The Spirit of Resistance : the Santal Hool
Maroona Murmu
The history of the Santals is as much as their
own making as it is of the non-Santals. The
historiography on the Santals owes its origin to
the colonial administrators, ethnographers,
anthropologists and missionaries like John Shore,
Francis Buchanon,
Montgomary Martin,
H.C. Sutherland,
Captain W.S. Sherwill,
E.G. Man, W.G. Archer,
P.O. Bodding, C.H.
Bompas, Rev L.O.
Skrefsrud, L.S.S. O
Malley, H.H. Risley,
W.W. Hunter, Col.
Dalton. Indian
historians/sociologists
in both colonial and
post-independence era
like K.K. Datta, D.
Chakravarty, Ranajit
Guha, J.C. Jha, B.B. Choudhury, C.B. Palit, S.B.
Sen, K.S. Singh have made valuable contribution
to the understanding of various aspects of the
lives of the Santals. Santal scholars like Stephen
Murmu, Dhirendranath Baske, Buddeshwar
Tudu too have asserted the cultural self-image
of the community through writing about the
Hool.
In order to understand the Santal Hool one
has to review changes in the socio-economic
status of Santals after their settlement in the
Damin-i-koh region. The hill tracts of Rajmahal
and Damin-i-koh were virtually reserved for the
Mal Paharias, mentioned as Malli in the notes
of Megasthenese, Greek Ambassador of Selukus
Nikater, in 302 B.C. The Mal Paharias were slash-
and-burn horticulturalists whose primary interest
was in exploiting the forest which they perceived
as their privileged sanctuary. After the Grant of
Diwani to the East India Company in 1765, the
Collector of Bhagalpur, Augustus Cleaveland
65 Purbasha Ekhon
(1779) wanted to settle the Damin-i-koh for
revenue generation. British officials found it
almost impossible to induce the Mal Paharias to
settle in the plains and reclaim the forests.
At around 1800 the Damin area saw migrant
Santals from Jungle-
Mahals, known for
their habit of
reclamation of jungle
for cultivation,
settling in this area.
In 1823, John Petty
Ward was deputed to
demarcate certain
area as Damin land
which would be the
property of the
British government.
At the end of the
survey in 1833, 1367
square miles of land
from Murshidabad, Birbhum and Bhagalpur was
declared to be its geographical territory. Lord
William Bentinck invited the Santals promising
initial three years of rent-free habitation on land
reclaimed by them and nominal rent in the next
three years. Santals from Bankura, Birbhum,
Purulia, Cuttack, Dhalbhum, Chhotanagpur
migrated to this land of the Mal Paharias. The
oral traditions of Santals reflect a continuing
pride in their achievements as they had earned
the right to habitation on the land not by victory
over the Mal Paharias alone but by their advanced
technique of land-clearing.
The Santals dreamt of a Santal Raj with their
traditional political and administrative
organization in the land they reclaimed. The
village council of Santals usually consisted of
seven officials: The Manjhi (a headman), Paranik
(a deputy headman), Jog Manjhi (an overseer of
village morals), his assistant Jog Paranik, Godet
(a messenger), Naeke (a village priest) and his
assistant Kudam Naeke. These officials
performed their functions in accordance with
Santal traditions, customs, religious beliefs and
practices. The introduction of forces of
modernization and commercialization by the
Company with its inherent asymmetrical
arrangement of power relations disturbed this
egalitarian, democratic system of social control.
The nexus between the indigenous pillars of
feudalismBengali, Oriya and Bihari traders and
money lenders (mahajans), zamindars, as well as
agents of the British administration
Superintendent, officials of the police and
judiciary department produced a history of
exploitation of the free-spirited Santals. In fact,
the Santals were ill-adjusted amidst a society
unsympathetic to their communal living and
structure of rights and obligation. They were
unprepared for incorporation into the colonial
political and economic order in the Damin.
In 1837 revenue administration of the Damin
was placed in charge of the Superintendent Mr.
James Pontet. In 1838 about 3,000 Santals resided
in less than 50 villages paying a rent amounting
to 2000 rupees. The amount of collectable taxes
on 82,795 Santals settled in more than 1473
villages increased to rupees 43,919 in 1851.
