33 Resistance to the British Rule

D. Subramanyam Reddy

1. Introduction :

The struggle against the British rule in India did not begin suddenly. It began from the time of the very inception of the British rule. The reason for this was its very nature of rule i.e., colonial nature. The latter destroys the country and the society where its rule is established. It creates a situation in which the ruled would resort to rebellion to drive out the alien rulers and save themselves from oppression, exploitation etc. For example, the Britishers dethroned several native rulers and chieftains in India. They removed the land rights of rulers, chieftains etc. They collected heavy tribute from all of them. Several of their rights were removed. Similarly, heavy ‘rent’ was collected from the peasants. In case of failure to pay their rent they were removed from their landholdings. They were even harassed, tortured, arrested and ‘confined’ for the same reasons. Even the then existing Acts, Judiciary etc., stood by the British. There was no development of agriculture and irrigation facilities. The ancient and medieval irrigation systems spreading all over the country were neglected and were transformed into historical ruins. There was widespread corruption in all the departments of the British government. Indian trade and commerce was destroyed through various measures. The privileges of the elite in the society i.e., of the villages, castes, sects, religions, servants of villages like headmen etc., were removed. Even the rights of the tribal’s were denied. In fact, the pride of the Indians was hurt by the British. Naturally, the Indians of different regions decided to drive out the Britishers from their regions and for that organized rebellions against the British.

2. Anti-Colonial Movements :

In the beginning, the opposition to British rule took the character of sporadic but heroic and self-sacrificing peasant struggles. The peasants and artisans driven to desperation often rose, arms in hand, against the colonial rulers and their native agents . One among the great peasant and adivasi rebellions which aimed at overthrowing colonial rule was the revolt of the ‘Sannyasins’ and ‘Fakirs’ of Bengal. This was the first widespread peasant revolt against the British rule. It began in 1763 and went through different phases until it was finally suppressed in 1800. The others include the revolt of the hillmen and peasants of Birbhum, Bishnupur and contiguous areas in 1789-99, the Chuar rebellions of 1769-70 and 1798-99. The latter extended from Midnapur to Bankura, Manbhum and contiguous districts and broke out from time to time in a wide area including Chota Nagpur and Western Bengal throughout the early half of the 19th century. There was insurrection of the Paiks in Orissa (1817-18). There were also the Wahabi revolts in certain parts of India including some districts of Bengal in 1831 and 1838-47 which waved the Muslim religious banner but were essentially struggles of the poor and landless peasants against the alien rulers, landlords and moneylenders. Among other anti-colonial movements were the revolts of the Kols of Chota Nagpur (1831-32), the resistance of the Bhils in Khandesh and neighbouring areas (1818-31), the revolts of the Kolis which broke out in Gujarat and several districts of Maharashtra between 1824 and 1843, and the “long and harassing hill warfare” waged by the Khasis (1829-33).

The Santhal rebellion of 1855-56 broke out under the leadership of legendary Sidhu and Kanu and spread over half of Bhagalpur and the greater part of the old Birbhum district which included the Santhal Parganas and the neighbouring areas. The uprising of the adivasis was organized and led by Vasudeo Balvant Phadke in a large area in Maharashtra. The Moplahs (Mappilas) revolted in Malabar in 1836-1896. Though the Moplahs revolts were of the oppressed peasants against oppressive landlords and the British rule, they acquired a Muslim religious tinge. The Munda tribals also revolted under Birsa of Ranchi in Chota Nagpur in the 1890’s. The peasants of the Tamil regions revolted during the last decade of the 18th century and early 19th century, of Malabar and Dindigul between 1800-1801, of Travancore in 1805, and of the palegars of Mysore during 1830-31. There were rebellions in the Telugu regions also. They include the rebellions in Vijayanagaram in 1794, Parlakimidi in 1766-1857, Gumsur from 1788, Visakhapatanam in 1830-34, Kadapa in 1801-1805 and 1846, Chittoor in 1801-1805 and the most widespread Gudem Rampa rising which began in 1839. The consolidation of British rule over the territories they acquired in Andhra took several decades. This was due to the formidable resistance offered to them by the Rajas and Zamindars of Northern Sarkars (between Chinaganjam and Pedaganjam) and Palegars of the Ceded Districts and Chittoor Palems (of present Rayalaseema) and even by the peasants, artisans, traders, tribals and others. The Rajas and Zamindars of Northern Sarkars who were not only farmers of revenue but also hereditary chieftains with strong and well garrisoned forts and a large number of military retainers refused to pay tribute revolted against the British. From 1768 onwards, for about sixty years, no year passed without the use of the military by the British against several zamindars before the tribute, due from them was collected. It may be noted here that by the end of the 18th century there were seventy zamindars with their forty thousand armed peons in Northern Sarkars, eighty palegars with their thirty thousand armed ‘peons’ in the Ceded Districts, the four ‘Western Palegars’ with their twenty one thousand armed peons in Nellore-Chittoor border region and the ten Palegars with their five thousand armed retainers in the then “Chittoor Palems”.

