A BIOGRAPHY OF SHER-E-BANGLA A.K. FAZLUL HUQ

◉ First Premiership (1937-1941) :
In 1935, provincial autonomy superseded the dyarchy, and the first general elections were conducted in 1937. The All Bengal Tenants Association was renamed the KrishakPraja Party by Huq. Huq became a key populist figure in Bengal during the election campaign. During the 1937 Indian provincial elections, his party gained 35 seats in the Bengal Legislative Assembly. After the Bengal Congress and the Bengal Provincial Muslim League, it was the third largest party. Huq joined forces with the Bengal Provincial Muslim League and independent MPs to create a coalition. He was chosen Leader of the House and Bengal’s first Prime Minister

⨭ Cabinet :
NaliniRanjan Sarkar was in charge of finance, Bijoy Prasad Singh Roy of revenue, Maharaja Srish Chandra Nandy of communications and public works, Prasanna Deb Raikut of forest and excise, MukundaBehariMallick of cooperative credit and rural indebtedness, Sir KhwajaNazimuddin of home, NawabKhwajaHabibullah of agriculture and industry, Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy (public health and local self-government)
⨭ Debt relief and Permanent Settlement :
The Bengal government employed administrative and legal means under Huq to discharge millions of tenant farmers’ debts under the Permanent Settlement’s zamindari system. Huq was from a zamindar family of the middle class. Many of his coworkers belonged to the zamindar class. Huq, on the other hand, represented a new generation of Bengali middle-class political consciousness that drew support from Bengali Muslims and Hindus alike. Land reform was pushed by the KrishakPraja Party. The Bengal Agricultural Debtors’ Act (1938), the Money Lenders’ Act (1938), and the Bengal Tenancy (Amendment) Act were all passed during Huq’s term (1938). In each district, a Debt Settlement Board was established.
Huq became the head of the All India Muslim League in 1916. Huq was a key figure in the formation of the Lucknow Pact between the Indian National Congress and the Muslim League in 1916. Huq was a Joint Secretary of the Indian National Congress in 1917 and the organization’s General Secretary from 1918 to 1919. He was the only individual to hold both the presidency of the League and the role of General Secretary in the Congress at the same time. Huq presided over the All India Muslim League’s Delhi Session in 1918.
The interest rate on rent arrears was cut from 12.50 percent to 6.25 percent by the statute. The tenants also gained the right to take control of the nadisekasti (land lost to river erosion and later resurfaced) by paying four years’ rent within twenty years after the nadisekasti’s disappearance. Millions of Bengali peasants were able to get out of debt as a result of these actions. However, Huq’s Rice and Lentils policy, which he campaigned for during the 1937 election, was never completely implemented.

⨭ Domestic and foreign policies:
The acceptance of the Lahore Resolution was a turning point in Huq’s political career. The All India Muslim League passed the resolution during its annual assembly in Lahore on March 23, 1940. “When the tiger (Huq) arrives, the lamb (Jinnah) must give away,” Muhammad Ali Jinnah said when Huq came at the Lahore assembly. At the annual session, Huq officially proposed the resolution. The resolution advocated for Muslim-majority regions in British India to be organized into “Independent States” with “independent and sovereign constituent components.”
The resolution’s initial phrasing implied that the Muslim League preferred numerous states than a single state. Huq later accused Jinnah of not putting forth enough effort to achieve a unified Bengal, including Calcutta. Since then, many interpretations of the Lahore Resolution have emerged. One view is that Huq wanted a distinct Muslim-majority state spanning Bengal and portions of Assam as early as the 1940s, based on the plural wording of’states.’

⨭ Education:
FazlulHuq was in charge of education in his ministry. In the Bengal Legislative Assembly, he presented the Basic Education Bill, which was enacted into law and made primary education free and obligatory. When FazlulHuq proposed the Secondary Education Bill in the assembly, however, it sparked a storm of objections from opposition members and the press because it included ‘principles of sectarian segregation in the sphere of education’ at the secondary level. Affirmative action for Bengali Muslims was something Huq believed strongly in. Huq was involved in the founding of a number of educational institutions in Bengal, including Islamia College and Lady Brabourne College in Calcutta, as well as Wajid Memorial Girls’ High School and Chakhar College in Kolkata.

