The Politics of a Partition Riot

Calcutta was plunged into a fury of Hindu–Muslim clashes exactly one year before India and Pakistan gained independence. They started early on the morning of 16 August, 1946 and continued for five days. The British authorities managed to quell the disturbances only after resorting to emergency measures that had never been taken in the long history of the colonial city. A curfew was imposed for the first time and the military was called in to regain control. The police and the military fired 876 and 1,916 rounds of ammunition respectively during the five days of rioting. The police used about 500 tear gas shells and grenades. ¹ Thirty thousand people had to be evacuated to safer places. ² When the surges of rioting passed, it became clear that, even on a conservative official estimate, 4,000 people had been killed and 10,000 injured. ³ Some 2,531 people were arrested prior to 6 September. ⁴ Due to this alarming number of casualties and the unprecedented intensity of the rioting, the Calcutta Communal Riot of 1946 is often referred to as the ‘Great Calcutta Killing’. ⁵