Peasant Movements

Nankar Uprising
Context of Nankar movement
• Nankar was a kind of social and economic
system of feudalistic society in the
Eastern part of Bangladesh, in particular,
Sylhet district
• The word nankar comes from the word nan
that means ruti
• Nankar is an Urdu word. In Bangla several
synonyms of nanker exist, for example,
Begar Protha, Chakran Protha
• Nanker refers to when a man could be
rented through the exchange of ruti
Land distribution under Nankar system

• Under the Nankar system, a landlord

distributed a limited size of land among
peasant
• In exchange of this land the nankars
were forced to provide unlimited labour
in the landlord’s land
• The nankars were known to nankar
proja, khane bari proja or begar proja,
or chakran proja
 Land use under nankar system
• Nankar did not have any freedom to use
this land
• Non transferable land
• Non-permanency
• Could use only for feeding
• No legal basis
• No right on other product, for example
trees
 Landlord’s right and nature of works under
Nankar system
• Unrestricted right
• Forcible
• Skill based nankar system
Types of skill-based Nankar
• Kiran – Muslim household workers
• Vandari – Hindus household workers
• Nomoshudro – Hindus fisheries
• Patni – Hindus fisheries
• Mymol – Muslim fisheries
• Malakar – Hindus Mali
• Dhuli _ Hindus drummer
• Bajni – Muslim drummer
• Dhopa
• Napit
• Hajam
• Jhalo – Hindus fisheries
 Nankar Uprising (1945-50)
• Emerged from Individual to group level
• For example, Zamindar Royech Mia and Nankar
Mothura Dhupi in Bahadurpur
• Formation of agrarian somity in Laota-Bahadurpur
in 1946

Demands as follows
• Eviction of Nankar system
• Expulsion of exploitation of Zamindar
• Eviction of gift system of Zamindar
• Introduce govt tax measurement into land system
• Define the tax system of land
• Suspension of tax on production
• Formation of law of suspension of nankar system
 Tevaga Movement
• Zamindar imposed any kind of tax on land
• Through this process the peasant became the
landless or semi-landless after the second
world war
• A kind of Adhiyar system introduced in the tax
of land system

Two kind of adhiyar system:

1. half of the crops needed to transfer as a form
of tax; or
2. The peasant needed to pay tax yearly on the
crops, if failed they needed to adjust it next
year
 Consequences of taxation system of land

• Moreover, most of cases, the peasants

were illiterate and they could not
document how much they loaned from
the lenders
• They did not get any receipt of paying
tax or loan
• Therefore the peasants were failing in
trap of loan cycle
 Income and Expenditure of a family in Jolpayguri
Income (10 bigha land Tk Expenditure (family) Tk
Rice mon @ 6.50 tk 325 Rice 351
Jute 50 Oil, Salt etc 12
Auyush 36 Garment 24
Bichali 50 Tax on home 2.50
Total 461 Repair of home 30
Adhiyar (half) 230.50 Medicine 20
Total 454.50

Cost for land

Zamindar 230.50
Cows 40
Plough 6
Seed 9.50
Others 26
Total 312
Grand total 766.50
• Peasants organised movement where they
got support from Bangiyo Kroshok Somaj
• The key demand of this movement was to
the peasant must get two-third of the
crops

Other demands were included:

• Possession rights of the sharecroppers
• 12.5% tax or 5 kg rich as a form of tax
• Suspension of all kind of other tax
• Distribution of all kind cultivated land
• Instead of Zamindars farm, crops brought
to peasant home
 Tevaga as a political movement
• Communist party supported the Tevaga
Movement
• Spread out 19 district in Bengal: Dinajpur,
Mymensingha, Jessore, Medinapur, Jolpaiguri,
Rangpur, Chabbishporgona, Khulna, Bogura,
Hugli, Bakuri, Birvum, Maldaho, Pabna, Hayor,
Dhaka, Chittagong, Nodia, Faridpur
• From Sep to Nov in 1946 organised mass
movement in some districts
• Formed Tevaga Committees
• Mass gathering and distribution of leaflets
• Brought rice and other cultivation to peasant
home
• Conflict between peasants and zamindars’
paramilitia
• Supported by Congress and Muslim
League in 1946
• 22 January 1947 Bangiyo Borgardar
Samoyik Ayeen
 Language movement
Group work
How far you know the language
movement?
 Language movement
The first phase (from 1947-51)

