BharatSangraha

Chota Nagpur Plateau · Central Highlands & Forest Belt

Freedom fighters

On this plateau the resistance is older than the national movement and, for a century, had nothing to do with it. The Kol uprising of 1831-32, the Santhal Hul of 1855, the Sardari agitation of 1858-95 and Birsa Munda's Ulgulan of 1899-1900 were fought over land, forced labour, debt and the right of a village to be governed by its own headman - against contractors, moneylenders and landlords as much as against the Government - and each of them was answered with a law rather than with a concession. That sequence, not Congress politics, is why the region has the Santhal Parganas Tenancy Act of 1876 and the Chotanagpur Tenancy Act of 1908, and why the words hul and ulgulan are ordinary vocabulary here. The connection to the national movement is made once, in December 1920, when the Tana Bhagats - who had begun in 1914 as a religious reform refusing rent and begar - joined non-cooperation and stayed non-violent through it. The 1857 rising here was a separate and briefer affair among landholders and the Ramgarh Battalion.

Risings and revolts

The Kol uprising1831-32

Mankis and Mundas dispossessed of village land in favour of outside revenue farmers rose across Ranchi, Tamar, Bundu, Sonpur and Porahat. Buddhu Bhagat, Joa Bhagat and Jhindrai Manki are among the named leaders; the rising drew in Munda, Ho and Oraon villages together.

Outcome: Suppressed by troops under Thomas Wilkinson. The Government created the South-West Frontier Agency in 1833 and issued Wilkinson's Rules in 1837, which recognised customary tenure and village headmanship in law.

The Santhal Hul30 June 1855 - January 1856

Santal cultivators settled in the Damin-i-Koh from the 1830s rose against moneylenders, revenue contractors and police. Beginning with an assembly at Bhognadih called by Sidhu and Kanhu Murmu, the rising drew tens of thousands across the Rajmahal hills and their foothills.

Outcome: Martial law from 8 November 1855 to 3 January 1856. Act 37 of 1855 created the district of Santhal Parganas, and the Santhal Parganas Tenancy Act of 1876 restricted the transfer of land out of Santal hands.

Birsa Munda's Ulgulan1899-1900

A movement among the Munda of Khunti, Tamar and Singhbhum against forced labour and the loss of khuntkatti land, combining religious reform with a demand for the restoration of village right. Around Christmas 1899 several thousand assembled; police fired on the gathering at Sail Rakab hill near Dombari on 9 January 1900.

Outcome: Birsa Munda was arrested on 3 February 1900 and died in Ranchi jail on 9 June 1900; 482 followers were tried. The Chotanagpur Tenancy Act of 1908 wrote khuntkatti tenure into statute.

The Tana Bhagat movementfrom 1914

A reform movement among the Oraon begun by Jatra Bhagat, which refused rent to landlords, refused begar (forced labour) and adopted vegetarianism, abstinence and non-violence as religious discipline. Its adherents withdrew from the plantation labour recruitment that had been draining the plateau since the 1860s.

Outcome: In December 1920 the movement joined the non-cooperation movement, the one point at which the plateau's own resistance and the national movement met directly. Tana Bhagat families kept the discipline afterwards.

People

NameYearsMovementKnown for
Buddhu BhagatSilagain, Ranchi district 1792-1832 Kol uprising The most prominent leader of the Kol uprising of 1831-32 in the Ranchi country, who drew Munda, Oraon and Ho villages into a single rising.Killed in action against Company troops in 1832.
Sidhu MurmuBhognadih, in the Damin-i-Koh died 1855 Santhal Hul Called, with his brother Kanhu, the assembly at Bhognadih on 30 June 1855 that began the Hul, and led it through its first months.Captured during the suppression of the rising and executed.
Kanhu MurmuBhognadih, in the Damin-i-Koh died 1856 Santhal Hul Led the Hul with his brother Sidhu; the last of the leaders to be taken, in the final phase of the rising.Captured and executed.
Phulo and Jhano MurmuBhognadih, in the Damin-i-Koh died 1855 Santhal Hul Sisters of Sidhu and Kanhu, remembered in Santal accounts as among the women who took part in the fighting of 1855. They are the figures through whom the Hul is remembered as a rising of whole villages rather than of men alone.Both were killed during the rising.
Telanga KhariaGumla country 1806 - c. 1880 Sardari agitation Organised Kharia villages against revenue farmers and set up a network of village jury panchayats to settle disputes outside the Company's courts - a form of withdrawal from colonial authority rather than armed rising. The date of his death is given as 1880 in later accounts and is not firmly documented.
Sheikh BhikhariOrmanjhi, near Ranchi died 1858 1857 Diwan to Tikait Umrao Singh of Ormanjhi, with whom he organised the blocking of the Ranchi-Hazaribagh road through the Chutupalu pass during the rising of 1857.Hanged with Tikait Umrao Singh at Chutupalu in January 1858.
Nilambar and PitambarPalamu died 1859 1857 Brothers of the Bhogta community who led the rising in Palamu in 1857-58, in the west of the plateau, after the Ranchi rising had been put down.Captured and executed in 1859.
Birsa MundaUlihatu and Chalkad, Khunti country 1875-1900 Ulgulan Preacher and leader of the Ulgulan of 1899-1900, which combined religious reform among the Munda with a demand for the restoration of khuntkatti village right against forced labour and outside landholding. He was twenty-four when he died.Arrested at Jamkopai forest near Chakradharpur on 3 February 1900; died in Ranchi jail on 9 June 1900.
Jatra BhagatChingri Nawatoli, Gumla district 1888-1916 Tana Bhagat Oraon cultivator who from 1914 preached a reform refusing rent, forced labour and spirit-propitiation, and whose followers withdrew from labour recruitment. The movement he began joined non-cooperation in December 1920, four years after his death, and has kept its Gandhian discipline since.Arrested and imprisoned; he died in 1916, in his twenties.

People from Chota Nagpur Plateau who resisted colonial rule, and the regional risings and revolts that shaped that resistance. (13)