International Journal For Multidisciplinary Research

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Relief, Labour, and Resettlement: The Political Economy and Social Hierarchies among Refugees in West Bengal, 1947–1960

Author(s) Dr. Sudipta Mondal
Country India
Abstract Abstract:
The Partition of India in 1947 triggered a prolonged movement of refugees from East Pakistan into West Bengal, placing immense pressure on the limited resources of the newly formed state. This article examines the policies and institutional mechanisms through which the West Bengal government attempted to manage this influx during the late 1940s and 1950s. It argues that refugee rehabilitation operated through a stratified administrative framework that linked access to relief and settlement to official assessments of economic productivity and “rehabilitability.” Through the creation of transit camps, worksite camps, and Permanent Liability camps, the state differentiated between self-reliant refugees, potentially productive labouring populations, and those deemed permanently dependent on state support.
The article further demonstrates that class and caste significantly shaped the trajectories of refugee settlement. While many middle-class bhadralok refugees were able to rehabilitate themselves through urban employment and the formation of squatters’ colonies, poorer agrarian and lower-caste migrants were more dependent on camps and state-sponsored resettlement schemes, often located in marginal or frontier regions. Despite the persistence of caste hierarchies in settlement patterns and administrative practice, refugee mobilisation in West Bengal was largely articulated through the language of class and economic deprivation. By situating rehabilitation policy within the broader political economy of the postcolonial state, the article highlights how refugee governance simultaneously managed displacement and reproduced social inequalities.
Keywords Keywords: Partition of India, Refugee Rehabilitation, Labour, Caste and Class, Refugee Camps, Postcolonial State.
Field Sociology > Archaeology / History
Published In Volume 8, Issue 2, March-April 2026
Published On 2026-03-19
DOI https://doi.org/10.36948/ijfmr.2026.v08i02.71825
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