SOME ASPECTS of SOCIETY and POLITICS in BENGAL 1927 To
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SOME ASPECTS OF SOCIETY AND POLITICS IN BENGAL 1927 to 1936 Thesis submitted for the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY at the University of London by Bazlur Rohman Khan School of Oriental and African Studies University of London February 1979 ProQuest Number: 11010376 All rights reserved INFORMATION TO ALL USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a com plete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. uest ProQuest 11010376 Published by ProQuest LLC(2018). Copyright of the Dissertation is held by the Author. All rights reserved. This work is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States C ode Microform Edition © ProQuest LLC. ProQuest LLC. 789 East Eisenhower Parkway P.O. Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106- 1346 Bazlur Rohman Khan SOME ASPECTS OF SOCIETY AND POLITICS IN BENGAL, 1927 to 1936 ABSTRACT Chapter I discusses Muslim politics in Bengal during the period under review, analysing the social structure of the Muslim community and the background of the articulate segment of that community. The problems of leadership, of the formation of political groups and of their strategies in legislative politics are reviewed, and the responses elicited by the prospect of constitutional advance. Chapter II deals wi. th Hindu politics in the same years, in both social and strictly political aspects. The nature of the two m ajor groups, at leader and follower levels, and of their ties with fringe groups is discussed, and the objects for which they fought. The relationship of provincial with national and of provincial with Calcutta Corporation politics is discussed, and the general strategies of the provincial Congress. Chapter III concentrates on student politics— the process of political orientation, and the sociological and psychological factors involved therein. Student organisation and action— their strengths and weaknesses are considered, and the relationship between activist students and elder politicians and party groupings. Chapter IV deals w.th the politics of violence-—the formation and organization of terrorist parties, their aims and objectives, the response they elicited from government and from constitutional parties, and the effectiveness of terrorism as a political instrument. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS *1 wish to express my sincere thanks to the staff of the following libraries for their assistance and co-operation in the course of my research for this work: the School of Oriental and African Studies Library, the University of London Library, the British Library, the India Office Library and Records, the Cambridge University Library, the Centre of South Asian Studies Library, Cambridge, and the Bodleian Library, Oxford. I have received encouragement and help in various ways from many friends in connection with this work. I take this opportunity to thank them all. I thank especially Dr. W. Zaman, Dr. M. Rahman, Mr. P.N. Chaudhsan, Mr. A.M. Choudhury, Dr. P. Addy and Mr.R.Wahhab for extending their ungrudging help in the preparation of this work. I owe, however, a special debt of gratitude to my wife who has braved many difficulties and much personal discomfort to make possible this work, which without her help and encouragement could scarcely have been completed. To my daughter, for her patience with an abstracted father, I would also add my thanks. CONTENTS r - PAGS # 1 Abstract W1 cknowledgements Abbreviations R f l Introduction Chapter I •••• Muslim Politics 13 Chapter II •••• Hindu Politics 88 Chcxpter III Students and Politics 171 Jj'/V .%r,j Chapter IV Politics and Violence 226 Conclusion 335 Appendices 340 Bibliography 364 ♦ V 5 ABBREVIATIONS B.A.R. Report on the Adm inistration of B e n g a l. B . P . R . Report on the Police Administration in the Bengal Presidency. 0 . P . R . Report on the Police Adm inistration in the Town and Suburb of Calcutta. C.U.C.R. Report of the Commission appointed by the Government of India to enquire into the condition and prospects of the University of Calcutta, Calcutta University Commission Report, 1919. ....... D . N . B . Dictionary of National Biography V. R J* (institute of Historical Study, Calcutta). P tparf en ftctli'c (n 5"£via <rAorj un F . R . Bengal Government's Fortnightly Report on the internal political situation. First and second half of month indicated by (l) and (2) respectively. G. of B . Government of Bengal. G . of I. Government of India. G. of I.C . P. Procs. Government of India. Confidential Political Proceedings. 