December 17, 2025
Ritabrata Banerjee’s Zero Hour mention on the demand for the inclusion of the nine young Bengali revolutionaries who gunned down British district magistrates in NCERT’s school textbooks
Sir, on 7th of July, 1931 at 3.45 a.m. in the morning, Dinesh Gupto, the lone living lion heart of the famous trio of the Writer’s Building Corridor War against the British, was executed by hanging. Dauntless Dinesh died at dawn and at 7.30 p.m. in that very evening itself, Bimal Das Gupto and Jyotijivan Ghosh gunned down James Peddy, the tyrannical district magistrate of Medinipur. Both were deported to the Andamans. The next District Magistrate of Midnapore, Robert Douglas was even more brutal. He opened fire on unarmed inmates at the Hisley Jail in September, 1931. On 30th of April, 1932, the scores were settled. Pradyut Bhattacharya and Prabhanshu Shakarpal avenged the killing of Santosh Kumar Mitra and Tarakeshwar Sen. Douglas was gunned down. Pradyut was hanged and Prabhangshu was deported. No Britisher was ready to take charge as the District Magistrate of Midnapore. Bernard Barge came forward. His security was almost impossible to be breached. On September 2nd 1933, during an exhibition match between Mohammedan Sporting Club and the Town Football Club of Medinipur five determined Bengali brave hearts – Brajokishwar Chakraborty, Ramkrishna Roy, Nirmal Jivan Ghosh, Mrigyan Dutta and Anadbandhu Paja, appeared from nowhere and fired a barrage of eight bullets killing Bernard Berge. Anandbandhu and Mrigyan Dutta died in the crossfire and Brajokishwar, Ramkrishna and Nirmal Jivan were executed by hanging. Additional valiant souls implicated in this case were deported to the Andamans. These incidents of the killing of three District Magistrates in three successive years send shivers amidst the British Administration. From that day, until India’s ted independence, the District of Midnapur never again had a British District Magistrate. The death defying heroism of these Bengali brave-hearts, belonging to the revolutionary organisation Bengal Warriors, need to be honoured. They are heroes, they used to raise a storm in the sky; Their stories, amidst the blood of foreigners, in the fire of guns, bombs, and bullets, are thrilling even today; Their consciousness flows through every vein; Who is there today to turn them away? Who considers them strangers? They are heroes, they used to raise a storm in the sky. Sir, 70 percent of the brave revolutionaries in the Cellular Jail of the Andamans were Bengalis. They used to speak in Bengali. None of them, Sir, had any expectation of immortality, nor did they have any desire to find a place in history. They belong to our country, these brave Bengalis, our country, too, has not given these brave Bengalis their due respect. In our State, Sir, the Government of Ms. Mamata Banerjee has accorded due respect to all these revolutionaries. But the sad reality is that these brave Bengalis need to find a place in the curriculum of the NCERT school textbooks. This event needs to find a place. It is unfortunate that they have no place there. This incident will never be forgotten. But people who wrote mercy petition after mercy petition, they are being celebrated. But these revolutionaries…
