Singh, Moni

Born July 19, 1900, in Calcutta. Leader in the Bengali labor and national liberation movements.

Singh helped organize the revolutionary trade union movement in Calcutta. In the late 1920’s he was a union organizer among textile workers, dockers, and workers in the jute industry. In the 1930’s and 1940’s he was a leader of the peasant movement in East Bengal.

After the establishment of Pakistan in 1947, Singh helped in the founding of the Communist Party of East Pakistan in March 1948. From 1948 to 1971 he was a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of East Pakistan, and from 1951 to 1968 the committee’s secretary. Arrested many times for his revolutionary activities, he spent approximately 15 years in prison. After the declaration in East Pakistan of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh (1971), Singh became a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Bangladesh; in 1973 he was elected chairman of the party’s Central Committee. [23–1231–]