The British power was playing its political bets in India completely regardless of the demand of the Indians. The Bengal in which the British had established the first British province, taken away from Nawab Siraj-ud-daula and Mir Jafar, included a vast territory up to Bengal, Assam, Bihar, Orissa and Chota Nagpur. Lord Curzon partitioned Bengal on 18 July 1905 to form two provinces namely East Bengal and West Bengal.
In the first piece the eastern part of Bengal and the region of Assam were kept. A separate lieutenant governor was appointed for this province, whose capital was Dhaka. The territories of Bihar, Orissa and West Bengal were kept in West Bengal. Its capital remained at Calcutta. The real purpose of dividing Bengal was to dissolve the united political power of Bengal. The British made a province in the form of East Bengal through the dissolution of the partition, in which the Muslim predominance was there. The British hoped that the new province would continue to raise its voice against the Hindu-dominated Western Province. Syed Ahmed Khan and his companions supported the British in this work so that their politics could shine.
3 crore 10 lakh people lived in East Bengal, of which 1 crore 80 lakh were Muslims. Lord Curzon East Bengal Province Organized meetings of Muslims in which he said that this division is being done not only for the convenience of governance, but a Muslim province is being created by him in which the followers of Islam will predominate. Remaining West Bengal Province The number of speakers of Bihari and Odia languages was 4 crore 10 lakhs in comparison to 1 crore 70 lakh Bengali-speaking people.
Thus Bengali Hindu In East Bengal, minorities were made on the basis of religion and in West Bengal minorities were made on the basis of language. Behind the partition of Bengal, many types of fear were working in the minds of the British. Harwart Hope Risley, the then Home Secretary of the Government of India, wrote a confidential report - 'United Bengal is a power. Bengal will be divided into different paths once it is partitioned…….. One of our main objectives is to divide and weaken the force organized against us.'
Lord Ronaldsay said– 'The growing firmness of Bengali nationalism was struck.' The British newspapers also condemned this act of Curzon. Manchester Guardian wrote- 'Curzon's plan to divide Bengal is difficult to understand and even more difficult to forgive.'
The partition of Bengal brought a sudden spurt in the fierce Hindutva based national movement. The whole of India strongly opposed this partition. The government resorted to repression to suppress the movement, due to which the extremist leaders got a new field of work and a favorable environment. Maharaja Jatindra Mohan Thakur in Calcutta A public meeting was held under the chairmanship of which the government was demanded to make some amendments regarding the partition of Bengal. Curzon declined to make any amendments.
On 7 August 1905, a huge public meeting was held in the Town Hall of Calcutta in which big leaders and delegations from different districts were present. After this, public meetings were held all over Bengal in protest against the dissolution. The program of boycott of foreign goods was accepted in these meetings.
On 16 October 1905, Curzon implemented the Declaration of Dissolution. The Bengali people celebrated this day as a day of mourning. Streets of various cities including Calcutta since morning Vande Mataram echoed the singing. Groups of humans gathered on the banks of the river and started tying rakhis on each other's wrists.
The singing troupes inculcated the feeling of patriotism in the public by singing songs full of Veer Ras. On that day there was a strike in the whole of Bengal. In public meetings organized at various places, the Bengalis took a vow that as a caste, we would do everything in our power to remove the ill effects created by the division of our province and to maintain the unity of our caste.
A Federation Hall in Calcutta The foundation stone was laid in which the idols of all the districts were placed. The idols of the separated districts were covered until they were reunited. Strikes and fasts were organized at many places. Surendranath Banerjee established the National Fund with the help of the weaving industry. A massive campaign started for the boycott of foreign goods and the use of indigenous goods. Public meetings were organized across the country to protest against the partition.
Entire Bengal Vande Mataram echoed the singing. Government repression made the movement more violent. With the control of the song of Vande Mataram and the arrest of the agitators, the movement took a very violent form. Surendranath Banerjee and Bipin Chandra Pal toured the whole of Bengal and appealed to the people to make the anti-Bungal campaign a success. The leadership of the Indian National Congress was still in the hands of the liberals, but the Congress strongly criticized the dissolution. Youths and students participated in large numbers in this movement.
