Basanta Kumar Das

Basanta Kumar Das (; ; 1883–1965) was a Pakistani lawyer and politician of the Pakistan National Congress who was a federal minister and a member of the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan from East Pakistan.

Early life Das, who came from a Sylheti family, was born on 2 November 1883 in Negal, Renga Pargana, Sylhet District, North-East Frontier Province, British India (present-day Dakshin Surma Upazila, Sylhet District, Bangladesh). He received his education from Sylhet Government College, Bangabasi College, Vidyasagar College and Ripon Law College. As a member of the Central Legislative Assembly, the lower house of the Imperial Legislative Council, Das proposed to change the name of Assam Province, formerly North-East Frontier Province, as according to him Assamese were not majority of the province. In 1932, he was imprisoned for his involvement in the civil disobedience movement and was released in 1934. In the 1937 Indian provincial elections, he was elected and became the speaker of the Assam Legislative Assembly. After the 1946 Indian provincial elections, he became minister for the home department of Assam Province. In April 1947, Muhammad Saleh Akbar Hydari, governor of Assam, proposed to let the immigrants settle on the north bank of the Brahmaputra River to resolve immigrants issues, which Das opposed. During the 1947 Sylhet referendum, Das advocated for vote for joining Sylhet District to the dominion of India. However, the referendum's turnout was in favour of joining the dominion of Pakistan. On 2 January 1948, a delegation led by Das and composed of members from several organizations submitted a memorandum of complaints to Vallabhbhai Patel, India's deputy prime minister, regarding discrimination against Bengalis in the newly formed Indian state of Assam. After the partition of India in 1947, Das immigrated to East Bengal (later renamed East Pakistan), part of the newly founded Pakistan, from Assam, India. As a leader of the Pakistan National Congress (PNC), he became leader of the opposition of the East Pakistan Provincial Assembly. In 1955, he became finance minister of East Pakistan as a member of the First Abu Hussain Sarkar ministry. In 1958, until a military coup happened, he was education and labor minister of Pakistan as a member of the Feroze Khan administration. After that, he retired from politics. In 1960, Das moved to India for medical treatment. His wife, social worker Kusum Kumari, was the founder of the Sylhet Women's Association.