Monthly Archives: October 2022

Topics in the Chapter

• Resources

• Types of Resources

→ Natural Resources

→ Human Made Resources

→ Human Resources

• Conserving Resources

→ Resource Conservation

→ Sustainable Development

Resources

• Definition: Anything that can be used to satisfy a need is a resource.

• What makes a thing Resource

→ Utility or usability is what makes an object or substance a resource. Example includes Water, textbook etc.

→ Some resources have economic value while some do not. Example: Metals may have an economic value, a beautiful landscape may not. But both satisfy human needs so these are considered as resource.

• Some resources can become economically valuable with time. Example: Grandmother’s home remedies are not economically valuable today. But if they are patented and sold by a medical firm tomorrow, they could become economically valuable.

• Important factors that can change substances into resources:

→ Time

→ Technology

• People themselves are the most important resource. Their ideas, knowledge, inventions and discoveries that lead to the creation of more resources.

• Each invention leads to many others. Example: The discovery of fire led to the practice of cooking

and other processes while the invention of the wheel ultimately resulted in development of newer modes of transport.

Types of Resources

• There are three types of resources:

→ Natural

→ Human made 

→ Human

• Resources that are drawn from Nature and used without much modification are called natural resources. For example: air, water, soil, minerals etc.

• The resources which are created from natural resources through human resources are known as human made resources. For example: buildings, bridges, roads etc.

• People are human resources. It refers to the quantity and abilities of the people.

Natural Resources

• Many of natural resources are free gifts of nature.

• These can be used directly but in some cases we have to use tools and technology may be
needed to use a natural resource to utilize it in best possible way.

• Natural resources are classified into different groups depending upon their level of development and use;
→ Origin
→ Stock
→ distribution

• On the basis of their development and use resources it can be classified into two groups:

→ Actual resources: Those resources whose quantity is known. These resources are being used in the present. For Example: The dark soils of the Deccan plateau in Maharashtra

→ Potential resources: Those whose entire quantity may not be known and these are not being used at present. This is due to the present level of technology is not advanced enough to easily utilise these resources. For Example: The uranium found in Ladakh is a potential resource that could be used in the future.

• Based on their origin it can be classified into two groups:

→ Abiotic resources: Non-living resources. Example includes Soil, Water, rocks etc.

→ Biotic resources: Living resources. Exampl includes Plants and animals.

• On the basis of Stock:

→ Renewable resources: Those which get renewed or replenished quickly. For example solar energy, soil, forest etc.

Some of these are unlimited and are not affected by human activities such as solar or wind energy while careless use of certain renewable resources like water, soil and forest can affect their stock.

→ Non-renewable resources: Those which have a limited stock. For example: Coal, Petroleum etc.

Once the stocks are exhausted it may take thousands of years to be renewed or replenished. Therefore, they are considered as non-renewable.

• On the basis of their distribution resources:

→ Ubiquitous: Resources that are found everywhere like the air we breathe, are ubiquitous. For Example: air, water etc.

→ Localised: Resources that are found in only certain places are localised. For Example: Copper, Iron Ore etc.

• The distribution of resources is unequal over earth and depends upon number of physical factors like terrain, climate and altitude.

Human Made Resources

• Natural substances become resources only when their original form has been changed. For Example: Iron ore was not a resource until people learnt to extract iron from it.

• Technology is also a human made resource.

Human Resources

• People use the nature in the best possible way using their knowledge, skill and the technology. Therefore, they considered as human resources.

• Education and health help in making people a valuable resource.

• Improving the quality of people’s skills so that they are able to create more resources is known as human resource development.

Conserving Resources

• Using resources carefully and giving them time to get renewed is called resource conservation.

• Sustainable development is the development meets the needs of present and also conserve them for
the future.

• Principles of Sustainable development:
→ Respect and care for all forms of life
→ Improve the quality of human life
→ Conserve the earth’s vitality and diversity
→ Minimise the depletion of natural resources
→ Change personal attitude and practices toward the environment
→ Enable communities to care for their own environment.

• It is our duty to ensure that:
→ All uses of renewable resources are sustainable
→ The diversity of life on the earth is conserved
→ The damage to natural environmental system is minimised.

Glossary

• Patent: It means the exclusive right over any idea or invention.

• Technology: It is the application of latest knowledge and skill in doing or making things.

• Stock of Resource: It is the amount of resources available for use.

• Sustainable Development: Carefully utilising resources so that besides meeting the requirements
of the present, also takes care of future generations.

The Emergence of Nationalism

• India was the people of India where all the people irrespective of class, colour, caste, creed, language, or gender resides.

• The British were exercising control over the resources of India.

• The political associations were started forming after 1850, especially those that came into being in the 1870s and 1880s.

• The important ones were the Poona Sarvajanik Sabha, the Indian Association, the Madras Mahajan Sabha, the Bombay Presidency Association, and of course the Indian National Congress.

• The Arms Act was passed in 1878, disallowing Indians from possessing arms. 

• In the same year the Vernacular Press Act was also enacted in an effort to silence those who were critical of the government.

• The Indian National Congress was established when 72 delegates from all over the country met at Bombay in December 1885.
→ The early leadership – Dadabhai Naoroji, Pherozeshah Mehta, Badruddin Tyabji, W.C. Bonnerji, Surendranath Banerji, Romesh Chandra Dutt, S. Subramania Iyer, among others – was largely from Bombay and Calcutta.

A nation in the making

• The Congress in the first twenty years was “moderate” in its objectives and methods.

• It demanded that Indians be placed in high positions in the government. 
→ For this purpose it called for civil service examinations to be held in India as well.

• The early Congress also raised a number of economic issues.

“Freedom is our birthright”

• By the 1890s many Indians began to raise questions about the political style of the Congress. 

• In Bengal, Maharashtra and Punjab, leaders such as Bepin Chandra Pal, Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Lala Lajpat Rai started exploring more radical objectives and methods.

• Tilak raised the slogan, “Freedom is my birthright and I shall have it!”

• In 1905 Viceroy Curzon partitioned Bengal.
→ The partition of Bengal infuriated people all over India.

• The Swadeshi movement sought to oppose British rule and encourage the ideas of self-help, swadeshi enterprise, national education, and use of Indian languages.

• The Congress split in 1907 however the two groups reunited in December 1915.

• In 1916, the Congress and the Muslim League signed the historic Lucknow Pact.

The Growth of Mass Nationalism

• The First World War altered the economic and political situation in India.

• The government increased taxes on individual incomes and business profits.

• Increased military expenditure and the demands for war supplies led to a sharp rise in prices.

• Gandhiji arrived in India in 1915 from South Africa is well known for leading successful movement against racist regimes.

The Rowlatt Satyagraha

• In 1919 Gandhiji gave a call for a satyagraha against the Rowlatt Act passed by British that curbed freedom of expression and strengthened police powers.

