With all the talk of aid assistance for flood victims around the world, let us not forget community fund raising by their diaspora communities. 

A case in point is the Bangladeshi community in Camden and their efforts of assistance to Sylhet where we had flooding not seen there for more than 120 years. Almost three-fourths of the Sylhet Region in North East Bangladesh was inundated earlier this year due to the heaviest rainfall the region has seen in living memory causing over 100 fatalities, marooning millions and uprooting thousands. As a result many in the Bangladeshi community in the UK sent monies to their villages and towns to give assistance to people directly affected by the floods.  Others went further like the Surma Centre in Camden, which via televised Appeal on Channel S and Charity Dinner event at the Irish Centre raised over £10,000 for the victims to dispersed directly by the Surma Centre, to help rebuild homes and tube wells and livelihoods like buying richshaws and of course food parcels. 

Many will already know this financial assistance from the diaspora aboard is often more reliable than any official assistance. Ask any Finance Minister from the developing world and they will confirm this picture. 

So while the Pakistanis attempt to raise monies for the humanitarian assistance for their flood victims in Sind predominately via aid assistance from the developed world based on historic damage down by carbon emissions of the developed world bear a thought for community assistance for flood victims from their diaspora communities like we do in the Bangladeshi community around the world as shown by the Camden Bangladeshi community via their local community centre, the Surma and the Bangladesh Workers Association (BWA). And well done to them as well. 

Picket line in front of Baker St Crown PO

In my part of Westminster, we are still fortunate to have a few Crown Post Offices in service still like on Baker St & Praed St but they need protecting particularly the staff from real term cuts in their wages particularly through the impending energy crisis. That is why l joined the picket lines over the past few day with fellow CWU members. 

The Post Office Ltd is to pay over £2 million to managers in bonuses but nothing for the workers. This when the Post Office made £39 million for year ending 2021/22 and £35 million the previous year, triggering maximum bonuses for the managers to be paid this month.  The workers on the counters deserve much better than the offer made so far particularly with the cost of living keep going up like keeping their homes warm has hit the roof. So key workers who helped get us through the COVID pandemic deserve a pay rise. 

Unless this is resolved soon, you can be expecting further strike actions on the 31st of August and 8 & 9th of September.

In the run-up to the Indian subcontinents’s 75th anniversary of independence from British rule this week, Channel 4 screened their two part documentary, India 1947 Partition in Colour, which tells us about the characters involved in the decision making towards partition. 

I have been riveted for the past two Sunday nights. It beats Richard Attenborough’s film Gandhi, which portrays ” jolly good fellows just getting it wrong” commentary on partition if discussed at all.  

The first part of the two part Partition in Colour, goes into much details about the personal relationship between the lead characters in partition and how that may well have influenced partition itself, even to suggest that “Mountbatten and Nehru were attracted to each other on a romantic level” but that is all best not to dwell on too much. The most important things, we learn are that Mountbatten’s Plan Balkan is approved in London, despite not benign discussed with any Indian leaders that is Jawaharlal Nehru and Muhammad Ali Jinnah, when he arrives six months before partition. What later became known as the Mountbatten Plan wasn’t his at all, it was YP Menon who hastily came up with the idea to transfer power to two countries rather than a dozen or more provincial governments when facing opposition from the likes of Jinnah.

Whilst it may have over emphasised the personal relationships between the leading characters, it does at least begin to hold the Mountbatten legacy in India to full account. 

Firstly out of the blue, Mountbatten declared that independence had to happen by the 15th of August even though the British government had given him till June 1948 to leave British India as its last viceroy. This clearly made a tight programme even tighter and led to bad decisions becoming even more profound as it gave little space to look at bizarre decisions like that of creating a new state of Pakistan with two parts 1,000 miles from each other, and a potential future adversary in between. Furthermore he had to stay around after 15th of August anyway too sort out the independence of Ceylon (Sri Lanka) in June 1948. It’s not clear at all what advantages they were in bringing this deadline forward at all apart from personal convenience and vanity on the part of Mountbatten. 

