Topic: Political-Religious Movements in the Early Phase of Colonial Expansion

Question : Briefly discuss the major political-religious movements in the early phase of colonial expansion?

Answer:

These movements erupted in the early phase of colonial expansion. In this phase religion provided the framework to locate and understand the colonial rule and articulate resistance. The main politico-religious movements were the Faqir Uprising, Sanyasi Rebellion, Pagal Panthis, Tariqah-i-Muhammadiya, Wahabi Movement, Faraizi Movement and Kuka Revolt.

(A) Faqir Uprising (Bengal, 1776-77): Faqirs were a group of wandering-Muslim religious mendicants. Shortly after the annexation of Bengal in 1776-77, Majnum Shah, the leader of these Faqirs, began to levy contributions on the zamindars and peasants and, defied the British authority. After Majnum Shah’s death, Chirag Ali Shah, supported by Pathans, Rajputs and the disbanded Indian soldiers extended the operations to the northern districts of Bengal. Two famous Hindu leaders who supported him were Bhawani Pathak and Devi Chaudhurani, a woman. The Faqirs led by-Chirag Ali Shah gained considerable strength and attacked English factories, seized their goods, cash, arms and ammunitions. There were a number of skirmishes between the Faqirs and Company’s troops. The Faqirs were finally brought under control at the beginning of the nineteenth certury.

Sanyasi Uprising (Bengal, 1770-l820s): The Hindu Naga and Giri armed Sanyasis once formed a part of the armies of the Nawabs of Awadh and Bengal, and also of the Maratha and Rajput chiefs. The immediate cause of the rebellion was the restrictions, imposed on the pilgrims visiting the holy places. The Sanyasis raided the English factories and collected contributions from the towns, leading to a series of conflicts between the large bands of Sanyasis and the British forces. After nearly half-a-century long strife, the Sanyasi Uprising ended in the second quarter of the nineteenth century.
The Sanyasi-Faqir resistance had some commons features. Both groups of mendicants lived on alms provided by their followers. The Company officials, who little understood the religious institutions of the country, took their alms collection drive for unauthorised impositions on the inhabitants of the village. The Government thus issued decrees banning collection of alms by the organised groups like the Fakirs and Sanyasis. These groups also enjoyed rent free tenures. Both the groups lost this privilege under the British In response, they started a resistance movement against the feringhee rulers. The resistance gained a ready support from the peasantry who were hard pressed under the new land revenue policy of the Company’s Government. The conditions of the peasantry were worsened by the Great Famine of 1769-70, a by-product of the systemic loot of the countryside by the rapacious landlords and their agents. Furthermore, a settled society being considered as an ideal type by the Company meant that the wandering groups, like that of the Faqirs and Sanyasis, were often looked upon with suspicion and efforts law and order.

The Sanyasis presented a formidable force, defeating the British forces several time, especially in 1773, and the struggle continued till the end of 1800. The cause of Faqir-Sanyasis was formed the background for the work Anandmath, by the famous Bengali novelist, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee. Vande Matram’, which was to become the national song during the Swadeshi Movement, was penned in the same novel.

(B) The Moplah Rebellions (Malabar 1835- 1921): The Moplah rebellions of Malabar, South India, were not only directed against the British but also the Hindu landlords. The relations of the Arab traders with the Malayali society can be traced back to the ninth century. The traders helped the local Hindu chieftains and were granted concessions. Many of the Arab traders settled in Malabar marrying mostly Nayar and Tiyar women; and the subsequent descendants came to be known as Moplahs. Their numbers also increased with the conversion of Hindus from the lower castes, especially the Cherumars who were slave labourers and hoped to gain better social status upon conversion. Through the years the Moplahs settled, became agriculturalists and joined the ranks of landless labourers, cultivating tenants, fishermen and petty traders.

In the traditional Malabar land system, the jenmi held land by birthright and were mostly high-caste Hindus, and let it out to others for cultivation. The other main sections of the Malabar society were the kanamdar who were mostly Moplahs, the verumpattamdar (cultivators) and agncultural labourers. The peasants were mostly the Muslim Moplahs. The land was given by the ruling raja to Namboodiri Brahmins whose obligation was to look after the temple and related institutions, and to the chieftains (mostly Nayars), who provided martial aid when needed. Traditionally, the net produce of the land was shared equally between the three. But during the reigns of Haider Ali and Tipu Sultan, Namboodiri Brahmins and Nayar chiefs fled and the subsequent vacuum was filled by the Moplahs.

The conflict arose when after Malabar’s cession to the British in 1792 and the return of the exiled Namboodiri Brahmins and Nayars, the government reestablished and acknowledged their landlord rights. The British by recognizing the jenmis as the absolute owners of the land gave them the right to evict the tenants at will. This reduced the other two to the status of tenants and leaseholders. The courts and the1aw officers sided with the jenmis. Once the jenmi landlords, who had the backing of the revenue officials, the law courts and the police started tightening their hold and demands on the subordinate classes, the Moplah peasantry rose up in revolt. According to Dhanagare the first outbreak occurred in 1836 and during the period of 1836-54 there were 22 uprisings, with the ones in 1841 and 1849 being quite serious. The first phase of the uprisings from 1836 to 1854 witnessed 22 revolts and had messianic overtones. The faithful sacrificed their lives in the belief that as Ahadis they would go straight to heaven. The second phase of the revolts was recorded in 1882- 85, and another spate of outbursts in 1896.

The pattern of the rebellion was uniform with usually a group of Moplah youths attacking a Brahmin jenmi or a Nayar official or a jenmi’s servant, burning or defiling a temple or attacking the landlords’ house. The police would then crack down on them and the rebels would then seek refuge in either a mosque or the temple. During the Khilafat movement due to the efforts of the Khilafat and Congress leaders, the tenancy movement in Malabar merged with it, though it is doubtful to evaluate the degree to which the locals understood the cause of the pan-Islamic call. Nonetheless, due to their participation in the Khilafat movement, the Moplah peasantry learned how to give a coherent expression to their grievances. However, when the Moplahs became more militant after the Majlis-ul-Ulema (council of Muslim learned men), an all-India militant Muslim organization caIled upon the Moplah masses to launch a jihad, the cause of swaraj and Non-Cooperation waned between March and August 1921. There was significant increase in the number of forced conversions. The support of the well-off Moplahs was more superficial than real throughout the period. It was only in August 1921, following an incident in Pookhottu village, that a major rebellion broke out with the Government deploying the army to take control of the civil administration. By the end of December 1921, the Moplah rebellion was completely suppressed.

To quote Dhanagare, “the 1921 uprising was in essence an expression of long-standing agrarian discontent, which was only intensified by the religious and ethnic identity and by their political alienation”. It was essentially ‘pre-political’ in nature.

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