• In its first National Educational Conference held in

Karachi in 1947, the Pakistan rulers reassessed the
British Education System in the Pakistan and set up
the Islamic religious ideology as the vision for
whole education system (Kabir, 2016).
• Intellectual leader of "Islamic Nationalism," argued
that Urdu would be the official language and
medium of instruction in Pakistan. Urdu should be
the only state language of Pakistan
• July 1947, the Rector of Aligar University
recommended, similar to Hindi as state language of
India, Urdu as a state language of Pakistan
 Opinion of Dr Shahidullah
• In an article entitled ‘The crisis of state language
in Pakistan’ published in Daily Azadi said, “...the only
logic against English language that it is not a native
language of any province of Pakistan dominion. The
same logic is applicable for Urdu”
• Saying that imposing Urdu on the Bengali speaking
population is against the scientific theory of
education, right to self-determination and
provincial autonomy.
• "If Urdu or Hindu instead of Bengali is used in our
law, courts, and universities, that would be
tantamount to political slavery”.

• Protest held in DU to the state-sponsor National

Education Conference in Korachi
 The initiative of Tamuddin Mazlish
• Initiated by some students and teachers of
Dhaka University in September 2 1947
• In September 15, 1947 published a booklet
September 1947 entitled "Pakistaner Rashtra
Bhasha, Bangla na Urdue” (Pakistan's State
Language, Bengali or Urdu)
• The Secretary of Tamuddin Mazlish, Prof Abul
Kashem proposed:
• 1. Bengali language shall be the following:
A. Medium of instruction of East Pakistan
B. Medium of court communication
C. Medium of office of communication
• 2. the language of the central government will
be both Urdu and Bengali
• One contributor in the booklet, professor Kazi
Motahar Hussain, argued that the attempt to
impose Urdu as the national language stands for
the possibility of replacing old masters with
new ones from the same religion.
• He maintained that the attempt to impose Urdu
against the will of the people of East Bengal
would result in total failure.
• He even warned that "it might lead to the end
of the relationship between the East and the
West.”
• However, the federal government failed to
appreciate the depth of feeling of majority of
people of Pakistan
• As a result, Rastrobhasha Songram
Parishad was formed by students and
cultural activists in Dhaka in October
1947
• Protested exclusion of Bengali language
from newly issued money, postal stamps,
coins and office forms of the
government of Pakistan
• October 5, 1947, the first street
demonstration by the students and
teachers of Dhaka University
 Language movement in 1948
• This general optimistic view began to change when the
central government adopted a formal decision to impose
Urdu on the Bengalis during the first session of the
Constituent Assembly of Pakistan (CAP) in late February
1948.
• Dhirendranath Dutta, a member of the opposition
Congress Party from East Bengal, moved an amendment
motion to accept Bengali as one of the official languages
of the CAP.
• According to Dutta, "the state language should be the
language which is used by the majority of the people of
the State, and for that, Sir, I consider that Bengali
language is a lingua franca of our State. ''
• According to Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan "the object
(of the amendment to introduce Bengali as lingua franca)
seems to be to create a rift between the people of
Pakistan and to take away from the Muslims that unifying
link which can be achieved by a common language. ''
• Liaquat Ali Khan concluded his speech with an
unambiguous decision to make Urdu the sole
national language:
• “Pakistan is a Muslim state and it must have as
its lingua franca the language of Muslim
nation...[P]akistan has been created because
of the demand of a hundred million Muslims
in this subcontinent and the language of the
hundred million Muslims is Urdu. It is necessary
for a nation to have one language and that
language can be Urdu and no other language”.

