Tribal Societies: Social Change

• New arts, crafts, and production flourished alongside the rise and fall of kingdoms.
• Over centuries, political, social, and economic developments occurred.
• Social change varied as societies evolved differently.
• Society in the subcontinent was divided by varna rules set by Brahmanas.
• Rulers of large kingdoms accepted these varna rules.
• The difference between high and low classes and rich and poor increased.
• The social hierarchy grew under Delhi Sultans and Mughals.

Tribal Societies

• Some societies did not follow Brahmana social rules/rituals.
• These societies lacked unequal classes and are known as tribes.
• Tribe members were united by kinship bonds.
• Tribes obtained livelihoods from agriculture, hunting, or herding.
• They often combined these activities to use natural resources fully.
• Some tribes were nomadic, moving from place to place.
• Tribal groups jointly controlled land/pastures, dividing them by their own rules.
• Many large tribes thrived in forests, hills, deserts, and remote areas.
• Tribes sometimes clashed with more powerful caste-based societies.
• Tribes retained freedom and preserved separate cultures.
• Caste-based and tribal societies depended on each other which gradually led to change in both societies.

Tribal People

• Contemporary historians and travellers provide limited information about tribes
• Tribal people generally did not keep written records, with few exceptions.
• Oral traditions and rich customs were preserved and passed down generations.
• Present-day historians use oral traditions to write tribal histories.
• Tribal people lived in almost every region of the subcontinent.
• A tribe's area and influence varied by time.
• Powerful tribes controlled large territories.
• The Khokhar tribe was influential in Punjab during the 13th-14th centuries.
• Kamal Khan Gakkhar, chief of the Gakkhars, was made a noble by Emperor Akbar.
• The Langahs and Arghuns dominated Multan and Sind before being subdued by the Mughals.
• The Balochis were another large and powerful tribe in the northwest, divided into smaller clans.
• The shepherd tribe of Gaddis lived in the western Himalaya.
• The Nagas, Ahoms, and others dominated the northeastern subcontinent.
• Chero chiefdoms emerged in present-day Bihar and Jharkhand in the 12th century.
• Akbar's general Raja Man Singh, attacked and defeated the Cheros in 1591.
• Booty was taken from them, but they were not entirely subdued.
• Mughal forces captured many Chero fortresses and subjugated the tribe under Aurangzeb.
• The Mundas and Santals lived in this region, as well as Orissa and Bengal.
• The Maharashtra highlands and Karnataka were home to Kolis, Berads, and others.
• Kolis also inhabited many areas of Gujarat.
• Large tribal populations of Koragas, Vetars, Maravars, and others lived further south.
• The large Bhil tribe spread across western and central India.
• Many Bhils became settled agriculturists and some became zamindars by the late 16th century.
• Many Bhil clans remained hunter-gatherers.
• The Gonds were numerous in present-day Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, and Andhra Pradesh.

Nomads

• Nomadic pastoralists moved long distances with animals.
• They lived on milk and other pastoral products.
• They exchanged wool, ghee, and other goods with settled agriculturists for grain, cloth utensils, etc.
• The Banjaras were the most important trader-nomads.
• Their caravan was called a tanda.
• Sultan Alauddin Khalji used Banjaras to transport grain to city markets.
• Emperor Jahangir wrote that Banjaras carried grain on bullocks from different areas and sold it in towns.
• They transported food grain for the Mughal army during campaigns, employing upto 100,000 bullocks.

The Banjaras

• Peter Mundy described meeting a tanda of Banjaras with 14,000 oxen.
• The oxen were laden with grains like wheat and rice.
• The Banjaras carried their household (wives and children) with them.
• Their way of life was similar to that of carriers who continuously travel.
• They owned their oxen, sometimes hired out by merchants, but were commonly merchants.
• Banjaras bought grain where it was cheap and carried it to places where it was more expensive.
• They reloaded their oxen with anything that could be profitably sold.
• A tanda contained as many as 600–700 persons.
• They did not travel more than 6 or 7 miles a day, and that too in cool weather.
• After unloading oxen, they turned them free to graze where there was enough land and no one forbade them.
• Many pastoral tribes reared and sold animals, such as cattle and horses, to prosperous people.
• Petty peddlers also traveled from village to village.
• They made and sold wares such as ropes, reeds, straw matting, and coarse sacks.
• Mendicants sometimes acted as wandering merchants.
• Castes of entertainers performed in towns and villages for their livelihood.

New Castes

• As the economy and societal needs grew, people with new skills were required.
• Smaller castes, or jatis emerged within varnas.
• New castes appeared among the Brahmanas.
• Many tribes and social groups were taken into caste-based society and given jati status.
• Specialized artisans (smiths, carpenters, and masons) were recognized as separate jatis by the Brahmanas.
• Jatis, rather than varna became the basis for organizing society.