Deciding to announce the boundaries of partition till after independence appears to have been solely the decision of Mountbatten and what a crazy one it was indeed, as we see him locking away the maps of the new borders in the second part of the review.This undoubtedly added to the insecurity of many who wanted to be on the right side of the new borders and was clearly a contributing factor to over one million who were killed in communal violence with one of the biggest mass transfers of people humanity has seen of up to 15 million. Once announced, it caused mayhem and chaos and lead to one of the worst humanitarian crisis in human history. On top of this, some parts of Bengal put up the wrong flags on independence only to find out a few days later how wrong they were. In Malda and Murshidabad they hoisted the Pakistani flag before becoming a part of India and similarly Khulna and Chittagong hoisted the Indian tri-colour only two days before becoming part of Pakistan! While Karimganj in Sylhet which had been elected by plebiscite to be part of East Bengal found itself astonishing in India. Thankfully my family stayed put not far from the new India & Pakistan border defined by the Ratcliffe Line. 

It is also clear that Mountbatten had also given Nehru privileged access to the Radcliffe lines of partition proposed by British Lawyer Cyril Radcliffe who knew little about India at all. A line that has not stopped bleeding since 1947! Nehru thus was able to argue for certain bits to be included in India like Kolkata in Bengal. Jinnah was clearly disadvantaged and suspected this to be the case and it of course complicated his relationship with Mountbatten even further. 

Furthermore there was a complete reluctance to use British troops in communal riots in the lead up to Partition in both Punjab and Bengal by Mountbatten. There may have been a case after independence when the British still had control of the armies even though we had two independent countries now, but beforehand it may well have saved many lives at least as a deterrent to the religious gangs roaming the streets. The reorganisation of the future armies of India and Pakistan was clearly their priority even with the mayhem around them. 

Clearly no one in the Indian Office at Whitehall either at Minister or civil servant level, kept an eye on the complete and utter maladministration of Mountbatten and his antics in Delhi at all. This at the great cost of many lives and souring the relationship between the two states created at independence right from the outset. 

Where it falls down is its lack of coverage of the circumstances in Bengal with its complete focus on the situation in Punjab which l try to make amends with above. And in doing so does not acknowledge the revolutionaries and martyrs in the independence movement, many of whom were Bengali.  Where not Rabindranath Tagore who wrote the Indian national anthem and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose who famously said “Freedom is not given, it is taken” not critical to how partition came about in the first place by offering an alternative. Furthermore many Bengalis were also involved in the All India Muslim League, as its illustrated by its founding meeting occurring in Dhaka. As Gopal Krishna Gokhale, a senior leader of the Indian National Congress once said “What Bengal thinks today India thinks tomorrow” 

A copy of this blog was published in the Morning Star on the 17th of August 2022.

As London experiences hotter and drier summers these are further impacted by the Urban Heat Island effect (UHI). The UHI can cause London to be up to 10’C warmer than neighbouring rural areas, particularly in Central London. This is a result of the sun’s rays being absorbed by hard surfaces rather than by the vegetation such as trees, plants and grass.

So it will be interesting to see to what extent present heatwave will acceded the one we had in the summer of 1976 is explained by not only climate change but also whether vegetation like trees, plants and grass coverage in the City has changed sufficiently via planning to help us shelter from the impact of the heat wave. If not, then we have to reappraise the planning system and whether it has acted to limit the impact of the Urban Heat Island in the past few decades with all the new developments it has approved.  

I was very sorry to see the Big Table business run by Kim and Steve for so long close in May 2022, after it had been saved by the local community a decade ago when Crossrail wanted to Compulsory Purchase Order (CPO).  So as to knock it all down for transformers to supply the energy on the tracks.  Furthermore, l had brought many mattresses from them over the years and my present bed frame was from their business on this unique premises! 

