French Colonization in India with Special Reference to Chandannagar

Sumanapal Bhikkhu

 

By the term French India, we mean a French colony that consisted of five geographically separated settlements of the subcontinent of India that had originally been factories of the East India company of the French. These settlements were Pondicherry, Karikal, Yanam on the Coromandel Coast, Mahe on the Malabar coast and Chandannagar in Bengal. 

It was Ibrahim Khan, the Nawab of Bengal who permitted the French for the establishment of a trading post in the present Chadannagar situated on the right bank of the river Hoogly. 

In that year (1673-74) the French commander Duplessis received the necessary permission from Ibrahim Khan to bulid a house at Taldanga located in the northern portion of the settlement. 

In the year 1688 Chandanngar became a permanent French settlement and the next important event in the history of Chandannagar took place in 1730 when Joseph Ftancois Duplex took charge of the city as its governor. Dupleix's tenure saw the construction of more than two thousand brick houses in the city and the beginning of a remarkable volume of trade across the seas. There was a time when Chandannagar was considered to be the most important commercial hub of Bengal. 

After beginning business at Bandel in 1687 the French commander Deslandes met many difficulties and as a result of it he made an attempt to shift to another Gate place in Hoogly but was denied approval by the then Nawab of Bengal Ibrahim Khan. However, the Mughal Government under Emperor Aurangzeb accorded the French the sanction to do duty free trade in Bengal, Bihar and Orissa upon the receipt of Rs 40000. The foundation of Chandannagar was laid by Deslandes. Gradually Chandannagar became the most important among all French settlements of Bengal and conducted business with China, Pegu, Jedda and Tibet. 

 Chandannagar was bombarded and captured by the British navy under Colonel Robert Clive and Admiral Watson in 1757 during the war which started between England and France in 1756. This led to the destruction of many houses and the fortifications of the town and finally paved the way for the gradual deterioration and ultimate eclipse of the town by Calcutta. In 1763 the French regained its control but only to lose it to the British in 1794 and this was followed by its restoration to the French in 1816.

 The French retained its control over Chandannagar till 1950 and during this period the town was under the jurisdiction of the Governor General of Pondicherry. The town lost its former glory before the beginning of the 20th century and it became a small and quiet suburban town of the metropolis of Calcutta. In the year 1901, 25000 people lived in town. The European portion of the town had tidy and wide roads and many beautiful residential buildings built on the bank of the river Hoogly. It was an European inhabitant of Chandanmagar namely Louis Bonnaud who started the cultivation of indigo in India by building an indigo plant at Chandannagar.

The first founder of a cloth mill among Bengalis named Batakrishna Ghosh use to live in this town. At a time when the names of Bengal Chemicals, Indian Drugs etc were unknown to the people Dinesh Chandra set up the first factory in the area for the preparation of European and other medicines. Indra kumar Chatterjee the first person to make and publish a wall map of locations of the various places of Bengal was an inhabitant of Chandannagar.

The commercial activities of Chandannagar depended mainly on the merchants of the town and its nearby areas. Among the local businessmen we may mention the name of Indranarayan Chaudhury whom the Company appointed its courtier in 1730. The emperor of France awarded him a gold medal. In the year 1740 the Nandadulal Temle and a rest house was constructed by him. A committee with the intention of assisting the poor people was set up in 1832.

In 1862 an educational institution named Ecole de saint mare was established and that school turned out to be one of the best educational institutions of the town at present and now its name is Kanailal Vidyamandir. A convent was established in Chandannagar for the improvement of women education by the assistance of Doctor Morgan. The first Indian recipient of Chevalier de legion de Honour was Durga Charan Rakshit the courtier of the French Government.

Some people of Chandannagar fought in the First World War in favour of France. Mahatma Gandhi came here twice in order to encourage the local people to join the freedom struggle against the British, first in 1925 and then again in 1927. On 12th March 1930 Gandhiji announced his decision to undertake the Dandi March as a protest against the notorious Salt Act. The movement received the full and enthusiastic support of the Yuva Samity an association of the local youth of the town. 

In the nineteen thirties when communist ideology was gaining ground in India Chandannagar became one of its strongholds. Its leader was Dr Hiren Chatterjee who was a commissioner general under the French Government.