3. The Revolt of 1857 :

The last of the Pre-1857 movements was the Uprising of 1857-58, generally called the Mutiny, and by some as the First War of Independence.

The mightily popular revolt broke out in northern and central India in 1857 and nearly swept away British rule. It began with a mutiny of the sepoys, or the Indian soldiers of the Company’s army but soon engulfed wide regions and involved the masses. Millions of peasants, artisans and soldiers fought heroically for over a year and by their exemplary courage and sacrifice wrote a glorious chapter in the history of the Indian people.

The Revolt of 1857 was much more than a mere product of sepoy discontent. It was in reality a product of the character and policies of colonial rule, of the accumulated grievances of the people against the Company’s administration and of their dislike for the foreign regime. For over a century, as the British had been conquering the country bit by bit, popular discontent and hatred against foreign rule was gaining strength among the different sections of Indian society. It was this discontent that burst forth into a mighty popular revolt.

The Revolt began at Meerut, 58 km from Delhi, on 10 May 1857 and then, gathering force rapidly, it cut across northern India as if like a sword. It soon embraced a vast area from the Punjab in the north and the Narmada in the south to Bihar in the east and Rajputana in the west.

Even before the outbreak at Meerut, Mangal Pande had become a martyr at Barrackpore. Mangal Pande, a young soldier, was hanged on 29 March 1857 for revolting single-handed and attacking his superior officers. This and many similar incidents were a sign that discontent and rebellion were brewing among the sepoys. On 24 April, ninety men of the 3rd Native Cavalry refused to accept the greased cartridges. This sparked off a general mutiny among the Indian soldiers, stationed at Meerut and spread all over the country.

The movement had its impact on southern India also, particularly in the united Andhra Pradesh in the form of the rebellions of Tura Baz Khan in Hyderabad city and Korukonda Subba Reddy in Godavari region of Coastal Andhra during 1857-58. The Uprising of 1857, being the first wide-spread movement of different regions, classes, castes, and communities of India, in contrast to the Pre-1857 localised, unconnected and wholly self-centred rebellions, could have ended the British rule in 1857-1858 itself had the Nizam of Hyderabad kingdom(Deccan) opposed the British rule in southern India and the Mughal rulers at Delhi in northern India had assured the regional and local rulers and chieftains of his support and built up confidence in them. But, both disappointed the people and their aspirations by refusing to take up leadership of the movement. The result was the ruthless suppression of the uprising and killing of lakhs of innocent people and destruction of properties. But, it inspired many a successive movements and culminated, after 1885, in the various streams of the National Movement, non-violent as well as violent, and defined India of August 15, 1947. In other words, the memory of the uprising of 1857-58 did more damage to the British rule than the rebellion itself.

4. Tribal Movements :

As noted earlier, the tribal communities also responded to the British exploitation and oppression with occassional violent outbursts with very high order of solidarity. Often, religious and charismatic leaders — messiahs— emerged, promising divine intervention to end their suffering and sudden miraculous entry into a golden age and asked their fellow tribals to rise and rebel against foreign authority. Most of these leaders claimed to derive their authority from God. They also often claimed that they possessed magical powers, for example, the power to make the enemies bullets ineffective. Filled with hope and confidence, the tribal masses followed these leaders to the very end. This feature we find in particular from the second half of the 19th century and in general after defeated uprisings under traditional chieftains. It is to be noted that the fight between the tribal rebels and the British armed forces was totally unequal. While the British had drilled regiments armed with the latest weapons, the tribals fought in roving bands armed with primitive weapons such as stones, axes, spears and bows and arrows, with strong confidence in magical powers of their commanders/leaders. The tribals died in lakhs in this unequal warfare.