Deliberations on Jati

• A 12th-century inscription describes deliberations in a sabha of Brahmanas.
• They deliberated the status of rathakaras (chariot makers).
• Their occupations included architecture, building coaches/chariots, erecting gateways for temples, preparing equipment for sacrifices, building mandapas, and making jewels for the king.
• New Rajput clans became powerful among Kshatriyas by the 11th-12th centuries.
• They belonged to lineages like Hunas, Chandelas, Chalukyas, and others.
• Some had been tribes earlier, many were regarded as Rajputs.
• They gradually replaced older rulers, especially in agricultural areas.
• A developed society emerged, and rulers used wealth to create powerful states.
• The rise of Rajput clans set an example for the tribal people.
• Many tribes became part of the caste system with support of Brahmanas.
• Only leading tribal families joined the ruling class.
• The majority joined the lower jatis(castes) of caste-based society.
• Many dominant tribes of Punjab, Sind, and the North-West Frontier adopted Islam.
• They continued to reject the caste system/unequal social order prescribed by orthodox Hinduism.
• The emergence of states is closely related to social change among tribal people.

The Gonds

• The Gonds lived in Gondwana, known as the "country inhabited by Gonds," a vast forested region.
• They practiced shifting cultivation.
• The large Gond tribe was divided into smaller clans.
• Each clan had its own raja or rai.
• A few large Gond kingdoms dominated smaller Gond chiefs as Delhi Sultan power declined.
• A history of Akbar's reign called, the Akbar Nama, mentions the Gond kingdom of Garha Katanga with 70,000 villages.
• The administrative system of these kingdoms was becoming centralised.
• The kingdom was divided into garhs, each controlled by a Gond clan.
• Each garh was further divided into units of Chaurasi of 84 villages.
• The chaurasi was subdivided into barhots, each made up of 12 villages.
• Social classes developed as large states emerged and Gond society became divided.
• Brahmanas became more influential as they received land grants from Gond rajas.
• Gond chiefs wished to be recognized as Rajputs.
• Aman Das, the Gond raja of Garha Katanga, assumed the title Sangram Shah.
• His son, Dalpat, married princess Durgawati, from a Rajput raja of Mahoba.
• Rani Durgawati started ruling on behalf of her five-year-old son, Bir Narain, after Dalpat died early.
• The kingdom became even more extensive under her rule.
• Mughal forces under Asaf Khan attacked Garha Katanga in 1565.
• Rani Durgawati offered strong resistance but was defeated.
• She chose to die rather than surrender.
• Her son died fighting soon after.
• Garha Katanga was a rich state earning wealth by trapping and exporting wild elephants.
• The Mughals captured much booty, including precious coins and elephants when they defeated the Gonds.
• They annexed part of the Garha Katanga kingdom and granted the rest to Chandra Shah.
• The Gond kingdoms survived for some time despite the fall of Garha Katanga, however they became weaker and fought unsuccessfully against stronger Bundelas and Marathas.

The Ahoms

• The Ahoms migrated from Myanmar to the Brahmaputra Valley in the 13th century.

• They created a new state by suppressing the older political system of the Bhuiyans (landlords).

• They annexed the kingdoms of the Chhutiyas (1523) and Koch-Hajo (1581) during the 16th century.

• The Ahoms subjugated other tribes.

• They built a large state and used firearms as early as the 1530s

• By the 1660s, they could make high-quality gunpowder and cannons.

• The Ahoms faced invasions from the southwest.

• The Mughals under Mir Jumla attacked in 1662.

• The Ahoms were defeated despite their brave defense.

• Direct Mughal control over the region was short lived.

• The Ahom state depended upon forced labor as those forced to work were called Paiks

• They were chosen through a census.

• Each village had to send a number of paiks by rotation. – People were shifted from heavily populated areas to less populated places.

• Ahom clans were broken up.

• The administration became quite centralized in the first half of the 17th century.

• Lachit Barphukan, the Ahom General, defeated the Mughal amry of Emperor Aurangzeb in 1671 in the battel of Saraighat near Guwahati

• Almost all adult males served in the army during war

• They built dams, irrigation systems and engaged in other public works in times of peace.

• The Ahoms also developed new methods of rice cultivation.

• Ahom society was divided into clans or khels.

• There were very few Artisan castes and they came from adjoining kingdoms

• A khel often controlled several villages.

• Peasants were given land by their village community, and even the king could not take it away without consent.

• The Ahoms originally worshipped their own tribal gods.

• The influence of Brahmanas increased and kings gave land toTemples in the first half of the 17th Century.

• Hinduism became the predominant religion during the reign of Sib Singh (1714–1744).

• The Ahom kings did not abandon all their traditional beliefs after adopting Hinduism.

• Ahom society was sophisticated.

• Poets and scholars were given land grants.

• Theatre was encourage.

• Important works of Sanskrit were translated into the local language.

• Historical Chronicles, called buranjis, were in Ahom, and also Assamese.

• Considerable social change occurred during this period.

• There was constant interaction between varna-based society and tribal people.

• Both societies adapted and changed because of this interaction.

• There were many different tribes and diverse livelihoods

• Many of them merged with caste-based society over time.

• Others rejected both the caste system and orthodox Hinduism.

• Some tribes established extensive states with well-organized systems of administration.

• Thus leading to political power that brought them into with larger and more complex kingdoms/empires.