Marichjhapi massacre

Coordinates: 22°06′25″N 88°57′04″E / 22.1070°N 88.9510°E / 22.1070; 88.9510
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Marichjhapi incident
Date24 January 1979 (1979-01-24) – 18 May 1979 (1979-05-18)
Location
Marichjhanpi

22°06′25″N 88°57′04″E / 22.1070°N 88.9510°E / 22.1070; 88.9510
Parties
Hindu Refugees from East Pakistan who fled from Dandakaranya (mostly Namasudras)
Lead figures
Casualties and losses

Sources put it between 50-10000[2][1]

2(official)

Marichjhapi massacre (also known as Marichjhapi incident) refers to the eviction of Bengali Hindu[1][2] Dalit refugees[3] who settled on legally protected reserve forest land on Marichjhapi[4][5] island in the Sundarbans, West Bengal, in 1979, and the subsequent massacres and deaths by disease of Hindu refugees.[2][6]

Background[edit]

During and after the division of Bengal, many Hindu Bengalis fled communal violence in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh). The first flow was of refugees who were mostly upper and middle class Hindus who were able to resettle in West Bengal. However most lower caste Hindus remained behind. But this latter huge flow of poor, mostly low-caste Hindus[7] couldn't be accommodated in Bengal. This later surge reached its peak in 1970's. During this time in 1976 Ram Niwas Mirdha said in Lok Sabha that Bengal had become saturated and relocating migrants was inevitable.

There was resistance from refugees (hailing from wetland marshy coastal landscape) against the relocation to wastelands. However, after initial resistance from they were forcibly sent to "rocky inhospitable semi arid land" of Dandakaranya (mostly in Orissa, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh),[8][9] Terai (Uttar Pradesh, now in Uttarakhand), and Little Andamans. Most of them were destined to bear the brunt of an already failed Dandakaranya Project.

Left Front leaders like Ram Chatterjee then opposed the relocation policy of Union Govt[citation needed]. They reached out to migrants by visiting camps in Dandakaranya and promised them that if the Left Front comes to power in West Bengal then all migrants would be brought back and settled in Bengal itself.

Incident[edit]

Once the Left Front came to power in 1977, the Hindu refugees started to return to Bengal in huge numbers. Approximately 150,000 refugees, which was almost all of Dandakaranya, arrived.[9] But the Left Front had changed its policy on refugee settling and considered the refugees as a burden to the state, and that the refugees were not the citizens of West Bengal but of India.[8] Approximately 150,000 Hindu refugees, which was almost all of Dandakaranya, arrived, where most of them were deported back. In the meanwhile around 40,000 refugees went south to Hasnabad, Hingalganj and Geonkhali, and about 15,000 settling in the small island of Marichjhapi (renamed by them as "Netaji Nagar"), a protected place under Reserve Forest Act.[10] A survivor claims that there were only shrubs on the island when they came.[11] They attained self-sufficiency fishing for food and had built schools and hospitals on their own. However they had to travel to nearby Islands for obtaining grain and clean drinking water.

The Communist government considered the Hindu refugee settlement unauthorized occupation of a reserved forest land, and claimed that with subsequent chain of migrations that it may lead to in that area could result in a severe ecological disaster. It pressured the Hindu refugees to vacate. On 24 January 1979, the Communist-run Government of West Bengal clamped prohibitory orders under Section 144 of the CrPC around the island of Marichjhapi. The police and the district administration started a complete blockade. Thirty police ferries started patrolling the island,[11] preventing food and clean water access to the residents of the island. Under the blockade, the starved Hindu refugees were forced to consume contaminated and poisoned water resulting in dozens of deaths.[2]

Eyewitness accounts say that on 31 January, the police opened fire on the Hindu refugees who settled on the island, when the refugees allegedly attacked a police camp with traditional weapons,[12] killing at least 400-500[2] refugees. After 15 days, the Calcutta High Court ruled that "The supply of drinking water, essential food items and medicines as well as the passage of doctors must be allowed to Marichjhapi".[13]. Several attacks continued in the months that followed. Hindu refugee women were kidnapped at night and raped to pressure their families.[2] Over 6,000 huts were burnt down. Eyewitness accounts recount the participation of Communist Party of India (Marxist) cadres in the carnage against the refugees.[1] They also recount bayonets being thrust into fifteen school kids – aged between five and twelve – who had taken shelter inside the thatched hut that was their school and their skulls being crushed. The kids had gathered there to make arrangements for Saraswati Puja, which was to be celebrated the next day. The policemen had smashed Saraswati’s idol before they left. The process of firing, rape and threats against the Hindu refugees continued till May.[1]

