The Making of Another East Pakistan in Nadia District

A NRI's journey to his village

Shondanga is a lush-green village under PS Dhubulia, in Nadia District, West Bengal. It is just 7 km away from Mayapur (the headquarters of ISKCON), 2 km from National Highway number 34, and about 11 km from Sadar Krishnanagar (administrative headquarters of Nadia district).

The week after Durga Puja, a team of Hindu Samhati activists led by Sri. Tapan Ghosh, Sri. Dipak Sanyal and Sri. Somraj Ganguly visited Shondanga to assess the situation and offer strength and support to the beleaguered Hindus of this village, who are experiencing the brazen creation of another East Pakistan by alien Muslims who hold East Pakistani nationality, while the authorities continue to live in denial and nonchalantly look the other way.

There was not a single Muslim in Shondanga in June 1950. The village consisted of local Hindus and "refugee" Hindus from Chithalia and Amla- Sadarpur of Kushtia District, East Pakistan. Today, Shondanga has a population of over 20,000 (out of which about 95% are Muslims, while only about 1500 are Hindus), but Chithalia has no Hindu left.

The Hindu Samhati team met Sri. Sunil Pal, a remarkably brave hero and his equally resilient sister Kum. Renuka Pal, whose family has been spearheading the resistance (against the emerging East Pakistan-like situation for over 6 decades now) and have literally paid its price in blood. Their bold behaviour is exceptional in all of West Bengal. The brave Pal family is now the only Hindu family left in the Masjid Para of Shondanga.

They fearlessly guided the Hindu Samhati team around the village, including the 3 acres of Hindu land in Garai Para ("Locality of Oil Pressers") that has been forcibly occupied by Muslims to build a "club"; as well as the 18-remaining Hindu families (belonging to the extremely poor Muchi or cobbler community) in nearby Das Para.

In front of the Das Para, there is a small Kali temple and an adjoining ground which serves as the central meeting place of the Hindus of 'Das Para'. Not content with illegally capturing almost all of Shondanga village, the East Pakistani Muslims are now trying relentlessly to capture that ground and forcibly wrest it away from the native Hindus by turning it to an 'Anganwadi Center'.

Interestingly, this village is under 'Debipur Gram Panchayat' which is governed by BJP for a long time. but this booth is Muslim-majority, and its elected member is a Muslim from the Congress party.

Sri. Sunil Pal, a Chartered Electrical Engineer by profession, gives all the detailed background about the alien Muslims and their activities in this village, explains:

"My septuagenarian disabled elder sister, Kumari Renuka Pal, who is 81-years old, lives in Shondanga. I live with my family in London since over 3 decades but I have close contact with the village where we migrated in 1950.

My sister is the only Hindu in the so-called Masjid para. This village has 95% Muslim population. Muslims want to evict her so that they can grab our family property. She applied in the High Court of Calcutta and got an order for protection. Then SP Nadia Benoy Chakraborty IPS, a CPI(M) cadre, ignored the order. A contempt petition was filed which is still pending. She is now getting some sort of police protection causing anger to the Muslims.

Like many refugees, my late father Jagot Bondhu Pal came to live by exchanging land and properties in 1950 during the widespread communal riots in East Pakistan. Our house, along with all Hindu houses, was looted at Chithalia (PS Mirpur, Dist.Kushtia erstwhile Nadia, East Pakistan in March 1950. All Hindus from Chithalia and adjoining villages left for West Bengal. Most of them from Chithalia settled at Shondanga by exchanging their land and properties.

For your better understanding of issue in wider context, I shall reiterate the background and other details.

Background: There was wide spread communal riots in erstwhile East Pakistan in early 1950s. Hindus left in droves to avoid communal persecution. They exchanged their land and properties with the Muslims in West Bengal who were not affected as there were no riots in West Bengal. However Muslims wanted to leave voluntarily to live in their homeland i.e East Pakistan. Thus the Muslims took the nationality of Pakistan and Hindus that of India.

