the Council from January 1921 till the end of 1923. The Muslim minister, Nawab Ali Chaudhury, who was elected president of the Central National Mohammadan Association after Salimullah’s death, was a zamindar without any formal education. He was chosen in preference to the highly educated Abdullah Suhrawardy because he was from East Bengal. Otherwise, all three would have represented West Bengal.
An emerging difference between Hindu and Muslim legislators became evident even in the discussion in the Council on Surendranath’s amending bill on Curzon’s anti-democratic Kolkata Corporation Act of 1899 restoring self-government in the corporation. Taxpayers were to elect 80 per cent of the municipal commissioners, who would elect the mayor and the chief executive officer. The majority of Muslim members, led by Syed Nasim Ali of the Muslim League, demanded a separate electorate for the Muslim seats and an increase in the number of reserved seats for Muslims from twelve, which the bill had provided. This was despite opposition from Abdullah Suhrawardy and some other Muslim councillors affiliated to the Khilafat Party. Suhrawardy challenged Nasim Ali to contest any member of the Khilafat Party in any ward in Kolkata to prove his claim that the Bengal Provincial Muslim League was the true representative body of Muslims in Bengal. Eventually, the principle of separate electorates was accepted, reflecting the majority Muslim view.
A straw in the wind was the unnecessary controversy over the government grant to the newly established Dhaka University
promised by the government as a sop to East Bengal Muslims, some of whom felt aggrieved by the annulment of the partition and the resultant loss of Dhaka’s importance. From having been a provincial capital, Dhaka had become only a district town with the divisional commissioner’s headquarters. An unfortunate agitation against it was started by, of all people, Ashutosh Mukherjee, a great educationist and judge, who felt that this would affect the standing of Kolkata University. Lord Hardinge announced, as a compromise, that the new university would cover only the city of Dhaka and a radius of 10 miles and would be essentially a residential university. While this compromise satisfied the West Bengal Hindus, some of them agitated and were successful in depriving Dhaka University of the annual contribution of Rs 5 lakh from the government of India. In that process, they created animosity between Muslims and Hindus and between East and West Bengal. Educated Hindu opinion simply failed to gauge the East Bengal Muslim’s hurt feelings and to appreciate how much this new university could do in eradicating ignorance and spreading the light of education in backward East Bengal. We cannot do better than to recall the appeal made by the respected leader, Fazlul Huq, in the course of his intervention in the debate in the Council on this issue:
To my mind the Dhaka University became an eyesore to the men at the helm of the Calcutta University ever since Lord Hardinge proclaimed its establishment, though this proclamation was merely the fulfillment of a long-promised and long-desired decision of the government that had so long been kept in cold storage. I do not want to say much but I would caution my friends of West Bengal who put up objections whenever any money is proposed to be spent for Dhaka-Beware; if you persist in this attitude, it will only create differences between the two communities which will cause serious harm to the administration. I appeal to my friends on behalf not only of the Muslims but of the people of East Bengal in general not to object to the allotment of the fund proposed for the Dhaka University.
Khwaja Muhammad Azam of the Dhaka nawab family observed:
The major part of the total income of the Bengal government is collected from East Bengal but is spent for West Bengal; we do not object to it. What I do not understand, however, is the attitude of the people of West Bengal in objecting to the Dhaka University a few lakh rupees which was intended to be spent for that university but could not be spent so long. Nor do I understand why the Calcutta University
should be so envious of the Dhaka University. The meaningless controversy definitely sowed the seeds of communal division in Bengal. But there were silver linings. Many conservative Hindus supported the scheme for Dhaka University and voted with Muslims against the proposal to give women the right to vote.
By 1923, the Swarajya Party contested the Calcutta Corporation elections with the approval of the Congress leadership. With their getting a majority in the Calcutta Corporation, the spotlight shifted to the corporation. C.R. Das became mayor, H.S. Suhrawardy deputy mayor and Subhas Chandra Bose chief executive officer. Five aldermen were also elected by Swarajya Party members, including luminaries like Rabindranath Tagore and scientist Sir J.C. Bose.
The Bengal Pact, 1923
Now Chittaranjan Das, in a determined effort to break the communal deadlock and win back the general support of the Bengal Muslims, drafted his historic Bengal Pact (1923), a shining example of an instrument that could bring the Muslims and the Hindus of Bengal together. The following were the main terms:
a) The number of members of the two communities would be decided by their respective strength in Bengal’s population and the two communities would vote separately to elect their members.
b) The Muslims would have 60 per cent and the Hindus 40 percent of the seats in local self-government institutions.
c) Fifty-five per cent of government appointments would be
Muslims, but 80 per cent of the vacancies would be filled by them until the overall percentage of 55 per cent was reached.
d) Music near mosques, usually a standard excuse for Hindu Muslim riots, was to be banned.
e) Killing of cows for religious purposes on Bakr-Id, a standard pretext for starting communal violence, was to be permitted and nobody was allowed to object to it.
f) A committee with an equal number of Muslims and Hindus would be appointed in every subdivision to supervise the implementation of these terms.
The Bengal Pact, Chittaranjan’s masterstroke, did win for him the support of the Bengal Muslims, but cost him substantial Hindu support. But it was rejected at the Congress session (1923) at Kakinad presided over by Mohammed Ali. Again it was endorsed by the Bengal Provincial Conference of 1924, showing that the majority of the Hindu Congressmen defied their own central leadership and preferred to go along with Chittaranjan Das in what they perceived to be in Bengal’s larger and long-term interest. But the Bengal Pact, in some respects the high watermark of Chittaranjan’s political career, remained a subject of heated debate. Chittaranjan was so agitated when the Kakinad Congress refused to endorse the Bengal Pact that he confided that he would wash his hands off all-India politics and confine his activities to Bengal.1
In the elections to the Second Legislative Council (1924–26), the Swarajya Party, a group within the Congress itching to take part in the elections under C.R. Das’s charismatic leadership and fortified by Congress’s approval to join the election, stormed the bastion of the Liberal Party. Surendranath Banerji himself lost to a young unknown doctor, Bidhan Chandra Roy, who fought as an independent candidate with the support of the Swarajya Party. C.R. Das became leader of the fifty-four-member Swarajya group in the Council. The Nationalist Party, led by Byomkesh Chakraborty, had nineteen members and usually voted with the Swarajists. The Muslim members usually sided with the government. Lord Lytton, the Governor, invited Chittaranjan, the leader of the largest party, although it did not command an absolute majority, to form the
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government. This move met with strong opposition from the British community and its spokesman, the Statesman. But Chittaranjan declined. After all, the Swarajya Party’s avowed object was not to form any government but to oppose the government at every step and to create a deadlock and show the hollowness of the Mont-Ford (Montague-Chelmsford) reforms. In retrospect, this was perhaps an unwise decision from the bhadralok point of view. Lytton now appointed A.K. Fazlul Huq, a one-time protégé of Nawab Salimullah, but till recently a Congress leader, A.H. Ghuznavi and Surendranath Mullick as ministers, signalling the shift of political gravity in Bengal for the first time to Muslims. As Surendranath Mullick’s election was set aside by the court, Huq and Ghuznavi stayed as the only two ministers and they carried on with the support of the officials, the Europeans, the old liberals and some friends. Thus it was the 1924 Council election that, for the first time, put Muslims in a dominant position in the politics of modern Bengal.
After the very first meeting of the Second Legislative Council, a resolution moved by J.M. Sengupta and eloquently supported by C.R. Das for the release of all prisoners detained under the Bengal Regulation Act of 1818 without trial was passed by seventy-six to forty-five votes. This put the government in a predicament. Law and order was the Governor’s retained subject. Sir Abdur Rahim, member of the Governor’s Executive Council, had a dig at the Swarajists wondering how those who wanted to do away with these laws would refuse to take the responsibility for administration. Das’ retort was ‘I can assure Sir Abdur Rahim that we should take over the responsibility for the administration the moment the entire responsibility therefore devolves on the people.
The Council passed two more resolutions–one urging the release of all prisoners convicted of political offences and the other calling for the repeal of all those laws under which persons had been convicted. Emboldened by such success, the Swarajists moved a noconfidence motion against the ministers, but this was defeated by one vote. Unfortunately, this incident acquired a communal overtone with agitated Muslim demonstrators rushing into the Council chamber (the Town Hall) urging members not to join the conspiracy
for removal of Muslim ministers’. The Swarajya strategy of voting against the budget proposals with the help of others in the Opposition further heightened tensions. The Governor himself held a secret conference with some members to garner support for the budget. Das with his followers left the chamber in protest. Thereafter, the budget proposals were passed. But the Opposition took a stand on the salary of the ministers and, despite the Governor’s best efforts, repeatedly disallowed the salaries. The motion was moved by Dr Bidhan Chandra Roy, who had already made a mark as a legislator. The ministers had to resign and the Governor himself took over the administration of the transferred subjects. Thus the Swarajists succeeded in their main objective of bringing the dyarchy of the 1919 Act to a halt temporarily. But in that process they had to pay a heavy price of kindling the communal flame.
Another effort was made by the Governor to make the system work when he appointed Raja Manmothnath, Raja of Santosh, and Nawab Ali Chaudhury as ministers, but the Swarajya Party moved a cut motion reducing their salary and got it passed with the support of Fazlul Huq. The government then decided not to appoint ministers any more, but to suspend dyarchy till the end of the second term of the Council (January 1927).
The basic disagreement between Gandhi and Chittaranjan Das on the issue of the attitude to terrorists continued. It came to the surface in 1924 when a young terrorist, Gopinath Saha, in trying to assassinate Sir Charles Tegart, the notorious anti-terrorist commissioner of police of Kolkata, shot dead another Englishman, Day, an officer of Kilburn & Co., by mistake on 11 January. Gopinath expressed his regret at killing an innocent man, but showed great courage when he was being hanged, declaring, ‘Every drop of my blood will sow the seeds of freedom in the homes of Bengal. Sympathy and emotion surged up all over Bengal. The Bengal Provincial Congress Committee at its annual conference hel at Sirajgunge on 1 June 1924 passed a resolution acknowledging the supreme self-sacrifice of Gopinath Saha. It stated: “This conference while denouncing and dissociating itself from violence and adhering to the principle of non-violence, appreciates Gopinath Saha’s ideal
of self-sacrifice, misguided though it is, in respect of the country’s best interest and expresses respect for such self-sacrifice’. This was opposed by Gandhi. He moved a resolution at the Ahmedabad session of the All-India Congress Committee (AICC) condemning the killing of Day by Gopinath Saha. But Chittaranjan moved a counter-resolution reproducing the text of the Sirajgunge resolution. The AICC rejected Chittaranjan’s motion and approved Gandhi’s motion by a very narrow majority of seventy-eight to seventy. This reflected the strength of both sides, as also the fact that Gandhi’s support base in the Congress was only a shade larger than that of Chittaranjan Das.
The disagreement between Gandhi and C.R. Das was visibly growing. The government took advantage of this situation by hitting the extremists hard. Subhas Bose, chief executive officer of the Calcutta Corporation and Das’s main lieutenant, was arrested on a charge of encouraging terrorism. Even Gandhi saw through this me and hurried to Kolkata for a conciliatory dialogue with Das, which resulted in an agreement between the two.2 All the hard work and the immense tension was beginning to tell on Chittaranjan’s health. Even during the short span of life left to him he followed a mixed policy of confrontation and conciliation with the British raj. He vehemently opposed a draconian ordinance issued on 5 October 1924 for suppressing terrorists and the arrest of Subhas Bose and several others under this ordinance. He left Shimla, where he was convalescing, and rushed to Kolkata on 27 October to lead the protest demonstration. He had to be carried to the Council chamber on a stretcher, accompanied by Dr B.C. Roy and others. The Bill was defeated. From the mayor’s chair Chittaranjan announced that ‘Mr Subhas Chandra Bose is no more a revolutionary than I am’. But his conciliatory tone was evident both from a published pamphlet (29 March 1925) in which he condemned violence and from his presidential address at the Faridpur session of the Bengal Provincial Congress (2 May 1925) where he offered a compromise to the British Raj on his terms. These terms were:
First, government should relinquish for good the repressive powers assumed by them and, in proof of their bona fides, should release all political prisoners.
Secondly, they should make a firm commitment of complete Swaraj for India within the British Empire and this commitment should be unalterable.
Thirdly, pending grant of independence, the administrative machinery should be moulded in such a way as to serve as the foundation for the complete independence to come.
The nature and manner of moulding of administrative machinery to suit complete independence should be determined by mutual discussion.
We, on our part, shall undertake not to encourage any seditious movement by word, deed or conduct-of course this is not done now and we shall try in all possible ways to eradicate such suicidal movements from the land.
The strength and energy that are now being misdirected against the government would find their fulfillment in full utilisation for the real good of the country.
If government would not heed our proposals for a compromise, we would generate among the masses in the whole country a general atmosphere of disobedience of the government. Vanquished in our struggle for freedom, this is the ultimate weapon in our handa weapon sure and
unfailing. Chittaranjan’s gesture coincided with a significant change in British attitude. The British authorities realized that with Gandhi having withdrawn from active politics for a while, Chittaranjan’s leadership of the Congress offered the best prospects of a settlement. There began what an observer has called a long-range flirtation between Lord Birkenhead, the new secretary of state for India, and C.R. Das.3 Birkenhead entered into negotiations with Chittaranjan Das through Governor Lord Lytton and an intermediary.4 In a speech in the House of Lords, Birkenhead appealed to all Indians to move forward on the lines of Chittaranjan’s appeal and cooperate with the government. On his part, he expressed his willingness to lay aside all suspicions from his mind. Das had also in his memorable speech at Faridpur on 1 May 1925 declared that he was prepared to negotiate
if the government divested itself of its discretionary powers and announced an amnesty for all political prisoners. But within six weeks, Chittaranjan, while convalescing at Darjeeling, breathed his last on 16 June 1925. Birkenhead’s promised statement on India was still to come. Needless to say, his untimely death put an end to a strong possibility of a Congress-British political settlement. It plunged Kolkata and the whole country into unprecedented grief. To quote from his daughter’s biography: ‘If the country had advanced along the path indicated by my father at Faridpur with the leaders forsaking the illusion of leadership and their vanity, we would have obtained complete independence long ago and would not have to partition the country for gaining independence’.5 Gandhi, who was at Khulna when Chittaranjan died, rushed to Kolkata and endeared himself to Bengalis by joining the funeral procession and making a number of grief-stricken statements.
Before his death, Chittaranjan Das had gifted his house to the nation in order to divest himself of the last vestige of wealth that he possessed in the world’, to use Mahatma Gandhi’s own words.6 Even on his death-bed, he tried to solve the deteriorating communal situation over matters in the Calcutta Corporation. The burial of a Muslim pir inside the municipal market had created much controversy, primarily among non-Bengali Muslims. He told Mahatma Gandhi, who spent five days with him at Darjeeling ‘Neither Suhrawardy nor Subhas Bose had any authority to allow the pir to be buried in the Hogg market. A wrong has been committed, but we cannot wound the feelings of the Mussalmansit will be a greater wrong to exhume the body.’ He asked an associate to ‘go and see Sarat and ask him to speak to Suhrawardy so that everything may be smoothly done. If other communities raise the proposal for exhuming the body, and the Muslim members then resign, I shall also resign with them. But if any sect among the Muslims claims the body and has it removed for burial at some other place then troubles will be over.7 That was his practical solution to what had become an emotive communal issue.
The unexpected and untimely passing away of C.R. Das, a giant among men, created a vacuum in both all-India and Bengal politics.
30
It not only stopped a possible political settlement with the British government, but also prevented the emergence of a joint HinduMuslim front in Bengal. He was the only national leader whom both the Hindus and the Muslims trusted. Not only was his death mourned by stalwarts like Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore and by political leaders like Motilal Nehru, M.A. Jinnah, Maulana Azad and Muhammad Ali, but even by common people everywhere, Hindu and Muslim alike. One has to go through the highly emotional comments of the Muslim newspapers and periodicals of Bengal to understand the depth of their feelings. A typical comment was that of Muhamadi (Bengali) which described Chittaranjan’s death ‘as God’s extreme punishment to our countrymen’. Also it was he who first perceived the need for the Congress to go beyond city politics and reach out to the masses in outlying areas. In doing so, he not only made a very special effort to attract the Muslims but also co-opted into the provincial Congress hierarchy district Hindu leaders like J.M. Sengupta, a barrister in Chittagong, who had successfully led labour agitations around 1917, B.N. Sasmol, a Mahishya caste leader of Contai, Midnapore, who had led an effective non-cooperation movement in Midnapore and Anil Roy, who had led a successful anti-Union Board Movement in Bankura in 1921. He made a special effort to bring the armed revolutionaries within the fold of the Congress and thus enlist their patriotic fervour and organizational skill for the Congress cause.
There were two main groups, the roughly East-Bengal-based Anushilan Samiti, and the West Bengal-based Jugantar Party. Both accepted Das’ leadership under an informal agreement, though not officially. But this carried an inherent danger of driving the Muslims away by excessive dependence on Hindu religious myths, ideals and motifs. Das was eminently successful by 1921 in roping in the newly emerging Muslim leadership and building up a joint Hindu-Muslim anti-British political front. Some of the Muslim leaders who came under his banner were Abdullahal Barqui of Dinajpur, Maniruzzaman Islamabadi of Chittagong, Akram Khan of 24-Parganas, Shamsuddin Ahmed of Kushtia, Ashraffuddin Ahmad Chaudhury of Tippera, Tamizuddin Khan of Jessore and H.S. Suhrawardy of Kolkata and
Medinipore. Tamizuddin Khan, a former Congressman and subsequently a front-rank Krishak Praja Party member and Muslim League leader, has in his memoirs paid this tribute to Das’s heroic effort to build a composite platform: “The crowning achievement was the Bengal Pact of 1923 under which the Muslims in Bengal were to be given 55 per cent of the government jobs and 60 per cent of membership of local bodies in Muslim majority districts. This was a unique effort at co-opting the educated Muslims among the bhadralok. It was opposed by some Hindu Congressmen and some Muslims. Abdullah Suhrawardy accused Das of playing into the hands of religious zealots: ‘You have given so many concessions to the Muslims that tomorrow they will say that all Muslims must grow beards. I refuse to grow a beard.’ Tamizuddin Khan himself bemoaned that ‘Hindu-Muslim differences were of such a radical character that the influence of one single man, however strong, could only provide a temporary diversion of the natural course of history, but it could hardly lead to different destiny unless some social upheaval uprooting the causes that divided the two people intervened.9
No such social upheaval occurred. Nor was generosity, the one quality that the Hindu bhadralok needed to show towards the downtrodden Muslims, shown. This fomented bitterness amongst the Muslims. After Das’s death in 1925, a great blow to the development of Bengali nationalism, the Krishnanagar session of the Bengal Provincial Congress Committee (1926), under sustained pressure from a majority spearheaded by the terrorist-dominated Karmi Parishad, rejected the Bengal Pact. Das had steamrolled the Hindu terrorists and Muslim leaders into joining the Congress, but failed to integrate them into it. Inevitably, once his dominant leadership was no more, they parted company. After the abrogation of the Bengal Pact by the Kakinad session of the Indian National Congress, the Muslims in large numbers felt betrayed and deserted the Congress. Among them was the well-known Swarajya leader H.S. Suhrawardy. They found a new pasture in the Muslim League, till then viewed by Bengali Muslims as a party of the propertied classes and therefore with only marginal influence. The first sign of
this estrangement was that the Muslims fought the Calcutta Corporation election in 1927 separately. Unfortunately, the one Bengali politician who could have changed the general orientation of the Congress in favour of the interests of the Hindu rentiers and urban professionals, namely, Subhas Bose was kept away during long periods of incarceration at home and abroad (Mandalay) or externment in Europe.
3
UNMAKING OF A NATION
(1927–37)
The promise of united action against foreign rule was belied during the decade 1927–37 and thereafter. After Das there was no one who could retain the general loyalty of both the communities. Muslim separatism now started asserting itself and staking its claim to political power. Both Fazlul Huq’s Krishak Praja Party (KPP) and the Muslim League, already conscious of the demographic preponderance of the Muslims over Hindus, started systematically to stake claim to all institutions of patronage, power and influence hitherto the preserve of Hindus. They adopted policies and programmes to counteract Hindu bhadralok control of these institutions and all walks of life. From 3–5 April 1926, and again from 11-25 July, Kolkata exploded into communal violence on a scale unknown before, starting with the standard issue of Arya Samaj processions playing music in front of mosques. This accentuated the process of communal polarization.
It was during these riots that poet Nazrul Islam wrote his inspiring song Durgamagiri kantara moru dustara parobara he asking Hindus and Muslims to unite. This was sung as the opening song at the Provincial Political Conference at Dhaka (1926) as also at the annual conference of the Bangiya Muslim Sahitya Samaj. But, by and large, his message was unheeded. The much talked of composite
34
culture of Bengal gave way to the political stance of ‘Islam in danger accepted by large sections of Bengali Muslims. There were repercussions of the Kolkata riots at Patuakhali, Barisal and elsewhere. According to official reports, between 1922 and 1927 there were 112 communal riots during which 450 died and about 5,000 were injured.
There were two standard starting points. For the immersion of Durga idols on the occasion of Durga puja, Hindu processions would insist on playing music near mosques and Muslims would object to being disturbed while praying. Or during Bakr Id, Muslims would make it a point to kill cows in the open, thereby hurting the religious sentiments of orthodox Hindus. Incidents such as these aided by agent provocateurs would lead to ugly communal disturbances negating the efforts of so many right-thinking people (among both communities) who would have liked to see them living as friends. As always happens, anti-social elements would invariably take advantage of the situation to engage in widespread looting and destruction of property. Why the Durga puja or Janamashtami processionists could not be advised to avoid routes where mosques stood, or at least agree to stop playing music while passing by mosques, and why Muslims had to perform cow slaughter in the open and not in secluded places, will never be known. The city of Dhaka for years fell victim to this almost annual ritual of communal violence following a set pattern where anti-socials of both communities would temporarily take over, and decent people on both sides would withdraw indoors for a few days. Officialdom stayed inactive, complicating matters.
As the decade of the 1930s wore on, even separatist politics became increasingly confrontationist. The politically dominant Hindus had ridden roughshod over the genuine Muslim desire for an acceptable communal adjustment in the 1920s. It was now the turn of the Muslims to do the same unto the Hindus in the late 1930s and early 1940s. The Muslims were now fully conscious of their newly acquired political power as a result of a series of constitutional changes. The growing confrontation turned the 1940s into a period of great communal divide from which there was no
35
turning back. The communal riots in Kolkata in 1926 gave the first signal that all was not well with delicate communal relations in Bengal. Politics tended to be dominated increasingly by communal issues. It was in 1927 that the British rulers, for the first time, gave official recognition to the dominance of Muslims in Bengal and the corresponding end of bhadralok dominance. Legislative politics, hitherto the preserve of the Hindu bhadralok, slowly but surely passed under Muslim dominance. There were now five distinct groups: a Muslim upper class group of which Nazimuddin and Suhrawardy were the two main leaders, the Muslim peasantry and professional classes of which Fazlul Huq was the undisputed leader, the Congress-centred Hindu bhadralok class, dominated by the socalled ‘big five’ of Bengal Congress politics (Sarat Bose, Bidhan Chandra Roy, Nalini Ranjan Sarkar, Tulsi Goswami and Nirmal Chander), a powerful and vocal non-Congress Hindu zamindari class and, last, the Hindu scheduled castes led by Jogendra Nath Mandal. These five broad groups were to attempt different permutations and combinations in legislative politics during the remaining two decades before 1947, more often than not under the manipulative control of British officialdom. The Third Legislative Council (1927—30) started with Sir Abdur Rahim being appointed chief minister on condition that he would select a Hindu minister. As he was unable to select any Hindu and resigned, the Governor appointed Byomkesh Chakraborty and A.H. Ghuznavi. But they lost the confidence vote and resigned. In October 1927, Nawab Mosaraf Hossain and Pravash Chandra Mitter were appointed. Sometime later, the raja of Nasipur replaced Mitter, who had become a member of the Governor’s Executive Council.
Transfer of political power to Muslims
In a way, the formal Hindu domination of the politics of Bengal ended around 1927. Since then each successive ministry was headed by a Muslim politician who received the combined support of the elected Muslim MLAs, the Scheduled Caste Federation MLAs, the European MLAs and nominated official members. Thanks to the Congress policy of systematically sending Congressmen into the
legislature only for the purpose of wrecking the dyarchy constitution, Muslim leaders in Muslim majority provinces received complete support from the government and developed a vested interest in separatism. This also paved the way for partition.1 The Communal. Award of 1932 also dealt a body blow to the power of the bhadralok. This was vigorously opposed by the Hindus of Bengal. The Hindu Mahasabha accused the Congress of betraying the interests of Hindus.2 Interestingly, some Muslim leaders like Akram Khan also opposed it and moved a resolution in the Bengal Legislative Council that reservation of seats for the majority community in Bengal was a betrayal of their own interests. But the larger body of Muslims, including Fazlul Huq, welcomed it as a distinct advance’.
The composition of political parties in this House was confusing. Most of the Muslim Swarajists led by H.S. Suhrawardy had parted company with their Hindu compatriots and demanded Muslim majority in the Legislative Council in proportion to their strength and also separate electorates for them. The once strong Khilafatist group was slowly disappearing. The Muslim League was as yet inconsequential in Bengal. The most influential party among the Muslims, especially the East Bengal Muslims, was Fazlul Huq’s KPP, nominally secular, but with strong Muslim orientation, dedicated to protecting farmers and ryots from exploitation and ameliorating their conditions.3
For nearly ten years there was no-holds-barred rivalry between two broad factions in the Bengal Congress led by J.M. Sengupta and Subhas Bose respectively. With this division, and with the Swarajists boycotting the Council from 1929, the Muslim ministers carried the show of managing the transferred departments with the help of official members, Muslims and scheduled caste members in general, and some upper-class Hindu members, including some liberal Congressmen. The ministers did take some concrete legislative measures in the fields of education, local self-government and settlement of the debt burden of the peasantry and safeguarding their rights. This Third Legislative Council was indeed a turning point in the history of modern Bengal. It marked the transfer of effective political power in Bengal from upper-caste Hindus to
Muslims, aided by scheduled caste Hindus and a small section of the Hindu aristocracy. Although the Pakistan slogan and Jinnah’s twonation theory were still far off, there was a gradually emerging divide between Muslim Bengal politics and the politics of the Hindu bhadralok. There was an inevitable hardening of attitudes on both sides. Nationalism in Bengal was relying more and more on developing a Hindu cultural identity in spite of its claims that its ideology was secular. In particular, the terrorist group was unashamedly Hindu. It did not take any steps to attract middle-class Muslims4 or even the Hindu lower castes. This Hindu divide was further strengthened by the Gandhi-Irwin Pact (1931) and the Poona Pact (1932), which made sure that the Hindu bhadralok would no longer have the final say in the politics of undivided Bengal. Henceforth, a Muslim Bengali, and a Muslim Bengali alone, was likely to be the leader of the government under any constitutional pattern. With Subhas Bose’s continued detention and externment abroad, factionalism reared its ugly head in the Congress once again. Some of its members, in protest against the steep reduction of the number of caste Hindu seats in the Council following Gandhi’s controversial fast, formed a Bengali Nationalist Party, fought the Congress candidate in the elections to the Central Legislative Council in 1934 and even defeated them in a number of seats.
The growing Hindu-Muslim divide vitiated the proceedings in the Bengal legislature. On the one hand, there was increasing dominance of politics by Muslim politicians who carried majority control in the assembly by sheer electoral arithmetic. They could demand a larger and larger share of government jobs where Hindus had predominated so far, specially the upper and middle echelons. This antagonized a section of Hindus who resented losing their vested interest. There was also another economic basis. The Muslims were the dominant section among the peasantry and these leaders took it as their mission to improve the lot of the famished peasantry by enacting new tenancy laws. Once again this clashed with the economic interests of the Hindu zamindars and other landlords who dominated these sections. This provided a class basis to the HinduMuslim divide. All Muslim politicians by and large followed this
pattern, whether they were Bengali-speaking leaders from East Bengal like Fazlul Huq, or whether they were West Bengal-based Urduspeaking leaders like Suhrawardy, or whether they were scions from old nawab families like Nazimuddin. Most of them had started in the Congress and drifted away from it after Chittaranjan’s passing away. Interestingly, the Muslim League, despite originating in Dhaka, never had a base in East Bengal until the Second World War. Having for at least two decades been subjected to a system where the overwhelming number of new recruits in the executive services of the provincial government like the Bengal Civil Service were Muslims, and Hindu candidates, despite their educational superiority, were taken into subordinate services, educated Hindu opinion remained sullen and resentful. Instead of viewing it as an inevitable adjustment with reality, some of them viewed it as an invidious discrimination. This attitude of mind played no inconsiderable role in their unwillingness to stay with a Muslim majority in a united Bengal and in their decision to opt for a partition.
During the 1930s, the KPP and the Muslim League represented two contrasting ideologies vying for Muslim Bengali support. The KPP broadly represented tenant and peasant interests while the Muslim League represented the interests of zamindars and the business community. The first emphasized secular aspects like economic disparity and zamindari exploitation, while the second traced the root cause to the disadvantages suffered by the Muslims as a religious under-privileged community and emphasized that the only way the community could remove the state of deprivation was to act politically with a communal identity. There was a third weak stream consisting mostly of intellectually inclined middle class Muslims, who believed in establishing a common identity with a common anti-imperialist stand. But this trend was progressively weakened as the decade of the 1930s wore on.
With deteriorating Hindu-Muslim relations, communal riots unknown in the pre-British days became a recurrent feature in some towns in Bengal and continued during the 1930s. Once again there were many deep-seated causes, the most important being the tendency of anti-social goondas to utilize every conceivable occasion
of communal friction to create general disorder that would provide them an opportunity for looting and settling score with rivals and opponents. The manipulation of religious symbols in these riots was a standard occurrence. There was growing distrust of the other community’, which was seen as the enemy in a battle. The true meaning of slogans like Allahu-Akbar (God is great) and Bande Mataram (homage to the motherland) were simply forgotten, making them war cries underpinning the mutual separation of the two communities. Day-to-day politics inside the Bengal assembly and outside became recriminatory. The Muslims criticized the Hindus for utilizing their majority in the Calcutta Corporation to deny the Muslims elective offices like that of the mayor, deputy mayor and aldermen. The Muslims in Bengal formally stayed out of the Civil Disobedience Movement (1930–34) led by Gandhi. The Hindu bhadralok, already threatened with the loss of its power, further viewed with alarm the Muslim alliance with the Namasudras, or lower-caste Hindu peasantry. The Hindu press was bitterly critical of the Huq ministry’s agrarian reforms and, later, the efforts to take away secondary education from the control of the traditionally Hindu-controlled Calcutta University by forming a Board of Secondary Education.
Two relevant administrative reports of those times give interesting insights. The Bengal Administrative Report of 1929–30 remarked that ‘Muslims and Hindus tended to range themselves in opposite camps on any contentious question and illustrated this by giving the case of the Primary Education Bill which was turned into a communal issue by the Hindu members in the Council. The Dhaka Disturbance Enquiry Committee gave political jealousy among the educated classes of the two communities since the inauguration of the ‘first reforms’ as the root cause of all troubles. Each distrusted the other. Distrust bred distrust and the Hindus, instead of giving way to Muhammadans on non-vital points, still offended the Muslims by talk of revenge and threats of economic ruin. An interesting case in point was the somewhat irrational Muslim objection to the word Shri (meaning prosperity) or the symbol of the lotus in the Calcutta University motif. The Muslims protested against these and wanted their removal.
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End of the Bhadralok’s political supremacy
The Government of India Act of 1919 had introduced partial responsible government, enlarged the electorate, but kept 13 per cent of the Council seats reserved for nominated officials. The 1935 Act enfranchised only 13.4 per cent of the adult population of Bengal over twenty years of age. Almost anyone paying any tax had the right to vote. Under dyarchy, franchise qualifications (cess of Re 1 or chowkidari tax of Rs 5 a year for rural areas and Rs 1.5 a year for urban areas) were such that many Muslims were left without the right to vote. The 1935 Act enfranchised about 12.6 per cent of the population for the assembly. This was enough to cover the entire Muslim intelligentsia. This Act also substantially reduced the property qualifications (six annas of chowkidari tax and eight annas for municipal tax or cess) and the educational qualifications to completion of upper primary course for men and literacy for women. This substantially increased Muslim voting power. This coupled with the decimation of the Hindu bhadralok power after the MacDonald Award (1932) and the subsequent Poona Pact between Gandhi and Ambedkar of the same year-where Gandhi gave more power to the scheduled castes than even what the MacDonald Award had given-ensured Muslim domination of politics in Bengal with backing from the Hindu scheduled castes.6
Another area of acrimony was the control over secondary education by creating through legislation a Secondary Education Board. This was resented by the Hindus. This became the subject matter of a running battle in the Bengal assembly throughout the period from 1937 to 1946. Despite this, general Hindu-Muslim relations until 1944 were not marked by violence or confrontation except in isolated instances. Many individual Hindus including Nalini Ranjan Sarkar and Shyama Prasad Mukherjee served in ministries led by Huq and Nazimuddin. Even many Congress leaders were socially on good personal terms with Muslim leaders. Subhas Bose had a substantial following among Muslims and had several well-known Muslim lieutenants like Ashraffudin Ahmad Chaudhury, Huq’s KPP, despite being predominantly Muslim, was essentially a secular party. His personal closeness to the Hindu Mahasabha
leader, Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, and Dr Bidhan Chandra Roy, a non-conformist Congress leader, surpassed all barriers.
The reforms of 1935
The political deadlock created by the Ramsay MacDonald Award and the Poona Pact ended with the announcement of the Government of India Act, 1935. In many respects, the 1935 reforms envisaged a constitutional scheme applicable to an independent country in a not too distant future. This Act had a ‘federal component and a provincial component. The federal component with a federal government covering the provinces along with the princely states, the Federal Legislature, the Viceroy’s Executive Council and the Supreme Court except the last two was never implemented on account of the Congress Party’s strong resentment and the refusal of the majority of the princes to join the federal scheme. But the provincial autonomy that was envisaged was accepted by the Congress in spite of reservations on the veto power vested in the Governor. Other parties also followed suit. All parties, therefore, agreed to take part in the elections to the provincial assemblies as also the proposed Central Assembly.
The Government of India Act of 1935 by giving the Muslims 119 seats and the caste Hindus only 50 (30 out of 80 for general Hindu constituency being reserved for scheduled castes under the Poona Pact) in a House of 250 with twenty-five European members, once again underscored that Bengal politics would be dominated in future by Muslims aided by the so-called scheduled caste Hindus and that the caste Hindus would lose the privileged position they had enjoyed since the beginning of British rule. This was not acceptable to a section of the caste Hindus who almost believed that they had a divine right to rule and refused to cooperate with the Muslim leaders. This further intensified the communal divide. The failure of the Congress leadership in Bengal to win the Scheduled Caste Federation’s political support and the latter’s steady support to the Muslim League must be considered as a crucial failure of Congress policy.
There can be no doubt that before the mid-1940s, Pakistan was never considered as a serious model by Bengal Muslims. The original Pakistan scheme conceived by Chaudhury Rehmat Ali, a student in Cambridge University in the early 1930s, and blessed by poet Sir Mohamamed Iqbal, did not even include Bengal. It was a nebulous concept and was to comprise Punjab, Sind, Kashmir, Baluchistan, North West Frontier Province and even Afghanistan. The original blueprint was not even clear about the future of the Hindus and the Sikhs in Punjab, who taken together, were only a little less than the Muslims in number. Interestingly, the leadership for the Pakistan Movement did not come from the mullahs and the orthodox, but from western-educated, broadly secular-minded Muslim politicians like Jinnah, Liaqat Ali and Suhrawardy who saw in it an opportunity
controlling political power and economic resources for their community. Nor did the Muslim League gain much ground with the slogan before the early 1940s in those provinces where the Muslims were in the majority and controlled political power. Rather it gained unassailable positions in the provinces where the Muslims were in a minority and suffered from a fear of being swamped by the Hindu majority.
True that Fazlul Huq, under political pressure from all sides, joined the League and even moved the so-called Pakistan resolution in Lahore in 1940, but he never believed in the Pakistan concept and all along stood for a non-communal regime where the rights of the Muslims would be amply safeguarded. In fact, Pakistan meant different things to different people. To politicians like Jinnah it was a bargaining counter. To the Muslim masses it provided an escape route from Hindu domination and the possibility of realizing a meaningful separate identity. To the Islamic orthodox groups like the Khaksars, the concept of Pakistan was a misapplication and misuse of Islamic principles. For Jinnah, who was a staunch nationalist till 1930 and adopted the concept of Pakistan only in 1940, it was an instrument of political and economic power and religion had only a secondary role. For Kamruddin Ahmed, a Bengal Muslim League leader, it was essentially a movement of the Muslim middle class against the Hindu middle class.? The fear of being
swamped by the majority Hindu community fanned the flames of Pakistan, especially in those provinces where they were in a minority. Paradoxically, nearly all the provinces that were destined to form Pakistan in 1947, namely, Punjab, Sind and North Western Frontier Province, were outside the Muslim League’s domination as late as 1940. So was Bengal till 1943. In the wake of the Pirpur Report, in all the provinces where Muslims were in a minority they had, to quote Jinnah, ‘sampled Congress rule and were determined not to submit to any constitution, which would install Congress domination over the whole country’. Ispahani, an industrialist from Kolkata and the Muslim League’s main financier, noticed an “almost fanatical determination amongst Muslims not to be dominated by Hindus any longer, for it was impossible to achieve economic emancipation at the hands of the Hindus’.8 The resignation of the Congress ministries in seven provinces in 1939 created a vacuum which was exploited by the Muslim League, specially in provinces like Assam where in place of a Congress ministry the Muslim League was allowed to form a contrived coalition by Shadullah. Major political changes also occurred in Punjab, Sind and Bengal. The Unionists in Punjab, a non-communal party led by Sir Sikandar Hayat Khan, and the KPP in Bengal under Huq’s leadership were ‘coopted into the Muslim league.9 This led to the League, confined till then only to the towns, reaching the rural agricultural masses. Both Huq and Sikander Hayat Khan soon got disenchanted. Huq, who never believed in the two-nation theory, refused to resign from the National Defence Council as directed by Jinnah in 1940 and revolted against “Jinnah’s arbitrary use of power’. He even resigned from the Muslim League protesting against the manner in which the interests of the Muslims in Bengal were being ignored by Muslim leaders of provinces where the Muslims were in a minority. He also announced that the policy pursued by the Muslim League was neither Islamic nor patriotic and served neither the Muslims nor anybody else. He also complained that the policies pursued by the League were really leading even the Muslims into political ruin and disaster.
But Huq’s joining the Muslim League had given the party a respectability it never had, and it rapidly grew in strength at the
expense of both the Congress and the KPP. The mantle of Deshbandhu had passed on to Netaji Subhas Bose who was another leader in whom the Muslims had confidence. The fact that Bose had favoured the 1937 offer of Fazlul Huq for a Congress-KPP coalition. and that he fought the Calcutta Corporation election under the banner of what was loosely called at that time the Bose-League Pact (1941) illustrate this. Another example was the united movement under Bose’s leadership for the removal of the Holwell monument. Significantly, leaders like Ispahani and A.R. Siddique were close friends of both Mohammad Ali Jinnah and Subhas Bose. After Subhas Bose escaped from Bengal, Muslims again felt somewhat leaderless. But it was clear that with the formation of the Indian National Army by Subhas Bose in South-East Asia and their invasion of India in 1943 and by Subhas’s regular radio broadcasts addressed to the Indian people, a great deal of enthusiasm was created even among the Muslims of Bengal. After Subhas Bose’s disappearance in 1945 there was no turning back and most Muslims irretrievably jumped into the bandwagon of M.A. Jinnah and the demand for Pakistan. Extremism gained ground on both sides and moderates were driven to the wall. All efforts at Hindu-Muslim collaboration such as the Huq-Shyama coalition (1941-43) failed partly on account of intrigues of British officials and there was steady polarization on communal lines and a parting of ways.10
Crystallization of the distinct Muslim psychosis
By the 1920s there had been the clear emergence of a Muslim middle class intelligentsia in Bengal, which staked its claim to both political power and job opportunities.11 It was not a homogeneous group, linguistically, socially or economically. It attracted followers from both the aristocratic ashraf and the Muslim ryots and talukdars, although it was not coterminus with either. Some of them were as critical of Islamic fundamentalism and the activities of mullahs as of domineering Hindu attitudes and action. The Bangiya Musalman Sahitya Samiti (32 College Street, Kolkata) founded by Muzaffar Ahmad was the earliest manifestation of this trend. It brought out the Bangiya Musalman Sahitya Patrika in 1325 BS. Other examples
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were Saogat (1326 BS) edited by Muhammad Nasiruddin, the monthly Moslem Bharat (1327 BS) edited by poet Mozammel Huq, the evening daily Nabayug (1925) of which A.K. Fazlul Huq was the proprietor and Muzaffar Ahmad and the poet Nazrul Islam the joint editors. The eternally rebellious poet Nazrul Islam was connected with nearly all these publications. By far his most famous poem Bidrohi (The Rebel) was published in the Kartick 1328 BS edition of the Moslem Bharat. Nazrul maintained close contact with the freedom fighters and on 21 November 1921, led a procession at Comilla protesting against the Prince of Wales’ visit. He himself brought out the weekly Dhumketu in 1922, which was stridently anti-British. For a poem titled Anandamayeer Agamane (Arrival of the Blissful Mother) in the Puja edition of this weekly in 1922, he was charged with sedition, went underground, was arrested from Comilla and imprisoned in Hooghly Jail where he went on a hunger strike and was released on 15 December 1923. So great was his appeal that Rabindranath dedicated his play Basanta to him, and the novelist Sarat Chandra Chatterjee wrote to him greeting him as one of the greatest poets Bengal had produced. He carried on his patriotic activities by editing the weekly Langol (Plough), mouthpiece of the Shrameek-Praja-Krishak Group (1925), the Ganabani (1933) and Nabayug (revived in 1940 with him as editor) and in courting detention a second time in 1930, from which he was released on 4 March after the Gandhi-Irwin Pact.
The Muslim Sahitya Samaj founded by some Dhaka teachers and intellectuals in January 1926 was also an illustration of this secular national trend. Its organ, Sikha, declared significantly ‘where knowledge is confined and the intellect active, emancipation is impossible’. It also declared that it wanted ‘a change of direction in the social and intellectual life of the Muslim society’. Some of the leaders of this group were Kazi Abdul Wadud, Qazi Mutahar Hussain, Abdul Qadir, Kazi Nazrul Islam, Humayun Kabir, the intellectual politician, and Sheikh Wajed Ali, the writer who joined the group. One of its meetings in 1937 was presided over by Sarat Chandra Chatterjee, the famous novelist, showing its overall non-communal approach. Along with Sikha, another journal that provided sustenanceto the newly rising Muslim middle class for years was the monthly Saogat of Abdul Hussain. The Saogat opposed the separate educational stream of madrassas and advocated a common educational stream for both communities in order to establish amity in the body politic’. Abdul Hussain even went to the length of castigating Muslims for obstructing through their folly and wretchedness every good initiative of the progressive Hindus. Many of them braved prosecution and social ostracism for their views, some of them went so far as to form a ‘League against Mullahism’.
A number of other periodicals published from Kolkata and Dhaka such as Naoroz (June 1927), Ganabani (August 1926) and Jyoti (April 1930, editor Abdul Qadir) reflected this new liberalhumanist spirit among Bengali Muslims, which, unfortunately, became a casualty of the rising crescendo of communal bitterness during the 1930s. The middle-class Muslim had placed high hopes on the Congress-League Scheme of 1916 and on Chittaranjan’s Bengal Pact and thereafter on the anti-communal patch-up efforts of Subhas Bose. Bose was a rare bhadralok politician in the post-Das period to earn praise from Muslims. In 1928, in the Bengal Legislative Council, Abdul Karim from Burdwan spoke of the earnest efforts that are being made by my young friend Mr. Subhas Chandra Bose, and others of his way of thinking to bring about a relation of amity and cordiality between the two communities’12 His continued detention and externment from Bengal frustrated all such efforts. After the death of C.R. Das and the Congress rejection of the pact, the Bengali Muslims were disenchanted with both the Congress and the League. The KPP emerged as the strongest champion of peasant and middle-class rights. This party sought to improve the conditions of ryots by legislation and raise the percentage of Muslims in government jobs. Its moves invariably met with opposition from the Hindu bhadralok.13 Even the Swarajists bitterly opposed the KPP’s proposals during the discussion in the Council on the 1928 Tenancy Act. In December 1925, a KPP-sponsored Tenancy Amendment Bill giving occupancy rights to the ryots was opposed by Hindu interests even at its introduction. There were illustrations of a deep divergence of class interests.
By the mid-1930s, the KPP and the Muslim League, representing conflicting ideologies, were both vying for Muslim support in Bengal. The first reflected peasant and tenant interests, the second zamindar and business interests. The salaried and professional classes were evenly divided. The Muslim League, essentially a party of the upperclass affluent Muslims, had become virtually a defunct body after 1920, when it was overshadowed by the Khilafatists. It was literally put on the shelf on account of Jinnah’s opposition to the Khilafat Movement. It was revived in 1934 by Jinnah himself, who had been its staunch opponent earlier, and took over its leadership under Liaqat Ali’s persuasion. A Bengal branch was formed only in 1936 when Jinnah visited Bengal. Its main organizers were two Kolkatabased businessmen-M.A. Ispahani and A.R. Siddique. But such were the shifting sands of political loyalty in Bengal that both of them became close allies of Subhas Bose. Soon the League attracted leaders like Nazimuddin and Suhrawardy, both seeking a platform.