After India's independence from the British in 1947 the French authority decided to hold a plebiscite for giving the people of Chandannagar an opportunity to decide whether they would like to remain a part of France or would like to join the Indian republic. The plebiscite took place in June 1948 and the inhabitants of Chandannagar decided to become a part of India with an overwhelming majority (97%). Government of India assumed de facto control over Chandannagar in May 1950 under the approval of the French authorities. On 2nd February 1951 the French officially ceded Chandannagar to the Government of India. De jure transfer took place on 9th June 1952. On 2nd October 1955 Chandannagar was incorporated in West   Bengal and thus became a part of India. 

According to Viswanath Bandopadhyaya Bramhin orthodoxy in Chandannagar was not as influential as it was in Kolkata. The inhabitants of Chandannagar belonged mostly to labouring agricultural and artisan class like Kaibarta (fishermen and peasants), tanti (weaver), dhopa (washerman), goala (milkmen and chutor (carpenter. People of these communities were sympathizers of Vaisnavism which was more liberal than Brahmanism in its outlook. The philosophy of Vaisnavism gave more opportunity to women and as a result of its women got more opportunity to participate in the cultural life of the city. But at the same time the liberal attitude of the French Government also contributed to it. Slave trade was abolished in Chandannagar in 1789 but in Calcutta it continued up to the 1830s until 1843 when the anti-slavery act came into force. Satidaha or the self-immolation of widows on their husband's burning pyre took place for the last time in Chandanagar in 1808 but in British India Satidaha continued until it was abolished in 1829. 

Regarding the penal system of Chandannagar during the French rule it can be said that though capital punishment was in the statute book of the administration its implementation took place rarely. The last insrance of capital punishment took place in January 1883. Those two persons were Sheikh Abdul Panjari and Hiru Bagdi. In the year 1894 a person by the name Sarat Chandra Bhattacharya was charged with murder and was sentenced to be guillotined. It was the custom of the French authorities of Chandannagar to send those given the death sentence to the island of Reunion to be beheaded by guillotined. We find the instance of an odd kind of punishment in Debganer Martey Agaman of Durgacharan Ray who appeared in the nineteenth century. In this case the person who got the sentence had to stand within a small wooden cubicle and a noose used to hang over his head. He was compelled to face the sun and all through the day and had to move his head following the location of the sun. At sunset he got back his liberty. But this sort of punishment made most of the offender’s half blind. In contrast to Calcutta where professionals like lawyers, teachers and doctors became the influential class the old order prevailed in Chandannagar. Society in that town was ruled by the merchants and traders.

The kabiwalas were the first representatives of popular culture in Chandannagar. The most famous among them were two brothers namely Rashu (1734-- 1807), and Nrishingha (1738--1809), these two hailed from Gondalpara; Nityanada Das Bairagi (known as Nite Baishnab), Nilmoni Patni Gorakshanath, Balaram Kapali, Pesha Dhopa (washerman), etc. However, the most illustrious among them was Hesman Anthony (better known as Anthony Firingi). From their surnames we know that most of them were born in poorer or underprivileged classes. Rashu and Nrishinga were by birth Kayasthas and were the sons of a person who worked as a clerk under the French authorities at Chandannagar.

 After losing their father at a tender age they began to lead a sort of Bohemian life in Chandannagar and became members of the Kaviwala group under the leadership of Raghunath Das who was perhaps a blacksmith or weaver by profession.

Jatra was another important popular folk medium in Chandannagar and this medium presented the dramatization of episodes of ancient myths (e.g., Krishna- jatra) as well as stories from Mangal kavyas about popular Bengali gods and goddesses. In the eighteenth century Guruprasad Ballabh was the pioneer of jatra in Chandannagar and he rose to prominence by the performance of Chandi jatra on the stage. 

In the following century the jatra troupe led by Madanmohan Chattopadhyaya alias Madanmaster (Madan the teacher) staged many popular shows like Prahlad -charitra, Ram - banobash, Harishchandra and Vidyasundar. His notable contribution to the yatra was the introduction of chorus in it. The management of his group was taken over by his daughter in law after his death and from then on, the name of the group became bou mastarer dal (the group of the bride teacher). 

