Have you ever heard of Marichjhapi? A tiny, little-known island in the interiors of Sundarbans, about 75 km east of Calcutta? In 1979, it witnessed a macabre massacre of Bengali Hindu, mostly Dalit, refugees. It is perhaps the single largest pogrom in independent India’s history. Forty years on, Blood Island by Deep Halder vividly reconstructs the buried past of Marichjhapi. The author, a senior journalist, recorded the version of the witnesses and the survivors while investigating the massacre.
As the story begins, in the middle of 1978, around 1.5 lakh Bengali Hindu refugees started settling in Marichjhapi from the refugee camps in Dandakaranya. Most of them were Namasudras, the largest Dalit caste in Bengal. Driven out by the Islamists in Bangladesh, these Hindu refugees had crossed the border in search of a new home. During their stay in Dandakaranya, the Left—then in Opposition—had promised them that they would be “welcomed in Bengal with open arms” once it comes to power.
The Left...
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