Bengal Tenants Association into the Krishak Praja Party. During the election campaign period, Huq emerged as a major populist figure in Bengal. His party won 35 seats in the Bengal Legislative Assembly during the 1937 Indian provincial elections. It was the third largest party after the Bengal Congress and Bengal Provincial Muslim League. Huq formed a coalition with the Bengal Provincial Muslim League and independent legislators. He was elected as the Leader of the House and the first Prime Minister of Bengal. Cabinet Huq's cabinet included Nalini Ranjan Sarkar (finance), Bijoy Prasad Singh Roy (revenue), Maharaja Srish Chandra Nandy (communications and public works), Prasanna Deb Raikut (forest and excise), Mukunda Behari Mallick (cooperative credit and rural indebtedness), Sir Khwaja Nazimuddin (home), Nawab Khwaja Habibullah (agriculture and industry), Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy (commerce and labour), Nawab Musharraf Hussain (judicial and legislative), and Syed Nausher Ali (public health and local self-government). Debt relief and Permanent Settlement Under Huq, the Bengal government used administrative and legal measures to relieve the debt of millions of tenant farmers under the zamindari system of the Permanent Settlement. Huq hailed from a middle class zamindar family. Many of his colleagues were also from the zamindar class. But Huq represented a new generation of Bengali middle-class political consciousness which won support among both Bengali Muslims and Bengali Hindus. The Krishak Praja Party promoted land reform. Huq's tenure saw the enactment of the Bengal Agricultural Debtors' Act (1938), the Money Lenders' Act (1938) and the Bengal Tenancy (Amendment) Act (1938). Debt Settlement Boards were created in all districts. The Land Revenue Commission, appointed by the Government of Bengal on 5 November 1938 with Sir Francis Floud as chairman, submitted its final report on 21 March 1940. This was a valuable document relating to the land system of the country. The Tenancy Act of 1885 was amended by suspending rent provisions for ten years. Huq abolished informal taxes imposed traditionally by the zamindars on tenants. The tenants obtained the right to transfer their tenancy without paying any transfer-fee to zamindars. The law reduced the interest rate for arrears of rent from 12.50% to 6.25%. The tenants also obtained the right to get possession of the (land lost through river erosion which then reappeared) by payment of four years' rent within twenty years of the erosion. These measures resulted in debt relief for millions of Bengali peasants. But Huq failed to fully