Colonization through Municipalization: The Politics of Sanitation and Municipal Governance in the ‘Mofussils’ of Colonial Bengal, c. 1870–1940s

Abstract

How does the state govern a territory which has rapidly grown to become one of the most densely populated regions of the province? How does the state account for the governance of a place which has only recently transitioned from a rural or a semi-rural tract to a town? Most importantly, how does the state govern a region where the main source of power resides with the proprietors of private enterprises? These were some of the questions the colonial state had to deal with when it was faced with the prospect of administering some of the most rapidly ‘urbanizing’ or expanding regions of Bengal. This included the industrial belt—the riparian municipalities of the districts of 24 Parganas and Hooghly—and the mining and railway junctions of Ranigunj and Asansol, which developed from the last quarter of the nineteenth century. How did their administration differ, if at all, from other mofussil municipalities which also had a semi-rural character? This article will examine these questions and try to understand how, through the process of municipalization, the colonial state was trying to control newer territories. It shall also analyse how local communities reacted to these attempts. This paper will argue that any attempt at improvement in these mofussil municipalities was hindered by a lack of understanding, on the part of the provincial government, of the local socio-economic conditions and the ineffectiveness of the local self-government in these towns.