• The Rowlatt Satyagraha turned out to be the first all-India struggle against the British government.

• In April 1919, there were a number of demonstrations and hartals in the country and the government used brutal measures to suppress them.

• The Jallianwala Bagh atrocities, administered by General Dyer in Amritsar on Baisakhi day (13 April), were a part of this repression.

Khilafat agitation and the Non-Cooperation Movement

• The leaders of the Khilafat agitation, Mohammad Ali and Shaukat Ali initiated a full-fledged Non-Cooperation Movement.

• Gandhiji supported their call and urged the Congress to campaign against Jallianwala massacre, the
Khilafat wrong and demand swaraj.

• The Non-Cooperation Movement gained momentum through 1921-22.

• Thousands of students left government- controlled schools and colleges.

• British titles were surrendered and legislatures boycotted.

People’s initiatives

• Different classes and groups, interpreting Gandhiji’s call in their own manner.

• In Kheda, Gujarat, Patidar peasants organised non-violent campaigns against the high land revenue
demand of the British.

• In coastal Andhra and interior Tamil Nadu, liquor shops were picketed.

• In the Guntur district of Andhra Pradesh, tribals and poor peasants staged a number of “forest satyagrahas”.

• In Sind (now in Pakistan), Muslim traders and peasants were very enthusiastic about the Khilafat call.

• In Bengal too, the Khilafat-Non-Cooperation alliance gave enormous communal unity and strength to the national movement.

• In Punjab, the Akali agitation of the Sikhs sought to remove corrupt mahants – supported by the British.

• In Assam, tea garden labourers demanded a big increase in their wages.

The happenings of 1922-1929

• Mahatma Gandhi abruptly called off the Non-Cooperation Movement when in February 1922 when a crowd of peasants set fire to a police station in Chauri Chaura.

• Two important developments of the mid-1920s were the formation of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a Hindu organisation, and the Communist Party of India.

• The decade closed with the Congress resolving to fight for Purna Swaraj (complete independence) in 1929 under the presidentship of Jawaharlal Nehru.

The March to Dandi

• In 1930, Gandhiji declared that he would lead a march to break the salt law.

• Gandhiji and his followers marched from Sabarmati to the coastal town of Dandi where they broke the government law by gathering natural salt found on the seashore, and boiling sea water to produce salt.

• The Government of India Act of 1935 prescribed provincial autonomy and the government announced elections to the provincial legislatures in 1937.

• In September 1939, after two years of Congress rule in the provinces, the Second World War broke out.

Quit India and Later

• Mahatma Gandhi decided to launch ‘Quit India’ movement against the British in the middle of the Second World War.

• Gandhiji and other leaders were jailed at once but the movement spread.

Towards Independence and Partition

• In 1940 the Muslim League had moved a resolution demanding “Independent States” for Muslims

in the north-western and eastern areas of the country.

•  In 1937, the Congress rejected the League’s wish to form a joint Congress-League government in the United Provinces which annoyed the League.

• At the end of the war in 1945, the British opened negotiations between the Congress, the League and themselves for the independence of India.

→ The talks failed because the League saw itself as the sole spokesperson of India’s Muslims.

• The Congress did well in the “General” constituencies but the League’s success in the seats reserved for Muslims persisted with its demand for “Pakistan”.

• After the failure of the Cabinet Mission, the Muslim League declared mass agitation for winning its Pakistan demand.

• 16 August, 1946 was announced as a “Direct Action Day” by the League.

→ On this day, riots broke out in Calcutta, lasting several days.

• By March 1947 violence spread to different parts of northern India.

• Millions of people were forced to flee their homes.

• Partition also meant that India changed, many of its cities changed, and a new country – Pakistan – was born.

Colonial rule introduced several new art forms, styles, materials and techniques which were creatively adapted by Indian artists for local patrons and markets, in both elite and popular circles.

The changes were seen primarily on paintings and printmaking.

New Forms of Imperial Art:

(i) In 18th century a stream of European artists came to India along with the British traders and rulers.

(ii) The artists brought with them new styles and new conventions of paintings. They began producing pictures which helped shape western perceptions of India.

(iii) The main feature of the European painting was realism, i.e., what the artists produced was expected to look real.

(iv) Oil painting was also introduced in India by the European artists. It enabled artists to produce images that looked real.

(v) Paintings were based on varied subjects. However, the European artist’s common intention was to emphasise the superiority of Britain, its culture, its people and its power.

Looking for the Picturesque:

Picturesque is an aesthetic ideal introduced into English cultural debate in 1782 by William Gilpin. The term “picturesque” needs to be understood in relationship to two other aesthetic ideals: the beautiful and the sublime

(i) Picturesque landscape painting was one of the popular imperial traditions. It depicted India as quaint land, to be explored by travelling British artists.

(ii) The most famous artists of this tradition were Thomas Daniell and his nephew William Daniell.

(iii) They produced paintings of newly acquired British territories.

(iv) In some of the images, they showed the British rule bringing modern civilization to India. In other images, depicting buildings reminding the glory of past and decaying ancient civilization.

(v) One of the images shows the modernizing influence of British rule, by emphasizing a picture of dramatic change.

Portraits of Authority:

(i) Portrait painting was another tradition of art that became popular in colonial India.

(ii) The rich and powerful people, both Indian and British, were very fond of self-portraits.

(iii) In colonial India, portraits were life-size images that looked lifelike and real.

(iv) The art of making portraits is known as ‘portraiture’ that served as an ideal means of displaying the lavish lifestyles, wealth and status generated by British in India.

(v) European artists like Johann Zoffany visited India in search of profitable commissions.

(vi) He was born in Germany, migrated to England and came in India and stayed for five years.

(vii) He depicted the British as superior and imperious, flaunting their clothes, standing royally or sitting arrogantly and living a life of luxury while Indians were portrayed as submissive and inferior serving their white masters and occupying a shadowy background in his paintings.

(viii) Many Indian Nawabs got their portraits painted by European painters.

(ix) Nawab Muhammad Ali Khan of Arcot commissioned two European artists- Tilly Kettle and George Willison to paint his portraits and gifted these paintings to the king of England and the Directors of East India Company.

Painting History:

‘ History painting‘ refers to any picture with a high-minded or heroic narrative.

(i) Itwas a third category of imperial art. These paintings dramatized and recreated various episodes of British imperial history and enjoyed prestige and became very popular in the late 18th and early 19th century.

(ii) British victories in India served as rich material for history painters in Britain.

(iii) They painted the various wars, in which the colonial rule had defeated the Indians and British were celebrating their power, their victories also their supremacy.

(iv) The first painting of history was produced by Francis Hayman in 1762 when the British defeated the Indian army of Nawab Sirajuddaula in the Battle of Plassey and installed Mir Jafar as the Nawab of Murshidabad. The painting shows Mir Jafar welcoming Lord Clive.

