History of West Bengal

The name of Bengal, or Bangla, is derived from the ancient kingdom of Vanga, or Banga. References to it occur in early Sanskrit literature, but its early history is obscure until the 3rd century bce, when it formed part of the extensive Mauryan empire inherited by the emperor Ashoka. With the decline of Mauryan power, anarchy once more supervened. In the 4th century ce the region was absorbed into the Gupta empire of Samudra Gupta. Later it came under control of the Pala dynasty. From the beginning of the 13th century to the mid-18th century, when the British gained ascendancy, Bengal was under Muslim rule—at times under governors acknowledging the suzerainty of the Delhi sultanate but mainly under independent rulers.

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In 1757 British forces under Robert Clive defeated those of the nawab (ruler) of Bengal, Sirāj al-Dawlah, in the Battle of Plassey near present-day Palashi. In 1765 the nominal Mughal emperor of northern India, Shah ʿĀlam II, granted to the British East India Company the dīwānī of Bengal, Bihar, and Orissa (now Odisha)—that is, the right to collect and administer the revenues of those areas. By the Regulating Act of 1773, Warren Hastings became the first British governor-general of Bengal. The British-controlled government, centred at Calcutta (now Kolkata), was declared to be supreme: essentially, the governor-general of Bengal was the chief executive of British India. Thus, the Bengal Presidency, as the province was known, had powers of superintendence over the other British presidencies, those of Madras (now Chennai) and Bombay (now Mumbai).

Britain was not, however, the only European presence in Bengal. The town of Hugli, north of Calcutta, was the location of a Portuguese factory (trading post) until 1632; Hugli-Chinsura (Chunchura), the next town south, was the Dutch post until 1825; the next town, Shrirampur (Serampore), was the Danish post until 1845; and Chandernagore (Chandannagar) remained in French hands until 1949.

From 1834 Bengal’s governor-general bore the title “governor-general of India,” but in 1854 the post was relieved of the direct administration of Bengal, which was placed under a lieutenant governor. Thenceforward, the government of British India became distinct from that of Bengal. In 1874 Assam was transferred from the charge of the lieutenant governor and placed under a separate chief commissioner. In 1905 the British determined that Bengal had become too unwieldy a charge for a single administration, and, in spite of violent Hindu protests, it was partitioned into two provinces, each under its own lieutenant governor: one comprised western Bengal, Bihar, and Orissa; the other included eastern Bengal and Assam. In 1911, because of continued opposition to partition, Bengal was reunited under one governor, Bihar and Orissa under a lieutenant governor, and Assam once more under a chief commissioner. At the same time, Delhi became the capital of India in place of Calcutta.

Under the Government of India Act (1935), Bengal was constituted an autonomous province in 1937. That remained the situation until the Indian subcontinent was partitioned into the two dominions of Pakistan and India after the British withdrawal in 1947. The eastern sector of Bengal, largely Muslim, became East Pakistan (later Bangladesh); the western sector became India’s West Bengal state. The partition of Bengal left West Bengal with ill-defined boundaries and a constant inflow of non-Muslim, mostly Hindu, refugees from East Pakistan. More than seven million refugees entered the already densely populated state after 1947, and their rehabilitation placed an immense burden on the administration.

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Geography of India

In 1950 the princely state of Cooch Behar (Koch Bihar) was integrated with West Bengal. After the linguistic and political reorganization of Indian states in 1956, West Bengal gained some 3,140 square miles (8,130 square km) from Bihar. The additional territory provided a link between the previously separated northern and southern parts of the state.

The Indian National Congress (Congress Party) dominated the West Bengal government during nearly all of the state’s first three decades. In 1977, however, the Communist Party of India (Marxist; CPI-M) won a majority of seats in the state legislative elections and became the ruling party. The CPI-M remained in power as the world’s longest-serving democratically elected communist government until it was voted out of office in 2011. The winner of the legislative elections that year, the All India Trinamool (or Trinamul) Congress (AITC), had been an ally in what was then the Congress Party’s national ruling coalition government. The AITC’s founder and leader, Mamata Banerjee, became the state’s first female chief minister (head of government).