Although the rent in 1854-55 went up to 58,033
rupees, Pontet reported that there was perfect
contentment for the increase was more due to the
quality of land under cultivation. Criminal
matters were placed under the Magistrate of
Bhagalpur and police stations were formed in
Bhagalpur, Berhampur and Birbhum. Since there
was one local Magistrate at Deoghar, most people
had to go to Bhagalpur, Birbhum or Aurangabad
for seeking justice.
The Santals relatively independent economic
and social life was disrupted by
dishonestappropriation of the marketing
processes introduced by the Dikus (outsiders).
The Santals brought rice, mustard and other oil-
seeds and clarified butter to the market in
exchange for which they got money, cloth,
tobacco and salt. The traders used false weights
to measure the Santals supply and paid them less
than market value. The retail merchants provided
credit to Santals at usurious rates of interest to
encourage overspending on various goods. Loan
66 Purbasha Ekhon
was given against mortgage of land. As soon as
the debtor began to default on payments, the law
permitted the moneylender not only to take
possession of the mortgaged acreage but also the
person of the Santal who hereditarily became a
kamiya or bonded servant on the acres he had
brought into production. The rigidly bureaucratic
judiciary, to which the Santal was compelled to
resort to in the face of economic exploitation and
treachery, was alien to them. Accustomed to
personal procedures of their village council
where adjustments and adaptations were made
with considerable freedom, illiterate Santals
failed to avail the safeguard provided by British
courts with written laws.
The grievances of the Santals recorded by the
British administrators after the suppression of
the Hool were numerous: prevalence of
falsehood; corruption of government clerks; the
oppression and cruelty of the police; the
negligence of the Sahibs; the extortionate
moneylenders who gave loans at usurious rates
of interests and engaged in cattle lifting on non-
payment of debt; misery caused by the unfair
system of allowing personal and hereditary
bondage of debt; the impossibility of obtaining
redress from the courts; the rapacity of tax
collectors and zamindars collecting land-taxes;
oppression of indigo planters who forced Santals
to cultivate indigo on the basis of contract-
farming; abduction and rape of two Santal
women by Europeans employed in railway
construction and general use of them as comfort
womenby the money lenders, zamindars and
agents of the Britishdarogas and payadas of
the police station.
E. G. Man wrote:
When for oppression such as this no
remedy was to be found... when many a
dreary mile had been trudged, and their
last pice spent to enable them to seek a
remedy at the foot of the Hakim, and
when their claims were either ignored
or dismissed, it is not to be wondered at
that they should seek a remedy for their
misery in arms. When the Sal branch,
their signal for war...was passed
willingly hands from village to village,
the whole of this peaceful, industrious
 race rose as one man, to contend not
only for their rights...but for bare
existence, as they had no faith in a
Government (and) they had every
reason to consider tyrannical, unjust,
extortionate. Thus the torch was lighted
which flamed over all the Sonthalian
country... The causes that gave rise to
this rebellion, with the prior inactivity
to give the Sonthals redress, and the
stringent measures afterwards taken,
form a dark blot on the pages of British
History in India.
Varied Narratives on the Heroic Hool
The Santal scholars trace back their tradition
of resistance against colonial sovereignty as early
as in 1770 under the leadership of Tilka Murmu
who fatally wounded Augustus Cleveland, the
Collector of Bhagalpur, in 1784. He was hanged
in 1885 for the offence. According to historian
K.K. Datta, the long oppressed Santals resorted
to violence to achieve freedom from the
zamindars and moneylenders and establish
themselves as free people, to take possession of
the country and set up a government of their own.
For the purpose of political mobilization, God
was invoked. Sidhu and Kanhu declared that they
witnessed apparitions of their Thakur who gave
orders that the Santals should defy their
oppressors exploitative control over them and
establish an independent Santal Raj. Under divine
inspiration, they called themselves subah-
thakurs or tax-collecting sovereigns. Kanhu
Murmus parwana to Santal brethren stated :
The reign of truth has begun...He who
does not speak the truth will not be
allowed to remain on earth. The
mahajuns have committed great sin.
