Hungry Bengal: War, Famine and the End of Empire

by Janam Mukherjee

The years leading up to the independence and accompanying partition of India mark a tumultuous period in the history of Bengal. Representing both a major front in the Indian struggle against colonial rule, as well as a crucial Allied outpost in the British/American war against Japan, Bengal stood at the crossroads of complex and contentious structural forces - both domestic and international - which, taken together, defined an era of political uncertainty, social turmoil and collective violence. While for the British the overarching priority was to save the empire from imminent collapse at any cost, for the majority of the Indian population the 1940s were years of acute scarcity, violent dislocation and enduring calamity. In particular there are three major crises that shaped the social, economic and political context of pre-partition the Second World War, the Bengal famine of 1943, and the Calcutta riots of 1946. Hungry Bengal examines these intricately interconnected
events, foregrounding the political economy of war and famine in order to analyse the complex nexus of hunger, war and civil violence in colonial Bengal at the twilight of British rule.

Genres: History, India, Nonfiction, Bangladesh, Asia, Politics, World War II

336 pages, Hardcover

First published November 1, 2014

Reviews

[Aditi Mukherjee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bengal has ironically been a land of abundances and famines. A background to the geographical, economic and political history of this land is imperative to understand Bengal and its people. Janam Mukherjee’s Hungry Bengal is just that – an insightful history of the pre-independence Bengal with focus on WWII and its impact on colonial Bengal.

The book changes many a perceptions. For starters – the very definition of famine; that it could be caused by the inability of a certain section of the society to procure food rather than the common perception of ‘unavailability of food’. The book also reveals the financial and psychological impact of WWII on the Indian subcontinent, particularly Bengal. And although it highlights the British Prime Minister’s apathy towards suffering Indians, it is the indifference of our own people in powerful positions that comes out as the greater betrayal.

In 1943, Bengal did not suffer so much from the drought that it did from denial of rice and boats. In the name of war, cultivators were paid a pittance for the rice they were made to sell forcefully, later appropriated and stored in government and corporate godowns which then rotted while people across Bengal starved to death. Even the essential personnel (industrial workers) for whom the rice was meant, did not always benefit from it. ‘The anyhow underfed Bengalies’ as said by Churchill were dispensable, an inexpensive and accepted collateral damage in the greater scheme of things in the British war. This is in stark contrast to the arrangement that the British government made for their own citizens, so much so that during the entire period of the war, the average health of British citizens was surprisingly quite good.

The description in Hungry Bengal of famine struck Bengal slowly draining of its compassion is heart-wrenching; the dispassionate disposing of the dead bodies only a glimpse of their importance when alive.

Also, the British policy of divide and rule cannot be any clearer than during this period. When the Indian National Congress protested the Indian involvement in the unrelated WWII, the British reason for preference of the Muslim league was celebrated. The riots following the Direct Action day in August 1946 were planned against the British, but the fact that they turned communal brought much relief to the Brits. Hungry Bengal covers the post-famine communal riots in great detail with emphasis on the effect of longtime deprivation of food and resources on the poor despite their social background.

I highly recommend the book to anyone who is interested in South Asian history, politics and socio-economic health of the Indian diaspora during the colonial times.

[Conrad Barwa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book that weaves a long duree history of the Bengal famine with the pressures of WWII in the Eastern theatre and the rising tide of Indian nationalism and communalism. Mukherjee provides a convincing link between the deficiencies of colonial policy in reaction to the Japanese invasion of SE Asia, the Great Calcutta killings of 1946 and the structural violence caused by mass deaths due to famine, disease and disaester that wracked much of the Bengal countryside during the period.

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book examines the circumstances around the Bengal Famine in 1943 in India, where millions of people died due to starvation, mostly caused by WWII and government incompetence. It's a very dense book to read, but fascinating especially if you are curious about the history of famine, disease, WWII, or India.

[Nallasivan V. · Rating 5 out of 5]

An in-depth enquiry into Bengal famine and various factors contributing to it, like colonial negligence, communal politics and wartime profiteering. A brilliant historical account of the much-overlooked part in Indian history!

