Direct Action Day

Direct Action Day, also known as the Affirmative Action Plan, the Calcutta Riots, the Great Calcutta killings, and "The Week of the Long Knives" , started on August 16, 1946. It was a day when the Muslim League planned peaceful protests all over India to voice the Muslim demand for a separate homeland during the Indian Freedom Struggle against the British Raj. This protest was followed by massive riots in Calcutta instigated by the Muslim League and led to further riots in the surrounding regions of Bengal and Bihar by Muslims against Hindus and Sikhs, followed by retaliatory attacks on Muslims by Congress followers and supporters.

Background

In 1946, the Indian independence movement against the British Raj had reached a pivotal stage when the British Cabinet sent a Mission to India aimed to discuss and finalize plans for the transfer of power from the British Raj to Indian leadership, providing India with independence under Dominion status in the Commonwealth of Nations. The Mission held talks with the representatives of the Indian National Congress and the All India Muslim League, the two largest political parties in the Constituent Assembly of India. After initial dialogue, the Mission proposed plans over the composition of the new government.

Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the one time Congressman and now the leader of the Muslim League, had accepted the Cabinet Mission Plan whereas the Congress rejected it. Jinnah denounced the British Cabinet Mission and decided to try and put pressure on Congress and the British, by resorting to civil disobedience.

According to Margaret Bourke-white, in July 1946, Jinnah held a press conference at his home in Bombay where he declared his intent to create Pakistan. Margaret Bourke-White, a LIFE magazine correspondent, wrote extensively about the meeting. Jinnah proclaimed that the Muslim league was "preparing to launch a struggle" and that they "have chalked a plan" . He had decided to boycott the Constituent Assembly. He rejected the British plan for transfer of power to an interim government which would combine both the Muslim League and the Indian National Congress. He attacked the Congress and called it "Hindu dominated". He said that if the Muslims were not granted Pakistan then he would launch "Direct Action". When asked to specify Jinnah retorted:

Go to the Congress and ask them their plans. When they take you into their confidence I will take you into mine.

He further declared:

Why do you expect me alone to sit with folded hands? I also am going to make trouble.

On the next day, Jinnah is claimed to have said on August 16, 1946, "Direct Action Day" for the purpose of winning the separate Muslim state:

We shall have India divided or we shall have India destroyed

In terms of a resolution of the Muslim League Council Meeting held during the period 27 July – 29 July 1946, the Direct Action Day was intended to unfold “direct action for the achievement of Pakistan.”

An account given H V Hodson in his famous book "The Great Divide" writes:

"The working committee followed up by calling on Muslims through out India to observe 16th August as direct action day. On that Day meeting would be held all over the country to explain League's resolution. These meetings and processions passed of- as was manifestly the Central league leaders' intention- without more than commonplace and limited disturbance with one vast and tragic exception... what happened was more than anyone could have foreseen."

Riots in Calcutta

Causes and prelude

The riots, instigated by members of the Muslim League in the city, were the consequence of the declaration by the Muslim League that Muslims throughout the subcontinent were to 'suspend all business' to support their demand for an independent Pakistan.

In April 1946, following a period of direct rule by the governor, new provincial elections returned another Muslim League ministry in Calcutta. It was headed by Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy. Following the Muslim League's condemnation of the Cabinet Mission, Suhrawardy heeded Jinnah's call for "Direct Action Day" in August, and demanded a "public holiday", claiming that even the police would "take the day off". Muslims in Calcutta took that to indicate that they were free to riot . The Statesman wrote about the ensuing riots:

The origin of the appalling carnage- we believe the worst communal riot in India's history- was a political demonstration by the Muslim League

Following the protests against the British on I.N.A day and Abdul Rashid Day, the British decided to prioritize protests against them over communal violence in their "Emergency Action Scheme". British high officials such as Sixsmith and Walker vehemently opposed any intervention in Muslim-Hindu matters by the police.

The absence of the police during the riots in Calcutta during "Direct Action Day" is the best illustration of this posture .

Riots and massacres

Dead and wounded after the 'Direct Action Day' which developed into pitched battles as Muslim and Hindu mobs attacked and killed each other, Calcutta in 1946, the year before independence

The violence started on the morning of the day when Muslim League volunteers forced Hindu shopkeepers in North Calcutta to close their shops and Hindus retaliated by obstructing the passage of League's processions. The League organized a rally at Ochterloney Monument. The Muslim League Chief Minister in his address reportedly assured the audience that the military and police had been 'restrained'. This was interpreted by the gathering as an open invitation to commit violence on the Hindus. Subsequently, there were reports of lorries (trucks) that came thundering down Harrison Road in Calcutta, carrying Muslim men armed with brickbats and bottles as weapons and attacking Hindu shops.In a secret communique, Fredrick John Burrows writes to Lord Wavell that