(v) Robert Kerr Porter painted the defeat of Tipu Sultan of Mysore in 1799 at the famous battle of Seringapatam. It is a painting full of action and energy, the painting dramatizes the event and glorified the British triumph.

(vi) Imperial history paintings sought to create a public memory of imperial triumph to show that the British were invisible and all-powerful.

What Happened to the Court Artists:

(i) There were different Indian traditions of Art in different courts. Some of them are as follows-

• In Mysore, Tipu Sultan resisted the European art and continued to encourage his tradition of mural paintings.
• The court of Murshidabad had different trend. The British had successfully installed their puppet Nawabs on the throne; first Mir Zafar and then Mir Qasim after defeating Sirajuddaulah. The Nawab encouraged local miniature artists to absorb the tastes and artists style of British.
• The local artists of Murshidabad began to adopt the elements of European realism. They used perspective, i.e., style of painting which creates a sense of distance between objects that are near and those at a distance. They used various shades to make the figures realistic.

(ii) Local painters produced a vast number of images of local plants and animals, historical buildings and monuments, festivals, etc. and these pictures were collected by the East India Company officials and known as Company paintings.

The New Popular Indian Art:

(i) A new world of popular art developed in 19th century in many of the cities of India.

(ii) Scroll painting; paintings on a long roll of paper that could be rolled up, was developed by local villagers called ‘patuas’ and ‘potters’.

(iii) Kalighat in Bengal was expanding as a commercial and administrative centre.

(iv) Mythological themes were the main art forms for the scroll painters producing images of gods and goddesses.

(v) Traditionally, figures in scroll paintings looked flat, not rounded.

(vi) Kalighat painters began to use shading to give them a rounded form, to make images look three dimensional but were not realistic and lifelike.

(vii) Early Kalighat paintings use a bold deliberately non-realistic style depicting large and powerful figures with a minimum of lines, detail, and colours.

(viii) Many of the Kalighat pictures were printed in large numbers and sold in the market and the images were engraved in wooden blocks.

(ix) In late 19th century, mechanical printing presses were set up in different parts of India, which helped in producing larger number of printings.

(x) Calcutta Art Studio was set up in late 19th century in Calcutta and produced lifelike images of eminent Bengali personalities as well as mythological pictures.

(xi) With the spread of nationalism in the early 20th century, the studio produced popular prints with elements of nationalism. Some of them have Bharat Mata appearing as a goddess carrying the national flag or nationalist heroes sacrificing their head to Bharat Mata.

The Search for a National Art:

(i) The impact of religions, culture and the spirit of nationalism on art was strongly visible by the end of the 19th century.

(ii) Many painters tried to develop a style that could be considered both modern and Indian.

The Art of Raja Ravi Varma:

(i) Raja Ravi Varma was one of the first artists who tried to intermingle modern and national style.

(ii) Raja Ravi Varma belonged to the family of the Maharaja of Travancore in Kerala.

(iii) He mastered the Western art of oil painting and realistic life study but painted themes from Indian mythology.

(iv) He mainly painted scenes from the Ramayana and the Mahabharata.

(v) Raja Ravi Varma set up a picture production team and printing press on the outskirts of Bombay.

A Different Vision of National Art:

(i) A new group of nationalist artists in Bengal gathered around Abanindranath Tagore, the nephew of Rabindranath Tagore.

(ii) They opposed the art of Ravi Varma as imitative of western style and declared that western and modern art could not be used to depict the nation’s ancient myths and legends.

(iii) He wanted to revive and turned for inspiration to medieval Indian traditions of miniature painting and the ancient art of mural paintings in the Ajanta Caves.

(iv) He received inspiration from Rajput style of paintings.

(v) His art was influenced by the Japanese paintings that can be seen in some of the paintings.

Introduction

Early Years

• Before two hundred years, society was totally different.

• Most children were married off at an early age.

• Both Hindu and Muslim men could marry more than one wife.

• ‘Sati Pratha’ (a widow burn herself on the funeral pyre of their husbands) was prevailing in Hindu society.

• Women’s rights to property were also restricted.

• Most women had virtually no access to education.

• In most regions, people were divided along lines of caste. 

→ Brahmans and Kshatriyas considered themselves as “upper castes”. 

→ Traders and moneylenders, referred to as Vaishyas were placed after them. 

→ Peasants, and artisans such as weavers and potters referred to as Shudras were at the lowest rung.

• Over the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, many of these norms and perceptions slowly changed.

Working Towards Change

• From the early nineteenth century, after the development of new forms of communication, debates and discussions about social customs and practices started.

• These debates were often initiated by Indian reformers and reform groups. 

→ Raja Rammohun Roy (1772-1833) was one such reformer who founded a reform association known as the Brahmo Sabha (later known as the Brahmo Samaj) in Calcutta.

• Reformers were those people who felt that changes were necessary in society, and unjust practices needed to be done away with.

• He was interested in spreading the knowledge of Western education in the country and bring about
greater freedom and equality for women.

• He wrote about the way women were forced to bear the burden of domestic work, confined to the home and the kitchen, and not allowed to move out and become educated.

Changing the lives of widows

• Rammohun Roy was particularly moved by the problems widows faced in their lives so he began a campaign against the practice of sati.

• By the early nineteenth century, many British officials had also begun to criticise Indian traditions and customs therefore, they were more than willing to listen to Rammohun who was reputed to be a learned man.

• In 1829, sati was banned.

• Another reformer, Ishwarchandra Vidyasagar, used the ancient texts to suggest that widows could remarry.

• His suggestion was adopted by British officials, and a law was passed in 1856 permitting widow remarriage.

• In the Telugu-speaking areas of the Madras Presidency, Veerasalingam Pantulu formed an association for widow remarriage.

• In the north, Swami Dayanand Saraswati, who founded the reform association called Arya Samaj, also supported widow remarriage.

Girls begin going to school

• Many reformers felt that education for girls was necessary in order to improve the condition of women.

• Vidyasagar in Calcutta and many other reformers in Bombay set up schools for girls.

• Paople feared that schools would take girls away from home, prevent them from doing their domestic duties.

• Also, girls had to travel through public places in order to reach school which would have a corrupting influence on them.

• Throughout the nineteenth century, most educated women were taught at home by liberal fathers or husbands.

• In the latter part of the century, schools for girls were established by the Arya Samaj in Punjab, and Jyotirao Phule in Maharashtra.

• In aristocratic Muslim households in North India, women learnt to read the Koran in Arabic.
→ They were taught by women who came home to teach.

• Some reformers such as Mumtaz Ali reinterpreted verses from the Koran to argue for women’s education.

Women write about women

• From the early twentieth century, Muslim women like the Begums of Bhopal founded a
primary school for girls at Aligarh.

• Begum Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain started schools for Muslim girls in Patna and Calcutta.

• By the 1880s, Indian women began to enter universities and trained to be doctors, some became teachers.

