Swatantra Tripura Committee
Encyclopedia
The Swatantra Tripura Committee was a coordination of political forces in Tripura
Tripura
Tripura is a state in North-East India, with an area of . It is the third smallest state of India, according to area. Tripura is surrounded by Bangladesh on the north, south, and west. The Indian states of Assam and Mizoram lie to the east. The capital is Agartala and the main languages spoken are...

, India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

, that struggled against the integration of Tripura into the state of Assam
Assam
Assam , also, rarely, Assam Valley and formerly the Assam Province , is a northeastern state of India and is one of the most culturally and geographically distinct regions of the country...

. The campaign was active 1955-1956.

The committee was founded at meeting in Hotel Tripur, Agartala, October 8, 1955. The organization had 62 members at the time of its foundation. The committee was led by an Executive Committee, Swarnakamal Roy was its president and Dasarath Deb
Dasarath Deb
Dasarth Deb was a political leader in the Indian state of Tripura. He was a leader of the Ganamukti Parishad and the Communist Party of India . He was elected to the Lok Sabha in 1952, 1957, 1962 and 1971 from Tripura East constituency...

 its general secretary.

The Swatantra Tripura Committee had been formed with the backdrop of rumours that the States Reorganisation Commission
States Reorganisation Commission
The States Reorganisation Commission was constituted by the Central Government of India under the States Reorganisation Act and consisted of Hon. Fazal Ali, Kavalam Madhava Panikkar, and H.N. Kunzru...

 would propose that Tripura be annexed to the state of Assam. On October 10, 1955, the rumour became an official fact, as the SRC made its recommendations public. The founders of the Swatantra Tripura Committee argued that such a merger would have been ‘undemocratic’ and ‘illogical’. Moreover, the committee argued that Tripura should be an entity of its own within the Indian Union and have its own legislative assembly
Vidhan Sabha
The Vidhan Sabha or the Legislative Assembly is the lower house or the sole house of the provincial legislature in the different states of India. The same name is also used for the lower house of the legislatures for two of the union territories, Delhi and Pondicherry...

.

Politically, the committee was backed up by the Communist Party of India
Communist Party of India
The Communist Party of India is a national political party in India. In the Indian communist movement, there are different views on exactly when the Indian communist party was founded. The date maintained as the foundation day by CPI is 26 December 1925...

, the Revolutionary Socialist Party
Revolutionary Socialist Party (India)
Revolutionary Socialist Party is a Marxist-Leninist political party in India. The party was founded on March 19, 1940 and has its roots in the Bengali liberation movement Anushilan Samiti and the Hindustan Socialist Republican Army. The party got around 0,4% of the votes and three seats in the Lok...

 and the Praja Socialist Party
Praja Socialist Party
The Praja Socialist Party was an Indian political party in existence from 1952 to 1972. It was founded when the Socialist Party, led by Jayprakash Narayan, Acharya Narendra Deva and Basawon Singh , merged with the Kisan Mazdoor Praja Party led by J.B. Kripalani...

. The Tripura organization of the Indian National Congress
Indian National Congress
The Indian National Congress is one of the two major political parties in India, the other being the Bharatiya Janata Party. It is the largest and one of the oldest democratic political parties in the world. The party's modern liberal platform is largely considered center-left in the Indian...

 had been invited to take part in the founding of the committee, but they stayed aloof.

On October 11, 1955, the committee organized a hartal
Hartal
Hartal is a term in many Indian languages for strike action, used often during the Indian Independence Movement. It is mass protest often involving a total shutdown of workplaces, offices, shops, courts of law as a form of civil disobedience...

 (general strike) in Agartala. In the evening, a manifestation was held. Nripen Chakroborthy
Nripen Chakroborthy
Nripen Chakraborty was an Indian politician and the chief minister of Tripura state from 1978-1988.-Life:...

, a speaker at the public meeting, gave a call to build Swatantra Tripura Committee branches throughout Tripura.

On November 4, 1955, the Union Home Minister G .B. Pant visited Agartala. The Swatantra Tripura Committee mobilized a protest with 75 000 participants. During his visit, Pant conveyed that the reorganization issue had not yet been decided and that the Congress party should not be criticized for the recommendations of the SRC.

The Swatantra Tripura Committee organized a conference in Agartala on November 6, 1955, in which representatives from Halam
Halam (ethnic group)
The Halam people are a Kuki tribe native to the state of Tripura in India. The name Halam is coined by the Tipra Raja. They are also known as Mizo, while some people called them Ranglong. They are further divided into 15 sub-clans.-History:...

, Kuki
Kuki people
The Kukis are an ethnic group that spread throughout the Northeastern region of India, Northwest Burma and Chittagong Hill Tracts in Bangladesh. In Northeast India they are present in all the states except Arunachal Pradesh. This dispersal across international borders is mainly attributed to the...

, Tripuri, Bengali
Bengali people
The Bengali people are an ethnic community native to the historic region of Bengal in South Asia. They speak Bengali , which is an Indo-Aryan language of the eastern Indian subcontinent, evolved from the Magadhi Prakrit and Sanskrit languages. In their native language, they are referred to as বাঙালী...

 Hindu
Hindu
Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...

 and Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...

 communities took part. The conference resolved that subdivision-level conferences of the Swatantra Tripura Committee should be held in every subdivision of Tripura within one month.

The issue was settled in July 1956, as the Lok Sabha
Lok Sabha
The Lok Sabha or House of the People is the lower house of the Parliament of India. Members of the Lok Sabha are elected by direct election under universal adult suffrage. As of 2009, there have been fifteen Lok Sabhas elected by the people of India...

decided to retain Tripura as a separate entity.
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