Friday, August 16th. Even before 10 o'clock Police Headquarters had reported that there was excitement throughout the city, that shops were being forced to close, and that there were many reports of stabbing and throwing of stones and brickbats. The trouble had already assumed the communal character which it was to retain throughout. At that time it was mainly in the northern half of the city. (Later reports indicate that the Muslims were in an aggressive mood from early in the day and that their processions were well armed with the lathis, iron rods and missiles. Their efforts to force Hindu shops to close as they passed through the streets were greeted with showers of brickbats from the roofs above - indicating that the Hindus were also not unprepared for trouble - and from this sort of exchange of missiles, matters soon degenerated into arson, looting and murder). The situation deteriorated during the forenoon and at 2.40 p.m. the Chief Secretary rang up my Secretary to say that the position had become so serious that he supported the request of the Commissioner of Police that the Army should be called in at once in aid of the civil power. ...... Ten minutes later the Commissioner of Police reported that the Chief Minister had already agreed to the calling in of troops. He added that the Police had used tear-smoke on crowds frequently and that the situation was bad in Harrison Road, Wellington Square and Corporation Street.

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Noted Indian historian Sita Ram Goel, his wife and first son were witnesses to the riots. He writes in his autobiographical work "How I became a Hindu" that he "would have been killed by a Muslim mob" but his fluent Urdu and his Western dress saved him. And he writes that on the evening of the 17th he and his wife and son "had to vacate that house and scale a wall at the back to escape murderous Muslim mobs advancing with firearms."

The riots became heavier on the fourth day.The weapons shifted from bottles to iron staves. The military brought tanks into the city and gunned down the mobs, and the police made a belated appearance.

Jugal Chandra Ghosh, a local Hindu, said the following at the time of the riots:

I saw four trucks standing, all with dead bodies piled at least three feet high; like molasses in a sack, they were stacked on the trucks, blood and brain oozing out… that sight had a tremendous effect on me.

The region most affected by the violence was the densely populated sector of the city bounded by Bowbazar Street on the south, Upper Circular Road on the east, Vivekananda Road on the north and Strand Road on the west. Official estimate put the casualties at 4,000 dead and 100,000 injured.Other sources put the death toll at 6,000.Most of the victims were Hindus. Consequently, the riots were viewed as one of the "spark plugs" for igniting the hitherto moribund flames of militant Islamism in India.The rioting reduced on the 22nd of the same month

Comparison with earlier riots

While in earlier riots in Calcutta shops dealing with immediate consumer goods or items whose price had just risen were mostly looted, in the riot of 1946 any shop was an object of attack, the only discriminatory feature being Muslims exclusively pillaging Hindu shops.

What most distinguished the 1946 riots from previous outbreaks was its highly organised nature. The Muslim League mobilised all its frontal organisations to make the 'Day' a success. Special coupons for gallons of petrol (gasoline) were issued in the names of League ministers to be used by their party functionaries to incinerate Hindu businesses. One month's food ration for 10,000 people was allegedly drawn in advance to feed the League activists. Once the riots began the Chief Minister, Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, accompanied by his political aids, spent considerable time in the Police Control Room to allegedly "shield" Muslims from "police operations" while Muslims executed the riots. On the other hand, Marwari merchants reportedly purchased arms and ammunitions from American soldiers, which were later used during the riot. Acid bombs were manufactured and stored in Hindu-owned factories before the outbreak. Calcutta's Hindu blacksmiths were mobilised to prepare spearheads and other weapons .

While militant Islamists have attempted to whitewash the role of the Muslim League government in the riots, outside observers noted the "hands-on" involvement of Muslim League strongman Hussein Shahid Suhrawardy in coordinating a well-planned series of riots in Calcutta against the Hindu minority

In turn, Muslim league sympathizers retaliated by accusations against Hindus.The Administration could not indict the League due to lack of evidence.

‘On August 21, Wavell informed Pethick Lawrence that “the present estimate” of casualties was 3000 dead and 17,000 injured. Congress was convinced that all the trouble was deliberately engineered by the Muslim League ministry but the Viceroy had as yet seen no “satisfactory evidence to that effect.” The latest estimate of casualties was that “appreciably more Muslims than Hindus were killed”

Lord Wavell wrote to Pethick Lawrence:

Last weekend has seen dreadful riots in Calcutta. The estimates of casualties is 3000 dead and 17000 injured. The Bengal Congress are convinced that all the trouble was deliberately engineered by the Muslim League Ministry, but no satisfactory evidence to that effect has reached me yet. It is said that the decision to have a public holiday on 16th August was the cause of trouble, but I think this is very far-fetched. There was a public holiday in Sind and there was no trouble there. At any rate, whatever the causes of the outbreak, when it started, the Hindus and Sikhs were every bit as fierce as Muslims. The present estimate is that appreciably more Muslims were killed than the Hindus . Fredrick John Burrows, in a report to British Viceroy Pethic Wavell, summarized the overall riots and their political consequences thus:

The setting. Omitting the more remote causes of the riots - the long struggle for power between Hindus and Muslims, in which Calcutta is a focal point, the weakening of our authority which is an inevitable consequence of our impending departure, the dislocation of the normal life of Calcutta by war and famine, and the presence of a Muslim Ministry in a predominantly Hindu city - the proximate cause was the resolution of the Council of the All-India Muslim League passed at Bombay on July 29th, calling on ‘the Muslim nation to resort to direct action to achieve Pakistan’, and the consequent fixing of August 15th as ‘Direct Action Day’.