There was not a single Muslim in Shondanga in June 1950. The village consisted of local Hindus and "refugee" Hindus from Chithalia and Amla- Sadarpur of Dt. Kushtia, East Pakistan. Now Shondanga has a population of over 20,000 out of which only 1500 Hindus, but Chithalia has no Hindu.

Our family is now the only Hindu family in the Masjid Para of Shondanga. In 1950 all Muslims left for East Pakistan by exchanging the land and property with Hindus. Some Hindus exchanged the land and properties with proper documents, some by word of mouth and some by just one sheet of paper signed on a revenue stamp. The Muslims left although there was no communal riot in Shondanga or in Nadia. On the other hand there was widespread riot in East Pakistan driving out thousands of Hindus.

In 1956 when there was "RS" settlement record of land, the head of the Muslims from each family returned from East Pakistan to get their names recorded in RS record. The Government of West Bengal did not recognise the exchange of land and properties of Hindus by word of mouth or on the document where not all land of the Muslims was listed. In Muslim law, every adult person in the family has to sign a document of transfer of land. With regard to Hindus, the signature of the head of the family was enough. Thus those who did not have document listing each property and signed by each member of the Muslim family, had to give up the rightful ownership at the end though they have been living legally by exchanging their land and property. Thus Muslims got the land and properties which Hindus owned in East Pakistan where the Hindus could not return to reclaim.

The Muslims also got the land of "refugees" in Shondang owing to the Muslim law. That was a rather bizarre situation imposed on the hapless Hindus. They fought for a while but subsequently gave up and left the village. The Hindus with properly listed property stayed and yet to fight odd lapses but ultimately had to give up. Other Hindus left Shondanga to settle elsewhere in Nadia. Many became pauper again. The Muslims after acquiring voluntarily Pakistani nationality returned clandestinely to revert to Indian citizens illegally. They began forcible possession by disposing even legally settled Hindus like late Dr Sudhir Kumar Pal and his family who now live at Krishnanagar. Hundreds of Muslims together displaced him and the police behaved as onlookers. His sons Dr Subrata Pal and others live in Ghoorni, Krishnanagar like many other Hindus from Shondanga.

Muslims had thus double whammy at the cost of Hindus who lost their land and properties in Kushtia district as well as in Nadia. In addition, many Muslims in Shondanga clandestinely enjoy dual nationality. Hindus cannot claim Pakistani/Bangladesh hi nationality and claim their properties in Bangladesh.

After driving the most of the Hindu refugees, they then applied the brute force to the local Hindus. All Garai families are affected by the illegal acts of the Muslims. The Muslims forcibly displace Hindus from their land as a pastime. The court case takes long time. Thus the character of the land and property changes, the Hindus finally give up as all Muslims give evidence against Hindus who cannot find any witness owing to fear of persecution by the Muslims who are protected by the politicians now the CPI(M). This is has now become a tradition. Whenever there is a conflict, thousands of Muslims join hand against the Hindu family who does not get similar solidarity from the Hindus. Thus Muslims, who voluntarily took Pakistani nationality and subsequently Bangladeshi nationality, have driven out most of the Hindus who migrated from erstwhile East Pakistan. They are living elsewhere in Nadia.Many Muslim families enjoy dual nationality owing to overwhelming Muslim population.

As an example, CPIM leader Ismail Sheikh, s/o late Ehannabi who is married to a Bangladeshi woman clandestinely. His daughter was born in Bangladesh and settled there but visits Shondanga illegally to maintain dual nationality without any legal sanction of Indian government. His sons are also in similar situation. It is known that one of his sons has gone to the Middle East via Bangladesh but the rulers in West Bengal turn a blind eye to preserve vote banks.

Another Muslim Ashraf Gaen, Head master of Shondanga School, is a Pakistani/ Bangladeshi national. His father was in Pakistani civil service and died in Kushtia. Ashraf Gaen worked in Chuadanga and elsewhere in East Pakistan/Bangladesh but returned to Shondanga clandestinely in 1975 and has been a supporter/ member of CPIM. He took leading role in assaulting an observer of Election Commission in May 2004.These are just the tip of the iceberg in Nadia alone.

