Imperial Governance and the Challenges of War

Abstract

This article deals with factors that led to the outbreak of the Great Bengal Famine of 1943–44, which claimed more than an estimated 3 million lives. Dealing with the extensive literature on the causes of the famine, it provides both administrative and statistical data on the role of both central and provincial governments in its aggravation. The timely installation of a proper mechanism for the prevention of the food crisis could have effectively checked spiralling of prices and hoarding of rice. It demonstrates the government's inability to provide adequate relief and rehabilitation measures to the victims of starvation during and after the official termination of food scarcity. The establishment of a new procurement system by the government proved abortive, especially due to bureaucratic delays and refusal to acknowledge in the early stages of the famine that there was a serious danger of food shortage in Bengal. Bureaucratic red tapism also took its toll on efforts at conceptualization and implementation of a new rationing policy supposedly drawn up by the policy makers to cope with the crisis.