The day was 8th June 1980. Hundreds of Hindu Bengali immigrants were butchered by violent tribal mobs in a pre-planned attack in Mandai village in the Northeastern State of Tripura. An estimated 350-400 Bengali Hindus were brutally killed in a single day, thus making the ‘Mandai massacre’ one of the deadliest ethno-religious episodes of violence in 20th-century Independent India.
The village of Mandai is located just 30 km away from Tripura’s capital city of Agartala. It had a substantial indigenous tribal population and a minority Bengali Hindu population, which had settled there for over 20 years by then. The Bengali Hindus were refugees from East Pakistan (now Bangladesh).
The regional politics of the 1970s and the large-scale influx of the Bengali Hindu population to Tripura, in the aftermath of the 1971 India-Pakistan War, saw renewed resentment among the tribal population for the incoming refugees. A radical tribal political party ‘Tripura Upajati Juba Samiti (TUJS)’ had emerged by then based on this anti-Bengali sentiment.
Other armed tribal extremist groups, Tripura National Volunteers (TNV) and Sangkrak Army (The Mighty One), also capitalised on the political rhetoric at that time to create a conducive environment for the massacre that followed in Mandai on 8th June 1980.
One event in particular became the precursor to the carnage. Some shopkeepers (presumably Bengalis) had assaulted a tribal boy in Lembucherra Bazar. Soon after, a mob of over 1000 tribals descended on the market area, vandalised shops and killed people. The Bazar remained closed for a week amid agitation by the ‘Tripura Upajati Juba Samiti (TUJS).’
The tribal extremist group ‘Sangkrak Army’, which had been procuring arms from the Mizo National Front (MNF), seized on the opportunity and attacked markets in Thelakung and Gulirai (about 30 km from Mandai). And then began the orgy of unprecedented violence.
On 8th June 1980, a strong mob of 1,000 tribals ambushed the Bengali residents of Mandai with guns, spears, swords, bows, arrows, and daos (scythes).
The extremists first demanded money from the Bengali Hindu villagers, who handed over approximately $250 (all the cash the victims had in possession). The victims were gathered in the village market area and forced to watch their houses being burnt.
A report by Time Magazine (dated 30th June 1980) read, “In the worst massacre, in the village of Mandai, the tribals first demanded money, then corralled the Bengalis in the village market. The horrified settlers were forced to watch while tribesmen armed with guns, spears and heavy scythes called daos put the torch to dwellings and butchered their occupants.“
The extremists showed no mercy. The Indian army found at least 350 dead bodies of Bengali Hindus with crushed heads and severed limbs. Children were stabbed while some victims were chopped in half. Some decomposed bodies were found floating in rivers. A notable case was that of a 6-month-old infant whose body was dumped in pieces on either side of his mother’s corpse.
The Indian army soldiers were forced to bury the victims in shallow graves. Mandai was completely in ruins. All that remained were ashes, charred walls of houses, broken pots, and sewing machines. The victims had no police protection because the nearest police outpost was located 7 miles away in Jirania.
Ex-Mandai MLA recounted, Manoranjan Debbarma. “Children were spiked to death and wombs of pregnant women were ripped open. We had lived through a horrific, difficult time.” While the official death toll is just 255, Army sources put the number of deaths at over 700.
In the days that followed the Mandai, arson attacks and violence followed in other districts of Tripura. The total death toll is estimated to be anywhere between 2000-10000. A whopping 1,50,000 to 2,00,000 victims (mostly Bengalis) were displaced due to the pre-planned attack by violent tribal mobs.
Major R. Rajamani, the commander of the Indian Army unit that reached Mandai on 9th June 1980, compared the brutality of the killings to the ‘1968 My Lai massacre‘ in Vietnam. While speaking to The New York Times, he remarked, “I have heard of My Lai. I wonder whether that was half as gruesome as here.“
He added, “That first day, I saw a six-month-old child chopped into two with each piece lying on either side of his dead mothe. I have never seen anything like it, nor do I want to.”
“There were shallow graves from one of which a hand was visible,” a UNI reporter had noted. The then Inspector General of Police, Satyabrata Basu, dubbed the Mandai episode as an act of ‘genocide.’
Bengali Hindu victims narrate ordeal
One of the survivors of the Mandai massacre was a 20-year-old Bengali barber, Haradhem Seal. He lost his parents, 3 sisters and 3 brothers in the dastardly attack.
