Why bihar was divided

Yet, nine years on, Bihar's senior BJP leader and deputy CM Sushil Kumar Modi thinks the separation of Jharkhand has proved to be a boon for Bihar for economic reasons, specially in the light of interest the investors have now been showing.

Modi made his observation on Thursday. He was giving keynote address at the function organised here to release the "Bihar Vision A growth Strategy" document prepared by the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India Assocham under its president Swati Piramal, who is also the chief of Nicholas Piramal Group of Industries.

Modi, who holds the finance portfolio and is probably the most widely travelled minister in the Nitish Kumar government, quantified the current mood of investors towards Bihar, in particular, and the eastern region, in general, saying: "Now India is coming to Bihar. Modi presented the broad scenario of investments and industrial growth in united Bihar, and said that all investments and industrial activities, over the last 50 years, were in "southern Bihar read mineral-rich Jhakhand ", and no industry had come up in the plains of Bihar proper after the death of state's first CM Shri Krishna Sinha in On the contrary, Assocham is acting as a catalyst to stimulate growth of Bihar.

Eastern region and Bihar have come in focus," Modi said, adding: "It is acting as a bridge between investors and the state's positive atmosphere. Today, the focus is on Bihar on its own strength. She said products of Bihar needed proper branding for both national and international marketing. On Thursday morning, she had purchased 80 dozens of "yellow bananas grown in Hajipur area" and said that it could be marketed as "Ganga banana", if produced by organic farming.

With education making a slow start, the angst at being discriminated against by the British in blatant favour of Bengalis gave way to open discontent. The call 'Bihar for Biharis' started only with the publication of an Urdu newspaper, 'Murge Sulema', which in its edition dated February 7, , wrote openly that capable Biharis should be appointed in the government, which should have a two-pronged strategy, that of strengthening the education department here and giving required fillip to dialects and languages native to Bihar.

The 'Bihar Bandhu' journal, in its April 5, , edition strongly mentioned that if Bihar continued to stay within Bengal for very long, it would be damaging for its interests as there was no meeting point between the two in terms of food, culture, attitude, matrimonial alliances, so much so that Bengalis looked down upon their Bihari brethren and treated them as inferiors. In Bihar part of Bengal Presidency, all jobs in the railways and later in technical education were filled up by Bengalis, pushing Bihar further into the morass of backwardness.

Archival sources show that with the growth in national awakening due to cultural renaissance and the Vernacular Press Act of , a panicky British government , adopting a dual policy, decided to give piecemeal benefits to Bihar region, both as a device to admonish Bengal to mend its ways in a veiled manner and to pacify Biharis.

Bihar, nevertheless, stepped up its demand despite the absence of an organized form and leadership. In column after column, the two stalwarts wrote extensively on the educational and socio-economic conditions of the region, arguing vociferously that only segregation from Bengal would do it good.

The newspaper also strongly advocated that instead of separating Chittagong from Bengal and merging it with Assam , Bihar should be segregated from Bengal if it had to progress. Prior to partition of Bengal in , the voice for creation of Bihar reached a high pitch. Bihar saw the first signs of colonial grace post The Frazer Memorial Trust granted assistance for education in the region, leading to the Bihar Landholders Association mentioning the governor of Bengal as the Governor of both Bengal and Bihar in its citation.

Sinha's writings during this period reflected Bihar's constant monetary drain to Bengal resulting in lack of medicare, increasing poverty and illiteracy. This drew Biharis closer and the demand shriller. Ali Imam presided over the first session of Bihar Prantiya Sammelan in and Fakhruddin mooted the proposal that Bihar should finally be segregated from Bengal.