Number of submissions is limited to two (2) per contestant per year. Only English prose (essay, story, report, article, etc.) would be considered, and the length should be limited to 2,500 words

RE MEMBER ING KANAK DUTT A (1927-2018) A Pioneer Political Activist & Community Leader

By Jayashree Chatterjee

I have believed from childhood that to want social change to take place, and then to wait for others to bring it about and to benefit from it is sheer selfishness. I believe that everyone has to participate fully in the effort to initiate change by giving one’s labor, time and complete commitment to the cause.

These are the words of Kanak Dutta, the first Asian Indian to contest in an election to a state office in New Jersey. They were said to Shamita Das Dasgupta of Manavi, for an article entitled Teen Kanyar Golpo that was publishedinthe Bengali magazine Sukanya. Today, several men and women of Indian origin are taking part in local and state politics in the US. In the 1980s, when Kanak Dutta entered the political scene, this was not the case. At the time, according to the 1980 census, there were only 25,799 Indians in New Jersey, compared to 292,256, as stated in the 2010 census. So Ms Dutta’s entry into politics was a courageous move, to say the least.

Kanak Dutta was born, in 1927, into a well-known family, the Ghatbhoger Chatterjee family, in Khulna, present-day Bangladesh. She was a school student in 1942 when she participated in the Swadeshi Movement by making posters that read “British Quit India.” During her college days in Kolkata, she joined the Chhatra Congress, and some years later, she contested a seat in the West Bengali Assembly elections but lost to Tarun Kanti Ghosh of Amrita Bazar Patrika fame.

The man Kanak Dutta chose to marry in 1951 was Manoranjan Dutta who shared her keen interest in politics. In 1958, Dr Dutta came to the US on a Fulbright Scholarship, and Kanak di, as she was affectionately called in the Bengali community, followed him to this country in 1959. Once in the US, she majored in education at the University of Pennsylvania, began teaching at a local school, and served as a consultant for South Asians at the local Board of Education.

It was in 1963 that the Duttas moved to New Jersey, and Kanak Dutta joined Rutgers Prep as a history teacher. It was also at this time that the Duttas took more of a lead in local political matters. Kanak Dutta explains this involvement in an interview with Renu Agarwal for the Local History Project of the Association of Indians in America. AIA, the first organization of its kind in the US, was started by a group of Asian Indians, including the Duttas, in 1967. It was an association of great importance for many reasons. The Asian Exclusion Act had just come to an end with the passing of the Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965, and many Indians were coming to the US. They needed assistance in settling in this country.

Dr. Manoranjan Dutta also helped establish the enumeration of Asian Indians as an independent category in the 1980 US census and brought

about the classification of Asian Indians as a constituent group of the Asian/Pacific Americans. This landmark legislation came into effect in 1979 and was the result of an executive order of President Carter. Dr. Dutta helped appoint the first Indian, Piyush Agarwal, to the census bureau as well.

In 1972, the Duttas became American citizens, and Kanak Dutta’s career in politics really took off. She went to the Somerset County Democratic Party office and said she wanted to be involved in party work. She worked for the election and reelection campaigns of Governor Brendan Byrne, and then, in 1976, for the election of Jimmy Carter as president. In 1980, she attended the Democratic National Convention as a Carter delegate, and one gets the impression that she did her best to bring people together at a time when many were supporting Kennedy as the Democratic candidate. Kanak Dutta’sstance was that it was wrong to go against an incumbent president. The Courier News, in an article entitled “Delegate finds animosity lacking amid battle over convention rules”, described how Kanak Dutta sat with Kennedy delegates and talked with them but also cheered for her candidate. She told the paper that the meeting was “more a battle of banter and banners than a war of bitter words and angry clashes.’

Kanak Dutta was elected as a member of the County Committee to represent her district, the 12th district in Bridgewater Township in Somerset County. She also became Head of the Political Action Committee of the New Jersey Federation of Democratic Women, and from 1971 to 1981, she was a member of the Governor’s EthKanak Dutta with President and Mrs. Carter nic Advisory Council.

In 1981 Kanak Dutta decided to run for the New Jersey Assembly. Her county chairman warned her that her county was heavily Republican but as she told Agarwal, “I argued that I wanted to prove I belong here and that I am a part of this society.” She campaigned door-to-door. And she did this clad in a sari because though she now felt she was American, she never forgot her Indian origin. Both Ratna Karmakar, a close friend of hers, and Shamita Das Dasgupta recall Kanak Dutta telling them that this is what she said at election meetings: My color is brown, I am of Asian origin, I cannot speak English like you, I wear a sari and I am a woman. But do not judge me by all this. Vote for me based on how I think. She told Agarwal that she said to someone who commented negatively on her wearing a sari, “--- to make decisions, I use my brain not my dress.” She added that her clothes did not make her a good American. “A good American must have a good mind. Let us all try to pass that test.”

Kanak Dutta lost that election; Ronald Reagan had just become President and the Republicans were very popular. This is how she explained what happened: it is difficult for the first generation to enter politics; but they have to make the attempt in order to make things easier for the coming generations. I find it completely understandable that I met with resistance. If, in India, a woman of European origin had tried to enter politics, would Indians have welcomed her (at once and open-heartedly)?

But apart from making it easier for “coming generations” to enter the political scene, there was another important result. Many voters and Democrats realized that despite her ethnic origin, she could be relied upon, and that she had the good of the country and the party at heart. I didn’t win but I made people realize that I could be relied upon, she later said when speaking about that time. Some people still didn’t trust me completely, but the number was less than before.

(It should be mentioned here, though, that after 9/11 her thoughts about what she should wear changed. As she said to Agarwal, “I am part of this society, and my sense of belonging to this society must be pronounced to all --- I will ask all Indian girls to be a part of the United States and not to be dogmatic about the dress.”)

In 1984, she was pledged to Walter Mondale, and she became New Jersey’s state campaign coordinator. A June 9, 1984 New York Times article describes the dramatic way in which this happened. After the primary on that Tuesday, Barbara Drake, who was pledged to Gary Hart, was declared the unofficial winner by five votes over Kanak Dutta. Then the absentee ballots in Mercer County came in, and Kanak Dutta was declared to have won by 15 votes – 6,785 to 6,770! (Eventually, though, Ronald Reagan defeated Walter Mondale.)

Upendra Chivukula, who was a member of the state General Assembly for more than 12 years, and who now serves as a Commissioner on the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities, had a great deal to say about Kanak Dutta’s work for the party. “She was one of the pioneers, and a mentor to me and many others. She introduced me to many key people.” He listed her achievements by citing all the work she had done for the ClintonGore and the Gore-Lieberman campaigns, for NJ governors like Governor Corzine, and for some New Jersey senators.

Her strength, he said, was in being able to mobilize support for causes she believed in and in fundraising.

She also organized Chivukula’s first fundraising event when he ran for the legislature. “People used to consult her on any number of problems, and I, too, was a beneficiary of all her experience. We went to Democratic events together. She arranged for me to be invited to Bill Clinton’s holiday party at the White House. I called her Kanak Didi and that brought a beautiful smile to her face. She was really a sister to all of us.”

Chivukula also talked about her Kanak Dutta with President Clinton

being a strong supporter of the Asian community. She not only backed his political aspirations, but also those of Kumar Barve, a member of the state legislature in Maryland. She and her husband were involved with SAARC, the South Asian Association for ReKanak Dutta with Upendra Chivukula at a democratic event