The Rise and the Fall of the King

By Barun Roy

There have been many who have had the pleasure and the misfortune of witnessing the rise and fall of a man who was once so loved that he was declared as the ‘Maha mahim’ – His Great Eminence. Such was a protocol associated with him that none could call him by his first name even in his absence. Subash Ghisingh became a King and he ruled over the Darjeeling Hills with a suffocating grip. A common notion prevailed - it was only upon His Eminence to realize the aspirations of the people and it was to his infinite wisdom that the destiny of Indian Gorkhas ultimately linked.

On the fateful days of the month of February 2008 when Subash Ghisingh was laid under seize by the very people he seemingly ruled, the realization struck perhaps slowly that he was no longer the one with the people’s mandate.. Still, making his way back to the Chief Minister of Bengal, Buddhadeb Bhattacharya, Subash Ghisingh declared, “I was the King of Darjeeling Hills, I still am”, perhaps only to mock himself. Subash Ghisingh lays today, marooned in his own follies.

 

The Rise

Subash Ghisingh was born on the 22^nd of June 1936 at Manju Tea Estate. A son of a garden babu, he was sixth among the seven siblings. He dropped out during the 9th year of his study at St. Robert’s High School and joined the Indian Army, where he excelled in bantamweight boxing. His flair for writing also blossomed while in the Army. However, it would be much later when he would come out with his romantic novellas. He completed his matriculation in the Army quitting almost immediately to return back to Darjeeling. In 1961, he joined the Tindharia Bangla Primary School as a teacher and served there for a year, before enrolling at the Kalimpong Junior BT College in 1962 for training in teacher education. He left the BT training midway following an altercation with the college principal. After a few months, he joined Darjeeling Government College and completed his pre-university studies in Arts in 1963. Eventually, he enrolled for Graduate studies. While still in the second year in 1965, he again quit his studies midway. He was then the general secretary of Tarun Sangha.[Youth Association] This was the beginning of his political career. In 1968, Subash Ghisingh formed ‘Nilo Jhanda’ [Blue Flag], a political party vocal on issues concerning the hills. On the 22^nd of April 1979, for the first time, Subash Ghisingh raised the demand for a separate state. And on the 5^th of April 1980, he demanded “Gorkhaland” and formed the Gorkha National Liberation Front at his birthplace, Manju Tea Estate to strive towards statehood. After a prolonged struggle marked by more than 1200 officially dead and thousands injured, he signed an agreement with the state and the Centre for creation of the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council, an autonomous body on the 22^nd of August 1988. In 2004, Ghisingh demanded that the Council area be brought under the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution. The Centre and the State agreed and signed a tripartite memorandum of settlement ‘in principle’ with him on the 6^th of December 2005. The Union cabinet cleared a Bill and in December 2007, tabled it before Parliament for ratification.

Today, that Sixth Schedule Bill after the recommendations of the Parliamentary Standing Committee headed by Sushma Swaraj stands shelved.

The Fall

On the 7^th of October 2007, the one time protégé of Subash Ghisingh, Bimal Gurung declared the formation of Gorkha Janmukti Morcha in a political meeting held at Darjeeling. Bimal Gurung broke away from the Gorkha National Liberation Front on the issue of the Sixth Schedule Bill. A mere former Councillor then, Subash Ghisingh and the prominent leaders of the party refused to make much of Bimal Gurung and his new party. Within a month, Gorkha Janmukti Morcha found prominence amongst the people and Gorkha National Liberation Front found itself wanting. The Sixth Schedule Bill which was the brain child of the GNLF president was rejected and with it was rejected the GNLF and its President, Subash Ghisingh.

But then what really led to the fall of the King

Was it truly, the formation of the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha alone which lead to the fall of Subash Ghisingh and Gorkha National Liberation Front? There were more and most of it, either Subash Ghisingh was alone to be blamed for or the leaders he chose to run his party. Subash Ghisingh peculiarly never trusts any one and that includes his own cadres and supporters. It was also due to this very reason that he never chose his successor or worked towards succession. He believed that it was his burden and his burden alone to lead ‘the ‘abandoned sheep’. He was the Moses of this people chosen not by people but by God. It was his destiny. Such are his convictions even today that he earnestly believes that it will still be he, who would be marching his people towards Gorkhaland. He also believes that the Gorkhas as a race has to be instituted andremodeled. And based on his on calculations and divine derivations, he manipulated religious and cultural institutions. The people went silently from worshipping 20 handed Durga Idols to Bedrocks and ultimately to drinking chaangs and jaards – reminiscent of primitive Bonbo worship, aimed at making Tribals of proud Gorkhas who have been Hindus since the Mahabharata Era. His manipulations did not end there either. Engineering Projects were mandated to be based on religious implications and he threw pebbles muttering religious incantations on where helipads were to be built. His Tourist festivals began and ended with chaangs and jaards as mandated by the Bonbo King himself. And all the while, when the hills echoed with the cries of the assassination of C. K. Pradhan in Kalimpong, Rudra Pradhan in Darjeeling, Jiwan Prakash Theeng in Goke. Such assassination of the prominent leaders of the party should have brought immediate justice to the bereaved family but nothing was achieved. The cases lie still pending in the judicial departments of the Darjeeling District Court. The mass siphoning of more than 5 crores of Sarva Siksha Abhiyan that took place still remains unsolved its purported single mastermind Lakpa Rinden still at large. Either the Law Enforcement Authorities including the CID of the Bengal police did not ernest find him or earnestly searched for him amidst rumours that Lakpa Rinden had all the while been living in Nepal. And ultimately, the Sixth Schedule Bill itself which would have forever divided the Gorkha people into different tribe, castes and sects. Subash Ghisingh finds himself transformed today a common citizen laid bare by his own doings, perhaps power corrupts all and to some it corrupts completely. His one time loyalists have almost all but left him and while he suffered alone during his stay at the Pintail Village during the blockade, he must have realized that in this world called Indian Democracy, trying to be a King is a mistake in itself, rest and all are the doings of history.

Subash Ghisingh, still could be the father of Gorkhas and the true leader of Gorkhaland given that he garners once again the mandate of the people not the authority to rule over them from the Gods in the heaven….

Yet, still, he shall be known in the history, as the first King of the Indian Gorkhas and certainly as it seems he shall not be the last of the Kings to rule.

Krishna Bahadur Sunuwar – A legendary soldier of Azad Hind Fauz

By  Bhagtaraj Sunuwar (Mukhia)

The Author with Krishna Bahadur Sunuwar

Netâji Subąs Chāndrā Bose at Gidhēpâhâar, Kurseong flanked by
Amiya Basu and Shishir Basu (Pictures reproduced from Fallen Cicada, the unwritten History of Darjeeling Hills by Barun Roy)

Netâji Subąs Chāndrā Bose under house arrest in Kurseong. (Pictures reproduced from Fallen Cicada, the unwritten History of Darjeeling Hills by Barun Roy)

The immense popularity of Subash Chandra Bose during the climax of India’s freedom struggle against the mighty imperial forces of the Great Britain owe much of its credit to the overwhelming allegiance and sacrifices of its valorous Freedom Fighters. As such, there is an simple evidence to show the exemplary conducts demonstrated by some fo the Indian Gorkhas at part with other great Indian patriots. In fact, the actual profundity of India’s Independence history cannot be measured without knowing the names of its makers even if in a brief manner and style.

In view of above mentioned background most fortunately, we have one such glorious figure among us, and who is none other than our brave soldier, Krishna Bahadur Sunuwar [Mukhia], who was born to Ravilal and Savitri Sunuwar on the 21^st of February, 1925 at Bannockburn Tea Estate of Darjeeling. Sunuwar was fond of driving since his early days and kept driving for some more time. First around that time the Second World War was making its devastating impact felt all over the world; and India was no more exception to the call of grim reality. The gravity of the situation demanded huge manpower in the war fronts. The young energetic Sunuwar also made a decisive decision to srve his motherland without a second thought and got himself recruited in the army at Ghoom Depot of Darjeeling Hills on the 12 March 1941. He was sent to the Indian Army Ordinance Corps Training Centre in Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh. After his brief formal training period he was immediately sent to the South East Africa along with his entire unit.

