Bengalis are the largest ethnic group in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, comprising 26% of the union territory's total population.
History The modern history of Bengali settlement in the islands began after the Partition of India in 1947, when many Bengali refugees from East Bengal (now Bangladesh), particularly from the districts of Khulna, Jessore, Bakerganj (now Barisal) and Faridpur, were resettled in the Andaman Islands.
On 14 March 1949, a group of 495 East Bengali refugees arrived at Kidderpore Dock in Kolkata from the transit camp at Andul, where they had been gathered from several hastily established refugee camps across West Bengal. The group consisted of 132 families, including 50 agricultural families, 22 tāṃtī (weaver) families and 34 sūtradhara (carpenter) families. They became the first group of refugees to be resettled in the Andaman Islands. According to Anandabazar Patrika (15 March 1949), they represented only a small fraction of the approximately 70,000 refugees awaiting rehabilitation in West Bengal. Their departure was described by West Bengal's Chief Minister Dr Bidhan Chandra Roy as a historic event. Accompanied by Relief Minister Nikunjabihari Maity, Roy personally attended their departure from Kolkata, presenting the occasion as a significant milestone in the government's rehabilitation programme. In a speech delivered before their departure, Roy remarked on the willingness of so many refugees to migrate to what was then perceived as a distant and unfamiliar land.
A second phase began in 1952, when the Government of India introduced the Colonisation and Development Scheme. This programme offered loans and land grants to agriculturists and aimed to develop forested land in the islands for cultivation. Although the scheme was nominally open to settlers from the mainland, the great majority of those who drove it forward were Bengali refugees.
A third and final phase began in 1962 after the Colonisation and Development Scheme was discontinued. In the decade that followed, nearly 700 refugee families were settled through two one-off measures. Across the period from 1949 to 1970, the result was the transformation of a small refugee population into a durable settler society. Many Bengali settlers came from poor, rural and low-caste East Bengali backgrounds, especially Namaḥśūdra "chhoṭolok" families.
The table below shows the recorded migration and settlement of Bengalis in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands based on official reports, census data and scholarly sources. +Bengali migration / settlement in Andaman and Nicobar Islands Year Numbers 1949 495 1952 21 families 1953 97 families 1954 438 families 1955 390 families 1956 357 families 1957 221 families 1958 194 families 1959 217 families 1960 250 families 1961 228 families 1967 323 families 1969 375 families 1971 28,092 (approx.) 1991 64,706 2001 91,582 2011 (latest official census) 108,432 +Displaced families settled in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, 1953-1971 Year State of Origin Number of Families Area of Settlement Region of Settlement 1953 East Bengal 97 Ferrargunj South Andamans 1954 East Bengal 438 Rangat Middle Andamans Kerala 35 Rangat (Betapur) Middle Andamans 1955 East Bengal 390 Ferrargunj & Rangat South and Middle Andamans Kerala 37 Rangat Middle Andamans Tamil Nadu 4 Rangat Middle Andamans 1956 East Bengal 357 Diglipur North Andamans Kerala 52 Diglipur North Andamans 1957 East Bengal 221 Diglipur North Andamans Pondicherry 4 Rangat (Betapur) Middle Andamans 1958 East Bengal 194 Mayabunder North Andamans Kerala 6 Ferrargunj South Andamans 1959 East Bengal 217 Mayabunder North Andamans Tamil Nadu 14 Diglipur North Andamans Bihar 120 Rangat (Baratang) Middle Andamans 1960 East Bengal 250 Mayabunder North Andamans Tamil Nadu 17 Diglipur (Milangram) North Andamans Bihar 64 Diglipur (Ramnagar) North Andamans 1961 East Bengal 228 Port Blair (Havelock) South Andamans Kerala 14 Port Blair South Andamans Bihar 13 Diglipur North Andamans 1967 East Bengal 323 Mayabunder (Billiground) North Andamans 1969-1971 East Bengal 375 Little Andamans Little Andamans
Settlement and distribution Bengali settlement is concentrated overwhelmingly in the Great Andaman region, especially South Andaman and North and Middle Andaman. The first phase of refugee resettlement placed people entirely in South Andaman, and later agricultural colonisation expanded settlement into other parts of the Great Andaman zone.
Occupation and economy
The Bengali settler economy in the islands is rooted mainly in agriculture. The post-Partition rehabilitation schemes were explicitly designed to place Bengali refugees on land and turn them into cultivators, and the settlement programme selected families with able-bodied workers who could clear and cultivate forest land.
Between 1952 and 1961, Bengali refugees accounted for more than 85 per cent of the agricultural settlers rehabilitated in the Andaman Islands. Although not officially designated as such, this period marked the peak of refugee resettlement in the islands. Following a brief decline, smaller resettlement schemes continued between 1965 and 1970, but none approached the scale of the earlier programme. During the 1952 to 1961 period, at least 52 new villages were established across the Andaman Islands, often at the expense of the indigenous tribal communities, particularly the Jarawas. Despite the scale of these settlement efforts, official reports and public propaganda concerning refugee rehabilitation in the Andaman Islands declined significantly during this period.
Many Bengali villagers living in the Andaman and Nicobar islands are farmers, vegetable sellers, fishermen, conch-shell divers, deer and wild pig hunters and itinerant singers, with only a smaller share in salaried government jobs.
Culture A major part of Bengali identity in the islands is linked to the Matuyā tradition and related low-caste Vaiṣṇava devotional practices from East Bengal. In the islands, it provides a language of equality, devotion and collective memory that helps people anchor themselves in a new homeland.
The form of Bengali culture commonly associated with the works of Rabindranath Tagore is rooted in the Hindu bhadralok tradition, a cultural framework that has had comparatively limited influence among Bengalis in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Most Andaman Bengalis are of Namaḥśūdra origin. Many were resettled in the islands following the Partition of India and subsequent displacement from East Bengal. Historically, sections of the community placed greater emphasis on their distinct social and religious traditions than on a broader Hindu identity. Many adherents of the Matua movement continue to interpret their beliefs through anti-caste, anti-Brahmanical and in some cases, Buddhist-influenced perspectives.
A large proportion of the Bengali community in the islands identifies with the Matuyā religious movement (Matuyā panthī). The word matuyā means "intoxicated" or "absorbed in devotional love". The movement originated in the first half of the 19th century in the Faridpur district of East Bengal (now Bangladesh). Influenced by earlier Tantric Vaishnava traditions, it emphasises social equality and emerged primarily among members of the Namaḥśūdra community, who were historically regarded as an "untouchable" caste. It developed in opposition to caste discrimination within the Brahmanical social order and shares elements with other Bengali religious traditions, including the bāul, kirān, mātām, baiṭhak panthī and kīrtan traditions.
The Partition of India in 1947 and the creation of East Pakistan displaced much of the Matua population of East Bengal. Following resettlement in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, music and oral traditions became important means of preserving community identity. Singing gatherings (gāner āsar), devotional songs and dance continue to play a central role in Matua religious and cultural life.
Social and political status In 2005, Bengali settlers were given OBC status in the Union Territory's reservation policies. Many settlers interpreted this as a disadvantage because the largely rural Bengali community had to share reserved seats in education and government employment with other groups.
Bengali has an established place in territorial schooling. The Nicobar district education page states that education is provided in five media, including Bengali, alongside English, Hindi, Tamil and Telugu.
See also Bengalis Andaman and Nicobar Islands
References