• In reality, only 3.3% of the total population in

Pakistan had Urdu as their first language.
• After the debate in the Constituent
Assembly, Liaquat Ali Khan's position was
rejected by the university students,
academicians, linguists and journalists in
East Bengal.
• On February 26, 1948, students of Dhaka
University called for "hartal" (strike), and
on March 2nd, a State Language
Committee of Action was formed.
• A general strike was observed as a protest
day throughout East Bengal on 11 March.
• The Government with its usual political
manoevers portrayed the student agitation
as" nothing but a plot of the Hindus and
enemy agents out to destroy Pakistan by
fomenting discontent. ‘’
• The chief minister, Kwaja Nazimuddin, agreed to
sit with the students of the Action Committee.
• In the negotiations a seven point program was
adopted. Two of the program's most important
items were:
(1) In the April (1948) session of the East Bengal
Legislative Assembly a special resolution would be
moved to propose to the Constituent Assembly of
Pakistan to make Bengali one of the state languages
of Pakistan and to give Bengali the same status with
Urdu in the competitive examinations of the central
services of Pakistan.
(2) In the month of April another resolution would be
moved in the East Bengal legislative Assembly to
make Bengali the official language of the province
of East Bengal in place of English.
• Besides English, it argued that, Bengali will be the
medium of instruction.
• Jinnah visited East Bengal in March 1948, and
addressed a public meeting on 21 March, as well
as the students of Dhaka University on 24
March.
• The main thrust of his two speeches was that
the enemies of Pakistan had seized the
language issue to destroy Pakistan.
• On 21 March, he declared: “Let me make it
very clear to you that the state language of
Pakistan is going to be Urdu and no other
language. Anyone who tries to mislead you is
really the enemy of Pakistan. Without one
state language, no nation can remain tied up
solidly together and function. Look at the
history of other countries. Therefore, so far
as the state language is concerned,
Pakistan's shall be Urdu”.
• And again while addressing the students
of Dhaka University, he reiterated the
same opinion:”There can only be one
language. If the component parts of this
state march forward in unison, that
language, in my opinion, can only be
Urdu”.
• Jinnah identified the demand for
Bengali as "provincialism" and
contrasted the latter with his own
vision of "Pakistani patriotism.”
 Second phase (1952)
• The colonial relationship between West Pakistan
and East Bengal was firmly established and the
initial euphoria among the Bengali Muslims about a
better future in "Islamic Pakistan" was dashed.
• The entire middle class was increasingly
disillusioned as various administrative jobs were
filled by non-Bengali West Pakistanis.
• The feeling of estrangement of the Bengalis from
West Pakistan grew as the economy of East Bengal
was held in the firm grip of the incoming West
Pakistani bourgeoisie.
• As Kabir argued, "as Bengali frustrations in the
field of politics, economy and administration were
reaching a climax, their linguistic identity gained
increasing salience. ‘’
• In this background, the Pakistani State continued
its effort to subvert the demands of Bengalis.
• Fazlur Rehman, a Bengali Central Minister, tried
to impose the Arabic alphabet on Bengali.
• Similarly, the Provincial Government of East
Bengal, in accord with the Central Government,
set up a committee on 9 March 1949 to reform
the structure of the Bengali language.
• When the East Bengal Language Committee
