Pijushkanti Sarkar, State Govt. Employee
Dandabhukti was a prominent territorial sub-division of Ancient Bengal during the period of 6th Century A.D. to 12th Century AD that drew attraction of the historians like Acharya J. N. Sircar (1870-1958) R. D. Banerjee (1885-1931), Dr R. C. Majumder (1888-1980), Dr. D. C. Sirkar (1907-1985) and others who tried to discover epigraphic pasts and the events of the ancient times of a proud Bengal to glorify the Bengali as a race with special characteristics of its own. Bhashacharya Suniti Kumar Chattopadhyaya (1890-1977) on the other hand tried to the interpret the epigraphic discoveries of ancient Bengal in the light of Indian History from the holistic point of view.
Ancient Rarh or Radha region was divided into several smaller regions – Kankagrambhukti, Bardhamanbhukti and Dandabhukti, as parts of the Radha division. It is very much interesting to learn that the area under discussion was an integral part of that Gauda-Banga region which was a shadow zone to northern Indian society. The earliest reference to Bengal and Bengali speaking people contained in the text viz. Aitareya Aranyak written between 700 and 600 BC was indifferent to the instant society in terms of culture and civilization .‘For a long time the river Gandaka of Bihar was taken as the dividing line between civilization and barbarism and the Aryans were advised to avoid the area to its east as far as possible.. ..’ [Sen, Sukumar, 1978, vol1]
It is thus astonishing to learn as to how a non-Aryan people dominated Bengal (though not known in the name) comprising the Deltaic Ganges-Radhas region and extra Gangetic prachina Plateau region that remained neglected throughout the Greater Aryabarta [also that remained out of the limelight of the region “Shorhasha Mahajanapada” (Sixteen Great Settlements) of the Northern India] turned into region of interests with Buddhism and Jainism religions and then how rebel Buddhism and Jainism religious areas were converted into the Brahmanical settlements under the patronage of the kings of that time and it is also praiseworthy to learn as to how a settlement like Dandabhukti comprising a portion of the South Radhas and Orissa took its shape based on a national lifeline-like road passing through the western Bengal and Orissa in the environment of Buddhist culture. Classical Indian philosophers peeped into livelihood of greater Bengal and took the place of stories of Chandal Harischandra-Shaibya, Hiranyakashipu, Satyakam and so on in the life of Bengalis living in the greater Bengal while the scripts of Charyapadas were then being recorded on papers of Toolat Patra, Bhurja Patra used for Punthi (Puthi)-Patra.
Even before the invasion of the Central Asian Muslim leaders-turned-administrators at the dawn of the 13th century AD, the greater Bengal was divided into small independent states like Gouda, Radha, Banga, Sumbha, Barendri, Pundravardhana, Bardhamana-bhukti, Kankagrambhukti, Harikel, Samatata whence Dandabhukti and Tamralipti went into oblivion. Famous laureate Dinesh Chandra Sen mentioned the whole region of ancient Bengal as Brihat Banga (Greater Bengal). As far as the epigraphic study goes, before a period of one hundred year of the Gauda’s emerging as a great settlement under the Guptas, Dandabhukti settlement came into limelight. Access the Full Text>>