Lord Curzon and his associates tried to keep the Muslims away from this movement, but under the leadership of leaders like Abdul Rasool, Liaquat Hussain, Abdul Halim Ghaznavi, Yusuf Khan Bahadur, Muhammad Ismail Choudhary, a large number of Muslims also participated in the anti-dissolution movement. participated in.
The Muslim leaders organized a huge meeting and passed a resolution that the work that the Hindus would do for the progress of the country, the Muslims would support it, the Muslims would support the Hindus not only in the anti-dissolution movement, but in other matters as well, and for foreign goods. Will support boycott and use of Swadeshi. On this the British instigated to riot those separatist Muslim leaders who wanted a Muslim-majority province for themselves. This worsened the situation of Hindu-Muslim harmony.
The government banned public meetings. The teachers were warned to keep their students away from this movement. In Mymansingh district, two boys were fined just because they were singing Vande Mataram. The government threatened the private educational institutions that government aid would be stopped by derecognising the schools whose authorities would not keep their students and teachers apart from this movement.
The managers of these schools removed many students and teachers from the schools. The government took a large number of protesters captive and gave them inhuman punishments. The frightening face of the Ghori government came to the fore when the government instigated the Muslims of East Bengal to attack and oppress the Hindus. At one place, the Muslims made the announcement by playing drums that the government had given them permission to plunder Hindus and marry Hindu-widows. Bengal Governor Wamfield Fuller gave this statement to provoke people- '…… Among my Hindu and Muslim wives, the Muslim wife is my favorite.'
Commenting on these incidents that happened in Bengal, the famous newspaper Modern Review of those days wrote- 'The events of the movement-period are condemnable for all concerned…….for their timidity towards Hindus. , because he did not use force against the desecration of temples, desecration of idols and kidnapping of women, for the local Muslim population because of the abundance of lowly people and for the English government because such incidents happened without stopping under his rule. -Tok continued for a long time.'
British at the hands of furious Hindu nationalism defeat in his own capital Calcutta
During the partition movement, Lord Curzon created a gulf between Hindus and Muslims, which became progressively deeper and created a terrible problem of communalism in the country. During the partition movement, there were riots at many places and great injustice was done to the Hindus. On the encouragement of the British, in the Surat session of the Congress in AD 1907, the Congress was divided into two parts.
The moderate Congress under the leadership of Gopal Krishna Gokhale and the extremist Congress under the leadership of Bal Gangadhar Tilak parted ways. The liberal faction began to call itself the Indian National Congress while the extremist faction called itself the National Party. After this conference, the government tried to thwart the partition movement by arresting Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Aurobindo Ghosh, Lala Lajpat Rai, Bipinchandra Pal etc.
In AD 1909, the Government of India, through the Marley-Minto Act, wanted to remove the air of the dissolution of the movement. An Indian member was given a place in the Viceroy's executive, the number of Indians was increased in the executive of the governors of the provinces and by increasing the number of members of the Legislative Assemblies, separate representations were given to Muslims, landlords and traders. Initially, the moderate leaders welcomed these reforms.
Gokhale was of the opinion that this step of the government was undoubtedly generous and justified. They were requesting that the public should accept them and congratulate the government, but the extremist leaders of the extremists said that these reforms were done to fool Indians. Soon the liberal leaders also agreed with the extremist leaders and in the Allahabad session of Congress in AD 1910, the Marle-Minto reforms were also strongly criticized by the liberal leaders and described it as a divide between Hindus and Muslims and promoting communal feelings. Gone.
Thus the partition movement continued. In the end, in AD 1911, the British government ended this movement by canceling the partition. Thus the nationalist Indians gave a deep defeat to the British in their capital Calcutta. So the British moved their capital from Calcutta to Delhi in the same year. It was a big victory for the Indians.