• Tarabai Shinde, a woman educated at home at Poona, published a book, Stripurushtulna, (A Comparison between Women and Men), criticising the social differences between men and women.

• Pandita Ramabai, a great scholar of Sanskrit, wrote a book about the miserable lives of upper-caste
Hindu women.
→ She founded a widows’ home at Poona to provide shelter to widows.

• By the end of the nineteenth century, women themselves were actively working for reform.

• They wrote books, edited magazines, founded schools and training centres, and set up women’s associations.

• From the early twentieth century, they formed political pressure groups to push through laws for female suffrage (the right to vote) and better health care and education for women.

Caste and Social Reform

• Some of the social reformers criticised caste inequalities.

• Rammohun Roy translated an old Buddhist text that was critical of caste.

• The Prarthana Samaj was attached to the tradition of Bhakti that believed in spiritual equality of all castes.

• In Bombay, the Paramhans Mandali was founded in 1840 to work for the abolition of caste.

• Many of these reformers and members of reform associations were people of upper castes who were often, in secret meetings, these reformers would violate caste taboos on food and touch.

• During the course of the nineteenth century, Christian missionaries began setting up schools for tribal groups and lower-caste children.

• The expansion of cities created new demands of labour.
→ The poor from the villages and small towns, many of them from low castes, began moving to the cities where there was a new demand for labour.
→ Some also went to work in plantations in Assam, Mauritius, Trinidad and Indonesia.
→ The people from low castes, saw this as an opportunity to get away from the oppressive hold that upper-caste landowners exercised over their lives and the daily humiliation they suffered.

Demands for equality and justice

• By the second half of the nineteenth century, people from within the Non-Brahman castes began organising movements against caste discrimination, and demanded social equality and justice.

• The Satnami movement in Central India, founded by Ghasidas who worked among the leatherworkers and organised a movement to improve their social status.

• In eastern Bengal, Haridas Thakur’s Matua sect worked among Chandala cultivators.

• In present-day Kerala, a guru from Ezhava caste, Shri Narayana Guru, proclaimed the ideals of unity for his people and argued against treating people unequally on the basis of caste differences.

• All these sects were founded by leaders who came from Non- Brahman castes and worked amongst them.

Gulamgiri

• Jyotirao Phule was born in 1827 and studied in schools set up by Christian missionaries.

• He set out to attack the Brahmans’ claim that they were superior to others, since they were Aryans.

• Phule argued that the Aryans were foreigners, who came from outside the subcontinent, and defeated and subjugated the inhabitants of the country.

• He proposed that Shudras (labouring castes) and Ati Shudras (untouchables) should unite to challenge caste discrimination.

• Phule founded the Satyashodhak Samaj, an association which propagated caste equality.

• In 1873, Phule wrote a book named Gulamgiri, meaning slavery and dedicated his book to all those Americans who had fought to free slaves, thus establishing a link between the conditions of the
“lower” castes in India and the black slaves in America.

Who could enter temples?

• Ambedkar was born into a Mahar family and faced discrimination since childhood.

• On his return to India in 1919, he wrote extensively about “upper”-caste power in contemporary society.

• In 1927, Ambedkar started a temple entry movement, in which his Mahar caste followers participated.

• Ambedkar led three such movements for temple entry between 1927 and 1935 with the aim to make everyone see the power of caste prejudices within society.

The Non-Brahman movement

• In the early twentieth century, the non-Brahman movement started by non-Brahman castes that had acquired access to education, wealth and influence.

• They argued that Brahmans were heirs of Aryan invaders from the north who had conquered southern lands from the original inhabitants of the region – the indigenous Dravidian races.

• E.V. Ramaswamy Naicker, or Periyar, as he was called, came from a middle-class family, founded the Self Respect Movement and believed that the untouchables had to free themselves from all religions in order to achieve social equality.

• Periyar was an outspoken critic of Hindu scriptures, especially the Codes of Manu, the ancient lawgiver, and the Bhagavad Gita and the Ramayana as these texts had been used to establish the
authority of Brahmans over lower castes and the domination of men over women.

• These assertions were challenged by orthodox Hindu society who began founding Sanatan Dharma Sabhas and the Bharat Dharma Mahamandal in the north, and associations like the Brahman Sabha in Bengal.

• Debates and struggles over caste continued beyond the colonial period and are still going on in our own times.

Introduction

• The British in India wanted not only territorial conquest and control over revenues but also felt that they had a cultural mission and had to “civilise the natives”, change their customs and values.

How the British saw Education

The tradition of Orientalism

• In 1783, William Jones arrived in Calcutta who was a linguist.
→ He had studied Greek and Latin at Oxford, knew French and English, Arabic and Persian.
→ At Calcutta, he started learning Sanskrit language, grammar and poetry.
→ Soon he was studying ancient Indian texts on law, philosophy, religion, politics, morality, arithmetic, medicine and the other sciences.

• Englishmen like Henry Thomas Colebrooke and Nathaniel Halhed were also busy discovering the ancient Indian heritage, mastering Indian languages and translating Sanskrit and Persian works into English.

• Together with them, Jones set up the Asiatic Society of Bengal, and started a journal called Asiatick Researches.

• Jones and Colebrooke went about discovering ancient texts, understanding their meaning, translating them, and making their findings known to others.
→ They believed this project would help the British learn from Indian culture and also help Indians
rediscover their own heritage, and understand the lost glories of their past.
→ In this process, the British would become the guardians of Indian culture as well as its masters.

• Influenced by such ideas, many Company officials argued that the British ought to promote Indian rather than Western learning.

• They felt that institutions should be set up to encourage the study of ancient Indian texts and teach Sanskrit and Persian literature and poetry.

• In 1781, a madrasa was set up in Calcutta to promote the study of Arabic, Persian and Islamic law

• In 1791, the Hindu College was established in Benaras to encourage the study of ancient Sanskrit texts that would be useful for the administration of the country.

• Not all officials shared these views and many crticised the Orientalists.

“Grave errors of the East”

• From the early nineteenth century many British officials began to criticise the Orientalist vision of learning.

• According to them, knowledge of the East was full of errors and unscientific thought.

• James Mill was one of those who attacked the Orientalists and declared that the aim of education ought to be to teach what was useful and practical.
→ So, Indians should be made familiar with the scientific and technical advances that the West had made, rather than with the poetry and sacred literature of the Orient.

• By the 1830s the attack on the Orientalists became sharper.
→ Thomas Babington Macaulay saw India as an uncivilised country that needed to be civilised.
→ According to him, no branch of Eastern knowledge could be compared to what England had produced.

• Macaulay gave importance to the need to teach the English language.
• He felt that knowledge of English would allow Indians to read some of the finest literature the world had produced.
→ It would make them aware of the developments in Western science and philosophy.
→ Thus, it is a way of civilising people, changing their tastes, values and culture.

