Author:

Dr. Ritabrata Goswami
Associate Professor
Department of History
Kaliachak College
Malda,West Bengal,India

Email:ritabrataswami@gmail.com
Abstract: In the history of colonial India, the plague was not merely a medical catastrophe but a symbol of a profound social, political, and cultural crisis. When, the plague epidemic spread across India, including Bengal, in the late nineteenth century, contemporary periodicals became important documents of public health, administrative failure, and social consciousness in Bengal. Particularly, magazines like Swastha (Health) and Swasthyasamachar (Health News) did not merely discuss the cure for diseases; they critically highlighted the discrimination of colonial public health policy, the state’s evasion of responsibility, and the rise of indigenous medical consciousness. Alongside the treatment, prevention, and social reaction to the plague, these periodicals initiated a new “health-public sphere” within the Indian middle-class society. This research paper analyzes the severity of the plague epidemic and the evolution of its remedies in the colonial era through the lens of the Swastha and Swasthyasamachar periodicals, where a historical re-reading of the tripartite relationship between health, state, and society emerges.

Key Words: Colonial Rule, Colonial Hegemony,Public Health, Swastha and Swasthyasamachar etc.