Bhupendranath Datta

Bhupendranath Datta (4 September 1880 – 25 December 1961) was an Indian revolutionary and later a noted sociologist and anthropologist. He associated Rishi Aurobindo in his political works. In his youth, he was closely associated with the Jugantar movement, serving as the editor of ''Jugantar Patrika'' until his arrest and imprisonment in 1907. In his later revolutionary career, he was privy to the Indo-German Conspiracy. His elder brother was Swami Vivekananda. The Asiatic Society today holds the ''Dr. Bhupendranath Datta memorial lecture'' in his honour.

Datta was a writer too. He wrote several books on Indian culture and society. He wrote a book named "''Swami Vivekananda, Patriot-prophet".''

Early life and education

Datta was born on 4 September 1880 in the town of Calcutta, the capital of Bengal Presidency, the largest province of British India at that time. His parents were Vishwanath Datta and Bhuvaneshwari Datta. He had two elder brothers, Narendranath Datta (later known as Swami Vivekananda) and Mahendranath Datta. Vishwanath Datta was an attorney of Calcutta High Court and Bhuvaneshwari Devi was a housewife. Datta was enrolled in Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar's Metropolitan Institution from where he passed entrance examination. In his youth, he joined Brahmo Samaj led by Keshub Chandra Sen and Debendranath Tagore. Here he met Sivanath Sastri who deeply influenced him. Datta's religious and social beliefs were shaped by Brahmo Samaj which included belief in a caste-less society, in a single God and revolts against superstitions.

Revolutionary activities

In India

Datta decided to join Indian independence movement, and joined Bengal Revolutionary Society formed by Pramathanath Mitra in 1902. In 1906, he became the editor of the newspaper ''Jugantar Patrika''. This newspaper was the mouthpiece of the Revolutionary Party of Bengal. In this period he became a close associate of Sri Aurobindo and Barindra Ghosh.

In 1907, Datta was arrested by British police with the charge of sedition and was sentenced to one year's imprisonment.

In USA

After release in 1908 he left India for the United States. After his arrival, he stayed at the "India House" for a while. He finished his post-graduate studies and obtained an M.A. degree from Brown University.

In Germany

Datta joined Ghadar Party of California and there he studied about socialism and communism. During World War I, he went to Germany and started revolutionary and political activities there. In 1916, he became the secretary of Indian Independence Committee in Berlin. He remained the secretary of this organisation until 1918. He took memberships of German Anthropological Society in 1920 and German Asiatic Society in 1924.

In 1921 Datta went to Moscow to join Comintern. Manabendra Nath Roy and Birendranath Dasgupta also attended this year's Comintern. During the visit Datta presented Vladimir Lenin a research paper on political condition of contemporary India. He obtained a doctorate degree in Anthropology from the University of Hamburg in 1923.

Back in India

Then he returned to India and decided to join Indian National Congress. He became members of Bengal Regional Congress in 1927—28 and All India Congress Committee in 1929. In the annual conference of Indian National Congress organised in Karachi in 1930, he proposed a fundamental right for Indian farmers and had it accepted by the Congress Committee led by Jawaharlal Nehru. He chaired two All India Trade Union Congress' annual conference. He was arrested for his political activities.

Bhupendranath returned to a much-changed India after 16 long years, in April 1925. He fully cooperated with the newly formed Communist Party of India, established in Kanpur, and took part in the
Workers’ and Peasants’
Party (WPP). His first political
activity was participation in Political Sufferers’ Conference in Gauhati in December 1926, presiding over it. Bhupen said
that not only the Indian
bourgeoisie but also the
common masses had
joined the struggle for
freedom.

Bhupendranath at-
tended the annual
conference of WPP in
1927, where he met
Nalini Gupta. He spread
ideas of socialism and
Marxism among youth,
speaking about Russian
revolution. Veteran
Communist and TU
leader Dr Ranen Sen re-
called that Dr
Bhupendranath used to
take political classes
among young revolu-
tionaries on Marxism.
Many of them later
joined the CPI under his
influence.

Famous Communist historian Chinmohan
Sehanavis recalls his indebtedness to Bhupendranath for his training in Marxism thus:
“I came in contact with
Shri Bhupendranath
Dutta during 1933-34.
When I expressed my
desire to study socialism
and Marxism from him”,
he asked whether it was
for becoming a scholar or
a mass worker.
Sehanavis told him he
wanted to work among
workers and peasants.

