The Kol people referred to a group of tribal communities of Chotanagpur in eastern parts of India. Historically, the Mundas, Oraons, Ho and Bhumijs were called Kols by the British. [1]
It also refers to some tribes and castes of south-east Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra. [2] [3] They are mostly Indigenous people and dependent on forest produce to make a living, and they have their own land. The caste has several exogamous clans, including the Bhil, Chero, Monasi, Rautia, Raut, Gauthiya Rojaboria‚ Rautel and Thakuria. They speaks the Baghelkhandi dialect. [4] Around 1 million lives in Madhya Pradesh while another 5 lakh lives in Uttar Pradesh.
Once spelled "Kole", the swaths of land they inhabited in the 19th-century were called "Kolean". [3]
Kol was generic term for non-Aryan people in Chotanagpur such as Oraon and Munda. The term Kola mentioned in Rigveda. According to legend, Yayati, the son of Nahus divided his kingdom for his five sons. Then after ten generation, India was divided among four brothers; Pandya, Krala, Kola and Chola. According to Markandeya Purana, the Aryan princess Suratha was defeated by some unclean tribe called Kolabidhansinah means slayer of Pig.
Colonel Edward Tuite Dalton has referred to non-Aryan Kolarian and Dravidian tribals of Chotanagpur as Kol such as Munda, Oraon, Ho, Santal, Bhumij, Juang, etc in his writings in 1867. According to him, the word is epithets of abuse applied by the Brahmin races to the aboriginals who opposed their settlements. In Chotanagpur, the term kol generally applied to Munda and Oraon. Although, Oraon and Munda celebrate same festivals, but they don't intermarry among themselves. [5] [6]
Later, Colonel Dalton classified Oraon as Dravidian and Munda, along with other Kols such as Ho, Bhumij as Kolarian after observing their customs and traditions which were distinct. [7]
The Adivasi are heterogeneous tribal groups across the Indian subcontinent. The term is a Sanskrit word coined in the 1930s by political activists to give the tribal people an indigenous identity by claiming an indigenous origin. The Constitution of India does not use the word Adivasi, instead referring to Scheduled Tribes and Janjati. The government of India does not officially recognise tribes as indigenous people. The country ratified the International Labour Organization (ILO) Convention 107 on Indigenous and Tribal Peoples of the United Nations (1957) and refused to sign the ILO Convention 169. Most of these groups are included in the Scheduled Tribe category under constitutional provisions in India.
The Kurukh or Oraon, also spelt Uraon or Dhangad, are a Dravidian speaking ethnolinguistic group inhabiting Chhotanagpur Plateau and adjoining areas - mainly the Indian states of Jharkhand, Odisha, Chhattisgarh, and West Bengal. They predominantly speak Kurukh as their native language, which belongs to the Dravidian language family. In Maharashtra, Oraon people are also known as Dhangad.
The Munda people are an Austroasiatic-speaking ethnic group of the Indian subcontinent. They speak Mundari as their native language, which belongs to the Munda subgroup of Austroasiatic languages. The Munda are found mainly concentrated in the south and East Chhotanagpur Plateau region of Jharkhand, Odisha and West Bengal. The Munda also reside in adjacent areas of Madhya Pradesh as well as in portions of Bangladesh, Nepal, and the state of Tripura. They are one of India's largest scheduled tribes. Munda people in Tripura are also known as Mura. In the Kolhan region of Jharkhand the Munda people are often called Tamadia by other communities.
The tribes of Jharkhand consist of 32 scheduled tribes inhabiting the Jharkhand state in India. In 1872, only 18 tribes were counted among the scheduled tribes from which Banjara, Bhatudi, Chik Baraik, and Mahli were marked as semi-Hindu aboriginal and Kora as proletariat Hindu. In the 1931 census, including the above four semi-Hindu aboriginal and Kora, a proletariat Hindu, the number was raised to 26 from 18. They were Birajia, Godait, Karmali and Paharia, but Kisan was excluded from the list. In the 1941 census, Baga, Bedia and Lohra were included again taking Kisan in the annexure and the number came to 30 which prevailed till June 2003. Kanwar and Kol were added on 8 June 2003 in the annexure and the number of Schedule Tribes came to 32.
