Odisha. On hearing the name of which the powerful king of the Chola Empire trembles with fear, the eyes of the young Begums are filled with tears in fear of widows, on the soil in which even in the darkness, a beautiful young woman could walk fearlessly with a golden belt in her hand, the golden urn on the palace of the soil of which the child was so rich, it was seen from the golden urn on the palace of Odisha. Two-thirds of the people were starved to death in just six months, after the food was taken away from the mouth of the heirs of a rich, loving, industrious, benevolent race, causing a famine. The then rulers, administrators and some non-Odia communities, who could not bear the srisampada of odias, were laughing at the tragedy of Odia’s death. The massacre shattered the great heroism of a nation that had dominated the entire South East Asia, including the sub-continent of India for two and a half thousand years, and destroyed the rich history, culture and social system of this nation. The sons of this land, known as the world’s greatest merchant nation, lost their ability to earn wealth through their labour overnight. The Odia, which supplied grains to the world, did not find a single piece of manure and sheltered the leaves of the tree. Oh; What a scene! He did not even get the leaves of the tree instead of entering the umbrella with his hands to fill the abdomen.
Why?
What fault did he do to whom?
Who else wanted to brutally beat up this Odia, known as a loyal, hardworking and intelligent caste? We have to turn the pages of history when looking for answers to this question.
Economy of Odisha:
During the time of the Gangavanshi rulers, Odisha achieved considerable expertise in the field of art, architecture and external trade. After this, the Suryavanshi ruler emphasized on border security, so the Oriya-peasant joined the army instead of kalasthatya. At this time, all the trade and commerce was in the hands of the Oriyas as the economic condition was strong with the production of abundant goods. Therefore, the economic transparency of the state and the people of the state played an important role in providing political security to the Gangavanshi and Suryavanshi kings. But after becoming the ruler of Afghanistan, the trade did business with revenue collection from the coastal commercial cities. They were joined by the Marwaris and Gujaratis of western India. From here, the trade in Odisha went into the hands of non-Odias. They used business techniques to gradually take over the outlying empire of Odisha. Therefore, at this time, the Oriya Sadhu was forced to produce only goods and provide them to this non-Odia trader at a cheaper rate.
Although the process of collecting revenue in the form of currency started from the time of Akbar, it did not have an impact in Odisha. Because Odisha was the manufacturing center of goods. Export-oriented essentials like rice, clothes, salt, earthen pots were so cheap here that they could not be priced by any money or metal. As an example of this, we can take the accounts of 18th-century European traders. At that time, the average price of rice in Odisha was 14 maunds or 560 shers or 700 kg for one rupee. So the price per kilo of rice could not be decided in monetary terms. That’s why the crow was used as the minimum exchange. In Odisha, 1,600 crows were sold at Re 1, so one sher or 1 or 250 grams of rice was available for about 2 or 3 kavadis. It was only 200 years ago.
Arrival of European businessmen in Odisha:
During the time of Suryavanshi rulers, the emphasis on the construction of nationalism rather than the construction of a temple brought about a radical change in the political, social, cultural and economic fields of Odisha. Each man became an able army with the farmer. Therefore, with the removal of food shortages, peace prevailed in the whole of Odisha. Caesar Frederick of Italy, who came to Odisha in the second half of the 16th century, writes in his travelogue: “During the reign of Mukundadeva, a passerby with gold in his hand could move effortlessly on the streets. By the 16th century, when the temple construction industry shut down, it was replaced by textiles. Odisha textiles were sold in large numbers during this period as they were widely popular only in the Asian market. According to the then Dutch report, the worst cotton textiles collected from Odisha were sold in the European market at a profit of 247.8 per cent. (Om Prakash, Datch East India Company & the Economy of Bengal, 1650-1717, P-169-170, Ph.D. thesis, Delhi University, 1967)ö।
After the occupation of Constantinople by Turkey in 1498, european merchants found a way to trade directly with India by waterways as prices soared in Europe. In 1499, the Portuguese merchant Vascodagama arrived at Calicut with the help of the Indian merchant Abdul Majid with three ships and made a profit of 250 times by buying and selling with the local inhabitants. After this, as the only European merchant race, the Portuguese started looting by declaring the Indian Ocean as their empire, along with making huge profits by trading with India. This led to a new crisis in the entire Indian and Arab trading systems. At the same time, the Gajapati Empire of Odisha fell. The muslim subedar, who became the new ruler, exploited the Odia businessman financially in various ways instead of adequately protecting them. They created various problems for the Odia sadhus by providing various facilities to non-Odia Marwari and Gujarati traders. As a result, the cloth and spice business of Odia went into the hands of the Portuguese.
Seeing the huge profits of the Portuguese in the spice trade, the other two merchant castes of Europe formed the English and Dutch East India Company and came to trade with Odisha, the most prosperous productive region in the east of India. They used to collect rice, clothes and salt from Odisha and export it to Bantam Port in Sumatra by Masulipatna Port. On April 21, 1633, an eight-member British merchant group led by Ralph Cartwright arrived at Hariharpur (now Jagatsinghpur), one of the busiest port cities of Odisha, when the Dutch massacred British merchants in Amboina, Indonesia, in 1623. William Bruton, a member of the group, described in detail the horrific attack by the general public to this group of merchants. According to him, if the local king had not intervened, none of the eight men on board his ship would have survived. However, Thomas Cooley and another man were seriously injured, and thomas died a few days later.