The KPP originated from the first All Bengal Praja Conference held at Mymensingh in 1934. It was not a Muslim party by definition, but one does not come across any caste Hindu name among its prominent members, although it had a large scheduled caste base. The leadership was exclusively Muslim, many of them high-class ashrafs. But the party was mainly concerned with improving the conditions of the Muslims and ensuring equal rights for them. The Nikhil Banga Praja Samiti, with Maulana Akram Khan as its secretary, came up in 1934 following the disappointment of many Muslims with the Bengal Tenancy Act, 1928. Soon there was a distinct cleavage along East Bengal-West Bengal lines. For electing a successor to Sir Abdur Rahim, who resigned as president, the delegates from East Bengal supported Fazlul Huq in overwhelming numbers, while the majority of the delegates from West Bengal led by Maulana Akram Khan supported Khan Bahadur Abdul Momen. Another party, the Jamait-i-Ulema-Hind, also had some peripheral influence. Paradoxically, it had elements who were also to oppose the demand for Pakistan on the ground that creating a territorial sub-nation was un-Islamic. Its leadership was largely non-Bengali.
It is difficult to accept Jatindranath De’s contention that the
KPP primarily reflected the interests of jotedars (landlords) and sampanna prajas (affluent farmers) and did not really launch a composite movement of the lower strata of Hindus and Muslims against exploitation of the zamindars’.14 His charge that the KPP. served only Muslim interests is not supported by facts. There is overwhelming evidence that it espoused the causes of ryots, both Muslim and Hindu. Also, it had a substantial scheduled caste base. It was thus an inter-communal party. Fazlul Huq’s election as the secretary of the Nikhil Banga Praja Samiti in 1935, the party renaming itself as the KPP and its open demand for the abolition of zamindari without compensation met with opposition from the landed upperclass Muslim leaders from Kolkata and the western districts, like Akram Khan, Abdur Rahim and H.S. Suhrawardy. They broke away in 1936 to form the United Muslim Party (UMP), which subsequently merged with the Muslim League. It criticized the KPP as not a purely Muslim organization and said it sought its identity among Muslims only in order to serve its own class interests.
As analyzed by Tazeen Murshid, ‘lack of consistency, or a certain ambivalence regarding their political destiny and ideological outlook characterised … the majority of the intelligentsia in the prepartition period15. Leaders like Fazlul Huq, Suhrawardy, Abul Hashim, Abdul Mansur Ahmad and Maulana Akram Khan were all, in varying degrees, victims of this ambivalence. It also affected their attitudes to British rule, the Congress and the Muslim League, on the concept of Pakistan and the idea of a united Bengal. Whether they came from the ashraf aristocracy-like Abdul Latif, Amir Ali, Nawab Salimullah, or Mir Musharraf Hussain or rose to ashraf status from rural background like Munshi Maherullah and Danshil Ketabuddin—they were all local reformers with a deep concern for the education of their downtrodden community. They resented the Hindu bhadralok’s contempt for the Muslims, his refusal to accept some of the typical vocabulary commonly used by Muslims (for example, pani for water) as part of the Bengali language and the refusal of at least some of the Hindu Bengalis to give them the status of bhadralok or even that of Bengali16 In a way this attitude was refuted with vengeance in Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s emphatic
assertion two decades later that. East Bengalis were the true Bengalis and their country the true Bangladesh. Rabindranath Tagore could pinpoint the emerging separate psyche of Muslim Bengal. In his Ghare Baire (Home and the World) he expressed his empathy with the Muslim cloth-seller who was bewildered and angry to see his shop full of foreign-marked cloth burnt by the swadeshi babus, thus creating a communal divide. The following comments are also of great relevance.
It is difficult to wish away a real separateness that exists between Hindus and Muslims. If we ignore this separateness in the interest of short-term gains, that in turn also will not respond to our needs. Whenever we have appealed to the Muslim we have looked on him as a mere helper in getting a job done and not as one we look upon as our own. We have not treated him as a true companion, but only as an accessory. Where there is an incongruity between the two they will stay together only so long as it is necessary for them to do so in the interest of overcoming a common external danger. The moment that necessity is over they would start fooling each other in the distribution of the spoils. It is on account of this mistrust that the Muslim has not responded to our call. It is not unreasonable of him to feel that if he can prosper through his separatism that is his obvious choice. The feeling of separateness between Hindus and Muslims was not so intense a little while ago. We had united together so well that the separateness was not visible. But a time came when the Hindu started taking pride only in his being Hindu. If the Muslim had acknowledged the glory of the Hindu and removed himself to the background, the Hindu would no doubt have felt pampered. But the Muslim now raised his Islam precisely on the same token by which the Hindu’s Hinduism had become aggressive. He now wanted to be the winner through his Islam form, not by uniting with the Hindus.17
In her excellent research work, Tazeen Murshid18 traces the evolution of Abul Mansur Ahmad during those years from a nationalist and
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Congress position to a communalist position in the 1940s through a transitory KPP phase. Initially Mansur Ahmad was not at all antiHindu and strongly advocated Hindu-Muslim unity on Chittaranjan’s lines. Gradually he became a Muslim communalist in the sense of being exclusively concerned with protecting Muslim interests. In 1944 he joined the Muslim League as he was said to be upset with aggressive Hindu communalism, even refusing to accept the separate characteristics of Bengali Muslims. Driven to a point of extreme communalism he would not acknowledge Rabindranath, Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar and Bankim Chandra as a part of East Bengal culture, as they neither used East Bengali languge, nor depicted East Bengal Muslim life. Even when he participated in the Bengal Muslim Sahitya Samiti, he strove to perceive it in a communalist role unlike many of the other members of the Samiti. But after Pakistan came into being, bereft of the overwhelming Hindu threat, he became less of an exclusive communalist. He even supported the language movement in East Pakistan for recognition of Bengali as the country’s official language. Abdul Mansur Ahmad, in many respects, epitomized the career of many average members of the Bengali Muslim intelligentsia who, during the late 1930s and early 1940s, changed over from nationalist positions to separatist positions on the basis of religion in politics.
The MacDonald Award (1932) and the Poona Pact between Gandhi and Ambedkar ensured that in future Muslims with the help of Hindu scheduled castes would dominate Bengal’s legislative politics and the bhadralok Hindus would recede to a secondary position. The newly acquired political strength further accentuated the aggressive Muslim psyche, which tended to browbeat the Hindus much in the same way as the Hindus had done in the yesteryears. The key point of the conflict was the determination of the Hindu bhadralok classes to cling to the social and economic privileges they had enjoyed for one-and-a-half centuries and the equally vocal aspiration of the emerging Muslim middle classes for a share in the privileges denied to them so long. This point was forcefully brought out by a non-politician scientist, Sir P.C. Roy, while addressing a meeting of Muslim young men at Karachi on 26 October 1932.
Hindu Muslim differences were differences only among intellectuals for loaves and fishes of office. It was a lie to say that Islam was spread by sword. Hindus should have been annihilated if this doctrine was true. The real reason for the . spread of Islam was democracy and brotherhood, and landslides in Hinduism were due to untouchability and the caste system. For centuries Bengal was ruled by Muslims, and yet ninety-nine percent of zamindars were Hindus.19
Gradually the Muslims in Bengal came to be broadly divided into three strands-conservatives, moderate and radical. Nazimuddin and Tamizuddin Khan represented the first, Nausher Ali, Humayun Kabir and, to an extent, Huq and Suhrawardy, despite strong differences between the two, represented the second, and Muzaffar Ahmad and Kazi Nazrul Islam represented the third. Muzaffar Ahmad, a secular progressive nationalist leader, represented a very striking case of one who took a leading role in Congress politics, did his best in association with Nazrul Islam to project an intellectual approach in the politics of Muslim Bengal and eventually turned to communism. Born in a bilingual family in Chittagong and having learnt both Bengali and Urdu, he was attracted to the terrorist movement, but found it difficult to accept its identification of the motherland with Goddess Durga and turned to literary pursuits. In 1920, he decided to opt for politics. Deeply influenced by the Russian Revolution of 1917 and the atheism of Marxism, he gradually turned to communism and became one of the founders of the Communist Party operating as a part of the Congress. As a Congressman he took a leading part in the affairs of the Bengal Congress while also working as a communist underground worker. But he, like so many others, was politically ineffective in influencing the generality of Bengali Muslims who turned to the Muslim League. Muzaffar Ahmad stayed on in India as several others like Kazi Abdul Wadud did to become a leading figure of the Communist Party of India and after 1964 the Community Party of India (Marxist) while maintaining a close link with the communists in East Bengal. But in the 1930s and 1940s he was ahead of his time as far as Muslim Bengal was concerned.
In Nazrul Islam, the secular and nationalist Bengali tradition reached its zenith. The feeling was eloquently expressed by Subhas Bose as chief guest at a reception given to Nazrul at Albert Hall Kolkata on 15 December 1929 on behalf of the ‘Bengalee nation’ (its chairman was Acharya Prafulla Chandra Roy and the organizers were Md Nasiruddin Abul Kalam, Shamsuddin Ahmed, Abdul Mansur Ahmad, Habibullah Bahar).
The rebel poet Nazrul through his poems has revived mass awakening and patriotism and indeed brought about the magic of revolution in the life of the nation. The influence of his writings on the people is uncommon. Even an unmusical person like me felt like singing his patriotic songs inside the prison. We shall sing Nazrul’s battle songs when we go to battles. We shall also sing his songs when we go to the prison. I have had the good fortune to listen to patriotic songs in various provincial languages. But I do not recall listening to such a stirring song as Durgama Giri. The dream of Nazrul is not just his own dream, it is the dream of the entire Bengalee nation.20
Unfortunately, there were not many takers in Bengal of this dream as the 1930s and the 1940s progressed, and more and more Bengalis surrendered themselves to the galloping cavalcade of separatist and communalist forces. Also, their leaders, Muslims and Hindus, subordinated Bengal’s true interests to the dictates from leaders in northern and western India. The pathetic fact remains that the Bengal Muslim Society in the late 1930s and 1940s was not yet ready for rebels like Nazrul Islam and Muzaffar Ahmad, or even the gentle and scholarly Humayun Kabir or the poet Sufia Kamal who were inspired by the best secular humanist traditions of Bengal and upheld the religion of man above all communal considerations. Their psyché opted for communalist and separatist politics at that point of time. It was only after the creation of two Bengals in 1947 that their Bengali psyché could get the upper hand with its inevitable political fallout after a quarter of a century. But in the turbulent 1940s, their mind was dead set on separation and breaking away from Hindu-dominated India.
4
PARTING OF WAYS
(1937-45)
The Government of India Act of 1935, which was brought into effect in 1937, was a very important landmark in the evolution of the Hindu-Muslim relationship. The federal component of the Act was not acceptable to either the Congress or the princes, but the Congress accepted the provincial part of the Act and provincial elections were announced. Dyarchy, which had prevailed in the provinces since 1919, came to an end. For the first time the common masses (still only a pathetic 13 per cent of the population) cast their votes in the general elections to elect legislators, who would form responsible government in the provinces. The political history of Bengal during the eventful years 1937-45 can be divided into:
a) Fazlul Huq’s KPP-Muslim League coalition (1937-41);
b) the Shyama-Huq coalition (1941-43);
c) the Muslim League coalition government led by Khwaja Nazimuddin (1943-45);
d) Governor’s rule under Section 93 (1945-46).
It was during these years that the uneasy coexistence between the bhadraloks and the Muslims in a political system that had marked Bengal for about ten years gave way, leading to the parting of ways. Fazlul Huq, H.S. Suhrawardy and Khwaja Nazimuddin
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were the three dominant Muslim leaders who played decisive roles in the last phase of undivided Bengal. Eventually they all surrendered their initiatives to leaders from northern and western India. Of them, Huq had brought a new style of mass-based politics into the picture, not depending on official patronage as Nazimuddin did, but deriving power from demonstrated contribution to the well-being of the masses. His slogan of daal-bhat for the people and his concern for farmers and prajas endeared him to the Muslim peasantry of East Bengal, whose language he spoke. Yet, his career was marked by many turns and twists, many ups and downs.
Starting politics as a lieutenant of Nawab Salimullah, he supported the first partition of Bengal but thereafter gravitated to the Congress. In 1916, he supported the Lucknow Pact and stood for Hindu-Muslim unity. In 1918, he had the unique distinction of being both general secretary of the Congress and president of the League. In 1920, he opposed Mahatma Gandhi and the Swarajists’ call to students to leave government schools because he felt that forsaking education was not the right thing for Muslim youth. In this respect he stood side by side with Rabindranath Tagore, Ashutosh Mukherjee and, paradoxically, Muhammed Ali Jinnah. In 1920, he opposed Muslim participation in Gandhi’s civil disobedience movement as this, in his opinion, would hurt the interests of the Muslims. The repudiation by the Congress of C.R. Das’s Bengal Pact in 1926 and its unwillingness to take a pro-peasantry stand in the Council discussions on the 1928 Bengal Tenancy (Amendment) Act led to general disenchantment among peasants, specially Muslim peasants, with the Congress. This led to the overwhelmingly Muslim participation in the Praja Movement in Bengal. Social and cultural segregation between the two communities added to the political bitterness. In this background, during the 1930s, Huq organized the KPP as an inter-communal though overwhelmingly Muslim party, By the beginning of the 1930s, krishak samitis had been formed in almost all the districts of east and north Bengal. In 1929, they all joined together to form an all-Bengal Praja Samiti. In April 1936, at a conference in Dhaka presided over by Fazlul Huq, the Praja Samiti turned into the KPP. Huq was elected mayor of the Calcutta
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Corporation in 1936. Apart from the prajas or tenants it also claimed to represent small jotedars (landlords) and Muslim professionals. It did not profess to be a Muslim or communal party despite the aspersions cast by researchers like De.1
Suhrawardy, a barrister of liberal views, whose family was from Medinipore, started politics as a lieutenant of C.R. Das, the one Bengali Hindu leader who commanded the loyalty of Muslims in general. He came from an urban ashraf background and, like Huq, was an independent-minded politician who could not be purchased by titles. On the other hand, he could not go against his class interests and support land reforms. He was a lieutenant of C.R. Das during the Swarajya days, but left the Congress platform after Das’s death and gravitated to the Muslim League. The following comments from his memoirs are of great significance:
Entering politics in 1920, I became a member of the Bengal Legislative Assembly and joined the Khilafat Organisation. In the initial stages I was loosely associated with the Congress and was the Deputy Mayor of Calcutta with Deshbandhu C.R. Das as Mayor. He was a great Bengali, I say an Indian, scarcely less in stature than Mahatma Gandhi. I have had the good fortune to know him. He was endowed with vision, he was wholly non-communal, generous to a fault, courageous and capable of unparalleled self-sacrifice. His intellectual attainments and keen insight were of the highest order. As an advocate he commanded fabulous fees which he laid at the feet of his country. Towards the end of his days he renounced his profession, devoted himself to politics and the service of his country and died a pauper overwhelmed with debts. I believe with many that had he lived he would have been able to guide the destiny of India along channels that would have eliminated the causes of conflict and bitterness, which had bedeviled the relationship between Hindus and Muslims, which for want of just solution, led to the partition of India and creation of Pakistan.2
In 1937, when Nazimuddin lost to Fazlul Huq in the elections, Suhrawardy rehabilitated him by giving him one of the two
constituencies from which he had won. But the two never got on with each other. Again, Suhrawardy got Huq and Nazimuddin together in 1937 to form the KPP-League coalition government. He had a somewhat questionable role during the war and the Bengal famine years and was accused by many of corruption. He was also known for his close contact with the Kolkata underworld. But in fairness to him, it should be said that he was the main fund manager for the Muslim League. In the early 1940s he, along with Abul Hashim, who was general secretary of the Bengal Muslim League, did a lot to popularize the League among the Muslim masses in Bengal, and he led the League to an overwhelming victory in the 1946 elections. He is held responsible by many for the great Kolkata killings in August 1946, which, more than any single event, paved the way for Pakistan. And yet when he had to face Pakistan as an unavoidable reality, he projected the concept of a sovereign united Bengal which, in his vision, was to be a non-communal, socialistic society. His crusading role in Pakistan politics in defence of the Bengali language and the rights of the Hindu minority must also be highlighted in any overall assessment of this mercurial leader.
Khwaja Nazimuddin, a well-meaning and essentially moderate political leader, was a scion of the Dhaka nawab family. A veteran Muslim Leaguer, but not fanatically communal, he was of a bureaucratic temperament. He was not a mass leader like Fazlul Huq, nor a scheming player of realpolitik like Suhrawardy. He chose to be a questioning camp follower of Jinnah and generally maintained a low profile. As home minister in Huq’s first cabinet and thereafter as prime minister in the Muslim League coalition government in Bengal between 1943 and 1945, he maintained good personal relations with many Congress leaders. Even as the first chief minister of the East Bengal province of Pakistan he did his best to protect the Hindu minority, although often overruled by the anti-Hindu West Pakistan bureaucracy. He never got along with Suhrawardy and was party to Suhrawardy’s expulsion from the Muslim League and from East Pakistan in 1949.
After the dramatic escape of Subhas Chandra Bose (1941), who commanded emotional loyalty from large sections of both Hindus
and Muslims in Bengal, there was no Hindu leader of national stature left in Bengal. The four Hindu leaders who played key roles were Sarat Chandra Bose (Forward Block-Congress), Shyama Prasad Mukherjee (Hindu Mahasabha), Kiran Shankar Roy (Congress) and Dr B.C. Roy (Congress). Sarat Chandra Bose, who had left the Congress with his brother Subhas in 1939 and formed the Forward Block, was in detention till 1945, and returned to the Congress on his release. He was elected to the Central Assembly and became leader of the Congress in the Assembly. He also briefly became a minister in Nehru’s first interim cabinet, but had to quit to accommodate Congress Muslims when the Muslim League joined. He was distrusted by the British raj and ignored by the Congress high command. He joined up with Suhrawardy in mid-1947 in projecting the concept of a sovereign, united Bengal and continued his efforts till the very end.
Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, the son of Sir Ashutosh Mukherjee, came to public life as vice-chancellor of Calcutta University. He started his political life as a Congressman and was elected to the Bengal Legislative Council as a Congress candidate in 1929. But he resigned from both the Council and the Congress when the Civil Disobedience Movement began. He resigned from the Council because Gandhi required this and from the Congress because he was opposed to this idea. He was re-elected to the Bengal Council as an independent candidate in 1937 and was elected to the Bengal Legislative Council from the Calcutta University constituency, and would have favoured a KPP-Congress coalition, but he was appalled at the Congress leadership’s pathetic naivette in turning down Fazlul Huq’s coalition offer. In 1939, coming out against both the Congress and the Muslim League, he joined the All India Hindu Mahasabha, He became its president and was destined to play a key role during the period. A nationalist par excellence, he was not against Muslims but against the Muslim League and its communal policies. Passionately opposed to the partition of India, he ended up proposing and working for the partition of Bengal. He was essentially not communal-minded. He believed in cooperating in politics with progressive Muslim leaders like Fazlul Huq, whom he joined in a
coalition government in 1941. This was a shining example of collaboration in an age of communal polarization. Its success could have prevented the partition. But the coalition collapsed under constant attack from communalists on both sides and the intrigues. of white officialdom led by Governor Herbert. Ironically, in 1947, when the partition of the subcontinent seemed inevitable, it was Shyama Prasad who first gave the call for a parallel partition of Bengal. He joined Nehru’s cabinet after independence after resigning from the Hindu Mahasabha and advising the Mahasabha to disband itself.
Kiran Shankar Roy, as leader of the Congress both before his arrest in 1942 and after the 1946 elections, played a key role in the Bengal Assembly. He had considerable literary flair and was more of an intellectual than a politician. He played a role in the abortive Congress-KPP negotiations and had good personal equations with League leaders like Suhrawardy. He was, for a while, a supporter of a sovereign united Bengal along with Suhrawardy and Sarat Bose until he was overruled by the Congress leadership. He stayed in Pakistan for some time as leader of the Congress Party in the East Bengal Assembly, but came to India in 1948 when Dr Bidhan Chandra Roy, on becoming chief minister of West Bengal, appointed him as home minister. Bidhan Roy was a Congress leader who had shot into eminence as far back as the 1920s, became a member of the Congress Working Committee in 1930, but preferred his medical profession to everything else. He kept up good personal equations as a doctor with all his political opponents like Fazlul Huq, Jinnah and Suhrawardy. But he disagreed with some of the major decisions of the Congress leadership, preferred to withdraw to the ringside and did not play any active role in politics during the years 1942-47. He was opposed to the partition and kept himself aloof from all negotiations on it.
The elections of 1937
The announcement of the elections triggered off intense political activity. The Bengal Congress, somewhat weakened by internal squabbles and its growing estrangement from the Muslim masses,
was still the strongest force. The KPP, founded in 1927 by Fazlul Huq and rapidly gaining support among the Muslim peasantry of East Bengal, was also a strong political party. The Muslim League, with its landlord base, had only minimal presence in Bengal. Some Muslim leaders led by the nawab of Dhaka formed the United Muslim Party (UMP), in order to take part in the elections. M.A. Jinnah, who had returned to India in 1936 after his six-year selfimposed exile in Britain and assumed the Muslim League’s leadership, made serious efforts to bring both the KPP and the UMP under the League’s banner and fight the elections. The UMP agreed to merge itself with the Muslim League, its top leadership including Nawab Habibullah of Dhaka. Khwaja Sir Nazimuddin, H.S. Suhrawardy, Maulana Akram Khan, Tamizuddin Khan and Khwaja Shahabuddin were co-opted to the Muslim League central committee. A prominent role was taken in these negotiations by Jinnah’s close friend, M.A. Ispahani, a leading Kolkata businessman. Huq initially agreed to join forces and took part in the negotiations for a common election manifesto. He, along with Nausher Ali, Syed Badruddza, Shamsuddin Ahmed and Hasan Ali of Bogra took part in these negotiations on behalf of the KPP. But the negotiations broke down on the issue of Huq’s insistence on including in the election manifesto a promise to abolish the zamindari system and another for free universal primary education
These demands were not acceptable to the landlord-dominated Muslim League. Huq and his colleagues, therefore, left the negotiating table. Addressing the students of Dhaka University shortly thereafter, Huq complained that Jinnah was under the influence of the nonBengali zamindars and capitalists and of Kolkata-based leaders, and announced that he would lead a struggle on behalf of the poor, the praja, the ryots and the farmers of Bengal against the businessmen and the capitalists.
In the election campaign, Huq promised daal-bhat (rice and pulses) to the poor, while the Muslim League enlisted the support of the Muslim fundamentalist forces. The daal-bhat appeal became very popular and East Bengal’s Muslim peasantry sided with Huq, so much so that Fazlul Huq had a resounding victory over Nazimuddin
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from Patuakhali where also the Muslim peasantry sided with the popular leader in preference to their own zamindar who, as a member of the Governor’s Council, also received official support. Huq had dared Nazimuddin openly and announced that he was in reality fighting Governor Sir John Anderson rather than Khwaja Nazimuddin. A straw in the wind was that poet Nazrul Islam who contested as an independent candidate lost his deposit.
The Congress high command committed a political mistake, which cost Bengal dear, when it decided that the Congress would form ministries only in those provinces where it had an absolute majority in the Assembly and would not join hands with any other party. Thus, when Governor Sir John Herbert invited Sarat Bose as the leader of the single largest party to discuss the formation of a ministry, he declined the offer. Fazlul Huq, leading the KPP, requested Kiran Shankar Roy, the leader of the Congress in the Assembly, to join him in a coalition government under his leadership. Sarat Bose was inclined to agree and he requested Abul Kalam Azad, the Congress president, for permission to join hands with Huq, taking into account the special situation in Bengal. This idea was said to have the support of Subhas Bose, who was soon to become Congress president. But the Congress high command turned it down despite repeated requests. History would have been different had the Congress agreed to Huq’s offer at this juncture. Huq now turned to the Muslim League, which promptly seized the initiative when it agreed to join the coalition under Huq’s leadership. Even Bidhan Chandra Roy was reported to have favoured a KPP-Congress coalition and, on being disappointed when it did not happen, stayed aloof from active Congress politics for several years.
The correspondence between Mahatma Gandhi and Subhas Bose some time later when Bose became Congress president clearly proves that, left to himself, Subhas would have liked to join up with Fazlul Huq,’ he tried even afterwards to upturn the KPP-League coalition, but found himself powerless to defy Gandhi. As late as December 1938, Gandhi wrote to Bose, then Congress president:
A long discussion with Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Nalini Ranjan Sarkar and Ghanasyamadas Birla has convinced me
that the present ministry in Bengal [a coalition of the Muslim League and the KPP) should not be changed. Change will be of no avail. Rather, if the Congress forms a coalition ministry in Bengal with the Krishak Praja Party, it may be injurious to the province. Nalini Sarkar has told me that if the present coalition ministry takes any measure, which is against the country’s interest, he will not hesitate to resign from it.
Subhas Bose’s reply to Gandhi (21 December 1938) was:
Your letter came as a profound shock to me. I have had many discussions with you over the formation of a ministry in Bengal. The matter was also discussed with you some days back in Wardha. My elder brother, Sarat Chandra Bose, too has talked with you over the matter. Both of us clearly recall that you have every time supported the idea of a coalition ministry of Congress and Krishak Praja parties in Bengal. I cannot understand how you changed your views so soon after the discussion at Wardha. It is quite clear that your talks with Azad, Nalini and Birla are responsible for the change of your views. The position therefore appears to be that you prefer to give more importance to the views of the above three persons than those of persons who are responsible for running the Congress in Bengal.
There is a hint that Gandhi was unduly influenced by G.D. Birla representing Indian business interests. Birla, as the leader of the Marwari business interests, strongly felt that political unity between the Muslims and Hindus in Bengal would threaten Marwari dominance of the business landscape in Kolkata. The existing arrangement in which the Muslim League, a party of vested interests, played the dominant role with strong links with up-country business interests through non-Bengali industrialists like Ispahani would suit both Marwari and British industrialists. Subhas Bose, in the same letter to Gandhi (21 December 1938), further wrote:
In the face of the crisis brought about by your letter I would like to have some plain speaking in the matter. In the case of Assam, Maulana Azad opposed my proposal for a coalition ministry and if Sardar Patel had not come forward to support me, you could not have accepted my views in the matter in the Congress Working Committee meeting and no coalition ministry would have been formed in Assam. Maulana Saheb was against a coalition ministry in Sind too while I along with some members of the Working Committee was in its favour. In the case of Bengal too his views are against mine. According to Maulana Saheb, Muslim ministers should be accepted where Muslims are in a majority even though those ministries are blatantly communal. It is now quite clear that Maulana Saheb is unhappy over Congress support to Alla Baksh ministry in Sind.5
Subhas Bose advanced many other arguments in support of his views. According to Nirad Chandra Chaudhuri, who was at the time secretary to Sarat Chandra Bose and dealt with Subhas Chandra’s correspondence, Subhas came to believe that not only Maulana Azad but G.D. Birla also played a part in bringing about a change in Gandhi’s views in the matter. The reason was that Birla came to believe that Marwari domination over the trade and economy of Kolkata would be lost if a political pact of Hindus and Muslims lead to a KPP-Congress coalition ministry in Bengal. There is no written evidence to corroborate Nirad Chaudhuri’s views on his assessment of Gandhi on this point, but the rift that occurred between Gandhi and Subhas shortly thereafter gives some credence to this view.6 Subhas, the Congress president at Haripura Congress (1937), defied Gandhi in seeking a second term as the Congress president and won a convincing victory, but was expelled from the Congress by a series of moves by the Congress old guard.
Fazlul Huq’s coalition with the Muslim League
Thus a KPP-Muslim League coalition government, with support from the scheduled castes and some independent upper-caste Hindu
MLAs came to power. Fazlul Huq was the first prime minister of Bengal, Azizul Huq, an able lawyer, was elected Speaker of the Assembly and Satyendra Chandra Mitra, a Congressman, was elected president of the Upper House of the Legislative Council with the Congress Party’s permission, defeating Raja Manmothnath Chaudhury of Santosh with only one vote.
The 1937 Bengal Assembly was full of excellent orators for whom the visitor’s gallery was packed. There were five Hindu and five Muslim ministers, Interestingly, Nalini Ranjan Sarkar, essentially a Congressman and one amongst the Congress’s big five in Bengal, became the finance minister and the target of the Opposition from the beginning. Initially he fumbled, but soon developed into a good parliamentarian. From the Treasury benches Huq, Nazimuddin (home minister) and Suhrawardy were the main speakers. The Opposition benches also commanded many star performers, including Shyama Prasad, an independent. Another costly blunder that had a long-term impact on all-India politics was made by the Congress in the United Provinces. Here the Congress and the Muslim League had gone jointly to the electoral battle, but as soon as the Congress got an absolute majority on its own, it forgot its understanding with the Muslim League about forming a government together and dumped the latter. Nawab Ismail Khan and Chaudhury Khaleguzzaman, the two Muslim League leaders who were tipped to be part of the six-member cabinet, found themselves left out after they had enthusiastically campaigned for a Congress-League front. The League leadership never forgave the Congress for what it considered a breach of faith and went on a collision course, which embittered Hindu-Muslim relations and paved the way for the ‘Pakistan’ slogan. Jinnah could from then on count on the full support of Muslim leaders like Khalequzzaman who were permanently alienated from the Congress with which they had till then very close ties.7 Soon the League complained of atrocities on Muslims in Congress-led provinces and appointed on 20 March 1938 a committee headed by the Raja of Pirpur, to enquire and report on them. The Pirpur Report highlighting alleged atrocities on Muslims in Congress-led provinces was a scathing document, which
the Congress did not accept but which, nonetheless, worsened communal relations.
Muslim opinion even in Bengal was influenced by the report of the Pirpur Committee. It reported that in these provinces the . minorities had ‘only secondary rights’ and cited the Congress decision to foist Bande Mataram, an ‘anti-Islamic and idolatrous song’, as the national anthem, the imposition of Hindi as the lingua franca, the withholding of licences for cow slaughter in some provinces, the abolition of Muslim representation in debt conciliation boards among instances of ‘atrocities’ against Muslims. These had no relevance for Muslims in Bengal, but nonetheless helped to fan the communal flame even here, and the Muslim attitude to the Congress stiffened. An enquiry ordered by Governor-General Linlithgow found these stories of ‘atrocities’ highly exaggerated, but the report had done its mischief. Even public servants were infected by the communal contagion.
In retrospect, there can be no doubt that the Congress’s mistake in turning down Fazlul Huq’s request in Bengal, together with its blunder in the United Provinces, did pave the way for the partition of the subcontinent ten years later. The Muslim League took full advantage of its governmental authority in Bengal to extend its support base over the Muslim masses. It also befriended Huq. In fact, in his anxiety to accommodate every interest that could support the government, Huq soon became a minority within the ministry. This, as also his abandonment of the election pledges, caused rumblings in the KPP. As early as March 1938, a majority of the KPP party in the Assembly sat with the Opposition to register their protest. Shamsuddin Ahmed at the head of twenty KPP MLAs accused Fazlul Huq of abandoning the party’s election promises. Huq expelled seventeen MLAs from the party. Then, Saiyad Nausher Ali led a group of dissidents out of the KPP opposing Huq’s acceptance of a proposal to start certificate proceedings against ryots to realize rent arrears due to the government. Literally placed between the devil and the deep sea, that is, the Muslim League and his coalition partner, and the Congress-KPP majority Opposition, and reduced to a minority in the coalition, Huq realized that he
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could save his ministry only with Jinnah’s support and joined the League at its annual session at Lucknow in December 1937. Between 1937 and 1940, Huq was drawn into the vortex of Muslim League politics, although he never felt comfortable in that landlord-. dominated party. In 1939, he went out of his way to declare that he was a Muslim first and a Bengali afterwards. Ironically, it was Hug, never a subscriber to the two-nation theory, who was made to move the so-called Pakistan Resolution in the Lahore session of the Muslim League in 1940. This was not only Jinnah’s cynical masterstroke, but a great propaganda victory for him. By bringing Huq, the undisputed leader of the Muslim peasantry of Bengal under his umbrella, he had gained for the Muslim League, till then a weak player in Bengal politics, a strong foothold in Bengal. His short-lived honeymoon with Sikandar Hayat Khan, the unionist premier of Punjab, was another feather in his cap. He skillfully used both Fazlul Huq and Sikandar Hayat Khan, neither of whom believed in the two-nation theory or in the partition of the country, to mobilize Muslim support for these concepts.
The new ministry faced uneasy times from the beginning. Huq pressed his most important agenda of abolishing the zamindari system. This met with sharp opposition from the League ministers, one of whom, Nawab Musharraf Hussain, declared that he was willing to spend all his money to get Huq removed from the cabinet. Within a year it had to resign and reconstitute itself when a minister, Nausher Ali, was asked to resign and refused to do so. In 1938, Mahatma Gandhi himself came to Kolkata in a bid to persuade scheduled caste members to leave the coalition and join the Congress. Ten separate no-confidence motions were moved in the Assembly against the ten ministers, but they failed on account of deep divisions in the Congress ranks and the twenty-five European votes going in favour of the ministers. As Huq opened up a secret line of communication with the Congress led by Subhas Bose, the Muslim Leaguers were looking for an opportunity to throw him out. The Congress members moved a no-confidence motion on 8 and 9 August 1938 against some ministers. This provided an opportunity for confrontation
As the League declared a hartal and its supporters barricaded all streets in order to prevent Congress and anti-government MLAs from reaching Town Hall-venue of the Bengal Assembly those days-many such MLAs including Tulsi Goswami, Devendralal Khan, Tamizuddin Khan, J.C. Gupta, K.N. Barman, Abu Hussain Sarkar, Maniruzzaman Islamabadi and Atul Chandra Kumar spent the night in the Assembly premises. The Muslim League goons attacked Humayun Kabir’s residence and insulted him. On 8 August, the no-confidence motion against Maharaja Srish Chandra Nandy, a minister, was narrowly defeated (130–110) with the help of the twenty-three European members. Thus, Huq’s government came to depend entirely on the League and the European members. Gandhi visited Kolkata a second time and negotiated for a coalition between Fazlul Huq’s supporters and the Congress, but Huq, who had been repeatedly spurned by the Congress, could not trust it any more.
There was inevitably a hardening of attitudes on communal lines, the Congress openly calling the ministry a Muslim government and Huq’s supporters raising the cry of Islam in danger. The cabinet moved a resolution before the Assembly that India should be given dominion status after the war and the constitution should provide safeguards based on the full consent and approval of the minority communities. Finance minister Nalini Ranjan Sarkar refused to support this resolution and resigned from the cabinet (1939). Suhrawardy replaced him as finance minister. Huq’s dependence on the League increased further. But amidst all his political turmoils, Huq never forgot the impoverished Muslim peasantry of East Bengal. By a series of administrative and legislative measures, such as the Bengal Tenancy (Amendment) Act of 1938, the Money Lenders Act of 1940 and the debt settlement boards, he enhanced his popularity among Muslim peasants, who resented every move to bring down Huq as a betrayal of the Muslim cause. The first of these measures was opposed by both the League members as also the Europeans, but was passed by 110 to 27 votes.
There were several other significant developments. First, Huq appointed a commission of enquiry (the Floud Commission) to suggest changes in the Permanent Settlement of 1793. The
Commission recommended the replacement of the zamindari system by a ryotwari system in which ownership of the land would vest with the ryot and the land revenue payable by him could be revised from time to time; but these recommendations could not be implemented . on account of deep divisions among ministers. Fazlul Huq also proceeded with piecemeal amelioratory measures such as: (i) keeping in abeyance for ten years the right of the landlords to increase the rent payable by tenants; (ii) combining the landlords’ right to enforce realization of arrears of rent (1937); (iii) protecting tenants’ rights with regard to mortgaging their land (1938); (iv) the Debt Relief Act of 1940 fixing a ceiling on the rate of interest that could be charged by money-lenders, banning compound interest and fixing the rate of interest on mortgages at 9 per cent and on unsecured loans at 10 per cent; (v) passing another Act creating a relief fund to meet the needs of relief during floods, famines and other natural calamities; and (vi) providing for one-and-a-half day’s leave in a week and paid leave for fifteen days in a year and work hours up to 8 p.m. in all public holdings.
In 1939, separate electorates were introduced for Muslims and Anglo-Indians for election to the Calcutta Corporation. Fazlul Huq himself justified this Calcutta Municipal Amendment Act by announcing that ‘we have made it certain that Congress no longer dominates the Calcutta Corporation. I do not say that we have succeeded fully. The chances are that the Congress will not have a dominant voice in the Calcutta Corporation.8’This provoked Hindu reaction. Two other contemplated legislations of the Huq government ran into serious controversies, namely, the Secondary Education Bill and the Communal Ratio Bill. The first aimed at shifting secondary education from the Hindu-controlled Calcutta University to a proposed Board of Secondary Education with fifty members, of whom twenty were to be nominated from amongst the Hindus and Muslims, five from amongst Europeans and five from amongst other categories; nineteen were to be directly nominated by the government. There was to be an Executive Council of fourteen of whom six were to be ex-officio government officials. This move was interpreted by the Hindu intelligentsia as a politically motivated
move to communalize school education. So great was the feeling against this Bill that even a close friend of Huq, Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, took a public stand against it. In his address before the annual conference of the All Bengal Teachers Association (1939) he announced: ‘If the board is established we shall sever all connections with such an anti-educational board and shall, if necessary, seek affiliation for our schools with an outside university.’ In the face of such vehement opposition from the press and from within and outside the Assembly, the government was compelled to put this Bil in cold storage. Needless to say, this hardened anti-Hindu feelings among Muslims.
The various efforts of the Huq ministry to ensure a higher percentage of government jobs for Muslims and the proposed Communal Ratio Act met with stiff opposition and embittered communal relations. What Huq attempted to do was not something more than what Chittaranjan Das had assured Bengal Muslims through his Bengal Pact. But Hindu opinion continued to be resentful. Other flashpoints were the Muslim demand for the removal of the lotus flower and the word ‘shri’ from the Calcutta University’s motif on the ground that these were Hindu symbols, the demand for appointing a large number of Muslim professors and nonteaching staff in the university and a systematic policy of nominating only Muslim League supporters as nominated members in the district and local boards. After the outbreak of the war and the natural interest of officialdom in encouraging loyalists, officials were instructed to support only Muslim League followers. M.O. Martin, commissioner of Chittagong division, admitted that ‘some of the European officials are more sympathetic towards Muslims and Muslim propaganda’ and wrote to E.N. Blandy, chief secretary, Bengal, on 30 April 1939: ‘I find the League extraordinarily useful at least in this division because their leaders are generally willing to come to the assistance of officials and to give effect to their suggestions, especially where there are any sort of disturbances.
Thus, the policy followed by the Huq-League coalition directly led to the increasing popularity of the Muslim League among Muslims in Bengal, especially in the districts. This was reflected in
the doubling of its membership in some districts. As commented by Humayun Kabir: ‘Forced into the arms of the Muslim League, Fazlul Huq did perhaps more than anybody else in India to restore the prestige of the League and win for it support among the masses of the land. Thus an awakened mass consciousness contributed to the growth of the popularity of the League.9 Communal relations continued to deteriorate, culminating in several Hindu-Muslim riots from 1940 onwards. The most serious of them were the riots in Dhaka in 1940 and 1941 ignited on such pretexts as Hindu religious processions playing music in front of mosques, or Muharram processions making provocative noises in front of temples, or Hindus objecting to the sacrificial killing of cows in public on Bakr-Id. Agent provocateurs started the trouble and anti-social elements took advantage of the situation. In the rioting in Dhaka that started on 17 March 1941, the army had to be called in after many lives had been lost. Rioting also spread to neighbouring villages and about 10,000 Hindus had to run away from home and hearth. Hindus, being the more affluent community, became victims of looting by anti-socials of the other community. Despite a communiqué issued by the government appealing for peace, appointment of goodwill committees at various localities and the ordering of a judicial enquiry, rioting continued through June-July 1941. Fazlul Huq was accused by the Congress and the Hindu Mahasabha of partiality to the Muslims. Huq advised Jinnah to arrive at a compromise with the Congress. Jinnah’s reply was that this was not possible as long as the Congress considered itself as the only representative organization in the politics of India. There was a steady erosion in Huq’s popularity and an acceleration of the Muslim League’s strength among Muslims.
Huq’s government showed its courage in releasing a large number of terrorists and extremists detained without trial. In so doing Huq had to ignore the views of the Governor and white officialdom. By 1940 more than 2,000 terrorists had been released from jail or from internment, Many of them were by now communists and turned their attention to organizing peasants against zamindars.
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Holwell Monument agitation
An important event in 1940 in which Fazlul Huq showed his courage in overruling white officialdom was the Holwell Monument agitation personally led by Subhas Bose, who asserted his political leadership through this emotional agitation and also won back the support of large sections of Bengali Muslims. For many in Bengal, Siraj-ud-Daula, the last independent nawab of Bengal, was innocent of the heinous crime of the black hole tragedy (1756) attributed to him by a section of racially prejudiced British historians. When Subhas Bose, in mid-1940, demanded removal of the Holwell monument located at Dalhousie Square in Kolkata commemorating the black hole tragedy, he found strong mass support. The Provincial Political Conference in Dhaka (25 May 1940) responded strongly in favour of the demand. Many Muslims joined in. Subhas gave an ultimatum at a public meeting held on 29 June at Albert Hall, Kolkata, that this monument must be removed from public view by 3 July, the anniversary of Siraj-ud-Daula’s murder. He followed it up by threatening to personally lead a march to this monument on that day.
Subhas was arrested on 2 July, a day before his proposed direct action on the pretext of a seditious article he had published in his journal Forward of 15 June 1940, arguing that India could only gain from the collapse of the British. But the movement started with batches of demonstrators advancing towards the monument every day and courting arrest. On 13 July, a huge public meeting at Albert Hall presided over by Abdul Karim criticized government repression. The government issued a directive to the press prohibiting publication of any news of the movement. Students of Islamia College replied by holding a protest meeting outside the college. But Fazlul Huq seized the initiative and defied official British opposition by announcing the removal of the Holwell Monument from public view. He also ordered the release of all the detainees on account of this movement.
Beginning of World War II
The outbreak of the second world war with Hitler’s invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939 brought unexpected relief for Huq. On
3 September, Great Britain declared war on Germany. This eased the pressure on Huq. Along with the British declaring war on Germany, Viceroy Lord Linlithgow issued a bland proclamation on the same day that India was at war with Germany. No Indian leader had been. consulted and India was dragged into a war with a country that was not a direct threat to it. Gandhi’s initial hunch was to unconditionally support Britain. Nehru, who was of a somewhat different emotional bent, wanted India to play its full part and commit all its resources to the ‘struggle for a new order’ by which he could have meant the abolition of both Nazism and colonialism. Subhas, still an important Congress leader and, therefore, invited to the meeting of the Congress Working Committee (10 September) at Wardha, favoured India utilizing the international situation, including the British empire’s discomfiture, to press for freedom. Jinnah was willing to promise the full support of the Muslims, but on condition that Congress ministries in the seven provinces which, according to his reckoning, had followed anti-Muslim policies, were immediately thrown out and the British agree in principle to separate Muslim majority provinces from the rest of the country.
The Congress Working Committee, overruling the arguments of Subhas Bose, a special invitee, preferred only to ask the British Raj to clarify its intention about India’s independence. A disappointed Subhas returned to Kolkata from Wardha. He now agitated for the removal of the monument to Holwell. For nationalists, this was a calumny wrongly attributed to Siraj. This agitation attracted emotional support from all Bengalis, Hindus and Muslims. Eventually Premier Huq intervened, overruling the white officialdom, and ordered the removal of this monument from public view. This along with international and domestic developments gave the beleaguered Huq ministry a certain reprieve.
With the advent of the war, there was pressure on both the Congress and the League to take a stand in relation to the war, and also the future of British rule in India. Sandwiched between Subhas Bose’s pressure for a confrontationist policy to British rule and Nehru’s passionate antipathy to the Nazi-fascist combine, the Congress Working Committee brought out a resolution that was a
masterly combination of inconsistencies. It preached anti-Nazism and anti-imperialism at the same time, reflecting the contradictions in the Congress.
The Muslim League Working Committee met immediately after this statement and demanded that the British recognize the League as the sole voice of Muslims and revise the federal part of the 1935 Constitution so as to reflect the demands of the League. On 17 October, Linlithgow made an announcement vaguely promising dominion status after the war and also consultation on the revision of the 1935 Constitution at that time. In trying to incorporate the concerns of all parties, it satisfied none. The Congress Working Committee now asked all Congress provincial governments to resign by the end of October. They did so in all the seven Congress-ruled provinces and the Governors took over administration under Section 93 of the 1935 Act. In retrospect, this decision to resign en masse from the provinces was politically unwise. Protest against the Viceroy’s unilateral declaration could have taken other forms. In resigning, the Congress played into the hands of Jinnah and left the field open for the Muslim League and white officialdom. The Muslim-led governments of Bengal, Punjab and Sind continued. In Assam, a League-led coalition soon replaced a Congress-led coalition. Jinnah called for a ‘Day of Deliverance and Thanksgiving for the Muslims on Friday, 22 December 1939 as a mark of relief that the Congress regime has at least ceased to function’. But he appealed to his followers for calm and for avoiding anything that could incite communal violence. His proclamation catalogued various Muslim grievances against the Congress governments highlighted by the Pirpur Committee report and dubbed as imaginary by the Congress.