Of all the tribal revolts in modern India the Santhal hool or Uprising of 1855-56, just a couple of years before the Uprising of 1857, was the most massive. The Santhals lived in the region between Bhagalpur and Rajmahal known as Daman-i-Koh. They rose in revolt, made a determined attempt to expel the outsider — the dikus — and proclaimed the complete annihilation of the alien rule. About 6,000 Santhals of 400 villages met at Bhaganidihi on 30th June 1855, decided to revolt to get rid of the outsiders and their colonial masters and usher in satyug, ‘The Reign of Truth’, and ‘True Justices’. The Santhals believed that their actions had the blessings of God. Sido and Kanho, the principal rebel leaders claimed that Thakur (God) had communicated with them and told them to take up arms and fight for independence. Soon, nearly 60,000 Santhals had been mobilized and the revolt began. But, it was crushed ruthlessly. More than 15,000 Santhals were killed, while tens of villages were destroyed. Sido was betrayed and captured and killed in August 1855, while Kanho was arrested by accident at the tail end of the rebellion in February 1856.

Santhal rebellion was followed by the Kherwar or Saphar Har movement of the 1870s which preached monotheism and internal social reform, at first, but had begun to turn into a campaign against revenue settlement operations just before it was suppressed. The Nikda forest tribes in Gujarat attacked police stations in 1868 in a bid to establish a dharma-raj. The Kacha Nagas of Cachar attacked the whites, in 1882, under a miracle worker named Sambhudan who claimed that his magic had made his followers immune to bullets. The Kols of Chota Nagpur rebelled from 1820 to 1837. Thousands of them were massacred before the British authority could be re-imposed.

The best known of the tribal rebellions of 19th century was the Ulgulan (Great Tumult) of Birsa Muda in the region south of Ranchi in 1899-1900. The Mundas had seen their traditional Khuntkatti land system (joint holdings by Khunts or tribal lineages) being eroded by jagirdars and thikadars coming from the northern plains as merchants and moneylenders. They had seen their area becoming a happy hunting ground for contractors recruiting indentured labour. They had seen the Lutheran, Anglican and Catholic missions making promises of help, but doing nothing about their basic land problem. They had seen, in the early 1890’s, the cheating of a Calcutta based Anglo-Indian Lawyer in the legal fight of their tribal chiefs (Sardars) against the alien landlords and the imposition of bethbegari (forced labour). They have also appealed to the government for redressal but got nothing. Therefore, they resorted to rebellion. Munda savior came in the shape of Birsa (1874-1900). He was the son of a sharecropper. He received some education from the missionaries. Then, he came under Vaishnava influence. During 1893-94, he took part in a movement for prevention of village waste lands being taken over by the Forest Department. In 1895, he is said to have seen a vision of a supreme God. After this he claimed to be prophet with miraculous healing powers. Thousands began flocking to Chalked to hear the ‘new word’ of Birsa with its prophecy of an imminent deluge, while the Sardars started introducing an agrarian and political note into the initially religious movement. Birsa was jailed, in 1895, for two years by the British who feared a conspiracy. But, he returned much more of a firebrand. A series of night meetings were held in the forest during 1898-99. Birsa gathered a force of about 6,000 Mundas armed with swords, spears, battle-axe and bows and arrows. Birsa was allegedly urged the ‘killing of Thikadars and Jagirdas and Raja and Hakims and Christians’ and promised ‘that the guns and bullets would turn to water’. Effigies of the British Raj were solemnly burnt. On Christmas Eve, in 1899, the Brisaites (who had already won over large number of Christian Mundas to their new faith in a single God whose prophet was Birsa Bhagawan) shot arrows and tried to burn down churches over an area covering six police stations in the districts of Ranchi and Singbhum. The police themselves became the main targets in January 1900, leading to panic in Ranchi. On January 9, however, the rebels were defeated at Sail Rakab hill and Birsa was captured three weeks later in February 1900 and died in jail in June 1900. Nearly 350 Mundas were put on trial, three were hanged and 44 transported for life. Though the revolt was suppressed some reforms were introduced. For example, the survey and settlement operations of 1902-10 and the Chotanagpur Tenancy Act of 1908 recognized the Khuntkati rights and banned bethbegari. Chotanagpur tribals won a degree of legal protection for their land rights. Birsa Munda still remains a living memory, both as the apostle of a small religious sect and also through some extraordinary moving folk songs. He is even now revered for different and sometimes quite contradictory reasons — as a full-fledged nationalist, a prophet of a separatist Jharkhand, or a hero of the extreme left. But, it is to be noted that his vision could not have embraced anything broader than a heroic defense of his tribal homeland against all intruders, including the foreigner.

