ঊনবিংশ শতাব্দীর উত্তরবঙ্গে ম্যালেরিয়া সংক্রমণ : মিশনারি চিকিৎসা এবং তৎকালীন সামাজিকক্ষেত্রে আধুনিক চিকিৎসা বিজ্ঞানের গ্রহণযোগ্যতা (১৮৩০–১৯২০)/ Malaria Transmission in Nineteenth-Century North Bengal : Missionary Medicine and the Acceptance of Modern Medi

Abstract

In the second half of the nineteenth century, specifically between 1830 and 1920, the contributions of Christian missionaries to treating 'marsh fever'—subsequently identified as malaria—remained very important to the broader medical landscape of North Bengal. During this period, the healthcare environment across North Bengal, particularly in regions like Darjeeling, Jalpaiguri, and their surrounding territories, was notoriously deplorable. Prior to the medical interventions introduced by the British administration and various missionary groups, the local female population relied heavily on occult practitioners, exorcists, hakims, and traditional healers, deeply embedding their healthcare choices in superstitious customs. Due to a total absence of state initiatives and systemic government neglect, impoverished tea garden labourers and indigenous women were forced to depend on ancestral indigenous medicine and herbal remedies for survival. Consequently, numerous pregnant women lost their lives due to malpractice and flawed treatments. This high mortality rate was exacerbated by a widespread ignorance regarding malaria, a severe lack of literacy, and a profound absence of public health campaigns, which left the local populace entirely unaware of the true nature of the epidemic. As a hill station, Darjeeling represented a distinct archetype of colonial urbanization. In colonial India, the development of hill stations was fundamentally shaped by racial segregation, whereas the historical focus on subaltern women was primarily confined to their roles as tea plantation labourers. This colonial urban planning mirrored a stark spatial divide between indigenous and European residential quarters, gradually solidifying into segregated 'white' and 'black' towns. Darjeeling occupied an exclusive position; it served as a vital administrative, political, and commercial hub catered specifically to the elite of the British Raj. Despite growing anxieties among the colonial authorities regarding the town's overpopulation, Darjeeling enjoyed exceptional municipal amenities compared to the rest of Bengal—a privilege manifested in exclusive institutions like the Eden and Louis Sanitariums, the Governor’s Residence, and the Planters’ Club. 

           Consequently, the indigenous settlements situated within the core of Darjeeling were systematically displaced to peripheral zones. Subaltern slum areas were officially designated as hazardous vectors of disease. This 'Edenic sanctuary' was explicitly engineered to serve the colonial economy rather than the migrant populations or the native hill communities. Driven by an exponential population growth not just within the urban center but also across remote frontiers, indigenous groups like the Lepchas were steadily evicted from their ancestral lands. Thus, the systemic marginalization of local inhabitants—including indigenous and migrant women—compelled them to depend entirely on traditional medicine for any health crises.

           However, this analysis does not imply that native medicine was inherently ineffective. Rather, the critical issue lay in the fact that local traditional healers, such as the vaidyas, hakims, and occult practitioners, lacked the empirical scientific understanding required to standardize and administer the extracts derived from medicinal leaves and roots. For instance, the only definitive cure for malaria was quinine, an alkaloid scientifically extracted and processed from the pulverized bark of the Cinchona tree. Historically, evidence reveals that due to the flawed and unscientific practices of these healers, pregnant women were frequently administered dangerously high, unregulated doses of quinine. This caused severe uterine contractions, resulting in widespread induced abortions and maternal deaths among expectant mothers. Under these precarious conditions, women frequently relied not only on hakims and vaidyas but also on traditional midwives (dhais or dais). Furthermore, local women frequently resisted seeking treatment from trained male physicians. Driven by the gendered conservatism of the era and the rigid enforcement of social norms, women were often socially constrained from accessing professional medical care, leaving their healthcare needs neglected by modern empirical science.

           Summarily, this study analyses the specific therapeutic strategies and interventions adopted by various Christian missionaries to combat malaria. By examining these historical dynamics, this study illuminates the pivotal role played by missionary medicine in treating the female population of North Bengal, while critically evaluating the socio-economic and political mechanisms through which these medical interventions were deployed.