The town of Hariharrapore is very full of people and it is in bounds of six or seven miles in campass. There are many merchants in it and great plenty of all things here is also cloth of all sorts for there do belong to this town at the least three thousand weavers…” (Bruton, P-44)
Despite the strong opposition and non-cooperation of the general public, with the full support of the local administrators, with great difficulty, the British merchant traded in Odisha till 1642. The products produced by Odisha were much cheaper in the entire Indian subcontinent. About the state of textiles in the town of Hariharpur (Jagatsinghpur), Brutton writes- The town of Hariharrapore is very full of people and it is in bounds of six or seven miles in campass. There are many merchants in it and great plenty of all things here is also cloth of all sorts for there do belong to this town at the least three thousand weavers…” (Bruton, P-44)
When the Odisha traders did not sell the clothes to the British company, they started buying it through middlemen. In 1659, they built a building on the banks of the Hooghly river, a constricted place where there was no transport facility to hide these things from the Mughals and the Nawab of Bengal. As its scope gradually increased, In 1688, Job Charnock established a trading room or Fort William at Sutanati.
In this new commercial center, non-Odia middlemen from Odisha collected clothes, rice, salt and other goods through traders and sent them to different places. By this time, the Portuguese’s military might and commercial influence were dwindling due to frequent wars between the Portuguese and Dutch. With the French repeatedly defeating the Dutch, there was now only a show of military and commercial strength between french and british companies.
Apart from textiles, Odisha also earned fame for its shipbuilding industry. “A sea town where shipping was builtö ‘Markat-e-Hasan’, as the Persian text shows, the shipbuilding and repair factory in Balasore was running under the direct supervision of the government,” Bruton wrote in an introduction to the balasore port-city. Records of the British East India Company show that in 1729, 1,440 maunds were loaded into the Balasore iron ship and exported to surat port.
Odisha under British rule:
The last two of the five Dandapats, Jaleswar, Bhadrak, Cuttack, Kalinga and Rajahmundry, which were ruled by the Mughals, were included in the Golconda rule in 1651. In 1687, when Aurangzeb captured Golconda, the Odia region of Kalinga and Rajahmundry Dandapat were merged with the Deccan Suba without being merged with The Suba of Odisha. In 1724, the Southern Subedar Nizam-ul-Mulk or Chinclich Khan declared independence and renamed the Southern Subah to the kingdom of Hyderabad. As a result, Kalinga and Rajahmundry Dandapat, which are part of the Oriya region, were included in the states of Hyderabad and took the name of the Northern Government. In 1751, when Salavatjung became the Nizam of Hyderabad, the Northern Government handed over to du Plessis, the French Governor. Although the British army was defeated in this war, the British brought under the control of the vast coastal Oriya region from chilika to krishna river called the victorious France to the northern government. This fertile rich area, along with Subedari, got the ownership of large ports such as Masulipatna, Visakhapatnam, Kalingapatna, Manikpatna, Chinapatna.
After this, the British company “The United Company of Merchant of England Tredeing to the East Indies” took over the Odia territory from Bengal after the Battle of Plassey on 23 June 1757 and the Battle of Buxar in 1764. Calcutta on the northern Odisha border and Madras (Chinapatna) in the south became their main office and main port. This reduced the influence of Balasore, Hariharpur and Ganjam, which are the major ports of eastern India. Meanwhile, fed up with the pressure of high taxes, the producer class of Odisha left their homes in the hope of earning an income and fled to the new trading cities of Calcutta, Rangoon, Madras, among others. With the establishment of two relatively safe ports and commercial complexes named Calcutta and Mandraj, the big ports of Ganjam, Manikpatna, Harishpur, Pipili, Balasore became deserted and Calcutta and Mandraj became more active.
After the Battle of Plassey, only Medinipur went under the control of the British. Meanwhile, the rest of Odisha was bought by marhatta from the Nawab of Bengal for Rs 12 lakh per annum. Odiya’s spine was completely broken in marhatta’s atrocities. After the Battle of Baksar, the British Company Envoy suggested to Clib that ‘Total’ was the right time for the possession of the rest of Odisha, but he did not accept the proposal as he understood that it would have an impact on the newly-established company city of Calcutta if the Odias were to be taken care of. His next company, Governor Hastings, also paid Rs 25 lakh to Marhatta Bhosale for using the Marhatta-occupied Odisha route during the Mysore attack.
During this time, the British company government forced the people of Bengal to buy bilatiluga and salt by banning the production of textiles and later salt production. However, due to cheap clothing and salt available in neighbouring Odisha, these were smuggled to Bengal, causing a loss to the British company. No matter how many requests and requests were made to the Marhatta Subadar of Odisha to stop this smuggling, the British authorities decided to take over Odisha as they did not get any result. In 1803, when the Deogram agreement was signed between The Governor of Calcutta Arthur Wellsley and Raghuji Bhonsla, the coast of Odisha went under the control of the British Company of Cuttack, Puri and Balasore. After this, in 1826, the whole of north Odisha i.e. Sambalpur to Chhattisgarh, Singhabhoomi Odia region was under the control of the British. Though they captured Odisha in four phases, the British officials had so much fear of Odisha that they outlined Odisha as a region on their political map but kept it as the tail of three different provinces. From here, a large state of 2,200 years lost its existence for the first time.
Economy of Odisha under British rule:
Despite the import of textiles from The British-ruled Odisha in lieu of exports and the reduction in the impact of all the bandhs, the export of rice remained the same. The export of salt and cloth was replaced by rice. The smuggling of clothes and salt from Odisha to Bengal stopped as Kanika Raja had already accepted the company’s subjugation. He forced the people of Odisha to buy bilatiluga. He cut off the hand of the weaver who was weaving clothes. Thousands of looms were destroyed. In 1807, he started the salt monopoly business made in Odisha, which was the first choice of Indians. For this, ic.s. Salt officers were appointed through the ICSS exam. Earlier, the government got only as much annual revenue from the entire Odisha as it did from the monopolistic salt trade. The price of salt suddenly increased from Rs. 1,400 to 15,500 kavadis (Rs. 3.25). Personally making salt was punished and fined. Having destroyed the textile and salt industry of Odisha as a cottage industry, the British company forced it to pay silver in exchange for taking cucumber or grain at the time of revenue collection. For this, in exchange for one silver rupee, four kahs or 5120 crows had to be given. As the products produced were much cheaper, exports of cloth and salt stopped in two of the three sources of cucumber imports. Earlier, when the external trade situation was strong, not every Odia family was saving silver money due to lack of emphasis on metal products. When it took a lot of kawdies to exchange money, many rich Oriyas became poor overnight.