Our village in Nadia shows how a village without a single Muslim in 1950 has now over 20,000 Muslims. The village is like any Bangladeshi village. Cows are slaughtered every Friday. Mosque is built occupying public road (Road leading to Mayapur). Pregnant cow is "stolen" from a Hindu and is slaughtered at Muharam. The CPIM administration turns a blind eye to preserve vote banks constituted by aliens who have recorded their names in the voter list illegally at the behest of the political parties.

I will now give one example as to how the Muslims persecute Hindus to drive them out of the village.

Persecution of our family: My younger brother Nisith Pal a teacher of Belpukur High School was murdered by the Muslims in August 1975 just because he was a leader of Hindus. He was persecuted as he was exposing the criminal acts of the Muslims including slaughtering cows, clandestine movement and settlement of aliens etc. The Muslims conspired regularly as to how to kill him. He was attacked in our house several times. My father died in 1974. The Muslims got an additional opportunity, Nisith was murdered in 1975. Since my brother's murder, the Muslims were persecuting my mother and elder sister. Our pump house was destroyed several times, similarly our crops. It is a kind of pastime for the aliens, owing to brute numbers.

My mother died in 1994. Since then my sister is living alone in our house. She is being looked after by a maid. Her circumstances have encouraged the aliens to persecute her in association with the CPIM rulers.

Prelude to the latest bout of heinous crime and gross communalism against our family:

1. On 14th April 2000, the Muslims and the police at about 2.30 am destroyed 7 lines of 150 feet long barbed wire fence and 11 concrete pillars weighing 60 kgs each from the boundary of our house. The police have turned a blind eye as the criminals are Muslims protected by the CPI(M) administration.

2. On 23rd october 2000, in broad daylight at around 10am, more than dozens of CPI(M) Muslims raided our house and cut bamboos by force by threatening my sister. The police did nothing except a diary, GDE 696 of 23.10.2000. As a result my wife, Dr Kalyani Pal and I had to rush to our village. A case was instituted, CJM-Nadia Ordered by memo 451/2000 of 3.11.2000 to Dhubulia PS to record a case.(Dhubulia PS Case no.113/2000) . The case was not investigated properly and is still pending.

Since then the communalist Muslims in the guise of CPI(M) have been raiding our house as a pastime. My sister lodged dozens of complaints with Dhubulia Police station who has shown close affinity with the Muslims at the behest of the CPI(M) rulers. It was a sort of routine that the police insulted her and refused to take any complaint from her.

On 8th September 2002 a group of Muslims after a grand conspiracy trespassed and squatted in our house. The police at Dhubulia PS did not do anything. On 12th September 2002, my sister (Renuka Pal) got an order of removal by the Executive Magistrate, Krishnanagar, Nadia, case no.61/EM/02. Mr Himadri Chakroborty then OC Dhubulia refused to accept the order let alone execute it. Owing to this my sister, sent the copy of the order by registered post but still he did not act properly. Mr Chakroborty half-heartedly removed the trespassers on 17th September 2002 without arresting anyone who trespassed, squatted and threatened my sister in our house to kill her.

On 28th September 2002, at about 7 am the squatters assaulted our neighbour in our house. My sister complained over phone to Dhubulia PS. The police came to investigate the complaint. In the meantime, the squatters spread the rumour that a relative of our neighbour ,who was working as my sister's driver, assaulted the squatters. The police saw that the complaint was false and as a result advise our neighbour to file a written complaint. After this investigation, when the police was returning, the police was attacked by hundreds of Muslims at the cross road at the Masjid. Realising the danger, they wired for additional help. OC Dhubulia/DSP- DEB came with additional force. They were also surrounded by the CPIM/Muslim mob.

