About Bengal famine.

Churchill's Secret War (2010)
Author: Madhusree Mukerjee

Besides participating in the Boer War and WW1 personally, as a Prime Minister, he spearheaded the Allied Forces in World War 2; Winston Churchill made it his life ambition to destroy India. His handling of the 1943 Bengal famine is equal to genocide. Instead of being responsible colonial masters taking care of their colonies that helped to propel their economies, he chose to blame the shortage solely as the natives' fault for choosing to breed like a rabbit. In his same tone of contempt, he verbalised, "Why isn't Gandhi dead yet?"

At the heights of the Second World War, the British had its hands tied all over the place. It was trying to act as the biggest superpower. In reality, it was bleeding. India was supplying all its credit needs. In essence, on paper, the British bought India's produce with a promise to pay later. And later was after WW2 when Britain was in dire straits and had to let them go.

Britain was also not self-sufficient as far as its food supply was concerned. Churchill had to feed his people throughout the war. He was dependent on the colonies for that - from Australia and the Americas too. The war made it difficult to move the food supply around. The U-boats were supposedly terrorising the Atlantic. In reality, however, there was only one such attack on commercial ships. There was a fear that the Japanese may enter India via Burma, made worse by the support by Bose's Indian National Army.

To deprive the invading foes of food supply, stockpiles were moved and even burnt. Restrictions were imposed on the transportation of rice. On top of that, the agricultural yield in 1943 was dismal after a typhoon. Massive famine ensued. Instead of moving grains from other parts of India to fill in for the need, Churchill did just the opposite. Produce from the Punjab region were siphoned to feed the war troops in the Mediterranean. In Churchill's eyes, feeding Indians serving the British army was equivalent to providing for the whole of India. Imports from Australia were detoured to Ceylon. Despite being advised of the situation on the ground, the one-tracked hotheaded imperialist Churchill gave two hoots to the misery of the Bengalis. He kept dragging his feet to send aid. Contribution from American civil societies also did not make it to India.

The final outcome is a devastating famine in the Bengal region estimated to have reached 3 million by some studies. It became a testbed for what deprivation of food could do to Man. It brought out the best and worst of mankind. Mothers killed their children to ease their suffering. Lactating mothers were seen feeding their already dead babies. The mothers themselves were skin and bones. Some families had to sell their teenage girls to brothels to feed the rest. Many young brides kept themselves alive by marrying old widowers for food. It was common for British officers in India to give their supplies to the pleading and dying locals, but this was supposedly illegal. Eyewitnesses of the devastation at the ground are described in gruesome details in this book.

It is ironic that despite all the miseries that were taking, business in Sonaganj, a brothel village established around the time the British established Calcutta as their administrative capital, prospered with many few intakes! Sonaganj laboured through these hard times and remain the biggest brothel complex in the world.

Churchill's subsequent election loss spurred him to write history to put his perspective history as the correct one, one where he would not be painted as the villain. His statement before the House of Common in 1948 summed it all, "For my part, I consider that it will be found much better by all parties to leave the past to history, especially as I propose to write that history myself."

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