Page 2 - Lesson Notes-SubTopic-2-How did colonial rule affect tribal lives Std-8-History-Ch-4

⚫ In return, those who lived in the villages had to provide labour to
the Forest Department

⚫ Many tribal groups disobeyed the new rules, continued with
practices that were declared illegal, and at times rose in open
rebellion.

The problem ⚫ During the nineteenth century, traders and moneylenders started
with trade coming into the forest more often.

⚫ They wanted to buy forest products, offered cash loans, and
asked tribal groups to work for ages

⚫ In the eighteenth century, the demand for Indian silk was high in
European markets.

⚫ The silk market expanded so the East India Company encouraged
silk production.

⚫ The Santhals of Hazaribagh reared cocoons and the traders
dealing in silk gave loans to the tribal people and collected the

cocoons.

⚫ The middlemen made huge profits.

The search for
work
⚫ From the late nineteenth century, tea plantations started coming
up and mining became an important industry.

⚫ Tribals were recruited in large numbers to work at the tea
plantations of Assam and the coal mines of Jharkhand.

Some took to ⚫ Many tribal groups had begun to settle down instead of moving
Settled from one place to another.
Cultivation ⚫ They began to use the plough and gradually got rights over the
land they lived on.

⚫ British officials saw settled tribal groups like the Gonds and
Santhals as more civilized than hunter-gatherers or shifting
cultivators.