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Aftermath

After the riots died down, thousands began fleeing Calcutta. For several days the Howrah Bridge over the Hooghly river was crowded with evacuees headed for the railway station on the Howrah side of the bridge. Many of them would not escape the violence that spread out into the region from Calcutta .

Members of the Indian National Congress, including Mohandas Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru responded negatively to the riots and expressed shock. The riots would lead to further rioting and pogroms against Hindus and Sikhs by Muslims, together with retaliatory attacks against Muslims. These events sowed the seeds for the eventual Partition of India.

Noakhali massacre

An important incident following Direct Action Day was the Noakhali district massacre on October 1946. Noakhali, a district in what is now the Nation of Bangladesh, had a Muslim majority. About three-fourth of the land belonged to the Hindu landlords and the tenants were mostly Muslims. The Direct Action Day riots in Calcutta spread to other regions, reaching this district where a massive pogrom was organized against the Hindu minority. The death toll is estimated to be in the thousands, with 51-75 thousand Hindus ethnically cleansed from the region .

The riots and massacres

During the massacre, the Hindu minority were killed and beaten, and their properties were destroyed. Many Hindus were forcibly converted to Islam and Hindu women were abducted and raped. Often, members of the Muslim mob who slaughtered the Hindus would forcibly marry the widows after converting them to Islam at point of weapon.Many Hindu temples were looted and destroyed. Hindus were forced to throw deities into the Ganges river and Muslim mobs forced them to consume beef, which is disallowed in Hinduism

The horror and the underlying conspiracy of this occurrence can best be described in the words of S. L. Ghosh of the A. B. Patrika, quoted below. Says S. L. Ghosh:

"The horror of the Noakhali outrage is unique in modern history in that it was not a simple case of turbulent members of the majority community (Muslims) killing off helpless members of the minority Hindu community, but was one whose chief aim was mass conversion, accompanied by loot, arson and wholesale devastation... No section of the Hindu community has been spared, the wealthier classes being dealt with more drastically. Abduction and outrage of Hindu women and forcible marriages were also resorted. The slogans used and the methods employed indicate that it was all part of a plan for the simultaneous establishment of Pakistan."

Involvement of the Muslim League Government

The Muslim League Government in Bengal aided the murderers. Ex-servicemen in Bengal joined in committing the atrocities . There were reports of rioters chanting slogans like "Long Live the League", "Long Live Pakistan", "Fighting, we will get Pakistan", "Killing, we will get Pakistan".It is believed that the Muslim League chose this district specifically for its Muslim majority and the ease by which Hindus could be targeted for extermination. Noted investigative journalist Subodh Ghosh of the Ananda Bazar Patrika was a witness to the pogroms. He confirmed the nature of the massacres as planned by the Muslim League, quoting:

It is false to suggest that the perpetrators were a gang of hooligans or that they mostly consisted of outsiders.The local people were the perpetrators in many cases and there was a general mass sympathy for what happened

He concluded that there was a deliberate delay in disseminating news of the masscre (4 days), pointing to a "criminal inefficiency" of the Muslim League administration. It took 10 additional days for the Army to arrive in the region and another month to "comb the interior of the devastated countryside". He went on to quote that the objective of the Noakhali carnage was "mass conversion to Islam, accompanied by loot, arson and wholesale devastation":

The demand for subscriptions for the Muslim League and for other purposes, including conversion ceremonies, showed that mass attackers, and their leaders were inspired by the League ideology.

Mediation by Gandhi

Mohandas Gandhi, upon the request of his associate Muriel Lester , attempted to mediate the consequences of the rioting by visiting Noakhali on 6 November, 1946. He tried to reason with both Muslim and Hindu communities. However, he advised Hindus "not to resist Muslim attacks" as per his philosophy of non-violent resistance. The Muslim League retaliated against Gandhi by spreading propaganda against him . Similar anti-Hindu pogroms took place in the Comilla cantonment in Bengal.

Further rioting in the Indian subcontinent

The Direct Action Day riots sparked off several riots between Muslims and Hindus/Sikhs in Bihar, Punjab, and the North Western Frontier Province in that year.

See also

• Partition of India