Pakistan Resolution (1940)
Jinnah followed it with the famous Pakistan Resolution at the Muslim League council meeting in Lahore (21 March 1940). This was moved by Fazlul Huq, who had by then been driven into the arms of the Muslim League. This resolution claimed that the Musalmans are a nation by any definition, not a minority’ and asked
the British to divide the subcontinent into ‘autonomous national states’. The operative part of the resolution in its third paragraph was as follows:
No constitutional plan will be workable in this country or acceptable to the Muslims unless it is designed on the following basic principles, viz. that geographically continuous units are demarcated into regions which should be so constituted, with such territorial readjustments as may be necessary, as in the north-western and eastern zones of India should form more than one independent state and the units comprised in these states should be independent and sovereign. 10
Significantly, the word ‘Pakistan’ was not mentioned by Jinnah even once, nor did it find a place in the resolution, which was vague and capable of different interpretations by different interests. Fazlul Huq, the mover of the resolution, thought that there would be an eastern Muslim-dominated state and a western one. Sikander Hayat Khan, Punjab’s premier, had thought of a loose federation with strong provinces and a Centre that would control minimal subjects. Jinnah clearly intended to keep all options open as to use the slogan as a bargaining counter to gain as much concession as he could. But for the moment he had succeeded in defeating the Congress claim that it spoke for all sections of India, including the Muslims. Also, he had succeeded in making the British authorities turn to him as the only dependable ally who would support them in the war efforts. Thus, the Muslim League in general stood by the empire whereas the Congress in about a year was to launch the Quit India Movement. Subhas Bose, who in a daring escape left India secretly for Germany in 1940, was to challenge the British through the Azad Hind Fauj with the help of the Japanese in 1943.
The Shyama-Huq coalition (1941-43)
Huq’s honeymoon with the League was short-lived and his exit was as dramatic and sudden as his entry. Making Huq, a strong proponent of Hindu-Muslim unity, move the resolution for partition was a
great achievement of Jinnah; but the two shared a common mutual distrust which surfaced very soon. Jinnah wanted from his associates complete subordination. Huq, with his strong views, could not put up with it. The Muslim League instructed its followers to observe 23 March as Pakistan Day. As the communal situation in Bengal was getting overheated, Fazlul Huq with Suhrawardy’s support, issued instructions to League branches in Bengal in 1941 to put off this public celebration. But the Kolkata district Muslim League held a public meeting in open violation of this instruction.” Huq was slowly coming to the realization that the Muslim League, having made full use of his stature, was determined to leave him high and dry. In a bid to totally dominate the Muslim League, Jinnah had a directive issued in 1941 to the three League premiers, namely, Fazlul Huq, Sikander Hayat Khan and Mohammad Shadullah of Assam, whom the Viceroy had nominated to his Defence Council, that they must resign from the Council. He resented League members being appointed by the Viceroy without his clearance. Sikander Hayat Khan and Mohammad Shadullah promptly resigned. But Huq, not a man to be cowed down by Jinnah’s swashbuckling attitude, refused to resign. Jinnah gave him ten days time and threatened disciplinary action. Huq resigned under a lot of pressure, but at the same time he showed his anger by simultaneously resigning from the League Working Committee and accused Jinnah of using arbitrary powers and being ‘wholly unconstitutional’. An open split now ensued in the Muslim League between pro-Jinnah Leaguers led by Khwaja Nazimuddin, who had not forgotten his Patuakhali humiliation, and H.S. Suhrawardy on the one hand, and pro-Huq former KPP elements on the other. But Huq, according to all contemporary accounts, was never happy in the company of the landlord-dominated Muslim League, and while in the government all along carried on a balancing game.
He started secret negotiations with Sarat Bose, Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee and scheduled caste leaders, and looked for friends elsewhere. A new combination, namely, the Progressive Coalition Party, which included both the KPP and the Forward Block, was formed secretly with 110 members who unanimously
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elected Huq as leader. He thus showed his great capacity for survival. The Muslim League ministers led by Nazimuddin resigned en bloc on 8 December 1941, to put pressure on Huq. Apparently the League leaders had reckoned that the Governor would invite. Nazimuddin to form the new government. But once again Fazlul Huq demonstrated his skill for flexibility and manoeuvrability when he contrived a majority with the announced support of twenty-five Congress MLAs and formed a nine-member cabinet on 12 December 1941 with four Hindu ministers and the nawab of Dhaka. One of the four was Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, leader of the Hindu Mahasabha but a staunch nationalist and vice-chancellor of the University of Kolkata, who became the finance minister. He responded to Huq’s invitation as he felt that this way he would be able to keep Muslim League’s communalism, British divisive policies and Congress’ brow-beating at bay and would bring together both Muslim and Hindu nationalists on a common platform. In an interview with the Associated Press of India on the same day, Shyama Prasad stated that ‘Bengal has shown today that in spite of internal differences the important elements of our national life can combine for the good of the country’.12 Sarat Bose, a strong supporter of this coalition, was soon interned in south India. Poet Nazrul Islam also welcomed the ministry as a big step towards HinduMuslim unity.
During the life of this ministry there was not a single instance of communal rioting. On 16 February 1942, while presenting the budget, the finance minister provided Rs 1 lakh for the promotion of communal harmony, a unique gesture. Thereafter Huq and Mukherjee jointly travelled to several districts of Bengal preaching the message of communal harmony. In a speech at Coronation Park, Dhaka, on 21 April 1942, Shyama Prasad said that the Bengal ministry was no longer for any particular community, but for all communities. He congratulated Premier Huq for the courageous steps he had taken to eradicate communalism and regretted that Amery, Secretary of State for India, did not have a good word for Fazlul Huq’s bold steps to eradicate communalism. This would not only solve the communal problem in Bengal, but would show the
whole of India how to stand shoulder to shoulder in the face of common danger. He appealed for complete Hindu–Muslim unity and asked the Hindus to defend the mosques and the Muslims to defend the temples against attacks from goondas.13
Incidentally, two of the Hindu ministers were Forward Block members who showed enough flexibility to assume office under an oath to the British king while their leader, Subhas Bose, had by that time reached Germany in a bid to enlist German support for India’s independence. He knew every detail of the goings-on in Bengal and was reported to have given his nod to this new arrangement. One of the Hindu ministers was a scheduled caste member. Premier Huq, who was expelled from the League on 10 December 1941, described the new government as a coalition between the two major communities in Bengal. The Muslim League called it a Hindu cabinet in effect. In actual fact this was a great experiment, one that could have turned Bengal’s history in a new direction had it been allowed to function for a reasonable length of time without becoming a victim of the British policy of divide-and-rule and communal intransigence. No doubt this government was made possible by Fazlul Huq’s personal charm and the willingness of a number of Bengali leaders, including Subhas Bose and Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, following contradictory politics to come together in Bengal’s larger interest. In so doing they defied the Congress high command as Fazlul Huq had defied Jinnah. Both felt that the central leadership of the Congress and the League were imposing policies that were not in the interest of Bengal.
Thus, the Shyama-Huq ministry, as it was popularly called by contemporaries, though disliked by both Congressmen and Muslim Leaguers, received tremendous goodwill from the middle-of-theroad Bengalis, both Muslim and Hindu. Fazlul Huq made no secret of his belief that the leaders from Bengal, or for that matter other provinces, must have a decisive say in forming political alliances and the central leadership of political parties must accept this. Both Subhas Bose and Shyama Prasad Mukherjee were also of the same view. In fact, Subhas Bose before his great escape had made friends with a number of Muslim League leaders in Bengal, notably Abdur
Rahman Siddique, the mayor of Kolkata, M.A. Ispahani, the leader of the League in the Kolkata Corporation and Jinnah’s main financier, and Nooruddin. The Bose-League front jointly fought the elections to the Kolkata Corporation and won a majority. Unfortunately, neither the Congress high command nor the Muslim League’s central leadership agreed with this approach. Both tried to impose their political will in Bengal. The result was a disaster for Bengal.
Huq’s second administration took office at a crucial point in the history of the subcontinent. With Japan’s dramatic entry in the war on 6 December 1941, on the side of the Axis powers, the capture of Malaya, Singapore and Burma in quick succession and the appearance of the Japanese army on the Bengal-Burma border, the war reached the backyard of Bengal. Thousands of Indian refugees from Burma trekked to Bengal. On 20 December 1942, the first Japanese air raid on Kolkata took place. There were several other air raids. The Japanese army attacked the borders of Bengal in Chittagong on 23 March 1942. Also, all-India politics became tense with the arrival of the Cripps Mission and with the Congress poised for launching the Quit India Movement.
Cripps Mission
On 23 March 1942, Sir Stafford Cripps, British minister and wellknown Labour Party leader known to be a friend of India, was sent to India by Prime Minister Winston Churchill to win over Congress leaders with the promise of dominion status at the end of the war. After several long rounds of discussions with Indian leaders, Cripps outlined a scheme which would have made India independent at the end of the war. If any province did not want to join the federation it could have its separate constitution and have dominion status for itself. But the proposal did not find favour with either Gandhi-who called it a ‘post-dated cheque’-nor Jinnah. Also, there was hostility from both Churchill and Linlithgow. Cripps returned to London empty-handed on 11 August 1942. In retrospect, the Cripps proposals seem eminently practicable and it also seems possible that their acceptance could have avoided many subsequent untoward
happenings. However, neither the Congress nor the League was in a mood to accept them. Thus the Cripps Mission was a failure.
Quit India Movement (1942)
With the failure of the Cripps Mission, the Congress under Gandhi was gravitating to a direct anti-British agitation, something that Subhas Bose had pleaded three years ago. The Congress Working Committee adopted a resolution at Wardha on 14 July 1942, calling upon the British to quit India forthwith and announced the resolve to start a non-violent movement if they failed to do so. It met again in Bombay on 7 August and confirmed the Quit India resolution. The 500-strong All India Congress Committee met in Bombay on 8 August 1942 and endorsed the Working Committee’s Quit India resolution reiterating that ‘a non-violent struggle will start all over India under Gandhiji’s leadership’. An overwhelming majority voted for the resolution, barring the thirteen communist members who were in favour of supporting the government’s war efforts following the Soviet line that this was a peoples’ war. Soon after this, in the evening hours the government swung into action. Gandhi, all the members of the Congress Committee and, in fact, all second- and third-rung Congress leaders all over the country were arrested under the Defence of India Act. The Congress was declared illegal and its offices were closed by the police. Mahatma Gandhi, with his wife and a small retinue, was detained at the Aga Khan Palace in Poona. Nehru, Sardar Patel and all other Congress Committee members were taken to Ahmednagar Fort. This was the beginning of the August Revolution, also called the Quit India Movement. It started with strikes and processions, but in the absence of the leaders, degenerated into violent demonstrations. Incidents of violence and anti-British rioting were reported from places as far apart as Bombay and Bihar. Viceroy Linlithgow described it in a letter to Churchill as ‘the most serious rebellion since that of 1857’.
So intense was the national feeling that Shyama Prasad, a minister in the Bengal government, wrote a letter to GovernorGeneral Linlithgow on 12 August 1942 emphasizing that ‘the demand of Congress virtually constituted the national demand of India as a
whole’ and that ‘an immediate transfer of power is essential to the solution of the Indian deadlock and there never was a period during the last hundred years when the feeling against the British was so bitter as it is today’.14 In Bengal the August Revolution took its most pronounced and militant form in Tamluk and Contai in Medinipore district, which had already earned a reputation as the most antiBritish or freedom-loving district in the subcontinent.
At many places, students and Congress volunteers brought down the British Union Jack and hoisted the Congress tricolour, which flew for days. As the Congress leaders were arrested en masse in all towns and even at the village level, there was little guidance at the grass-roots level. It was war-time and the administration was busy with various tasks connected with the arrangement of military movement. Thus, people everywhere, on their own initiative, in a natural outburst of anger, took various steps as they thought best. Some of them even resorted to subversive actions. In Contai and Tamluk subdivisions of Medinipore district, a large number of Congressmen who had all along been non-violent freedom fighters under leaders like Birendranath Sasmol turned violent against the British authority and their local collaborators in the winter of 1943. The vestiges of British rule disappeared for months together and the revolutionaries themselves established virtual national governments. In Tamluk, the national government lasted from 17 December 1942 to 8 August 1944. The supreme leader of this government was Satish Chandra Samanta. Other leaders were Ajoy Mukherjee and Sushil Dhara. An official report of that period described what happened as follows:
In Medinipore in Bengal, the operations of the rebels indicated considerable care and planning. All approach roads to these two subdivisions were cut off from the rest of the district by felling trees, digging trenches and destroying bridges. Military and police forces from outside could approach these areas after many months. An effective warning system had been devised and elementary tactical principles were observed, for instance, encirclements and flanking movements clearly on pre-arranged signals. The
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rebel groups were accompanied by doctors and nursing orderlies to attend the casualties and its intelligence system was effective. 15
The rebels formed a national government16 under a supreme commander. To help him in administration there were ministers in charge of justice, law and order, health, education, agriculture and publicity. A postal system was introduced. Steps were taken for using convicts who had been released from jail. A volunteer army was formed and captains were appointed under an army chief. Besides fighting men, the army had intelligence personnel, doctors, compounders and nursing orderlies; there were arrangements for removing the injured and sick soldiers. This was the general picture. The British authorities replied with ruthless suppression.
Some ministers of Fazlul Huq’s government, notably Shyama Prasad Mukherjee, made local enquiries and protested against the repressive policies. Shyama Prasad raised his voice strongly against police excesses and formed a Sufferers’ Relief Committee with Fazlul Huq as president and B.M. Birla, Dr B.C. Roy and himself as co-sponsors for providing relief to survivors and relatives of victims of police and military atrocities during the August uprising. These atrocities, according to Shyama Prasad ‘resembled the activities of the Germans in occupied areas as propagated by the British agencies’. Medinipore district was placed under an ‘iron curtain’ from which no one could come out without a permit issued by the government. But officialdom was totally impervious. As there was a strong demand in the Assembly for an enquiry into police excesses, Premier Huq gave an assurance of such an enquiry. This provoked Governor Herbert to write to the premier in intemperate language on 15 February 1943:
You have given today in the Legislature an understanding for an enquiry into the conduct of officials in the district. You are well aware that this subject attracts my special responsibilities and you are also aware of my views on the undesirability of enquiries into the matter…I shall expect an explanation from you at your interview tomorrow morning of your conduct in failing to consult me before
announcing what purports to be the decision of the Government.
Huq paid back the Governor in his own coin by replying on 16 February:
It appears from your letter that you are not prepared to give your consent to the constitution of a committee of enquiry. If so, the only way left open to me is to make a statement in the House in which I shall endeavour to explain that my statement made yesterday should not be taken as a commitment on the part of the government to a committee of enquiry, and I propose to read out to the House your letter under reply so as to explain my position.
Even Viceroy Linlithgow expressed his reservation over the Governor’s overzealousness in a letter to Amery, the minister for India in the British government.
I am very disturbed about this business of Herbert. I am sure it is more dangerous for governors to play politics even if they are of outstanding capacity, and I fear that poor Herbert can hardly claim to be of the latter category. My confidence in him has never, as you know, been great, but this incident has administered a severe further shock to it; and I have as you will see felt obliged to send him a pretty stiff letter, though of course I accept the necessity for protecting his position and saving his face.
But the Governor-General did not make any visible move. Even when Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee and, after him, Fazlul Huq resigned, such acts of oppression continued. To quote from Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee’s letter on the subject:
The atrocities perpetrated by the government in Medinipore can be compared only with the German atrocities in the occupied countries during the Second World War. We have received information of the police having had burnt down hundreds of houses and committed rape on women.
Government officials have incited Muslims to set fire to and to loot the houses of Hindus and they have themselves been guilty of such acts. The local officials did not pay heed to government directions to stop the same. When we went to Medinipore 15 days after the cyclone that ravaged the district on 16 October, to inspect the extent of the calamity, arson and looting were still going on in some parts of the district.17
Premier Fazlul Huq admitted that during two weeks in the month of August, firing by the police had taken twenty lives and caused injury to 152 persons–the casualties actually numbered much more. Fazlul Huq also admitted that police firing on some occasions was not justified.
Santhals and Muslims of Bolpur in the district of Birbhum attacked the railway station and caused a good deal of damage to it. At other places too post offices, railway stations and courts were targets of attack and the police and the army were always prepared to take adequate revenge. This unequal fight between the people and the government lasted about two weeks, but by the beginning of 1943 normalcy returned everywhere except in Contai and Tamluk.
People’s attention now turned to the Japanese attacks at the borders, the broadcasts made by Subhas Bose from Singapore announcing the formation of the Azad Hind Government in exile and the Indian National Army and exhorting his countrymen to rise up against the British raj, the Japanese air raids in Kolkata and Chittagong, the cyclone and tidal waves affecting Medinipore and the approaching Bengal famine of 1943. People used to listen to Subhas Bose’s radio broadcasts with rapt attention. Such was his popularity with the Bengalis that Ian Stephens, the then editor of the Statesman, Kolkata, wrote that Subhas would only have to parachute down to the maidan in Kolkata and 90 per cent of the people would rise up and follow him.
Medinipore Cyclone, 1942 An important event during this period was the Medinipore cyclone and tidal waves of 16 October 1942. Unprecedented tidal waves
lashed the Contai coast, killed hundreds of people and cattle and destroyed scores of villages and miles of paddy land. While this natural calamity put a halt to the Quit India Movement in Contai and Tamluk, it also exposed officialdom to the charge of ignoring the relief and rehabilitation needs of the affected villagers. Their feelings of revenge got the better of their humanitarian feelings. The affected people numbered 23.5 lakh. Shyama Prasad rushed to Medinipore on 30 October and held a meeting at the circuit house. So enraged were the authorities at his outbursts that while returning he was briefly placed under arrest by white officials at Kolaghat. On his return to Kolkata, he held a meeting presided over by Premier Huq. This meeting decided to place relief operations in the cycloneaffected areas under the direct supervision of a senior Indian Civil Service (ICS) officer, B.R. Sen. Shyama Prasad stated in the Legislative Assembly (12 February 1943) that:
Actuated by malice and disgust for the revolutionaries of Medinipore the district magistrate declined to discharge the imperative duties of a responsible officer that were called for to lessen the distress of the affected people. He informed the government that no relief operation would be undertaken by the administration as a measure of punishment for the hostility of the people to the government and no permission would be granted to non-official organisations for carrying on relief work.
The newspapers were instructed not to publish any account of the distress of the people of Medinipore. But Huq and Shyama Prasad sought to bypass the district magistrate and created a separate and parallel relief administration headed by an official with higher status.
Erosion of Huq’s popularity
Meanwhile the ground was slipping fast under Fazlul Huq’s feet. The true winner in the situation created by the Quit India Movement and the mass-scale incarceration of Congressmen was Jinnah, who had a clear field to himself and made the most of the government’s unstinted support extended to him. He dramatically improved his
standing among Muslims and was fast becoming a leader who was acknowledged as such by the overwhelming number of Muslims in undivided India. Several chance happenings like the untimely death of Sikander Hayat Khan of Punjab, the indefatigable advocate of a . united Punjab with Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs sharing power, and the assassination of Premier Alla Baksh in Sind, who was not a friend of the Muslim League, helped him. In Bengal, Fazlul Huq was fast getting isolated among Muslims. The League activists systematically attended Huq’s meetings, heckled him and attacked KPP workers. In the Bengal Legislative Assembly sessions, the Muslim League trio-Nazimuddin, Suhrawardy and Tamizuddin Khanlaunched bitter personal attacks on him, calling him a Muslim renegade and appealing to the religious sentiments of Muslims. Thus on 24 February 1942, Suhrawardy declared in the Assembly: ‘Fazlul Huq has betrayed his colleagues in his party and his community and as such Muslim society has cast him away. Muslim Bengal will avenge his conduct.’ This provoked Shyama Prasad to say: ‘I strongly protest against the dirty calumny made by Suhrawardy—his party having been kicked out of the cabinet has been spreading calumnies to vent its spleen…. The new path that Fazlul Huq has chalked out with courage is the only way to save not only Bengal but India as a whole.’ The results of the League’s propaganda war and the erosion of Huq’s popularity were evident from a bye-election for a Muslim seat in the Assembly (1942) in which the League candidate trounced the KPP candidate by 10,843 votes to 840.
Huq’s government also became the victim of a set of repressive policies launched by the Government of India over which the provincial government had no control. With the Japanese army lurking on Bengal’s doors, the government stopped the plying of boats on rivers so as to deny transport to the invading Japanese when they came. This affected the movement of foodgrains and prices shot up. Also, the movement of people was hindered. Indiscriminate arrests and restrictions on personal freedom also built up resentment. The government in power inevitably became the target of peoples’ resentment, although all these policies were ruthlessly imposed by the bureaucracy headed by the Governor with
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the help of the army under direct orders from New Delhi, bypassing Huq’s provincial government.
Muslim League leaders also poisoned the ears of the British authorities saying that since one of the coalition partners was the Forward Block, the party of Subhas Bose who had joined the Axis powers, Fazlul Huq and his ministers inevitably had sympathy for Subhas’ anti-British activities. Such a government could not truly support the war efforts. Nazimuddin openly stated: “This ministry is sympathetic to people engaged in traitorous activities and by facilitating enemy attacks on India is setting at naught all our war efforts.’18 Thus, a conspiracy was being hatched by the Muslim League, the Governor and the twenty-five European MLAs to replace the Shyama-Huq coalition with a Muslim League-led coalition. This was facilitated by two unexpected developments—first, Fazlul Huq’s overtures to Jinnah for rapprochement and second, Shyama Prasad’s abandonment of Fazlul Huq at this critical hour. On 13 November 1942, Huq wrote a secret letter to Jinnah offering to return to the Muslim League with his party and suggesting a meeting. Jinnah in his response laid down certain conditions, which Hug did not find it possible to accept. Jinnah hit Huq below the belt by publishing this correspondence, a clear breach of faith. Huq lost credibility among the Hindus as also his own party men. Meanwhile, Shyama Prasad had written to Governor Sir John Herbert on 7 March 1942, proposing the creation of a home army for the defence of Bengal from the Japanese invaders. This was stonewalled by the government.
Also, Shyama Prasad was gradually coming to the conclusion that the bureaucracy, taking advantage of the war-time conditions and with encouragement from the Governor and the white masters at New Delhi, was determined to frustrate the efforts of the ministers to do anything concrete. Under the 1935 Constitution, the Secretary of a department could approach the Governor directly and express his view, bypassing the minister. The Governor under his special powers could uphold the Secretary and overrule the minister. Sir John Herbert was taking full advantage of this provision and dealing directly with the officials, completely ignoring the ministers. There was the ridiculous incident of the district magistrate passing a
Section 144 order against Premier Huq at Feni and preventing him from addressing the victims of military atrocities (1943). Governor Herbert ordered officials to remove foodgrains from several East Bengal districts and also strictly implement the ‘boat removal policy so as to obstruct the advance of the Japanese. He did not even consider a memorandum on this submitted by the minister. As such instances multiplied, Shyama Prasad wrote a long letter to the Governor on 26 July 1942, bitterly complaining that officialdom in Writers Building was obstructing the functioning of Fazlul Huq’s cabinet in every possible way and accused the Governor himself of encouraging this defiance, favouring the Muslim League in its nefarious design and not encouraging Fazlul Huq and his colleagues in their progressive efforts.
In his letter he declared forcefully:
For the first time in British Indian history, the influential representatives of the Hindus and Muslims respectively in Bengal have been trying to work the democratic constitution given to them in spite of the numerous defects and shortcomings in it. If their efforts succeed, it will naturally falsify the plea that the political advancement of India is impeded by communal disputes. It is therefore to the interest of the autocratic bureaucracy to see that the ministerial efforts do not succeed.
He did not hesitate to criticize the conduct of the Governor himself in the following words:
Instead of encouraging Fazlul Huq and his colleagues in their progressive efforts, you have time and again found it necessary to hold the brief for the Muslim League. Your special pleadings for the Muslim League have, to speak the truth, shown you up before your eyes as a distinguished manipulator of the manoeuvrings of the Muslim League rather than as an impartial constitutional head and your conduct has appeared to us as quite mysterious… It is a matter of deep regret that even in important matters relating to popular demands and the right of the people, you have
allowed yourself to be guided by a class of permanent officials instead of your constitutional advisers. The special responsibility bestowed on you by Article 52 of the Government of India Act is capable of a wide interpretation, particularly now during the war, and you have brought into existence a separate administration inside the administration in this province, with the result that real power has passed into the hands of people who under the democratic constitution have no responsibility for the administration of the province. This is a weighty allegation that I am making. You should know that willingly or unwillingly you have created an idea in the minds of your ministers which stands in the way of good administration in the province… I end this letter with this assurance that what I wanted was also that during the war you would exercise your powers in collaboration with the elected representatives of the people. If you are decided in your mind that this war is a conflict between the two ideals of brute force and authoritarianism on the one hand and humaneness and a spirit of freedom on the other and that you are determined to uphold the latter, you should have no difficulty in conceding what I have asked for.
Shyama Prasad also raised the issue of the police atrocities on Congress agitators especially in Medinipore district and suggested a persuasive and conciliatory approach with the help of elected ministers in dealing with the Congress’ Quit India Movement. As the Governor once again turned down his proposals, he wrote to the Viceroy, Lord Linlithgow, on 12 August 1942, advising that India should be granted independence without delay and that a national government should be formed at the Centre and also in all provinces, consisting of representatives of all political parties. All power should be transferred to them except the actual responsibility of conducting military operations, which could stay with the commander-in-chief. In his opinion this was absolutely necessary ‘if India was to participate in the war with success’. Also, the demand of the Congress is the national demand of India as a whole’. He suggested the formation
of national all-party governments at the Centre as well as the provinces.
Without waiting for a reply, Shyama Prasad proceeded to resign from Fazlul Huq’s cabinet on 16 November 1942, calling provincial autonomy a ‘colossal mockery and accusing the Governor of allowing official advice to prevail over the minister, especially in matters concerning the rights and liberties of the people. Significantly, there was no difference of opinion with Premier Huq nor any rancour between the two. They continued to be good friends amidst adverse political circumstances till Shyama Prasad’s untimely death in 1953. His resignation was entirely due to his aversion to British policies and intrigues and his sense of frustration at not being able to achieve anything positive in the face of hostilities from the government and white officialdom and their unhelpful and unsympathetic policies in relation to the Medinipore freedom fighters and cyclone victims. His letter of resignation was suppressed under the Defence of India Rules. But in his statement before the Bengal Assembly on 12 February 1943, the great nationalist leader mentioned in detail the arrogance of the permanent British officers, how they put up obstacles in the path of ministers with the connivance of the Governor and stated that under these circumstances it was not possible for any self-respecting person to continue as minister. He repeated in the statement the same arguments that he had advanced in his letters to the Viceroy and the Governor in support of his proposal for granting independence to India immediately and of entrusting the defence of the country to the Indian Army.
He also referred to the reign of terror let loose by the bureaucracy with the support of the Governor in Medinipore and other places for suppressing the movement of 1942 and described how the people of cyclone-devastated Medinipore were denied relief as a punishment for their seditious activities and were thus pushed into the jaws of death. He expressed his deep regret that the ministers were totally powerless to render any help to the afflicted people. According to him, the wily bureaucracy with the help of arrogant officials and the ready support of the Governor set at naught all the efforts of the ministers in that regard.
Referring to the arrogance of the British officials he said:
The insolence of a British civilian officer reached a height that he went the length of recording in a note that the unfortunate displaced persons from East Bengal did not deserve the amount of monetary help that was being given to them and that as an officer of the Imperial service he was not bound to carry out the orders of the provincial government in that regard. That officer is still smug as a trusted official in a responsible post.19
He bitterly complained how in the name of suppressing a political movement relief was being denied by a heartless administration to genuinely distressed people after the Medinipore cyclone. After this devastating catastrophe of 16 October, it had been hoped that political disputes would end and the people and the government would cooperate in taking relief to the distressed victims of the cyclone. But far from relieving the distress of the people, the officials did not even allow the news of this catastrophe to be published for a fortnight with the object of preventing non-government relief from reaching the suffering people. The district magistrate refused permission to any non-official organization to start relief work in the areas. The Governor himself remained impervious to any suggestions. No attempts were made to improve the political situation by calling for cooperation in the relief operations from persons inside and out of jail in connection with the movement. Rather, the government followed a sinister policy of carrying on relief work during the day and looting and harassment during the night.
In the presence of local officers, people have made numerous complaints of oppression on them but we have not been able to give them any protection. Before I finish this account of my experience concerning Medinipore, I would point out that the information about an attack on a village about a month back that has reached us, reveals many shameful incidents of systematic rape on women by those who are responsible for maintenance of law and order. I have with me the statements of the women who were violated and
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these have smeared the administration with an indelible black stain.
Fall of Fazlul Huq’s second government
After Shyama Prasad’s resignation, the fall of Fazlul Huq’s ministry was only a question of time. The Muslim League made overtures to Hindu legislators as no government could be formed without the support of some of them. On 27 March 1943, both Nazimuddin and Suhrawardy appealed to Hindus to discard Fazlul Huq and join up with the League in forming a new government. Suhrawardy announced that ‘I give this understanding on behalf of the Muslim League that if Fazlul Huq stands aside, we Hindus and Muslims jointly should be able to carry on the administration peacefully.’ But Fazlul Huq still demonstrated his majority by winning on a cut motion on 27 March 1943. In a memorable emotion-paced speech he pleaded for a national government, which alone could alleviate Bengal’s distress.
But the very next day he was tricked into resigning by the wily Governor, Sir John Herbert. The Governor sent for him in the evening and from 7.30 p.m. to 9.30 p.m. discussed the possibility of the formation of a national cabinet. Then he requested Huq to resign to facilitate the formation of such a cabinet and even placed a typed letter of resignation before him for his signature, giving him the impression that he would invite Huq again to form such an allparty national government. Huq naively signed the letter,20 which was as follows:
My dear John, Understanding that there is a probability of the formation of a ministry representative of most of the parties in the event of my resignation, I hereby tender my resignation of my office as minister in the sincere hope that this will prove to be in the best interest of the people of Bengal.
Yours sincerely
A.K. Fazlul Huq
Huq went home, only to be informed at 10 p.m. that the Governor had accepted his resignation. The expected invitation to form a new government never came. Clearly, the Governor reneged on the understanding he gave Huq. According to another version, Huq was not willing to resign, but was forced to sign a letter of resignation, already prepared, under threat of dismissal. Fazlul Huq himself never told the full story of what transpired in Government House, but only stated in the Assembly on 5 July 1943 that he was forced to resign as a result of a deep conspiracy to which the Governor was party. He still asserted that he commanded the majority in the Bengal Assembly. The manner in which Fazlul Huq was made to resign perfidiously in March 1942, by an intriguing double-faced British Governor, will always remain a blot on British rule in Bengal. Fazlul Huq’s coalition with Shyama Prasad (1941-43) was a shining example of right-thinking politicians shedding their political labels and coming together in the province’s larger interest to save Bengal from its journey to political disaster. Also, it gave a good example of communal harmony in the enveloping communal darkness. But fate decreed otherwise.
Nazimuddin’s Muslim League coalition (1943-45)
Governor’s rule was proclaimed under Article 93 of the Constitution but only as an interregnum for about a month. On 24 April 1943, Khwaja Nazimuddin, the leader of the Muslim League in the Assembly, was invited to form a cabinet. Evidently, this was what Governor Herbert and officialdom had intended. This cabinet included some breakaway Congressmen like Tulsi Goswami and Barada Pyne as also some scheduled caste leaders. But it was essentially a Muslim League government, not a national government.21 The duplicity with which Fazlul Huq’s cabinet was bundled off and a Muslim League-led government was installed came in for a lot of criticism. Both Huq and Shamsuddin Ahmed, the KPP parliamentary party leader, wired the Viceroy demanding the installation of a national government in Bengal. A public meeting held in the Town Hall on the same day (24 April 1943) under the chairmanship of Abdul Halim Ghuznavi, bitterly criticized the action of a partisan
Governor. Shyama Prasad said that the Governor and the British trading community of Kolkata could not accept Fazlul Huq’s independent attitude and had, therefore, entered into a heinous conspiracy to oust him. Huq himself complained that he was made to sign on a false assurance and accused the Governor of breach of faith and of bringing through the backdoor the Nazimuddin ministry, which was not ‘national but communal. The meeting adopted a resolution condemning the Governor’s action and demanding a national government. Needless to say, the British raj remained unmoved. What must have weighed with the British authorities in removing Fazlul Huq and bringing in a government22 led by the loyalist and pliable Nazimuddin was the fact that in the context of the deteriorating war situation for the British, the spectacular Japanese occupation of South-East Asia, the formation of the Azad Hind government led by Subhas Bose and their joint advance to Bengal’s borders, they could not tolerate an independent-minded premier in Bengal and wanted a ‘yes man’ like Nazimuddin who would not oppose their denial policies or repressive steps on grounds of public suffering. Thus Governor Sir John Herbert was given a free hand in engineering the political coup.
The great famine of 1943
The single biggest happening of these two years, apart from the raging world war—the one that overshadowed everything else–was the great Bengal famine of 1943 (1350 BS). Occurring towards the end of British rule, this famine popularly called panchasher manwantar (the great famine of 1350 BS) is comparable in its magnitude with the great famine of 1770 (1176 BS)-chhiattarer manwanter—that had ravaged Bengal at the commencement of British rule. Almost as many people died in this famine as those who were killed in the second world war raging—a slow lingering death by starvation. The official Enquiry Commission headed by Sir John Woodhead put the death toll at 15 lakh. Unofficial estimates spoke of figures as high as 50 lakh. Applying the Commission’s own method of calculation, Amartya Sen has estimated a figure of around 30 lakh deaths.23 The importance of this great catastrophe,
almost wholly man-made, also lay in the fact that it severely damaged Bengal’s rural economy and rural life, and also played havoc with the ‘social value system’. The principal causes were the following:
a) The Japanese occupation of Burma had cut off the supply of rice from that country. Bengal had traditionally depended to a significant extent on rice from Burma.
b) The widespread confiscation of boats and other means of transport such as bullock carts by the government all over the province in pursuance of the so-called ‘denial policy to Japanese invaders affected normal trade channels and caused acute scarcity in a large number of pockets. The ruthless manner in which this policy was implemented with the backing of the army created serious dislocation. Not only were the boats and carts destroyed or confiscated, the police even forcibly removed or destroyed stocks of paddy from the godowns of the rice merchants or often the peasants. Such destruction and seizure of paddy on a large scale took place in the districts of Medinipore, 24-Parganas, Khulna, Bakharganj and Noakhali and several other districts. The seized rice was generally passed on to the hands of government agents who hoarded it and brought it out later as ration rice. In his memoirs of the famine, Ashok Mitra graphically described how Munshiganj subdivision, that is, Bikramapur Pargana, was rendered completely devoid of rice and paddy in 1942-43 and countless people died as a result of severe scarcity 24 In this area, the price of rice, which was Rs 3-4 per maund in February 1942, became Rs 90-100 per maund by December 1943. As this was a riverine area, there was not enough flow of rice from the normal trade channels to this area. Nor was the government prepared for a contingency of this type. What was happening in Munshiganj by and large happened in many pockets all over Bengal. Along with the destruction of trade and commerce through the denial’ policy, the forcible removal of the inhabitants of a large number of villages in the coastal areas (speech by K.C. Neogy in the Central LegislativeAssembly on 17 September 1942) also aggravated the conditions.
c) Large-scale procurement of foodgrain from the market for feeding the huge military personnel of the allied powers.
d) Restrictions imposed by the government on movement of goods including foodgrains by railways and roadways also hindered the movement of foodgrains from other provinces to Bengal. This was further worsened by the choking of the
available railway capacity by military movement.
e) Influx of several lakhs of refugees from Burma to Benga and the need to feed so many additional mouths.
f) There was wide-scale hoarding of paddy and rice by dishonest businessmen with a view to black marketeering and profiteering. It was rumoured that this was often assisted by dishonest ministers and government officials who had links with those traders. Appointing Ispahani’s company as the sole buying agent for the government without calling for tenders and giving it an advance of Rs 2 crore came in for much criticism. The anti-hoarding drives conducted by the government agencies were more cosmetic than serious. In a radio speech, the acting Governor. Ratherford, admitted that on account of the administration’s laxity the ration shop owners could sell essential articles to dishonest black marketeers at high prices and that a section of dishonest officials obstructed the policy of government distribution at fair prices.
g) Farmers were removed from several parts of Bengal for war needs and the lands remained fallow.
The disastrous cyclone of 1942 that ravaged Medinipore, 24-Paraganas and other coastal areas reduced large sections of marginal farmers and landless labourers to poverty and left them without any purchasing power. It also killed a huge number of menfolk, thereby reducing their womenfolk and children to penury. This was responsible for the presence of a very large number of famished women among the beggars that one saw in Kolkata streets and other urban areas crying for food.
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There was a certain spirit of revenge in Governor Herbert and a section of the white officialdom against Bengal after Subhas Bose’s escape from custody on 27 January 1941, which subjected the entire administration and the security arrangements to ridicule, and the. August Movement, especially in Medinipore, which had for all practical purposes freed large areas from the colonial administration and turned them into liberated zones.
The situation was aggravated by the government’s inability to start relief work in a timely fashion, set up adequate organization for food procurement and distribution and declare famine in Bengal under the Famine Code. As early as 24 April 1943, in a meeting at the Kolkata Town Hall, Shyama Prasad announced that the new ministry had done the greatest disservice to the people of Bengal by emphasizing that there was no shortage of food supplies in Bengal. Again, on 14 July 1943, he thundered in the Bengal Assembly, ‘The government was fiddling while the villagers in Bengal were crying for a morsel’ and blamed the British administration in India fairly and squarely. But all these warnings were simply ignored by the government in both Kolkata and New Delhi.
It is possible to get at the truth of this phenomenal happening from the proceedings of the Bengal Assembly, in particular from the speech of Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee on 29 February 1943, from the speeches of Fazlul Huq on 29 March and 5 July, and the proceedings of both the British Parliament and the Indian Central Assembly. It was a clear case of the Governor’s administration enforcing certain high-handed policies in the interest of the war, but totally unmindful of their disastrous effect on the life of the common people, while the so-called provincial government only played a very secondary role in a highly inept manner. This famine also received considerable academic attention even at that time from scholars like P.C. Mahalanobis, who did not have access to any data, and subsequently from Amartya Sen in his seminal work Poverty and Famine: An Essay on Entitlement and Deprivation, 198125 after nearly four decades. What is a matter of great surprise is that this famine, unlike its predecessors, did not affect the bhadralok class, but only the poorer sections of society, especially the rural poor who
found themselves without anything to sustain themselves in their villages and were forced into cities and towns in the quest for food, which was available in significant quantities in shops in the towns for those who had the purchasing power. These famished poor had none. They had neither the money to buy food nor the courage to defy the police and the army and start food riots. They simply starved and died in thousands in silence. Subhas Bose offered, in his radio broadcasts from Saigon, to send two shiploads of rice for the dying people of his beloved Bengal and asked the British authorities to accept these ships and get them unloaded. But this was rebuffed both by the Allied supreme commander, Mountbatten, and the minister for India, Amery, who said that this would amount to appeasement of the nationalists.
There were ominous signs even in 1942. The price of rice jumped up in three months from Rs 10 a maund to Rs 45 per maund. But these were ignored by Fazlul Huq’s government, which was rendered ineffectual by its internal weaknesses, by a callous Governor busy with his intrigues and a heartless Viceroy in Delhi, who never found time even once to visit Bengal even when the famine was raging in its full fury. In fact, the entire government machinery showed utmost callousness and indifference. The Congress leadership, almost in its entirety, was behind bars. The Muslim League leaders were busy playing power games. Officialdom was demoralized and incompetent. Part of it, especially white officials, were too busy enforcing war-time restrictions. Strict censorship kept the public in the dark, and suppressed all the warning signals. It was only when hundreds had died of starvation in the countryside, and thousands of famished villagers made their way to the metropolis of Kolkata and district towns, many of them dying in full view of the public, that the full magnitude of the raging disaster dawned on the authorities and the world outside. Apathy in Delhi and incompetence and corruption in Kolkata combined together to bring about by far the worst famine in recent history, a largely man-made disaster. The whole of Bengal was rent with anguished cries of the hungry seeking bhat (rice) or even fan (the water drained out after boiling rice). The streets of Kolkata were littered with dead bodies and dying men and
women. The majority of those who used to beg for fan day in and day out on the streets of Kolkata were women from the Medinipore and 24-Parganas districts who had lost their men during the cyclone of 16 October 1942. The New Statesman of London in its issue of 24 September 1943 under the headline ‘Black Death in Calcutta said: “The description of life in Calcutta reads like extracts from medieval chronicle of black death.’
But even when faced with this grim reality, Nazimuddin’s government proved hopelessly incompetent. It came in for severe criticism in the Assembly from Fazlul Huq, Shyama Prasad Mukherjee and many others. There were dark hints that some of the ministers were party to the hoarding of foodgrains, racketeering and black marketeering. It was during this time that a new expression ‘black market entered the Indian English vocabulary. The Civil Supply Department, of which Suhrawardy was minister, came in for criticism. All efforts by distinguished observers like Hridaynath Kunzru, who visited Bengal early in 1943, failed to make the government in Delhi sit up to take steps to rush supplies to Bengal. But Jinnah acquitted Nazimuddin’s government by describing it as ‘a fire brigade called too late to put out the raging flame 26 There were, however, largescale private relief efforts spearheaded by Shyama Prasad’s Bengal Relief Committee in which prominent non-officials like B.C. Roy, G.D. Birla, Fazlul Huq, Saraogi and Anandilal Poddar participated.
It was only the departure of Linlithgow and the arrival of Field Marshal Lord Wavell as the new Viceroy on 17 October 1943 which for the first time imparted a sense of urgency to famine control measures. Within a week after being sworn in as Viceroy, Wavell with his instinct as a soldier flew to Kolkata to study the Bengal famine for himself. He spent three days in discussions with Bengal ministers and officials. At night he went round the streets to see piled up dead bodies and sleeping destitutes. He spent one day in the Contai area of Medinipore, which had been ravaged thrice, first by the Quit India Movement, next by the unprecedented cyclone and tidal waves and now by the famine. He made the director general of the Indian Medical Services cancel all his programmes in Shimla and rush to Kolkata to arrange for medicines to deal with starvation
related diseases which were stalking Bengal. He badgered both Churchill’s government in London and his own administration in Delhi for shipment of foodgrains and other aid to Bengal, and at one point even threatened to resign if London did not arrange immediate . shipments. Wavell also instructed the Bengal government to take the following steps immediately:
a) Construction of shelters outside Kolkata for the countless famine-stricken people who were staying on the streets or in the open and arranging to shift them there and providing them food.
b) Dispatch of foodgrains to the scarcity-affected village areas with the help of the army.
c) Introduction of full statutory rationing in Kolkata.
After this, the civil supply department under Suhrawardy showed some signs of activity. But the famine had already taken a heavy toll. According to official records, 15 lakh people died in this famine. Unofficial estimates placed the number around 30 lakh between July 1943 and June 1944. In Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee’s reckoning, around 50 lakh people died. The relief efforts launched by Shyama Prasad in, among other things, setting up the Bengal Relief Committee, opening around 250 relief centres covering 24 districts, feeding starving people in these centres with collected foodgrains and appealing to all legislators in India to donate Rs 10 out of their daily allowance of Rs 40 provided a shining example of what the private efforts of a visionary nationalist free from communal considerations could achieve in the face of a hostile government environment. He received commendation even in the secret reports of the Central intelligence branch. Wavell himself blamed the Bengal ministry for this man-made famine and after his personal visit was said to have recommended the dismissal of this ministry and Governor’s rule under Section 93. But the home government did not agree. Thus, Bengal was ravaged by a severe famine at the close of British rule as it had been by another even at its advent.27 It took long to recover from the ravages.
The famine coincided with another man-made scarcity–that of cotton textiles in 1944-45. Cotton simply disappeared from the market. Once again, there were complaints of large-scale hoarding by Marwari black marketeers, and dark hints of the complicity of . the civil supply minister, Suhrawardy, and the officials of his department. Day in and day out there was mud-slinging between the Treasury and the Opposition in the Assembly. Even the leader of the European group in the Assembly, H.R. Norton commented openly: ‘As a businessman of 36 years experience in Calcutta I have never known such a dearth of cloth as there has been during the last 12 months.’ 10 March 1944 was observed as the ‘textile crisis day and a public meeting in Wellington Square presided over by the Assembly Speaker, Nausher Ali, lambasted the government for creating this artificial scarcity.
Fall of Nazimuddin’s government and Governor’s Rule (1945)
Nazimuddin’s government tried unsuccessfully to get a modified version of the KPP-League government’s 1940 Bill on Secondary Education passed by the Assembly, but once again the Hindu members were adamant and moved about 3,000 amendments to the bill. Even a parliamentary secretary to the government, Atul Chandra Kumar, resigned in protest. The passage of the bill was deadlocked as before.
But all this added to the League’s popularity among the Muslim masses, further helped by the mass contact programme launched by Abul Hashim after he was elected secretary of the Bengal Muslim League. The Pakistan slogan was also steadily gaining ground. A straw in the wind was the Muslim League’s unprecedented success in the 1944 elections to the Calcutta Corporation, ending the balance that had continued since Subhas Bose’s pact with the League. Securing seventeen seats in the 1944 elections when the Congress was divided between Subhasists and non-Subhasists and with the Hindu Mahasabha further splitting Hindu votes, the League captured power in the Calcutta Corporation and got its nominees elected to all the aldermen’s seats.
