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Socio-Political Movements in North Bengal (A Sub-Himalayan Tract) Edited by Publish by Global Vision Publishing House Sukhbilas Barma

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Socio-Political Movements in North Bengal (A Sub-Himalayan Tract) Edited by Publish by Global Vision Publishing House Sukhbilas Barma Socio-Political Movements in North Bengal (A Sub-Himalayan Tract) Edited by Publish by Global Vision Publishing House Sukhbilas Barma North Bengal and Its People Sukhbilas Barma ABUL FAZAL has commented in Ain-i-Akbari, ‘North from Bengal is the province of Coach (Koch), the Chief of which commands 1000 horses and 100,000 feet (the usual oriental exaggeration). Kamrup, which is also called Kamtah (Kamota, the old capital) makes a part of this dominion’. Stray references to the land and people of modern North Bengal, the core area of North Bengal are available in the Ramayana, Harivansa, Brahmanandapurana, Vishnupurana, Raghuvamsa, Brihat-sanghita, Yoginitantra and the Greek work ‘Periplus of the Erythronean Sea’, of the first century AD. The land was then known as Pragjyotishpur and then Kamrup and as the land of the Kirats. The name of Bhagadatta, the king of Kamrup has been mentioned in the Mahabharata, described as a king of the Mlechchhas, taking part in the battle of Kuruskshetra on the side of the Kauravas with his army of Chinese and Kirata. Early History Vaskarvarman is the best known king of Kamrup since the seventh century A.D. He ruled over the whole of the Brahmputra valley in Assam and over considerable areas of Dr. Sukhbilas Barma: A retired I.A.S Officer, Dr. Barma held important positions in the Government of west Bengal. 2 Socio-Political Movements in North Bengal the north of Bengal. He was contemporary to Harsha- vardhana of Kanauj and Sasanka of Bengal. Prof. Suniti Kumar Chattopadhyay thought that this seventh century king of Kamrup was a kirat or an Indo-Mongoloid. He was a devotee of Siva and from this, the Pundits came to the conclusion that the Hinduisation and sanskritisation of the leading sections of the Indo-Mongoloid people had taken place by the seventh century. According to Hieu-en-Tsang, the Chinese traveller to the kingdom of Vaskaravarman, Kamrup included the whole of Assam valley and extended upto the Karatoya river in the West. In the ninth century the history of the area became a part of the history of Pala kings within whose domain were included Vanga and Varendra. By the end of the tenth century, the Kambojas dispossessed the Palas of certain parts of their empire in Varendri of North Bengal. The Pundits think that the Kambojas might have been originally an Indo-Mangoloid tribe speaking one of the Tibeto-Burman languages but they had become Saivite Hindus and have accepted Sanskrit as their court language as is evident from the stone-pillar inscription of a Siva temple at Bangarh of Dinajpur. It thus appears that successive waves of Indo-Mangoloids had become sanskritised and Hinduised. In the eighth decade of the eleventh century, the Palas were dispossessed of their kingdom by the Kaivarta chief Divyok. Tabaquat-I-Nasiri by Minhaj-i-Siraj describing the expedition of Muhammad Bakhtyar Khilji to Tibet, suggests that there were independent, semi-independent and tribal chieftains named as Bhuinyas within Kamrup, in spite of the rule of the Kamteswar king. At the end of the thirteenth century, a feudatory chief named Durlabhnarayan became supreme in Kamrup. According to Rudrasingha’s Burunji, Durlabhnarayan had North Bengal and Its People 3 brought a number of Brahmans and Kayasthas from the Gangetic places who had settled in Coochbehar district or Brahmaputra valley. In the lineage of those Kayasthas was born the famous Vaishnava poet and preacher Sankardeva in 1449. Durlabhnarayana’s line could not continue long and they were uprooted by the Dhwaja kings—Niladhwaja, Chakradhwaja and Nilambar with the capital of Kamtapur at Gosanimari. Ghiyasudin Azam Shah (1389–1409), the Illyas Shahi king of Gauda, invaded Kamrup but could not advance beyond the Tista-Karatoya, being forcefully resisted by the joint force of Kamtapur-Kamrup and Ahom king. Again, Rukunuddin Barbak Shah (1459–1474) sent Shah Ismail Ghazi to war against the king of Kamtapur-Kamrup and Ismail faced the defeat in a battle that took place near Santoshpur in Dinajpur. In 1498, Alauddin Hussain Shah (1493–1519) launched a vigorous campaign against Nilambar, the king of Kamtapur- Kamrup being instigated by Nilambar’s Brahmin minister, whose licentious son had been brutally killed by the king. Taking recourse to a clever strategy, Hussain Shah could gain entry into the inner citadel and captured Nilambar at long last. Hussain Shah then proceeded to invade the Ahom Kingdom but could not succeed, though he achieved limited temporary gain. Immediately after this, Haridas alias Haria Mandal became a powerful feudatory chief and his son Biswa Singha waged wars against the neighbouring Bhuinyas and annexed their territories. He then crowned himself as the Kamteswar king of Kamtapur-Kamrup. He held his coronation in accordance with proper Vaidic rites presided by the Brahmins and attended by Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas and Sudras to formally acknowledge the sovereignty of the king. According to the Pundits, Biswa Singha formally declared 4 Socio-Political Movements in North Bengal himself to be Hindu along with a large number of his civil and military officials. They are of the opinion that it is through Biswa Singha that the large scale sanskritisation of the Koches began which eventually led to their assumption of the caste name Rajbanshi. Out of the vast number of population groups residing in North Bengal, belonging to Austric, Tibeto-Chinese, Dravidian, Indo-European – all the four families, the single largest group is the Rajbanshis. Given below the figures of the Rajbanshi population of 2001 census which show the major population groups of the districts of North Bengal: TABLE 1 Districts Darjeeling Jalpaiguri Cooch Uttar Dakshin Malda Behar Dinajpur Dinajpur Total Population 1609172 3401173 2479155 2441794 1503178 3290468 Major Community wise SC Population. Bagdi 70 431 2836 879 1060 2305 Jalia Kaibarta 1326 9541 45330 25389 9500 13411 Koch 199 472 1251 1687 3454 5224 Namasudra 41555 286708 165514 99237 39172 101444 Palia / Pan 32887 69403 27637 Rajbanshi 129904 811567 972803 405140 224988 144158 Major Community wise ST Population. Bhutia 45014 13777 151 112 40 23 Lepcha 31210 780 65 26 19 16 Mech 2159 32912 167 04 54 Munda 17189 83252 1309 4432 26496 4901 Oraon 66978 360876 5916 12496 41797 13125 Rabha 5 12221 2280 21 4 3 Santhal 14709 33312 999 94304 153634 146723 North Bengal and Its People 5 The population figures of Rajbanshi (Census 2001) relating to the districts of North Bengal as percentage of total district population may be helpful for futher understanding. In the district of Darjeeling, SC people including Rajbanshis constituting more than 60 per cent reside mostly in the plains i.e., Siliguri subdivision. It is therefore, evident that Cooch Behar, Jalpaiguri and Siliguri Sub-division of Darjeeling district is the core area of Rajbanshi inhabitation (see table 2). Our study concerns the Rajbanshis, the major group of people, the sons of the soil of the northern part of Bengal, popularly known as North Bengal which has recently been claimed as Kamtapur by a section of the ethnic group. A part of the tribal people of the region, namely, Rabha, Mech (Bodos) have also joined the Rajbanshis in their claim for a separate State as the sons of the soil. They put forward the justification for separate State by citing the past glory of their illustrious history, namely the history of Kamtapur in the 15th century. Even they go further back to the glorious days of Vaskarvarman of Kamrup in the 7th century and Bhagadatta of the Mahabharata days of Kamrup. From the 15th century Kamtapur they come to the history of the Koch-Rajbanshi dynasty of Cooch Behar started under the leadership of Biswa Singha in 1515 or so and firmly consolidated by the great king Naranarayana ably supported by his brother Chila Rai who happened to be one of the greatest military generals of the world. The Koch-Rajbanshi kings ruled the region till 1950 when the state of Cooch Behar was merged with West Bengal with the abolition of princely States of Independent India. History of the Khen Dynasty The history of the rulers of Kamrup from the 15th century is well known. During this period, the kings of Khen dynasty 6 TABLE 2 Districts Male Female %age of Rajbanshi Darjiling Population Total 1609172 830644 778528 Darjiling All Scheduled Castes Total 258881 132858 126023 Darjiling Rajbanshi Total 129904 66903 63001 8.07 Siliguri Sub. Div. Population Total 818581 429124 389457 Siliguri Sub. Div. Scheduled Caste Total 209792 108518 101274 Socio-Political MovementsinNorthBengal Siliguri Sub. Div. Scheduled Tribe Total 119120 59724 59396 Jalpaiguri Population Total 3401173 1751145 1650028 Jalpaiguri All Scheduled Castes Total 1248577 642828 605749 Jalpaiguri Rajbanshi Total 811567 418066 393501 23.86 Koch Bihar Population Total 2479155 1272094 1207061 Koch Bihar All Scheduled Castes Total 1242374 636446 605928 Koch Bihar Rajbanshi Total 972803 497550 475253 39.24 Uttar Dinajpur Population Total 2441794 1259737 1182057 Uttar Dinajpur All Scheduled Castes Total 676582 348693 327889 Uttar Dinajpur Rajbanshi Total 405140 208508 196632 16.59 Dakshin Dinajpur * Population Total 1503178 770335 732843 Dakshin Dinajpur * All Scheduled Castes Total 432660 222063 210597 Dakshin Dinajpur * Rajbanshi Total 224988 115672 109316 14.97 Maldah Population Total 3290468 1689406 1601062 Maldah All Scheduled Castes Total 554165 284726 269439 Maldah Rajbanshi Total 144158 73921 70237 4.38 Total population of Six disticts 14724940 Total Rajbanshi population of Six disticts 2688560 18.26 North Bengal and Its People 7 reigned in Kamta. The Khens claimed themselves as the Kayasth but most of the scholars do not accept this claim. It is said that the first king of this dynasty Niladhwaj was a cowherd. Following the prophecy made by his Brahmin master that he would become king, Niladhwaj, helped by the Brahmin, overthrew the last degenerated descendant of the Pal family, ascended the throne, made the Brahmin his minister and embraced the Hindu religion.
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