[Sandhya Murukan · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the most devastating chapters in India's history—the Bengal Famine of 1943 and everything that followed because of it.

Right from the start, the author asks us to look at famine differently. Not to see it only as a human tragedy, but as something unfairly shaped by political decisions and the choices made by people in power.

It begins when India was under British rule during World War II. After Japan invaded Burma in 1942, the British became worried about a possible invasion of Bengal and introduced policies like removing boats and rice from many coastal areas (the Denial Policy).

People were already poor and struggling, and these decisions made things much worse. Food became too expensive for ordinary people, millions went hungry, and the Bengal Famine claimed countless lives.

Then its the second famine, the spread of diseases like cholera, malaria, and chickenpox, continued deaths, migration to cities like Calcutta, the Calcutta riots, and finally Partition.

Political decisions during the war turned a food shortage into a disaster that cost millions of lives.

One of Janam Mukherjee's major arguments in this book is that the famine changed Bengal for a very long time.

The damage didn't stop when people stopped starving. It made many people lose trust in British rule, created more anger and increased tensions between Hindus and Muslims. He tells how the effects of the famine carried on for years and played a part in the Calcutta riots of 1946 (Direct Action Day) and eventually Partition in 1947.

I am glad that I picked this particular book by Janam Mukherjee to understand this part of our Indian history. It was heartbreaking, but it helped me understand the “why"behind the whole tragedy much better.

Not an easy read, but an important one. Huge respect for Janam Mukherjee and the years of work that went into this book 🙌🏽

[Titas Bose · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's a book horrifying and disturbing in detail but very bold and precise in its analysis. The author deconstructs in granular depth the different levels of structural and individual violence in Bengal and in Calcutta from 1943-46, pushing back against overarching and all encompassing political rhetoric. Most importantly he draws a tangible link between the devastating famine, the impunity of the colonial state in their lack of efforts in alleviating it, the continuation of famine-like conditions despite the end of the second world war, and the outbreak of riots that together massacred close to 4 millions. Despite official rhetoric pushing for seeing these as disparate events connected individually to anti-colonial rhetoric, the second world war and partition, this long linked trajectory unravels how a society got continuously dehumanized by hunger, scarcity and blatant governmental neglect. Combining police records, eyewitness accounts, oral histories and journalistic sources, it holds accountable the motivations of the Muslim League, the Hindu Mahasabha and the Congress and recovers the individual actions and motivations of people and labor communities (such as dock workers, mill workers, corpse burners, etc)instead of subsuming them into a uniform rhetoric of a mad population gripped by communalism. In my reading, the thick description, which at times gets difficult to read, makes an important intervention into seeing these events as moments of unprecedented crisis coming at the inevitable culmination of famine, war, hunger, scarcity and dislocation (dislocation due to famine much before the "exchange of populations), rather than understanding them retrospectively as a history of Partition. It lays bare how little common people really understood the full implication of partition, both in terms of material reality and its devastating psychological effect.

Very relevant for your divisive times.

[Ilora Roy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I finally finished this book after oh so many months. There are some really dense and data heavy parts that makes it hard to get through, but Mukherjee does an incredible job humanizing the people affected by the Great Bengal Famine and placing their experiences in context. There are so many insightful excerpts throughout. An incredible piece of work.

[Reese Gaw · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the most psychologically difficult books I've ever read. The horrors which the British unleashed on India are widely ignored by westerners. This book perfectly captured the extreme racism of Britain and it's leaders

[Barnali · Rating 5 out of 5]

The book is a brilliant take on the otherwise neglected history of Bengal Famine. It problematizes the historic event as well as the factors that led up to it. Politics, history and famine are all dealt with deft academic astuteness in this fascinating book.

[Rana Das · Rating 3 out of 5]

very informative book. it explains causes beyond the established rhetoric. but some times the book feels a bit tiresome due to its tautological explanation of some things. over all a good read.. - 3.5/5

[abby]

read for modern india reading colloquium

[Audrey Josa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Visceral, but truthful. It's a piece that synthesizes how this crisis came to be and what factors exacerbated the situation.