Meanwhile, the British company administration introduced the new land revenue system. Mughalbandi consisted of 150 Parganas and 2,361 zamindari in addition to 31 districts of Odisha. Under the Sunset Act, the Auction was held at the English Revenue Board office in Calcutta at the price of Odia zamindari shagfish. In just eight years of British rule, 789 of the 2,361 zamindari had already been auctioned. These zamindari owners became the most ordinary Bengalis from the porters of Calcutta to the peon-chaprashi instead of the Oriyas. Historian Rakhaldas Banerjee said, “After the British took over Odisha, for almost 50 years, it was a group of lower-class Bengalis who ruled Odisha. Filled with both the departments of governance and judiciary, those Bengalis in Odisha suddenly found an easy way to make themselves clean and prosperous. Hundreds of ancient Oriya elites were destroyed and their historical possessions went into the hands of Bengali zamindars. (History of Orissa, pp. 279–281). The Cuttack Commissioner, in his report in 1818, notes this: “Even after 15 years of the British monarchy, there has been no benefit to the Oriyas. They are only being harassed by paying taxes. The zamindars’ zamindars are auctioned off at nominal rates for the rest of the revenue. Naseemuddin, an office member, has auctioned the state, which gives an annual revenue of Rs 53,000, for Rs 23,000. This regime is no less than a duck (Little better than downright robbery) in the early hours of the day. Apart from this, 11 land revenue settlements were made till 1817 and the revenue amount was increased every time. That is, the annual revenue of 1817 was increased by about Rs. 5 lakhs more than the annual revenue of 1805.
Odia’s rebellion against the British:
Although the Odias were ruled by various kings, gajapati was all attracted to the king because of the beloved deity Jagannath. Even after the end of Gajapati rule, the Odia Empire did not fall. That is why Akbar’s general Jai Singh said in 1580 – “This country is not to be conquered, it is above human aspirations”. We can only feel the reality of this by taking a small state of Kanika as an example.
Kanika, a small kingdom on the coast of Odisha, had lost the sleep of mughal, Afghan and British company soldiers at that time. British company records show that between 1680 and 1805, british cargo ships passing through the Kanika region were frequently looted by the King of Kanika. In 1740, the company refused when the Mughal Nawab asked the British company for naval help to suppress the King of Kanika. Kanika Raja’s power and naval prowess had the ability to destroy the British and the Marhatta’s naval prowess, according to the account of a British company employee named Whart Hamilton. In 1770, Marhatta expressed his inability to respond to the British company’s request to the Subedar to avenge the plundering of a ship and the inhuman treatment meted out to the crew by the local inhabitants at Dhamra. It must have been difficult to seize kanika raja, who was obstructing british trade, by Clive in 1770. That is why after the Deogram Treaty, the British Army first brought Kanika under its control.
The clever merchant studied the history of British Orissa well and was familiar with the antanadi of this caste. Even now, their ears reflected the ranhunkar of The King of Parla, Jagannath Gajapati Narayandev – “I am an Odia king. I will not give money to anyone or obey anyone’s authority. Also, the tactics of Krishnachandra Bhanja, the king of Ghumus, and the guerrilla warfare of the Kondhas. I was reminded of the strong protest of the Oriyas when they set foot on the soil of Odisha for the purpose of trade. From the beginning of the rule of Odisha i.e. 1757, 1767-68, 1772, 1798, 1801, the rebellion of the terrible Paralaraja, the Khallikot rebellion of 1769, the Ghumusar rebellion of 1778, the Mayurbhanj rebellion of 1781, the Oriya rulers of small areas identified as kings, the Oriya rulers of small areas identified as kings, were opposed to the collection of revenue by the French and the British.
In 1804, the flames of Jayi Rajguru’s rebellion were ignited in 1817, when the male-held Rodhang zamindari of Bakshi Jagabandhu, the commander-in-chief of the King of Khurda, was sold to Krishnasingh, a Bengali employee of Calcutta. With the abolition of Odia zamindari through the Sunset Act, the abolition of Paika’s Jagiri and other jagiris, the stripping of India from the Temple management from the Thakur king, the increase in the treasury due to the frequent settlement of land, there was a fierce revolt. Garhjat and other Karad kings remained silent in the Paik rebellion, which was a struggle to protect Oriya self-respect. 1817 to 1825 – After eight long years of struggle, the company administration, desperate to save its position, suppressed the paiks with the help of some traitorous money-seekers. After this, the Parla of 1831, Ghumusar of 1835, and the Angul rebellion of 1847 gave them sleep again. After the kidnapping of wealth and commerce-power from the Oriya caste, they were as frightened as they were to see where so much power was coming from to protest again, as much as they were afraid that the flames of this revolt would not spread to other regions.