⨭ Rift with the Muslim League
A.K FazlulHuq joined the Viceroy’s Defence Council in 1941, which was founded to manage British India’s military effort during World War II. Huq was accompanied by Punjab’s Prime Minister, Sir Sikandar Hayat Khan. Jinnah despised the rising prominence of provincial Muslim League leaders like as Huq and Khan. The Muslim League leadership, led by Jinnah and his friends, asked that the Prime Ministers of Bengal and Punjab resign from the Defence Council. Khan ultimately agreed, but Huq was adamant. Huq was expelled from the Muslim League when his relationship with Jinnah deteriorated. Following that, Jinnah’s friends in Bengal sought to destabilize Huq’s administration. The Defence Council, Jinnah.

◉ Second Premiership (1941-1943):
On December 12, 1941, the second Huq coalition administration was created. Except for the Muslim League, most members of the Bengal Legislative Assembly backed the partnership. Shamsuddin Ahmed’s secular branch of the KrishakPraja Party, Subhash Chandra Bose’s Forward Bloc, pro-Bose members of the Bengal Congress, and Syama Prasad Mukherjee’s Hindu Mahasabha were among his supporters.
He resigned on December 2, 1941, and Governor’s Rule was instituted.

⨭ Cabinet :
The cabinet included NawabBahaburKhwajaHabibullah, Khan Bahadur Abdul Karim, Khan Bahadur Hashem Ali Khan, Shamsuddin Ahmed, Syama Prasad Mukherjee, Santosh Kumar Bose and Upendranath Barman.

⨭ Tensions with the Governor and WWII:
Despite the fact that Huq had the support of the majority of the legislature, he had strained ties with the Governor of Bengal, John Herbert. The governor favored the leaders and sponsors of the provincial Muslim League, especially the Leader of the Opposition, Sir Khawaja Nazimuddin, and the “Calcutta Trio” in the legislature (Mirza Ahmad Ispahani, KhwajaNooruddin and A. R. Siddiqui). The League’s campaign against Huq was centered on his increasing friendship with Syama Prasad Mukherjee of the Hindu Mahasabha, who was accused of working against Muslims’ political and religious interests. The League petitioned the governor to dissolve the Huq government.
The threat of a Japanese invasion during the Burma Campaign, as well as the military’s installation of a “denial strategy” in 1942, wreaked havoc on the delta region. On October 26, a severe hurricane and tidal surges wreaked havoc on the coastal region, but rescue operations were hampered by bureaucratic inaction. A number of detainees were shot in a Dhaka jail on August 3, but owing to bureaucratic meddling, no inquiry could be undertaken. The Congress began the Quit India movement on August 9, which was met with British political persecution. This put further burden on the administration. Protests resonated across the province.
The issue became much more convoluted when Mukherjee quit, expressing his displeasure with the governor’s meddling in the ministry’s operations. Huq also advocated for the Bengal Army to be resurrected.
On March 15, 1943, the Prime Minister revealed on the floor of the Assembly that the governor had disobeyed the ministry’s recommendations on multiple occasions under the pretext of discretionary authority, and he named those instances. The governor did not take the claims lightly, and no-confidence resolutions were passed in the assembly on March 24 and 27 primarily as a result of his effort. The motions were lost on both occasions, albeit by small margins. On March 28, 1943, the governor asked Huq to sign a prepared letter of resignation and gave himself the role of managing the province under Section 92 of the constitution in order to execute his writ.A month later, Nazimuddin was appointed Prime Minister of a League-dominated government.
Huq slammed John Herbert for forcing his resignation and imposing Governor’s rule, calling it a “constitutional outrage.” Huq also chastised the colonial bureaucracy for working against his administration, claiming that “the steel frame of the Imperial Service” mocked the elected Bengal government’s authority. Huq accused John Herbert of being a bumbling administrator, claiming, “After all, even busy Governors go out on private business.” Huq quoted Plutarch as saying, “The mills of God grind slowly but very little,” Huq quoted Plutarch as saying, “and sooner possibly than Sir John Herbert or the Ministers’ supporters may believe, Nemesis will overtake those who [Nazimuddin] raced to government not to serve the people but to taste the delights of power emoluments.”
During the 1946 Indian provincial elections, Huq’s party received far less votes than the Muslim League, which was led by Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy.