Grow More Food Campaign
Grow More Food Campaign & Bengal Famine of 1943
Before we got independence, a first nationwide programme was launched in mid of 1940s. This was WWII period and in 1942, the British suffered a defeat in Singapore. The Japanese forced invaded Burma. Burma as mentioned above was responsible for 15% of India’s overall rice and at that time was world’s largest exporter of rice. 16 October 1942 the whole east coast of Bengal and Orissa was hit by a cyclone and the autumn crops in many core rice producing areas failed. The same was also the time for quit India Movement protests in Bengal and Bihar. The famine of Bengal claimed 3 million lives. The immediate reasons were
- The rice import from Burma was hindered
- Rice export from Bengal was not stopped which fed Indian and British troops in Middle east
- The cyclone hit
- Irresponsible reaction of the Bengal Government.
The Grow More Food campaign was organized to help India to overcome the effects of Bengal Famine. Since the campaign was launched by the British, it narrowly focused on the dissemination of the technical information related to agriculture through the posters and slogans. This campaign could not leave any mark and had almost no effect on food production.
