Partition of Bengal

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Partition of Bengal may refer to the partition of the Bengal region on two occasions:

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Partition of India</span> 1947 division of British India

The Partition of India in 1947 was the change of political borders and the division of other assets that accompanied the dissolution of the British Raj in the Indian subcontinent and the creation of two independent dominions in South Asia: India and Pakistan. The Dominion of India is today the Republic of India, and the Dominion of Pakistan—which at the time comprised two regions lying on either side of India—is now the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and the People's Republic of Bangladesh. The partition was outlined in the Indian Independence Act 1947. The change of political borders notably included the division of two provinces of British India, Bengal and Punjab. The majority Muslim districts in these provinces were awarded to Pakistan and the majority non-Muslim to India. The other assets that were divided included the British Indian Army, the Royal Indian Navy, the Royal Indian Air Force, the Indian Civil Service, the railways, and the central treasury. Provisions for self-governing independent Pakistan and India legally came into existence at midnight on 14 and 15 August 1947 respectively.

Events in the year 1947 in India. It was a very eventful year as it became independent from the British crown, resulting in the split of India and Pakistan. Many people died during partition and India became a democracy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Radcliffe Line</span> Boundary of the Partition of India

The Radcliffe Line was the boundary demarcated between the Indian and Pakistani portions of the Punjab Province and Bengal Presidency of British India. It was named after Cyril Radcliffe, who, as the joint chairman of the two boundary commissions for the two provinces, had the ultimate responsibility to equitably divide 175,000 square miles (450,000 km2) of territory with 88 million people.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bengal Presidency</span> Administrative unit in British India

The Bengal Presidency, officially the Presidency of Fort William in Bengal and later Bengal Province, was a subdivision of British India. At the height of its territorial jurisdiction, it covered large parts of what is now South Asia and Southeast Asia. Bengal proper covered the ethno-linguistic region of Bengal. Calcutta, the city which grew around Fort William, was the capital of the Bengal Presidency. For many years, the Governor of Bengal was concurrently the Governor-General of India and Calcutta was the de facto capital of India until 1911.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Swadeshi movement</span> 1905–1947 Indian movement for domestic cloth production

The Swadeshi movement was a self-sufficiency movement that was part of the Indian independence movement and contributed to the development of Indian nationalism. Before the BML Government's decision for the partition of Bengal was made public in December 1903, there was a lot of growing discontentment among the Indians. In response the Swadeshi movement was formally started from Town Hall at Calcutta on 7 August 1905 to curb foreign goods by relying on domestic production. Mahatma Gandhi described it as the soul of swaraj (self-rule). The movement took its vast size and shape after rich Indians donated money and land dedicated to Khadi and Gramodyog societies which started cloth production in every household. It also included other village industries so as to make village self-sufficient and self-reliant. The Indian National Congress used this movement as arsenal for its freedom struggle and ultimately on 15 August 1947, a hand-spun Khadi tricolor Ashoka Chakra Indian flag was unfurled at Princess Park near India Gate, New Delhi by Jawaharlal Nehru.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Direct Action Day</span> 1946 sectarian violence in British India

Direct Action Day was the day the All-India Muslim League decided to take "direct action" for a separate Muslim homeland after the British exit from India. Also known as the 1946 Calcutta Killings, it was a day of nationwide communal riots. It led to large-scale violence between Muslims and Hindus in the city of Calcutta in the Bengal province of British India. The day also marked the start of what is known as The Week of the Long Knives. While there is a certain degree of consensus on the magnitude of the killings, including their short-term consequences, controversy remains regarding the exact sequence of events, the various actors' responsibility and the long-term political consequences.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Partition of Bengal (1905)</span> 1905 territorial reorganization of the Bengal Presidency by the British Raj

The first Partition of Bengal (1905) was a territorial reorganization of the Bengal Presidency implemented by the authorities of the British Raj. The reorganization separated the largely Muslim eastern areas from the largely Hindu western areas. Announced on 20 July 1905 by Lord Curzon, then Viceroy of India, and implemented on 16 October 1905, it was undone a mere six years later. The nationalists saw the partition as a challenge to Indian nationalism and as a deliberate attempt to divide the Bengal Presidency on religious grounds, with a Muslim majority in the east and a Hindu majority in the west. The Hindus of West Bengal complained that the division would make them a minority in a province that would incorporate the province of Bihar and Orissa. Hindus were outraged at what they saw as a "divide and rule" policy, even though Curzon stressed it would produce administrative efficiency. The partition animated the Muslims to form their own national organization along communal lines. To appease Bengali sentiment, Bengal was reunited by Lord Hardinge in 1911, in response to the Swadeshi movement's riots in protest against the policy.

The Partition of Bengal in 1947, part of the Partition of India, divided the British Indian Bengal Province along the Radcliffe Line between the Dominion of India and the Dominion of Pakistan. The Bengali Hindu-majority West Bengal became a state of India, and the Bengali Muslim-majority East Bengal became a province of Pakistan.

Harendra Coomar Mookherjee, also spelt as H.C. Mukherjee, was the Vice-President of the Constituent Assembly of India for drafting the Constitution of India before Partition of India, and the third Governor of West Bengal after India became a republic with partition into India and Pakistan.

East Bengali Refugees are people who left East Bengal following the Partition of Bengal, which was part of the Independence of India and Pakistan in 1947. An overwhelming majority of these refugees and immigrants were Bengali Hindus. During the Bangladesh liberation war with West Pakistan, an estimated ten million people of East Pakistan fled the country and took refuge in India particularly in the Indian states of West Bengal and Indian North East region, especially Tripura and Assam.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Eastern Bengal and Assam</span>

Eastern Bengal and Assam was an administrative subdivision (province) of British India between 1905 and 1912. Headquartered in the city of Dacca, it covered territories in what are now Bangladesh, Northeast India and Northern West Bengal.

United Bengal was a proposal to transform Bengal Province into an undivided, sovereign state at the time of the Partition of India in 1947. It sought to prevent the division of Bengal on religious grounds. The proposed state was to be called the Free State of Bengal. A confessionalist political system was mooted. The proposal was not put up for a vote. The British government proceeded to partition Bengal in accordance with the Mountbatten Plan and Radcliffe Line.

Midnapore or Medinipur is a city in West Bengal, India.

First Partition may refer to:

Second Partition may refer to:

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Greater Bangladesh</span> Theory about an expanded Bangladesh

Greater Bengal represents the ideological assertion that Bangladesh will inevitably expand its sphere of influence to include the Indian states that currently has, or historically had, large populations of ethnic Bengali people. These include West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand, and Odisha in the west, Sikkim to the north, and the states of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura, Mizoram, Manipur, and Nagaland in the east. The first and only real attempt at forming such an entity was made in 1943 by the Indische Legion under Bengali Nationalist Subhas Chandra Bose, de facto leader of the Azad Hind movement. Such endeavors, however, failed to ultimately materialize due to Germany and Japan’s loss in World War II.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bangamata</span> Personification of Bengal

Baṅgamātā, Bangla Maa, Mother Bengal or simply বাংলা/ Bangla, is a personification of Bengal created during the Bengali Renaissance and later adopted by the Bengali nationalists. In Bangladeshi, Bengali and Indian Bengali poetry, literature, cultural and patriotic song, she has become a symbol of Bangladesh and India's West Bengal & Tripura and considered as a personification of the People's Republic of Bangladesh. The Mother Bengal represents not only biological motherness but its attributed characteristics as well – protection, never ending love, consolation, care, the beginning and the end of life.