NORTH 24 PARGANAS, West Bengal

Main Attraction: ANCESTRAL HOUSE OF RISHI BANKIM CHANDRA CHATTOPADHAYA

On March l, 1986, as a result of bifurcation of erstwhile 24 Parganas, North 24 Parganas emerged as a separate district having the name of all the 5 Sub-Divisions - curious enough - starting with the letter “B”. A survey of this district is even more curious.

Bankim Chandra Gabesana Kendra is located in the ancestral house of the ‘Emperor of Bengali Literature’ at Kantalpara, Naihati. It has (i) a museum containing documents and keepsakes on him (ii) a library containing his family collection of books and journals (Rishi Bankim Chandra Granthagar-OSangrahashala). The house is the birth-place not only of Bankim Chandra but also of some of his masterpieces, his epoch-making Bengali Periodical ‘Bangadarshan’ and his famous song ‘Bande Mataram’ which afterwards became an incantation with the revolutionaries in the Country’s struggle for independence against British Raj and is regarded as the Second National Anthem (Stotra) of Free India.

Here in this district are several other house of the 19th & 20th Century grates in different walks of life - that of - Surendra Nath, Keshab Chandra, Dinabandhu Mitra, Titumir, Haraprasad Shastri, Rakhaldas Bandapadhaya, Satyendra Nath Dutta, Bibhutibhusan Bandapadhaya and so on. The district has to its credit the Kali Temple at Dakshineswar, the ‘Shahi Masjid’ at Basirhat, Ramprasha's seat of worship at Halisahar and the Dargah of Pir Gora Chand at Haroa. The district can glory in its having the site of the ‘Dhibi’ of Khana-Mihir and Chandraketugarh at Berachampa which widen the scope of our civilization far back to remote past. Clive House at Dum Dum, Hestings House at Barasat, Sepay Mongal Pandey’s memorial column and Gandhi Ghat at Barrackpore also are places of historical interest.

Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport at Dum Dum, Yuba Bharati Krirangan at Salt Lake, works of Man’s highest technology, stand well within the territory of this district and the Sundarbans, the world’s largest Delta, falls partially within this district and is a triumph of Nature in both its beauty and fierceness.

Brief History:

Before going into the discussion about the district of North Twenty Four Parganas, it may be mentioned that there were no existence of a district named North Twenty Four Parganas that we hear now. The district was named Twenty Four Parganas only. It was only in the year 1986 this district was carved out from the erstwhile Twenty Four Parganas district.

Existence of the land form is evidence from the 2nd century A.D. writing of Ptolemy’s Treatise where it is said that the ancient land of Gangaridi was stretched between the rivers Bhagirathi-Hoogly (lower Ganges) and Padma-Meghna. What we know today as Twenty Four Parganas (undivided) was the south and the south-eastern part of the Gangaridi kingdom. Through archaeological excavation at Berachampa village under Deganga P.S., it was known that the area was directly not attached to the Gupta rules but could not avoid their cultural influence. Even when Xuanzang (c. 629-685) visited India, he found 30 Buddhist Bihar (monastery) and 100 Hindu temples throughout India of which some of those were in this region. The district was also not a part of Emperor Shashanka’s unified Bengali Empire i.e. Gauda, but it is assumed that the district which was the south-west frontier territory of ancient Bengal, was comprised in under the rule of Dharmapala (estimated c. 770-810).

During the middle half of the 16th century A.D., the region was invaded by the Portuguese pirates who used to invade and plunder many of the waterways and loot the prosperous human settlements. People left these places out of fear of being murdered, robbed, raped or captured to be sold as slaves. In the early years of the 17th century, Maharaja (King) Pratapaditya fought and resisted the Portuguese. Maharaja Pratapaditya was a Bhuian (feudal lord of Bengal who declared their sovereignty from the Mughal Empire along with another 11 Bhuians together referred as the Baro Bhuians means twelve chieftains) of Jessor, Khulna, Barisal and Greater Twenty Four Parganas. Maharaja Pratapaditya was defeated and captured in the battles of Salka and Magrahat by the Mughals. He died in prison on the way to Delhi probably in Benaras.

In the mean time, slowly but steadily the British East India Company was strengthening their position in Bengal. The small rulers of Bengal got their biggest blow when the last independent Nawab (King) of Bengal Siraj-ud-Dullah faced defeat in the battle of Plassey (1757). After the battle, the Company assigned it to Lord Clive as a personal Jaghir (zamindari) and after his death it again came under the direct authority of the Company. Thus the British rule under the mask of a trader started. In 1793, during the rule of Lord Cornwallis, entire Sunderbans were under Twenty Four Parganas. In 1802, some more parganas were attached with the district from Nadia. For administrative purpose, a separate collectorate was established in 1814. Later, Falta and Baranagar was included in the district in 1817, some potions of Nadia’s Balanda and Anwarpur in 1820 and in 1824, portion of Barasat, Khulna and Bakhargunge (now in Bangladesh) were also included to it. In 1824, the district headquarters was shifted from Kolkata to Baruipur, but in 1828, it was removed to Alipore. In 1834, the district was split into two districts – Alipore and Barasat, but later these were united again.

In the year 1824, the district got focus when the sepoys (soldiers) deployed at Barrackpur declared that they will not take part in the Burma war as crossing the sea was forbidden as per Hindu belief. The European troop opened fire on the mutineers after all negotiations failed on 2nd November. Many of them were killed, some fled and leading mutineers were hanged and the regiment (47th Bengal Infantry Battalion) was struck out of the Army list.