• The English Education Act of 1835 was introduced.
→ The decision was to make English the medium of instruction for higher education and to stop the promotion of Oriental institutions like the Calcutta Madrasa and Benaras Sanskrit College.

Education for commerce

• In 1854, the Court of Directors of the East India Company in London sent an educational despatch to the Governor-General in India come to be known as Wood’s Despatch which emphasised once again the practical benefits of a system of European learning, as opposed to Oriental knowledge.

• It said, European learning would enable Indians to recognise the advantages that flow from the expansion of trade and commerce, and make them see the importance of developing the resources of the country.

• Wood’s Despatch also argued that European learning would improve the moral character of Indians and would make them truthful and honest.

• Following the 1854 Despatch, education departments of the government were set up to extend control over all matters regarding education.

What Happened to the Local Schools?

The report of William Adam

• In the 1830s, William Adam, a Scottish missionary, toured the districts of Bengal and Bihar and asked by the Company to report on the progress of education in vernacular schools.

• Adam found that there were over 1 lakh pathshalas in Bengal and Bihar imparting education to over 20 lakh children.
→ These institutions were set up by wealthy people, or the local community.

• The system of education was flexible.
→ There were no fixed fee
→ There were no printed books
→ There were no separate school building
→ There were no benches or chairs
→ There were no blackboards
→ There were no system of separate classes
→ There were no roll-call registers
→ There were no annual examinations
→ There were no regular time-table.

• Adam discovered that this flexible system was suited to local needs.
→ For example, classes were not held during harvest time when rural children often worked in the
fields.

New routines, new rules

• Up to the mid-nineteenth century, the Company was concerned primarily with higher education.

• After 1854 the Company decided to improve the system of vernacular education.

• Each guru was asked to submit periodic reports and take classes according to a regular timetable.

• Teaching was now to be based on textbooks and learning was to be tested through a system of annual examination.

• Students were asked to pay a regular fee, attend regular classes, sit on fixed seats, and obey the new rules of discipline.

• Pathshalas which accepted the new rules were supported through government grants.

• The new rules and routines affected the children from poor peasant families negatively as new system demanded regular attendance, even during harvest time.

• Inability to attend school came to be seen as indiscipline, as evidence of the lack of desire to learn.

The Agenda for a National Education

• From the early nineteenth century, many thinkers from different parts of India began to talk of the need for a wider spread of education.

• Some Indians felt that Western education would help modernise India
→ They urged the British to open more schools, colleges and universities, and spend more money on education.

• There were other Indians who reacted against Western education. Mahatma Gandhi and Rabindranath Tagore were two such individuals.

“English education has enslaved us” (Mahatma Gandhi’s view on Indian Education)

• According to Mahatma Gandhi, the colonial education created a sense of inferiority in the minds of Indians.

• It made them see Western civilisation as superior, and destroyed the pride they had in their own culture.

• Mahatma Gandhi wanted an education that could help Indians recover their sense of dignity and self-respect.

• As per Mahatma Gandhi, western education focused on reading and writing rather than oral knowledge; it valued textbooks rather than lived experience and practical knowledge.

• He argued that education ought to develop a person’s mind and soul.

• Literacy – or simply learning to read and write – by itself did not count as education.

Tagore’s “abode of peace” (Rabindranath Tagore’s view on Indian Education)

• Rabindranath Tagore started the Santiniketan in 1901.

• Tagore felt that childhood ought to be a time of self-learning, outside the rigid and restricting discipline of the schooling system set up by the British.

• Teachers had to be imaginative, understand the child, and help the child develop her curiosity.

• According to Tagore, the existing schools killed the natural desire of the child to be creative, her sense of wonder.

• Tagore was of the view that creative learning could be encouraged only within a natural environment.
→ So he set up santiniketan, 100 kilometres away from Calcutta in a natural setting, where living in harmony with nature, children could cultivate their natural creativity.

Difference in Gandhi and Tagore view about Indian Education

• Gandhiji was highly critical of Western civilisation and its worship of machines and technology. Tagore wanted to combine elements of modern Western civilisation with what
he saw as the best within Indian tradition.

• Gandhiji considered work with their hands, learn a craft, and know how different things operated as education while Tagore emphasised the need to teach science and technology at Santiniketan, along with art, music and dance.

Introduction

• The chapter tells the story of the crafts and industries of India during British rule by focusing on two industries:

→ Textiles 

→ Iron and steel.

Indian Textiles and the World Market

• Around 1750, India was by far the world’s largest producer of cotton textiles.

• Indian textiles had long been renowned both for their fine quality and exquisite craftsmanship.

• They were extensively traded in Southeast Asia and West and Central Asia.

• From the sixteenth century, European trading companies began buying Indian textiles for sale in Europe.

Words tell us histories

• European traders first encountered fine cotton cloth from India carried by Arab merchants in Mosul in present-day Iraq.
→ They began referring all finely woven textiles as “muslin” – a word that acquired wide currency.

• The cotton textiles which Portuguese took back to Europe, along with the spices, came to be called “calico” which became the general name for all cotton textiles.

• In 1730, English East India Company sent to its representatives in Calcutta to order a variety of cloth pieces in bulk.
→ Amongst the pieces ordered in bulk were printed cotton cloths called chintz, cossaes (or khassa) and bandanna.
→ Chintz is derived from the Hindi word chhint, a cloth with small and colourful flowery designs.
→ The word bandanna term is derived from the word “bandhna” refers to any brightly coloured and printed scarf for the neck or head.

• The printed cotton cloths called chintz, cossaes (or khassa) and bandanna.

• There were other cloths in the order book that were noted by their place of origin such as Kasimbazar, Patna, Calcutta, Orissa, Charpoore.

Indian textiles in European markets

• By the early eighteenth century, worried by the popularity of Indian textiles, wool and silk makers in England began protesting against the import of Indian cotton textiles.

• In 1720, the Calico Act was introduced in England which banned the use of printed cotton textiles – chintz.

• Competition with Indian textiles led to a search for technological innovation in England.
→ In 1764, the spinning jenny was invented by John Kaye which increased the productivity of the traditional spindles.
→ In 1786, steam engine was invented by Richard Arkwright which revolutionised cotton textile weaving.

• European trading companies – the Dutch, the French and the English – made large profits through textile trade with India.

• These companies purchased cotton and silk textiles in India by importing silver.

• When the English East India Company gained political power in Bengal, they used revenues from peasants and zamindars in India to buy Indian textiles.

Who were the weavers?

• Weavers often belonged to communities that specialised in weaving.

• Their skills were passed on from one generation to the next.

• Some communities famous for weaving:
→ tanti weavers of Bengal, the julahas or momin weavers of north India.
→ sale and kaikollar and devangs of south India.

• The first stage of production was spinning done mostly by women in which charkha and the takli were used.

• After weaving, spinning was done mostly by men.