The mob demanded that the police should arrest my sister's driver Ekat and hand over to them so that they can lynch him according to their conspired plan and wanted the police to say that "Ekat was lynched by the mob". Ekat's mother understood the plan and advised Ekat to move away. To satisfy the mob, the law was forced to take back seat by the police and they went to our house to look for Ekat.

My sister told the police that Eikat was not in our house but the police to satisfy the Muslim mob entered into our house and searched each room both in the first floor and ground floor without telling my sister about the "crime" and why they searched our house. The police did not find Ekat in our house. This enraged the police. They went away. At around 2 pm DSP-Nadia and other police officer came to our house again and asked my sister to open the door of our building. In the meantime, she phoned me for help as our house was surrounded by hundreds of Muslims. I told her to shut the collapsible gate and advised her not to open the door without speaking with me. My sister did not open the door. DSP threatened that he would break the door. My sister nearly collapsed and needed attention and told the police to do anything they liked. While the police was in our house, the squatters went on building huts in our house by violating the Order of the Executive Magistrate-Nadia. The police deliberately violated the law of the land to help the criminals belonging to CPIM.

The police left without breaking our door but threatened my sister that they would not "help" my sister if the mob attacked her. This irresponsible pronouncement emboldened the squatters.

The Police came back again in the evening to frighten my sister. They did not take any action to remove the squatters who was allowed to violate the law of the land with impunity. The conspiracy of the police and the communalist Muslims was complete. They together have violated the Orders of the Executive Magistrate-Nadia (Case No. 61/EM/02 u/S 144 Cr P C) and the West Bengal Land Reforms and Tenancy Tribunals (Case no.O.A. No.1276/2002 LRTT).

To cover up the violation of the judicial order, the police fabricated a criminal case against Ekat Sheikh and his elder brother Haru Sheikh (s/o late Jasomoddi) though Haru's wife Ainur was beaten up badly by the squatters. The police ignored the severe assault on poor Ainur despite her showing the injury and complaining against the squatters who assaulted her. The police did not enquire from my sister who phoned for the assault of Ainur. If there is any independent investigation, it will be easily seen how the police conspired with the communalist Muslims with a view to satisfy the Muslims by fabricating a case, a culture of the police under Mr Buddhadev Bhattacharya. These Muslims who are vote banks of CPI(M) hate India and Hindus. They show loyalty towards Bangladesh and Pakistan.

With regard to the plight of my sister, the Muslims want us to leave the village by selling our properties in throw away prices as they did to others over the years. They want Masjid Para free of any Hindu. Hence they have been persecuting my septuagenarian disabled elder sister. If a Muslim was being persecuted by a Hindu which is highly unlikely, the whole country would have been up at arms with the Hindus. The gravity of the situation is worse than that with regard to my sister and our family and yet the CPI(M) politician is conspicuously silent. It is clear that if the Muslims are communal, the CPI(M) turns a blind eye. The same CPI(M) portrays a secular Hindu as communal if that Hindu shows the following which I have done in the recent past.

Other issues:

1. I complained to Additional Magistrate-Nadia( General) on 22nd December 1999 about illegal construction of a mosque and walls on the public road without permission at Natun Para of Shondanga, on the way to Mayapur.

2. I complained several times for illegal slaughter of cows. Earlier it was on one place but now it is on half a dozen of places on every Friday by Anchhar and Mojam of Maniktala Para; Chatai Sheikh of West Para; Sahadot of Masjid Para; Bhola Sheikh of Natun Para behind the illegally constructed mosque. This is causing unhygienic environment which the health authorities know but dare not handle lest the Muslims are "hurt".

In addition to unhygienic situation, the Muslims slaughter cows in the public to injure the feelings of Hindus. Cow slaughter affects public order as it incites communal tension. You can enquire from the milkmen of Choughacha, PS Dhubulia. They are Sanjit Ghosh, Sudhan Ghosh and Dalim Ghosh. I have seen from our house how Sahadot slaughter cows in front of young children who learn cruelty from very early age. (I complained to SP-Nadia on 11.1.99 Attn: D K Gangopadhya, DM-Nadia on 28th December 1999 and Chief Secretary, West Bengal on 24th January 2000. I pursued without any results whatsoever).

