TY - JOUR
T1 - ‘Enemy Agents at Work’
T2 - A microhistory of the 1954 Adamjee and Karnaphuli riots in East Pakistan
AU - Uddin, Layli
N1 - Funding Information:
After partition, the East Pakistan Federation of Labour emerged as the representative body for workers, with Faiz Ahmed as the principal labour leader. His close relationship with Aftab Malik, the first labour minister of Pakistan, who initially proposed the idea of a central labour organization, meant that he was someone that the government and industrial owners were willing to bargain with. This use of trade unions to control and undermine self-organizing amongst workers can be traced back to the partition period. Subho Basu's work demonstrates how, during the 1937 general strike in the jute-mill industry, the Muslim League set up the White Union to disrupt the activities of ‘red-flag’ union and the radical factory committees during the 1937 general strike in the jute-mill industry in Calcutta. The White Union, supported by the state and the British and native industrial lobby and funded by the mills, was able to effectively diminish the threat of labour militancy.
Publisher Copyright:
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2020.
Copyright:
Copyright 2021 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 2021/3
Y1 - 2021/3
N2 - Between March and May 1954, an election and two riots took place in East Pakistan, with far-reaching implications. On 30 May, the prime minister of Pakistan, in a bellicose tone, declared that ‘enemy agents’ and ‘disruptive forces’ were at work and imposed governor's rule for the first time in East Pakistan. The autocratic and high-handed attitude of the Central government in Karachi over the seemingly wayward East Wing was to become a portent of future conflicts between the province and the state, eventually leading to the unmaking of Pakistan in 1971. What precipitated the 1954 crisis? Who were the enemy agents and disruptive forces that the prime minister had alluded to? The reference was to the Bengali labourers in East Pakistan—the main protagonists of the 1954 Karnaphuli Paper Mill and Adamjee Jute Mill riots. These were the most violent industrial riots in the history of United Pakistan, if not the subcontinent. Using sensitive materials obtained from multiple archives, this article dismantles the conventional thesis that these riots were ‘Bengali–Bihari riots’, fanned by the flames of Bengali provincialism at the political level, or events instigated by the Centre to derail the democratic hopes of the Bengali population of Pakistan. A microhistory of the events demonstrates a more complex picture of postcolonial labour formations and solidarities; the relationship between state-led industrialization and refugee rehabilitation, and conflicting visions of sovereignty. This is a story of estrangement between employers and workers over the question of who were the real sovereigns of labour, capital, and Pakistan itself.
AB - Between March and May 1954, an election and two riots took place in East Pakistan, with far-reaching implications. On 30 May, the prime minister of Pakistan, in a bellicose tone, declared that ‘enemy agents’ and ‘disruptive forces’ were at work and imposed governor's rule for the first time in East Pakistan. The autocratic and high-handed attitude of the Central government in Karachi over the seemingly wayward East Wing was to become a portent of future conflicts between the province and the state, eventually leading to the unmaking of Pakistan in 1971. What precipitated the 1954 crisis? Who were the enemy agents and disruptive forces that the prime minister had alluded to? The reference was to the Bengali labourers in East Pakistan—the main protagonists of the 1954 Karnaphuli Paper Mill and Adamjee Jute Mill riots. These were the most violent industrial riots in the history of United Pakistan, if not the subcontinent. Using sensitive materials obtained from multiple archives, this article dismantles the conventional thesis that these riots were ‘Bengali–Bihari riots’, fanned by the flames of Bengali provincialism at the political level, or events instigated by the Centre to derail the democratic hopes of the Bengali population of Pakistan. A microhistory of the events demonstrates a more complex picture of postcolonial labour formations and solidarities; the relationship between state-led industrialization and refugee rehabilitation, and conflicting visions of sovereignty. This is a story of estrangement between employers and workers over the question of who were the real sovereigns of labour, capital, and Pakistan itself.
U2 - 10.1017/S0026749X19000416
DO - 10.1017/S0026749X19000416
M3 - Review article
SN - 0026-749X
VL - 55
SP - 629
EP - 664
JO - MODERN ASIAN STUDIES
JF - MODERN ASIAN STUDIES
IS - 2
ER -
