An important incident following Direct Action Day was the Noakhali district massacre on October 1946. Noakhali, a district in what is now the Nation of Bangladesh, had a Muslim majority. About three-fourth of the land belonged to the Hindu landlords and the tenants were mostly Muslims. The Direct Action Day riots in Calcutta spread to other regions, reaching this district where a massive pogrom was organized against the Hindu minority. The death toll is estimated to be in the thousands, with 51-75 thousand Hindus ethnically cleansed from the region [20].
The riots and massacres During the massacre, the Hindu minority were killed and beaten, and their properties were destroyed. Many Hindus were forcibly converted to Islam and Hindu women were abducted and raped. Often, members of the Muslim mob who slaughtered the Hindus would forcibly marry the widows after converting them to Islam at point of weapon.[21]Many Hindu temples were looted and destroyed. Hindus were forced to throw deities into the Ganges river and Muslim mobs forced them to consume beef, which is disallowed in Hinduism.[4]
The horror and the underlying conspiracy of this occurrence can best be described in the words of S. L. Ghosh of the A. B. Patrika, quoted below. Says S. L. Ghosh:
"The horror of the Noakhali outrage is unique in modern history in that it was not a simple case of turbulent members of the majority community (Muslims) killing off helpless members of the minority Hindu community, but was one whose chief aim was mass conversion, accompanied by loot, arson and wholesale devastation... No section of the Hindu community has been spared, the wealthier classes being dealt with more drastically. Abduction and outrage of Hindu women and forcible marriages were also resorted. The slogans used and the methods employed indicate that it was all part of a plan for the simultaneous establishment of Pakistan."