1 .A .R . Indian Annual Report. I.Q.R. Indian Quarterly Report. J.C.E. Joint Committee on Indian Constitutional Reform (Session 1932-33), Minutes of Evidence given before the Joint Committee—on Indian Constitutional Reform. J.C.R. Report of the Joint Committee on Indian Constitutional Re form . L / P & J / 6 Public and Judicial Department Papers, L / P & J /7 Public and Judicial Papers (Political F ile s ) . L/PO. Private Office Papers. M. M. P. C .I. Moral and M aterial Progress and condition of India. Q. R .P . E. B. Quinquennial Review of the Progress of Education in Bengal. S . C . R . Sedition Committee Report. Simon Commission,!. Report of the Indian Statutory Commission. Vol. I - Survey. S im o n Ibid. Vol. II - Report. Commission, II. S im o n Memorandum Submitted by the Commission, V III Government of Bengal to the Statutory Commission. S im o n Extracts from Official Oral Commission, XV. E v id e n c e . S im o n Selection from M emoranda and Commission, XVI, Oral Evidence by non-officials. and X V I I . VR. Viceroy. INTRODUCTION This study attempts to review certain aspects of Bengal politics from 1927 to 1936 with reference to the society of that time. This decade, though a key period in the politics of the entire sub-continent, is still relatively unexplored as regards Bengal, particularly as regards Muslim Bengal. Several works have been written on Bengal dealing with this period. J.H . Broomfield's Elite Conflict in a Plural Society : Twentieth-Century Bengal deals mainly with institutional, particularly legislative politics and concentrates mainly on Hindu politics in the period between 1912 and 1927. L.A . Gordon's Bengal : The Nationalist Movement 1876-1940 concentrates more on personalities; moreover it covers such a long period that the years here in question are of necessity treated cursorily. D. M. Laushey's Bengal Terrorism and the Marxist Left. Aspects of Regional Nationalism in India, 1905- 1942 focusses only on one aspect of the Bengali terrorists, namely their conversion to Marxism . Kenneth Mcpherson in his book The Muslim Microcosm : Calcutta, 1918 to 1935 really dealsfas the title indicates, only with urban politics in the metropolitan city. J.G. Drummond's 'The Working of the Bengal Legislative Council under the Government of India Act, 1919’ (Cambridge University Ph. D. Thesis) too concentrates on legislative politics only. Sumit Sarkar's The Swadeshi Movement in Bengal, 1903-1908 does not coincide with my 8 period, although it helps as a good background work. The decade under review, however, merits a more thorough evaluation than has hitherto been attempted because of the intensive political and constitutional activities which were taking place in Bengal and elsewhere in British India during these years. The year 1927 opened with a realignment of Hindu and Muslim politicians on communal lines after the breakdown of the Bengal Pact of 1924. In 1923 twenty-one of the thirty-nine Muslim members of the provincial legislature were returned on the Swarajya party tickets ; in 1927 this party could lay claim to only one Muslim member in the Bengal legislature, a pattern that recurred till 1936 when the tenure of the 1919 Act elapsed. Another landmark in 1927 was the appointment of the Indian Statutory Commission (Simon Commission) setting in motion a new constitution making process in India and bringing in its trail a wave of political activity in the province. The anti-Simon Commission agitation reinforced by the Congress' adoption of independence as its political goal at the Madras session late in 1927 in turn produced a rift in the ranks of the Congressmen, the Bengal Congress suffering most therefrom. The Congress had dissociated itself from the constitution making process except for Gandhi's attending the Second Round Table Conference as the sole representative of the 9 C o n g re s s , The year 1936, on the other hand, marks the end of the provincial dyarchy introduced under the 1919 Act. A new constitution providing for a largely extended provincial legislature with a new UpperH ouse and for provincial autonomy under the Government of India Act, 1935 was introduced in Bengal in 1937 following an election under the new constitution. The reasons for taking 1927 as a starting point and 1936 as a terminating point are clear enough. I have tried to avoid the tedium of mere chronological narration and have endeavoured to explain particular events and political actions in relation to the socio-economic structure of Bengal, and against the sociological and psychological background of the political activists and leaders. I have tried to assess the impact of external influ ences on the politics of the province, be it communal, revolutionary or nationalist. The Indian nationalist movement as a whole was not a monolithic one, nor was it in Bengal. Various groups experimented with varying strategies — loyalist, pacifist, constitutional, agitational and even revolutionary. At times different groups entered into unstable and shifting alliances. This study focusses on these shifts and turns in political initiatives. Central to the politics of Bengal during the period was the question of leadership.