That’s what happened. The Sepoy Mutiny of 1857 was the end result of the weakness of the British administration, which was plagued by various rebellions in Odisha. Odisha had no direct role to play in the rebellion. The first wave of the sepoy mutiny originated from Sambalpur and was finally extinguished in 1863 in sambalpur. Though the sepoy mutiny was suppressed with great difficulty, the company officials, who were angry with the fact that the rule of India later went into the hands of the British, were determined to abolish the existence of the Oriya caste, which was the root cause of it. For this, Lord Canning, the last governor general of the company and the first governor general of the Monarchy of England, wrote in a letter to Charles Wood on 27/2/1860 in eddie murmur – You must knock a native down before you pardon him. He will not accept your pardon till he is at your money. (To make a nation accept its subjugation, let them down.) When their existence is in jeopardy and expect your help, they will stand up like angels). The special preparations to put the Odia nation in crisis by accepting their own sense of desperation and violent mindful advice were started through the then Commissioner of Odisha, Kobaran Sahib. The Odiatva Hanan, formulated with the policy of killing rice without hitting it with your hands, is based on three phases. For example, 1- To create a food crisis by increasing the export of food grains from Odisha, 2) to destroy the consciousness of Jagannath, which binds the Odia people in the thread of unity, 3- To create fear of the introduction of other languages by taking away the language of their faces. It was this mentality that gave rise to a terrible massacre like the famine of the Nine. The hero of which was Thomas Edison Ravenshaw.
Thomas Edward Ravenshaw Introduction:
Thomas Edward Ravenshaw was born in 1827 in Bath, Somerset, England. His father, John H. Ravensa is a board of directors of the East India Company and his grandfather John Goldsberry Ravenshaw was also once the chairman of the company. Thomas Ravenshaw, after passing the company’s ICS examination in 1849, served as an officer in various places until 1865 in Bengal, the main center of British administration in India. Meanwhile, due to the sepoy mutiny, the governance of India went from the hands of the company to the British king. As a result, the company’s officials remained as administrative officers of the British king of India, but they became vengeful in the temptation of losing absolute power. Especially when the rebellion of the Odias near Calcutta, the headquarters of the British administration, did not stop, a special preparatory festival to keep Calcutta safe by accepting the advice of the Governor General Lord Canning began through the then Commissioner of Orissa, Kobaran Sahib. Thomas Edward Ravenshaw, a 16-year-old veteran administrator and judge of Birbhumi, who was appointed in various positions in Bengal and Patna, was promoted and appointed as the Revenue Commissioner of Odisha to implement the policy of killing rice without being hit by hand. He first arrived at Puri on July 3, 1865, and reached Cuttack on The 5th and took over as the Revenue Commissioner of Odisha. He was appointed commissioner for three years but on his request he served as the Commissioner of Odisha till 1878. From 5-4-1878, he served as the Commissioner of Burdwan and thereafter as a member of the Board of Revenue of Calcutta and retired in 1882. He died in England in 1914. During the tenure of Odisha, the famine of nine, the imprisonment of the Gajapati king of Puri, the suppression of the Bamanghati and Keonjhar rebellion were the main events.
Not the famine of nine, but the Ravenshaw famine:
The famine of nine was the first of the three main conspiracies hatched with the aim of suppressing the rebellion of the Odias forever. The above three tasks will be done with such care that in order to fulfill the first goal of not even the slightest doubt on any Oriya British ruler, to fulfill the first goal, he collected abundant rice from the farmers in the villages of Odisha and stored it in his warehouses in cities like Rangoon, Calcutta etc. He also gave full opportunity to other business houses for the same. They knew from their long-standing experience that Odisha was a natural disaster like floods, cyclones and droughts. Since it happens almost every year, the average farmer also saves food grains for at least two years. Therefore, it will have to wait for a minimum of two years to create food shortage. In 1859, the East India Irrigation and Canal Company was formed and in the name of irrigation, it was tasked with digging canals to transport and collect grains from the Mahanadi, Virupa, Brahmani and Baitarani rivers to the nearby and interior areas. Although the construction of this canal was talked about for flood control and irrigation, it was assured at the time of the company’s stake sale on August 28, 1860, that the company’s shareholders would get a lot of profit along with the recovery of the money spent on freight transportation as it was unlikely to make a profit. From 1861, the construction of Kendrapara, Jambu, Pattamundai and from 1863 the Taldanda canal began. In 1866, £252 was first collected as water tax. Earlier, however, the movement of goods was started and the treasury was being collected illegally. In 1865, the maximum grain collection was possible only because of this canal. As the canals were built for the purpose of shipping, it became much higher than the embankments. So in the event of a flood, instead of the river’s water flowing downstream, it was blocked by the canal embankments and landed in the fields and villages. This led to crop loss, crop loss and widespread loss of life and property. The result of which was the famine of nine of 1865. It completely erased the identity of Oriyatva from the Oriyas.
According to the Famine Commission report set up in 1866, 52,970 maunds of rice were exported from Odisha in 1859, while in 1864-65, 9,38,000 maunds (1hn = 50 kg) of rice were exported to Europe via Maldivian route. That year, the farmers were very happy that the pulses had a good harvest by March. But suddenly, under pressure to collect higher taxes and the lure of higher prices from outside traders, the farmers sold all the rice. In the month of Ashadh in 1865, the farmers sowed paddy, like every year, because of the rains. Paddy gaja died because it had not rained since the month of Bhadrav. With no rain for the month of Ashwin, the condition of the limited income earners became unmanageable. Meanwhile, in August, french merchants, along with English merchants, bought the rice stored from small farmers at the rate of 35 cents by the port of Hukitola. According to British records, this single month saw the highest export of rice than last year and this year. The reason why small farmers sell rice is to meet the need for money for farming again after gajamrudi. The reason why the rich sell rice is to collect more money because of the high price of rice.