In 1900, the British troops suppressed a rising in the Jagdalpur region against the Raja of Bastar. Though it was provoked by a succession dispute, the main cause was the recent imposition of forest regulations banning shifting-cultivation and free use of forest produce. The rebels disrupted communications, attacked police stations and forest outposts, burnt schools (which were being built by forced labour and compulsory levies on tribals), and even tried to besiege Jagdalpur town. Similarly, in October 1914 the Khond rebellion in the feudatory state of Daspalla began over a disputed succession. Then, it took on a different colour. There were rumours that a war had started and soon ‘there would be no sahebs left in the country’ and the Khonds would ‘live under their own rule’. The British feared a general Khond rising which could ‘set ablaze the whole of the vast inaccessible mountain tracts stretching along the Eastern Ghats so far as Kalahandi and Bastar; and so went about burning Khond villages.

News of the war produced interestingly similar results among the Oraons of Chotanagpur, the neighbours of the Mundas. Here, a movement started by Jatra Bhagat in 1914, calling for monotheism, abstention from meat, liquor and tribal dances, and a return to shifting-cultivation. But, it gradually took a more radical millenarian colour in the following year as rumours spread of the imminent coming of a savior variously identified with Birsa or the ‘German’ or ‘Kaiser Baba’. Of course, repressive action stamped out this militant stand. But, a pacific ‘Tana Bhagat’ movement survived among the Oraons and developed links with Gandhian nationalism from the 1920’s. The British efforts to recruit tribal labour for menial work on the Western Front led to a Santhal rising a Mayurbhanj and a rebellion in Manipur among the Thadoekukis in 1917. Guerrilla war went on here for two years, fuelled also by other grievances like Pothang (tribals being made to carry the baggages of officials without payment), and the government efforts to stop jhum (shifting-cultivation). In southern Rajathan also the Bhils of Banswara, Sunth and Dungarpur states (adjoining Mewar) started, at first, reform movement under Govind Guru. This began as a temperance and purification movement. But, in late 1913 it developed into a bid to set up a Bhil Raj. About 4 ,000 Bhils assembled on Mangad hill. The British could disperse them only after considerable resistance in which 12 tribals were killed and 900 taken prisoner. Similarly, in the wake of the Non-Cooperation Movement the Bara Banki with its Eka Movement worried the Uttar Pradesh officials in March 1922. Order could not be fully restored in Tippera and Chittagong district of Bengal till July 1922.

The tribals of Andhra also responded to colonial policies with violent outbursts in the hills of the Rampa of the Chodavaram division in the then Godavari district where the tribal Koya and Konda Dora hill chiefs (muttadars) had risen against the new restrictive regulations of the Government and depredations of the Government supported Mansabdar of Rampa in 1840, 1845, 1857, 1858, 1861, 1862 and also in 1879, the last one being a major one covering an area of about 5000 square miles.

5. Summary :

All these anti-colonial movements which are generally treated as pre-political movements are clear-cut evidences of discontent and opposition to the British rule.

Web links

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_independence_movement
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_independence_movement
• http://www.historydiscussion.net/articles/peasant-and-tribal-movements-during-british-eastindia-company/2081
• http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G2-3045300096.html
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Rebellion_of_1857
• http://www.importantindia.com/11627/great-revolt-of-1857/
• http://asianhistory.about.com/od/india/f/What-Was-The-Revolt-Of-1857-in-India-All-About.htm