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But the Nazimuddin ministry, which had lost popularity, was also fast losing its legislative strength. On 28 March 1945, during the budget session, it was defeated on the floor by 106 votes to ninetyseven on the grant for the agriculture department. In a historic ruling, the Speaker, Nausher Ali, declared Nazimuddin’s government as invalid after its defeat on the floor. There were accusations that the Marwari businessmen played some role with their money power to induce some members to leave the Treasury benches and vote against the government. Suhrawardy openly made accusations on the floor of the House: ‘If the voting goes against us and we have to resign, the only reason for that would be that members would be casting their votes against us out of greed for money offered to them by hoarders, profiteers and black marketers. If we had not moved for de-hoarding illegally hoarded stocks, we would not have to face this predicament.28
In a desperate move, Nazimuddin asked for Jinnah’s permission to form a coalition with the Congress and Jinnah gave his nod so long as the coalition was on honourable terms. But in a swift move, Governor Sir Richard Casey, who had joined on 22 January 1944, after Sir John Herbert’s death, dismissed the Nazimuddin government and took over administration under Section 93. In his memoirs, Casey, who later on became Australia’s foreign minister, made the following observations on his experience in Bengal: ‘It is a matter of great regret that a certain proportion of Muslim and scheduled caste politicians are seduced to defect from the party and do not hesitate to join another.29 To set the record straight, we should also mention that the defection of Nawab Habibullah of Dhaka with ten followers reportedly because of his not being given the supply portfolio that he wanted played a major role in the government’s defeat. In a statement issued on 19 April 1945, Nawab Habibullah and his ten followers accused the Nazimuddin ministry of ruining Bengal through their corruption and incompetence. They also accused the government of openly favouring Marwari businessmen and said that there was only one Muslim among the twenty agents appointed by the government for importing textiles from outside the province; all others being Hindus, mostly Marwaris. Thus, paradoxically, both
Suhrawardy and Nawab Habibullah of Dhaka blamed the Marwari businessmen, the former for the fall of the Nazimuddin ministry, and the latter for being hand in glove with that ministry. Perhaps both were partially right.
True, that no tears were shed for the fall of an inept government, but in fairness it must be said that on account of the prevailing wartime conditions and of the Defence of India Rules, the provincial government did not sometimes have the powers to set things right. Much of the administration took orders directly from the Government of India through the Governor. And their priority lay in meeting the supply needs of the Allied army fighting in Assam, Manipur and Chittagong, in facilitating military movements and in organizing activities such as air raid precautions. Unfortunately, the rising communal divide also had a role to play. The more the Hindu press attacked the government and some of its ministers personally, the more would a section of Muslims treat it as an unfair attack on Muslims and would more often than not impart a communal colour to it. This served as a shield for the government
In retrospect, it should be highlighted that during these years from 1937 to 1945, the Muslim League, till then a small upper-class marginal party in Bengal, was transformed from an elitist to a massbased party on account of a variety of circumstances. Entry to the League was made easier by reducing the annual membership fee from Re 1 to 2 annas. Old pro-zamindar policies were replaced by pro-tenant policies. In this process, Suhrawardy, who was popular among students, and Abul Hashim with his leftist leanings, played a major role. On his election as general secretary to the Bengal Provincial League in November 1943, Abul Hashim criticized the League’s inability to meet people’s needs. The League, according to him, had pawned itself thrice.30 It had pawned its political leadership to the nawabs of Ahsan Manzil since the time of Salimullah; it had pawned its publicity rights to the owner of daily Azad, Maulana Akram Khan, and its finances to the business tycoon Ispahani. He promised to free the League from these shackles and let the Bengali Muslim middle class find its rightful place. He, as also Suhrawardy, toured the districts of Bengal extensively to build up grassroots
support for the League. Students were extensively used to move from village to village and propagate the League. Workers of the KPP joined the League in large numbers. The Bengal famine of 1943 was seized as an opportunity to make mass contact in the name of relief. In 1944, the League leftists invited some KPP and Congress old guards to join the League. While Humayun Kabir and Ashraffuddin Chaudhury preferred to join the Congress, others like Maulana Abdullah-il-Baqi, Abul Mansur Ahmad, Shamsuddin Ahmed and Nawabzada Syed Hassan Ali joined the League. So great was the pull that a liberal lawyer and old follower of Gandhi and C.R. Das like Ali Ahmed Khan (1900-66) felt emotionally compelled to join the League and was elected to the Bengal Assembly in 1946 on its ticket.
By 1944 in his annual report Abul Hashim, as general secretary of the Bengal Provincial League, could announce that the Muslim League had become a revolutionary ‘mass’ movement and had penetrated rural Bengal. He claimed that in 1944 about 5,50,000 new members had been enrolled in Bengal. By abandoning its traditional pro-landlord stand in the United Provinces for the demand for the abolition of zamindari in Bengal, the League had drastically transformed itself. Dhaka University, by no means a League stronghold till the mid-1930s, became one in the 1940s. Its students offered themselves as volunteers to the League for the 1946 elections. Huq faced black flag demonstrations from students almost in every town of East Bengal after he left the League in 1941. Thus by 1945, the Muslim League had replaced all others as the overwhelmingly dominant party among Bengali Muslims. The rising tide of Bengali Muslim aspirations had no time for secular Muslims like Muzaffar Ahmad or Humayun Kabir, scholars like Saiyad Mujtaba Ali and nationalist politicians like Saiyad Nausher Ali and Ashraffuddin Ahmad Chaudhury. With extreme communalism rearing its head on both sides, all moderate sections were simply pushed to the wall.
Unfortunately, Hashim’s efforts to propagate some sort of Islamic socialism and turn the League into a leftist organization came a cropper. His experiment in setting up a party house in Dhaka with a weekly paper Hushiar to carry on within the League a left-oriented
movement that would eventually take over leadership from the khwajas and ashrafs also failed in the prevailing atmosphere of Muslim solidarity caused by the explosive slogan of ‘Islam in Danger’. It had to wait until after partition when, faced with the rising tide of Bengali nationalism, the Muslim League disappeared from East Bengal almost as rapidly and as dramatically as it had made its advent ten years ago. In this process, leadership came not only from new leaders like Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and Maulana Bhashani but also, paradoxically, from veterans like Fazlul Huq and Suhrawardy.
5
UNITED BENGAL: LAST HOUR
Bengal was in a sullen mood under a spell of Governor’s rule when the second world war ended in 1945 with the surrender of Germany (8 May) and Japan (8 August) after the Americans dropped the atom bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Politics in India had reached a virtual deadlock after the en masse arrest of Congress leaders and the petering out of the Quit India movement. The only gainer was the Muslim League under Jinnah. Gandhi went on a fast in protest against cruelties on satyagrahis from 9 February to 2 March 1943. But he failed to move an impervious colonial regime. The British authorities now released Gandhi for talks with Jinnah, which took place at Poona on 9–27 September 1944. These talks broke down because Gandhi was not willing to accept Jinnah’s two-nation theory, although he gave his nod to the concept of an autonomous Muslim majority Pakistan. In a way, Gandhi, by his tacit acceptance of the idea of a partition and by calling Jinnah Qaid-e-Azam, strengthened Jinnah’s position among Muslims. Also Jinnah, sensing victory, raised the stakes. He retorted to Gandhi’s non-acceptance of the two-nation theory with his famous statement:
Muslims and Hindus are two major nations by any definition or test of a nation. We are a nation of a hundred million, and what is more, we are a nation with an even distinctive culture and civilization, language and literature, art and
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architecture, names and nomenclature, sense of values and proportions, legal laws and moral codes, customs, calendar, history and traditions, aptitudes and ambitions. In short, we have our own distinctive outlook on life and of life. By all canons of international law we are a nation.
What a long way to travel for one who was once hailed as an angel of Hindu-Muslim unity and one who till 1930 described himself as a nationalist Muslim and steadfastly opposed all forms of Muslim fundamentalism like the Khilafat agitation!’ Even those opposed to him now started flocking under his banner. A significant section of the Hindus remained resentful of Gandhi’s meek surrender.
Shimla Conference-Labour Party in power in Britain
Even before the British elections on 26 July 1945, and the surrender of Japan in August, Governor-General Wavell called leaders of all political parties to a conference at Shimla. The main proposition that Wavell put before the Indian leaders was a fully Indian Executive Council with near full powers. But the Shimla Conference lasting from 25 June to 14 July 1945 ended in a fiasco, as the Muslim League and the Scheduled Caste Federation demanded that the Muslim and scheduled caste members in the Governor-General’s Executive Council must be their respective nominees and the Congress rejected these demands, claiming the right to represent all sections of Indians, including the Muslims. Meanwhile, in the British elections in July 1945, Churchill’s Conservative Party was defeated and the Labour Party formed the new government with Clement Attlee as Prime Minister. India’s independence was one of the election pledges of the Labour Party. On 21 August, Attlee announced that elections to the central and provincial legislatures would be held immediately and thereafter a conference would be arranged for drafting a constitution for independent India.
The Indian National Army trials
At this time, the trial of the Indian National Army (INA) officials who had deserted the British Indian Army and joined Subhas Bose’s
Azad Hind Fauj and fought the British, galvanized the whole country in 1945. They were accused of treachery against the king emperor and court-martialled. Not only did it spark off countrywide protests, but also brought about a temporary Hindu-Muslim unity. Thus the INA, when it was no more, proved much more trouble for the British raj than when it existed. The trial of the captured officers of Bose’s Azad Hind Fauj by the authorities in 1945 on charges of treason and waging war against the king shook the whole subcontinent. Viceroy Wavell and Commander-in-Chief Auchinleck must have regretted subsequently their decision to publicly try the INA officers.
The first in a series of 15 court-martials were held in the Red Fort of Delhi, from 5 November 1945. The accused were Lt Col Shah Nawaz Khan, Captain Sehgal and Major Gurbax Singh Dhillon, the first a Muslim, the second a Hindu and the third a Sikh. The result was an emotional union of all the three communities in protesting against the trial. Public outcry compelled the Congress and the Muslim League leaders, initially hostile to the INA, to join up together on this issue. Congress leaders like Bhulabhai Desai. Tei Bahadur Sapru and even Nehru appeared before the military tribunal at the Red Fort to defend these officers. By this action they made up for their earlier lack of enthusiasm for Netaji and his INA. There was a frenzied public feeling against these trials, which also focused the spotlight on Subhas and the INA. In Kolkata there was widespread popular disturbance leading to police firing, in which forty were killed, and there was burning of trams, buses and police vans. The military tribunal sentenced the three officers to transportation for life. But on Gandhi’s personal request and in response to popular feelings, the government commuted these sentences to dismissal from military service. No punishment was given to any officer or men of the INA who were tried in the next few months in 1945–46. On 21 November, a joint demonstration of the Congress, the Muslim League, the Forward Block and the Communists in Kolkata led to pitched battle conditions in which thirty-five people including students were killed in police firing. Many were arrested and subjected to sentences of up to seven years of rigorous imprisonment. Even
the members of the Indian armed forces made no secret of their sympathy with the INA prisoners. Auchinleck commented in a report that every Indian commissioned officer is a nationalist.2 The British were confused to see the intensity of Indian reaction and realized what a big political mistake they had made.
On 1 December, Auchinleck announced that the charge against the INA, accused of waging war against the king, would be dropped, and that further trials would be only for murder or brutality against other prisoners of war (POWs). But this failed to satisfy public opinion.
The trial of Captain Rashid Ali, one of the last in the series, on 11 February created a great deal of public hysteria. There were pitched battles between the police and the demonstrators in Kolkata leading to fatal casualties. Hindus and Muslims faced police bullets and lathi-charge shoulder to shoulder in this near-revolution, and eighty-four people were killed and 300 injured, including British and US soldiers. The Muslim League, the Congress and the Communists jointly took part in the movement. The army and the police took two days to restore normalcy. The Hindu-Muslim togetherness seen in Kolkata on that occasion was unbelievable. None could anticipate that in a few months, they would actually fight each other on the same streets in Kolkata during the Muslim League’s Direct Action Day on 16 August 1946.
Naval mutiny, 1946
If the INA trials focused on the widespread anti-British feelings among the armed forces, another happening, namely, the mutiny in the Royal Indian Navy (18 February 1946) also highlighted this widespread phenomenon of wavering of loyalty in the armed forces. On that day, a number of Royal Indian Navy ships in the Bombay and Karachi naval bases openly revolted against the British, starting with protests against the court-martial of a Bengali naval rating, P.C. Dutt, for scribbling Jai Hind-the INA slogan-on walls. The mutiny spread like wildfire to seventy-eight ships and twenty shore establishments. Some of these ships opened fire against British naval ships. As the news of this revolt in the harbour reached Bombay
there was widespread anti-government rising in the city. The police was unable to control the violence and the army had to be called in, leading to the killing of about 200 men. The Congress leadership did not encourage these anti-government disturbances at a time when it. was about to assume power. Vallabhbhai Patel intervened and persuaded the mutineers to surrender on 23 February 1946. Jinnah also advised the Muslim seamen to return to their ships and lay down their arms. The naval mutiny did play a role in unsettling the psychology of the British rulers. In a way, it revived for many of them the memories of the 1857 mutiny. Also, the low morale of the British soldiers in India, anxious to return home, unnerved them. There were several cases of near revolt (for example, the revolt by British soldiers and airmen of the RAF units at Dum Dum, who had to be detained by Indian soldiers). Slowly the realization was dawning that the sooner they left India, the better.
On 19 February 1946, that is, one day after the naval mutiny, Prime Minister Attlee announced that a cabinet mission consisting of Lord Pathick Lawrence (leader), Sir Stafford Cripps and A.V. Alexander would be visiting India in a few days to negotiate with the Indian leaders a time frame for the British to leave India and the future Constitution for free India. Clearly, the British had realized that they could no longer count on the loyalty of Indian soldiers to hold India and should, therefore, hand over power to Indians. The memory of Subhas Bose and his Azad Hind Fauj loomed large on their mental horizon.
Central Assembly elections, December 1945
The elections held in December 1945 (for the Central Assembly) and March 1946 (for the provincial assemblies) returned the Congress in majority in the Central Assembly and in most of the provinces, the Muslim League to majority in Bengal and Sind and to the largest party position in Punjab. The Congress won 91.3 per cent of the votes in the general (all except Muslim) constituencies, nearly eliminating all other parties including the Hindu Mahasabha. Similarly, the Muslim League secured 88.6 per cent of the votes in the Muslim constituencies and bagged all the Muslim seats, thereby
reinforcing its claim that it alone could, for the time being, speak on behalf of the Indian Muslim community. The new Central Assembly which had limited legislative powers under the 1935 Government of India Act, was composed of the following (figures in parentheses show the strength in the previous Assembly): Indian National Congress–fifty-seven (thirty-six), Muslim League-thirty (twentyfive), Nationalist Party-zero (ten), Akalis-two (zero) and Europeans-eight (eight). Sarat Chandra Bose, who had been welcomed back to the Congress on his release in 1945 and was elected to the Central Assembly as a Congress candidate, was elected leader of the Congress Party in the Assembly. But there are reasons to believe that the British were never happy to have dealings with Sarat Bose, a brother and close ally of that arch enemy of the British, Subhas Bose, and the Congress leadership soon realized this.3
Thus, in the entire negotiations for the transfer of power in 1946, the leader of the Congress in the Central Assembly was bypassed completely against normal constitutional practice. Nehru, Patel and Azad negotiated on behalf of the Congress, leaving Sarat Bose severely alone.
Bengal Assembly elections (March 1946)
Suhrawardy in power
In the campaign for Assembly elections in Bengal, the Muslim League made Pakistan the single issue and asked Muslims to vote only for Muslim League candidates to show that the League alone represented the Muslims. Jinnah had declared that this election was ‘a plebiscite of Muslims of India on Pakistan’. Abul Hashim brought out a pamphlet titled “Let us Go to War’ in which he made the following appeal:
The general election is the beginning of our struggle. Immediately after recording our votes in favour of Pakistan at the polling centres, immediately after winning our plebiscite liquidating the false claims of the Congress to represent the Muslims, we shall direct our attention towards British imperialism and demand immediate transference of power to the people of India on the basis of Pakistan.
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The Muslim League enlisted the support of both Muslim student organizations and the mullahs in its campaign, and also launched a terror campaign on all non-League nationalists and Muslim KPP candidates. There were a number of complaints of assault on such. candidates, their kidnapping in some cases or forcibly detaining some of them in their own houses. Even such well-known persons as the Speaker of the Assembly, Nausher Ali, and KPP leaders like Syed Jalaluddin Hashemi and Azahar Ali were attacked. Some of the mullahs put the fear of divine punishment on illiterate Muslims, warning them to vote only for League candidates.4
The result was a resounding success for the League. It got 115 seats out of 250 and the Congress 87. The KPP and the Communists got only four and three seats respectively. The only exception to the general tide was Fazlul Huq’s convincing victory in the two seats that he contested. The Europeans had twenty-five seats. The Assembly election results showed that the anti-British unity seen during the INA trials had as good as disappeared. In the elections, the Muslim League was led by H.S. Suhrawardy, who had intrigued to scuttle Nazimuddin’s nomination as a Muslim League candidate. Complaints of widespread rigging, manipulation and open partiality by government officials in the elections came from politicians as far apart as Abul Kalam Azad and Fazlul Huq. Others like Nausher Ali and Syed Badruddoza proposed in the Assembly that a commission be appointed to enquire into the allegations of complicity by British officials in favour of League candidates. Suhrawardy denied these allegations and pointed to the narrow margin with which League candidates won in many seats. He was elected leader of the League in the Assembly and was invited on 2 April 1946 by Governor Frederick John Burrows to form a ministry. The Bengal Muslim League, like the Bengal Congress, was rife with factionalism. Suhrawardy was apparently not even sure that the diehard followers of Nazimuddin or Tamizuddin Khan would not ditch him on the floor of the house. He was reported to have even secretly proposed an alliance with the Congress through Kiran Shankar Roy, the leader of the Congress Party in the Assembly. Roy referred this to Maulana Azad, who was Congress president. Suhrawardy discussed this
proposal with Azad in Delhi, where he had gone to attend the Muslim League Convention.5 But nothing came of it.
Suhrawardy now formed his League ministry with only Muslim Leaguers. The only exception in his ministry was Jogendra Nath Mandal, who represented the Scheduled Caste Federation. The formation of a cabinet with only Muslims save one (J.N. Mandal) and the omission of any caste Hindus among ministers hardened the Bengali caste Hindus and sent a strong message to them that the government was determined to rule Bengal without associating the caste Hindus with the governance of the province. For them this was a foretaste of what was likely to happen to them if the whole of Bengal went to Pakistan. Till then the League had always associated some breakaway caste Hindu leaders with the government. Now it was out and out a Muslim League ministry.
The fact that the Muslim League ministry could count on the unfailing support of the European members for its continuance in power illustrated the extent of the British raj’s support to the League. But at the all-India level, the provincial elections did not on the whole record as overwhelming a success for Jinnah as in the Central Assembly elections. In sharp contrast to the Congress forming governments in eight provinces, including the overwhelmingly Muslim North West Frontier Province, and a coalition government in Punjab with the Unionists and the Akalis, the League could form governments only in Bengal and Sind, and that too with the support of the European members. But two impressions were clear. First, by winning 442 out of 509 Muslim seats in these assemblies and nearly 87 per cent of the Muslim votes, Jinnah had demonstrated his overwhelming hold over Muslims. Second, and interestingly, his success was total in those provinces which would never be part of Pakistan, if formed, but much less so in provinces like Punjab and North West Frontier Province which were envisaged as parts of the proposed Pakistan. In the face of such overwhelming evidence, Congress leadership should perhaps have accepted his claim to be the representative of the Muslim community. That might have made negotiations easier.
The Cabinet Mission, 1946
The Cabinet Mission reached New Delhi on 24 March 1946. It had prolonged and tortuous meetings and negotiations for seven weeks with not only Congress leaders, including Gandhi, officially not even a member of the Congress, but really still the supremo, Nehru, Azad and Patel and the Muslim League leaders (Jinnah and Liaqat Ali), but leaders of all other political shades like the Scheduled Caste Federation (Ambedkar and J.N. Mandal), the Akalis (Master Tara Singh and Baldev Singh). It interviewed 472 people in 181 formal meetings. In general, nearly every political party agreed to disagree with others. Even among some of the political parties there were sharp disagreements, such as the Akalis who pressed for Sikhistan, but each leader had his own concept, or the scheduled castes, where the followers of Ambedkar sharply clashed with those of Jagjivan Ram.
Eventually, the Cabinet Mission announced and broadcast its plan on 16 May 1946. It rejected the concept of a sovereign Pakistan as unworkable and impractical, as with the two wings being separated by 700 miles, the communication between them in war and peace would be dependent on the goodwill of Hindustan. It also ruled out any partition of the two provinces of Bengal and Punjab. On the whole it tried to maintain a facade of united India with complete self-government for the provinces. It was somewhat influenced by a three-tier scheme suggested by Azad. In a nutshell, the Cabinet Mission proposals were as follows:
a) India would constitute a federal union with both the British Indian provinces and the princely states as constituents. The union would be in charge of foreign affairs, defence and communications (railways, posts and telegraphs etc.) and all other subjects would be under the charge of the provinces and the princely states.
b) The provincial assemblies and the princely states would elect 296 members to form a Constituent Assembly to frame a constitution for the Union. These members were to be elected on the basis of separate electorates.
c) The British Indian provinces would be grouped into three:
(i) a group comprising Punjab, North West Frontier Province, Sind and Baluchistan, all Muslim majority provinces; (ii) Bengal and Assam; and (iii) the rest of the provinces, all of them with a Hindu majority.
d) There would also be a loose regional government for each of these groups and the representatives of each separate group would draw up the constitution for the provinces in the group concerned.
e) The new Constitutions, both provincial and national, would continue for ten years after which every province would have the option to consider the matter and leave the Union and form a separate state.
f) Until the new Constitution was in place, the country would be run by the Executive Council to be designated as an interim government consisting of Indian leaders. This would also include a war member, the position the British were unwilling to part with in 1942 and one the Indian leaders were determined to have.
g) The paramountcy of the British Crown over the princely states would lapse. The precise status of the states would have to be negotiated during the building up of the new constitutional structure.
The proposals met with a mixed reaction. The two main parties, that is, the Congress and the Muslim League were initially silent. The Sikhs and the scheduled castes expressed their vehement opposition. On 6 June, the Muslim League accepted the Cabinet Mission’s three-tier formula. A few days later, the Congress agreed to participate in the Constituent Assembly but not to join the interim Executive Council. Any agreement on the issue of interim government was not possible on account of the Congress’ known position that it also represented the Indian Muslims and, therefore, had the right to nominate Muslim members in the interim government while the Muslim League was absolutely adamant on the point that it alone represented the Muslims. After three weeks of debate, the Congress Working Committee was persuaded by Nehru
and Azad on 25 June to accept the Cabinet Mission Plan subject to a few reservations such as the proposed grouping of Assam with Muslim-majority Bengal and the grouping of the Congress-ruled North West Frontier Province in the north-west group of states. which would be dominated by the Muslim League. When the Cabinet Mission members flew back to Britain on 29 June, they had thought that the mission was by and large successful. The All India Congress Committee accepted the plan by a massive majority on 6 July 1946. There was a certain euphoria, which was, however, shortlived.
Nehru’s faux pas
In the same All India Congress Committee session on 6 July 1946, at the end of Azad’s term as Congress president, Jawaharlal Nehru took over as the new president. He was imposed by Gandhi and not chosen by a majority of the provincial committees who had a clear preference for Vallabhbhai Patel. Apart from Gandhi’s personal fondness for Nehru, he felt that Nehru understood the English language and English mind better than Patel. This, he felt, would be an advantage in the negotiations ahead. But Gandhi’s judgement was a serious error in several respects. First, the replacement of the captain of the boat in the middle of the negotiations was in itself unfortunate, all the more so because a gentle, affable and scholarly Muslim was replaced as Congress president by a doctrinaire and highly temperamental Hindu Brahmin. Nehru did not share Azad’s commitment to the Cabinet Mission scheme. Second, there was a basic incompatibility between him and Jinnah. No two persons could be as intolerant of each other as Nehru and Jinnah. One has only to read their speeches and writings to know how they hated each other. History might have been different if these two did not face each other at the negotiation table.
Nehru was in the habit of thinking aloud, and it was in one of his spells of loud thinking at a press meeting at Bombay on 10 July 1946 that he put a spanner on the whole issue. At a juncture in history ‘when circumspection should have been the order of the day and there was much to be gained by silence’,6 Nehru decided to
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make, to quote Michael Brecher, his biographer, ‘one of the most fiery and provocative statements in his forty years of public life’. Asked whether the Congress had accepted the Cabinet Mission Plan in toto, he answered that his party was ‘completely unfettered by · any agreements and free to meet all situations as they arise’. As regards the formation of three groups of provinces as envisaged by the Cabinet Mission, he more or less ruled it out on the ground that Group A would decide against it and so would NWFP in Group B and Assam in Group C. Notwithstanding the fact that the Congress had accepted the three-tier formula, Nehru said, ‘we are not bound by a single thing except that we have decided to go into the Constituent Assembly’. In his opinion the Constituent Assembly would be a sovereign body free to do whatever it chose and the Central government would also be much more powerful than what the Cabinet Mission scheme had envisaged and free to modify the scheme as it pleased.
Nehru did not realize that after both the Congress and the League had accepted this compromise formula, which did not fully satisfy anyone, he was once again reopening the issue and thus sabotaging the cause of Indian unity. He was bitterly criticized by his colleague Maulana Azad in his memoirs India Wins Freedom: ‘I have to say with regrets that he is at times apt to be carried away by his feelings. Not only so, but sometimes he is so impressed by theatrical considerations that he is apt to underestimate the realities of a situation… The mistake of 1946 proved costly.’ This was, to quote Brecher again, ‘a serious tactical error.’ Nehru played into the hands of Jinnah and gave him the excuse that he needed to repudiate the agreement. ‘Mr. Jinnah reacted to Nehru’s statement like an army leader who had come in for armistice discussion under a flag of truce and finds himself looking down the barrel of a cocked revolver. He dived for cover screaming treachery as he did so.7
All hopes of a united India were shattered and the idea of an independent Pakistan, which Jinnah had compromised in accepting the Cabinet Mission’s Plan, was revived. In Jinnah’s reckoning the Congress had given a foretaste of how exactly the Hindus would behave towards the Muslim minority after the British had departed.
This was too much of an affront to him after he had climbed down from his declared aim of Pakistan to persuade the League to accept an arrangement minus a sovereign Pakistan’. Also, he was somewhat disillusioned by what he had thought was reneging by Wavell on his promise to ask the League, which had first accepted the Cabinet Mission Plan, to form an interim government after the Congress refused to take part. On 22 July, Wavell had written to both Nehru and Jinnah proposing an interim government of fourteen ministers: six from the Congress (including one representative from the scheduled castes), five from the Muslim League and three representing the other minorities. Jinnah was aghast at what he considered a breach of faith. On 27 July, the League council met to withdraw its acceptance of the Cabinet Mission Plan. Jinnah accused the Congress, the Cabinet Mission and the viceroy of repeatedly going back on their commitments over the interim government. Feelings ran very high and the Muslim League council prompted by Jinnah adopted a resolution to the following effect:
Whereas it has become abundantly clear that the Muslims of India would not rest contented with any thing less than immediate establishment of an independent and fully sovereign State of Pakistan, the time has now come for the Muslims to resort to Direct Action to achieve Pakistan, to assert their just right, to vindicate their honour and to get rid of the present slavery and the contemplated caste Hindu domination.
In other words, the Muslim League now decided to repudiate the Cabinet Mission’s three-tier formula and opt for Pakistan. It instructed its followers to prepare for a programme of Direct Action to organise the Muslims for the coming struggle to be launched as and when necessary’. It also called upon Muslims to protest against the British Raj and, as a token of their deep resentment of the attitude of the British, to renounce all titles conferred upon them by the alien government. The Working Committee gave a call for the declaration of 16 August as a ‘Direct Action Day’, which was to be a ‘universal Muslim hartal’. Jinnah also gave a provocative speech in the course of which he announced:
Never have we in the whole history of the League done anything except by constitutional methods and by constitutionalism. But now we are obliged and forced into this position. This day we bid goodbye to constitutional methods. Today we have also forged a pistol and are in a position to use it.
Direct Action and the Great Calcutta Killings, 1946
This directly triggered off the communal holocaust in Kolkata, then India’s largest city with a population of 25 lakh. The violence that erupted on 16-19 August sparked off a chain of communal violence that led to the partition of the country within a year. Suhrawardy’s government declared 16 August, the Direct Action Day, as a public holiday for both Muslims and Hindus. By contrast, neither in Sind nor in Punjab, the two other Muslim-dominated provinces, was this day declared a holiday. Whether or not Suhrawardy had a sinister design in mind is difficult to say. But many contemporaries believed that the clear object of calling a hartal on that day was to enable the murderous gangs to identify for attack those shops and establishments that opened their shutters in defiance of the hartal and were, by implication, not Muslim-owned. In fact, these attacks started in the Muslim localities in a pre-planned manner. In these localities there were murderous assaults on unsuspecting Bihari rickshaw-pullers and milk-vendors from early morning. Also, at Shyambazar and Hatibagan, violence started when Muslim League supporters tried to compel Hindu shopkeepers to close their shops.8 Further, the crossing of the river early in the morning, from the Howrah side, of a substantial number of Muslim toughs on a string of boats with the clear intention of violence could not have been unpremeditated. What happened during those four days can best be described in the words of Leonard Mosley, an objective non-partisan British researcher.9
The British governor of Bengal was Sir Frederick Burrows, an ex-railwayman and union official, who had been appointed by the Labour Government in February 1946 to
succeed R.G. Casey. He was an able and amiable administrator who got on well with Hindus and Muslims alike, and was popular with the local British Army Command; but he was not exactly a man of great strength or quickness of mind. As a personality he was certainly no match for the Chief Minister of Bengal, Shaheed Suhrawardy, an Oriental politician of considerable shrewdness, deviousness of mind, and great natural charm. Suhrawardy was a member of the Working Committee of the Muslim League, and therefore might have been expected to jump at the crack of Jinnah’s whip with the same alacrity as the other Muslim satraps. In fact, he exercised considerable independence and made it clear to Jinnah that he would brook no interference in his administration. Jinnah did not like him, particularly since he suspected that Suhrawardythough he was always careful to pay lip-service to the idea of Pakistan-secretly cherished an ambition of his own: to carve an independent Bengal out of free India and run it as a separate state, outside Jinnah’s control. To this outwardly affable but inwardly ruthless politico, the decision of Jinnah to declare 16 August 1946 as ‘Direct Action Day’ seemed a golden opportunity to demonstrate his power over Bengal’s Muslims and his enthusiasm for Pakistan. He announced that 16 August would be a general holiday in Kolkata for Muslims and Hindus alike; and when Hindu members of the provincial legislature protested that they had no wish to share in a Muslim political hartal, he ordered his party machine to vote them down. On 5 August, under the nom de plume of Shaheed’, he wrote an article in The Statesman, Calcutta, in which he said, somewhat cryptically, ‘Bloodshed and disorder are not necessarily evil in themselves, if resorted to for a noble cause. Among Muslims today, no cause is dearer or nobler than Pakistan.’ In a speech in Delhi on 10 August, he threatened to turn Bengal into a separate government if Congress went ahead and formed an interim government on its own. ‘We will see that no revenue isderived from Bengal for such a Central Government, and will consider ourselves as a separate government having no connection with the Centre,’ he declared. And in a declaration on the eve of ‘Direct Action Day’, one of his aides called upon the Muslims to adopt the slogan of Lar ke lenge Pakistan, which could be translated as ‘Pakistan by Force’. The stage was set for the demonstration that was to split India in two.
One cannot ignore Bengal’s contribution to the cause of India’s freedom, or to India’s intellectual and cultural life. Rabindranath Tagore, the great poet, was a Bengali, as were Michael Madhusudan Dutt, the father of modern Indian poetry, Rammohun Roy, Swami Vivekananda and Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, the founders of Hindu nationalism. But the Bengalis who counted on 16 August were the mobs from the slums.10
They crossed the Hooghly River from Howrah into Kolkata soon after dawn. They were armed with lathis (long sticks), knives, bottles and automobile cranks and other kinds of iron bars. Most of them at this time were Muslims. They waited in doorways and alleyways until it was time for shops to open, and they watched to see which shops did open (in the circumstances, they were bound to be non-Muslims). The doorkeeper who opened the shop was swiftly clubbed down, or kicked, or stabbed; then the contents of the shops were smashed or looted.
It began quietly at first and scarcely anyone realized what terrible things were taking place. A Briton cycling across Chowringhee Square on his way to a hospital where he worked saw a sweeper running towards him, pursued by a mob. At the moment he dismounted, one of the mob reached the sweeper and whacked him so hard across the legs that the sound of his bones breaking could be clearly heard. The moment he touched the ground, another member of the mob leaned down and cut the man’s throat and then sliced off his ear. Then the rest of the mob came up, nodded and smiled and touched their hearts and foreheads to the Englishman, saying: ‘Good day to you, sir’ before turning to make off across the
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square. It all happened so swiftly that the Englishman found it hard to believe it had happened at all.
In the beginning there were isolated incidents. By noon, however, the small, evil spurts of violence had begun to develop into flames and fires. It was catching. At first, it had only been groups of goondas who killed and battered, while small scatterings of wary onlookers followed them and looted and smashed shops or helped to overturn cars. But, gradually, the onlookers became participators in the killings. From many parts of Kolkata, the noise of human voices began to be heard; voices raised in anger or in pain, a steadily increasing keen sound that rose and fell, like the voice of hell, for the next four days to come.
At two o’clock on the afternoon of 16 August 1946, H.S Şuhrawardy addressed a mass meeting in the Maidan, Kolkata’s main square. He was in an ebullient mood and thanked his listeners for turning out in large numbers, their enthusiasm and their active work for Pakistan. While he spoke, men were being killed a couple of streets away. The smoke from fires started by the mob (who had broken into petrol stations by now and were spraying nearby shops with fuel) could be plainly seen from the square. But neither Suhrawardy nor his considerable retinue of police bodyguards seemed to be aware of them.
In truth, the Kolkata police were finding the job of putting down the riots almost insuperable. There was the psychological difficulty at first (when the acts of murder were being mostly committed by Muslims) that the killers and violators were of their own religion, for most of the Kolkata police were Muslims. By afternoon, the bellows of artificial fury had done the work and the Hindus and Sikhs came out on the streets too, red hot for revenge and reprisal. They came out not to meet the Muslim goondas in head-on clashes, nor even to protect their own people and put down the rioting. That is not the way Kolkata mobs work. While Muslim gangs went on hunting helpless Hindus and looting Hindu shops, Hindus and Sikhs went out on a hunt for helpless Muslims. It was always old men, children and women that they were after. The only pitched battle that took place between Muslims and Hindus happened
at Ripon College, when the Muslims hoisted a Muslim League flag on the pole. A Hindu climbed up and replaced it with the Congress banner, while below the mobs fought briefly and then swiftly retired. They were not there to get hurt themselves but to kill and maim the unarmed among their enemies. And though the police managed to clear the main streets by firing tear-gas on the mob, they reappeared as soon as the patrols had passed; there is always an alleyway in Kolkata down which you can disappear until the police has gone away.
Jinnah had called the ‘Direct Action Day’ a demonstration against the British for their refusal to recognize Pakistan, but of all the communities in Kolkata once the rioting began, the British were the only ones who were safe. ‘I have a stomach made strong by experiences of a war hospital, but was never like this’, wrote Kim Christen. 11
I made my way on a cycle, up Chittaranjan Avenue, to the Medical College. There I hoped to use my wartime experience in hospitals to do whatever I could do to help. There had been a mob killing two hundred yards south of the Medical College, and bodies lay about in the roads among the wreckage of burning cars. I waited awhile until the mob moved towards a side street and then continued to the hospital, where I first realised the enormity of the situation. Ambulances, service units, police trucks emptied themselves of bleeding, shattered and wounded, while open carts were piled with those who had not survived the journey back. I approached a Red Cross truck and joined a group of young medical students. They pinned a paper cross to my shirt and then drove to the Mirzapur area, dismounted when the bodies grew thick, and searched among them for any flicker of life in the pulse. They were few, and they were lifted on to stretchers, already red and sodden, to be taken to a hospital already overcrowded. This search for survivors continued throughout the day and night. We went North and East, over the canal, gathering broken heads and stricken bodies, and took them to whatever
hospital was nearest. Weapons of every shape and size had been gathered by the mobs—heavy tools, iron bars, spikes tied to lathis, while barrel loads of bricks were wheeled to the edge of the encounters. One man whose back was streaming with blood, having been hurled through a plate glass window behind him, squatted on the kerb. I saw him, while still bleeding, tear strips of cloth from his shirt and tie a piece of glass to the split of a stick so as to use it as an axe. All the hospitals had hung ‘Full notices outside. Doctors and nurses operated continuously, and medical students whose medical books were still clean were called up to exercise their knowledge in the most practical of schools. The ambulances were told to refuse all pleas for refuge and confine their loads to those not yet dead.
At the end of the first forty-eight hours, an air of death and desolation hung over Kolkata.12 It was hot, muggy and raining slightly. The smoke from the fires hung heavy in the air. Only an occasional cycle (usually ridden by an Englishman) or a military jeep, canopied in wire netting, rushed by. The city had come to a standstill. No more trains were coming to Howrah or Sealdah from the country. The sewers overflowed; and in the fetid gutters the bodies of dead men and women and dead cows lay side by side, being picked at by vultures.
There were already 4,000 dead and countless numbers wounded, but it was not over yet. The military (that is the army under British command) had been called in by now and more troops were being rushed in from the up-country garrisons. The sight of British or Gurkha troops was always a signal for the mob to stop their depredations and often they received a cheer; they moved about the city, calmly moving barricades, breaking up demonstrations, stopping to investigate and rescue whenever they heard a cry from a house. But they had been called in too late to have the great psychological impact, which might have put an end to the rioting right at the start. From now on, they would be able
to stop the big riots and keep the gangs off the main streets, but there was little they could do to prevent the knifings and batterings that still went on in the alleyways.
Sir Frederick Burrows had made his own tour of the riot-stricken areas on the first day, but the mobs squeezed back into the woodwork whenever he passed, and the chief minister, Suhrawardy, had been able to persuade him that all was under control. It was only when the Hindus and Sikhs had come out in retaliation that the chief minister had called for military aid, afraid for the first time of the enormity of the tragic events that had been set in motion.
On the third day the general Hindu retaliation was spearheaded by the Sikhs from the Bhawanipur area branching out across the city in their vehicles with guns and swords and attacking the Muslims wherever they could be found all over the city. The whole metropolis was now literally on fire. There was a pitched battle near the Howrah Bridge as Muslim mobs from Howrah tried to advance into Burra Bazaar, the central business district of Kolkata. The Sikhs, Kolkata’s motor mechanics and drivers, jumped into the fray from the third day and charged through Muslim localities like a motorized cavalry, killing anyone they could lay hands on without mercy. It is established that the army was not called by the government till the third day although several battalions of British forces were ready in Fort William. It was only when the whole metropolis was involved in the worst form of communal violence that the army was called in following a conversation between the viceroy, Lord Wavell, and the Governor of Bengal, Frederick Burrows. Suhrawardy himself was visibly panicky by the third day and was spending most of his time in the conference room of the Kolkata police. Hounded by the question of his direct complicity with the initial happenings, he clearly saw that what had happened had gone far beyond what he had initially conceived of on a limited scale. His detractors cite his presence in the control room as yet another proof that he was masterminding the whole thing.13 His apologists, on the other hand, point out that he was truly trying to control the situation with his
personal presence and personal supervision.14 A pro-government newspaper, the Statesman, declared:
We wrote two days ago that conditions in Calcutta were horrifying. They have gone beyond since. Whatever the appropriate adjective is, they were nothing in comparison with what we have subsequently seen. The last estimate of dead is 3,000, who have lain thick about the streets. The injured number many thousand and it is impossible to say how many business houses and private dwellings have been destroyed. This is not a riot. It needs a word found in medieval history, a fury. Yet fury sounds spontaneous, and there must have been some deliberation and organisation to set this fury on its way. The horde who ran about battering and killing with lathis may have found them lying about or brought them out of their pockets, but that is not to be believed. We have already commented on the bands who found it easy to get petrol and vehicles when no others were permitted on the streets. It is not mere supposition that men were brought into Calcutta to make an impression. Thousands have been brutally hurt, smashed eyes, smashed jaws, smashed limbs of men, women and children—these are the kind of political argument the twentieth century does not expect.
Fazlul Huq, the veteran leader, narrated in the Assembly instances where the police either connived with the mob that looted or remained mere spectators, for example, during the looting of the Mahishadal Palace, around 100 traffic policemen were in a barrack in the neighbourhood, but did not stir out. He commented in anguish: ‘I have felt that the greatest disturbances did not arise in a moment, but seem to be a well-planned action–maybe on one side or maybe on both sides.’15 There were innumerable reports in the first two days where the police, on being told of violent incidents, either did not pay heed, or said they had no instructions to take action.
Amrita Bazar Patrika, a Hindu nationalist paper, wrote: ‘Hindus
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and Muslims must hang down their heads in shame that exhibitions of such unmitigated beastliness should have been allowed to occur in our modern city. The tallest among us must look small in the eyes of the outside world.
Suhrawardy made no statement defending himself. It seems certain from his subsequent behaviour and his actions, that even he was bewildered by the great massacre. Both Nehru and Jinnah were quick in their condemnation. The Muslim League leader issued a statement saying:
I unreservedly condemn the acts of violence and deeply sympathise with those who have suffered. At present I do not know who are responsible for the resultant loss of life and property, which has been reported in the Press. Those who are guilty of resorting to indefensible conduct must be dealt with according to the law, as their actions, as far as the Muslim League is concerned, are contrary to instructions. They play into the hands of the enemy. They may be the actions of agent provocateurs.16
But in his heart of hearts Jinnah no doubt noted with satisfaction that if there was one lesson that the Kolkata riots had proved it was that when India became independent, Hindus and Muslims could no longer live together and civil war would be the inevitable result.
But there were still signs of sanity and humanity as shown by many stories of how in the midst of the carnage, when some Muslims were killing Hindus, and some Hindus killing Muslims, others tried to save innocent victims from their co-religionists. There was still a gleam of light in the midst of the gloom. All over the city, examples of Hindus who had died trying to save Muslims, of Muslims who had sheltered Hindus at the risk of their own lives and, towards the end, bands of young Muslims and Hindus marching through the streets, dispersing mobs, crying Hindu-Muslim ek ho (Hindus and Muslims unite), with the flags of the Congress and the League tied together, came to light. In her memoirs From Purdah to Parliament, Begum Ikramullah records a moving account of how a Hindu doctor risked his life to provide medical help to her critically
ill father in a Muslim locality. There is also the well-known story of how some Hindu neighbours saved Dr Qudrat-i-Khuda, principal, Presidency College, who was attacked in his home at Bhawanipur and escorted him and his family to the safety of a Muslim locality, endangering their own lives. There were many such events to demonstrate that there was still some civilization left in the ugly city of Kolkata and that there were still some secular people who could work and fight together in spite of their religious differences and uphold a common humanity. These shining examples sharply contrasted with the venomous hatred that marked other sections of Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs in Kolkata of that time.
Meanwhile, the British and Gurkha troops started pouring in from the third day of rioting. By the end of 19 August, there were 45,000 British soldiers in the city. On that day a peace committee was formed and, on its behalf, Muhammad Ali of Bogra made a public broadcast on All India Radio appealing for peace. A peace procession, including prominent leaders like Nazimuddin, Kiran Shankar Roy and Muhammad Ali of Bogra went round the streets of the disturbed localities. Slowly life in the metropolis was returning to normalcy.
The question of the degree of Premier Suhrawardy’s involvement in the unfortunate and regrettable killings in Kolkata from 16 to 19 August 1946 has remained a mystery ever since and perhaps will always remain so. Many contemporaries sincerely believed that he was the main schemer behind this tragedy. His apologists have felt that he had been more sinned against than sinning. A typical observation of the first school of thought quoting contemporary sources is from R.C. Majumdar:
It is beyond doubt that the communal riots that rocked Calcutta for four days were an offshoot of conspiracy by the Muslim League. The misuse of power by the Muslim League ministry of Bengal is unique in the civilised world and the British administration is also guilty of indifference and partiality.
Quoting from the accounts given by the then director of publicity of Bengal, P.S. Mathur, Majumdar also speaks of an attitude of
indifference on the part of the European officialdom. According to him, the British police commissioner retorted when asked to take strong action that ‘when both Hindus and Muslims are asking us to leave the country, why should I interfere? Better inform the Congress office. This typifies the attitude of the white officialdom. According to Mathur, Suhrawardy himself requested the Governor to agree to the summoning of the army on the third day, but the Governor did not take any action.
The Statesman, edited at the time by a known pro-Leaguer, Ian Stephen, wrote:
What befell India’s largest city last week was no mere communal riot, as we have hitherto understood the sanguinary term. For three days, the city concentrated on unrestrained civil war. Upon whom the main guilt for it rests is manifest. There has been criticism of the Governor [Sir Frederick Burrows]. We do not think he has emerged particularly well. But none except a very great man holding his traditionally constitutional office during a swift crisis could have done so. Where the primary blame lies is where we have squarely put it – upon the provincial Muslim League Cabinet which carries responsibility for law and order in Bengal, and particularly upon the one able man of large administrative experience there, the Chief Minister [Suhrawardy). That in the whole of India the only province where carnage occurred, on the League’s professed peaceful Direct Action Day, should have been in Bengal, where a League ministry holds office, astounds us.
