Alipurduar - History

History

The history of Alipurduar (named after Hedayet Ali) can be reconstructed from the writings of J. F. Grunning, J. A. Milligan, D.H.E Sunder and Sailen Debnath. Whereas the fist three writers left behind the details of the earliest state of the Dooars (the doors or geographical passages leading into and out of Bhutan) and the growing sequences of the town of Alipurduar in the colonial period, Sailen has brought out the exhaustive narrative of the whole of the Bengal Dooars corresponding to Alipuduar Sub-Division in his acclaimed book ‘The Dooars in Historical Transition ISBN 9788186860441’. After the second Anglo-Bhutan War in 1865, according to the Treaty of Sinchula, the Eleven Bengal Dooars were annexed by the British Government, although the Seven Assam Dooars had already been occupied by the British in 1942; and subsequently Colonel Hedayet Ali was posted as the commander at the military settlement on the bank of the River Kaljani. The entire tract of land of the Buxa Dooar was leased out to Hedayet Ali on his superannuation and the growing town adjacent to the military settlement began to grow as well. According to Sailen, the military settlement in the town of Alipurduar, in course of time, increasingly turned to be less important because of the fast growth of military cantonment at Buxa Fort away in the north of the town as well as the Chila Roy Barrack in Cooch Behar. Along with the expansion of tea plantation and set up of Railway lines, Alipurduar began to be important in terms of communication and administration; and the partition of the country in 1947, led to the immigration of refugees from East Pakistan and the growth of population in the town of Alipurduar.