Some of the remaining 250-300 refugees were then forcibly relocated to Dandakaranya while the rest were escorted in police launches to Hasnabad. Some of them were settled in Marichjhapi Colony near Barasat while others rehabilitated themselves in the shanties near railway tracks in Sealdah.[14] Some of the survivors resettled themselves in Hingalganj, Canning and nearby areas.[15]

Death toll[edit]

Different accounts have put the death toll anywhere between 50 and over 10,000.[2] The official toll was two.[16][17]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c d e Deep Halder (11 May 2019). "The Left massacre of migrant Hindus in Bengal that was bigger than 2002 & 1984". theprint.in. ThePrint. Retrieved 16 July 2020.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g "Marichjhapi massacre: Forgotten story of Hindu refugees slaughtered in Bengal". India Today. Retrieved 3 September 2023.
  3. ^ Dilip Mandal. "40 yrs ago, the Left mercilessly massacred Dalit Bengalis. Now, it's back to haunt them". The Print.
  4. ^ Soumya Sankar Bose. "Where The Birds Never Sing". Red Turtle Photobook.
  5. ^ Sengupta, Debjani (3 October 2018). "The Forgotten Massacre of Dalit Refugees in West Bengal's Marichjhapi". The Wire.
  6. ^ Deep Halder (11 May 2019). "The Left massacre of migrant Hindus in Bengal that was bigger than 2002 & 1984". theprint.in. ThePrint. Retrieved 16 July 2020. Not much is known about the Marichjhapi incident that took place under the Jyoti Basu government on a tiny island in the Sundarbans where Hindu refugees had settled.
  7. ^ Pramanik, Asim (23 March 2014). "1979 Marichjhapi killings revisited". The Statesman. Archived from the original on 6 October 2014. Retrieved 4 October 2014.
  8. ^ a b Chowdhury, Debdatta (2011). "Space, identity, territory: Marichjhapi Massacre, 1979". The International Journal of Human Rights. 15 (5): 664–682. doi:10.1080/13642987.2011.569333. S2CID 144052321.
  9. ^ a b Mallick, Ross (2007). Development Policy of a Communist Government: West Bengal Since 1977. Cambridge University Press. p. 99. ISBN 978-0-521-04785-2.
  10. ^ Mallick, Ross (February 1999). ""Refugee Resettlement in Forest Reserves: West Bengal Policy Reversal and the Marichjhapi Massacre"". The Journal of Asian Studies. 58 (1): 104–125. doi:10.2307/2658391. JSTOR 2658391. S2CID 161837294.
  11. ^ a b Halder, Deep (17 May 2019). "'We were attacked thrice': A survivor's story of the Left Front government's siege of Marichjhapi". Scroll.in. Retrieved 27 April 2020.
  12. ^ ""Controversies that dogged the pragmatic chief minister"". The Telegraph. 18 January 2010. Archived from the original on 21 January 2010. Retrieved 29 January 2012.
  13. ^ "The Tale of Marichjhapi :Review of the book "Marichjhapi chhinna desh, chhinna itihaash"". radicalsocialist.in. Retrieved 4 October 2014.
  14. ^ Mitra, Sukumar (6 July 2011). "Today English Newspaper Update Headlines India- the Sunday Indian Online Magazine - - the Sunday Indian" গণহত্যার সুবিচার হবে!. The Sunday Indian (in Bengali). Archived from the original on 23 June 2013. Retrieved 29 May 2012.
  15. ^ Mitra, Shyamalendu (3 August 2011). তিন দশক পরে মরিচঝাঁপির ফাইল ফের খুলল রাজ্য. Anandabazar Patrika (in Bengali). Archived from the original on 16 January 2013. Retrieved 29 May 2012.
  16. ^ Bhattacharya, Snigdhendu (25 April 2011). "Ghost of Marichjhapi returns to haunt". Hindustan Times. Retrieved 5 August 2013.
  17. ^ Sankha Ghosh (27 November 2019). "Bauddhayan Mukherji busy with his 'Marichjhapi' project". The Times of India. Retrieved 16 July 2020.

Further reading[edit]

  • Mandal, Jagadish Chandra (2002). Marichjhapi: Naishabder Antarale. Sujan Publications.
  • Sengupta, Sukharanjan (2010). Marichjhapi Beyond & Within. FrontPage Publications.
  • Halder, Deep (2019). Blood Island: An Oral History of the Marichjhapi Massacre. HarperCollins Publishers India.
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