3. Pregnant cow was stolen from the house of Mr Anil Biswas of Shondanga a day before the Muharam on 24th March 2002. It was slaughtered on the day of Muharam to the merriment of the communalist Muslims. Biswas family complained to Dhubulia Police Station against the persons who "stole" the cow. The police wanted to hush up to avoid "communal tension". A Congress Party Chairman Krishnanagar II, Mr Shyma Prasad Singhroy helped the police to hush up. Biswas family was given Rs 4000/- as compensation from the sale proceeds of the slaughtered cow. In 2001 also a cow was stolen from the same house just before the Muharam.

4. The Muslims from Shondanga went to Ballaldighi and threw beef at the Lakshmi Narayan temple on 13th July 2001. CPIM wanted to hush up but failed. A police case was started by Nabadwip Police Station, Case no.69/2001 of 14th July 2001. Owing to the influence of the CPIM, the conspirators were left out. It is a ploy to hush up the communalism of the Muslims.

5. One Anej Sheikh s/o late Chhomer Sheikh of Natun Para of Shondanga was fined Rs5000/- by the Islamic fundamentalists applying Sharia law. In addition, following a meeting of the Islamic fundamentalists on 13 March 2000, the Secretary of the East Shondanga, Masjid Committee, Mr Abdul Ohab Sheikh, sent letters to all the mosques in the area advising them to boycott this family.

6. Stealing of electricity for commercial purposes by Muslims like Fakir Biswas, Kutari Gaen and other Muslims in association with the police, CPIM and WBSEB officials at Dhubulia.

7. Dual nationality of many Muslims (The Supreme Court of India ordered in case of Bhanwaroo Khan & ors, W.P(C) 737 0f 1995 (judgment on 2nd April 2002 by Mr. Justices Doraiswamy Raju and Ashok Bhan) that "those who voluntarily migrated to Pakistan after Partition and became Pakistani national cannot claim Indian citizenship”.

However the Muslims of Shondnaga has precisely done that at the behest of the corrupt politicians and the corrupt administration. Hindus who are migrating to India to avoid persecution in East Pakistan/ Bangladesh are denied refugee status and citizenships of India but the Muslims who voluntarily accepted Pakistani nationality to live in their "homeland" can return to India and claim Indian citizenship. Since many of these Hindus were born in undivided India, their claim for Indian citizenship cannot be denied when the aliens are allowed to become Indian citizens. I believe this hypocrisy and double standards need to be challenged. Recently Mr Justices S B Sinha and PK Balasubramanium of Supreme Court of India have ruled, "it is unconstitutional to put the onus of proving that someone is aliens solely on the complainant", the State has to help the complainant to prove it if the State do not want to rely on thecomplainant's complaint.

8. Muslims in Shondanga launched a anti-India rally, loudly shouting anti-India tirades and slogans, when our Indian Parliament was attacked by Pakistani Muslim attackers in 2001. They offered prayers for Osama bin Laden. In 2006, they were mourning for Saddam Hussein of Iraq (after he was hanged for genocide after a trial).

9. Senior police officer DSP Papiya Sultana supports cow slaughter. When DSP Sultana was posted as DSP in Krishnanagar in Nadia, she came to investigate my elder sister's complaint of cow slaughter at Shondanga. DSP Sultana told my sister that she cannot stop the illegal cow slaughter without licence in our village.

The characteristics of our village are that if you enter into the village, it will give an appearance of a village in Bangladesh and not in India. It is therefore necessary to expose the culture of this village as in the future it will be a haven for the terrorists like the 2007 incident at N'Para, PS Dhubulia, Nadia.

The above will give you some mixed idea of the plight of Hindus and more so, Hindus like my sister in overwhelming Muslim dominated area.