The following observations by two recent researchers17 also have relevance. ‘In Bengal, however, and particularly in Kolkata, things quickly got out of hand, thanks largely to the Chief Minister and Leader of the League in Bengal, Hussain Shaheed Suhrawardy.’ Shortly before Direct Action Day, Suhrawardy threatened to declare Bengal an independent state, withholding all revenues, if Nehru was allowed to form a Central government.
On Tuesday, 13 August, Suhrawardy announced a three-day
public holiday starting on Friday, Direct Action Day itself. Why he did this is not clear. One explanation is that, fearing communal violence, he hoped to direct the wrath of the mob away from public offices and departments. Whatever its purpose, the result was to release Muslims to take part in meetings and marches–and mischief. On Friday, Suhrawardy had planned to address a mass meeting at the maidan.
Intelligence reports reaching Lt-General Sir Francis Tucker, general officer commanding-in-chief Eastern Command, said that Suhrawardy himself had told the huge Muslim crowd at the Ochterlony monument that ‘Direct Action Day would prove to be the first step towards the Muslim struggle for emancipation.’ He had urged the crowds to return home early and said that he had arranged with the police and military not to interfere with them. Whether this promise of immunity was meant as an invitation to loot and kill is hard to say—but a number of well-known Muslim goondas were among the crowd, and they needed no second bidding. When the meeting ended, they set off into the narrow streets of the city and soon Hindu shops, easily identifiable as they were not closed in response to the hartal, and houses were looted and burnt. Hindu goondas soon retaliated. At 4.15 p.m, Fortress Headquarters sent out the code word ‘Red’ to indicate that there were incidents all over Kolkata.
Suhrawardy’s apologists, on the other hand,18 point to his association with C.R. Das and the Swarajists, his secret parleys with some Congress leaders even after the 1946 elections to form a coalition government, his joint call for a sovereign united Bengal with Sarat Bose, his association with Mahatma Gandhi in 1946 and 1947 when he often risked his own life for the sake of preventing communal violence and his subsequent role in Pakistan politics in favour of the Hindu minority and Bengali language to disprove his alleged complicity with the riots in Kolkata in 1946. Suhrawardy himself stated in the Bengal Assembly that miscalculation on his part of the explosive effect of Jinnah’s call for Direct Action, rather than mischievous intent, was the real culprit.
As against these contradictory views, the following balanced
observations from a scholar, on the whole unbiased, but in sympathy with Suhrawardy are also relevant.’19
Suhrawardy has been accused not only of being responsible for the Calcutta killings in 1946 but also of having organised them. Though as Chief Minister, Suhrawardy was responsible for law and order in Bengal, it must be remembered that 16 August was declared Direct Action Day by Jinnah, not Suhrawardy.
Abul Hashim’s statement to the press issued on 13 August declared that the Muslim League would observe Direct Action Day to demonstrate its grievances against British imperialism. Khwaja Nazimuddin and Raja Ghaznafar Ali Khan of Lahore saw their struggle as being ‘against the Congress and the Hindus’. It has, in fact, been suggested that the target of Direct Action were the Hindus as the British and the Christians were left unmolested. According to S.A. Masud, who defended Suhrawardy on behalf of the Muslim League along with B.A. Siddiqui, an inquiry into the killings revealed that the riots had begun even before Direct Action was defined. He places the blame squarely on the ‘Mahasabha and Hindu communalism’. Masud recalls that the earliest incidents of rioting occurred at 8 a.m. that day. Others have suggested that it began at 6 a.m. It started with the looting and burning of an entire Muslim area in Bow Bazaar Street in central Kolkata. Suhrawardy drove alone to the spot to try and bring the incident under control. A strike had been called on that day and several meetings were scheduled to be held, such as the one at Islamia College at 4 p.m. and another at the Maidan at 3 p.m. Muslims were totally unaware of the trouble brewing. S.A. Masud, Abul Hashim and others went to the Maidan with their little children. Muslim women students from Munnujan Hall, a post-graduate hostel for women, headed for Islamia College on foot and waited there for several hours before being warned that a communal riot had started. In the meantime, the hostel had been attacked, the valuables looted and furniture burnt. The women had to take shelter in the office of the weekly Millat. At 3 p.m., Suhrawardy requested the Muslim public to return to their homes; for while the
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men had assembled at the Maidan leaving their homes unguarded, Muslim pockets and bustees (slums) had been attacked. To quote M.A. Masud:
Hindus planned to make Direct Action Day unsuccessful so that the British Government would think that the people of Bengal did not want Pakistan…while the Muslims were coming to the Maidan and returning back to their homes they were attacked by gunfire from rooftops and with bricks which were collected in Hindu houses along the main roads.
To quote Abul Hashim:
The Muslim League had no knowledge, no apprehension or anticipation as to the unprecedented violence that started…the Muslims were unarmed and unprepared to meet the situation…if we had apprehended any danger we would not have taken our sons and grandsons to the Maidan.
The accusations against Suhrawardy seem implausible on two counts. As chief minister, he would be held responsible for any breakdown in law and order, which would also discredit his ministry. He could not want a riot on his hands while he was in government. If he was responsible for organizing the riots he would certainly not have wanted a united Bengal, but a divided one. Nor would public meetings be organized in such a way as to encourage Leaguers to attend them with their children; and women would not have been encouraged to participate in these public meetings if rioting on such a scale was anticipated. Abul Hashim writes in his memoirs that when Suhrawardy realized that the Kolkata police force was not strong enough to tackle the situation, he requested Burrows, the Governor of the province, to call out the army, but the army did not come. Finally, after five days of rioting, the situation was brought under control with the help of a big contingent of armed constables sent on request by the Punjab government. In the meantime, Suhrawardy himself took charge of the control room at Lal Bazaar police headquarters and directed the police operations at grave risk
to his life. He could not rely on the commissioner of police who was a European, but received help from his Hindu friend, Hiren Sarkar, who was an inspector of police. Another factor which helped quell the riots was a peace procession on 21 August, led by all party leaders including Suhrawardy, Sarat Bose, Khwaja Nazimuddin, Kiran Shankar Roy, M.A. Ispahani, J.C. Gupta, Shamsuddin Ahmed, Abul Hashim, etc.
The accusations against Suhrawardy came primarily from the Congress, the Hindu Mahasabha, British officials and other nonMuslim scholars. It is not the intention here to discuss the merits and demerits of these charges except to point out that Muslims had a totally different perspective on the issue. Apportioning blame for the riots instead of attempting to understand why they happened is an exercise in futility. The evidence cited is generally unreliable and faulty, as the witnesses were inevitably partisan. Impartiality could not be expected of British officials, including Governor Burrows, whose inaction or belated action contributed to the spread of the carnage. Few are willing to talk about those horrific and shameful events today, let alone admit to participating in them, although many are still alive. The Hindu Mahasabha had made clear in no uncertain terms that it would prevent the observance of a hartal on Direct Action Day. Along with the Congress, it resented the declaration of a public holiday on this day by the government and resolved to foil it. The police force was guilty of inaction. The Congress had exhibited total disregard and contempt for Muslim aspirations by refusing to come to any understanding with the Muslim League on the formation of an interim government. The Muslim League ministry obviously wanted Direct Action Day to successful in terms of the observance of the hartal and had built up a sense of fervour in order to ‘win Pakistan’ by force if necessary. The League ministry, though in charge of law and order, had to rely for help on senior European and Hindu officials, which was not forthcoming. The scene was, therefore, set for accusations and counter-accusations.
Speculation has continued since these charges were not investigated exhaustively and the results were not published.
Suhrawardy’s connections with the goondas (underworld hooligans) of Kolkata was often cited as proof of his role in the Kolkata killings, although other politicians from the Congress and the Mahasabha also had similar connections. The fact that Suhrawardy took charge of the police control room set up by the European commissioner to monitor developments in the city was seen as a sinister act of mischief by some investigators. Little notice was taken of the fact that he did so at grave risk to his own life only when the European commissioner and the police force controlled by him failed to act to restore order. His alleged release of eight Muslim rioters was highlighted, though the number is paltry considering that 10,000 people, most of them Muslim, were killed in the carnage. Although he was chief minister, his use of official vehicles to patrol the streets and offer protection and shelter to those caught in the crossfire was misrepresented as an example of his misuse of the state machinery to incite rioters and show them ‘sympathy’. The anomaly in the evidence cited has not always been explained. For example, Das20 states that 65 per cent of property destroyed belonged to Hindus and 25 per cent to Muslims. However, a larger number of goondas arrested were Hindus, who numbered 1,704 as against 1,192 Muslims, and the proportion of Muslims killed in the massacre far exceeded that of Hindus. Such facts raise doubts about his claim that Muslims had ‘organized the riots, nor lend credence to his silence on the extent of Hindu preparation which went into the massacre.
While blind and unreasoned communalism may have played a part in the Kolkata killings, the riots could not all have been totally ‘organized. If Muslims had planned the event they would have taken care to protect themselves, particularly their women and children, and stayed indoors. The responsibility for the killings must be shared by all parties and active politicians of the time. The nightmare was created by politicians, both Hindu and Muslim, who had successfully whipped up the emotions of their co-religionists and created an atmosphere of fear, intimidation and expectation of violence. It became a wish-fulfilling prophecy. Hatred and suspicion was generated by the distribution of provocative leaflets, threats and
speeches. The breakdown of negotiations over the interim government also contributed to the exacerbation of communal tension to an unprecedented degree. The highly charged atmosphere set the scene for mindless and frenzied killings. The guilt must be shared by all concerned. Although Suhrawardy’s main concern before partition was the welfare of the community, after partition he became a champion of minority rights. He cannot be bracketed with the extreme communalists of his time who were responsible for killing in the name of religion.
On an impartial assessment of the available evidence it seems plausible that Suhrawardy had planned violence on some scale, maybe modest, but he failed to take adequate precautionary steps to prevent communal violence on a large scale which was not anticipated by him. Possibly he wanted to demonstrate how serious the Muslims were in their demand for Pakistan and also that the League and he himself represented Muslim Bengal. If the League could organize such demonstrative violence in a city where Muslims were very much in a minority, there was every case for the whole of Bengal, including Kolkata, going to Pakistan. But the extent of the violence
actually occurred surpassed his own calculations. He was struck by remorse, which drove him to Gandhi’s umbrella. He tried his best to atone for his sins of omission and commission in his subsequent politics in India and Pakistan.
The scars of those four maddening days of the holocaust in Kolkata took long to heal. For quite some time after this the city continued to be divided into Hindu zones and Muslim zones with little cross movement, especially at night. Even the public buses and tram cars would ply through notoriously riot-disturbed localities with armed sentries. Hindus would not get off in Muslim localities and Muslims would not get off in Hindu localities. There was universal fear of the unknown assassin’s knife lurking somewhere and striking at an innocent passerby. The Great Calcutta Killings, as they came to be known, had indeed changed the course of Bengal’s history by making partition certain. There is a fairly objective description of the rioting in Kolkata between 16 and 19 August 1946 in Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rehman’s Unfinished Memoirs (Penguin Viking 2012, pp. 65–72).
Politics in Delhi: the Interim Government
Neither Nehru nor any of the top Congress leaders nor Jinnah found the time to visit riot-ravaged Kolkata, India’s premier city. They were politicking for or against the formation of the interim government. Only Wavell, the viceroy, felt compelled to visit the city. He had written to both Nehru and Jinnah on 22 July 1946 and requested them to join the interim government. He had expressed the British leadership’s firm decision to install an Indian interim government in Delhi as quickly as possible, making use of the Viceroy’s Executive Council. The Congress rejected the offer straightaway. The Muslim League also rejected it, while at the same time giving a call for direct action. After the riots of Kolkata, Wavell could persuade Nehru and the Congress to join the interim government without any more delay. On 24 August, only a few days after the Kolkata riots, Wavell announced the names of the members of the interim government which was to take office. Nehru had wanted to have nationalist Muslims in two of the five Muslim seats, but the Viceroy announced the names of three of them hoping that Jinnah could still be persuaded to make an announcement for the two remaining Muslim vacancies. Between his announcement and swearing-in of the interim government on 2 September, Wavell visited Kolkata for eighteen hours to see the situation for himself and to share the sorrows and sufferings of the citizens. The visit convinced him that the Congress and the League must make a show of unity if further catastrophes were to be avoided. On 27 August, Wavell summoned both Nehru and Gandhi, narrated to them his experience in Kolkata and requested them to agree on a formula under which the Congress would formally announce that it accepted the intentions behind the Cabinet Mission’s formula.
The author of the idea was said to be Nazimuddin, who was seldom known to take an initiative, but took a very significant one at this stage.21 He had suggested to Wavell during his visit to Kolkata that as Nehru’s thoughtless repudiation of the concept of three groups of provinces under the Cabinet Mission Plan of a federal India had been the reason for the Muslim League’s rejection of the plan, the only way by which the League could be persuaded to
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retrace its steps back to the earlier agreement was for the Congress to make an announcement that it accepted the Cabinet Mission Plan as intended by the Mission and not as the Congress interpreted it. There should be another guarantee that no minority province in the three groups would be allowed to opt out of its group before the ten-year period specified by the Mission. Nazimuddin was a member of the League Working Committee and was known to be close to Jinnah. Wavell, therefore, put this proposition to Gandhi and Nehru in his meeting with them on 27 August 1946. He also told them what he had seen in Kolkata and appealed to them to accept this as the last chance for a peaceful transfer of power. Its acceptance by them could perhaps have still saved the subcontinent’s unity, but it was not destined to be. Both Gandhi and Nehru refused point blank to sign a draft announcement that Wavell proposed. Their ground was that this would amount to surrendering to the Muslim League’s blackmail. They also raised the old argument that the Congress was not pro-Hindu or pro-Muslim and would never legislate against the interests of the Muslims. Also, they would not accept the Muslim League as the only representative body of Indian Muslims. Thus, the Nizamuddin formula was stillborn, and Wavell’s meeting with Gandhi and Nehru ended on an acrimonious note.
In a way, this interview was also the end of Wavell’s viceroyalty, for immediately thereafter Gandhi cabled to Attlee that the Viceroy had become funnerved owing to the Bengal tragedy and needed to be bolstered by an even mind’.22 Nehru was also reported to have written private letters to a number of friends in the Labour Party like Cripps accusing Wavell of being unfriendly to the Congress and being pro-Muslim League and appeasing Jinnah. He also used his friend Krishna Menon and Sudhir Ghosh to influence Labour Party leaders in Britain to the idea that Wavell was not the right man for the hour and that India needed a new Viceroy with a fresh mind to pilot her to independence.
Wavell, under considerable pressure from Attlee, could persuade the Congress to join the interim cabinet and went ahead with the swearing in of the cabinet on 2 September 1946, minus the Muslim League. The new government consisted of the following: Nehru,
designated as deputy chairman of the Viceroy’s Executive Council, Vallabhbhai Patel, Rajendra Prasad, Rajagopalachari, Asaf Ali, Sarat Chandra Bose, 23 John Matthai, Baldev Singh and C.H. Bhabha. Shafat Ahmed Khan and Sayid Ali Zaheer would join after a little while. •
The Muslim League still stood away protesting against the Congress nominating two Congress Muslim leaders to the cabinet. Jinnah had demanded an exclusive right to nominate Muslims-a claim that seemed quite convincing in the light of the League’s demonstrated hold over the Muslims of the subcontinent as shown in the 1946 elections, and yet was not acceptable to the Congress. Wavell went on patiently negotiating with Jinnah. Eventually he succeeded in persuading Jinnah to let the Muslim League join the interim government. This was indeed a great diplomatic achievement on his part. But when five members of the Muslim League joined the interim cabinet on 26 October 1946, Jinnah, like a master chess player, disputed the right of the Congress to speak for the scheduled caste Hindus and nominated Jogendra Nath Mandal, a scheduled caste leader from Bengal, as a Muslim League nominee. This was his quid pro quo to the Congress claim of representing Muslims. If the Congress put itself up as representing some sections of Muslims, Jinnah wanted to show that it did not enjoy the support of all sections of Hindus and that the Hindu scheduled castes looked for support to the Muslim League rather than the Congress. Also, he himself did not join the interim cabinet, as that would mean accepting Nehru’s superior status as deputy chairman. He left it to Liaquat Ali to lead the Muslim League contingent. But interestingly, apart from Liaquat, Jinnah did not nominate any heavyweight Muslim League leader like Nazimuddin.
Significantly, there was no Muslim League nominee from Bengal. As the Congress could nominate only five ministers, and was keen to nominate a Muslim, Sarat Chandra Bose was excluded at the last minute. Thus his tenure as Central minister was barely for two months. Apart from being a persona non grata with the British raj, Sarat Bose’s opposition to the ‘partition’ plan already under serious consideration was also said to have been a cause of his estrangement with the Congress leadership. In January 1947 he resigned from the
Congress Working Committee in protest against the decision to partition Punjab.
The Noakhali Riots
The Great Calcutta Killings had triggered off the Noakhali antiHindu riots in October 1946 and the Bihar anti-Muslim riots shortly thereafter, both vitiating the communal situation in Bengal to a point of no return. In Noakhali district, which was predominantly Muslim (82 per cent), and some adjoining areas of Tripura district violence started on 10 October 1946–the day dedicated to the worship of Lakshmi, the Hindu goddess of prosperity. Organised gangs of Muslim League miscreants attacked Hindu villagers, a helpless minority, killing them, burning their houses, looting their possessions, dishonouring their women, abducting and forcibly marrying many of them, forcibly converting people to Islam and desecrating Hindu temples in order to spread terror and force them to emigrate from their hearths and homes. The police force was by and large inactive. One of the most sensational cases was the open attack on the village home of Rajendralal Roychowdhury, a respectable zamindar, in broad daylight and the killing of the whole family of twenty-three. Such incidents were pre-planned to create terror among the Hindus systematically. Wavell himself commented in a letter to Pathick Lawrence that the riots were deliberately planned by the worst political elements ‘those in East Bengal by a discarded supporter of the Muslim League’ 24 The news of what was happening in Noakhali countryside was not allowed to be published in the press for a week under orders of the Bengal government. Strangely enough, the leader of the murderous gang was a former Congressman, Gholam Sarwar, an ex-MLA who had joined the Muslim League. Sarwar was not apprehended by the administration despite a warrant of arrest against him. As news started slowly trickling out to the outside world from 17 October onwards and the magnitude of the disaster came to be known, there was an outcry all over the subcontinent. The press reported that around 5,000 Hindus had been killed and about 1.5 lakh lost their homes and all possessions. Premier Suhrawardy flew over Noakhali to see the
extent of destruction and simply commented that the newspapers reports were grossly exaggerated.
True, official sources invariably described the newspaper reports as highly exaggerated, but even if we had to discount them, there is no doubt that what happened was itself of huge proportions. General Butcher of the Eastern Command himself admitted that the Hindus had sufficient cause for running away. The news of the happenings
n Noakhali caused much consternation all over the country Mahatma Gandhi felt extremely disturbed and decided to proceed to Noakhali. The government of Bengal deputed Simpson, a highranking official, to Noakhali and Tripura for an on-the-spot study of the situation and for a report on what happened and remedial steps needed to be taken. This report was not released, but according to newspaper reports, it had supported the story of widespread killing, looting, and raping and abduction of women. The gist of the report was leaked out in the Statesman of 13 November 1946. It brought out that no substantial structure was found standing in most of the Hindu localities. It also supported reports of forcible mass conversion of Hindus to Islam, confining Hindu womenfolk in large numbers to force them to change their religion and marry Muslims. Inquiring pointedly, Judge Simpson tried to ascertain if the rioters who attacked the villages were local people or hired goondas imported from outside. He was told definitely that most of the rioters came from the neighbouring villages. On the same day when Simpson’s report was published, Gandhi visited Ramganj village and found telltale evidence of destruction all around. J.B. Kripalani, who was the president of the Congress, also visited some of the areas. He met the Governor of Bengal and recorded that the Governor was totally indifferent to the happenings in Noakhali.
Mahatma Gandhi started from Sodepur near Kolkata on 6 November 1946 and reached Noakhali the following day. He stayed there for about four months and left Noakhali on 2 March 1947. He toured the disturbed areas on foot, lived in Muslim villages, held numerous meetings trying to re-establish communal amity, appealing to both the communities to live peacefully and amicably as before. His Noakhali tour was not only a high watermark in his own life,
but was also a major event in the chronicle of happenings before independence. However, it produced different reactions among different sections of the people. It obviously had a considerable effect on Suhrawardy.
Noakhali and Tripura continued to be in the grip of fear for many months. The following portion from a ‘confidential, top secret’ report sent by the commissioner of the Chittagong division to the government on 13 May 1947*25 illustrates this:
Though outwardly Noakhali is quiet, the Hindus there are still panicky; the reason for the panic is the petty oppression of the Hindus by the Muslims in the countryside away from the towns and the abuses they are subjected to. The Hindus comprise four lakhs out of a total population of eighteen lakhs and, remembering the October atrocities, they, particularly the upper class among them, are passing their days in fear and terror. They do not dare to report to the police station the harassment and oppression they are subjected to. If they do so, they apprehend greater harassment when the Muslims come to know of it. If again any such information is given, the informant denies it at the inquiry but, in spite of that, the complaint on many occasions is found to be true. The Muslims can be categorised into four classes. First, though their number is small, are those who want to live peacefully with the Hindus and they gave shelter to many Hindus during the riots. The second category, and this comprises the largest number of them, are supporters of the Muslim League and they want the Hindus to leave the district. They do not want to kill the Hindus outright but oppress them in various ways; they would turn their face when the Hindus face violence and at times would also join in it. Many members of the Union Boards belong to this category. The third category comprises of those who really hate the Hindus in the name of religion or out of greed for personal reasons and they are prepared to exterminate them by all means. The recent events have
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swelled their ranks and a large number of goondas have joined this class in the hope of profiting by looting Hindu property. Many of this class are good speakers and they incite others against the Hindus. Abul Kashim and Ali Akbar are two of the prominent men of this category. There are complaints against them and they have absconded and are evading arrest by the police. The fourth category comprises the goondas. About 56,000 men of this district used to earn a good salary during the war and they do not let go any opportunity for looting. They are adept in theft, dacoity, arson, murder and other crimes and the Hindus mostly are their target.
The Hindus are subjected to other forms of oppression and humiliation too. Since the last killings, the Muslims have started to address the Hindus publicly as “kafirs’, ‘malwun’, etc. and to snatch cash from them. Forcible snatching of articles purchased from the market, forcible plucking of fruits from the trees of the Hindus, forcible removal of timber, tin and cattle, destroying paddy standing on the lands of the Hindus, setting fire to the houses of the Hindus who might have made complaints at police stations, are matters of daily occurrence. Attempts are being made to stop the shows in cinema houses belonging to Hindus. Though most of the weavers are Hindus, the Muslims are demanding 50 per cent of licences for working looms for themselves. Attempts are being made for ejecting Hindu shopkeepers from the markets. A big wholesale dealer has stated that he and many others have received anonymous letters threatening them with dire consequences if they did not close their business. Many old shopkeepers have been ejected and Muslims have opened shops in the premises. The Hindus who have constructed new structures after the late killings and arson are being threatened with evil consequences if they persisted in continuing to stay. Those who filed cases in court after the disturbances in October last are being forced under threat to withdraw their cases.
The houses of 7,700 families were destroyed by arson during the disturbances and over 22,000 farmers and weavers were driven away from their villages. Arrangements for their rehabilitation with government help have been made.
The Gandhi Camps and other volunteers did not succeed in affording much relief to the distressed people. The volunteers have no contact with the local Muslims; they regard each other with suspicion.
The main reason for the moral and psychological weakness of the Hindus is the partisan attitude of the government for the miscreants in the October disturbances leading to an increase in the latter’s surge for oppressing and harassing the Hindus. After the disturbances, 1,529 criminal cases involving over 13,000 persons were instituted but cases against 164 accused persons only are now going on. Of the 677 persons arrested by the police only 50 are in detention. The Hindus know that the police do not want to arrest the miscreants and the miscreants know full well that they will not have to suffer punishment. The police cannot trace out the two master criminals, Abul Kashim and Ali Akbar, though they are freely moving about and are addressing public meetings saying that it was a mistake not to have done away with all the Hindus on the last occasion and that this mistake would not be committed at the clash to come. In spite of all this, the police do not arrest them and this has resulted in adding to the apprehensions of the Hindus and also in increasing the boldness and spite of the Muslims. Magistrates, under pressure from the authorities, are being forced to release accused persons on bail and these miscreants are threatening witnesses and forcing them to give false evidence. Correct information of the indifference, partisanship and oppression of the police is not forthcoming and the government is giving out that the trouble is at an end. It is this conduct and attitude of the police that made the terrible killing of October last possible and very likely there is going to be a repetition of the same.
There is no doubt that the Noakhali atrocities served to harden the attitude of the Bengali Hindus in favour of the partition of Bengal.
Holocaust in Bihar, 1947
If Noakhali hardened the Hindu attitude, the Bihar riots had the same effect for the Muslims. In Bihar it was the turn of the Muslims to suffer at the hands of armed murderous bands of Hindus who had been inflamed by reports from Kolkata of mass killings of many Bihari rickshaw-pullers and milk-vendors by Muslim goondas in August. As the news of the atrocities had spread to the villages in Bihar, invariably there was retaliatory action on a scale that surpassed the Kolkata killings. Armed mobs went round the countryside attacking Muslim villages in a planned manner. It was a replay of Noakhali, the only difference being that there was no forced conversion or dishonouring of women. Village after village was burnt, the inhabitants killed or injured and movable property looted. While the Bengal government was accused of inaction in the early days of the violence in Noakhali, in Bihar the army was deployed in the very first instance to check widespread rioting and arson. The prime minister of the interim government, Jawaharlal Nehru, and some of his Hindu colleagues who had not thought it necessary to visit the riot-torn Kolkata and Noakhali, rushed to Bihar. Nehru even threatened aerial bombing unless the rioting stopped. As Noakhali had hardened Bengali Hindu opinion in favour of partition, the happenings in Bihar hardened the attitude of Muslim Bengalis in favour of not staying in Hindu India.
British plan for withdrawal: arrival of Mountbatten
Continued communal violence in Noakhali and Bihar had further worsened the problem of finding a constitutional framework for India after British withdrawal. The British authorities were now working on a plan to completely leave India by June 1948. Wavell came to the conclusion that the British simply would not be able to govern India for more than eighteen months or so. He kept two contingency plans ready from April 1946. One was for the emergency
evacuation of British civilians. The other was for the withdrawal of the British army and administrators province by province (called Operation Ebb-Tide) after making conditions reasonably safe in each province and their eventual convergence in Bombay and Karachifrom which ports they could sail home. Meanwhile, things were moving fast in London. On 20 February 1947, Prime Minister Clement Attlee made the following historic announcement in the British Parliament. ‘His Majesty’s government wishes to make it clear that it is their definite intention to take the necessary steps to effect the transfer of power into responsible Indian hands by a date not later than June 1948.’ In spite of determined opposition from Winston Churchill who had for nearly four decades opposed every move towards India’s independence, the House of Commons overwhelmingly endorsed Clement Attlee’s decision to end British raj in India by June 1948. The same speech also made another important announcement, namely, the replacement of Field Marhshal Wavell by Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten as Governor-General and Viceroy. It was rumoured, as already stated, that Nehru through his associate in London, Krishna Menon, who had close contacts with the British Labour Party, had canvassed with the British government leaders in favour of replacing Wavell with Mountbatten with whom he had struck up a friendship during his visit to Singapore where Mountbatten, the supreme commander of the Allied forces in South-East Asia, had treated him like a head of government. Nehru had never got on with the matter-of-fact Wavell during the negotiations. Incidentally, general mistrust rather than confidence was the order of the day, the last thing needed at the negotiating table. Nehru did not trust Jinnah. Jinnah also had total mistrust for Nehru. Nehru did not fully trust his colleague, Patel, just as Jinnah did not trust Suhrawardy. Also, Nehru mistrusted Wavell and the Governor-General fully reciprocated this feeling. There was mistrust between Wavell and British Prime Minister Clement Attlee, who overruled Wavell’s decision to postpone the swearing-in of the interim government until the Muslim League would agree to join, and enforced its swearing-in only with Congress ministers. Thus, Attlee had shown his no-confidence in ViceroyWavell even before the latter was sacked.
In retrospect, the replacement of Wavell by Mountbatten as Britain’s last Governor-General in India was somewhat unfortunate for the ongoing negotiations on transfer of power. Wavell had tried to prevent the partition of the country as best as he could and, therefore, continued his seemingly endless negotiations. In that process he had even become unpopular with Indian leaders, who often lost patience with him. But Mountbatten, who arrived on 19 March 1947, saw his role as a military commander who had to accomplish a task, namely, British withdrawal from India, as fast as possible. His announcement to bring forward the date of transfer of power from June 1948 to August 1947 produced a lot of unforeseen and unfortunate effects, directly paving the way for the communal holocaust in Punjab.
The Punjab civil war
In Punjab, many people felt that their immediate future was uncertain and took recourse to arms to ensure things in their own ways. Muslims in West Punjab straightaway thought of driving out the Hindus and the Sikhs and grabbing their land and property. The result was disastrous and the government was simply not prepared to face the situation that emerged in Punjab. While Bengal during these months remained relatively quiet, except for Kolkata, the storm centre moved to Punjab where the situation deteriorated very fast. At that time Punjab was under the administration of a coalition government of the Congress, the Akalis and the Unionists under Khizar Hyat Khan who was the premier. The Muslim League, although returned as the largest party in the Assembly after decimating the once formidable Unionist Party, was in the Opposition because three other parties chose to form a coalition.
With Pakistan in sight, the Muslim League entered an armed confrontation with the coalition government in power through a no-holds-barred civil disobedience movement. The League’s National Guards and the Hindu Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh clashed everywhere and, for all practical purposes, created civil war conditions. The militant Sikhs scattered all over Punjab in
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innumerable pockets felt insecure and tried to protect these pockets with arms or migrate to safer areas in what was likely to be a part of the Indian Union, using force ruthlessly. Their leader, Master Tara Singh, issued an open appeal to the Sikhs to draw their swords out and fight the Muslims. Militant Muslims all over western Punjab started an orgy of violence in trying to drive out Hindus and Sikhs from their hearths and homes. Hindus and Sikhs in eastern Punjab in retaliation started a similar process of ethnic cleansing. The administration in Punjab found itself thoroughly unprepared to deal with this kind of civil war, which it had never anticipated.
Faced with civil war conditions and unable to control the situation, Premier Khizar Hyat Khan resigned on 2 March 1947. The Governor of Punjab, Sir Evan Jenkins, invited the Khan of Mamdot, leader of the Muslim League in the Punjab Assembly, to form a government. But such was the electoral arithmetic in the Punjab Assembly that the League could not have a majority of its own, and both the Congress and the Akali Party refused to extend support to it. Unavoidably, Governor’s rule under Section 93 followed. But the Muslim League, determined to seize political power by force, and carry into effect the slogan of ‘Ladke lenge Pakistan’ started widespread rioting. This started in Lahore and engulfed the whole of Punjab like wildfire. It also spread to neighbouring NWFP where armed Muslim League supporters tried with brute force to overthrow the Congress government elected only the year before, led by Dr Khan Sahib, the brother of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, the legendary Frontier Gandhi. So strong was the communal contagion that Jawaharlal Nehru, on a special visit to the province which he had thought all along was a Congress-friendly one, was heckled and almost manhandled and had to return so disappointed that he never took a strong stand on the issue of asking the NWFP to go through a referendum to decide whether to join India or Pakistan. The Congress could have taken a strong stand against referendum in a province that had voted for it only eighteen months ago.
With all these developments, in particular the experience of a deadlocked administration in the interim government caused by Liaquat Ali, who was in charge of the finance portfolio, blocking all
proposals from Congress ministers, Nehru and the Congress leadership were slowly getting reconciled to the inevitability of partition. In a conversation with Leonard Mosley several years later Nehru confided: ‘We were tired men. We were not prepared to go to jail again.’ V.P. Menon, who had by then become reforms commissioner and constitutional adviser to Governor-General Mountbatten, played a leading role in persuading them that a united India was virtually impossible and that it was inevitable that the British would transfer power to two Central governments, one representing the Muslim majority in Pakistan and the other representing the Hindu majority in India on the basis of dominion status. Once Nehru and Patel accepted that the partition was inevitable, V.P. Menon quickly formulated an outline plan, got Wavells approval and sent it to the India Office in London.26
The idea of the partition of Bengal
But just when Pakistan had become a certainty as also the inclusion of the whole of Bengal in it, a totally unforeseen development took place, namely, the idea of a partition of Bengal, which, paradoxically, Bengal had rejected half a century ago. Taking the cue from Punjab where a decision was taken to divide Punjab on religious lines in early March, a proposal was mooted for the partition of Bengal under which all Hindu majority districts were to be given the option to remain in India. This proposal, first suggested in the Tarakeshwar Conference of the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha (4-6 April 1947) rapidly gathered support like a rolling snowball. In his presidential address, N.C. Chatterjee said: ‘Let us declare today that as the Muslim League persists in its fantastic idea of establishing Pakistan in Bengal, the Hindus of Bengal must constitute a separate province under a strong national government. This is not a question of partition. This is a question of life and death for us, the Bengalee Hindus.’ One of the principal protagonists was Shyama Prasad Mukherjee who declared: ‘I conceive of no other solution of the communal problem in Bengal than to divide the province and to let the two major communities residing here to live in peace and
freedom.’ The conference authorized Mukherjee to take all steps for the establishment of a separate homeland for the Hindus of Bengal in collaboration with all the nationalist elements. The West Bengal Congress accepted this idea almost immediately and passed the following resolution:
If His Majesty’s Government contemplate handing over its power to the existing Government of Bengal which is determined to the formation of Bengal into a sovereign state and which by its composition is a communal party Government, such portions of Bengal as are desirous of remaining within the Union of India should be allowed to remain so and be formed in a separate province within the Union of India.
Thus the cycle had made a full turn since 1905. Bengali Hindus who in 1905 launched a full-scale political movement to protect the unity of Bengal and their destiny as its essential part now started a political movement for Bengals partition in order to protect their Hindu identity. There was a hartal in Kolkata in support of the partition of Bengal. Fifty jurists of the Calcutta High Court, in a statement, pressed for the partition of Bengal on the ground that by going to Pakistan the Bengali Hindus would only exchange one form of slavery for another, and that they needed a homeland of their own. On 1 April 1947, eleven members of the Constituent Assembly from Bengal submitted a memorandum to the viceroy supporting the partition of the province. On 24 April 1947, the Statesman, Kolkata, commented that the minds of the middle-class Bengali Hindus had been so embittered that nothing except a partition of the province would satisfy them. The Marwari business interests of Kolkata led by G.D. Birla also lent their solid support to the proposed partition of Bengal. On 30 April 1947, a meeting of the Chambers of Commerce held in Kolkata supported the partition of Bengal. According to G.D. Birla, this was not only unavoidable, but an excellent way out of the problem. On 1 June, addressing the Bengali community in Delhi, Shyama Prasad Mukherjee called for a division of Bengal on ‘linguistic, cultural and economic considerations if India had to be
divided. Even the Muslim business interests wanted the partition, which would free them from unequal competition with the Tatas and Birlas. Thus when the decision to partition Bengal was announced in Mountbatten’s broadcast on 3 June 1947, this was relayed through. microphones on street crossings of Kolkata by jubilant crowds who saw in this proposal a liberation from the dark days of Muslim League rule. For many of them, tired of a winter of discontent (1946–47) caused by communal riots and economic misery through scarcity and rising prices of essential commodities and an economic slump that followed the end of the war, this mirage of early independence (for Hindus of West Bengal an independent India, and for Bengali Muslims the promised homeland) seemed to be the light at the end of the tunnel. For average Muslim middle-class Bengalis who had been seeking a separate identity since the 1920s, the quest appeared to seek fulfilment in Pakistan.27
The countervailing idea of a sovereign united Bengal
Suhrawardy was totally unprepared for such a move for partition of Bengal. At a press conference in New Delhi on 27 April 1946, he described it as a suicidal move and pleaded for an independent sovereign undivided Bengal in a divided India’.28 He even expressed his willingness to accept a joint electorate to allay the suspicions of the Hindus. He appealed to the Hindus to accept his proposal and said that the future of independent and undivided Bengal was very bright. ‘I promise’, he said, ‘that the future will be unlike the present. Bengal’s wealth, peace and happiness will befit a great nation. If the Hindus can forget the past and accept the proposal, I promise to fulfil their hopes and aspirations to the full.’ He also announced: ‘Independent Bengal will frame its own constitution and its Legislative Assembly will take the final decision in the matter. We Bengalees have a common mother tongue, and common economic interests.
For him a Pakistan without the city of Kolkata was simply not acceptable. Also, his relations with Jinnah were already under strain. He got in touch with several other kindred souls like Sarat Chandra Bose and Kiran Shankar Roy who were also opposed to the prospect
of a divided Bengal. Their response now was an independent sovereign Bengal as a third succession state after the withdrawal of the British, along with India and Pakistan. For a while this idea also caught the imagination of some people. Many Bengali Muslims supported this idea. Abul Hashim, who had emerged as the spokesman of the progressive sections of the Muslim League, made the following statement:
Let the Hindus and Muslims agree to C.R. Das’s formula of 50:50 enjoyment of political power and economic privileges. I appeal to the youths of Bengal in the name of her past traditions and glorious future to unite, to make a determined effort to dismiss all reactionary thinking and save Bengal from the impending calamity.
But the concept of a united sovereign Bengal was stillborn. Its success largely depended on the support of the Hindu Bengalis in general, which was not forthcoming. Suhrawardy, according to P.S. Mathur, at that time his press secretary, had envisaged that the proposed undivided independent Bengal would include the districts of Manbhum, Singbhum and Purnea from Bihar and the Surma Valley of Assam, with the result that there would not be a substantial difference in the numerical strength of the Hindus and the Muslims.30 In fact, the two communities would be evenly balanced in an independent enlarged Bengal. This was Suhrawardy’s way of removing the misgivings of the Hindus. Whether Bihar or Assam would have agreed to readily part with their territory is a different issue. Also, apart from Suhrawardy, some of his trusted followers like Abul Hashim and Muhammad Ali, and only two Hindu leaders, namely, Sarat Chandra Bose and Kiran Shankar Roy, there were very few takers for this proposal. Both the Congress leadership and the Muslim League leadership cold-shouldered the idea of an independent Bengal. Kiran Shankar Roy soon backed out under pressure from Congress leaders.
Above all, the Hindus of West Bengal were in 1947 not convinced of a united Bengal and in no mood to settle for continued Muslim domination in the politics of undivided Bengal, after experiencing
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for nearly two decades so many irritants like the reservation of an overwhelming majority of government jobs for Muslims. Many of them had suspicion that this was Suhrawardy’s camouflage to lure them into an eastern Muslim-dominated sovereign state. Even the . Muslim business interests opposed this as yet another Hindu conspiracy to keep Muslims in bondage. There were reports of meetings both in Kolkata and in the districts to protest against Bengal’s division. In Rangpur and Mymensingh, where the communist-led Tebhagha Movement was at its height, sloganshouting peasants were reportedly saying: ‘We will not divide Bengal. We will not kill each other. The Communist Party of India also raised its voice against the partition of Bengal, although it supported the proposal of Pakistan with Bengal as a part of the new state.
The joint proposal formulated by Suhrawardy and Sarat Chandra Bose envisaged the following arrangement:
a) Bengal would constitute an independent state, which would determine the relationship it would establish with the other states of India, but without a two-third majority vote in the Legislative Assembly it would not join either India or Pakistan.
b) Election to the Legislative Assembly would be on the basis of adult suffrage. The number of seats for the two communities in the Legislative Assembly would be determined by the numerical strength of the communities, respectively, but the electorate would be a joint one.
Gandhi made a statement that he would support the proposal if each and every Bengali Hindu could certify openly that he would be able to live without fear in any part of Bengal. Sarat Bose kept Gandhi fully informed of his efforts to preserve Bengal’s unity even in a divided India and secured his support in principle.
Five days after the publication of the Cabinet Mission proposal of 3 June, Gandhi said at the end of his prayer meeting at Gurgaon:
It is rumoured that the proposal for an integrated Bengal is getting support from many quarters as it had got my support; I have also heard that large sums of money are
being spent on securing votes in support of the proposal. I admit the value of unity but I am not in favour of establishing its value by dishonest means. I have been criticised by many for having supported Sarat Bose’s proposal. Sarat Bose is my friend; there is no doubt about it; it is also true that there had been an exchange of letters between us over the proposal. I do not approve of undesirable means to achieve a desirable end and I am against any act which cannot be done openly and by fair means.
In a speech at Himayetpur in the district of Pabna, which appeared in the journal Parbasi (Chaitra 1353 BS) Sarat Bose stated:
A partition of Bengal is desired by some. Netaji’s objective was a greater India and a greater Bengal. I am personally in favour of inclusion in Bengal of the Bengali speaking districts of Sylhet, Singbhum and Purnea. If there is any move to partition Bengal—this beautiful land-another strong movement will start to resist it and all classes of people will join the agitation. We are all Bengalees. Let people of both West and East Bengal live together in amity. We do not want either Bengal or India to be divided.
Much has been said for Gandhi’s support for a united independent Bengal. Gandhi did at one stage lend his half-hearted support, but not the full-throated support that it needed. Sarat Chandra Bose met Gandhi on several occasions with the proposal for an undivided Bengal. On some of these visits he was accompanied by Suhrawardy and Abul Hashim. Hashim told Gandhi ‘Language, tradition and history have created an unshakable bond of unity between the Hindus and Muslims of Bengal. We are after all Bengalees in spite of the difference in religion. It is a matter of shame that Pakistan would rule us from a distance of thousand miles.’ Gandhi advised Suhrawardy and Hashim to gain the trust of the Hindus first. Suhrawardy and Sarat Chandra Bose did not give up their hope for an undivided Bengal and fought a valiant rear-guard action till the end. In May 1947, at a meeting held in his house for a discussion of the proposal, Suhrawardy, Abul Hashim, Fazlur Rahman of Dhaka,
Muhammad Ali of Bogra, Kiran Shankar Roy and Satyaranjan Bakshi unanimously favoured this. Their proposal was forwarded to Gandhi at Patna under the signature of Sarat Bose and Abul Hashim (23 May 1947). While Gandhi was at Sodepur before this, he had told Sarat Bose and some Muslim leaders who had met him that the foundation of an undivided independent Bengal would be that no government proposal would be effective unless it was agreed to by a two-thirds majority of the cabinet and of the Legislative Assembly. Referring to this, he wrote to Sarat Bose:
The new proposal makes no mention of the above condition, nor does it contain any admission of the unity of culture of the Hindus and Muslims of Bengal. Besides that, it is necessary to ascertain that the Central Muslim League was in favour of the proposal. I shall however move it before the Congress Working Committee.
But the Congress leadership made its position clear in no uncertain terms. So did the strident Hindu Mahasabha led by Shyama Prasad. At a meeting on 23 May, when Mountbatten raised Suhrawardy’s proposal, Nehru made his task simpler by saying that the Congress could accept a united Bengal if it stayed in India. Both the Congress and the Muslim League accepted the partition of Bengal and Punjab in terms of the viceroy’s declaration of 3 June. Still Sarat Bose did not abandon hope. He met Gandhi in Delhi on 6 June. On 1 June, Gandhi wrote to Sarat Bose:
I have discussed your proposal of an undivided independent Bengal with Sardar Patel and Pandit Nehru both of whom are very much opposed to it. According to them, it is just a device to drive a wedge between the caste and the depressed-class Hindus and this is not their doubt only.
They say they are convinced of it. Sarat Bose still persisted in his efforts. He met Jinnah at Delhi and on 9 June wrote to him from Kolkata requesting him to direct the Muslim League members of the Bengal Legislative Assembly to vote against joining Pakistan. Needless to say, nothing came out of it. The
fact is that, in the face of strong opposition from both the Congress and the Muslim League leadership and strong reservations among the majority of the Hindus of West Bengal, the concept of a united sovereign Bengal was simply stillborn.
The Mountbatten Plan
Mountbatten took over as Viceroy and Governor-General on 24 March 1947 with a clear mandate to arrange transfer of power to a unitary government, if possible, but in any case to two governments by 1 June 1948. He was given time till 10 October 1947 to persuade the Indian parties. But, in any case, with communal violence at its crescendo and with the Muslim League’s persistent refusal to join the Constituent Assembly, partition seemed inevitable. On 2 June 1947, a little less than three months after he had assumed charge, Mountbatten announced the following proposals in a meeting with seven leaders: Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, J.B. Kripalani (representing the Congress), M.A. Jinnah, Liaquat Ali Khan and Abdur Rab Nishtar (representing the Muslim League) and Baldev Singh (representing the Sikhs).
a) A separate independent state would be constituted with Muslim majority provinces, but before that representatives of the Hindu majority areas in Bengal and Punjab would be at liberty to opt for a partition of these two provinces.
b) A plebiscite in NWFP would decide whether that province would form a part of Pakistan.
c) The people of the Bengali-speaking district of Sylhet in Assam would also decide through a plebiscite whether that district would form part of Pakistan.
d) A Boundary Commission would be appointed for demarcating the boundary of the Hindu majority and Muslim majority areas in Bengal and Punjab, which would go to India and Pakistan respectively.
e) No immediate change was envisaged for the princely states, but they were advised to join either of the two dominions on the lapse of British paramountcy. Significantly, there was not a single representative in this meeting from Bengal, the province that along with Punjab had the most at stake. It is a measure of the extent to which Bengal politiciansHindu and Muslim-had abdicated their authority and surrendered. it to political leaders from other parts of the subcontinent. It also demonstrated that, whether in the Congress or in the Muslim League, Bengali leaders were no longer counted as front rankers. All the parties concerned gave their consent formally or informally. Mountbatten literally steamrolled all ‘ifs’ and ‘buts’ to which Wavell would perhaps have lent a patient ear and tried his negotiating skills. He summarily dismissed Nehru’s feeble plea for independence as a third option in the NWFP referendum, stating that the Congress could not ask for it when it had denied the same option to Bengal.