submitted its report to the central authority, it
argued:
• “1) that the Sanskritization of the language be
avoided as far as possible by the use of simple
phraseology and easy construction in vogue in
the speech of East Bengal.
• 2) that the expressions and sentiments of
Muslim writers should strictly conform to the
Islamic ideology.
• 3) that all the Sanskrit principles having no direct
and important role to play in the principles of
Bengali grammar, be omitted and only genuine
Bengali principles existing in the language and
envisaged in this report be found out and
established as principles of Bengali grammar.
• 4) that the unintelligible technical terms of
Sanskrit grammar imported to Bengali grammar,
which made the confusion worse, be substituted
by the simple non-technical terms of Bengali
language”.
• Meanwhile, a set of constitutional proposals,
alternatives to the proposals of the Basic Principles
Subcommittee was adopted at a National
Convention held in Dhaka.
• The Unitary State of Pakistan should be made into
the United States of Pakistan (USP), and that the
USP should consist of two regional states, West
and East Pakistan (East Bengal). In the USE Urdu
and Bengali should be the two national languages.
• Against this background, the Prime Minister of
Pakistan, Nazimuddin, announced at the Dhaka
session of the ruling Muslim League on 26
January 1952 that "Urdu will be the state
language of Pakistan. ‘’
• This announcement triggered the language
controversy once again and a new phase in the
Bengali language movement was initiated.
• A new All Party (except the ruling Muslim
League) State Language Committee of Action
was formed.
• The turning point came on February 21, 1951,
when police firing at student demonstrators
resulted in several deaths, A "hartal" was
organized by the All Party Committee of
Action.
• On the night of February 20 the State also
imposed Section 144 of the Criminal Procedure
Code banning demonstrations and public
meetings.
• Students, however, defied the government ban
and held protest meetings.
• The army and paramilitary forces were called
to restore "law and order."
• As a result of police shooting several students
were killed, hundreds were injured, and
thousands were arrested.
• The students that were killed attained shahid
(martyr) status and entered the Bengali psyche
forever.
• Spontaneous strikes continued on the following
day.
• The immediate aftermath of February 21 was a
classic case of the radicalization of mass
consciousness with a great degree of
spontaneity this part could be explained by the
fact that after February 21 the movement took
a massive turn as it spread to the rural areas
and the peasant masses stood solidly behind
the students.
• The peasants' support can be explained partly
by the fact that most of the students came
from the rural areas.
• But it was primarily due to their disillusionment
and frustration with the State of Pakistan. The
overall socio-economic conditions had
deteriorated, as the state of Pakistan firmly
established a colonial relationship with East
Bengal.
• Thus, from 1952 onwards the Bengalis of
Pakistan drew inspiration from the
sacrifices made on February 21 in all their
subsequent snuggles.
• Moreover, the social mythology of the
martyrs or the shahids of the "Bhasha
Andolan" created a profound impact on the
collective will of the Bengali masses.
• In the process of the creation of this
mythology, the "Bhasha Andolan"
constituted the center of gravity of a new
nationalist discourse articulated by the
Bengali subaltern social classes.
Rise of Economic & Intelligentsia Groups

