Find out more: Altab Ali and the Battle of Brick Lane

Over the next ten weeks I will share resources to find out more about each of the movements I discuss in The Shoulders We Stand On: How Black and Brown people fought for change in the UK.

The resources will mostly be free, and will cover a range of mediums including articles, videos, podcasts and radio programmes. Follow me on Twitter to be the first to know when a new list has been posted.

Poster appealing for information about the murder of Altab Ali

Just three more resource lists to go, this one is about Altab Ali and the Battle of Brick Lane in 1978. Bookmark it, and share it with anyone who may be interested.

The Altab Ali Foundation is doing great work to keep the memory of Altab Ali alive. Their website has interviews with people, photos, videos of the time, and pamphlets. It’s an invaluable source of information and remembrance e.g. here is a pamphlet the Foundation has recently compiled with the story, and reflections from people, and this pamphlet was written in 1994 by Kenneth Leech, a priest in the area in the 1970s.

In 2022 there was a great project from the Swadhinata Trust and Four Corners to remember Altab Ali and the Battle of Brick Lane. As part of it they created five short documentaries based on oral history. As part of this project Jan Fuscoe interviewed lifelong activist Balwinder Singh Rana for the Byline Times about what was happening in the 1970s, before and after.

The British Film Institute have a 30 minute free documentary called ‘A Safe Place To Be’ about racism in the East End in the 1970s, including housing discrimination that was happening.

And this short animated documentary beautifully tells the story of Altab Ali and what followed.

Housing discrimination was rife in Tower Hamlets, and Bengalis squatted in response to their struggles. Dr Shabna Begum has written a fantastic book about this (From Sylhet to Spitalfields) and you can read a little in this blog post from the Runnymede Trust.

And because I like to provide a range of mediums, here’s a short radio piece from the BBC World Service Witness History show on the Battle of Brick Lane.

Part of the Battle of Brick Lane included calling a strike and protest, and thousands took part. The Race Today journal spoke to some of those who participated: https://archive.leftove.rs/documents/ADER/3

If you want to read about Bengalis in the East End of London more widely, The Tower Hamlets Library and Archives have a fantastic booklet called ‘histories of life and work in Tower Hamlets’ and the Swadhinata Trust has a great history.

The Swadhinata Trust does phenomenal community work and had an oral history project including interviews with people who were active during the Battle of Brick Lane, like Terry Fitzpatrick and Rajonuddin Jalal.

Teachers, this one in particular is for you, this booklet is over 100 pages on Tower Hamlets’ radical history, then and now, from 1936 to 2011, complete with photos and interviews.

To learn more about Bengalis in the UK more generally, there was a great three-year project called Bangla Stories which has interviewed a range of people to chart the diverse backgrounds and experiences of the communities.

And if you are seeing this but haven’t read the book I’m referring to, then what are you waiting for?! Get your copy of The Shoulders We Stand On now.