True to his proverbial speed, Mountbatten met Gandhi immediately after his meeting, secured his approval and announced this scheme that same evening (3 June 1947) in a broadcast over the All-India Radio. He was followed in that radio programme by Nehru, Jinnah and Baldev Singh, each of them announcing the acceptance of the partition scheme and praising Viceroy Mountbatten. The British House of Commons also approved on the same evening what came to be known as the Third June Plan. Next morning Mountbatten, in a press conference, casually announced that the transfer of power would take place not in June 1948, but on 15 August 1947, that is, in just about two months time. If there was any single event that contributed most to the communal holocaust in Punjab, it was this advancing of the date of partition and independence.
The NWFP referendum passed off peacefully on 6-17 July 1947 with the Congress and Red Shirts, with total lack of logic, abstaining from it to register their protest. The result in favour of Pakistan was, therefore, a foregone conclusion. Also, the referendum in Sylhet, of more concern to Bengal, passed off peacefully. The people of the district decided to join East Pakistan by a clear majority. But in Punjab the situation deteriorated very fast, the whole province becoming a vast killing field.
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6
BENGAL DECIDES ON PARTITION
The last nail in the coffin of united Bengal was struck on 20 June 1946. The Bengal Legislative Assembly voted for Pakistan. Thereafter, in a separate session, the MLAs from notional Hindu majority districts voted in favour of partitioning the province and staying in India. The Muslim League MLAs of both East and West Bengal voted against partition. H.S. Suhrawardy announced in anguish that the idea of a sovereign undivided Bengal had been stabbed in the back and that the partition of Bengal was inevitable. On 3 July, 1947 a shadow cabinet was formed for the province of West Bengal with Dr P.C. Ghosh–member of the Congress Working Committee and Gandhian-as chief minister. The idea was that although the Suhrawardy cabinet would continue for the whole of Bengal till 15 August, all matters concerning the notional territory of West Bengal would need the concurrence of the shadow cabinet.
Later on the Muslim League members from East Bengal districts elected as their leader Khwaja Nazimuddin, who was to take over as the first chief minister of the province of East Bengal in the new dominion of Pakistan. Suhrawardy was elected leader of the Muslim League in the West Bengal Assembly.
Thus Pakistan under Jinnah had no use for the man, who, next to Jinnah, perhaps contributed most to the creation of Pakistan. In fact, he was destined to be expelled from the Pakistan Constituent
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Assembly and later on from the province of East Bengal in 1948 by his own Muslim League colleagues for his strong support for the Bengali language and the rights of the Hindu minority and was dubbed as anti-Pakistan and even anti-Muslim. He stayed in India till 1949 but returned to Pakistan in 1949 to build up the Awami League brick by brick and, in association with his old rival Huq and Maulana Bhashani, stormed the citadel of the Muslim League in
ngal in 1954 which he had personally done so much to build a decade ago.
Several other proposals, essentially in the nature of trial balloons, need to be mentioned. In a bid to protect the interests of the 20,000strong foreign community of Kolkata city, its trade and industry and its character as an international city, Governor Burrows proposed that Kolkata be turned into a free city and free port serving both India and Pakistan, but not becoming a part of either. For the present the British government was to nominate a Governor to be
ssisted by a council of advisers consisting of an equal number of Hindu and Muslim members and two nominated members, one representing the British community and the other the elite. A year after independence, the citizens of Kolkata were to decide by a majority vote whether they would like to join India or Pakistan, or prefer to continue as a free international city. Needless to say, the proposal did not receive support from either the Congress or the League and died a natural death instantaneously. With the advantage of hindsight, one can say that had this proposal been accepted, Kolkata might have developed like Hong Kong or Singapore well before these two cities developed in the 1950s and 1960s.
The other proposal, a stray thought from Jinnah, was for an 800-mile long corridor connecting West Pakistan and East Pakistan. It was impracticable even on the face of it, like Jinnah’s other proposal for the exchange of Hindu and Muslim populations between India and Pakistan. It was rejected straightaway by Nehru and Patel.
Meanwhile, with the future of Kolkata still uncertain (whether in Pakistan or in sovereign united Bengal or an international city) there was a relapse of communal violence in the city from 29 May till the end of July. Between 29 May and 24 June, forty-five persons
were killed. In July, 163 persons received injuries, 113 were hit by bullets and forty-seven received acid burns. On 28 May, Governor Burrows informed Viceroy Mountbatten that the situation in the city was explosive with both the rioting sides having stored huge quantities of explosives and arms. On 18 July he further wrote to the viceroy that any announcement about Kolkata remaining in India could be followed by large-scale rioting, with the city being divided into two armed camps. All kinds of panicky rumours were circulating adding to tension. Peace appeals jointly from Gandhi and Jinnah were being distributed from aeroplanes flying over the city. In this phase of rioting the Muslim bustees were mainly at the receiving end. The removal of Muslim police officers by the shadow cabinet of P.C. Ghosh at one stroke not only removed a protective umbrella but exposed them to attacks from Hindu anti-socials. Several bustees were burnt at Beliaghata, Kashipur and Entally in the first half of August. The en masse departure of Muslim officials and businessmen for Dhaka in the beginning of August left many of the Muslim localities vulnerable. Suhrawardy, who had gone to Karachi, cut short his programme there on hearing of the fresh outbreak of violence and returned to Kolkata on 10 August. He appealed to Gandhi not to proceed to Punjab and to return back to Kolkata.
The British House of Commons passed the Indian Independence Act on 14 July 1947 and the House of Lords did it a day later. The Act announced that the province of Bengal Presidency as under the Government of India Act, 1935, would cease to exist. With the decks cleared for the inevitable partition, all attention was focussed on the division of government personnel, including the army, and assets of undivided Government of India and of a provincial government of Bengal which itself was going to be partitioned. In the Bengal Secretariat in Kolkata and the headquarters of many of the districts there was feverish activity. Nothing like this had happened in all history. The date for independence or transfer of power was advanced to the night of 14 August 1947. Mountbatten wanted to be the common Governor-General for the dominions. Nehru and the Congress readily accepted him, but not Jinnah who himself wanted to be Pakistan’s first Governor-General, with Liaquat Ali as the first
prime minister. Jogendra Nath Mandal was nominated as the law and education minister in Pakistan in the first Central cabinet. Jinnah flew to Karachi from Delhi on 9 August 1947 after selling his house in Delhi. At the airport he was reported to have confided to a British ADC that he found it difficult to believe that he was after all getting his Pakistan.’ Writers Building in Kolkata witnessed an unprecedented spectacle of division of files, furniture and staff. Train-loads of government personnel left Kolkata for Dhaka where they were accommodated in make-shift offices after turning a college building into the provincial secretariat. Government officials were asked whether they would want to serve India or Pakistan. As expected, the Hindu officials with a few exceptions exercised their option for India, while the Muslim officials, once again only with a few exceptions, opted for Pakistan. The British ICS officers, by and large, decided to quit except some who opted for Pakistan. All the Hindu ICS officers opted for India and all the Muslim ICS officers, except one, opted for Pakistan. Sir Frederick Bourne was appointed Governor of the East Bengal province of Pakistan and C. Rajagopalachari, a front-ranking Congress leader, became the Governor of West Bengal. A joint statement was issued by Premier Suhrawardy, chief minister-designate for West Bengal Dr P.C. Ghosh, and chief minister-designate for East Bengal Khwaja Nazimuddin on August 9.
We… appeal to the people not to take the law into their own hands, but work in a peaceful and orderly manner. We want to give a fair deal to minorities in both parts of Bengal. But the minorities also must cooperate with the majority in making the states happy and prosperous.
About a week from now, transfer of power from British to Indian hands will take place. Undoubtedly, it is an event of great historical importance. By agreement between the Congress and the Muslim League, power will be transferred to two dominions on 15 August. The boundaries of the two dominions are not yet fixed. The matter will be decided by the Boundary Commission.
Both the Congress and the Muslim League have agreed to abide by the decision of the Boundary Commission. We do appeal to all sections of people in Bengal to accept the decision of the Boundary Commission, however unpalatable it may be to one community or to the other. We have no doubt that the vast majority of the people with allegiance to the Congress and the League will respond to the wishes of these organisations.
But during the transitional period, some undesirable elements may try to create trouble for their own interests. If they do so, the government would deal with them sternly.
The flag of the Dominion of India has been accepted by the Constituent Assembly. We do hope that the flag will be hoisted by all sections of the people in West Bengal and, in the same way, whatever flag is accepted by the Pakistan Constituent Assembly it will be hoisted by all sections of people of East Bengal.
We are going to be masters of our destiny. Let us hope God will give us courage and wisdom to shape it in the
interest of the toiling and starving masses. History was to show that these lofty wishes were followed more in the breach than in the observance.
Radcliffe Boundary Commission
Meanwhile two boundary commissions had been appointed, one for Bengal and one for Punjab, both presided over by Sir Cyril Radcliffe, a British jurist. For Bengal the two Muslim members were Justice A.M. Akram and Justice S.A. Rahman and the two Hindu members were Justice Bijon Mukherjee and Justice C.C. Biswas. Radcliffe arrived from England on 8 July 1947. He realized within a few days after briefly visiting Kolkata and Lahore and meeting members of the two boundary commissions that the Hindu and Muslim members could not agree on any point. He thereupon decided not to sit physically with either of the two commissions and stayed in New Delhi only, going through the records of the proceedings every day
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and the voluminous materials submitted by the counsels representing various parties, flown to him in Delhi every evening. Eventually he took upon himself, for all practical purposes, the entire responsibility of drafting the report on all contentious points. He overruled both the sub-reports and gave his own award. The award on Bengal was submitted to Mountbatten on 9 August 1947 and the one on Punjab after a few days. Radcliffe sailed for home on 15 August, having accomplished his task in less than five weeks, for which he did not accept any fee. Mountbatten chose not to publish the reports until after Independence Day on 15 August. Thus on the midnight of 14 August 1947, undivided Bengal disappeared from the map of the world and in its place the new provinces of West Bengal (in India) and East Bengal (in Pakistan) came into being. On the day of independence there was a sort of notional division. All the Hindu majority districts hoisted the Indian tricolour to celebrate India’s independence and all the Muslim majority districts hoisted the Pakistani flag. On 17 August 1947, the Radcliffe report consisting of sixteen pages was released, of which nine pages were devoted to Bengal. This award was as follows:
Sir Cyril Radcliffe’s Award
TO HIS EXCELLENCY THE GOVERNOR-GENERAL
1. I have the honour to present the decision and award of the Bengal Boundary Commission, which, by virtue of section 3 of the Indian Independence Act, 1947, is represented by my decision as Chairman of the commission. This award relates to the division of the Province of Bengal and the Commission’s award in respect of District of Sylhet and areas adjoining thereto will be recorded in a separate report.
2. The Bengal Boundary Commission was constituted by the announcement of the Governor-General, dated the 30th of June 1947, Reference No. D50/7/47R. The members of the Commission thereby appointed were:
Mr Justice Bijon Kumar Mukherjee, Mr Justice C.C. Biswas, Mr Justice Abusaleh Mohammed Akram, and Mr Justice S.A. Rahman.
I was subsequently appointed Chairman of this Commission.
3. The terms of reference of the Commission, as set out in the announcement were as follows:
“The Boundary Commission is instructed to demarcate the boundaries of the two parts of Bengal on the basis of ascertaining the continuous area of Muslims and nonMuslims. In doing so, it will also take into account other factors.
We were desired to arrive at a decision as soon as possible before the 15th of August.
4. After preliminary meetings, the commission invited the submission of memoranda and representations by interested parties. A very large number of memoranda and representations was received.
5. The public sittings of the Commission took place at Kolkata, and extended from Wednesday, the 16th of July, 1947, to Thursday, the 24th of July, 1947, inclusive, with the exception of Sunday, the 20th of July. Arguments were presented to the Commission by numerous parties on both sides, but the main cases were presented by counsel on behalf of the Indian National Congress, the Bengal Provincial Hindu Mahasabha and the New Bengal Association on the one hand, and on behalf of the Muslim League on the other. In view of the fact that I was acting also as chairman of the Punjab Boundary Commission, whose proceedings were taking place simultaneously with the proceedings of the Bengal Boundary Commission. I did not attend the public sittings in person, but made arrangements to study daily the record of the proceedings and all material submitted for our consideration.
6. After the close of the public sittings, the remainder of the time of the commission was devoted to clarification and discussion of the issues involved. Our discussions took place at Calcutta.
7. The question of drawing a satisfactory boundary line under our terms of reference between East and West Bengal was one to which the parties concerned propounded the most development has been on lines that do not well accord with a division by continuous majority areas of Muslim and non-Muslim majorities.
8. In my view, the demarcation of a boundary line between East and West Bengal depended on the answers to be given to certain basic questions which may be stated as follows:
(i) To which state was the City of Calcutta to be assigned, or was it possible to adopt any method of dividing the City between the two States?
(ii) If the City of Calcutta must be assigned as a whole to one or other of the States, what were its indispensable claims to the control of territory, such as all or part of the Nadia river system or the Kulti rivers, upon which the life of Calcutta as a city and port depended?
(iii) Could the attractions of the Ganges-Padma Madhumati river line displace the strong claims of the heavy concentration of Muslim majorities in the districts of Jessore and Nadia without doing too great a violence to the principle of our terms of reference?
(iv) Could the district of Khulna usefully be held by a state different from that which held the district of Jessore?
(v) Was it right to assign to Eastern Bengal the considerable block of non-Muslim majorities in the districts of Malda and Dinajpur? (vi) Which State’s claim ought to prevail in respect of the districts of Darjeeling and Jalpaiguri, in which the Muslim population amounted to 2.42 per cent of the whole in the case of Darjeeling, and to 23.08 per cent in the whole in the case of Jalpaiguri, but which constituted an area not in any natural sense contiguous to another non-Muslim area of Bengal?
(vii) To which state should the Chittagong Hill Tracts be assigned, an area in which the Muslim population was only 3 per cent of the whole, but which it was difficult to assign to a State different from that which controlled the district of Chittagong itself?
9. After much discussion, my colleagues found that they were unable to arrive at an agreed view on any of these major issues. There were of course considerable areas of the Province in the south-west and north-east and east, which provoked no controversy on either side; but, in the absence of any reconciliation on all main questions affecting the drawing of the boundary itself, my colleagues assented to the view at the close of our discussions that I had no alternative but to proceed to give my own decision.
10. This I now proceed to do: but I should like at the same time to express my gratitude to my colleagues for their indispensable assistance in clarifying and discussing the difficult questions involved. The demarcation of the boundary line is described in detail in the schedule which forms Annexure A to this award, and in the map attached thereto, Annexure B. The map is annexed for purposes of illustration, and if there should be any divergence between the boundary as described in Annexure A and as delineated on the map in Annexure B, the description in Annexure A is to prevail.
11. I have done what I can in drawing the line to eliminate any avoidable cutting of railway communications and of
river systems, which are of importance to the life of the Province: but it is quite impossible to draw a boundary under our terms of reference without causing some interruption of this sort, and I can only express the hope that arrangements can be made and maintained between the two States that will minimize the consequences of this interruption as far as possible.
CYRIL RADCLIFFE
New Delhi
The 12th August, 1947
There were many surprises. Khulna and Chittagong Hill districts, which had hoisted the Indian national flag two days ago, became parts of Pakistan, while Murshidabad and Malda districts which had hoisted the Pakistani flag were made parts of India. The districts of Jalpaiguri, Malda and Nadia remained in India while losing substantial territory from the districts to Pakistan. On the other hand, although Jessore and Dinajpur were allotted to Pakistan, a subdivision each from both the districts (Bongaon sub-division in Jessore and Balurghat sub-division in Dinajpur) were allotted to India. The state of West Bengal as it emerged from Radcliffe’s scissors was also moth-eaten. The districts of Darjeeling and Jalpaiguri were physically separated from the West Bengal mainland. The Muslims were sad to see that Kolkata had gone to West Bengal, as also the Muslim majority district of Murshidabad.
What weighed with Radcliffe in giving Murshidabad to India while, as a compensatory measure, giving Khulna to Pakistan was that the entire length of the Hooghly River from the point where it branches off from the Ganges should be with India in order to maintain the navigability of the Kolkata port. The Hindus were sorry that the predominantly Buddhist district of the Chittagong Hill Tract had been given to Pakistan. All its normal communication routes to the outside world lay through the Chittagong district and apparently that had influenced Radcliffe’s judgement, although he failed to notice in his haste that the hill tracts of Chittagong had a long border with the Lushai Hills district of the Indian province of Assam. It was somewhat immoral to award the Chittagong Hill
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Tract to Pakistan. As all the parties had given a guarantee that they would accept Radcliffe Award without any question, they had to keep quiet and accept whatever had been decreed by Radcliffe in what was by far the strangest, most illogical and arbitrarily drawn boundary line in history between two countries.
Partition: the extinction of One Bengal
On 15 August 1947, the Indian subcontinent won freedom for two countries from British rule. It was not the kind of freedom for which two generations of people in India had willingly fought and sacrificed. In that process Bengal was also partitioned, two-thirds of it joining Pakistan and one-third remaining in India. No Bengali wanted the partition of Bengal and yet the partition happened because the Hindu Bengalis, especially those from West Bengal, did not want to leave India and go into a predominantly Muslim state whereas the Muslims of East Bengal did not want to merge themselves into a predominantly Hindu India. The fact that despite much provocation and tension there was communal peace in all the districts of Bengal except Kolkata and Noakhali-Tripura was ignored by the politicians. Even when communal violence was rampant in Kolkata and Noakhali, the Muslim and Hindu peasants of the Tebhagha Movement in predominantly Muslim Rangpur and Dinajpur were fighting under the charismatic leadership of Ila Mitra and opposed partition. Such examples were ignored. The Congress leadership sans Mahatma Gandhi was as responsible as Jinnah and Mountbatten for accelerating the movement of events that made partition inevitable. Gandhi, on the other hand, opposed the division till the very end and even in his last meeting with Mountbatten requested the British not to partition the country, but to demit power either to the Muslim League or to the Congress to run India as a whole. If there was to be chaos, let that chaos be faced by Indians. On 31 March he announced that the Congress could agree to the country’s partition only over his dead body. He was conspicuous by his absence from the festivities at New Delhi and preferred to stay at a dilapidated Muslim house in riottorn Calcutta-the Hyder Manzil-at Belighata. His companion was Suhrawardy, the man the Hindus of Kolkata at that time hated
the most, whom he had invited to live in the same house with him. In his daily prayer meetings, in meeting countless groups and in the course of journeying through the disturbed localities of Calcutta driven by Suhrawardy himself, Gandhi preached communal harmony. and unity of religions and brought about a miracle. What the 50,000-strong boundary force in Punjab, led by General Rees, could not do was accomplished in Bengal, to quote Mountbatten, by this ‘one-man boundary force’. Bengal remained trouble-free and there were unprecedented scenes of Hindus and Muslims rejoicing and celebrating together on Independence Day, 15 August 1947. This was Gandhi’s great achievement.
In any case, an undivided Bengal disappeared from the atlas on 15 August 1947, thanks to the sins of omission and commission by two generations of its leaders. In spite of a common language of which every Bengali is proud, a shared culture and lifestyle and a common history for at least one thousand years, Bengal was irretrievably partitioned between two sovereign countries. Only the Bay of Bengal remained as a mute witness to what had been old Bengal, by far the most prosperous tract of the whole region. It was only the emergence of an independent Bangladesh in 1971 which partially restored the old historical pattern.
The question remains whether the 1947 partition of Bengal which, to quote the poet Akhtar-uz-Zaman Elias, was ‘so catastrophic, so deplorable, so heart-rending and meaningless that we are realising it more every day, could have been avoided. There can never be a unanimous answer to the question. Fazlul Huq, as chief minister of East Bengal in 1954, announced in public that he did not understand the political boundary separating the two Bengals. Suhrawardy chose to live in Kolkata until 1949. Annada Sankar Roy, the writer and former civil servant, chided the political leaders for breaking Bengal as little children break glass pots. Nirad C. Chaudhuri never accepted the partition and never got reconciled to a West Bengal without the mighty rivers of East Bengal. For Ritwick Ghatak, the film-maker, the indivisible Bengal was an article of faith and the cruelty of dividing this unity was shown in his series of memorable films. For Kayes Ahmad, the novelist, the partition was only ‘the freedom to be a refugee’.
PART II
TWO BENGALS
A Split Family
7
BENGALI OR URDU
(1947–54)
From 14 August 1947, East Bengal and West Bengal stopped sharing a common political history. On that day, the new state of Pakistan was formed with East Bengal as one of its provinces. The province now included the Sylhet district of Assam (minus Cachar and Karimganj), which had decided to join Pakistan through a referendum. A Muslim League government headed by Khwaja Sir Nazimuddin took charge in Dhaka, the capital of the province of East Bengal. The Congress constituted the main opposition both in the East Bengal Assembly and the National Assembly. Kiran Shankar Roy stayed on in Dhaka as the leader of the Congress opposition. In a speech to the Pakistan Constituent Assembly on 11 August, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the Governor-General of the new country, assured the people:
You are free, you are free to go to your temples, you are free to go to your mosques or to any other place of worship in this state of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion or caste or creed. That has nothing to do with the business of the state. We are starting in the days when there is no discrimination, no distinction between one community and another, no discrimination between one caste or creed and
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another. We are starting with this fundamental principle that we are all citizens and equal citizens of one state….
He continued, ‘I think we should keep this in front of us as our ideal and you will find that in course of time Hindus would cease to be Hindus and Muslims would cease to be Muslims, not in the religious sense, because that is the personal faith of each individual, but in the political sense as citizens of one state’. However, he emphasized, ‘let me make it clear to you that the state language of Pakistan is going to be Urdu and no other language. Two things became clear. First, Jinnah would not, left to himself, have developed Pakistan into a theocratic state. Second, he showed his political misjudgement when he ignored the sensitive issue of language with regard to East Bengal.
From the very beginning of the new state, the issue of giving Bengali, the language of the majority of the population in Pakistan, the status of a state language became important and was soon to unite all sections of the people. As early as 15 September 1947, Tamuddun Majlis, a cultural organization among Muslim intellectuals, brought out a book titled State Language of Pakistan: Bengali or Urdu? demanding that Bengali be made one of the state languages of Pakistan. Professor Abul Kashim, secretary of the Majlis and professor of physics at Dhaka University, convened a literary meeting in the Fazlul Huq Muslim Hall of Dhaka University to discuss this issue. Very soon a political party was formed called the “Khilafat-e-Rabbani Party’ with Professor Abul Kashim as the chairman, to focus on the claim of Bengali to be Pakistan’s official language.
On 23 February 1948, Dhirendra Nath Dutta, a member of the Congress opposition in the Pakistan Constituent Assembly, moved a resolution in the very first session of the Assembly for recognizing Bengali as a state language along with Urdu and English. Both Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan and, regrettably, Khwaja Nazimuddin and other non-Bengali members in the Assembly opposed this move. Even when Dhirendra Nath Dutta came up with a few amendments in the original resolution, these were opposed by the West Pakistanis and their Bengali stooges. On 25 February 1948, Begum Ikramullah stated in the Constituent Assembly that, ‘A
feeling is growing among the East Pakistanis that Eastern Pakistan is being neglected and treated as a “colony of West Pakistan’. This shows that along with the Bengali language, the alleged discrimination against East Bengal and her economic exploitation was also becoming a major issue. On 2 March 1948, Nazimuddin, chief minister of East Bengal, told the members of Parliament that, ‘we must have a fair and proper share in the Armed Forces’.
On 6 March 1948, H.S. Suhrawardy,1′ who till 1949 remained in India dividing his time between the two countries, stated in a memorable speech in the Pakistan Constituent Assembly: ‘If this State (Pakistan) is not founded on the cooperative goodwill of all the nationals, a time will come when this State will destroy itself. I am reminded of one of the statements of Mahatma Gandhi that if the Indian Union eliminates Muslims within its fold and forms a Hindu state, Hindism will be destroyed in the Indian Union, and if Pakistan eliminates non-Muslims from within its fold and forms a Muslim state, Islam will be destroyed in Pakistan. We have to think it out very carefully.’ In the same month of March 1948 the ‘objective resolution of the Pakistan Constituent Assembly recognized the legitimacy of the demand for provincial autonomy by proposing a federation wherein the units would be autonomous, with such boundaries and limitations on their powers and authority as may be prescribed.’
But the demand for Bengali as a state language equal in status to Urdu gathered momentum among all sections of the people of East Bengal. This got the spontaneous support of the Bengali civil servants, academics, students and various groups of the middle class. Several members of the Provincial Assembly, including some ministers, were reportedly active in supporting the movement. The East Pakistan Students League, founded in the first week of January by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, then a university student, was in the forefront of the agitation. By the end of February 1948, the controversy had spilled over to the streets. A committee of the students of Dhaka University representing all shades of opinionartists, leftists and centrists—was formed to carry on the objective of achieving national status for the Bengali language. This was known
as the Students’ Committee of Action. On 11 March 1948, students demonstrating for Bengali as the official language were lathi-charged and many of them arrested in Dhaka. The situation was gradually worsening and shortly before 19 March 1948, when Jinnah was to visit Dhaka, the then chief minister, Nazimuddin, under great public pressure, entered into negotiations with the help of Muhammad Ali of Bogra with the Committee of Action. An agreement was signed between the government and the Committee which provided: (i) the Provincial Assembly shall adopt a resolution for making Bengali the language of East Pakistan and the medium of instruction at all stages of education in the province; and (ii) the Assembly will pass another resolution recommending to the Central government that Bengali should be made one of the official languages of Pakistan.
The whole thing reached a climax on 24 March 1948, when Jinnah, on the occasion of Dhaka University’s convocation, held in Curzon Hall, announced that while the language of East Bengal could be Bengali, ‘the state language of Pakistan is going to be Urdu and no other language and any one who tries to mislead you is an enemy of Pakistan’. He viewed the language controversy as really one aspect of a bigger problem—that of provincialism. The remark evoked immediate vocal protest from the students who took it as an affront to a language that was spoken by 54 per cent of the population of Pakistan. The protest was led by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, who was taken into custody. Jinnah met the representatives of the Students’ Committee of Action to persuade them to have only one national language, but he failed to convince them. The government then resorted to repressive policies in order to crush the movement for Bengali to be made a state language. Prime Minister Liaquat Ali announced, we must kill this provincialism for all time’.
Jinnah died in 1949. Khwaja Nazimuddin succeeded him as Governor-General. Nurul Amin became East Bengal’s chief minister.
In 1950, serious anti-Hindu riots, encouraged by West Pakistan officials, broke out in Dhaka and several other districts such as Khulna, Rajshahi and Sylhet. These led to the large-scale exodus of minorities to West Bengal and Assam on an unprecedented scale.
This led to the Nehru-Liaquat Pact (1950) providing for safeguards against communal violence in both East Bengal and West Bengal. But the proposed measures failed to check the spread of communal riots. Even J.N. Mandal, Pakistan’s law and labour minister and Jinnah’s favourite, left Karachi on hearing about the disturbances and proceeded to Dhaka. He stayed in Dhaka for eight months at a stretch trying to stop the anti-Hindu riots and then went to Kolkata seeking asylum in India. He sent his resignation dated 9 October 1950 to Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan, claiming that the Hindu minority was not safe in Pakistan and accused West Pakistani officialdom of inciting the communal violence in a bid to throw out the minority from East Pakistan with the object of neutralizing East Pakistan’s demographic advantage over West Pakistan. Extracts from this letter are given in the Appendix to this chapter. Interestingly, he accused Liaquat Ali Khan of personally masterminding the 1950 communal rioting. Also Fazlul Huq in his meeting with Liaquat Ali Khan at the Barisal Circuit House accused the Muslim League of anti-Hindu rioting. Inevitably, the 1950 communal riots in East Bengal provoked anti-Muslim rioting in some areas of West Bengal leading to the influx of largely non-Bengali Muslim refugees to East Bengal, especially from the factory areas around Kolkata.
On 28 September 1950, the Basic Principles Committee (BPC) of the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan submitted its first interim report. Its recommendations included the creation of a federal legislature, which would consist of House of Units and House of People. The House of Units would be elected by the provincial legislatures, each of which would have equal representatives. The House of People would be directly elected. The two Houses would have equal powers. The official language of the state would be Urdu. The proposal for giving equal powers to the House of Units and the House of the People was attacked by the Dhaka Bar Association as definitely framed to cripple East Pakistan’. There were widespread protest demonstrations in which even officials of the Muslim League, the government party, took a prominent part. Also, East Bengal strongly objected to the choice of Urdu as the only official language to the exclusion of Bengali. Other events were the hartal by students
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against the BPC’s decision, protest meetings and demonstrations and demand for setting up of a university committee on the national language.
The distribution of various language groups in Pakistan was tabulated during the decennial census conducted in 1951.
Distribution of various language groups
in Pakistan (1951)
Language Groups – Percentage of the Total Population
Bengali – 54.6
Punjabi – 28.4
Pushto – 7.1
Urdu – 7.2
Sindhi – 5.8
English – 1.8
On 17 October 1951, Nazimuddin became Prime Minister after the assassination of Liaquat Ali Khan by unknown assailants. But he failed to be a true champion of East Bengal’s interests and continued to sing the tune of the West Pakistan leaders. Nurul Amin, the chief minister of East Bengal, took the same line, ignoring the true interests of East Bengal.
During 1952 the requirement of passport and visa was made compulsory for travel between the two Bengals. This further impelled sections of the minority to migrate to India. It was rumoured that the East Bengal politicians were not in favour of it and that West Pakistan officials serving in East Pakistan imposed it after steamrolling opposition from the ministers.
There was simmering discontent on the language issue for several years until it reached a crisis in early 1952. On 26 January 1952, the Basic Principles Committee of the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan recommended, riding roughshod over popular Bengali opinion, that Urdu should be the only state language. This was echoed by the then Prime Minister, Nazimuddin, in a public meeting
at Paltan Maidan in Dhaka. On 28 January 1952, the students of Dhaka University held a protest meeting calling both Prime Minister Nazimuddin and the provincial ministers ‘stooges’ of West Pakistan, and asking them to resign. On 30 January 1952, an All-Party State Language Committee was set up at a meeting held in the Bar Library Hall, Dhaka. On the same day the Awami League of Hussain Shaheed Suhrawardy held a secret meeting, which was attended by leftists, including Communists. The meeting expressed the opinion that the language agitation was no longer merely a students’ movement and it was necessary to mobilize full public support. It was decided that Maulana Bhashani would assume leadership of the language movement. The next day, Maulana Bhashani presided over a party convention in Dhaka, which was attended by prominent leaders like Abul Hashim and Hamidul Haq Chaudhury, who had resigned from the government and the Muslim League on the language issue.
In a public meeting, Maulana Bhashani reiterated East Bengal’s determination to continue the struggle until Bengali was accepted as one of the state languages. In the meanwhile, an All-Parties Language Committee was set up on 30 January and there were strikes and demonstrations all over East Bengal. An All-Party Committee of Action (APCA) was constituted on 3 February 1952, to coincide with the commencement of the budget session of the East Bengal State Assembly with Maulana Bhashani as chairman and with two representatives each from the Awami League, Students League, Youth League, Khilafat Rabbani Party and the Dhaka University State Language Committee of Action. The government followed it up by proclaiming on 20 February 1952, a prohibitory order under Section 144 of the Code of Criminal Procedure prohibiting processions and meetings in Dhaka city.
On 21 February 1952, the whole of East Bengal was in a state of complete general strike. At noon, at a meeting held on the Dhaka University campus, students decided to defy the official ban imposed by Nurul Amin’s administration and to take out a procession in the direction of the Provincial Assembly. Inevitably, there was teargas shelling by the police and retaliation through brickbats by the students. The riot spread to all the nearby campuses including the
medical and engineering colleges. At 4 p.m., the police opened fire in front of the medical college hostel killing five students Mohammad Salauddin, Abdul Jabbar, Abdul Barkat, Rafiquddin Ahmed and Abdul Salam. Bangladesh has observed the day as Martyrs’ Day ever since. The United Nations marks this day as the ‘Universal Mother Language Day’. The news of this killing sparked off the gunpowder of discontent all around, and there was complete lawlessness. Inside the Provincial Assembly, six opposition members pressed for adjournment of the House and demanded a judicial inquiry into the incidents.
When chief minister Nurul Amin proposed to proceed with the planned agenda for the day, the opposition members staged a walkout in protest. On 22 February 1952, Dhaka city was literally taken over by the people. Thousands of men and women roamed the streets offering prayers for the victims of the police firing. The police once again opened fire on an angry mob, killing four persons. The government had to call in the military to bring the situation under control. Eventually, Nurul Amin, the chief minister, decided to bow down to public pressure and moved a motion recommending to the Constituent Assembly that Bengali should be one of the state languages of Pakistan. The motion was passed unanimously. For the first time, Muslim League members broke their party rank to vote in favour of the amendments moved by the opposition, till then consisting mostly of Hindu Congress members. The split in the Muslim League became formalized when some of its members demanded a separate block from the Speaker.
But East Bengal had been deeply hurt and on 23 February 1952, despite the Provisional Assembly’s resolution, the whole of East Bengal continued the general strike. The government’s repressive measures further complicated the situation. An all-party Committee of Action gave another call for a general strike on 25 February 1952 to protest against the government’s action. The students of the medical college erected a ‘Shahid Minar’ overnight at the spot where one of their students, Barkat, was shot dead. This monument was to become the rallying symbol for Bengali nationalism. On 24 February 1952, the government gave full authority to the military to bring the situation in Dhaka to normal within forty-eight hours and arrested
almost all the students and political leaders. The next day Dhaka University was closed sine die. This only meant that the movement, although it had temporarily lost its momentum in Dhaka, spread into the districts. Apart from demanding the recognition of Bengali as one of the state languages of Pakistan, students now began to call for the resignation of the ‘bloody Nurul Amin cabinet’. Nurul Amin claimed that his government had saved the province from disaster and chaos by its repressive measures. This was ridiculed by the students who claimed that they had already written with their blood the success story of the movement on the streets’. There can be no doubt that the language movement played a leading role in weakening the Muslim League and in building up a secular/linguistic Bengali nationalism in East Pakistan which was to swamp the Muslim League out of power in the 1954 elections by the united front of opposition political parties led by the troika-Fazlul Huq, H.S. Suhrawardy and Maulana Bhashani. Suhrawardy, who during the years 1943-46 had transformed the Muslim League in Bengal from a small, rich men’s party to a mass-based party, now took the lead in demolishing brick by brick the edifice that he had created a few years ago.
The language movement added a new dimension to politics in East Bengal. Eventually, on 7 May 1954, the Pakistan government was compelled to recognize Bengali as a state language followed by an appropriate resolution by the Constituent Assembly.
In retrospect, whatever the merits of government and student actions, it is clear that the movement did sow the seeds of a secular-linguistic Bengali nationalism in East Bengal. Its immediate impact was to prepare the ground for the complete routing of the Muslim League in the 1954 elections by the United Front of opposition political parties, on a nationalistic plank of cultural, political and economic autonomy for East Bengal. The language movement in East Bengal brought about a sea change in politics in Pakistan. It left deep impression on the minds of the younger generation of Bengalees and imbued them with the spirit of Bengali nationalism. The passion of Bengali nationalism, which was
aroused by the Language Movement, shall kindle in the hearts of the Bengalees forever. Perhaps very few people realised then that with the bloodshed in 1952 the new born state of Pakistan had in fact started to bleed to death.3
Meanwhile, on 17 April 1953, Governor-General Ghulam Muhammad dismissed Nazimuddin and his cabinet and appointed Muhammad Ali of Bogra as the new Prime Minister of Pakistan. On 29 July 1953, the Krishak Sramik Party (KSP), a revival of the Krishak Praja Party (KPP) of Fazlul Haq a decade ago, announced its twenty-one-point programme. Its major demands were full regional autonomy for East Pakistan on the basis of the Lahore Resolution of 1940, recognition of Bengali as a state language, separation of the executive from the judiciary and the release of all political prisoners. On 7 October 1953, Prime Minister Mohammad Ali (Bogra) moved the Constituent Assembly for consideration of the report of the Basic Principles Committee in an amended form. The new proposal was that the two Houses should be constituted on the basis of the equality of units in the Upper House and population in the Lower House. The report was debated for thirteen days. After the exit of Nazimuddin, the non-Muslim League political parties became active in East Pakistan in their demand for elections. A sense of common danger from the establishment forged the United Front. It was composed of the Suhrawardy-led Awami Muslim League (soon renamed the Awami League), the Huq-led KSP and the Nizam-i-Islam. It was supported by the leftists and the ‘minority’ parties. Its twenty-one-point charter demanded inter alia recognition of Bengali as the official language along with Urdu, rejection of the draft Constitution, complete autonomy for East Pakistan in all matters except defence, foreign policy and currency, complete freedom from the Centre with regard to export of jute, consultation between the Centre and East Pakistan on the allocation of foreign exchange, abolition of Indo-Pakistan passport and visa system and all the existing restrictions on trade between East and West Bengal. On 16 November 1953, the East Pakistan Awami League issued its manifesto. It demanded complete regional autonomy and the declaration of Bengali as a state language.
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On 11 March 1954, in the provincial elections in East Bengal the United Front (comprising the Awami League, KSP, the Nizam-iIslam and the minority parties) won a sweeping victory with 223 members in a House of 310. Of the 237 Muslim seats, the breakdown among different parties was as follows: United Front 223; Muslim League 10; Independents 3; Khilafat-i-Rabani 1. Huq, Suhrawardy and Maulana Bhashani were the three main architects of the United Front’s overwhelming victory and the Muslim League’s decimation within six years of Pakistan coming into existence.
Appendix
Extracts of J.N. Mandal’s letter of resignation to Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan:
It is with a heavy heart and a sense of utter frustration at the failure of my life long mission to uplift the backward Hindu masses of East Bengal that I feel compelled to tender resignation of my membership of your Cabinet. It is proper that I should set forth in details the reasons, which have prompted me to take this decision at this important juncture of the history of Indo-Pakistan subcontinent…
After the establishment of Pakistan on August 14, 1947 you formed the Pakistan Cabinet, in which I was included and Khwaja Nazimuddin formed a provisional Cabinet for East Bengal. On August 10 I had spoken to Khwaja Nazimudin at Karachi and requested him to take 2 scheduled castes Ministers in the East Bengal Cabinet. He promised to do the same sometime later.
What happened subsequently in this regard was a record of unpleasant and disappointing negotiations with you, Khwaja Nazimuddin and Mr Nurul Amin, the present Chief Minister of East Bengal. When I realised that Khwaja Nazimuddin was avoiding the issue on this or that excuse, I became almost impatient and exasperated. I further discussed the matter with the Presidents of Pakistan Muslim League and its East Bengal branch. Ultimately I brought the matter to your notice. You were pleased to discuss the
subject with Khwaja Nazimuddin in my presence at your residence. Khwaja Nazimuddin agreed to take one scheduled caste Minister on his return to Dacca. As I had already become sceptic about the assurance of Khwaja Nazimuddin, I wanted to be definite about the time limit. I insisted that he must act in this regard within a month, failing which I should be at liberty to resign. Both you and Khwaja Nazimuddin agreed to the condition. But alas! You did not perhaps mean what you said. Khwaja Nazimuddin did not keep his promise. After Mr Nurul Amin had become Chief Minister of East Bengal, I again took up the matter with him. He also followed the same old familiar tactics of evasion. When I again called your attention to this matter prior to your visit to Dacca in 1949, you were pleased to assure me that a Minority Minister would be appointed in East Bengal, and asked 2/3 names from me for consideration. In deference of your wish, I sent you a note stating the strength of the Federation Group in the East Bengal Assembly and suggesting three names. When I made enquiries as to what had happened on your return from Dacca, you appeared to be very cold and only remarked: ‘Let Nurul Amin return from Delhi’. After a few days I again pressed the matter. But you avoided the issue. I was then forced to come to the conclusion that neither you nor Nurul Amin had any intention to take any Scheduled Castes Minister in the East Bengal Cabinet. Apart from this, I am noticing that Mr Nurul Amin and some League leaders of East Bengal were trying to create disruption among the Members of the Scheduled Caste Federation.
When the question of partition of Bengal arose the scheduled caste people were alarmed at the anticipated dangerous result of partition. Representations on their behalf were made to Mr Suhrawardy, the then Chief Minister of Bengal who was pleased to issue a statement to the Press declaring that none of the rights and privileges hitherto enjoyed by the scheduled caste people would be curtailed
after partition and that they would not only continue to enjoy the existing rights and privileges but also receive additional advantages. This assurance was given by Mr Suhrawardy not only in his personal capacity but also in his capacity as the chief Minister of the League ministry. To my utter regret it is to be stated that after partition, particularly after [the] death of Qaid-e-Azam, the scheduled castes have not received a fair deal in any matter. You will recollect that from time to time I brought the grievances of the scheduled castes to your notice. I explained to you on several occasions the nature of inefficient administration in East Bengal. I made serious charges against the police administration. I brought to your notice incidents of barbarous atrocities perpetrated by the police on frivolous grounds. I did not hesitate to bring to your notice the anti Hindu policy pursued by the East Bengal Government, especially the police administration and a section of Muslim League leaders
The first incident that shocked me took place at a village called Digharkul near Gopalgunj where on the false complaint of a Muslim brutal atrocities were committed on the local Namasudras. The fact was that a Muslim who was going in a boat attempted to throw his net to catch fish. A Namasudra who was already there for the same purpose opposed to throwing of the net in his front. This was followed by some altercation and the Muslim got annoyed who went to the near-by Muslim village and made a false complaint that he and a woman in his boat had been assaulted by the Namasudras. At that time, the S.D.O of Gopalganj was passing in a boat through the canal who without making any enquiry accepted the complaint as true and sent armed police to the spot to punish the Namasudras. The armed police came and the local Muslims also joined them. They not only raided some houses of Namasudras but mercilessly beat both men and women, destroyed their properties and took away valuables. The merciless beating
of a pregnant woman resulted in abortion on the spot. This brutal action on the part of the local authority created panic over a large area.
The second incident of police oppression took place in early part of 1949 under P.S. Gournadi in the district of Barisal. Here a quarrel took place between 2 groups of members of a Union Board. One group, which was in the good books of the police conspired to punish the opponents on the plea of their being communists. On the false information of a threat of attack on the Police Station, the O.C. Gournadi requisitioned armed forces from Head Quarters. The police helped by the armed forces then raided a large number of houses in the area, took away valuable properties, even from the houses of absenteeowners who were never in politics, far less in the Communist Party. A large number of persons over a wide area were arrested. Teachers and students of many English high schools were Communist suspects and unnecessarily harassed. This area being very near to my native village I was informed of the incident. I wrote to the District Magistrate and the SP for an enquiry. A section of the local people also prayed for an enquiry to the SDO. But no enquiry was held. Even my letters to the District authorities were not acknowledged. I then brought this matter to the notice of the highest authority in Pakistan, including yourself but to no avail.
The atrocities perpetrated by the police and the military on the innocent Hindus, especially the Scheduled Castes of Habibganj in the District of Sylhet beggar description. Innocent men and women were brutally tortured, several women ravished, their houses raided and properties looted by the police and the local Muslim Military pickets were posted in the area. The military not only oppressed these people and took away foodstuffs forcibly from Hindu houses, but forced Hindus to send their women folk at night to the camp to satisfy the carnal desire of the military. This fact also I brought to your notice. You assured me a report on
the matter, but unfortunately no report was forthcoming.
Then occurred the incident at Nachole in the district of Rajshahi where in the name of suppression of Communists not only the Police but also the local Muslims, in collaboration with the police, oppressed the Hindus and looted their properties. The Santhals there crossed the border and came over to West Bengal. They narrated the stories of atrocities wantonly committed by the Muslims and the police.
An instance of callous and cold blooded brutality is furnished by the incident that took place on December 20, 1949 in Kalshira under P.S. Mollahat in the District of Khulna. What happened was that late at night four constables raided the house of one Joydev Brahma in village Kalshira in search of some alleged Communists. At the scent of the police, half a dozen young men, some of them might have been communists, escaped from the house. The police constables entered the house and assaulted the wife of Joydev Brahma whose cry attracted her husband and a few companions who escaped from the house. They became desperate, re-entered the house, found 4 constables with one gun only. That perhaps might have encouraged the young men who struck a blow on an armed constable who died on the spot. The young men then attacked another constable when the other two ran away and raised an alarm, which attracted some neighbouring people who come to their rescue. As the incident took place before sunrise when it was dark, the assailants fled with the dead body before the villagers could come. The S.P of Khulna with a contingent of military and armed police appeared on the scene in the afternoon of the following day. In the meantime, the assailants fled and the intelligent neighbours also fled away. But the bulk of the villagers remained in their houses, as they were absolutely innocent and failed to realise the consequences of the happenings. Subsequently the SP, the military and the armed police began to beat mercilessly the
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innocent inhabitants of the entire village, encouraged the neighbouring Muslims to take away their properties. A number of persons were killed and men and women were forcibly converted. Household deities were broken and places of worship desecrated and destroyed. Several women were raped by the police, military and local Muslims. Thus a veritable hell was let loose not only in the village of Kalshira which has a large population, but also in a number of neighbouring Namasudra villages. The village Kalshira was never suspected by the authority to be a place of Communist activities. Another village called Jhalardanga, which was at a distance of 3 miles from Kalshira was known to be a centre of Communist activities. This village was raided by a large contingent of police on that day for hunt of the alleged Communists, a number of whom fled away and took shelter in the aforesaid village of Kalshira which was considered to be a safe place for them.
