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How NE got its first swadeshi school going
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Guwahati: During the national movement, Guwahati witnessed widespread rejection of foreign goods. Educated Assamese, Bengali, and Marwari community members embraced local alternatives – Kurkutch salt, Benaras sugar, and locally produced cloth – shunning their foreign counterparts.
Some called for boycotting Cotton College and Cotton Collegiate School, pushing for the northeast's first 'swadeshi' school.
Tensions escalated in 1930 when J.R. Cunningham, Assam's director of public information, issued a circular barring students from anti-British and pro-swadeshi activities. Students were required to pledge withdrawal from school if they joined political protests. After summer vacation, all students in government and aided high schools had to reapply and sign declarations against political involvement, also requiring parental consent.
Many parents refused, fuelling unrest across the Assam Valley.
In response, a meeting of guardians was held at Jubilee Park (now a water treatment plant) on June 15 or 16, 1930. Led by lawyer Upendra Sen, it featured Deshabhakta Tarun Ram Phukan, Karmabir Nabinchandra Bordoloi, Gopinath Bordoloi (later Assam's first Chief Minister), Rohini Kumar Chaudhuri, Kalicharan Sen, and Gaurikanta Talukdar. After the government ignored their demands, a follow-up meeting took place at Curzon Hall on June 23, resolving to establish a new high school.
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Devendra Nath Sharma was appointed headmaster.
The school began on July 15, 1930, with 53 students at Ramswarup Singh's 16-room house in Tokobari, rented for Rs 150 a month. Despite pressure, Singh offered the space. "The institution was named Kamrup Academy on Kalicharan Sen's suggestion. Binoy Talukdar was the first enrolled student," said Smriti Rekha Devi, current Principal of Kamrup Academy Higher Secondary School, now at Chenikuthi.
By the end of July, enrolment surged to 448 students, including 48 in Class 10.
The teaching staff, which began with Ramcharan Das, grew to 12.
In March 1936, after Assamese was made the primary medium of instruction, Bengali students and teachers formed the Silver Jubilee Anglo-Bengali High School with govt support. Kamrup Academy remained in its rented location. In 1937, Kamrup Academy shifted to Chenikuthi after raising ₹17,000 through public donations to build a U-shaped structure.
"Though it was expected that students would move to Cotton Collegiate School, they remained loyal," Devi said.
Following the Bengalis' departure, Gopinath Bordoloi became president of the school managing committee, and Gaurikanta Talukdar became secretary. Golap Chandra Chaudhuri served as headmaster from July 1942 to November 1968.
According to historian Dipankar Banerjee in Heritage Guwahati, Kamrup Academy introduced a handicrafts section with digestor machines for paper and thread production. Students trained in Sodepur, Bengal. Sarat Chandra Sinha, later Assam's fifth Chief Minister, once spent a summer there to learn papermaking.
The campus later hosted institutions like B. Borooah College and JB Law College. Among the school's alumni is Assam's current chief minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, reinforcing hopes of continued excellence.
