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and improved education facilities, as summarised by Resident Lieutenant-Colonel

Trenchard Fowle.
41

Although the demands of the mid-1930s faded as they were poorly

supported, they returned in a different form in 1938. Again the Baharna issued a set

of demands that included the establishment of a Legislative Committee, reform of

the Police Force, reform of courts, the termination of the services of the Education

Department’s Inspector, dismissal of two Shi’ite Sharia (Islamic law) judges, and the

declaration of Sheikh Salman as heir-apparent, as the Ruler had yet to publically

proclaim a successor. In the same year, a movement from among the Sunnis rose
42

in Bahrain. It was led by Ali bin Khalifa Al-Fadhel, Ebrahim bin Abdulla Kamal,

Ahmed Al-Shirawi, and Saad Al-Shamlan. The last member was the father of Abdul-

Aziz Al-Shamlan, the frontline member of the political movement of the mid-

twentieth century. According to Belgrave in Bahrain’s annual government report

for the year 1938, the Sunnis had unsuccessfully attempted to unite Sunnis and

Shi’ites in a single political front. The Shi’ites, however, ‘were not drawn into the

affair’ as the Adviser declared. The demands centered on, inter alia, the formation of

a Legislative Council, reform in the judiciary system, and the establishment of a

committee to supervise the education department. The nationalists of the 1950s
43
were to echo these demands. The Movement was overpowered by the

Administration and its ringleaders were arrested.

41 IOR/R/15/1/343, Fowle to Foreign Secretary to the Government of India, 18 March 1935.
42 IOR/R/15/2/176, Minutes on the Agitators Objectives, February 1938.
43 ‘Government of Bahrain: Annual Report for Year 1357 (March 1938-February 1939)’, in The
Bahrain Government Annual Reports 1924-1956, vol. II, 1937-1942, ed. R.L. Jarman,
(Buckinghamshire: 1986), 1-56 (29).

© Hamad E. Abdulla 11