I visited Kalshira and one or two neighbouring villages on 28th February 1950. The SP, Khulna and some of the prominent League leaders of the district were with me. When I came to the village Kalshira, I found the place desolate and in ruins. I was told in the presence of SP that there were 350 homesteads in this village, of these only three had been spared and the rest had been demolished. Country boats, and heads of cattle belonging to the Namasudras had been all taken away. I reported these facts to the Chief Minister, Chief Secretary and Inspector General of Police of East Bengal and you.
It may be mentioned in this connection that the news of this incident was published in West Bengal Press and this created some unrest among the Hindus there. A number of sufferers of Kalshira, both men and women, homeless and destitute, had also gone to Kolkata and narrated the stories of their sufferings, which resulted in some communal disturbance in West Bengal in the last part of January.
It must be noted that stories of a few incidents of
communal disturbance that took place in West Bengal as a sort of repercussion of the incident of Kalshira were published in exaggerated form in the East Bengal press. In the second week of February 1950 when the Budget session of the East Bengal Assembly commenced, the Congress Members sought permission to move two adjournment motions to discuss the situation created at Kalshira and Nachone. But the motions were disallowed. The Congress members walked out of the Assembly in protest. This action of the Hindu members of the Assembly annoyed and enraged not only the Minister but the Muslim leaders and officials of the Province. This was perhaps one of the principal reasons for Dacca and East Bengal riots of February 1950.
It is significant that on February 10, 1950 at about 11 o’clock in the morning a woman was painted with red to show that her breast was cut off in Calcutta riot, and was taken round the East Bengal Secretariat at Dacca. Immediately the government servants of the Secretariat struck work and came out in procession raising slogans of revenge against the Hindus. The procession began to swell as it passed over a distance of more than a mile. It ended in a meeting at Victoria Park at about 1 o’clock in the noon where violent speeches against the Hindus were delivered by several speakers, including officials. The fun of the whole show was that while the employees of the Secretariat went out in procession, the Chief Secretary of the East Bengal Government was holding a conference with his West Bengal opposite number in the same building, to find out ways and means to stop communal disturbances in the two Bengals.
The riot started at about 1 p.m. Simultaneously all over the city arson, looting of Hindu shops and houses, and killing of Hindus wherever they were found, commenced in full swing in all parts of the city. I got evidence even from the Muslims that arson and looting were committed even in the presence of high police officials. Jewellery shops belonging to Hindus were looted in the presence of police
officers. They not only did not attempt to stop [the] loot, but also helped the looters with advice and direction. Unfortunately for me I reached Dacca at 5 o’clock in the afternoon on the same day, that is, February 10, 1950. To my utter dismay I had occasion to see and know things from close quarters. What I saw and learnt from first hand information was simply staggering and heart-rending.
The reasons for the Dacca riot were mainly five: (1) To punish the Hindus for the daring action of their representatives in the Assembly in their expression of protest by walking out of the Assembly when two adjournment motions on Kalshira and Nachole affairs were disallowed. (2) Discussions and differences between the Suhrawardy Group and the Nazimuddin Group in the League Parliamentary Party were becoming acute. (3) Apprehension of launching of a movement for re-union of East and West Bengal by both Hindu and Muslim leaders made the East Bengal Ministry and the Muslim League nervous. They wanted to prevent such a move. They thought that any large-scale communal riot in East Bengal was sure to produce reactions in West Bengal where Muslims might be killed. The result of such riots in both East and West Bengal, it was believed, would prevent any move for re-union of [the] Bengals. (4) Feeling of antagonism between the Bengalee Muslims and non-Bengalee Muslims was gaining ground. This could only be prevented by creating hatred between Hindus and Muslims in East Bengal. The language question was also connected with it. (5) The consequences of nondevaluation and the Indo-Pakistan trade deadlock to the economy of East Bengal were being felt most acutely first in urban and rural areas and the Muslim League members and officials wanted to divert the attention of the Muslim masses from the impending economic breakdown by some sort of jehad against Hindus.
During my nine days’ stay at Dacca I visited some of the riot-affected areas of the city and suburbs. I visited
Mirpur also under PS Tejgaon. The news of the killing of hundreds of innocent Hindus in trains, on railway lines between Dacca and Narayanganj, and Dacca and Chittagong gave me the rudest shock. On the second day of Dacca riot I saw the Chief Minister of East Bengal and requested him to issue immediate instructions to the District authorities to take all precautionary measures to prevent spreading of the riot in district towns and rural areas. On the 20th February 1950 I reached Barisal town, and was astounded to know of the happenings in Barisal. In the district town a number of Hindu houses were burnt and a large number of Hindus killed. I visited almost all riot-affected areas in the district. I was simply puzzled to find the havoc wrought by the Muslim rioters even at places like Kasipur, Madhabpasha and Lakutia, which was within a radius of six miles from the District town and were connected with motorable roads. At the Madhabpasha zamindar’s house about 200 people were killed and 40 injured. A place, called Muladi, witnessed a dreadful hell. At Muladi Bandar alone the number killed would total more than three hundred, as was reported to me by the local Muslims including some officers. I visited Muladi village also, where I found skeletons of dead bodies at some places. I found dogs and vultures eating corpses on the riverside. I got the information there that after the wholesale killing of all adult males, all the young girls were distributed among the ringleaders of the miscreants. At a place called Kaibartakhali under P.S. Rajapur, 63 persons were killed. Hindu houses within a stone’s throw from the said Thana Officer were looted, burnt and inmates killed. All Hindu shops of Babuganj Bazaar were looted and then burnt and a large number of Hindus were killed. From detailed information received, the conservative estimate of casualties was placed at 2,500 killed in the district of Barisal alone. Total casualties of Dacca and East Bengal riot were estimated to be in the neighbourhood of 10,000 killed. I was really overwhelmed with grief. The lamentation of women
and children who had lost their all including near and dear ones melted my heart. I only asked myself what was coming to Pakistan in the name of Islam’.
The large scale of exodus of Hindus from East Bengal commenced in the latter part of March. It appeared that within a short time all the Hindus would migrate to India. A war cry was raised in India. The situation became extremely critical. A national calamity appeared to be inevitable. The apprehended disaster, however, was avoided by the Delhi Agreement on April 8. With a view to revive the already lost morale of the panicky Hindus, I undertook an extensive tour of East Bengal. I visited a number of places in the districts of Dacca, Barisal, Faridpur, Khulna and Jessore, I addressed dozens of largely attended meetings and asked the Hindus to take courage and not to leave their ancestral hearths and homes. I had this expectation that the East Bengal Government and Muslim League leaders would implement the terms of the Delhi Agreement. But with the lapse of time I began to realise that neither the East Bengal Government nor the Muslim League leaders were really earnest in the matter of implementation of the Delhi Agreement. The East Bengal Government was not only much too slow to set up a machinery as envisaged in the Delhi Government, but also was not willing to take effective steps for the purpose. A number of Hindus who returned to their native villages immediately after the Delhi Agreement were not given possession of their homes and lands, which were occupied in the meantime by Muslims…
In one of my public statements I expressed the view that the appointment of D.N. Barari as a Minister representing the minorities not only did not help restore any confidence, but on the contrary destroyed all expectation or illusion, if there were any in the minds of the minorities, about the sincerity of Mr Nurul Amin’s Government…
I would like to reiterate in this connection my firm conviction that the East Bengal Government is still following
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the well-planned policy of squeezing Hindus out of the Province. In my discussion with you on more than one occasion I gave expression to this view of mine. I must say that this policy of driving out Hindus from Pakistan has succeeded completely in West Pakistan and is nearing completion in East Pakistan too…
I have failed to understand why the question of electorate has not yet been decided. It is now three years that the Minority Sub-Committee has been appointed. It sat on three occasions. The question of having joint or separate electorate came up for consideration at a meeting of the Committee held in December last when all the representatives of recognised minorities in Pakistan expressed their view in support of joint Electorate with reservation of seats for backward minorities. We on behalf of the scheduled castes demanded joint electorate with reservation of seats for the scheduled castes. This matter again came up for consideration at a meeting held in August last. But without any discussion whatsoever on this point, the meeting was adjourned sine die. It is not difficult to understand what the motive is behind this kind of evasive tactics in regard to such a vital matter on the part of Pakistan’s rulers.
Coming now to the present condition and the future of Hindus in East Bengal as a result of the Delhi Agreement, I should say that the present condition is not only unsatisfactory but absolutely hopeless and the future completely dark and dismal. Confidence of Hindus in East Bengal has not been restored in the least. The Agreement is treated as a mere scrap of paper alike by the East Bengal Government and the Muslim League. That a pretty large number of Hindu migrants mostly scheduled caste cultivators are returning to East Bengal is no indication that confidence has been restored. It only indicates that their stay and rehabilitation in West Bengal, or elsewhere in the Indian Union, have not been possible. The sufferings of refugee life are compelling them to go back to their homes.
Besides many of them are going back to bring moveable articles and settle or dispose of immovable properties. That no serious communal disturbance has recently taken place in East Bengal is not to be attributed to the Delhi Agreement. It could not simply continue if there were no Agreement or Pact…
What is today the condition in East Bengal? About fifty lakhs of Hindus have left since the partition of the country. Apart from the East Bengal riot of last February, the reasons for such large-scale exodus of Hindus are many. The boycott by the Muslims of Hindu lawyers, medical practitioners, shopkeepers, traders and merchants has compelled Hindus to migrate to West Bengal in search of their means of livelihood. Wholesale requisition of Hindu houses even without following due process of law in many cases, and non-payment of any rent whatsoever to the owners have compelled them to seek for Indian shelter. Payments of rent to Hindu landlords were stopped long before. Besides the Ansars, against whom I received complaints all over, are a standing menace to the safety and security of Hindus. Interference in matters educational and methods adopted by the Educational Authority for Islamisation frightened the teaching staff of secondary schools and colleges out of their old familiar moorings. They have left East Bengal. As a result, most of the educational institutions have been closed. I have received information that sometime ago the Educational Authority issued a circular to Secondary Schools enjoining compulsory participation of teachers and students of all communities in recitation from the Holy Koran before the schoolwork commenced. Another circular requires Headmasters of schools to name the different blocs of the school premises after 12 distinguished Muslims, such as Jinnah, Iqbal, Liaquat Ali, Nazimuddin etc. Only very recently, in an educational conference held at Dacca, the president disclosed that out of 1,500 High English Schools in East Bengal only 500 were working. Owing to the
migration of medical practitioners there is hardly any means of proper treatment of patients. Almost all the priests who used to worship the household deities at Hindu houses have left. Important places of worship have been abandoned. The result is that the Hindus of East Bengal have got now hardly any means to follow religious pursuits and perform social ceremonies like marriage where the services of a priest are essential. Artisans who made images of gods and goddesses have also left. Hindu Presidents of Union Boards have been replaced by Muslims by coercive measures with the active help and connivance of the police and Circle Officers. Hindu Headmasters and Secretaries of schools have been replaced by Muslims. The life of the few Hindu government servants has been made extremely miserable as many of them have either been superseded by junior Muslims or dismissed without sufficient or any cause. Only very recently a Hindu Public Prosecutor of Chittagong was arbitrarily removed from service as has been made clear in a statement by Srijukta Nellie Sengupta against whom at least no charge of anti-Muslim bias, prejudice or malice can be levelled.
Commission of thefts and dacoities even with murder is going on as merrily as before. Thana officers seldom record half the complaints made by Hindus. That the abduction and rape of Hindu girls has been reduced to a certain extent is due only to the fact that there is no caste Hindu girl between the ages of 12 and 30 living in East Bengal at present. The few depressed class girls who live in rural areas with their parents are not even spared by Muslims goondas. I have received information about a number of incidents of rape of scheduled caste girls by Muslims. Full payment is seldom made by Muslim buyers for the price of jute and other agricultural commodities sold by Hindus in market places. As a matter of fact, there is no operation of law, justice or fair play in Pakistan so far as Hindus are concerned.
Now this being in brief the overall picture of Pakistan so far as Hindus are concerned, I shall not be unjustified in stating that Hindus of Pakistan have to all intents and purposes been rendered ‘stateless’ in their own houses. They have no other fault than that they profess Hindu religion. Declarations are being repeatedly made by Muslim League leaders that Pakistan is and shall be an Islamic State. Islam is being offered as the sovereign remedy for all earthly evils. In the matchless dialectics of capitalism and socialism you present the exhilarating democratic synthesis of Islamic equality and fraternity. In that grand setting of the Shariat Muslims alone are rulers while Hindus and other minorities are jimmies who are entitled to protection at a price, and you know more than any body else, Mr Prime Minister, what the price is. After anxious and prolonged struggle I have come to the conclusion that Pakistan is no place for Hindus to live in and their future is darkened by the ominous shadow of conversion or liquidation. The bulk of the upper class Hindus and politically conscious scheduled castes have left East Bengal. Those Hindus who will continue to stay accursed promise and for that matter in Pakistan will, I am afraid, by gradual stages and in a planned manner be either converted to Islam or completely exterminated. It is really amazing that a man of your education, culture and experience should be an exponent of a doctrine fraught with so great a danger to humanity and subversive of all principles of equality and good sense. I may tell you and your fellow workers that Hindus will never allow themselves whatever the threat or temptation, to be treated as jimmies in the land of their birth. Today they may, as indeed many of them have already done, abandon their hearths and homes in sorrow and in panic. Tomorrow they will strive for their rightful place in the economy of life. Who knows what is in the womb of the future? When I am convinced that my continuance in office in the Pakistan Central Government is not of any help to Hindus I should not, witha clear conscience, create the false impression in the minds of the Hindus of Pakistan and peoples abroad that Hindus can live there with honour and with a sense of security in respect of their life, property and religion. This is about Hindus. And what about the Muslims who are outside the charmed circle of the League rulers and their corrupt and inefficient bureaucracy? There is hardly any thing called civil liberty in Pakistan. Witness for example the fact of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan than whom a more devout Muslim had not walked this earth for many many years and of his gallant, patriotic brother Dr Khan Sahib. A large number of erstwhile League leaders of the Northwest and also of the Eastern belt of Pakistan are in detention without trial. Mr Suhrawardy, to whom is due in a large measure the League’s triumph in Bengal, is for practical purposes a Pakistani prisoner who has to move under permit and open his lips under orders. Mr Fazlul Huq, that dearly loved Grand Old Man of Bengal who was the author of now famous Lahore resolution, is ploughing his lonely furrow in the precincts of the Dacca High Court of Judicature, and the so-called Islamic planning is as ruthless as it is complete. About the East Bengal Muslims generally the less said the better. They were promised at Lahore of an independent State. They were promised autonomous and sovereign units of the independent State. What have they got instead? East Bengal has been transformed into a colony of the western belt of Pakistan, although it contains a population which is larger than that of all the units of Pakistan put together. It is a pale ineffective adjunct of Karachi doing the latter’s bidding and carrying out its orders. East Bengal Muslims in their enthusiasm wanted bread and they have, by the mysterious working of the Islamic State and the Shariat, got stone instead from the arid deserts of Sind and the Punjab. I can no longer afford to carry this load of false pretensions and untruth on my conscience and I have decided to offer my resignation as your Minister, which I am hereby placing in your hands and which, I hope, you will accept without delay. You are of course at liberty to dispense with that office or dispose it of in such manner as may suit adequately and effectively the objectives of your Islamic State.
8
TOWARDS AYUB’S MARTIAL LAW
On3 April 1954, A.K. Fazlul Huq formed the United Front government. He affirmed cooperation to the Centre provided his demands on language, the Constitution and provincial autonomy were met. A few days later, Abdul Ghaffar Khan, the veteran Pakistani leader, stated in the Constituent Assembly that the official languages of the Republic should be Urdu and Bengali and such other provincial languages as may be declared to be such by the Head of the State on the recommendation of the provincial legislature concerned’. On 20 April, the Muslim League party in the Constituent Assembly decided that Urdu and Bengali should be the state languages of Pakistan and that English should continue as an official language for another twenty years. But there were clear signs of a serious rift between the Centre and the new government in East Bengal.
On 17 May, there were riots and disturbances in the country, notably the unrest and violence in Adamji jute mills, Dhaka, and Karnapuli paper mill in Chittagong. Prime Minister Muhammad Ali (Bogra) saw the hand of the communists and subversive elements ‘within and from outside the country’. He denounced them as a ‘foul conspiracy against the industrial progress of Pakistan. Fazlul Huq rejected these allegations as ‘fantastic’. He along with some cabinet colleagues flew to Karachi to clear up the misunderstanding with the Central leadership.
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On 29 May, failing in his talks with the leaders of the Central government in Karachi, Fazlul Huq and his cabinet colleagues issued a joint statement saying that, there had been a great deal of misunderstanding created against the United Front Ministry of East Bengal in the West Pakistan press and publications’. The statement added, we are for the autonomy of provinces and not for their independence or for separation. We stand for our election manifesto of leaving only defence, foreign affairs and currency to the centre but nowhere in our election manifesto or speeches have we ever advocated the separation of Eastern and Western Pakistan. The Central government persisted in its strong criticism of Huq’s leadership and also took exception to Fazlul Huq’s emotional outburst in Kolkata while in transit between Karachi and Dhaka about the cultural unity of the two Bengals despite the political boundary between them. On the very next day, following a series of violent incidents in East Bengal, Fazlul Huq’s ministry was dismissed and Governor’s rule was proclaimed on the ground of emergency threatening the security of East Bengal. Major General Iskander Mirza was sworn in as Governor. Prime Minister Muhammad Ali (Bogra) called Hug a ‘traitor’. He added further that, ‘Huq’s pronouncements regarding the independence of East Bengal, viewed against his previous statements on this subject in Calcutta, convinced my colleagues and myself that in Fazlul Huq we are dealing with a Provincial Chief Minister whose government would not take the administrative measures that any responsible government would take and with a political leader who was fundamentally not loyal to Pakistan.’
On 31 May, Huq was placed under house arrest and Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, minister for cooperation in his government, was arrested. Maulana Bhashani, who happened to be on a visit to Kolkata, could not be arrested and continued to stay there till April 1955. On 24 September 1954, the Governor-General dissolved the Constituent Assembly and proclaimed a state of emergency.
On 10 April the next year, a public meeting was held under the auspices of the Krishak Sramik Party (KSP) and Nizam-i-Islam. At this meeting, Fazlul Huq appealed to the people to express themselves
against the unrepresentative government and launched a provincewide campaign against it. He demanded that Bhashani be allowed to return and declared that the country would not accept a constitution promulgated by an ordinance framed by a body of nominated persons. On 15 April, the Awami League organized a ‘protest day’. The party demanded the withdrawal of restrictions on Bhashani’s entry, release of political prisoners and restoration of parliamentary government. On 25 April, Maulana Bhashani returned to Dhaka and was given a great ovation. In a few days, he called upon the people to observe a 21-point programme week from that day. Fazlul Huq declared 30 May 1955 as United Front Day and announced that meetings would be held on that day to appeal to people to preserve the unity and solidarity of the United Front and resolutions were to be adopted, emphasizing the necessity of implementing the 21-point programme of accord.
Unfortunately, there was a simmering rivalry between the followers of H.S. Suhrawardy and the followers of Fazlul Hug, and the West Pakistan leadership took full advantage of it. It also turned to a new strategy to reduce the political importance of the majority province. All the provinces in West Pakistan were to be grouped into one unit, namely, West Pakistan, which was to be given the same political weightage as East Pakistan, thereby denying the latter its numerical advantage. In June 1955, elections were held for the new Constituent Assembly. Both the west wing and the east wing were given forty members. The East Pakistani contingent contained many new members. The concept of one unit was envisaged in the west wing as an effective counterpoise to East Bengal. To East Pakistan, it was a threat which sought to efface its standing as a majority province.
On 3 June 1955, Prime Minister Muhammad Ali (Bogra), taking advantage of the absence of the Governor-General and Suhrawardy in the country, started talks between his party and Fazlul Huq and the United Front. It was designed to weaken Suhrawardy’s position. On 5 June, a proclamation revoked Governor’s rule and Abu Hussain Sarkar, an associate of Fazlul Huq, headed a KSP-Nizam-i-Islam coalition to form a new
government. It was a manoeuvre by Mirza-Muhammad Ali (Bogra). On 14 June, the United Front Government took the decision to join the Constituent Assembly. On 5 August, Major General Iskander Mirza took over as Acting Governor-General. Two days later, Chaudhuri Mohammad Ali was elected leader of the Muslim League parliamentary party, which was dominated by the Punjabis. Muhammad Ali (Bogra) resigned on 16 September. The Awami League demonstrated throughout the province demanding the disbanding of the two-unit structure and the formation of a new Constitutional system that would give East Pakistan its rightful place. Mujibur Rahman, speaking at a public meeting, reiterated his party’s adherence to the 21-point programme and demanded the withdrawal of the One-Unit Bill and substituting it with a Constitution Bill for East Pakistan.
On 19 October, a convention of the workers of the Awami League was held at Joypurhat in Bogra. The convention marked the re-emergence of Maulana Bhashani as the leader of the Awami League. The convention took four major decisions: (i) full realization of the 21-point programme; (ii) throwing open the Awami League to non-Muslims; (iii) condemnation of the Pak-US military pact; and (iv) stand for joint electorate. On 25 November, the United Front parliamentary party had a three-day session presided over by Fazlul Huq. Most of the members present were reported to have expressed themselves very strongly on the question of provincial autonomy. They wanted East Bengal to have a very high degree of autonomy.
On 23 March 1956, the Constitution of Pakistan was promulgated. Article 214 (1) of the Constitution stated: “The state language of Pakistan shall be Urdu and Bengali; provided that for the period of twenty years from the Constitution Day, English shall continue to be used for all official purposes for which it was used in Pakistan immediately before the Constitution Day.’ Thus the people of East Bengal through a hard struggle and a remarkable show of solidarity had won for the Bengali language its rightful status. But the story of neglect and exploitation of the province by West Pakistan continued.
The Abu Hussain Sarkar ministry in East Pakistan lost its majority on 20 May 1956; Suhrawardy’s Awami League attracted the ‘minority’ parties. There was, for a short while, a musical chairs type of situation, with the United Front’s Abu Hussain Sarkar and the Awami League’s Ataur Rahman alternatively serving as chief minister several times. Governor’s rule was now imposed in East Pakistan, On 1 June, Governor’s rule was revoked and the Sarkar ministry was reinstated. On 3 September, in the midst of a food problem, food marchers defied prohibitory orders in Dhaka and the police opened fire. Ataur Rahman was sworn in as chief minister of an Awami League ministry. Meanwhile, at the Centre, Suhrawardy took over as prime minister from Chaudhury Muhammad Ali with the backing of the newly formed Republican Party of Dr Khan Saheb. On 8 October, it was decided that the sitting of the National Assembly would be held in East Pakistan and the first such session began in Dhaka. Three days later, the National Assembly passed the Electorate Bill under which the principle of joint electorate was accepted for East Pakistan.
From 6-8 February 1957, the Awami League council met at Kagmari and adopted forty resolutions. The podium was decorated with portraits of pre-partition leaders, in particular Chittaranjan Das. Among the resolutions passed were the holding of general elections, both at the Centre and in the provinces early in 1958, full regional autonomy for East Bengal on the basis of the 21-point programme, implementation of the principles operative between East and West Pakistan in all spheres. At the council, Maulana Bhashani, speaking with regard to regional autonomy, said that if the demand was not considered, a time might come when East Pakistan may have to split from the country. There was opposition to Maulana Bhashani and a chorus of protests. There was also a difference of views regarding foreign policy between Suhrawardy and Maulana Bhashani.
On 5 March 1957, President Iskander Mirza, addressing the Chambers of Commerce and Industry, sternly warned that he could not tolerate any attempt to break the unity of Pakistan. He said, ‘I shall not hesitate to take extreme measures to put down any effort
to subvert the unity and integrity of Pakistan.’ Maulana Bhashani’s reaction was quick and he immediately came out with the statement ‘that the demand of regional autonomy is no longer the demand of any particular party. On the other hand it has to take the united demand of inhabitants of East Pakistan and no political party can exist in East Pakistan which ignores this demand. On 21 March, Maulana Bhashani announced that he had resigned as president of the Awami League. On 3 April, the Provincial Assembly adopted the resolution on regional autonomy and it was passed with acclaim with only two negative votes. The resolution recommended regional autonomy for East Pakistan giving three subjects to the Centre, namely, defence, foreign affairs and currency. The resolution was proposed and seconded by members of the pro-Bhashani group within the League. Mujibur Rahman spoke strongly in favour of the motion but laid more emphasis on the economic needs of the province. On 5 April, Maulana Bhashani expressed anger at the reported statement made by Prime Minister Suhrawardy that the regional autonomy resolution was a ‘stunt’ and that people need not attach too much importance to it. Maulana said, ‘I could not even dream that Mr Suhrawardy would so blatantly fall back on his own stand on the question of regional autonomy as enumerated in 21point.’
Awami League minister Mujibur Rahman resigned from office to work for the party organization on 30 May 1957. Within a fortnight, the Awami League council met at Dhaka for two days. In the council, it was evident that the group led by Suhrawardy was numerically superior to that led by Maulana Bhashani. The council passed a vote of confidence on Suhrawardy’s foreign policy with very little opposition. One of his resolutions debarred the Youth League, a leftist pro-Bhashani organization, from membership of the Awami League. Thus the Awami League moved towards a formal split between the followers of Suhrawardy and those of Bhashani. On 30 June 1957, Muzaffar Ahmad, a lieutenant of Maulana Bhashani, gave a call to the pro-Bhashani elements to rally round the Maulana.
The Democratic Convention called by Maulana Bhashani met at Dhaka on 5-26 July 1957. As a result, a new political party with
the name of National Awami Party came into being consisting of the dissidents from the Awami League. The party adopted its constitution, its aims and objectives with an emphasis on an independent foreign policy, provincial autonomy and agrarian reform very similar to the. 21-point programme of the Awami League. Meanwhile, on 11 October 1957, Suhrawardy was forced to resign as prime minister of Pakistan as he lost majority through manipulative power politics in the Pakistan National Assembly. On 18 October 1957, I.I. Chundrigar became Prime Minister of Pakistan, but his was a short-lived government, as in a few days Chundrigar quit on the electoral issue. The Muslim League reopened the issue and insisted on separate electorates. Mujibur Rahman threatened to undo the parity formula. The proposals and counter-proposals wrecked the Constitution. On 16 December 1957, Chundrigar was succeeded by Firoz Khan Noon, now a Republican, who headed a six-party coalition, including the Republicans, the Awami League, the Scheduled Castes Federation, the Pakistan National Congress, and the Hamidul Haq Chaudhury group of the KSP.
On 3 January 1958, Awami League leaders broke the party discipline in the coalition government by not supporting a government Bill. On 31 March 1958, pandemonium broke out in the East Pakistan Assembly and the Finance Bill could not be introduced. The House adjourned. The musical chairs continued when Ataur Rahman and Abu Hussain Sarkar alternated as chief minister. On 1 April 1958, Chief Minister Ataur Rahman advised the Governor, Fazlul Huq, to prorogue the Assembly, but the Governor asked him to resign. On his refusal, he was dismissed. Abu Hussain Sarkar was invited by the Governor to become the chief minister. Now, President Mirza dismissed Governor Fazlul Huq for acting unconstitutionally. Ataur Rahman was reinstated. On 19 June 1958, the Ataur Rahman ministry fell on a cut motion. Nine Awami League members had crossed the floor and ten members of the Pakistan National Congress voted against the Ataur Rahman’s ministry. Abu Hussain Sarkar returned as chief minister. On 20 June 1958, this ministry lost on a motion of no-confidence and Governor’s rule was imposed for two months.
On 24 August 1958, Ataur Rahman’s ministry came back to office. The East Pakistan Provisional Assembly met on 20 September 1958. The Opposition protested against the presence of six government supporters disqualified by the Election Commission for. holding an office of profit. There was physical fighting between the Awami League and the Treasury benches. Clearly the political situation was becoming near anarchical. This was a prelude to the martial law that was to follow in a few days.
In his memoirs Bangabandhu Mujib has vividly described how Ghulam Muhammad, an official, was appointed first as finance minister and then as the president of the country, and similarly how another Punjabi official, Choudhury Muhammad Ali, was appointed the finance minister and then the prime minister. This showed that the West Pakistan officialdom had effectively captured political power. With the help of non-Bengali officials like Aziz Ahmed and later N.M. Khan as Chief Secretary, they wielded power in the province of East Bengal and Chief Ministers like Nurul Amin did not dare take any significant step without their approval. They also had links with the top guns of the Pakistan Army. This was to lead to the army takeover in 1958, formalizing the de facto situation where East Bengal was kept out of power.
9
CRYSTALLIZATION OF THE BANGLADESH CONCEPT
With the parliamentary system virtually coming to a standstill on 7 October 1958, President Iskander Mirza abrogated the Constitution and declared martial law. General Ayub Khan was made the chief martial law administrator. Slowly but surely, power was gravitating to the armed forces. On 25 October, in his last bid to remain in power, President Mirza constituted a twelve-man cabinet to replace the advisory council set up under martial law administration. The East Bengal contingent comprised inconsequential puppets. On 27 October 1958, President Mirza was eased out by General Ayub, who assumed the presidency. The next day, President Ayub proclaimed an American-type cabinet with no prime minister. East Pakistan was ominously silent on the changeover,
In the year that followed, a series of authoritarian measures were promulgated by President Ayub, for example, the Public Conduct Scrutiny Ordinance of 1959, the Public Offices (Disqualification) Order, 1959, the Elective Bodies (Disqualification) Ordinance, 1959, an order amending the Legislative Powers Order, 1959, which had the effect of giving the Centre and the provinces concurrent powers of legislation in all fields outside those specifically reserved for the Centre under the Constitution of 1956, and, finally,
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the Basic Democracy Order of 27 October 1959. They also aimed at decimation of the political classes.
President Ayub visited East Pakistan from 21-28 January 1960. Speaking at the Dhaka University convocation, he talked of oneness and common ideology’. On 14 February, in the first elections to the presidency held under the new basic democracy order, President Ayub received a near-unanimous vote of confidence from 80,000 electors, 96.62 per cent of them voting confidence in the President, Three days later, Ayub took over as the first elected President under the new dispensation. He appointed an eleven-man commission to frame the Constitution. Representation was given to both the wings. A questionnaire was circulated fairly widely seeking representative views.
Two months later, Lt-General Azam Khan was sworn in as Governor of East Pakistan. By 25 July, President Ayub was warning the people of East Pakistan of the dangers emanating from the communists, with their political stronghold in Kolkata. On 6 August, his apprehensions were echoed by the Governor of East Pakistan, who said that he was concerned about communism attacking the country on a very vulnerable front—the economic front. He was referring to the food shortage in East Pakistan.
On 6 May 1961, the Constitution commission submitted its report to the President. But contrary to Ayub’s wishes, it did not recommend a presidential system as hinted by the President. The President now appointed a sub-committee to study the issue further. In October 1961, the sub-committee concluded its work. It favoured the presidential system of government. The law minister (who belonged to East Pakistan) supported parliamentary reforms.
The Ayub Khan government’s prohibition in 1961 of the celebration of the birth centenary of Rabindranath Tagore and the ban imposed on singing of Rabindra Sangeet were bitterly resented by the public in East Bengal, which defied these orders. Dhaka held a grand function on the occasion, which was attended by judges of the high court and many other functionaries.
On 20 January 1962, President Ayub said that he would use American arms supplied under the US Mutual Security Act in the event of any threat to Pakistan. Ten days later, H.S. Suhrawardy was arrested under the Security Act for acting in a manner prejudicial to
the security and safety of Pakistan’. On 6 February 1962, more than 200 university students rioted in Dhaka and called for an end to martial law in Pakistan. The next day, a large number of members of the Awami League were arrested in Dhaka. President Ayub, who had left for Karachi, had warned the people against ‘irresponsible action’. Officials in Dhaka said the students had been ‘unruly since 1 February 1962, when President Ayub called a ‘high level conference in Dhaka to ‘review conditions in the country’. On 8 February, 128 persons were arrested in Dhaka for ‘having defied a ban on public meetings, processions and demonstrations and for having attacked policemen’. Those arrested included Mujibur Rahman, general secretary of the Awami League. On 1 March that year, President Ayub announced a new Constitution of Pakistan. It envisaged a presidential form of government, an independent judiciary, indirect election of the President and members of the Central and provincial legislatures. East Pakistan kept up a mood of ‘sullen silence’.
Pakistan’s Constitution for Basic Democracy also accorded recognition to Bengali as the state language of Pakistan at par with Urdu. Article 215 of the Basic Democratic Constitution was a faithful replica of Article 214 of the 1956 Constitution. On 31 March 1962, President Ayub inaugurated the Karnaphuli Hydroelectric Dam in East Pakistan built at a cost of $100 million. On 28 April 1962, elections for the National Assembly were held. Only 80,000 electors called the ‘Basic Democrats’ participated. The results indicated ‘an overwhelming endorsement of Ayub’s Government. On 8 June, martial law formally ended in Pakistan. The new Constitution went
to effect and the new National Assembly was sworn in. On 14 July 1962, the National Assembly approved a government Bill to allow the revival of political parties. Opposition members failed to bring about the deletion of the clause that excluded from party office membership all those politicians (officially estimated at 100) who had been disqualified from public office under the Electoral Bodies Disqualification Order. On 22 September 1962, the police opened fire on students who were observing ‘Protest Day-a nationwide expression of disapproval of electoral reforms in Misraj, East Pakistan. On 25 September 1962, leaders of the defunct United Front, the National Awami Party, Jamat, Nizam-i-Islam and a faction of the
Muslim League resolved in Lahore to go ahead with the formation of the National Democratic Front under the leadership of Suhrawardy. On 29 September 1962, President Ayub denounced Pakistan politicians who announced the organization of the National Democratic Front. He called them ‘opponents of the Constitution who were ‘trying to exploit the ignorance of the people for their own personal ends as they have always done in the past. He also bitterly criticized Suhrawardy, calling him an enemy of Pakistan.
On 7 October the same year, in Dhaka, Suhrawardy called for a ‘grassroots’ campaign to bring pressure on Ayub to permit a democratic Constitution’. He was exiled from the country shortly thereafter and breathed his last some time later as an exile in Beirut, Lebanon—a sad end for a politician who contributed to the birth of Pakistan and was also a strong proponent of a united sovereign Bengal. On 18 October, President Ayub summoned the National Assembly to meet in Dhaka on 10 December 1962. But even before that, on 25 October, Abdul Monaim Khan, President Ayub’s stooge and a known opponent of Bengal’s autonomy, was appointed Governor of East Pakistan in place of Ghulam Faruq, who had earned the people’s goodwill. This sent out the wrong message.
On 3 September 1963, the government of East Pakistan issued an ordinance similar to the one issued in West Pakistan restricting the press ‘to ensure correct reporting of proceedings in the National Assembly, Provisional Assembly and different courts of justice’. Five days later, newspapermen threatened to strike in protest against the verdict requiring newspapers to publish complete text of all government news releases. On 25 November 1963, the National Assembly began its session in Dhaka. It was reported that both the government parties, the Muslim League (Conventionalist) and the opposition party Muslim League (councillors) were expected to advocate issues of franchise and fundamental rights. On 25 December 1963, the National Assembly approved the Fundamental Rights Bill, which amended the 1962 Constitution making civil rights enforceable in the courts.
Meanwhile, East Pakistan continued to resent its economic backwardness. The economic disparity between the two wings of Pakistan at the end of the first five years of Ayub’s presidency (1958– 63) could be seen clearly (see tables 1, 2 and 3).
This disparity became a key issue in the minds of the people of East Pakistan together with the suppression of their democratic rights. On 19 March 1964, at a demonstration held in Dhaka, people demanded direct elections for the country’s presidency and legislative. assemblies. On 18 September, police in Dhaka fired on students parading in memory of two colleagues killed on 17 September 1960. On 20 September 1964, the supporters of Fatima Jinnah, who was emerging as the Opposition’s candidate for President, held a nationwide ‘day of protest against the government, disrupted traffic and closed shops in Dhaka. On 30 September, opening her election campaign, Fatima Jinnah charged that the government had created ‘an atmosphere laden with fear and reeking with corruption’ and the issues were essentially moral and political. On 21 October 1964, the president of the East Pakistan Federation of Labour charged that nearly 400 jute workers had been killed since the province-wide strike on 12 October. He attributed the killings to ‘hooligans’ hired by employers and asked for a governmental enquiry. Fatima Jinnah supported the demand. On 7 November, Mujibur Rahman, leader of the combined opposition parties, was arrested in Dhaka on ‘unspecified charges of sedition’, but was released on bail. On 9 November, balloting for 40,000 electors began in Dhaka.
On 2 January 1965, Ayub defeated Fatima Jinnah in the presidential election. In March, he was sworn in for a second term. He appointed an ‘inner cabinet’ composed of Z.A. Bhutto, Mohammad Shoiab, Khan A. Sabur Khan and Khwaja Shahabuddin. On 8 June 1965, the second National Assembly was sworn in. Next month, the government announced a twelve-month moratorium on press laws, leaving the press free for self-regulation through a code of ethics. In September 1965, a six-day undeclared war broke out between Pakistan and India on the issue of disputes over the Rann of Kutch. It was fought entirely along the West Pakistan-India border. But East Pakistan was scrupulously left free from any military action by India. The fact that the Pakistan army virtually left East Pakistan undefended was noted by the people of East Pakistan, including the so-called pro-Pakistan elements.
On 10 January 1966, India and Pakistan signed the Tashkent
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Declaration. Whereas West Pakistan’s reaction to the Tashkent Declaration was violently hostile, the political scene in East Pakistan was placid. By mid-February 1966, while the West Pakistan opposition still tried to hammer out a common line against the Tashkent. Declaration, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman came out with his own far more ‘practical six-point programme. The essence of his six demands was a federal constitution that would give the federal government control over nothing but foreign affairs, defence and currency. On 16 March 1960, speaking at Rajshahi, President Ayub warned the nation that the six-point programme of the Opposition was aimed at achieving their dream of ‘greater sovereign Bengal and added that the ‘fulfillment of this horrid dream would spell disaster for the country and turn the people of East Pakistan into slaves’. On 20 March 1966, at the closing session of the pro-Ayub Muslim League council, President Ayub said, ‘they should be prepared to face a civil war, if forced upon them to protect the sovereignty and integrity of the country…. If the nation faced disruption, it [the civil war) had to be accepted’. On 31 March 1966, in reply, the Pakistan Observer said, ‘stability cannot be ensured by calling in question the patriotism of a large section of our people belonging to a particular region’.
On 18 April 1966, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman was arrested. He was released on 9 May 1966, but immediately re-arrested under the Emergency Regulations. On 7 June 1966, violent mass demonstrations took place in East Pakistan in support of regional autonomy. There were clashes between the demonstrators and the police in Dhaka and Narayanganj.
But the Pakistan government now took official note of secessionist trends in East Bengal. On 6 January 1968, twenty-eight people including a naval officer were arrested on charges of being part of a conspiracy to bring about the secession of East Pakistan. Those arrested included a number of non-commissioned officers, senior civil servants, seamen and civilians. It was alleged that some of the conspirators were in touch with the First Secretary of the Indian Deputy High Commission in Dhaka and had discussed their plans with him. On 19 June 1968, the trial of twenty-five pe including Sheikh Mujibur Rahman opened in Dhaka in what came
to be designated the ‘Agartala conspiracy case’. They were accused of ‘plotting to deprive Pakistan of its sovereignty over a part of its territory by an armed revolt with weapons, ammunition and fund provided by India’. On 7 December 1968, anti-Ayub demonstrations spread to East Pakistan when the National Awami Party called a general strike in Dhaka. On 13 December, the opposition parties called a general strike throughout East Pakistan. Police opened fire at Chittagong on unruly crowds. In many respects the Agartala conspiracy case was a forerunner to East Bengal’s secessionist movement against Pakistan.
On 8 January 1969, the leaders of eight opposition parties formed the Democratic Action Committee. The demands of the Committee included: (i) restoration of democracy and direct elections on the basis of universal adult franchise; (ii) full autonomy for East Pakistan; transfer of all the powers of the Central government except defence, foreign affairs and foreign exchange to the provinces; introduction of a separate currency for East Pakistan; introduction of separate armed forces or paramilitary forces and ordnance factory and naval headquarters in East Pakistan; (iii) establishment of subfederal units in West Pakistan giving full autonomy to Baluchistan, NWFP and Sind; (iv) release of all political prisoners; and (v) abandonment of the Agartala conspiracy case. On 17 January 1969, the Democratic Action Committee observed a Protest Day and demonstrations were held throughout the country.
Serious disturbances occurred in Dhaka where many students were injured in clashes with the police. On 24 January 1969, a central strike paralysed East Pakistan. In Dhaka 10,000 students and workers stormed the government secretariat. There were also clashes in Chittagong, Mymensingh, Narayanganj and Khulna. On 30 January 1969, Maulana Bhashani, leader of the National Awami Party and over 1,000 persons of the party were arrested. On 1 February 1969, President Ayub announced in a broadcast that he was prepared to discuss changes in the Constitution with representatives of ‘responsible opposition parties’. On 5 February 1969, President Ayub abandoned the stipulation that talks must be confined to the responsible parties and expressed his willingness to invite anyone
who would be prepared to attend the discussion. On 7 February 1969, the Awami League stated that it would not take part in the talks unless it was represented by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. On 16 February 1969, President Ayub conceded that Rahman should be allowed to attend the talks.
There was serious disorder in East Pakistan at the funeral of one of the accused in the Agartala conspiracy case, shot dead while allegedly trying to escape. Maulana Bhashani told a huge crowd that the time has come to achieve democracy through violence. The days of constitutional struggle were over.’ On 21 February 1969, during disturbances in Khulna, eight people were shot dead by the police. The same day, the crowd surrounded the home of the chairman of the local council of Basic Democrats in Kushtia demanding his resignation. He opened fire wounding two students, and was subsequently beaten to death.
President Ayub now announced his decision not to seek reelection as President. In a speech, he said, ‘I am fully conscious of the dissatisfaction that exists in the country with the present system of elections. People want direct elections on the basis of adult franchise. I realise also that the intelligentsia feels left out and wants a greater say in the affairs of the State. People in East Pakistan feel that in the present system they are not equal partners and also that they do not have full control over the affairs of their Province.’
Meanwhile, on 22 February 1969, a rally of 100,000 students called for the National Assembly members and the Basic Democrats to resign by 3 March or ‘face the consequences’. The government withdrew all charges against Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and the thirtythree other accused in the Agartala conspiracy case, who were released on the same day. Four days later, the conference between President Ayub and the opposition leaders opened at Rawalpindi and, after a brief preliminary session, was adjourned till 10 March 1969. The Round Table Conference between the government and the opposition leaders was resumed. The eight parties constituting the Democratic Action Committee agreed on two points, that is, a federal parliamentary system of government with regional autonomy and the election of the national and provincial assemblies by direct adult franchise. They were, however, divided in their other demands.
Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, president of the Awami League, put before the conference the six-point programme for general autonomy for East Pakistan, which he had sponsored in 1966. He also suggested that the federal capital be transferred from Islamabad, in West Pakistan, to Dhaka, the capital of East Pakistan, and that representation in the National Assembly should be based on population rather than on parity between East and West Pakistan, giving East Pakistan 56 per cent of the seats. He also stressed the rising disparity in real per capita income between the two wings to the detriment of East Bengal. He said, ‘underlying such disparity, is the disparity in general economic structure and infrastructure of the two regions, in the rates of employment, in facilities for education, in medical and welfare services’. He cited many figures. During 1961-66, power generation in West Pakistan became five to six times higher than in East Pakistan. As against 36,200 hospital beds for West Pakistan there were only 6,900 in East Pakistan. Whereas there were forty-eight polytechnics in West Pakistan, there were only eighteen in the eastern wing. ‘More than 80 per cent of all foreign aid has been utilised in West Pakistan in addition to the transfer of East Pakistan’s foreign exchange earnings to West Pakistan. This made it possible for West Pakistan over 20 years to import Rs 3,109 crore worth of goods against the total export earnings of Rs 1,337 crore, while during the same period East Pakistan imported Rs 1,210 crore worth of goods as against its total export export earnings of Rs 1,650 crore. This was “gross economic injustice” to East Pakistan.’ This line of political propaganda made a deep impact on the psyche of the people of East Bengal and slowly but surely the concept of an independent Bangladesh free from Pakistan control was getting crystallized.
This was to be symbolized in Bangabandhu’s utterances ‘I am a Bengali’, ‘My language is Bengali’ and ‘My home is Bangladesh’.
10
FROM MARTIAL LAW TO
INDEPENDENCE
The simmering discontent in East Bengal was slowly reaching a crisis point. On 10 March 1969, President Ayub Khan stated that rifles and other weapons were being smuggled into East Pakistan from an unknown source and distributed to villages. This was denied by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, who questioned the credibility of the intelligence reports quoted by the President. By 25 March, faced with uncontrollable agitation in East Bengal, President Ayub Khan resigned. Before that, martial law was proclaimed once again and General Yahya Khan (commander-in-chief) was appointed chief martial law administrator. The Constitution was abrogated and the national and provincial assemblies were dissolved.