There are 43 recognized Scheduled Tribes in Madhya Pradesh, India, three of which have been identified as "Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups" or "PTGs". The population of Scheduled Tribals (ST) is 21.1 per cent of the state population, according to the 2011 census. Bounded by the Narmada River to the north and the Godavari River to the southeast, tribal peoples occupy the slopes of the region's mountains.
The Ho people are an Austroasiatic Munda ethnic group of India. They are mostly concentrated in the Kolhan region of Jharkhand and northern Odisha where they constitute around 10.7% and 7.3% of the total Scheduled Tribe population respectively, as of 2011. With a population of approximately 700,000 in the state in 2001, the Ho are the fourth most numerous Scheduled tribe in Jharkhand after the Santals, Kurukhs, and Mundas. Ho also inhabit adjacent areas in the neighbouring states of Odisha, West Bengal and Bihar bringing the total to 806,921 as of 2001. They also live in Bangladesh and Nepal.
Chik Baraik or Baraik are a tribal community originally from the Chota Nagpur plateau and neighbouring states of Chhattisgarh, and Odisha.
Below is given a chronological record of tribal and peasant revolts in India before independence from British rule in the 1947. The list covers those tribal uprisings that occurred during the period of British rule in India.
Kolarian is a word first used by George Campbell for Munda languages. He described it as one of the three non-Aryan language families of India, which he made up, along with the Tibeto-Burman and the Dravidian. It is a branch of Austro-asiatic languages spoken in the eastern regions of the subcontinent, and is also known as Munda languages. Its not a single tribal language but a group of tribal family languages. The speakers are called Kolarian tribes.
Sarnaism is a religious faith of the Indian subcontinent, predominantly followed by indigenous communities in the Chota Nagpur Plateau region across states like Jharkhand, Odisha, West Bengal, Bihar, and Chhattisgarh.
The Kudmi Mahato are a tribal community in the states of Jharkhand, West Bengal and Odisha of India. They are primarily agriculturalist.
Sadan are the native Indo-Aryan-speaking ethnolinguistic groups of Chota Nagpur Plateau consist of Indian state of Jharkhand and neighbouring states who speak Nagpuri, Khortha and Kurmali language as their native language.
The Kol uprising, Kol rebellion, also known in British records as the Kol mutiny was a revolt of the tribal Kol people of Chhota Nagpur that took place between 1831 and 1832. It was due to economic exploitation brought on by the systems of land tenure and administration that had been introduced by the East India Company. Tribal people of Chotanagpur including Mundas, Oraons, Hos and Bhumijs were called Kols. They initially plundered and killed Sikh and Muslims thikedars (contractors) who collected taxes by different means. Later they also started to plunder and kill Hindus of nearby villages and burn their houses. The insurgency was suppressed by killing of the leaders, their followers and arrest of many leaders by Thomas Wilkinson.
The Bhumij Rebellion or Bhumij Revolt, also known as Ganga Narain's Hungama was a revolt during 1832–1833 by Bhumij tribals based in the Dhalbhum and Jungle Mahal areas of the Midnapore district of the erstwhile Bengal state. It was led by Ganga Narayan Singh.
Ganga Narayan Singh was an Indian revolutionary from Jungle Mahals, known as the leader of Bhumij rebellion. He led a revolt against the East India Company in 1832-33. The British called it "Ganga Narain's Hungama", while some historians have called it the Chuar rebellion.
Edward Tuite Dalton CSI was a British soldier and anthropologist. He was posted in Assam, then became commissioner of Chota Nagpur Division. He was posted in Chotanagpur for two decades. Later he became major general of Bengal Lancer. He commanded both European and native people during the sepoy mutiny of 1857. Dalton, along with justice Campbell, Herbert Hope Risley, John-Baptist Hoffmann and P.O.Bidding initiated ethnographic studies in Chotanagpur. His work Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal formed a part of the Census in British India in 1872.
Buli Mahato was a revolutionary leader of the Bhumij Rebellion and Kol Rebellion. He was a zamindar of the Kudmi community of Karadih village in Sonahatu Thana, Jharkhand.