Sahibs and amlahs have made
everything bad. In this the Sahibs have
sinned greatly...On this account, the
Thacoor has ordered me saying that the
country is not the Sahibs....On this
account, the Thacoor has ordered me saying
that the country is not the Sahibs. (emphasis
mine)
On 30 June 1855, about 10,000 Santals from
Damin-i-koh, Birbhum, Bankura, Chhotanagpur,
67
Hazaribagh met at Bhaganadihi.
SidhuandKanhuruledthateverySantalwasto
share land equally for which fair revenue was
never imposed; that that no creditor was to be
repaid and for any debts thereon only one pice
per rupee should be given in interest; that the
houses of mahajans should be burnt and they
were to be expelled from the country; zamindars
were to be deprived of all authority and land
except that on which their houses stood; that a
tax of five rupees should be imposed on every
Bengali living in Santal land; that certain low
caste Hindu and Muslims were to be spared. The
traditional ManjhisKirta, Bhadoo and Sunno
wrote formal letters of complaint to the
Commissioner, Collector and Magistrate of
Bhagalpur and Birbhum, to Darogahs of Dighee
and Tikree police stations and to several
zamindars. These documents represent last
reconciliatory effort common to the Santals in
their own judicial processes. These letters
commanded the daogahs and zamindars to
appear before the Santals within 15 days for
judgement.
The inherent spirit of camaraderie within the
Santal society is reflected in their decision to
proceed from Bhagnadihi in the first ever public
march to Calcutta to meet government officials
and get redressal for their exploitation by
moneylenders, merchants, zamindars, European
officials and planters. The rebellion began on 7
July with the killing of 5 notorious Bengali
moneylenders and the Daroga of Thana
Dighee,Maheshlal Datta. The cry for freedom
struggle of Santals had spread to other quarters
with great rapidityin neighbouring Bankura,
Murshidabad, Birbhum, Hazaribagh, Bhagalpur
and Rajmahal. On 15 July, the troops of the
7thNative Infantry had an engagement with
theSantalsatMaheshpurinwhichthelatterwere
defeated.Sidhu,Kanhu,Bhairabwerewounded
though not mortally. Near Maharajpur Tribhuban
Santals men killed two European women and
two children. This shameful act was furiously
resented by the Sidhu and Kanhu and
consequentlyTribhubanwaspunishedbythem.
This shows that they followed a strict code of
conduct even in their acts of war against British.
E.G. Man wrote :
Purbasha Ekhon
 There was a rude kind of chivalry shown
by the tribes in this war which deserves
to be recorded. Although, as a race, they
are wonderfully imbued with a
knowledge of all the kinds of vegetable
poisons with which their jungles
abound, and although for hunting and
shooting they dip their arrow-heads into
a compound so poisonous that a full-
grown tiger, even if scratched with the
prepare barb, surely dies in half an hour;
yet, despite all this, they disdained or
neglected to take such an advantage
when at war with our troops.
Frederick James Halliday, the Lieutenant
Governor of Bengal, proclaimed Martial Law at
Birbhum, Murshidabad and Bhagalpur on 10
November 1855 offering high rewards for
capturing insurgent chiefs. On 3 January 1856 the
Law was suspended. Even Santal women joined
the rebellion. In the encounters in January at
Bhagalpur not only were Chand and Bhairav
killed, but also a woman leader dressed in male
attire. By the 3rd week of February 1856, Sidhu
and Kanhu were captured and executed. A large
number of Santals, including women, were tried
and sentenced to various terms of imprisonment.
The Hool was suppressed at the cost of some
20,000 Santal lives. Towards the beginning of
March 1856 all the panic subsided among the
British authorities.
Although the Rebellion was crushed with a
heavy hand, Major Vincent Jervis was forced to
recognize its general character, i.e., solidarity and
valour of the recalcitrant Santals :
It was not war; they did not understand
yielding. As long as their national drum
beat, the whole party would stand, and
allow themselves to be shot down. Their
arrows often killed our men, and so we
had to fire on them as long as they stood.