• Group work
• Do you have any idea of intelligentsia
group?
Rise of Economic & Intelligentsia Groups
Concept of intelligentsia
• The word 'intelligentsia' first appeared in the
1860s, when a group of Russians used it to
define their own intellectual circle.
• Believing in 'revolution, atheism and
materialism',
• They were largely inspired by Nikolay
Chemyshevsky's utopian novel, Chto Delat
(What is to be done?), which was published in
1863.
• The intelligentsia insisted that literature
should be a mechanism for socialist propaganda.
• Many of the prominent Bolshevik leaders who
were to seize power in 1917, including Lenin and
Stalin, were members of the intelligentsia.
• The term 'intelligentsia', then, arises
out of an aggressively secular in fact,
anti-religious social philosophy.
• The Oxford English Dictionary defines
it as 'The class consisting of the
educated portion of the population and
regarded as capable of forming public
opinion'.
• In modern usage, both Tolstoy and
Chemyshevsky would be considered part
of a broad intelligentsia.
• Currently, 'intelligentsia' is generally used
in English to mean the best educated and
most articulate section of society the
group often referred to in Britain and the
United States as 'the chattering classes'.
• It embraces both secular and religious
traditions.
• The intelligentsia are believed to have the
ability to influence public opinion, politics
and the values of the society in which they
are located.
Emergence of Intelligentsia group in Bangle
1. Intelligentsia ancient and medieval Bengal
• The Bengal under Hindu and Buddhist regimes
were governed essentially by priestly classes
who constituted the intelligentsia of the time.
• Their approach to intellectualism was
conformity to established institutions and
customs and rituals.
• Their status and authority enabled them to
impose their interpretations on society.
• The caste system was the principal mechanism
for the preservation and continuation of their
dominance.
• Under the more egalitarian Buddhist
influence, theoretically a more relaxed
social environment for people outside
the priestly class to acquire learning.
• In practice, few people had the
opportunities, means or motivation to go
for learning and enter the realm of the
ruling intelligentsia.
• 2. Intelligentsia Mughal Bangle
• During Mughal period a significant section of
the population is believed to have been
converted from Hinduism and Buddhism to
Islam led by Sufis who were both spiritually
and intellectually inclined.
• The darbars or courts of the Bengal nawabs in
the eighteenth century consisted of amirs and
mutsuddis.
• The mutsuddis (bureaucrats) were mostly
educated, and upper-class brahmins. The
judiciary was manned by muftis who were
educated Muslims.
• The pre-colonial intelligentsia had some distinct
characteristics.
• Their serious writings were in Persian,
and Sanskrit and Pali
• Literary and scientific works were
always addressed to the priestly and
ruling classes.
• For example Ghulam Husain Salim,
Ghulam Husain Tabatabai, Mirza Nathan,
Shihabuddin Talash and others wrote in
Persian. The contents of their works
were also elitist.
3. Intelligentsia British period
• For negotiations between the companies
and the local government, vakils (lawyers)
and banians were engaged by both parties.
• Working as agents for the Europeans, the
banians successfully convinced the Mughal
government that granting the English the
privilege of duty-free trade in the country
and the zamindari in Calcutta would be
beneficial to the country and to the ruling
aristocracy.
• They made significant contributions to the
formation of the colonial state.
• Joynarayan Ghoshal, a poet and mystic of
the late eighteenth century, was a banian
to the English.
• So was Raja Rammohun Roy who worked as
a mutsuddi and diwan of the company
officials until he came to settle in Calcutta
in 1815.
• The permanent settlement (1793) created
a socially ruling class in the persons of
zamindars and taluqdars .
• It was the members of this landed class
who first availed the modern education
provided by the colonial rulers.
• The early nineteenth century intelligentsia drew
their inspiration from three major sources:
• the colonial administration, orientalism-
spearheaded by the Asiatic Society and Fort
William College and new western education.
• Therefore Calcutta was the centre of this new
intellectualism.
• Many were critical of many aspects of British rule,
but, at the same time, loyal and even grateful to
colonial rule.
• The new intelligentsia viewed the British as
deliverers who had liberated India from the
'oppressive' Mughal rule
• However, traditional Muslim intelligentsia like Fakir
Maznu Shah, Balaki Shah of Bakerganj, Aga
Muhammad Reza Beg of Syhet, Nawab
Shamsuddaula of Dhaka and Titu Mir of Barasat
looked at British rule differently.
• Economic development and improved
communications during the nineteenth
century such as the opening of railway
networks during 1885-86, the creation of
the Municipality of Dhaka in 1864, and the
establishment of schools and colleges
helped to revive Dhaka and Eastern Bengal,
creating the conditions for the emergence