In the year 1857, the second mutiny by the sepoys broke out at the then headquarters of the Presidency Division of Bengal, Barrackpore. This mutiny is often referred as the First War of Independence. The mutiny is known to have been triggered by the introduction of the Enfield rifle in place of Musket among the native regiments. The cartridges of the new weapon, being manufactured at the arsenal of the Fort William, contained greased paper. The sepoys suspected, and later found true, that the grease was made of the fat of cow or pig, or both, which were highly tabooed among the Indians. In fact the greased paper was required to be torn off by teeth before loading. The rebellion was ignited with Mangal Pandey, a Sepoy of the 34th Regiment, stationed at Barrackpore on 20th March, 1857.

After the mutiny, the Queen of England took charge of India from the East India Company and India came under the direct rule of the British Emperor.

A special mention about the Neel Revolt or the Indigo Cultivators’ Revolt is a must while depicting the history of the district. The cultivation of indigo, an exotic species producing blue colour, was introduced in Bengal in 1777 by a Frenchman named Louis Bounard in two small farms near the French settlement of Chandannagar. In 1788 the Director of the East India Company urged for large scale cultivation under Company's domains with cheap native labour, to reduce the impact of high priced indigo into Great Britain from countries not under English control and to increase the export earning of the company. Consequent upon a big escalation of demand of indigo, used as dying agent in textile industry in Europe gave an impetus to some zamindars who started cultivation in lands hitherto kept fallow. Soon after the company’s servants began to take lease of lands from zamindars on pattani. The Company favoured them by enacting the Regulation VIII of 1891 which legalised the pattani and recognized the right of pattani taluqdars as landholders. Annoyed by such developments some of the leading zamindars of Bengal including Raja Rammohan Roy and Prince Dwarkanath Tagore lent the whole hearted support to the fighters for ‘free trade’ in England to end the Company’s monopoly over export business in India. There were two types of organization for indigo cultivation. Nij Chash meant cultivation under the direct supervision of Nil Kuthi with hired landless labourers whereas the raiyati chash was a system in which the planters used to give loans to the raiyats or tenants for cultivation of indigo. The Company gave powers to zamindars and pattanidars to hold any one in custody for breach of contract by exacting Regulation V of 1830.

In 1830-31 both the zamindars and British Planters jointly opposed the peasants who revolted against the cultivation system spread over Barasat, Basirhat and Bangaon Subdivisions. With the abolition of Company’s monopoly and influx of private European traders relation between the two groups became strained. For many reasons internal contradictions among the local landowning class thus increased.

Ultimately during 1859-61 the poor and exploited peasant rose in spontaneous revolt against indigo planters in the Blue Mutiny with at least some passive support from Bengali landlords. In retaliation any failure by a cultivator to act according to the wish of a planter had landed him in the inevitable dungeon of the nil kuthi (place where the indigo company’s representatives live) and subject to torture.

In Twenty Four Parganas (including areas later added) there were twelve plantations or factories spread over Barasat, Basirhat and Bangaon subdivisions. In fact the material bases of Dinabandhu Mitra’s famous play Nildarpan (Ducca, 1860) was the Bengal Indigo Company’s kuthi at Mollahati of Jessore district (presently in Bangladesh) and the main factory at Rudrapur village in the district.

The first notable resistance was led by a farmer of the village of Chaugachha of Nadia district, named Biswanath Sardar (nicknamed ‘Bishu-dakat’ by zamindars) whose area of operation included present day Barasat and Bangaon Sub-divisions of this district. A small taluqdar of indigo plantation named Sivnath Ghosh of the village Srirampur in Twenty Four Parganas, also put resistance against an oppressive planter Renny and was supported largely by the peasants.

“Such sporadic struggle and opposition wide spread mainly over the northern part of the district finally found support from the British Government in 1859. Ashley Eden, then Magistrate of Barasat (later Lt. Governor of Bengal) gave his judgment against forcible eviction of raiyats for having taken an advance for indigo cultivation without actually doing so. In the same year Herschell, the District Magistrate and Collector, observed that to plant or not to plant indigo could not be a contractual obligation of a raiyat and that contractual obligation of loan could only be the repayment of same with interest.

Consequent upon these two judgments, as reported by Herschell, hundreds of village headmen or morols (mondol) rose spontaneously to ask peasants not to cultivate indigo. These developments prompted the government to set up the Indigo Commission in March 1860 and its Report was published in August same year. This Report and further investigation convinced the Lt. Governor of Bengal John Peter Grant to declare that no contract to cultivate indigo should be forced on an unwilling peasant. Thereafter, the indigo cultivation under European Enterprises dwindled sharply in Bengal. In 1892 a chemist named Bayer invented the process of manufacturing synthetic blue which reduced the demand of organic indigo in European market, resulting the final withdrawal of indigo cultivation from India.” (re-printed from the District Census Handbook, North Twenty Four Parganas, 2001)

In the year 1905, some portion of the district around the Sundarbans was detached and linked with neighbouring Khulna and Barishal districts. These portions, till today, are under the main land of neighbouring country Bangladesh.

After India’s Independence, an administrative reform committee in the year 1983 under the Chairmanship of Dr. Ashok Mitra suggested to split the district into two. As per their recommendation, the district was bifurcated into two parts in the year 1986 i.e. North Twenty Four Parganas and South Twenty Four Parganas. It may be noted that the satellite township of Kolkata i.e. Bidhannagar or Salt Lake City is included in this district.