INFORMATION TO USERS This manuscript has been reproduced from the microfilm master. UMI films the text directly from the original or copy submitted. Thus, some thesis and dissertation copies are in typewriter face, while others may be from any type of computer printer. The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality or the copy submitted. Broken or indistinct print, colored or poor quality illustrations and photographs, print bleedthrough, substandard margins, and improper alignment can adversely affect reproduction. In the unlikely. event that the author did not send UMI a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted Also, if unauthorized copyright material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. Oversize materials (e.g., maps, drawings, charts) are reproduced by sectioning the original, beginning at the upper left-hand comer and continuing from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps. Each original is also photographed in one exposure and is included in reduced form at the back of the book. Photographs included in the original manuscript have been reproduced xerographically in this copy. Higher quality 6" x 9" black and white photographic prints are available for any photographs or illustrations appearing in this copy for an additional charge. Contact UMI directly to order. UMI A Bell & Howell Information Company 300 North Zeeb Road. Ann Arbor. MI48106·1346 USA 313!761-47oo 800:521-0600 Order Number 9519439 Discourses ofcultural identity in divided Bengal Dhar, Subrata Shankar, Ph.D. University of Hawaii, 1994 U·M·I 300N. ZeebRd. AnnArbor,MI48106 DISCOURSES OF CULTURAL IDENTITY IN DIVIDED BENGAL A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE DIVISION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF HAWAII IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN POLITICAL SCIENCE DECEMBER 1994 By Subrata S. Dhar Dissertation Committee: Michael J. Shapiro, Chairperson Andrew Arno Wimal Dissanayake Kathy Ferguson Sankaran Krishna Syed A. Rahim To my father who sacrificed his life for an identity. Now I wonder, why! iii Acknowledgments Throughout this dissertation, one point I have endeavored to make, rather emphatically, is that the subject is embedded in the prevalent discourse with much less autonomy than perhaps what we are inclined to credit to her or him. Therefore, as the 'tangible author' of this text, I should not hesitate to make one more enunciation in order to claim validity of the text and that is, my authorship is really problematic. What I enunciate here as the author of this dissertation is the function of the intertextuality in which I am embedded. Therefore, credit should be shared with all others who contribute to the prevalent intertextuality. Aside from numerous predecessors in the field, whom I have hopefully credited duly throughout the text, there are a few more with whom I share the authorship of this text more directly. Prof. Michael J. Shapiro was not only the Chairperson of my dissertation committee, indeed, he was always a source of intellectual inspiration to me. Attending his classes for three years before I started writing this dissertation had given me the insight which helped me look at the construction of identities in South Asia rather differently. This dissertation bears the marks of his iv presence in many ways. I express my deepest gratitude to him. When my immersion into certain ideas blurred the larger picture containing variety of perspectives, all my committee members came to my rescue. My interaction with them has always been emancipatory. Prof. Kathy E. Ferguson reminded me of the gendered voice of nationalism; Dr. Wimal Dissanayake was keen on the articulation of identity in the literary discourses and he introduced me to a number of very useful sources in this regard. In many conversations, Dr. Syed A. Rahim discussed his perceptions about the dynamics of South Asian politics and how it related to identity formations in contemporary Bengal. This provided me with an opportunity to reexamine my own perceptions more meticulously. Prof. Majid Tehranian has always taken interest in my work. His encouragement and appreciation always made me confident about the merit of my work. Prof. Andrew Arno initiated me into critical theory when I was a student of Communication at the University of Hawaii. It was a pleasure to have him on my committee. And, I take the opportunity to express my sincerest gratitude to Prof. Sankaran Krishna. Aside from his exceedingly valuable and informed comments on my dissertation, in Prof. Krishna, I found a very caring and compassionate friend with whom I shared my moments of joy and my moments of agony. The period when I was working on v this dissertation was in many other ways a very stressful period for me. Prof. Krishna was always there to console me and provide me with the necessary moral and emotional support. I would also like to express my gratitude to Prof. Phyllis Turnbull of the Dept. of Political Science at the Ulliversity of Hawaii and Mr. Larry E. Smith of the East-West Center. Their love, affection and encouragement have significantly contributed to the completion of this work. This study has been made possible by an award from the East-West Center and a research grant from the Ford Foundation, Dhaka, made available through the Social Science Research Council (SSRC), New York. The East-West Center award supported me through the period of initial course work and provided me with a grant for preliminary field research. The SSRC Fellowship allowed me to stay in Bangladesh and West Bengal for a longer time for an extensive field research. Social Science Research Council also organized a Bangladesh Workshop in Srilanka where a number of Bengal experts were invited. Paul Greenough, James Boyce, Abu Abdullah and Neeta Kumar sensitized me to a number of issues which otherwise wouldn't get adequate attention. I am also grateful to anonymous staff members at India Office Library, London, Indian National Library, Calcutta, Dhaka University Library, Dhaka, and Hamilton Library, University of Hawaii. I am especially thankful to Lynnette vi Wageman and Monica Ghosh at the Asia Collection section of the Hamilton Library for locating extremely rare materials for me. They arranged to have a number of rare books and numerous reels of microfilmed newspapers from other libraries, especially, the Center for Research Library at Chicago. And, my wife Madhumita was always there to soothe me when I seethed, to sacrifice her own time to make my time useful and productive, to take care of the family through a traumatic period and let me go abroad to finish my dissertation. My son Shayan finally accepted, with a discernible discontent that there is a thing called 'dissertation' which takes away much of his time with his father. My three-month-old daughter Kakon created the urgency for finishing my work in Hawaii and going back home immediately. It worked. vii Abstract cultural identity has always been the central issue in Bengal politics. But the parameters for defining identity always kept changing in keeping with the dominant modes of politics. Before the colonial intervention in Bengal, perception of identity was congruent with the cultural practices prevalent in a syncretistic system of social intelligibility. In early nineteenth century, new perceptions emerged in the terrain of reformism through a dialogue between the 'rich past' of India, rediscovered by the orientalists and their local cohorts from the ancient scriptures, on the one side, and modernity and Western rationalism on the other. In the wake of nationalism in late nineteenth century, the 'rich past' was reconstituted to negotiate its meaning with the politics of the present, and that was to confront colonial masculinity. This cultural nationalism, being a tailored response to coloniality, underestimated the possibility of intrinsic social diversities in perceptions of identities and the resistance from within. Therefore, it soon found its own configuration debilitating. The ethos of politics under the spell of the 'divide and rule' pOlicy of the colonial rulers, around the same time, foregrounded religious identities with another round of selective viii historicization of the past. All these agonistic perceptions led to the telos named 'partition' in 1947. But it was then again the beginning of another endless trail. East Bengal seceded from Pakistan historicizing and asserting an identity other than religious which was found to be empowering. But contentions are still there. Alternative imaginings of identities, irreconcilable to each other, have their own historicizable past and essentializable tradition to keep the space of politics always fraught with uncertainty. This dissertation focuses on the contentious terrains of politics and culture where agonistic identities are continually produced, essentialized and legitimated by historical narratives. The contention here is that enunciation of each identity is inextricably related to a particular imagining of power in the present. And, the locutionary environment, rather than the enunciating subject, quite often provides the clue as to what identity is empowering and what is to be historicized and essentialized. ix Contents Acknowledgments. •. .•. ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... .. ~ ~ Abstract. .. ... ... ... .. 0 ••• ••• ••• ••• ••• ••• ••• Vl.l..1 Introduction. .. ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... .. 1 Section One: Theoretical Considerations .•.•.•...... 19 Chapter 1: Identity, Difference