Tribals, Dikus and the vision of a golden Age

Points to be covered•Birsa Munda•Some were hunters and gatherers•Some herded animals•A time to hunt, a time to sow, a time to move to a new field

Birsa Munda• In 1895 people in chottanagpur region of Bihar began following a man named Birsa Munda who they believed had the power to free them from troubles and slavery of dikus that is the outsiders• He belongs to the family of Mundas a tribal group of that region. The tribals were facing threat from the British rule.• How did the tribal groups live?

Tribal people in different parts of India were involved in a variety of activities

• Some were in jhum cultivation that is shifting was mostly practiced in east and central India.

Some were hunters and gatherers• The tribal's saw forests as essential for their survival. The khonds of Orissa totally depended on the forest. They hunted animals, collected fruits roots, honey extracted oil from sal and mahua tree and sold kusum and palash flowers for colouring cloths • Some times they practiced barter system and sometimes they bought rice by payment • When forests shrank they were forced to become labourers • They where forced to depend on money lenders and traders for their needs

Location of Some Tribal Groups in India

Some herded animals

•Many tribal's lived by herding animals E.g. the Gujjars, the Gaddis, the Bakarwals and the Labadis of Andhra Pradesh•Some took to settled cultivation and gradually got rights over the land they lived on •At times the land belonged to a clan. The powerful people in the clan rented their land to the poor people of their clan for cultivation•The British government saw settled tribal's as civilized and herders as evil and savage

Thank You!