He told Time magazine, “There was blood everywhere. One man hacked at me with his dao. I collapsed, then several bodies fell on top of me. That was probably what saved me.”
Another survivor, Subarna Prabha Deb, recounted how her 2 daughters and a grandchild were hacked to death in Mandai. Her son was also seriously injured.
Another survivor Abani Dey (65) had narrated how he lost his parents and sister to violence by Muslim mobs in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh).
“When we came, the tribals here welcomed us and helped us to settle down. We thought we had found a safe place. Now this. Where can we go?” he told the media in the aftermath of the Mandai massacre, during which he lost his 15-year-old son.
“A tribal caught his hair and chopped off his head with a scythe. We were watching it from a distance,” he lamented. Another survivor, Nagendra Saha (45) narrated how his 2 sons were brutally killed.
“As the tribals came nearer we prayed aloud, ‘Oh God. Please save us. Once we were outside, they swung their daos at us. One man gave me a chop on my head and I fell unconscious. Before hitting me, I saw him force an old woman to lie on the ground and he smashed her head with the dao. My two sons died within seconds of one another,” he emphasised.
The 1980 Mandai massacre also led to subsequent attacks on tribals in Bengali-dominated pockets of Tripura. Reports of arson and the exodus of tribal refugees were also reported at that time. More than 12 refugee camps were set up for tribal community. One victim, Suhed Deb Burman, lamented, “We have become refugees in our own land.“
Political reaction to the Mandai massacre
The then Chief Minister of Tripura, Nripen Chakravarty had stated in no uncertain terms, “This looks like an absolutely pre-planned attack. They are on a killing spree…But no one could have anticipated this kind of massacre.“
He alleged that the Indira Gandhi government at the Centre did not send any army support amid growing tribal discontentment in Tripura. There were talks of dismissing the State government by the Centre but that did not materialise.
Union Home Minister Zail Singh had visited Tripura in the aftermath of the Mandai massacre to take stock of the situation. The Central government sent 5000 tonnes of rice and had assured to re-settle and rehabilitate the victims. Refugee camps were setup to temporarily house the survivors.
Changing demographics of Tripura
The ethno-religious tensions in Tripura have deep historical roots dating back decades.
The large-scale settlement of Bengalis in the Northeastern State, first through active encouragement by Tripuri rulers, followed by the Parition of 1947 and the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War, had been a bone of contention in the State.
The relationship between the tribal communities (who were being rapidly converted to Christianity) and the Bengali Hindus became strained in the 1980s, resulting in escalated conflicts, violence and massacres.
As can be seen in the data shared below, the tribal population in Tripura was rendered a minority (28.95% in 1971).
The Bengali Hindu population (referred as non-tribal population) had no choice but to to flee to the Northeastern State to protect themselves from marauding Muslim mobs in 1947 and 1971.
But the growing dominance of the incoming refugees over the natives in terms of trade, services, economic progress, political power, and access to plains had led to growing discontentment and rise of tribal extremism.
The 1980 Mandai massacre wasn’t the last deadly episode of ethno-religious violence. 16 unarmed Bengali Hindus were ruthlessly killed in 2002 Singicherra massacre.
Terrorists belonging to the banned Christian Tripuri outfit, National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT), gunned down Bengali Hindu refugees during the 2000 Bagber massacre as well.
End of tribal extremism in Mandai and a silver lining
The Mandai massacre left deep scars on the collective memory of both Bengali and tribal communities in Tripura. Most Bengalis living in the village fled after the violent incident.
Mandai remained the hotbed of insurgency and tribal extremism until at least 2009. However, since then, it has made great progress.
In November 2015, it was reported that Mandai block outperformed 6,835 other blocks in India in financial literacy and inclusion. Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself has awarded the Mandai block during an event held in New Delhi.
Former DM (West Tripura) Abhishek Singh informed, “Mandai block has achieved over 100 per cent target in providing access to banking and financial services and has become a role model for the others. As a result of financial inclusion, more and more tribal people of the block are now connected to banks for access to Government aid.”
Ethno-religious conflicts in Tripura are now rare. Most tribal extremist outfits have surrendered and joined the mainstream.
Today, Tripura is ushering into a new era of progress and development, leaving its old scars behind forever.