Organizer of Students, Youth

Bhupendranath was a much sought after leader. He delivered presidential address at DaccaDistrict Youngmen's
Conference in 1927. In a
letter to SA Dange, on
November 12, 1927, on
the proposed first all In-
dia Socialist Youth
Congress,
Bhupendranath wrote:
“This Congress is in-
tended for those young
men and women of India
who hold Marxist world-
view, and they only are
welcome to be the del-
egates of the Congress.”

Socialist Youth Con-
gress was held on
December 27, 1927, in
Calcutta.
Bhupendranath as chair-
man of reception
committee drew atten-
tion of youth to Marxism
and suggested formation
of study circles.
Jawaharlal Nehru presided over. All Bengal Youth Association was
formed at the beginning
of 1928, with
Bhupendranath as the
president of the organization and as the main
speaker at its conference.

Bhupendranath also
spoke at the conference
of Young Comrades’ League at Rajshahi in
April 1930. His speech
helped many young men
to give up anarchism
and come over to communism.

Bhupen presided over
Khulna district students’
conference on May 5,
1929, Burdwan district
students’ conference on
August 17, 1929,
Faridpur students’ con-
ference in June 1931, and
others. He urged upon
the students to follow
Marx. Famous Communist leader Benoy
Krishna Choudhury remembers that his acquaintance with
Bhupenda began in
Hooghly district students’ conference in 1928.

He along with Hiren Mukherjee and
Humayun Kabir attended BPSF conference on October 12, 1936.

WPP and TU Movement

During Meerut Conspiracy Case (1929–33),
the Communists outside
were in disarray. In
Calcutta, an ‘Indian Pro-
letarian Revolutionary
Party’ was formed, with
Panchu Gopal Bhaduri,
Kali Ghosh, Bankim
Mukherjee and others.
Bhupenda was closely
associated. This party
worked with Workers’
Party, which it recog-
nized as a branch of CPI.
It got in touch with
Bombay Group of
Sardesai, Ranadive and
Kulkarni, and helped
Meerut prisoners. It expressed desire to join
Calcutta Committee of
CPI and were given
membership individually. Bishwanath Mukherjee also belonged to this group.

Bhupendranath was
active in almost all the
major movements: of
Kharagpur railways
workers, BNR railway
workers, TISCO in
Jamshedpur, May Day
rallies in Calcutta in
1928, etc. He attended
Jharia session of AITUC
(1928) and was elected its
vice-president. He orga-
nized a number of trade
unions at local and all
India levels.

Other Mass Organizations

Bhupendranath Dutta
was the first president of Friends of Soviet Union (FSU), formed in 1941 at the initiative of Prof
Hiren Mukherjee and
others. Bhupesh Gupta,
Chinmohan, Gopal
Haldar, Jyoti Basu and
others were also present.
Bhupenda also took part
in the PWA.

Not a Member, But with CPI

Dr Bhupen Dutta was
never a formal member
of CPI, but for all practi-
cal purposes he
functioned as one. He
encouraged and re-
cruited members to the
party, among them
Somnath Lahiri. He
translated important
Marxist classics. Among
his famous works is the
‘Aprakashita Rajnitik
Itihas’ (unpublished po-
litical history). He was an
active propagandist of
Marxism.

He was a great scholar
in various fields, with
many books and articles
to his credit. He brought
to light the social and
mass aspects of Swami
Vivekanand and
Ramakrishna Mission,
who advocated and
worked for the well-be-
ing of people.

Literary works

Datta wrote books on different subjects like sociology, history, politics etc. He was a linguist and wrote books in Bengali, Hindi, English, German, Iranian. Few of his notable books are—
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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dutta, Bhupendranath
Anushilan Samiti
Bengali Hindus
Dutta,Bhupendranath
Dutta,Bhupendranath
Indian sociologists
Dutta,Bhupendranath
Dutta,Bhupendranath
Dutta,Bhupendranath
Dutta,Bhupendranath
Indian National Congress politicians
Hindi-language writers
Bengali-language writers
English-language writers from India
Indian independence activists from Bengal
Prisoners and detainees of British India
Swami Vivekananda
Indian male writers
Writers from Kolkata
19th-century Indian non-fiction writers
20th-century Indian non-fiction writers
University of Hamburg alumni