With good rains from September 6 to 18, farmers bought and sowed paddy seeds again at the cost of selling rice. But there was no rain after that. By October, starvation deaths had occurred. At first, tanti, gudiya, kamar, potter, carpenter, bania, and the families of the servant classes like kandra, paan, hadi, bauri, washer, barber, gardener, keut, gaud, etc., did not get a handful of rice and started eating whatever they found from the leaves of the tree to the rotten things. In Cuttack, when there was no rice available in the month of November, the money was barely getting eight cents of rice. By April 1866, in just six months, half of the 4.2 million population of Cuttack, Puri and Balasore districts had died. On every branch of the leafless thunta tree, many humans like monkeys were busy looking for the leaves. The ground was dry without rain. All around are only the carcasses of humans and animals, or the skeletons. Despite this, in the districts of Cuttack, Puri and Balasore in Odisha, the Bengali zamindars, who were spending their days comfortably by buying zamindari, repeatedly urged their gumastas to collect the treasury. Of course, Odia zamindars like Radhashyam Narendra of Kendrapara, Sunguda zamindar Jagusingh, Chaudhary Raghunath Das of Cuttack used to cook a lot by many Brahmin priests and feed the famine-affected people every day. Many kings, zamindars, monasteries and other wealthy Oriyas did not bother to feed the starving people for the protection of their caste, protection and protection of religion.
Ravenshaw’s role:
By the time Ravensa arrived at Cuttack on 5 July 1865 as commissioner of Odisha, the Gaja drought had begun in Odisha. Puri Collector Barlow, who was with him, repeatedly persuaded him to take steps to remedy this, but he did not pay heed to it and went to Balasore for three weeks on July 22. Rice was exported to Mandraj in 69 ships despite food shortage in Balasore. On January 31, 1866, Ravenshaw refused Barlow’s refusal to take steps to overcome food shortages and returned on January 31, 1866, to travel four months from October to the princely state of Odisha to spend this time in luxury.
Meanwhile, two darbars were held in Puri and Cuttack after the news of Bengal Governor Cecil Beedan visiting Odisha to find out the truth over repeated complaints about the famine. On February 13, 1866, the problems of the common man and the people in the Puri Durbar reached directly near Chotlat through the Puri Collector. However, two days later, on February 15, 1866, the darbar in Cuttack was made very impressive with the general public and problems being kept away from the common people and problems. In the last eight months, as a perfect example of establishing himself as a successful administrator by covering the misery and pain of odisha’s skeleton-stal kangal man, who has become half-deserted due to lack of food, Ravenshaw was praised by his superior Sisil Biden by organizing a grand darbar at the Irrigation Company house in Cuttack. With the king, landlords and nobles present at this court not supporting the demands of rice procurement, price control, waiver of treasuries and setting up of colleges for higher education, Chotalat left these problems to fate and God to understand them in an Odia traditional way and returned to Calcutta on the 19th after his successful visit.
Ravenshaw’s ruthlessness is evident from many of his letters. When Balasore zamindar Padmalochan Mandal requested that the date be postponed by a month, Ravenshaw turned it down and wrote a letter to Balasore Collector H. Masprat– “I doubt there is more rice than you think there is in your district.” You will not interfere in the business of hell in any way. Similarly, on November 14, 1865, after the collector informed Barlow Ravenshaw about the rise in the number of deaths due to food shortages in Puri, he wrote a letter to Barlow, accusing him of exaggerating his words and directing people to move elsewhere and not to help the old and inefficient. Starting the work plan for food, Narendra dug a pond in Puri, dug a pond at Satpada and started building Khurda-Puri, Cuttack-Puri roads and provided work and food to barlow people. “Don’t take up too much work,” Ravensa directly rejected Barlow’s suggestion to allow people to kill salt to give more work. People should go to work, work should not go to people. ”
Because of Ravenshaw’s cruelty, it was very common for a handful of rice inside the chikra of ha-anna. On being informed about this, the Cuttack collector dismissed the colonel with a bad report. Deepika had strongly opposed it then. A woman from Khurda had filed a petition in the name of Assistant Collector Barton for the maintenance of her daughter. But he was acquitted without taking any action. Once in Balasore, while watching The Annachhatra, people pushed him to the ground, but he did not pay attention to the real situation and went for a walk in Similipal. On April 20, 1866, when he saw a hungry man eating meat near Kemana Fandi, he wrote a letter to the Balasore collector for a medical examination instead of understanding the food of a hungry man. On May 25, when Ravenshaw returned from the Similipal forest after poaching tigers and the Dwarfaghati rebellion, the situation in Cuttack had become unmanageable. Seeing that the resentment of the soldiers due to the shortage of rice was turning into a rebellion, he was forced to write to Calcutta on The 27th to send rice worth one lakh rupees. Surprisingly, on the 29th, the day the letter was received, Chotlat ordered to buy the rice. The rice was distributed to the soldiers. Later, when more rice came up for sale, the rice could not reach the people as he did not take care of transportation and distribution properly.
When Commissioner Ravenshaw returned from a visit to Garhjat and went to the Hukitola port, he saw the untold incident on the streets of Kendrapara, that he realised that the time was here to do what the British government, based on representatives of the company, wanted. The power to revolt in the Odia nation is completely defeated. Now they are ready to survive in any way they can. In just six months, more than half of the Oriyas have been destroyed. Some of the remaining half will die in a few days. The rich Oriya has already been eradicated. In the midst of religious reforms, many dedicated Oriya religions, which have given the door of vice-versa, have already been lost. Even their unsavoury daughter-in-law is being sold as a prostitute in the streets of Calcutta at the price of shagfish. Illegal children have gathered in all parts of Odisha to avoid stomach ache. Karun has been crying out that the British government should protect jagannath instead of hunger. On the whole, all the pride of the Oriyas to be proud of their self-respect, caste, is now gone. The odia community is shattered. Therefore, if some food is provided without completely wiping out this nation, they will remain grateful to the British for the rest of their lives instead of rebellion. In this regard, he submitted his secret report to the Bengal government and sought permission to take steps to remedy it.
