Emergent Nationalism

It would be a mistake, however, to regard this inseparable link between Dacca University and Bangladesh only as a recent phenomenon or as due to the shared experience of last year's tragedy. One may see this link as a historical one, dating back to the inception of the Dacca University Act.

When founded it was being looked upon as a belated consolation given to East Bengal for the loss of its identity as a separate province (which included Assam) and with capital at Dacca. Viewed in this light the origin of Dacca University may be traced back to the partition of Bengal in 1905. The Partition had ended in 1911 as a result of British Governments decision to placate the majority Hindu opinion in India and West Bengal, but not until the seeds of the future partition of British India into India, Pakistan and Bangladesh had been sown.

In 1911 Britain was seen "moving into the heart of India" by sacrificing East Bengal's identity and Dacca's re-emergence as a provincial capital after a lapse of over two centuries. Founding of Dacca University and Carmichael Hall in Calcutta towards the close of the second decade of the century were seen as the first signs of a new policy of satisfying the majority community in Bengal, the Muslim.

By the twenties of this century the first results of the 1905 partition of Bengal became apparent in high school student population and to some extent in undergraduate population. The creation of a new province however had thrown up new job opportunities and the early beneficiaries had started sending their sons to school (the state has traditionally been the biggest employer all over the sub-continent).

New pressure began to build for more Muslim Halls in Dacca University and Fazlul Haq Muslims Hall was the answer of the pre-1947 days (Fazlul Haq, one of the brilliant students of Calcutta University, had been in the civil service for a time, but soon he gave it up to join politics).

The social legislations of the late twenties and early thirties had improved the lot of the Bengal peasant (80% Muslim) by giving him right to his land and by relieving him of the enormous debts in which he was born, in which he lived and with which he died. (Mainly the services rendered by Nawab Ali Choudhuri, A.K. Fazlul Huq and Khwaja Nazizm ud Dim). The Act of 1935 when it began implementation in 1937 opened a great future for the Bengali Muslims and the social revolution which began in 1905 now gathered tremendous momentum. But it failed to make any impact on Calcutta University itself. Only at Dacca did the new aspirations find fullest expression. The impact of the countryside made itself felt in Dacca University, on Sallimullah Hall much more than Islamia College, which was under Calcutta control. Dacca University alumni started crowding into public service.

Dacca University became an important centre of Pakistan movement, although most of the leadership was then based in Calcutta, then capital of the Province. (Shaikh Mujib was at Islamia College before 1947 and joined Dacca University as a law student after the partition.) Young teachers and students of Dacca University were all ardent Pakistanis, and in the 1946 General Elections in India which in a sense was a referendum on Pakistan so far as Indian Muslims were concerned - Pakistan received its solid support from Bengal, and in Muslim minority provinces, but not from Pakistan of today.

The vision of Pakistan for which Dacca University academics and Bangladeshis had prepared the country was to have two regions - in which both regions, were supposed to have, as Fazlul Haq's resolution no. 3 of 1940 had conceded, full powers in "defence, external affairs, communications, customs and such matters as may be neccessary" and the region in the east, 'Bangasam', was to compromise Bengal and Assam, which would have almost 50-50 Muslims and non-Muslim population. In the event Bangasam was reduced to 2/3rd of Bengal only and the most underdeveloped part at that. Pakistan also began developing its unitary character, at the cost of the eastern wing.

There was no time for debate in 1947. The immediate task was to shoulder the new responsibilities consequent upon the partition of the country, and these Dacca University sought to fulfill without sacrificing its original residential character, but by adding federal character on to it.

Between 1947 and now, Dacca University has fulfilled its responsibility to the best of its ability, assisted as time went on, by new institutions set on its model, and run by its College at Rajshahi, Chittagong and now at Sava.

While its direct educational responsibilities decreased with the growth of new universities it gradually assumed new role of national leadership.