When their drum ceased, they would
move off a quarter of a mile; then their
drums beat again, and they calmly stood
till we came up and poured a few volleys
into them. There was not a sepoy in the
war who did not feel ashamed of
himself. (emphasis mine)
According to Prathama Banerjee, the
68
textualization of the Santal Hool became
problematic for the judicial files of the colonial
offices gave no lead to a clear beginning or an
effective end of the rebellion that could be
chronologically serialized. Colonial narratives
made the Hool a centralized, synchronic
occurrence, with four sons of Chunar Murmu
Sidhu, Kanu, Chand and Bhairav mobilizing
every Santal everywhere by sending of sal gira
(sal branch). Yet, the authorities themselves had
to admit that there were varied versions of the
beginning of the Hool, and there were unrelated,
though coincident, risings.
The Santals incapability to give causal
explanation for their defiant acts amazed John
Petty Ward. Nothing seemed to serve as either
the immediate or the sufficient cause for the
revolutionary Hool. The officials complained that
everything the Santals said seemed to be
retrospective rationalizations for mutinous
action. The Santals themselves attributed their
Hool to inescapable time which could not neither
be mastered nor foretold. To the juridical question
why rebel? the Santals reply was exceptional:
the time to revolt had arrived. Basun Manjhis
proclamation reveals that the Santals shared the
popular notion about Kaliyugathe most evil
of the ages in the four-age time cycle (Satya, Treta,
Dwapar and Kali) when women and sudras
engaged in inversion. When the colonial official
asked Sidhu to decide on the grounds of
rebellion, gods order or negligence on the part
of the Damin Superintendent, Pontet, Sidhu
shouted: the thacoor will also come to the
Bengallis...The time will come. I cannot say
when... They believed that time being the
supreme motivating force would dispense justice
for all as everybody was equal before it. The
present time was seen as a break with the past
where previous limitations of judgement,
instruments of domination and structures of
hierarchy would cease to operate. Thus,
explaining the rebellion in cause-event-
consequence succession is to deprive the Santal
of his ingenious scheme and imagination. The
exceptional urgency of the time was such that
without calculations of probability and success,
the Santals dared to organize an insurrection in
anticipation of times that would be just.
Purbasha Ekhon
 To the colonial officials this undaunted mood
of rebellion seemed to arise from an irrational
primitive belief that the Damin land was once
belonged to the Santals. It was as if the body-
centric, primitives had habitually resorted to
primitive acts like brutality and insurgence.
Even at the height of the rebellion, colonial
authorities decided to keep the army subordinate
to civil administration as the belief prevailed that
the unthinking primitives could not actually
partake in a self-conscious historical act of
confrontation with the mighty British. It was
argued that the Santals were merely provoked
into uncharacteristic action by Hindu lower
castes like Gowalas, Telis, Kumars, Lohars,
outcasts like Haris, Bauris, Chamars, Domes and
disgruntled Muslim Julahs. In colonial
perception, Santals were supposed to be captives
of presentism with no vision for future.
The aftermath of the rebellion brought a
significant change in the relationship between the
Santals and the economic and political systems
of British India. J. M. MacPhail declared, a lesson
in government...had been taught not by the
Government to the subject people, but by a
subject people to its Government, the lesson
being that Government cannot ignore the welfare
of its people or remain blind to profound social
and cultural dislocations. The Act 37 of 1855
formed the district of Santal Parganas with an
area of 5500 square miles consisting of Damin-i-
koh and parts of Bhagalpur and Birbhum. It was
a non-regulation district under the control of
George Yule, the Commissioner of Bhagalpur. It
was divided into five jurisdictions to be
administered by Sir Ashley Eden, the Deputy
Commissioner (Dumka), along with 4 Assistant
Commissioners and Sub-Assistant
Commissioners dealing with civil and criminal
cases.
Stamps on civil and rent cases were abolished
and police control in the region was relaxed. The
requirement of intermediary between the
Assistant Commissioner and the complainant
was eliminated as verbal complaints were enough
to register court cases. The Santals were entrusted
to bring the criminals and witnesses to the courts
established in Dumka, Rajmahal and Godda.
Mahajans were not allowed in the area. Rates of
69 Purbasha Ekhon
interest on debt were reduced and the revenue
demand was also fixed moderately. The Manjhi
became the primary office of administration in
the district combining the work of the magistrate,
police officer and revenue collector in one. This
was formalization and legal recognition of the
traditional responsibilities of the Majhi-Parganait
implicit in the Santal society. To protect the
economic basis of the Santal society it was
declared illegal for a Santal to transfer ownership
of land to a non-Santal. Most of the land was
returned to the original Santal settlers or their
heirs. Through the rebellion the Santals managed
to preserve their right to live by their own
traditions and under their own Subahs in a region
they called their own.