Permission came. Government rice vending centres were opened. Six months ago, only one cent of rice per day was sold to hungry people from 10-15 kosh away who had bought 35 cents of rice for Rs. 35 a day. Several canals were dug up, propagating that the main cause of the famine was the lack of irrigation in the fields. For this, instead of less food, there was a lot of labour force. But the fact that such a pathetic incident had taken place in the coastal areas due to the digging of the canal earlier did not come to light.
This incident proves that the Bengali clerks of Calcutta were not a hindrance in exporting rice to Odisha, it was Ravensa herself. Ravensa herself used to write letters and her trusted clerk Bichitrananda Das and Puri Collector Barlow repeatedly pointed out the plight of the people of Odisha, but she was not changing her predetermined decision. In just eight months, 20 lakh people of an empty caste died without a war, without food, and 10 lakh people migrated due to the arrogance of an administrator. There has never been a greater man-made event on earth than this.
Famine Commission Report:
Some humanist members of the Uk Parliament were shocked and disturbed to learn of such a shocking incident of the Odisha famine. Their demand led to a commission of inquiry headed by Judge Malvel. Even more worrisome is the official testimony he took when the famine commission arrived on a ship named Feroze on December 17, 1866. The deputy magistrate said the people of Kendrapara were eating human flesh. He has heard from peons and barkandaj that people from untouchable castes are eating beef and sometimes raw meat. As of October, 1,67,356 of the 4,01,501 people in Puri district had died, according to the police report. Relief Assistant Collector G.M. Kerry gave his eyewitness account and said that only two out of 28 families in a chilean village are in a state of disrepair. The following is some of what the Commission had written in the report protecting the government, despite the fact that it was heartbroken to see and hear such a situation with its own eyes.
“The extent mortality never will be ascertained with any accuracy. Mr Revenshaw in his report of November first astimated it at not less than one fourth of population of the province. In the supplemental report of November 6th. He shows that in the subdivisions of Kendrapara, one fourth of the people are estimated to have died before first August and the mortality consequent on emaciation and want having continued for several months subsequent on emaciation and want having been, in the part of the country allowed to very considerably aggravated by floods”. (69th para of 1st part; malbhel report) ××× Things came to that pass that money was spumed as worthless. Prices were constantly merely normal, where rice was to be bought at all, it reached the rate of 5, 4 and 3 Calcutta seers (2 pounds each) per rupee at the chief stations where the external relief afforded was greatest and in the interior of the districts still higher rate are reported, even to one seer per rupee. These rates are far beyond those known in any famine in this country of which we have informations.
That is, in just two months, a quarter of the people of Kendrapara sub-division died without food. By this time, however, the Kendrapara, Patamundai and Jambu canals had been dug up for the agricultural development of the region. But since the canal was dug for movement, not agriculture, there was enough water in it, but there was no water going to the fields. The price of rice went up unexpectedly due to crop failure due to drought in the month of Ashadh without getting water. As a result, the poor, who bought rice every day, first got wages and then started dying due to lack of rice.
The committee report, chaired by Judge Campbell, blamed the NGO’s relief operations for the famine. After the nine-year famine, some Bengalis could not bear to take the blame away from their heads and put the blame on the head of the Bengali clerk, blaming the inconsequities of Ravenshaw and the indifference of Bengalis. In 1866, Gopalchandra Halder, one of the few sycophants, wrote a book called ‘Cuttack Famine’, praising clerks and hakims, describing Oriya as incomprehensible and blaming the entire Oriya for the famine of the nine. Strongly protesting against this, Swabhimani Gaurishankar wrote on the Utkaldeepika page – the bookgiver writes that there are few Bengali zamindars here. Even though their incomes are very low, they have helped in the prevention of famine according to their own. This view is an illusion – babu Ramnath Roy Chowdhury, Babu Laxminarayan Chaudhary, Babu Debendranath Thakur and Asureshwar and Pattamundi zamindars have a very low income? Some of them are millionaires and they have never helped according to their own strength. The outher has utterly condemned an Oriya zamindar. What he mentions and writes is known from his writings, but he does not fit such slander and slander. (8/12/1866)
After the British company achieved its first goal through another terrible massacre from the Battle of Kalinga by the famine of the man-made nine, now the second goal, Jagannath, came forward to abolish consciousness. The power of their protest had already been hijacked as only one-third of the muslim Oriya farmers survived by any means possible. And they were grateful to the British government for surviving the mercy of the administration.
Ravenshaw’s relief distribution policy; Give religion, take food:
After the arrival of rice after the famine, the responsibility of distributing it was given to the missionaries. Despite the strict adherence to Hinduism’s strict religious norms, they were first introduced into Christianity by luring their fatherless, fatherless, identityless and illegitimate children into Christianity by luring them with food and security because they could not find food during the famine. As the number of starvation deaths gradually increased, the enthusiasm of the clergy grew. With the help and full support of the government, they left Cuttack and adjoining areas to enter inaccessible rural and tribal areas. Utkal Deepika talks about the activities of the famine relief committee set up by the government.