General Yahya Khan announced that he had no political ambitions other than the creation of conditions conducive to the establishment of a constitutional government. The military government immediately cracked down on ‘violators’ of the martial law administration. Sheikh Mujibur Rahman now announced a plan for a true federal set-up. On 30 March 1969, Maulana Bhashani demanded a national government. He was interned in his village home at Kagmari. The very next day, the Government of Pakistan banned all political activities and in a rapid series of developments,
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General Yahya Khan assumed presidency and a Council of Administration consisting of three people was appointed.
On 10 April, at a press conference, General Yahya Khan said that after a sound, clean and honest administration’ had been. established, a Constituent Assembly would be elected on the basis of adult franchise. When asked for his views on regional autonomy for East Pakistan, he replied, ‘My personal views are of no consequence. It is entirely for the elected representatives of the people to decide what they want.’ On 24 April, continuing his series of talks with political leaders, General Yahya Khan flew to Dhaka for a four-day visit. He met Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Hamidul Haq Chaudhury and Sheikh Mashiur Rahman representing Maulana Bhashani, who then was ill. He seemed to take cognizance of the sentiments expressed during these meetings. On 6 May, Shafiul Azam, a Bengali was appointed as Chief Secretary, Government of East Pakistan. In a bid to further satisfy Bengali aspirations, five other Bengalis were appointed as secretaries to the Central ministries of home affairs, agriculture, information and commerce, labour and health. Prior to this, only one Central ministry was headed by a Bengali and only on one occasion had a Bengali served as Chief Secretary of the province.
In July 1969, the Government of Pakistan came out with a proposal to replace English with Bengali and Urdu as the official languages. In a broadcast, General Yahya Khan announced the appointment of a chief election commissioner to prepare for elections to be held within twelve-eighteen months. In his broadcast, General Yahya Khan said, ‘one of the reasons for dissatisfaction on the part of the people belonging to East Pakistan was a feeling that they were not being allowed to play their full part in the decision-making process at the national level, and in certain important spheres of national activity. In my view they were fully justified in being dissatisfied with this state of affairs. My administration has taken certain steps to correct this situation in certain spheres including civil administration.’ On 11 August 1969, seven civilians were sworn in as ministers and three more were added between August and October. Five of the ministers came from East Pakistan. General
Yahya Khan kept the portfolios of foreign affairs, defence and planning with himself.
On 1 September 1969, Admiral S.M. Ahsan was appointed Governor of East Pakistan. On his arrival in Dhaka, Admiral Ahsan. said that he was pretty sure that by 1971 a new government of elected representatives would replace the present interim government. In November, in a broadcast, General Yahya Khan outlined the legal framework for the restoration of a federal parliamentary system and promised the holding of elections on 5 October 1970 on the basis of ‘one man one vote’. The constitution-making task of the newly elected National Assembly would have to be completed within 120 days, failing which the National Assembly would be dissolved and a new National Assembly elected. He also announced conferment of maximum authority on the province consistent with the maintenance of a strong federation; and permission for the resumption of unrestricted political activity from 1 January 1970: “Maximum autonomy to the two wings of Pakistan as long as this does not impair the national integrity and solidarity of the country….”People of both East and West Pakistan are almost unanimous on demanding the break-up of one unit. My decision is, therefore, based on a popular wish.’ ‘People of the two regions of Pakistan should have control over their economic resources and development as long as it does not adversely affect the working of a national government at the Centre.’
On 1 January 1970, the ban imposed on political parties was lifted. In March, General Yahya Khan announced the Legal Framework Order, 1970, that was to be published on 29 March. It was announced that a comprehensive flood control project would be undertaken in East Pakistan and that a team from the World Bank was studying the project at the government’s request. When it came as promised, the Legal Framework Order laid down the fundamental principles to be incorporated into the new Constitution. Pakistan would be a federal Islamic republic. The National Assembly would consist of 313 members, of whom 300 would be elected to fill general seats and thirteen seats were reserved for women. East Pakistan was allotted 162 general seats and seven seats were reserved
for women. West Pakistan was to be divided into four provinces and Centrally-administered tribal areas that would have the rest of the seats. In the provincial assemblies, East Pakistan had 300 general and ten reserved (women) seats. On 1 April 1970, General Yahya . Khan ordered the dissolution of the one-unit West Pakistan. This was in response to East Bengal’s long-standing demand for restoring its status as the province with more than half of Pakistan’s population, instead of being equated as East Pakistan with one-unit West Pakistan.
On 15 July 1970, published electoral rolls showed the number of registered voters as a little over 56,400,000 of whom 31,200,000 were in East Pakistan and 25,200,000 in West Pakistan. On 15 August 1970, because of floods in East Pakistan, election to the National Assembly was postponed to 7 December 1970. The decision was criticized by both Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. In October 1970, nomination of national and provincial assembly seats were finalized. In a broadcast, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman advocated equality of all citizens and particularly equal rights for the minority community. While rejecting the thesis of Islam being in danger due to the six-point formula, he reiterated that ‘anything which permits prejudice between region and region and man and man can be opposed to Islam’. He urged General Yahya Khan once again to repeal the restrictive provisions of the Legal Framework Order to allow the elected representatives of the people to function as a sovereign Assembly in the task of formulating the Constitution. In the field of foreign policy he stated that normalization of relations with neighbours would be to the best advantage of Pakistan. He stated there should be ‘a just settlement of the Kashmir dispute in accordance with the UN resolutions and the Farakka problem which threatened to do ‘grave and permanent damage to the economy of Bengal.
In November 1970, a severe cyclone devastated the coastal areas in East Bengal. About 1 million people were reportedly killed. Bitter general criticism was voiced in East Pakistan about West Pakistan’s delayed response and apathy. Maulana Bhashani and Sheikh Mujibur Rahman were the first to make an extensive tour and criticized the Central government for its slow response and ineptitude. General
Yahya Khan paid a belated visit to the affected areas to supervise relief measures. He said he could not be blamed for the past omissions towards East Pakistan and that, unlike the leaders of the past, he had recognized the realities of the situation and felt that East Pakistan should have maximum political autonomy within the overall framework of Pakistan. Following the cyclone disaster, there was a demand from several prominent East Pakistan leaders like Maulana Bhashani, Nurul Amin and Ataur Rahman that elections be postponed. But the Awami League stood firm on holding the elections on schedule. The Election Commission stated that the elections would be held on schedule except in eight or nine constituencies of East Pakistan directly affected by the cyclone. The natural calamity heightened the political disaffection in the eastern wing, adding weight to the popular demand for autonomy.
Significantly, in his election-eve speeches, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto abstained from comments on the burning topics between East and West Pakistan. He said nothing about the six-point programme of the Awami League. On 4 December 1970, General Yahya Khan warned all political parties that martial law would remain supreme until after power was transferred to the elected representatives in the wake of the framing of a constitution. General elections were held on 7 December 1970. The Awami League obtained a decisive victory for the National Assembly from East Pakistan. It won 151 seats out of 153 results declared. On 9 December 1970, Maulana Bhashani said that he would launch a movement for the separation of East Bengal. He described the success of the Awami League as positive proof of the Bengalis wanting a free, independent and sovereign East Pakistan. On 10 December 1970, Mujibur Rahman said that there could be no Constitution except on the basis of the six-point programme.
On 17 December, elections to the provincial assemblies were held in Pakistan. In East Pakistan, the Awami League secured an absolute majority (268 seats out of the 279 results declared), while in West Pakistan, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s People’s Party secured the same in Punjab and Sind. On 20 December, Z.A. Bhutto, referring to Mujibur Rahman’s majority in the National Assembly, made an
uncharitable remark that ‘majority alone did not count in national politics’. In yet another affront to Bengali sentiments he added that the People’s Party had won a majority in Punjab and Sind where ‘lay the real centre of power’ and no government could run at the centre without the cooperation of this party. That the dominant political group in West Pakistan was not willing to hand over political power at the national level to the Bengalis became clear from Bhutto’s statement. The next day, Tajuddin Ahmed, secretary of the East Pakistan Awami League, said that the Awami League with the clear mandate of the electorate was quite competent to frame a constitution and form the Central government. He added that Punjab and Sind could no longer aspire to be ‘bastions of power’. Z.A. Bhutto made a statement that there were good chances for the establishment of a coalition government of the Awami League and the Peoples Party. He ruled out the possibility of Mujibur Rahman going it alone as that would ignore the geographical peculiarity of Pakistan where both the wings must share power.
On 27 December 1970, Bhutto said that his party was the only party that supported the cause of the people of East Pakistan and hoped that he would be able to reach some understanding with East Pakistan on the making of the Constitution. He felt that the Constitution should reflect the consensus of all provinces of Pakistan. If a majority party insisted on making a Constitution of its own liking, he would step aside ‘and his party would not be responsible for the consequences’. On 29 December, General Yahya Khan conceded to Mujibur Rahman’s demand for holding the National Assembly session in Dhaka.
As the year 1971 started, the relationship took a turn for the worse. On 3 January, Mujibur Rahman reiterated at a public rally that the Constitution would have to be on the six-point programme, for which he would seek the cooperation of the western wing. He warned the people that they should not be complacent and be prepared for any sacrifice that might be needed to achieve their rights. The next day, Mujibur Rahman said that the six-point programme would provide an equal quantum of autonomy to the people of the west wing also. On 8 January, he announced at a press
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conference that an attempt had been made on his life. He warned that conspiracies were being hatched to frustrate the verdict of the people and that he would start a mass movement if the anti-people elements persisted in such activities.
On 9 January 1971, newspapers reported that Maulana Bhashani, Mashiur Rahman, general secretary of the East Pakistan National Awami Party, Ataur Rahman Khan (PNL) and Commander Moazzam Hussaina, a leader of the Lahore Resolution Implementation Committee, had met at Santosh in Tangail District to discuss the implementation of a five-point programme. The programme envisaged: (i) the establishment of a sovereign East Pakistan on the basis of the 1940 Lahore resolution; (ii) boycotting of imported goods including those from the western wing; (iii) a gradual socialization of the means of production; (iv) adherence to the principles of anti-imperialism and anti-fascism; and (y) launching of a mass movement to press for a referendum on these issues.
Three days later, General Yahya Khan had talks with Mujibur Rahman and five other Awami League leaders at Dhaka. He described the talks as satisfactory and referred to Mujibur Rahman as the future prime minister of Pakistan and expressed the hope that the conditions in the country would improve after the government was installed. On 13 January 1971, Bhutto said that he favoured the idea of a genuine federation in Pakistan with all provinces having equal powers. On 17 January, President Yahya Khan met Bhutto. He said that the two parties should come to an understanding and if it became necessary another meeting between himself, Bhutto and Mujibur Rahman could be held. On 27 January, Bhutto arrived in Dhaka for talks with Mujibur Rahman. After the talks, Bhutto said at a press conference that the talks had neither failed nor had they reached a deadlock. He said he had agreed to two points of the Awami League pertaining to the question of federation and the right of the provinces to maintain paramilitary forces and that, for the remaining points, he would have to consult his colleagues.
At this crucial moment, an unexpected incident indirectly influenced the course of events. On 30 January 1971, an Indian Airlines plane was hijacked by some pro-Pakistan Kashmiri militants
to Lahore and blown up after two days. In retaliation, India banned Pakistani planes from flying over Indian air space. This created great difficulty in communication between Rawalpindi and Dhaka. On 3 February, Mujibur Rahman condemned the blowing up of. the Indian plane and called for a thorough probe. Bhutto said Pakistan was not responsible for the act since the hijackers were Kashmiris.
On 13 February, General Yahya Khan fixed 3 March for the start of the National Assembly session. Mujibur Rahman, addressing a meeting of the members of the Awami League elected to the national and provincial assemblies and the working committee of the party, reiterated that the constitution should be based on the sixpoint programme. On 16 February, Z.A. Bhutto, at a press conference, expressed his party’s inability to attend the National Assembly unless it was given an understanding that there was scope for adjustment and compromise on the six-point programme.
On 17 February, Mujibur Rahman stated that the people of “Bangla Desh’ could no longer be suppressed. Simultaneously, he started referring to ‘Bangla Desh’ vis-à-vis ‘Pakistan’ in his statements. On 21 February, Mujibur Rahman told newsmen that his party was firmly committed to framing a constitution on the basis of its sixpoint programme. On 26 February, Mujibur Rahman warned the Governor, Vice-Admiral S.M. Ahsan, that the postponement of the National Assembly session would create a tragic and dangerous situation. On 28 February, Z.A. Bhutto announced that his party would attend the Assembly session if it were postponed to allow his party time to hold talks with the Awami League, or if the time limit of 120 days for framing the constitution was lifted. He threatened a mass movement ‘from Khyber to Karachi’ if the National Assembly was held without the participation of the Pakistan Peoples Party.
On 1 March, General Yahya Khan postponed the National Assembly session. The President said that the Pakistan Peoples Party, the majority party of West Pakistan and certain other political parties, had declared their intention of not attending the Assembly session on 3 March. He said that the general situation of tension created by India had further complicated the situation. The same
day the President reinstated full martial law, removed the more liberal Vice-Admiral Ahsan as Governor of East Pakistan and appointed the hawkish General Tikka Khan in his place. On 3 March, Mujibur Rahman launched a civil disobedience campaign and called upon the people to stop all communication systems and directed that nobody should pay any rent/taxes or cooperate with the anti-people government. He asked the people to resort to noncooperation. He called upon the troops to return to their barracks and asked the martial law administrator to hand over power to the elected representatives of the people before 7 March.
On 6 March 1971, President Yahya Khan announced that the National Assembly would meet on 25 March. He warned the politicians that he and the armed forces would ensure at all costs the solidarity, integrity and security of Pakistan. On 7 March, Mujibur Rahman said at a public meeting that he would not attend the National Assembly unless martial law was lifted, the troops had returned to their barracks, an enquiry held into the current firings and power was handed over to the civil authorities. He announced that the ‘hartal would be continued till 25 March.
On 8 March, a civil disobedience movement was launched in a remarkable show of solidarity by all sections in East Bengal. The next day, judges in East Pakistan refused to swear in Lt-General Tikka Khan as Governor. This illustrated how the Bengalis were determined to rebel against West Pakistan’s swashbuckling attitude. On 14 March, the Central government issued an ultimatum asking workers to return to work by 15 March. On the same day, Mujibur Rahman announced a sort of unilateral declaration of autonomy and issued thirty-five directives to the people of East Bengal. General Yahya Khan now arrived in Dhaka and talks between him and Mujibur Rahman began the next day. On 17 March, General Tikka Khan announced an inquiry into the army killings, but Mujibur Rahman rejected this offer for an inquiry. On 21 March, Z.A. Bhutto arrived in Dhaka and conferred with Yahya Khan. Mujibur Rahman had an unscheduled meeting with Yahya Khan. On 22 March, General Yahya Khan postponed the inauguration of the National Assembly indefinitely. On 25 March, the Awami League
announced that constitutional talks were deadlocked. More killings were reported.
Then all of a sudden General Yahya Khan left for Karachi on the evening of 25 March, leaving the army a free hand to eradicate the Awami League. The Pakistan Army launched a full-scale attack on East Pakistan Police barracks and the EPR Rifle bases. This was the signal for the Pakistan Army to virtually declare a war on the entire population of East Bengal. There were en masse dishonouring of Bengali women, murder of Bengali nationalist activists and destruction of property. Sheikh Mujibur Rahman was arrested by the army on the night of 25 March and moved to an unknown destination in West Pakistan. There was no official announcement. On 26 March 1971, before his incarceration, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman proclaimed East Pakistan as a sovereign independent People’s Republic of Bangladesh. A clandestine radio station identified as Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendra announced: “The Sheikh has declared the 75 million people of East Pakistan as citizens of the sovereign independent Bangla Desh.
On the same night, Major Ziaur Rahman, the future President, seized the Chittagong radio station and announced that he had formed an independent government in the name of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and asked Pakistani forces to surrender to the Bangladesh Army. President Yahya Khan, in a broadcast, charged Sheikh Mujibur Rahman with treason and with insulting the Pakistan national flag and called him and his followers ‘enemies of Pakistan’. The Awami League was completely banned as a political party. Large-scale arrests of Awami League leaders and workers followed. Many of them went underground or crossed over to India. The Swadhin Bangla Betar Kendra announced the formal proclamation of the Government of Bangladesh. Sheikh Mujibur Rahman was named President of a six-member government and Syed Nurul Islam was named Vice-President. The council of ministers consisted of Tajuddin Ahmed (Prime Minister), Khondkar Mushtaq Ahmed, A.H.M. Kamruzzaman and Mansur Ali.
On 17 April 1971, at a public function at Mujibnagar (in Kushtia), Bangladesh was proclaimed a sovereign democratic republic.
A National Assembly member, Professor Yusuf Ali, read out the proclamation in Bengali which stated ‘we ratify the Declaration of Independence by Banga-bandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman [on 26 March]’. The function began with the singing of Rabindranath . Tagore’s Amar sonar Bangla ami tomay bhalobashi, which became the national anthem of free Bangladesh. The new government appealed to foreign countries to accord recognition to Bangladesh. On 18 April 1971, the Pakistan deputy high commissioner in Kolkata, Hussain Ali, declaring his allegiance to Bangladesh, took over charge of the office and hoisted the flag of Bangladesh. The next day, the Bangladesh Mission, formerly the Pakistan Deputy High Commission in Kolkata, started functioning.
On 1 May 1971, the Bangladesh government appointed Justice Abu Syed Choudhury, vice-chancellor of Dhaka University, as its representative to the United Nations (Statesman, 2 May 1971). On 3 May 1971, a former Pakistani diplomat in New Delhi, Shahabuddin, who had defected from Pakistan, was appointed chief of the Bangladesh Information Bureau in Delhi, a spokesman of the Bangladesh Mission announced in Kolkata.
Meanwhile, with military repression let loose all around, there was a tidal wave of refugee movement across the border to India, the number of refugees reaching the figure of 90 lakhs. This gave India a good reason, both to assist the freedom fighters and also to appeal to the international community to put pressure on the military government of Pakistan to stop repression in East Bengal and to hand over power to the elected representatives of the people. From the beginning, India drew the world’s attention to this gigantic refugee problem and the Pakistan government’s inability to create conditions where masses of people did not feel compelled to leave their homes and cross the border to seek safety and shelter. India complained of the tremendous economic burden the country had to bear in providing food and shelter to this vast multitude of refugees spread over the states of West Bengal, Tripura and Assam. Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi travelled to the leading western countries requesting them to put pressure on the military rulers of Pakistan to accept the democratic right of the people of the eastern
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wing, to take the refugees back and to rehabilitate them. The west’s apathy was in fact one of the main reasons for India’s subsequent military intervention.
From April to May 1971, civil war conditions prevailed in. Bangladesh with the Mukti Fauj, backed by the Indian Army from across the border, carrying on a relentless guerilla war against the Pakistan Army units. For the people of Bangladesh it was nine months of misery. The Mukti Fauj became the Mukti Bahini under the command of General Osmani. One of its sector commanders was Major (then Colonel) Ziaur Rahman who was destined to become the President of Bangladesh. The people assisted them everywhere and opposed the Pakistan Army. The Mukti Bahini also received logistic support from the Indian Army. Also the people of West Bengal and the city of Kolkata stood by their East Bengal brethren in every possible way. On 6 December 1971, the Indian Army crossed the border in support of the Bangladesh Mukti Bahini and launched frontal attacks on the Pakistan armed forces in Bangladesh on three fronts. Backed effectively by the Indian Air Force, which eliminated the Pakistan Air Force in 24 hours, and the Indian Navy, it overpowered the Pakistan forces in three to four days. It also received overwhelming popular support and was welcomed everywhere as the liberator. It liberated Jessore, Khulna, Mymensingh, Jamalpur, Rangpur, Dinajpur and all major towns in a three-pronged attack, encircled Dhaka and asked the Pakistan forces to surrender.
Bangladesh’s war of independence had its international repercussions. Both the US and China supported Pakistan in the UN Security Council, while the Soviet Union stood solidly behind India and Bangladesh in their efforts to secure Bangladesh’s independence. The situation reached a critical point when the US Seventh Fleet advanced to the Bay of Bengal in a clear gesture of support to Pakistan forces in Bangladesh. This coincided with General Niazi, the commander of the Pakistan forces in Bangladesh, appealing for ceasefire. Had the Indo-Bangladesh joint military command agreed to the ceasefire, Bangladesh’s independence would have been delayed considerably, as Pakistan forces would still have been in possession
of Dhaka and Chittagong. But the united command of Bangladesh and India simply ignored this development and redoubled their efforts to capture Dhaka.
On 15 December 1971, the Pakistan-appointed Governor, Dr A. M. Malik, resigned, creating a vacuum, as the Indian forces and the Mukti Bahini reached the outskirts of Dhaka from three sides. On 16 December 1971, Dhaka was liberated. General Niazi, the commander of the 93,000-strong Pakistan force, surrendered to General Jagjit Singh Aurora, the commander-in-chief of the joint forces of the Indian Army and the Mukti Bahini. Dhaka was now firmly established as the capital of the independent People’s Republic of Bangladesh. But even in the hour of their defeat the Pakistan Razakars and Ansars, backed by the Pakistan Army, committed a dastardly crime against humanity by slaughtering hundreds of intellectuals and professionals after arresting them at several locations around Dhaka.
On 11 January 1972, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, on his release from detention in Pakistan, returned to Dhaka via London to a hero’s welcome. A new dawn came after the eight-month-long war of liberation when an independent Bangladesh started its existence as a free member of the comity of nations. This was also a great victory for Bangladeshi nationalism that had smarted for a quarter of a century since the withdrawal of British rule in 1947 under conditions of exploitation, oppression and discrimination by Pakistan’s ruling class. It was a long struggle, the last nine months of which were marked by frontal warfare.
11
THE WEST BENGAL STORY
(1947–77)
West Bengal celebrated Independence Day with Mahatma Gandhi staying in Kolkata amidst unprecedented scenes of Hindu-Muslim friendship after a year of nightmares. The Congress government led by Dr P.C. Ghosh was sworn in. Also, C. Rajagopalachari, a veteran Congress leader, replaced Sir Frederick Burrows as Governor. Mahatma Gandhi, at the request of H.S. Suhrawardy, who returned from Karachi on hearing of the relapse of communal violence in Kolkata, stayed on in Kolkata to work for communal peace and harmony. Gandhi stayed at a dilapidated house at Belighata called Hyder Manzil and travelled to various trouble spots of the city accompanied by Suhrawardy. There was a miraculous show of communal harmony on 15 August.
But the euphoria was short-lived as communalism, largely triggered by anti-social elements, once again raised its ugly head by 31 August. This led to Gandhi’s fast unto death, which he said he would break only when all parties responsible for the violence openly repudiated it. It had a magical effect once again, and on 4 September 1947, peace returned and Gandhi broke his fast. He announced that he would now travel through trouble-torn Punjab. He left for Delhi on October 9, 1947 and stayed there until his
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assassination on January 30, 1948 by a fanatic Hindu who wanted to punish him for his appeasement of Pakistan and Muslims.
Meanwhile, the Radcliffe Boundary Award had been announced on 17 August, creating a strange situation where Murshidabad and Malda, which had celebrated Pakistan’s independence two days ago, had now to hoist the Indian tricolour while Khulna and Rangamati (Chittagong Hill Tract), which had hoisted the Indian tricolour two days ago now became part of Pakistan. Inevitably there was tension in all these districts. But Dr Prafulla Chandra Ghosh, the West Bengal premier, and Khwaja Nazimuddin, his East Bengal counterpart, issued a joint appeal to the people of the two Bengals asking them to accept the Radcliffe Award peacefully.
The Congress government, led by Dr Prafulla Chandra Ghosh as chief minister was short-lived. It was in power for only five months. In January 1948, Congress MLAs chose Dr Bidhan Chandra Roy as their leader. Dr Ghosh, essentially without experience in either legislative work or party structure, had an uneasy time from the beginning. With the vast Congress organizational network left behind in East Bengal (now Bangladesh) and with the West Bengal Congress coming under the complete control of the close-knit Hooghly-Medinipore group, P.C. Ghosh found himself without any support base. His uncompromising nature and acid tongue set many against him, including powerful business interests. His handling of the West Bengal Security Bill and the resultant agitation, including police firing killing one student, led to further troubles, and he had to make way in less than six months. Dr Roy formed his government on 23 January 1948. Kiran Shankar Roy, the Congress veteran, who had willingly stayed on in East Bengal, became home minister at Dr Roy’s request. His departure from East Bengal left the Hindus there leaderless. Another veteran, Nalini Ranjan Sarkar, became finance minister. One of the first acts of the new administration was to ban the Communist Party of India in West Bengal, defying the Central leadership on the ground that this party was seeking to overthrow the government by armed rebellion. This party stayed banned till 1950 when, taking advantage of the newly proclaimed Constitution, it moved the Kolkata High Court invoking Fundamental Rights and got this ban rescinded.
Also, Dr Roy had to face a grave threat within his own party when a large number of Congress dissidents, including some ministers, tried to unseat him. Dr B.C. Roy showed great determination in taking up this challenge. He showed a killer’s instinct in this power game. He dismissed the dissident ministers and re-established his hold over the party by calling an emergency meeting of the Congress MLAs who reaffirmed his leadership by an overwhelming majority.
Bidhan Chandra Roy was destined to dominate West Bengal politics and also play a leading role in national politics for nearly two decades. Meanwhile, a drastic change came about in the West Bengal Congress Party with the so-called Hooghly-Medinipore group led by Atulya Ghosh assuming dominant position, by and large replacing the East Bengal-based leaders. Atulya Ghosh became the president of the provincial Congress Party and gave solid support to Dr B.C. Roy during his entire regime. Very soon the Gandhian group in the Congress, under the leadership of Dr P.C. Ghosh, left the Congress to found the Krishak Praja Party, which was to merge into the Kisan Mazdoor Praja Party of J.B. Kripalani at the all-India level. Dr B.C. Roy could now turn his attention to restoring law and order and also start the process of rebuilding the shattered economy of West Bengal. The years 1948–52 were the years of reconstruction, rehabilitation and stabilization. He had to spend much time and energy in undoing the adverse effects of partition, for example, emphasizing on the cultivation of jute in West Bengal and in selected stretches of Orissa and Bihar to feed the Kolkata jute mills that were traditionally dependent on jute crop from East Bengal, providing relief and rehabilitation benefits to refugees from East Bengal, restoring vital communication links and taking steps towards West Bengal’s industrial recovery.
In 1949, the princely state of Cooch Behar acceded to the Indian Union and was put under a chief commissioner temporarily. It was thereafter merged in West Bengal as one of the districts. Also, the French possession of Chandannagar (Chandernagore) became part of West Bengal as a subdivision in Hooghly District after the merger of the French territories with the Indian Union through negotiations between France and India.
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The Constitution of India came into effect on 26 January 1950 and West Bengal became a state of the Union of India. Serious communal riots in East Bengal triggered off a large-scale movement of Hindu refugees to West Bengal and Assam. Retaliatory communal riots broke out in some parts of West Bengal. The refugee problem seriously affected West Bengal’s economy. The government had also to contend with the problem of communist insurgency and the economic problems of partition, like promoting jute cultivation replacing paddy to feed the jute mills in the Kolkata industrial belt that no longer had access to it as the traditional jute-growing areas were now part of East Pakistan. The princely state of Cooch Behar merged with West Bengal and became a new district of the state.
The Nehru-Liaqat Pact, signed between the prime ministers of India and Pakistan, concerned the borders and the Hindu minority in East Bengal. It reiterated that the minority population in Bengal should generally stay on in their respective homes instead of migrating to the other country, as had happened in the case of the two Punjabs. Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee and K.C. Neogy resigned from the Union cabinet in protest against the pact, which in their opinion failed to address itself to the problem of insecurity and discrimination faced by the minority in East Bengal. Shyama Prasad formed a new political party, the Bharatiya Jana Sangh. Shortly thereafter, Jogendra Nath Mandal, the law and labour minister of Pakistan since 1947, resigned and sought political asylum in India after his arrival in Kolkata, announcing that Pakistan was no place for Hindus to live with safety and dignity. West Bengal now faced an unprecedented refugee problem. Refugee colonies sprang up along the border districts and all around Kolkata. In many instances, refugees simply squatted on the sprawling estates of rich people around Kolkata or on government land, with the authorities looking away, and shanty towns with inadequate housing and unsanitary conditions came up. Often families were separated. Giving displaced persons title to the land they squatted upon and providing them other rehabilitation benefits took many years. Unlike the refugees from West Punjab, the Bengali refugees never got any evacuee
property as very few houses or plots of land left by migrating Muslims were available in West Bengal. There was no exchange of population as between the two Punjabs.’ West Bengal always had to face migration, sometimes in trickles, and sometimes like tidal waves.
Shortly thereafter came India’s first general elections in 1951. It returned the Congress to power in the West Bengal Assembly with the Communist Party of India, whose legality had been restored by the high court, as the main opposition. Jyoti Basu led the CPI. Shyama Prasad Mukherjee was elected to the Lok Sabha from south Kolkata and made a great mark as an opposition leader in the Indian Parliament but he died an untimely death in 1953, while in detention in Kashmir for entering that state without permission and courting arrest in protest against the requirement of Indian nationals to secure a special permit to enter Jammu and Kashmir. West Bengal was grief-struck.
The question of incorporating the Bengali-speaking areas from Bihar and Assam into West Bengal occupied the forefront of attention for a while. In 1956, the Government of India set up a States Reorganization Commission. West Bengal had demanded the inclusion of Manbhum and Singhbhum districts and a portion of Purnea district of Bihar, which were Bengali-speaking districts. West Bengal also wanted the district of Goalpara in Assam. There was opposition from both Bihar and Assam. In the meantime, B.C. Roy along with Chief Minister Srikrishna Sinha pressed for a merger between West Bengal and Bihar in the interest of economic and administrative stability. However, public opinion in West Bengal did not approve of this suggestion. Following a by-election to the north Kolkata parliamentary constituency when the Congress candidate was defeated by the opposition with merger being the main issue, Dr B.C. Roy withdrew that proposal. Finally, as a result of the reorganization of the states, Purulia sub-division of Manbhum district and Islampur sub-division of Purnea district in Bihar were added to West Bengal. Islampur’s addition provided a connecting link to Darjeeling, Jalpaiguri and Cooch Behar district, with the rest of West Bengal, thereby ending the enclave status of these three districts.
India’s First Five-Year Plan (1951–56) started under Dr B.C. Roy’s leadership. West Bengal’s economy, after undoing the damages of partition, grew at a fast pace. It once again became India’s number one industrial state.
During the years 1952-59, there was a steady ascent of West Bengal’s economy to the high noon of prosperity. With his great vision and penchant for innovative ideas, Dr B.C. Roy initiated and implemented a large number of schemes like the Damodar Valley Corporation, Chittaranjan Locomotives, Durgapur Steel Project, Digha Sea Beach Project, Kalyani Township, Salt Lake Reclamation Project in Kolkata, Himalayan Mountaineering Institute in Darjeeling, Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, Indian Institute of Social Welfare and Business Management, Kolkata, Indian Institute of Mangement, Kolkata, abolition of the zamindari system, the new land reform measures in West Bengal, the Bandel Thermal Plant, proposal for a subsidiary port at Haldia, several new universities like Burdwan, Kalyani, North Bengal and Rabindra Bharati and countless other schemes. His aim, to quote him, was a prosperous Bengal in a prosperous India’. As West Bengal did not have enough land
o settle successive waves of migrants from East Bengal in the Andaman Islands, in the Terai region of Uttar Pradesh and lastly in the Dandakaranya Forest region covering portions of Orissa and Madhya Pradesh. Unfortunately these schemes were opposed by the leftists, who for their own political compulsions wanted rehabilitation only in West Bengal.
On 1 July 1962, Dr B.C. Roy’s long rule ended when he died on his eighty-first birthday. Indeed, West Bengal’s history from 1948 to 1962 can truly be called the Bidhan Roy age. Prafulla Chandra Sen succeeded him as chief minister. In October and November 1962, following border disputes along the north-eastern Himalayas, a militarily unprepared India was humbled by the Chinese in several border skirmishes. Due to these military clashes in the North East Frontier Agency areas and India’s military unpreparedness, her defence spending increased manifold with adverse effects on the economy.
The three northern districts, namely, Darjeeling, Jalpaiguri and
Cooch Behar became the centres of military concentration for defence preparedness in relation to the Chinese threats to the northern border. Vigorous construction activities in these districts to strengthen road and rail links with Assam and the north-east were started.
In 1964, serious communal riots broke out in several parts of East Bengal as a reprisal to the reported theft of a sacred relic of Hazrat Mohammad, the prophet of Islam, from a mosque in Srinagar (Kashmir). There were also retaliatory communal incidents in some parts of West Bengal. This led to large-scale migration of Hindu refugees to West Bengal who were mostly taken to the distant Dandakaranya Forest covering Orissa, Madhya Pradesh and the foothills of Uttar Pradesh (which is now part of Uttaranchal). Communal disturbances were put down in both Bengals in a short time. Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru died in May 1964. Lal Bahadur Shastri succeeded him as prime minister.
During March-May 1965, some border skirmishes took place between India and Pakistan over the Cooch Behar enclaves. In September 1965, there was a short war between these two countries along the Jammu and Kashmir and Punjab borders. A ceasefire was followed by the Tashkent Peace Agreement brokered by the Soviet Union. But the East Pakistan-West Bengal border was free from any military clashes, thanks to the decision of Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri not to extend military activities to East Pakistan. This was to pay a rich dividend in a few years.
1966 was a year of intense political unrest. The leftist parties spearheaded by the Communist Party of India (Marxist), which had broken away from the undivided CPI, launched a succession of civil disobedience movements against the government on issues like nonavailability of foodgrains and general price rise. These movements would at times lead to serious law and order problems. As the general elections drew nearer political rivalry sharpened. There was a partial split in the West Bengal Congress with two top leaders, Ajoy Mukherjee and Humayun Kabir, quitting the party and establishing the Bangla Congress. But the opposition failed to unite. Two political formations fought the Congress in the 1967 electionsthe Peoples United Left Front (PULF) consisting of the Bangla
Congress, CPI, Forward Block and the Bolshevik Party and the United Left Front (ULF) consisting of the CPI (M), Revolutionary Socialist Party, Forward Block (Marxist) and others.
But in spite of the division in the opposition ranks, the Congress. failed to secure a majority in the Assembly. Thus the long rule of the Congress Party in West Bengal ended. Both P.C. Sen and Atulya Ghosh, president of the West Bengal Provincial Congress Committee, lost in their respective assembly and parliamentary constituencies. Internal squabbles leading to a split in the party and the formation of a breakaway new party, the Bangla Congress led by Ajoy Mukherjee and Humayun Kabir, were mainly responsible for the debacle. The Congress, though the largest party, refused to stake a claim for forming the government. Now faced with the prospect of securing power, the People’s United Left Front and the United Left Front agreed to combine.
A United Front government consisting of the Bangla Congress, CPI, CPI (M), the Forward Block and other smaller parties, in a way a combination of the PULF and ULF, took over power under Ajoy Mukherjee as the chief minister and Jyoti Basu as finance minister. Soon it was to face its biggest challenge, not from the Congress, but from a section of its own extremist followers, namely, the Naxalbari agitation.
The Naxalbari agitation of share-croppers started in Naxalbari police station of Darjeeling district led by CPM extremists, who broke away from their party. It spread to a few other pockets, but its violent activities forced the United Front government to suppress this movement by police action. In November 1967, the United Front broke up and a breakaway group, the People’s Democratic Front (PDF), with the support of the Congress, was sworn in with Dr Prafulla Ghosh as chief minister. This was the second time that Dr Ghosh became the chief minister. But soon the coalition government was under strain on account of internal bickerings. Dr Ghosh’s refusal to accept certain demands from a powerful Congress Party manager led to the wavering of support from a large section of the Congress Party. An abortive attempt was made by thos sections under the leadership of a Congress leader, Sankardas
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Banerjee, to stake a claim to power. Besides, a piquant situation was created by the Speaker of the Assembly, Bijoy Banerjee, who refused to recognize the Governor’s action in dismissing Ajoy Mukherjee’s government and installing Dr P.C. Ghosh’s government and adjourned the Assembly indefinitely. As the Assembly could not meet there was a constitutional crisis.
By February 1968, the PDF government, reduced to a minority as a result of Congress’ withdrawal of support, was dismissed by the President under Article 356 of the Indian Constitution and Governor Dharma Vira took over administration. The Assembly was now dissolved.
The elections were held and a second United Front government came to power with Ajoy Mukherjee as the chief minister and Jyoti Basu as the deputy chief minister and home minister. Once again Naxalite violence continued unabated, this time joined by some idealist but misguided students who left their studies to join the Naxalite ranks. Also, the gherao movement unleashed by the leftist parties, under which industrial workers were given the freedom to physically surround industrialists and managers in industrial disputes without the intervention of the police, seriously disturbed industrial relations. Flight of capital started and continued unabated for a long time. West Bengal started losing her industrial supremacy. This was the beginning of the long process of West Bengal’s industrial downward slide caused by Naxalite violence, chronic labour troubles, flight of capital and investment, strikes and sharp deterioratio work culture and productivity. West Bengal lost her industrial primacy to other states like Gujarat, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Orissa.
In 1969, the Congress also split between the Indira Gandhi-led Congress in power at the Centre and the Congress (Organization) led by the old guard leadership. The 1971 mid-term elections to Parliament returned Indira Gandhi to power at the Centre on her Garibi Hatao slogan. The Congress (0) was seriously decimated.
Meanwhile, serious disagreement between Ajoy Mukherjee and the Communists led to the dismissal of the second United Front government and the proclamation of President’s rule again in 1970.
In the general elections to the West Bengal Assembly, a new combination with Ajoy Mukherjee as chief minister and Bejoy Singh Nahar as deputy chief minister, the Congress as a constituent party came to power (this was popularly called the Ajoy-Bejoy2 coalition) with a precarious majority. But events were moving very fast across the border. On March 23, 1971, Pakistan’s military crackdown on East Bengal was followed by the declaration of independence by Bangladesh led by Sheikh Mujibur Rahman. India expressed total support for East Bengal’s freedom. West Bengal faced a massive refugee problem with around 90 lakh refugees pouring in. The fragile coalition government was not equipped to cope with the growing problems of the state and resigned, leading to yet another spell of President’s rule. There were also military movements along the borders. A short war between India and Pakistan took place during 6-16 December 1971, when Indian forces intervened on the side of the Bangladesh freedom fighters (Mukti Bahini). On 16 December, Dhaka fell to the joint Indo-Bangladesh forces, signalling Pakistan’s total military defeat. The surrender of the Pakistan Army in Dhaka on 16 December 1971 led to the emergence of Bangladesh as a free country, no longer East Pakistan, as East Bengal was officially known in 1947-71. From now on, in terms of international law, West Bengal could no longer lay claim to the title Bangladesh’ in the political sense.
In the elections to the State Assembly held in 1972, the Congress, led by Siddhartha Shankar Ray, returned to power after winning the election amidst vociferous complaints of widespread rigging by the leftists. The Naxalite movement was put down with unprecedented ruthlessness. This led to the return of industrial confidence to some degree. However, large-scale factionalism prevailed in the Congress during the entire five-year Congress rule.
On 11 June 1975, a judgement by Allahabad High Court declared Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s election to Parliament in 1971 as invalid on grounds of electoral malpractices. Political uncertainty set in thereafter. On 25 June, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi declared a state of emergency with S.S. Ray as one of her principal advisers. The government clamped down on the press and censorship was
introduced. This was followed by arrest of political opponents and dissident journalists. The Congress party steadily lost its popularity during the two years of the emergency.
On 12 January 1977 Prime Minister Indira Gandhi declared an. end to the state of emergency and announced dates for new general elections. In March 1977, the Indira Gandhi Congress was defeated in the elections and the Janata Party government, a combine of antiemergency right and left forces, came to power in Delhi with Morarji Desai as the Prime Minister. Congress candidates were defeated in all but two of the Lok Sabha seats from West Bengal indicating that the public had not approved the emergency of 1975-76. On 30 April 1977 the Central Government dismissed the Siddhartha Shankar Ray cabinet in West Bengal on the ground that the recent Lok Sabha elections had demonstrated that the Congress had lost the people’s confidence and brought West Bengal under President’s rule. Elections were held within two months time, that is, by June 1977. The Janata Party, led by P.C. Sen and the CPI (M)-led Left Front, failed to arrive at an electoral understanding and fought each other. The Left Front, backed by its grassroot organisation, gained an absolute majority and formed the first Left Front government with Jyoti Basu as chief minister. This combine ruled West Bengal for over three decades. Jyoti Basu was chief minister for twenty-three years, that is, till 2000 when he stepped down on grounds of old age. Basu was succeeded by Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee. But there was growing opposition to the Left Front rule and eventually the Trinamool Congress led by Mamata Banerjee inflicted a crushing defeat on the leftists in 2011.
EPILOGUE
The creator of Bangladesh, Bangabandhu Mujibur Rahman’s government lasted till 1975 when he, along with all his family members except two daughters who were abroad at the time, was assassinated by a coterie of middle-level army officers due to personal vendetta. The conspiracy, no doubt backed by pro-Pakistan elements, led to Khondkar Mushtaq Ahmed, a minister in Sheikh’s government, becoming President. This lasted for a few days, when civil war conditions prevailed, with army groups fighting one another. Eventually, troops loyal to Major General Ziaur Rahman, who had no hand in Mujib’s killing, seized power and started a military dictatorship. Ziaur Rahman consolidated power and eventually transformed military rule to a democracy, starting his own political party, the Bangladesh National Party (BNP), which had a substantial number of freedom fighters. Zia was also assassinated by a group of fellow army officers whose motives were not clear. History repeated itself when the army chief, General Ershad, seized power. After a short spell of army rule, parliamentary democracy was restored, with Ershad leading his own Jatiya Dal. He had soon to contend with united opposition from two confederate groups, one led by Mujib’s daughter Hasina, and the other led by Ziaur Rahman’s widow Begum Khaleda Zia, both wanting free elections and the restoration of parliamentary democracy. Faced with this strong opposition, Ershad gave in and ordered elections to be held. But the tactical unity between Hasina Wajid and Khaleda Zia ended and a bitter confrontation ensued.
Since then, Bangladesh has been ruled alternately by the two
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coalitions led by Hasina Wajid and Khaleda Zia respectively. In 2002, Hasina’s five-year rule ended when a BNP-led coalition defeated the Awami League-led coalition in the elections. This coalition included a small component of fundamentalist Muslim parties which also found their place in the coalition government. This has become somewhat controversial. There is a view that, thanks to their overt and covert role, Muslim fundamentalism has been strengthened in Bangladesh and is threatening the national forces. Bangladesh has made great progress in economic development during the last ten years. In spite of the many political changes and violence, democracy in a broad sense appears to have been established in Bangladesh. Efforts to establish military rule from time to time have not been successful in the face of strong popular feeling in favour of electoral politics and parliamentary democracy. The main issues facing the nation are: (i) whether the ruling BNP, which has a nationalist past, can keep the fundamentalistic forces under control and (ii) whether Bangladesh can evolve as a Muslim majority but non-theocratic nationalist state like Egypt, Indonesia and Turkey.
Turning to West Bengal, during the long period of Left Front rule, despite the government’s achievements of land reforms, cultural development and Panchayat Raj leading to the empowerment of the lower classes and have-nots in the villages, West Bengals general economy has steadily declined. West Bengal’s position has slipped from among the top states as has Kolkata’s position as the foremost industrial city. The Left Front government has now completed nearly three decades of being in power and has won yet another general election in 2006. There have been some winds of change in recent years when Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, influenced no doubt by the examples of Chinese and the Vietnamese communists, has taken some initiatives to break away from dogmatism and encourage private sector initiative, foreign direct investment and market economy. But the militant trade unions are still not reconciled to it. History will decide whether these initiatives will succeed.
But the Left Front government faced opposition from the farming community spearheaded by Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress on the issue of the Tatas setting up an automobile plant on land
taken over from the farmers at Singur, which led to the cancellation of the Tata Motors plant. Thereafter, at Nandigram in Midnapore district the farmers rose in rebellion against the move to take over their farmland for the setting up of new industries. All these led to a series of mass movements and eventually the Trinamool Congress combined with the Indian National Congress defeated the Left Front in both the Lok Sabha elections on 2009 and the state assembly elections of 2011. This was indeed a turning point in West Bengal’s history.
There is no doubt that people from both the Bengals cherish their commonality of cultural outlook and shared attitudes over other factors. In the case of Bangladesh, while they are proud of their own language and cultural identity, they have to guard against two powerful ‘pulls’: first, pan-Islamic Wahabi Islamic fundamentalism and jehadi fanaticism and second, the powerful pan-Indian cultural and social system. Naturally, they have to strike a balance in the face of these strong pulls. While they are proud of their Bengali cultural identity, they are also proud of their Islamic heritage, but would not like to see their Bengali identity being swamped by either of these two. Similarly, Bengalis in India have to balance their trans-national Bengali cultural identity with the very powerful force of pan-Indian identity of which they are also partners. The fact is, in a world where Bengali-speaking people today constitute the fifth largest language group, Bangladesh willy-nilly has assumed the driver’s seat of championing Bengali cultural identity and values and West Bengal has necessarily to play the second fiddle. But this is an unavoidable cultural situation which all Bengalis, whether belonging to Indian Bengal or to Bangladesh, will have to contend with.
Considering that there are several leading examples in history like the union of Poland after three partitions, the union of the two Germanys and of the two Vietnams, one can envisage that the two Bengals, even though politically separate, can have much commonality in terms of their common culture, their shared history and geography and economic complementarity. In a larger context one can also envisage a loose confederation between Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, which can create by far the strongest entity in the comity of nations. After all, history moves on and there can always be hope for the best.