Bengal famine: Tracking down the last survivors of WW2's forgotten tragedy - BBC News

Three million died in the 1943 Bengal famine - one man is collecting the remaining survivors' tales.

2 days agoShareclose panelShare pageCopy linkAbout sharingImage source, Sailen SarkarBy Kavita PuriBBC NewsThe Bengal famine of 1943 killed more than three million people in eastern India. It was one of the worst losses of civilian life on the Allied side in World War Two.

There is no memorial, museum, or even a plaque, anywhere in the world to the people who died. However, a few survivors remain, and one man is determined to gather their stories before it is too late.

"Many people sold their boys and girls for a little rice. Many wives and young women ran off, hand-in-hand with men they knew or didn't know."

Bijoykrishna Tripathi is describing the desperate measures people took to find food during the Bengal famine.

He is not sure of his exact age, but his voter card says he is 112. Bijoykrishna is one of the last people to remember the disaster.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-68311520

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