While fighting bravely in the front against the enemy he was captured and made Prisoner-of War after the fall of Singapore before Japanese Forces. After a short interval of such a surrender, on 15^th Feb. 1942, he was recruited in the Azad Hind  Fauz led by Netaji. While fighting decisively in the Burmese Frontier he was seriously injured and was taken to the Army hospital at once. But the visionaryand restless soldier of Azad Hind Fauz did not feel comfortable in the hospital any more. After a short recovery he made one more daunting effort to fight to the last in the bloody frontline. During the grim course of the war, the Allied Forces were making successful attempts one after another to drive the Japanese Forces beyond the enemy line; and unfortunately Azad Hind Fauz had to incur a heavy loss before the Allied Forces, especially after the retreat of the Japanese Soldiers from Rangoon, Burma; and had to surrender unconditionally to avert further losses. During this particular phase, Sunuwar was again made POW by the British. Later he was brought back to Jessore District Camp, Bengal. But afterwards his case was dismissed by the Court of Enquiry [Court Martial]. He was also dismissed from the service.

Blooming Spring

Gorkha Brigades marches in Siliguri

A procession taken out by former Gorkha Brigades

Seminar on bio-informatics in NBU

Siliguri, March 7: The second three-day workshop on Bio-informatics began at the North Bengal University today. The thrust areas of the workshop are ‘Codon usage and Molecular modeling of bacterial genes’. Among the guests was Prof Subhash Minocha, the eminent bio-technologist of the University of New Hampshire, USA.  Explaining the fast growing significance of the subject of the workshop Mr Arnab Sen, the coordinator, said that Bio-informatics was an inter-disciplinary subject involving diverse arenas of physics, chemistry, statistics and computer to solve problems related to biology. “Bio-informatics play a crucial role in management and analysis of biological data, molecular modeling, drug designing, disease predicting and agriculture. Billions of data have been accumulated in course of research work for years in this field. The need of the hour is to analyse those and derive the right inferences to serve the human society. We are now working on this,” Mr Sen said.  Delivering his keynote address Prof Subhah Minocha said that the domain of Bio-informatics was a very complicated one. “It is yet to be figured out after so many years of diligent research in this field whether the subject can be called information of Biology or Biology of information. We are progressing apace, yet the riddle behind the subject continues eluding us,” he added.[The Statesman]

“The politics of Majority”

A thought by Barun Roy 

Since the formation of the Gorkha National Liberation Front and the enigmatic rise of Subash Ghisingh as the uncrowned King of Indian Gorkhas, Darjeeling Hills had been in the grip of a false hope. Mismanagement and Misappropriation ruled the functioning of all the instruments of governance and Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council and the Municipalities excelled in it. Three categories of people found prominence and they were Councilors, Commissioners [Municipal] and Contractors. With the resignation of Subash Ghisingh an era of decay and misrule has come to an end. But the challenge now is not to repeat the same mistakes. The real power must be vested on the people and a fledgling democracy built in the hills. The powers to be that have meanwhile filled in the vacuum, Gorkha Janmukti Morcha and the Citizen’s Forum must also learn to respect the will of the people. It must be understood by one and all that political parties are mere instruments and the political leaders and individuals those who make up the Citizen’s Forum must be the one’s responsible to the people not vice versa. The era of Democracy and Freedom that has been heralded must at all cost be protected.

‘Real’ Ghisingh is yet to emerge, says DGHC chief

Kolkata, March 8: “The asli (real) Ghisingh is yet to emerge,” announced Gorkha National Liberation Front (GNLF) chief Subash Ghisingh in Siliguri on Saturday. He was speaking to the media regarding his impending resignation from the Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council (DGHC) and subsequent plans. Ghisingh, who is at present the caretaker administrator of DGHC, confirmed that he will step down on Monday.

Darjeeling district administration sources said the state government is trying to ensure a safe passage for Ghisingh by holding talks with the Gorkha Janamukti Morch (GJM) leaders. GJM leaders are apparently divided about allowing Ghisingh to enter Darjeeling even after he agreed to step down as DGHC chief.

While one section is in favour of allowing him to return to Darjeeling after he resigned, the other section feels his return will give him the opportunity to regroup his men and foment trouble.

However, a GJM leader said: “Going by the present mood in the hills, people might spontaneously block Ghisingh’s entry.”

Meanwhile, Ghisingh said he will not demand Sixth Schedule status for Darjeeling any more. “It has lost its relevance. I appreciate what the Morcha has done to unify the people of the hills for Gorkhaland,” he said.