of a larger educated class or intelligentsia.
• This progress was consolidated by two
events in the first decades of the
twentieth century: the Partition of Bengal
and the creation of the University of
Dhaka
a) Bangle partition
• Partition of Bengal, for six years, from 1905-1911,
Dhaka was the capital of Eastern Bengal and Assam.
• This gave it the status and infrastructure of a
modern provincial capital
• On 16 October 1905, the day that the partition
became legally effective, Khwaja Salimullah,
established the Eastern Bengal and Assam
Mohammedan Provincial Union (later Provincial
Mohammedan Association) to unite the Muslims of
the new province.
• The following year, Sir Salimullah broadened his
platform by founding the All-India Muslim League.
• In 1908, he formed the East Bengal and Assam
Muslim League, to develop Muslim political debate
within the new province.
• All of these organisations were primarily
vehicles for the elite of the Muslim
community.
• Membership of the Provincial Mohammedan
Association, for instance, was limited to
'men of social position and dignity'.
• Similarly, the Muslim League was at that
time largely a vehicle for Muslim
aristocrats across India to gain further
recognition and patronage than they were
already receiving from the British Raj.
b) Establishment of University of Dhaka
• The annulment of partition created the
conditions for a major step forward in terms of
the development of the Eastern Bengal
intelligentsia.
• The foundation of Dhaka University in 1921.
• Sir Salimullah had raised the issue at the first
meeting of the Muslim League in 1906.
• The Dhaka University represented a significant
counterweight to Calcutta.
• Most Hindus from West Bengal opposed the
establishment of Dhaka University, notably
Surendranath, Bipin Chandra Pal, Rashbehari
Ghose and (for obvious reasons) Sir Ashutosh
Mukherjee, the Vice-Chancellor of Calcutta
University.
• The influx of teachers and students, of
booksellers and publishers, meant that
Dhaka could establish its own intellectual
tradition, rooted in Eastern Bengal, to rival
the intelligentsia of Calcutta.
• Intellectual thinking in Bengal was never
straightforwardly communal, and many of
the arguments were about economics as
much as culture or religion.
• Given Bengal's history and demography,
the intellectual development of Dhaka and
Calcutta tended to polarise along religious
lines.
• Dhaka University made distinctive
contributions towards the rise of a Muslim
intelligentsia.
• A critical class of Muslim writers
committed to social change emerged from
Dhaka University
• In the late 1920s, this band of Muslim
teachers and students organised
themselves into a syndicate named Muslim
Sahitya Samaj with the intention of
introducing liberalism in Muslim social
thought and Muslim social structure.
• They published an annual magazine called
Shikha or burning torch to which the Rebel
Poet Kazi Nazrul Islam also contributed.
• This band of renascent writers, who
became known as the Shikha Group,
challenged many of the dogmatic aspects
stifling Muslim society.
• The English-educated Muslim intelligentsia
of Bengal became more self-consciously
Muslim in their public discourse and more
aware of their roots in Eastern Bengal as
they used the ideas of the Muslim League
to mobilise the Muslim masses to realise
their vision of a separate country called
Pakistan.
4. Pakistan period
• The intelligentsia of East Pakistan down to
the early 1960s were by and large
believers in the concept of Pakistan.
• Their discourse during this period was
inspired by Muslim nationalism and was
laden with examples of Hindu-Muslim
differences.
• But the language and autonomy questions
had a sure and certain impact on the
integrity of Pakistan.
• Many intellectuals had already begun to
raise doubts about the two-nation theory
• The doubt was particularly pronounced among
leftist intellectuals who guided the language
movement and whose activities led to the birth
of several political parties opposed to the
Muslim League.
• These intellectuals pointed out that the
economic disparities between East and West
Pakistan were so enormous that there were
essentially two different economies.
• East Pakistan, they pointed out, was still
treated as a colony rather than as an equal.
• The intelligentsia successfully influenced the
two-economy idea to politicians who later
developed a Six-Point Program which attempted
to give East Pakistan greater autonomy.
• This explains why the intelligentsia became the
special target of the Pakistani army's genocidal
revenge during the War of Liberation.
• A small section of the intelligentsia, however, did
not support the Six-Point Programme and remained
loyal to the concept of Pakistan.
• During the war of liberation they joined hands with
the occupation army in winning local and
international support in favour of Pakistan.
• The intelligentsia greatly influenced the state
formation process of Bangladesh and its
constitution, particularly the incorporation of the
policies of secularism, nationalism, socialism and
democracy.
• The intelligentsia's influence on the affairs of the
state was at its peak from 1969 to 1975.