List of Important Peasant Movements in India: Moplah Rebellion, Indigo Revolt, etc

Important Peasant Movements in India. During the British time, the peasants suffered from high rents, illegal levies, arbitrary evictions and unpaid labour. These overburdened the farmers and created a sense of insecurity among them. This resulted in a number of protests, revolts and movements taking place across the country as people sought to make their voices heard. Important Short note for various exams.

From the perspective of an examination like Civil services, State exams, SSC, Banking, Railways and any other One Day exam, all the necessary facts and information are listed below.

Table of Contents

List of Important Peasant Movements in India: Moplah Rebellion, Indigo Revolt, etc
- Peasant Movements
- Related articles

Peasant Movements

Movement (Year)	Place	Leaders	Reason	Result
Rangpur Revolt (1783)	Dinajpur, Northern Bengal	Dheeraj Narayan	Burdern of revenue was placed at the highest on the Zamindars who then passed it on to the peasants	Peasants grew violent and symbols of the government were destroyed. Courts and granaries were seized by the peasants.
Moplah Rebellion (1836-54)	Malabar	Local leaders	New Revenue policy of the British	Multiple movements and it took years to suppress.
Indigo Revolt (1859)	Bengal	Digambar Biswas and Vishnu Biswas	Forced Indigo cultivation	By 1860, the indigo cultivation ended.
Pabna Peasant Uprising (1873-76)	Bengal	Ishwar Chandra Rai, Shambhu Pal	Forced eviction of peasants from their own lands and the high rates of taxation.	Bengal Tenancy Act. 1855 was passed, land ownership of the farmers were recognized.
Deccan Riots (1875)	Poona, Ahmadnagar, Sholapur and Satara in MHA	Baba Sahab Deshmukh	Vicious circle of Mahajan’s oppression, increase in revenue by 50%.	Social boycott of Mahajans, passage of Deccan Peasant relief Act, 1879.
Punjab Peasant Movement (1890-1900)	Punjab		Indebtedness and transfer of peasant land to moneylenders.	Through the Punjab Alienation Act of 1901, land occupation of farmers by the moneylenders was prohibited.
Bijolia Movement (1905-13)	Mewar	Bhoop Singh Rathi, Vijay Singh Pathik, Manik Lal Verma	Various taxes on peasants numbering as much as 86.	The peasants refused to work on the farms of Jagirdars.
Champaran Satyagraha (1917)	Champaran, Motihari, Betia, Madhubani	Mahatma Gandhi	Tinkathia system, increase in revenue	Plantation owners agreed to return 25% of the illegal recovery.
Kheda Satyagraha (1918)	Gujarat	Mahatma Gandhi	Revenue demand even after crop failure	Secret directive by the government to take revenue only from those who can pay it.
Peasant Movement in Awadh (1919)	Pratapgarh, Sultanpur, Raibareilly, Faizabad	Jhinguri Singh, Baba Ramchandra	Increase in revenue demands, oppression by taluqdars.	Social boycott of Taluqdars was practiced.
Eka Movement (1921-22)	Barabanki Hardoi, Sitapur, Bahraich	Madari Pasi	Increase in revenue demands	Small Zamindars also participated in it.
Malabar Moplah Rebellion (1921)	Malabar	Ali Musliyar, V.K. Haji, Sithi Koya Thangal, Chembrassery Thangal, Moideen Kutty Haji	Increased revenue demands, forced eviction of peasants.	Grew communal, but the movement was crushed in 1921.
Bardoli Satyagraha (1928)	Surat	Sardar Vallabh Bhai Patel	Increased revenue demands, forced labour.	The rent increment was brought down to 6.03%.
Andhra Movement (1923-38)	Coastal region of Andhra	Satya Narayan Raju, N.G. Ranga	Revenue demands and fishing rights. Foundation of peasants associations by Ranga.	Revenue demands were addressed by the Government.
Peasant Movement in Malabar (1934-40)	Malabar region of Kerala	Satyanarayan Rao, Dandu Narayanrau, T. Prakasham, Kandra Venkataiah	Feudal cesses, demands of advance revenue payment.	The provincial Congress government passed a bill to address the grievances.
Peasants movement in Bihar (1929-39)	Bihar	Swami Sahajananda	Zamindari abolition, illegal cesses, Bakasht land.	The movements lost its steam after few reforms by government and repression of volunteers.
Peasant movement in Punjab (1930-40)	Jalandhar, Amritsar, Hoshiarpur, Shekhpura	Sohan Singh Bakhna, Jwala SIngh, Tej Singh, Master Hari Singh	Hike in canal tax, high revenue demands in Amritsar and Lahore.	Movements by Naujawan Bharat Sabha, Akalis, and Kirti Kisan Party. Bill passed in 1943.
Warli movement (1945-49)	Warli, Mumbai	Godavari Purulekar	Against begar, big landlords.	Communist influence increased.
Tebhaga Movement (1946-50)	Dinajpur, Rangpur, Jalpaigudi, Midnapore, Khulna	Krishna Vinodi Rai, Avni Lahiri, Sunil Sen, Bhawani Sen, Moni Singh	Decided to pay 1/3rd only to the landlords.	Suhrawardi ministry took steps to sddress the problems and passed regulation.
Punnapra-Vayalar Uprising (1946)	Travancore	Mannathu Padmanabha Pillai	Famine conditions, designs of C.P. Ramaswamy to remain independent.	Accession of Travancore to India.
Telangana movement (1946-51)	Telangana	Puchalapalli Sundarayya	Against feudal atrocities of Nizam rule	Played a role in the demise of Nizam rule, Abolition of Jagirdari.

If you find our content helpful and interesting, please consider joining us on Telegram @affairsmastery_official to show your support. We would really appreciate it!

Join us on Telegram