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Monday, July 11, 2011

Extract from Work in Progress : 2


A Planter’s Murder

There is at least one recorded mention of the murder of Mr Bloomfield, manager of an indio planter’s kothi at Telahara, by a crowd of irate farmers in 1906. On April 29, 1917, the Bettiah SDO, in a long confidential report to the Champaran DM about Gandhi’s continuing mission, wrote:

I further quoted [to Mr Gandhi] the example of Mr Bloomfield’s murder as showing the length to which raiyats will go, once excitement and passion take possession of them.; though murder may not have been their original intention, Mr Bloomfield was beaten down and every bone in his body broken. I further quoted the recent case in which Mr Kemp was attacked and assaulted, and expressed the opinion that, had not Mr Kemp retained his seat in the saddle, he would have lost his life.13 RP/CMG/13

In a Hindi novel Neel ke Dhabbe by Vindhyachal Prasad Gupta, a local poet and writer from Bettiah, there is a fictionalized recreation of Bloomfield’s tyranny and his consequent murder which provides a live commentary.

Scene 1 : Bloom field is sitting in his ‘kachahari’ (rent-collection office), smoking a cigar. His ryots stand in attendance around him with folded hands. One young man from the crowd, Dukhna, who failed to attend to his farming duty because his wife was in labour, is being thrashed mercilessly with shoes. Meanwhile Bloomfield’s roving eyes notice two young women in the crowd. He orders them to be brought into his bungalow, bathed, perfumed and ready for his night-long revelry…Sipping his glass of whiskey, Bloomfield notices a young newly married young couple passing by his window. The bride (Gulabi) is forcibly brought to his bed to make a threesome for Bloomfield’s orgies. Outside, the loyal Patwari (rent-collector) goes on handling the crowd of ryots with abuses, punches and shoes.

Scene 2 : The Bada Saheb (W.W.Hudson, Chief of the Bihar Light Horse, Military Contigent)) is about to ride his horse to his office when a guard comes running, with blood streaming down his forehead. In a terror-stricken voice he mumbles : “Huzoor! They have killed Bloomfield sahib”. Hudson in his rage kicks him with his boot, then quickly scribbles a note to his subordinate, James McLeod, to rush with his force to the scene of occurrence. Soon the military force reaches there and surrounds the Telahara village. All the males have already fled the village. Only women and children are left behind to bear the brunt of brutal repression at the hands of the tormentors. Scores of ryots are put into prison. One Purandar Teli, with two others, are sentenced to be hanged, though the sentences are later commuted to only six-years’ rigorous imprisonment.14 Neel 4-16.


Gandhi was now hearing all these tales of atrocities, over and over again, - of forced evictions, ravaging of whole villages, trampling of crops by elephants and horses, looting and burning of homes and rapes of women and virgin brides - from the farmers pouring in at Gorakh Babu’s house. When the influx increased in numbers, Gandhi and his dedicated band of lawyer colleagues moved to more spacious premises. The statements of the aggrieved farmers were recorded by his team members with full details, and under thorough cross-examination, duly signed or thumbed by the complainants.

Rajendra Prasad devotes two long chapters in his Autobiography on the Champaran satyagraha, besides writing Champaran me Mahatma Gandhi, a whole book full of details and relevant documents, including the Champaran Agrarian Enquiry Committee’s Report and the full text of the Champaran Agrarian Bill ( which became an Act in 1918).The last of the Appendices in that book gives a date-wise list of the farmers’ names whose statements were duly recorded, along with the names of the persons who recorded those statements. From that list we learn that Rajendra Prasad personally recorded the statements of over 300 farmers spread out between April 19 and May 12. He also discusses how he first became associated with Gandhi’s work in Champaran, and how the whole movement was successfully brought to its completion with the passing of the Agrarian Act, in the first seven chapters of his book At the Feet of Mahatma Gandhi.

Rajendra Prasad, in his Autobiography, also says that after the Government dropped the case against Gandhi and assured him of all administrative cooperation in holding his independent enquiry –

Now began in right earnest the investigation of the Champaran atrocities. We were divided in batches and recorded the statements of the kisans who came in a regular procession. We would sometimes move to Bettiah. Eventually one batch stayed at Bettiah: another at Motihari. We worked without respite. To anything startling in the statements we would at once draw Gandhiji’s attention, otherwise we just passed on the recorded statements to him for his perusal. The work continued for many days, and about 22,000 to 25,000 statements were recorded…. Sometimes Gandhiji would visit a village or send one of us to inquire into a complaint. We had strict instructions not to address the people. There were, therefore, no meetings and no lectures either by us, or by Gandhiji in Champaran in those days.15 A/89

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