Conclusion
Supporting Prathama Banerjees claim, one
must admit that the state of unrest and the spirit
of rebellion against injustices continued among
the Santals beyond its apparent suppression in
1856. Santali folksongs, ballads, verses, folktales
while embodying an incomplete past in the Hool
also talk of a pregnant present and also a future
with immense possibilities that it raised hope for.
To the Santals, Hool was not a singular critical
episode of protest or a once-and-for-all-
occurrence for it defied categorical encapsulation
within the idea of the momentous event. The
primitive Hool which subverted historical
modernity seemed to transform everyday life of
the Santals permanently. The official at Deoghar
wrote that Santals continued to assemble in large
numbers with bows and arrows even when there
was no hunt on schedule as late as in 1858. They
were not content in carrying arrows alone as the
sign of their tribalism and insisted on bows as
well, despite official persuasion. Armed existence
became an everyday life condition as protest was
incorporated in Santal consciousness as an
altered state of being. During the Revolt of 1857
the Santals rose in Chhotanagpur, Orissa and
South-West Bengal. They resented increased rent
in 1859 in Gopikander and in 1861 in Hendwa. In
1865 they circulated messages at Hazaribagh
demanding two rupees from each village and in
1871-72 they rebelled against the census
operations. Santals organized the Kherwar
movement between 1874 and 1881 for
establishment of the Santal Raj, non-payment of
taxes and socio-religious reform; in 1917 they
rebelled in Mayurbhanj against British attempts
to recruit labour-corps.
While the resolve and tenacity Santals in the
Hool inspired numerous other peasant struggles
and mass movements against feudal assertion
and imperialist exploitation, uncompromising
rebelliousness against unjust incidents remains
a gripping and unrelenting reality for the tribals
even after 68 years of Indias independence. In
recent past, the tribals of Odisha have
successfully resisted displacement by two
multinational corporations. MoU for steel plant
construction and iron ore mining was signed
between the government of Odisha and Posco-
India in 2005. Out of the eight villages where it
was supposed to be sited, Dhinkia, remained
steadfastly opposed to the project under the
tribal-led POSCO Pratirodh Sangram Samiti. On
14 June 2011 Odisha government paused land
acquisition in Dhinkia. In another instance, when
the mining giant Vedanta Resources engaged in
extraction of estimated $2billion-worth of bauxite
that lies under the surface of the Niyamgiri hills,
12 village councils of the Dongria Kondhs put
up a heroic resistance. The Dongria Kondhs have
traditionally farmed the hills fertile slopes and
worshipped the mountain god Niyam Raja and
the hills he presides over, including the Mountain
of the Law. They sustain themselves by using
70 Purbasha Ekhon
their expert knowledge of forests and diverse
wildlife habitat and biodiversity that the hills
uphold. The hills also give rise to more than a
hundred perennial streams and rivers, including
the Vamshadhar river. To the Supreme Court
verdict of 2013 that the tribe must decide whether
to allow mining on the Mountain of the Law, they
answered unambiguously in the negative. These
successes have been internationally acclaimed
and continue to motivate tribal resistances
around the world.
References
1. Dhirendranath Baskey, Saontal
Ganasangramer Itihas, Calcutta, 1980
(Bengali)
2. E.G. Man, Sonthalia and the Sonthals,
Calcutta, 1867
3. J. M. MacPhail, The Story of the Santal: With
an Account of the Santal Rebellion, Calcutta
and Simla, 1922
4. K.K. Datta, The Santal Insurrection of 1855-
57, Calcutta, 1940
5. L.S.S. OMalley, Bengal District Gazetteers,
Santal Parganas, Calcutta, 1910
6. Prathama Banerjee, Historic Acts? Santal
Rebellion and the Temporality of
Practice,StudiesinHistory,August1999,vol.
15: pp. 209 - 246.
7. Suchibrata Sen, The Santals: Crisis of Identity
and Integration, Calcutta, 1997
8. Suprakash Roy, Bharater Krishak-Bidroho O
Ganatantrik Sangram, Calc utta, 1966
(Bengali)