page_title: Eastern Bengal and Assam
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Eastern Bengal and Assam / History
caption_attribution_description: English: George, Lord Curzon, Viceroy of India.
context_page_description: Eastern Bengal and Assam was an administrative subdivision of the British India between 1905 and 1912. Headquartered in the city of Dacca, it covered territories in what are now Bangladesh, Northeast India and Northern West Bengal.
context_section_description: As early as 1868, British administrators saw the need for an independent administration in the eastern portion of the Bengal Presidency. They felt that Fort William in Calcutta, the capital of British India, was already overburdened. By 1903, it dawned on the colonial government on the necessity of partitioning Bengal and creating prospects for Assam's commercial expansion. The British promised increased investment in education and jobs in the new province called Eastern Bengal and Assam.
  Lord Curzon, the Viceroy of India, proposed the Partition of Bengal and put it into effect on 16 October 1905. Dacca, the former Mughal capital of Bengal, regained its status as a seat of government. Sir Bampfylde Fuller was the province's first Lieutenant Governor. He served for  a year in office, and resigned in 1906 after disagreements with Lord Minto and pressure from the British Parliament. He was succeeded by Sir Lancelot Hare (1906-1911), who in turn was succeeded by Sir Charles Stuart Bayley (1911-1912).
  The partition stoked controversy among Indian nationalists, who described it as an attempt to "divide and rule" the Bengali homeland. The merchant class in Calcutta also feared losing their economic influence in the region. In 1906, the All India Muslim League was formed in Dacca during the All India Muhammadan Educational Conference, as a response to rising Hindu nationalism. This in turn sparked the creation of the All India Hindu Mahasabha. At the Delhi Durbar in 1911, King George V announced that the British government had decided to annul the partition. The move by the colonial government was seen as an appeasement of hardline communal forces. Eastern Bengal was reunited with western Bengali districts, and Assam was made a chief commissioner's province.
caption: Lord Curzon initiated the creation of Eastern Bengal and Assam
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