“xxx The issue of protecting the xxx helpless boys and girls has been reminded of the help kumeti for three months, so that their plight is not yet resolved, who can be blamed for it. There would have been no need to make any arrangements in favour of the children now if Help Kumeti was well-intentioned from the beginning. The members of Sahayata Kumeti are all English people except one Hindu. When they did not consider the condition of the country, and appointed a clergy sahib in the maintenance of the children with the pride of their superior qualities, the fear of the people was that this was the way to increase the party of Jesus Christ. Because of this, even though the afflicted suffered a lot, they did not send their orthopaedic children to the priests. Even if the burden had been handed over to a Hindu, not a single helpless boy would have been seen wandering through the city at present, and many of the distressed would not have sold their children to prostitutes for a nominal amount of money or at no cost, just to free them from timeless. This helped, because of kumeti’s inability, many dormant animals were forced to survive by highly polluted deeds in the future. (The first part/second issue of Utkal Deepika ta 11/8/1866)
And elsewhere it is mentioned: “The Sanghangh clergy community is not the proper vessel of their upkeep, for he should bear this grave burden with as much care and honesty as he may be; The people here feel that they have adopted this India only to increase the Christian party and the government has also given the children to him, citing bias towards that religion. Children who are very young children are unnecessary to consider, but those who have some knowledge are reluctant to be brought up by the priests themselves. (The second part/second issue of ‘Utkal Deepika’, dated 12/1/1867).
On the one hand, while religious conversions were going on in the guise of distributing rice, bichitrananda’s efforts were to bring many jatiharas back to their own caste. As a result, he became angry with the then clergymen and British officials. At the same time, the advent of Mahimadharma created a new foundation in Odia national life and instilled hope of living with dignity in the hearts of the fallen bubhukshu people. It is known from the page of Utkaldeepika- “They build good houses in one place and give food to 45,000 thousand people, and sometimes if they want, they burn the house and leave the place. About 20 or 30,000 people are said to have adopted this religion. (Utkal Deepika, Part II/22 no. 1/6/1867).
Education system of Odisha and Ravenshaw:
Many feel that Ravenshaw has a huge role to play in the modern education system of Odisha. In fact, there are a lot of question marks in it too. After the Paik Rebellion, schools or language schools (now Odia medium schools) were established across India in the style of English education according to the Macle system of education, which came into force on 7.3.1835. On 7 December 1837, Henry Ricketts, the commissioner of Orissa, wrote a letter to the then Badlat, saying, “If the neglected Oriyas in the field of education had been taught the right education, he would have been more loyal than other castes”. The first school inspector of Odisha, E. Sor, in his annual report of 1857-58, opined: “The dialect of Bengali is not Oriya, but self-contained language. It has its own grammar and script. The Puranas have also been translated and written in a special basic way, but these are not being read. ”
Of the 100 schools established in Odisha from 1835 to 1870, 14 were high English schools and the rest were vernacular or language schools. The establishment of so many modern schools in just 30 years was a blessing in the education system of Odisha. Odia children like Bichitrananda Das and Madhubabu studied and became clerks, especially from the Cuttack District School established in 1841. However, due to lack of a job mentality and the Odias gave importance to business at that time, chatty education was their priority, so bengali children were studying more than Odia in modern schools. While the rule of Odisha from Calcutta and the zamindari of Odisha remained in Bengali hands, the Odias were aware of education and 100 per cent were educated, according to the then annual education report.
According to the Wood Declaration in 1854, the University of Calcutta, Medical College, was established in 1857. Commissioner Clerk Bichitrananda Das discussed with the intellectuals of Cuttack and submitted a charter of demands for setting up such a college in Odisha. He also established the Cuttack Hindu Balika Vidyalaya in 1868 for girls’ education, the editor of which was Avinash Chattopadhyay. Therefore, the Cuttack District School, which was restored in 1851, was converted into a class II college or collegiate school in 1863. Bichitrananda Das’s role in the completion of BA, Honours in Cuttack Collegiate School and converting it into a full-fledged college is important. On 8/11/1874, he started efforts to consolidate Odisha, build a railway track, set up a full-fledged college by organizing a meliavardhani ceremony with the help of the kings, zamindars and nobles of Odisha. For this, on February 27, 1875, he handed over a memorandum to The Little Richard Temple, who came to Odisha, through this meeting by zamindar Shyamananda Dey and other dignitaries at Balasore. While the government spends Rs 3,000/-, Rs 3,500/- per month for Dhaka and Patna colleges, the proposal said it would cost rs 1,000 less than that for setting up a college in Cuttack. According to the proposal, the Cuttack Commissioner of Bengal Had written to Ravensa in April to allow the establishment of a class I college at the rate of a total of Rs 12,000 per annum, out of a total of Rs 60,000 for five years, after depositing Rs 30,000 from the people of Odisha with the government.
Ravenshaw issued a notice in June to donate money along with the orders of Bangla Chotalat for setting up an Odisha college. Thinking that it is impossible for a common Odia, who is starving, to collect so much money and give it to the government, Utkaldeepika wrote on page 98 of June 19, 1875 – the advertisement does not show whether the advertisement alone will fetch Rs. 30,000.00 or else. It is assumed that he has completed his duty. When that happens, then all this happens when the commissioner tries to withdraw this money, then he should hold a meeting of all the rich people once through the collectors of the three districts for the rs. 6000 applicable for every year, then there may be some result. As a result, it is not possible for us to get an annual salary of Rs. 6,000 from Odisha or Rs. 30,000 at a time. At the time of Meo Sahib’s death, the zamindars, the king of Gadjat and Mughalbandi, came together and signed a donation of Rs 15,000/16,000. Since that time, what civilization and wealth has grown that double the amount of money will be handed over effortlessly? In any case, even though he envisioned raising the money for five years, he did not say whether the college would be in the future or not and how it would be spent if it remained. xxx। When the government wishes to set up colleges in Odisha, then just like you are spending money on other colleges, do not spend money for it, otherwise unnecessarily the money of the common man and the people should not be spent only for the maintenance of the staff.