• For coloured textiles, the thread was dyed by the dyer, known as rangrez.

• For printed cloth the weavers needed the help of specialist block printers known as chhipigars.

The decline of Indian textiles

• The development of cotton industries in Britain affected textile producers in India in several ways: → Indian textiles now had to compete with British textiles in the European and American markets.
→ Exporting textiles to England also became increasingly difficult since very high duties were imposed on Indian textiles imported into Britain.

• By the beginning of the nineteenth century, English-made cotton textiles successfully displaced Indian goods from their traditional markets in Africa, America and Europe.

• By the 1830s, British cotton cloth flooded Indian markets.

• Some types of cloths could not be supplied by machines thus handloom weaving did not completely die in India.

• Later, during the national movement, Mahatma Gandhi urged people to boycott imported textiles and use hand-spun and hand-woven cloth.
→ Khadi gradually became a symbol of nationalism.

• Many weavers became agricultural labourers.
→ Some migrated to cities in search of work, and others went out of the country to work in plantations in Africa and South America.
→ Some handloom weavers also found work in the new cotton mills that were established in Bombay, Ahmedabad, Sholapur, Nagpur and Kanpur.

Cotton mills come up

• The first cotton mill in India was set up as a spinning mill in Bombay in 1854.

• From the early nineteenth century, Bombay had grown as an important port for the export of raw cotton from India to England and China.
→ By 1900, over 84 mills started operating in Bombay.

• The first mill in Ahmedabad was started in 1861.

• Growth of cotton mills led to a demand for labour.
→ Thousands of poor peasants, artisans and agricultural labourers moved to the cities to work in the mills.

• The textile factory industry in India faced many problems.
→ It found it difficult to compete with the cheap textiles imported from Britain.

• The colonial government in India usually refused to protect the local industries.

• During the First World War, textile imports from Britain declined and Indian factories were called upon to produce cloth for military supplies which increased the development of cotton factory production in India.

The sword of Tipu Sultan and Wootz steel

• Tipu Sultan who ruled Mysore till 1799 had sword made up of a special type of high carbon steel called Wootz which was produced all over south India.

• Wootz steel when made into swords produced a very sharp edge with a flowing water pattern.

• Wootz steel was produced in many hundreds of smelting furnaces in Mysore.

• Indian Wootz steel fascinated European scientists.
→ Michael Faraday, the legendary scientist and discoverer of electricity and electromagnetism, spent four years studying the properties of Indian Wootz (1818-22).

• The Wootz steel making process, which was so widely known in south India, was completely lost by the mid-nineteenth century.

• The swords and armour making industry died with the conquest of India by the British and imports
of iron and steel from England displaced the iron and steel produced by craftspeople in India.

Abandoned furnaces in villages

• Iron smelting in India was extremely common till the end of the nineteenth century.

• The furnaces were most often built of clay and sun-dried bricks. The smelting was done by men while women

• By the late nineteenth century, however, the craft of iron smelting was in decline.

This was because:

• New forest laws enacted by the colonial government prevented people from entering the reserved forests, which reduced the supply of charcoal.

• By the late nineteenth century iron and steel was being imported from Britain.
→ Ironsmiths in India began using the imported iron to manufacture utensils and implements.

• By the early twentieth century, the artisans producing iron and steel faced a new competition as new iron and steel factories come up in India.

Iron and steel factories come up in India

• In the year 1904, Charles Weld and Dorabji Tata explored the hill pointed out by the Agarias people and found one of the finest iron ores in the world.
→ Rajhara Hills had one of the finest ores in the world.

• A few years later a large area of forest was cleared on the banks of the river Subarnarekha to set up the factory and an industrial township – Jamshedpur.

• The Tata Iron and Steel Company (TISCO) that came up began producing steel in 1912.

• In 1914, when the First World War broke out imports of British steel into India declined dramatically and the Indian Railways turned to TISCO for supply of rails.

• By 1919 the colonial government was buying 90 per cent of the steel manufactured by TISCO.

• Over time TISCO became the biggest steel industry within the British empire.

What Happened to Cities Under Colonial Rule?

• The changes in the Indian cities differ under colonial rule as per their nature.

• Unlike Western Europe, Indian cities did not expand as rapidly in the nineteenth century.

• In the late eighteenth century, Calcutta, Bombay and Madras rose in importance as Presidency cities.

→ They became the centres of British power in the different regions of India.

• At the same time, smaller cities declined.

→ Old trading centres and ports could not survive when the flow of trade moved to new centres.

→ Cities such as Machlipatnam, Surat and Seringapatam were de-urbanised during the nineteenth century.

• By the early twentieth century, only 11 per cent of Indians were living in cities.

How many ‘Delhis’ before New Delhi?

• Delhi as a capital had varied area under different rulers.

• As many as 14 capital cities were founded in a small area of about 60 square miles on the left bank of the river Jamuna.

• The building of capital of Shah Jahan known as Shahjahanabad was begun in 1639 and consisted

of a fort-palace complex and the city adjoining it. 

→ Lal Qila or the Red Fort, made of red sandstone, contained the palace complex. 

→ To its west lay the Walled City with 14 gates. 

→ The main streets of Chandni Chowk and Faiz Bazaar were broad enough for royal processions to pass.

→ A canal ran down the centre of Chandni Chowk.

→ It had several dargahs, khanqahs and idgahs and open squares, winding lanes, quiet cul-de-sacs and water channels.

The Making of New Delhi

• After defeating the Marathas in 1803, the British gained control of Delhi.

• The city developed only when Delhi became the capital of British India in 1911.

Demolishing a past

• In Delhi, especially in the first half of the nineteenth century, the British lived along with the wealthier Indians in the Walled City.

• The establishment of the Delhi College in 1792 helped in the intellectual development of sciences as well as the humanities largely in the Urdu language.

→ Many refer to the period from 1830 to 1857 as a period of the Delhi renaissance (rebirth of art and

learning).

• During the Revolt of 1857, Delhi remained under rebel control for four months.

→ After 1857, everything in Delhi changed.

• The British wanted Delhi to forget its Mughal past therefore area around the Fort was completely cleared of gardens, pavilions and mosques.

• In the 1870s, the western walls of Shahjahanabad were broken to establish the railway and to allow the city to expand beyond the walls.

→ The British shifted to the sprawling Civil Lines area away from the Indians in the Walled City.

• The Delhi College was turned into a school, and shut down in 1877.

Planning a new capital

• In 1877, Viceroy Lytton organised a Durbar to acknowledge Queen Victoria as the Empress of India.

• To reduce the importance of Mughals in the minds of people, the British decided to celebrate British power with pomp and show in the city of Delhi.

• In 1911, when King George V was crowned in England, a Durbar was held in Delhi to celebrate the occasion.

→ The decision to shift the capital of India from Calcutta to Delhi was announced at this Durbar.

• Two architects, Edward Lutyens and Herbert Baker, were called on to design New Delhi and its buildings.

