The Tanka movement (1937–1950) was the struggle of the Hajong, Garo and other peasants of Susang Durgapur and the hill areas of the then Mymensingh district (now Netrokona) against the Tanka rent system. Comrade Moni Singh was its principal leader.
What was Tanka?
Under Tanka, a tenant had to pay a fixed quantity of paddy as rent every year, whatever the harvest. Landlords auctioned the land, and the rent rose year after year until it was far above the value of a normal cash rent. A failed crop meant debt, eviction and hunger.
How the movement grew
After his release in November 1937, Moni Singh was asked by Hajong and Garo peasants to lead them. Peasants refused to pay Tanka and demanded a fair cash rent. The movement joined the wider peasant struggles of Bengal through the Kisan Sabha, and in 1945 Netrokona hosted the All India Kisan Sabha conference, with Moni Singh as chairman of its reception committee.
From 1946 the movement faced brutal repression and turned into an armed uprising. On 31 January 1946 Rashimoni Hajong – remembered as “Hajong Mata” – was killed at Bahera Toli while resisting armed police; a memorial stands there today. After 1947 the Pakistan government outlawed the leaders, confiscated Moni Singh’s property and drove many Hajong families across the border.
Abolition and memory
The Tanka system was finally abolished in 1950–51. The Tanka Martyrs’ Memorial at Durgapur and the Hajong Mata Rashimoni memorial keep the memory of the movement alive. One of the last surviving leaders of the movement, Kumudini Hajong, died in 2024.