In Chandannagar we find the existence of two other folk medias namely kathakatha and panchali. Kathakatha was mostly dominated by kathaks who came from various upper classes of the society and they were experts in religious literature composed in the Sanskrit language. Raghunath Shiromoni, Uddhabchandra Churamani and Dharanidhar were the leading kathaks.  The members of panchali groups represented more or less a cross section of the society.

In Chandannagar there was also the world of the social deviants like prostitutes and criminals like thieves and tricksters.  The popular poets who belonged to the lower strata’s of the society generally dwelt in the area that was in or adjacent to the localities like Hatkhola Gondalpara. The prostitutes ​living in that area may be classified into three groups. Some of   them were kept by the rich people as theist mistresses, some belonged to a position in the middle of housewives and prostitutes and they were known as half gerostho or half housewife and half prostitutes. The underworld of Chandannagar maintained a secret relationship with their counterparts in Calcutta.

The inhabitants of Chandannagar's Gondalpara once met their counterparts in Calcutta in 1868. As a result of the enactment of law known as the Contagious Diseases Act to stop the spread of veneral diseases in Calcutta many harlots migrated to Chandannagar.  Aghorechandra Ghose wrote a book titled Panchali Kamalkali which was published in 1872 and in this book, he presented a description of the harlots migrating to Chandannagar from Calcutta and also the new clientele coming to visit them. Their customers include the Vaishnavas, the neo rich class of the town, labourers, and boatmen belonging to the Muslim community. 

When the prostitutes came to Chandannagar they found under the French authorities a relief from the persecution of the British and they played the role of great levellers by dragging men of every class to themselves.​​1. In Calcutta the Bengali nationalists and those who practised national culture were persecuted by the British Government but the French Government did not interfere with the Bengali population at Chandannagar.

From the early twentieth century the revolutionaries of Bengal started to use Chandannagar as a refuge for escaping from the British police. Prabartak Sangha in Chandannagar established by Motilal Roy in 1920 came to be a centre of propaganda and activities against the British and offered shelter to the revolutionaries. The great revolutionary Rashbehari Bose whose revolutionary career lasted for four decades was a student of Dupleix College of Chandannagar where he according to his own words, was inspired by the French Revolution. 

Chandannagar was different from Calcutta because in Chandannagar the French administration did not produce any significant number of Francophile Bengali elites in that sense in Chandannagar. However, in other French colonies for instance in West Africa French educated Africans began to follow wholeheartedly French tradition and culture Some best known poets of the French language like Senghor and the West Indian Aime Cesarie rose to prominence at that time.

There was another point in which Chandannagar was different at the same time from Calcutta and other French colony like Pondicherry. Both Calcutta and Pondicherry took part in the anti-British and anti-French movements respectively but the people of Chandannagar refrained from doing so. However, there is the possibility of discovering evidences of secret plots against the French hitherto undiscovered.

 

Bibliography:

1.      Banerjee, Sudeshna (23 October 2013). "Restoration at French Cemetery". The Telegraph. No. Kolkata. Archived from the original on 28 October 2013.

2.      Bhattacharya, Narendranath. Hooghly Jelar Purakirti. West Bengal State Archeology. 

3.      Bondyopadhyay, Biswanath. Dictionary of Historical Places, Bengal, 1757 – 1947. Primus.

4.      Bose, Arghya (2017). Chandernagor: Recognizing Alternative Discourses on the Colonial.

5.      Discover Chandannagar/author - Kalyan Chakrabortty, Published by Chandernagor Heritage.

6.      Ghosh, Lipika.  Chandannagorer Katha, Published by: Chandernagor Heritage.

7.      Hill, Samuel Charles (1903). Three Frenchmen In Bengal Or The Commercial Ruin Of The French Settlements In 1757.

8.      Malleson, Major G. B. (1868). History of the French in India.

9.      Sen, Sailendra Nath (2012). Chandernagore: From Boundage to Freedom, 1900-1955.

10.   Vancheeswaran, Ganesh (9 November 2017). "Kolkata to Chandannagar: The French life".  6 August 2019.