• New Delhi took nearly 20 years to build. 

• The idea was to build a city that was a stark contrast to Shahjahanabad where to be no crowded mohallas, no mazes of narrow bylanes. 

→ The new city also had to be a clean and healthy space.

Life in the time of Partition

• The Partition of India in 1947 led to a massive transfer of populations on both sides of the new border.

• A large number of Muslims left Delhi for Pakistan, their place was taken by equally large numbers of Sikh and Hindu refugees from Pakistan.

• Many of the Muslims who went to Pakistan were artisans, petty traders and labourers.

→ The new migrants coming to Delhi were rural landlords, lawyers, teachers, traders and small shopkeepers.

→ They had to take up new jobs as hawkers, vendors, carpenters and ironsmiths.

• The large migration from Punjab changed the social background of Delhi.

Inside the Old City

• At the end of the nineteenth century, the Shahjahani drains were closed and a new system of

open surface drains was introduced.

The decline of havelis

• The Mughal aristocracy in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries lived in grand mansions called

havelis.

• A haveli housed many families which had open courtyard, surrounded by public rooms meant for

visitors and business, used exclusively by males.

• Many of the Mughal amirs were unable to maintain these large establishments under conditions of British rule. 

→ Havelis, therefore, began to be subdivided and sold.

• The street front of the havelis became shops or warehouses.

• The colonial bungalow was quite different from the haveli which meant for one nuclear family

→ It was a large single-storeyed structure with a pitched roof, and usually set in one or two acres of open ground. 

→ It had separate living and dining rooms and bedrooms, and a wide veranda.

→ Kitchens, stables and servants’ quarters were in a separate space from the main house.

The Municipality begins to plan

• The walled city was horribly crowded with as many as 90 persons per acre, while New Delhi had only about 3 persons per acre.

• In 1888 an extension scheme called the Lahore Gate Improvement Scheme was planned by Robert Clarke for the Walled City residents. 

→ The idea was to draw residents away from the Old City to a new type of market square, around which shops would be built.

• The Delhi Improvement Trust was set up 1936, and it built areas like Daryaganj South for wealthy Indians.

Policies and the People

Nawabs lose their power

• Since the mid-eighteenth century, nawabs and rajas gradually lost their authority and honour.

• Residents had been stationed in many courts, the freedom of the rulers reduced, their armed forces disbanded, and their revenues and territories taken away by stages.

• Many ruling families tried to negotiate with the Company to protect their interests however the Company, confident of its superiority and military powers, turned down these pleas.

• In 1801, a subsidiary alliance was imposed on Awadh, and in 1856 it was taken over in the name of British rule was needed to ensure proper administration.

• In 1856, Governor-General Canning decided that Bahadur Shah Zafar would be the last Mughal king.

The peasants and the sepoys

• In the countryside, peasants and zamindars annoyed with the high taxes and the rigid methods of revenue
collection.

• Many peassants failed to pay back their loans to the moneylenders and gradually lost the lands they had tilled for generations.

• The Indian sepoys were unhappy about their pay, allowances and conditions of service.
→ Also, some new rules violated their religious sensibilities and beliefs such as crossing the sea results in losing their religion and caste.

• Sepoys also reacted to what was happening in the countryside.
→ So the anger of the peasants quickly spread among the sepoys.

Responses to reforms

• The British passed laws to stop the practice of sati and to encourage the remarriage of widows.

• English-language education was promoted.

• The Company allowed Christian missionaries to function freely and even own land and property.

• In 1850, a new law was passed to make conversion to Christianity easier and allowed an Indian who had converted to Christianity to inherit the property of his ancestors.

Through the Eyes of the People

A Mutiny Becomes a Popular Rebellion

• A massive rebellion that started in May 1857 and threatened the Company’s presence in India.
→ Sepoys mutinied in several places beginning from Meerut
→ A large number of people from different sections of society rose up in rebellion.

From Meerut to Delhi

• On 29 March 1857, a young soldier, Mangal Pandey, was hanged to death for attacking his officers in Barrackpore.

• Some days later, some sepoys of the regiment at Meerut refused to do the army drill using the new cartridges, which were suspected of being coated with the fat of cows and pigs.

• On 9 May 1857, Eighty-five sepoys were dismissed from service and sentenced to ten years in jail for disobeying their officers.

• On 10 May, the soldiers marched to the jail in Meerut and released the imprisoned sepoys.
→ They attacked and killed British officers, captured guns and ammunition and set fire to the buildings and properties of the British and declared war on the foreigners.

• On the morning of 11 May, sepoys of Meerut reached Delhi and the regiments stationed in Delhi also rose up in rebellion.

• The soldiers forced their way into the Red Fort and proclaimed Bahadur Shah Zafar as their leader.

• The ageing emperor accepted the demand and wrote letters to all the chiefs and rulers of the country to come forward and organise a confederacy of Indian states to fight the British.

The rebellion spreads

• After a week, regiment after regiment mutinied and took off to join other troops at nodal points like Delhi, Kanpur and Lucknow.

• After them, the people of the towns and villages also rose up in rebellion and rallied around local leaders, zamindars and chiefs.

• Many famous leaders lead troops at different places:
→ Nana Saheb in Kanpur
→ Birjis Qadr in Lucknow
→ Rani Lakshmibai Jhansi
→ Kunwar Singh in Bihar
→ Bakht Khan in Bareilly

• The British were greatly outnumbered by the rebel forces and were defeated in a number of battles.

The Company Fights Back

• The company brought reinforcements from England, passed new laws so that the rebels could be convicted with ease, and then moved into the storm centres of the revolt.

• In September 1857, Delhi was recaptured from the rebel forces.

• Bahadur Shah Zafar was tried in court and sentenced to life imprisonment alongwith his wife Begum Zinat Mahal in Rangoon in October 1858.
→ Bahadur Shah Zafar died in the Rangoon jail in November 1862.

• Lucknow was taken in March 1858.

• Rani Lakshmibai was defeated and killed in June 1858.

• Tantia Tope was captured, tried and killed in April 1859.

• The British also tried their best to win back the loyalty of the people.
→ They announced rewards for loyal landholders would be allowed to continue to enjoy traditional rights over their lands.

• Hundreds of sepoys, rebels, nawabs and rajas were tried and hanged.

Aftermath

• By the end of 1859, the British had regained control of the country.

Important changes introduced by the British after 1858:

• The British Parliament passed a new Act in 1858 and transferred the powers of the East India Company to the British Crown.
→ A member of the British Cabinet was appointed Secretary of State for India and made responsible for all matters related to the governance of India.

• All ruling chiefs of the country were assured that their territory would never be annexed in future.
→ They were allowed to pass on their kingdoms to their heirs, including adopted sons.
→ The Indian rulers were to hold their kingdoms as subordinates of the British Crown.