It also has a lot local history as it was originally built by Great Western Railway (GWR) as a coffee Tavern for its workforce. The 1901 coffee house near Westbourne Park tube station is the last remaining purpose-built Temperance Bar built by the Great Western Coffee Tavern Company.  The company ran seven such premises for use by railway workers as an alternative to the pub. 

So it was one of the first original coffee houses in London long before we had multinational coffee chains along all our high streets. And the basement of the tavern was originally known as Carlton Hall and was used as a venue for educational talks and meetings. So ideally it would be great to bring it back to its original use as a coffee house with a venue for meetings and community use as well. 

But in the meantime, we need to protect the building and the land immediately around it from any developer who may have other ideas of its use. In this respect the best way forward is either we get  the premises listed locally at least, so acknowledging its history and presence. Or registered it as a community asset at RBKC. It may of course be advisable to pursue both paths simultaneously. 

I am only sorry we did not proceed with listing it sooner particularly after the victory we had against the Crossrail CPO almost 10 years ago. Now the building has survived being demolished by Crossrail and the Westway being built over and under it,  so let us make sure the structure and history of the building survives its next use whatever that maybe.

So the initial figures released by ONS of total population in Greater London by borough via the 2021 Census during the COVID lockdown on-line, may well suggest that Central London is hollowing out. While people are are moving Eastwards as the infrastructure continues to improve in the East London corridor promoted by GLA strategically. Can this be true? 

The initial figures suggest that Central London boroughs like Camden, Westminster & Kensington & Chelsea populations have come down by 4.6%,6.9% and 9.6% respectively. While at the other end, the population of Londoners has increased by around 20% in Tower Hamlets and Barking & Dagenham incredibly over the past decade, stands to reason given the major works undertaken there since the recreation of the GLA. Putting these two things together, some have suggested on twitter that Londoners are moving out of Central London and heading East, but l for one don’t see any evidence of this at all. Rather its newer Londoners going to cheaper bits of London for housing. Like the Bangladeshis, a subject for separate blog once those figures are released. 

It’s more likely that that Census 2021 held in March of 2021, had been influenced more so by the COVID lockdown than is acknowledge yet. Whilst my part of Central London felt very full, it was apparent that those with second homes in the countryside had left for rather than stay in town.  So l would be keen to see the ward breakdowns of these figures, as the wealthy wards would have had a lot more residents with second homes and also the plush developments largely lying empty, as well. Such a bias should be quite easily identifiable. 

It is critically important, we get these figures right, as it could have major implications for future funding of the respective councils where the populations has evidently gone down! So let us establish the extent that people left London during COVID lockdown by ward breakdowns and even tally it against what records of people having second homes across the country from Central London. 

Incredibly the 205 proposed bus route changes along the Euston & Marylebone Rd does away with its links between four rail terminuses of KIng’s Cross, Euston, Marylebone, Paddington ( as well as numerous  connections between tube stations ) and thus any assistance for movement of passengers & their luggage between these rail stations. 

This appears to have been the least of the considerations made in these proposals, so you have to ask what happened to integrated transport links between rail and buses?

So l will encourage locals along the Marylebone & Euston Rd and transport organisations, to make their contribution to the TfL Bus Review consultation on the following link https://haveyoursay.tfl.gov.uk/busreview  and register their concerns on this route in particular. 

Recently on watching Sunday morning the BBC London Politics program (29th May 2022), there was a package on “family voting” that unduly concentrated on Tower Hamlets, that is Bangladeshi families. As for the Lord in the package, l am not sure who he is but l don’t remember him being elected to make comments like this at all.

The real question here is why focus on “family voting” in Tower Hamlets when Democracy Volunteers highlighted other cases in London Boroughs and across the UK in their Final Report on English Mayoral Elections 2022 stating it is “‘ family voting’ is a widespread activity across different parts of London and other parts of England as well ” So clearly not pointing the finger at Bangladeshi voters as the BBC had done so in presenting their package.