• The proportion of Indian soldiers in the army would be reduced and the number of European soldiers would be increased.

• The land and property of Muslims was confiscated on a large scale and they were treated with suspicion and hostility.

• The British decided to respect the customary religious and social practices of the people in India.

• Policies were made to protect landlords and zamindars and give them security of rights over their lands.

How Did Tribal Groups Live?

• By the nineteenth century, tribal people in different parts of India were involved in a variety of activities.

Some were jhum cultivators

•  Jhum cultivation is another name of shifting cultivation.

• The cultivators cut the treetops to allow sunlight to reach the ground, and burnt the vegetation on the land to clear it for cultivation.

• They spread the ash from the firing, which contained potash, to fertilise the soil.

• They broadcast the seeds, that is, scattered the seeds on the field instead of ploughing the land
and sowing the seeds.

• After harvesting crop on one field, they moved to another.
→ Cultivated one was left fallow for several years.

• These cultivators were found in the hilly and forested tracts of north-east and central India.

Some were hunters and gatherers

• In many regions tribal groups lived by hunting animals and gathering forest produce.

• The Khonds were such a community living in the forests of Orissa.
→ They ate fruits and roots collected from the forest and cooked food with the oil they extracted from the seeds of the sal and mahua.
→ They used many forest shrubs and herbs for medicinal purposes, and sold forest produce in the local markets.

• Tribal groups often needed to buy and sell in order to be able to get the goods that were not produced within the locality.

• This was done through traders and moneylenders.

• Traders came around with things for sale, and sold the goods at high prices.
→ Moneylenders gave loans to met their cash needs but the interest charged on the loans was usually very high.

• So for the tribals, market and commerce often meant debt and poverty.
→ Therefore came to see the moneylender and traders as evil outsiders and the cause of their misery.

Some herded animals

• Many tribal groups lived by herding and rearing animals.

• The Van Gujjars of the Punjab hills and the Labadis of Andhra Pradesh were cattle herders, the Gaddis of Kulu were shepherds, and the Bakarwals of Kashmir reared goats.

Some took to settled cultivation

• Before the nineteenth century, many from within the tribal groups had begun settling down, and cultivating their fields in one place year after year, instead of moving from place to place.

• They began to use the plough, and gradually got rights over the land they lived on.

• In the Mundas of Chottanagpur, the land belonged to the clan as a whole.

• All of them had rights on the land.
→ But some people within the clan acquired more power than others, some became chiefs and others followers.

• British officials saw settled tribal groups like the Gonds and Santhals as more civilised than hunter-gatherers or shifting cultivators.

How Did Colonial Rule Affect Tribal Lives?

What happened to tribal chiefs?

• Before the arrival of the British, in many areas the tribal chiefs enjoyed a certain amount of economic power and had the right to administer and control their territories.

• Under British rule, the functions and powers of the tribal chiefs changed largely.
→ They were allowed to keep their land titles and rent out lands, but they lost much of their administrative power and were forced to follow laws made by British officials in India.
→ They also had to discipline the tribal groups on behalf of the British.

What happened to the shifting cultivators?

• The British wanted tribal groups to settle down and become peasant cultivators.

• The British also wanted a regular revenue source for the state.

• The British introduced land settlements – that is, they measured the land, defined the rights of each individual to that land, and fixed the revenue demand for the state.

• Some peasants were declared landowners, others tenants.

• The British effort to settle jhum cultivators was not very successful.

• Settled plough cultivation is not easy in areas where water is scarce and the soil is dry.

• Facing widespread protests, the British had to ultimately allow them the right to carry on shifting cultivation in some parts of the forest.

Forest laws and their impact

• Forest laws classified some forests as Reserved Forests for they produced timber which the British wanted.
→ In these forests people were not allowed to move freely, practise  jhum cultivation, collect fruits,
or hunt animals.

• Many shifting cultivators, therefore, forced to move to other areas in search of work and livelihood.
→ This poses problem of laborers for the Britishers to cut trees for railway sleepers and to transport logs.

• Thus, the Britishers decided that they would give jhum cultivators small patches of land in the forests and allow them to cultivate these on the condition that those who lived in the villages would have to provide labour to the Forest Department and look after the forests.

• Many tribal groups rose in open rebellion.
→ Such was the revolt of Songram Sangma in 1906 in Assam, and the forest satyagraha of the 1930s in the Central Provinces.

The problem with trade

• During the nineteenth century, traders and money-lenders started coming to more often in forests wanting to buy forest produce, offering cash loans, and asking tribal groups to work for wages.

• Hazaribagh was an area where the Santhals reared cocoons.
→ The traders dealing in silk sent in their agents who gave loans to the tribal people and collected the cocoons.
→ These cocoons were then exported to Gaya, where they were sold at five times the price.
→ The middlemen who arranged deals between the exporters and silk growers made huge profits.
→ The silk growers earned very little.

The search for work

• The condition of tribals who had to go far away from their homes in search of work was even worse.

• From the late nineteenth century, tea plantations started coming up and mining became an important industry.
→ Tribals were recruited in large numbers to work the tea plantations of Assam and the coal mines of Jharkhand and were paid miserably low wages, and prevented them from returning home.

A Closer Look

• Through the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, tribal groups in different parts of the country rebelled against the changes in laws, the restrictions on their practices, the new taxes they had to pay, and the exploitation by traders and moneylenders.

• The Kols rebelled in 1831-32

• Santhals rose in revolt in 1855

• The Bastar Rebellion in central India broke out in 1910

• The Warli Revolt in Maharashtra in 1940

• The movement of Birsa.

Birsa Munda

• Birsa was born in the mid-1870s

• He was the son of a poor father, grew up around the forests of Bohonda, grazing sheep, playing the flute, and dancing in the local akhara.

• Birsa movement was aimed at reforming tribal society.

• He urged the Mundas to give up drinking liquor, clean their village, and stop believing in witchcraft and sorcery.

• In 1895, Birsa urged his followers to recover their glorious past when Mundas lived a good life, constructed embankments, tapped natural springs, planted trees and orchards, practised cultivation to earn their living.

• The political aim of the Birsa movement was to drive out missionaries, moneylenders, Hindu landlords, and the government and set up a Munda Raj with Birsa at its head.

• As the movement spread the British officials decided to act.
→ They arrested Birsa in 1895, convicted him on charges of rioting and jailed him for two years.

• When Birsa was released in 1897 he began touring the villages to gather support.

• His followers attacked police stations and churches, and raided the property of moneylenders and
zamindars.

• They raised the white flag as a symbol of Birsa Raj.

• In 1900 Birsa died of cholera and the movement faded out.

• The significance of Birsa movement:
→ It forced the colonial government to introduce laws so that the land of the tribals could not be easily taken over by dikus (outsider like moneylenders, traders).
→ It showed once again that the tribal people had the capacity to protest against injustice and express their anger against colonial rule.