It is clear from this article that there is no specific order of the government or any means of collecting money for setting up the college on a permanent basis. However, on the basis of this letter of the government, this seemingly impossible amount, bichitrananda Das, who had a special place in the hearts of the then people of Odisha by devoting himself fully in the time of his personal relations, dutifulness and famine, was able to collect the required money by the month of July. Bichitrananda’s popularity increased further after this impossible task was made possible without government orders. Therefore, in a meeting of the college committee held on Monday, 26th of this month, the Commissioner Ravenshaw proposed the name of The Priest Samuel Ezer, who was forcing the conversion of the needy in return for feeding the needy during the famine, for appointment to the post of principal of the new college, but in support of Bichitranand, the members did not agree. According to Utkal Deepika – “The college should be made to make arrangements and care that it is as fruitful as expected and remains permanent.” On the other hand, it is only advisable to look at merit; Everything will be corrupted by “ignoring the passing” of the individual. Last Monday, in the school’s committee, Mr. Kamishner Saheb proposed the appointment of Ezer Saheb as the college principal, but no one included him in it. It will be decided in the larger meeting if the hearing of this serious matter is postponed due to the small number of members present. It’s been good. ”
As the above description shows, the pressure of the all-powerful Ravenshaw of the time was not heeded as the college committee was giving importance to the appointment of suitable teachers and principals. So Ravenshaw was trying to get his proposal passed in another large meeting. Reminding the commission’s responsibility and dignity as the committee members felt this, Utkal Deepika finally wrote: “We request Mr. Kamishnarsaheb to carefully consider this and work towards this so that fame does not take place immediately and his efforts, hard work and care do not fail.”
Ravenshaw did not pay heed to this warning of Utkal Deepika’s request. Rather, he started a conspiracy to fulfill his stubbornness. Had it not been for that, Odisha would not have lost its worthy son Adinetha Bichitrananda Das. On Monday, August 2, 1875, just eight days after his proposal was rejected, bichitrananda Das, the original man of the establishment of the college, died suddenly. So the appointment of Samuel Edger as the principal of the new college paved the way. At the time of the establishment of cuttack college in 1876, mayurbhanj raja’s donation in the construction of the college was only Rs 500. After the collection of Rs. 31,465 from the people of Odisha with the college funds and rs. 30,000 given by the Government of Bengal, the college education started in the district school premises near the Cuttack Court at a cost of Rs. 1000 per month (Principal-450/-, Lecturer- 250/-, Chemical Teacher- 200/-, Baje Expenses 100/-). When there was no shortage of funds in the college, suddenly two years after its construction, it was revealed in the Calcutta Gazette that mayurbhanj raja had donated Rs 20,000 to the company and the college’s partial expenses would run on its interest and on the request it was renamed Ravenshaw College. The cuttack collegiate, the original institution of the college, was renamed as Ravenshaw Collegiate School after it was separated from there. Unfortunately, the untimely death of the 48-year-old Odiapran Bichitrananda Das, who saved Odisha from the famine of nine and laid the foundation of Odisha’s education system, gave Ravensa the seat of the builder of modern Odisha.
Introduction of Odia language in schools and Ravenshaw:
By the 1860s, as many as 84 schools were established, and the number of children was gradually increasing. But at the same time, the Odia textbooks, which were already being printed, were suddenly stopped. As a result, bengali and Marathi children with a large number were forced to take the exam in Odia by reading Bengali and Hindi books. Noting this difficulty, the Bengalis demanded that these schools in Odisha should be taught through Bengali along with the introduction of Bengali books. School Inspector Matin, who visited the Odisha School, wrote a letter on 30.3.68, explaining the government’s neglect towards odia language in the independence of Odia language, the premises of this speaking area, other suburbs and proposed to the government to introduce Odia language class-wise in schools in Odisha. “Since the education department is managed by the inspectors of Bengal, the district in the north of Odisha, of Mandraj province in the south, and by the district of Madhya Pradesh in the west, these staff are more careful about Bengali, Telugu and Hindi schools,” he points out.
As a result, these three languages are getting better and the Odia language is declining. So they are forced to live below other languages in terms of education. As a result, all the jobs in Odisha are handed over to these highly educated non-Odias. In order to solve the shortage of Odia textbooks to introduce a rich language like Odia in school education, it has become necessary to translate odia with the election of books of different classes on a priority basis. In the early days, bengali language and literature were improved through translation into Bengali and applied to school education. Therefore, he hoped that odia language and literature could also be improved in that formula. In this article, he gave an account of the four types of schools of the time – (1) Puri and Balasore District Schools, (2) Middle English Vernacular Schools, (3) Middle Vernacular Schools, (4) Lower Class Schools. While it is optional for districts and high schools to study in Bengali or Oriya language, students of other schools will have to learn through their mother tongue. Only Odia textbooks will be introduced for lower class schools.
When the Bengal government directed The Odisha Commissioner Ravenshaw to give his opinion on martin’s two letters and atkin letters, the commissioner did not respond quickly and sought the opinion of the district collector and the educated Oriyas and Bengalis by presenting the issue in various meetings. Cuttack District Collector Bowring emphasized on the introduction of Bengali language while Cuttack Commissioner Mills and Goldberry voted in favour of Odia language. The people of Odisha also lodged a strong protest through Utkaldeepika (4.1.68). Sadly, commissioner Ravensa’s letter to the government on 21.11.67 did not mention the strong protest against the injustice meted out to the government and the Bengali-speaking employees in the petition submitted by the Odia people to the Government of Bengal.
In response to the letter dated 16.7.1868, the Government of Bengal wrote to The Department of Education to Stoppinson on 16.7.1868, after a long year and 15 days (10.8.1869), suggested that the government should only silently aim at it by “leaving the established language policy on the bi-lingual tradition going on in schools for self-mediation”. Which was a favourable comment about the introduction of Bengali language. The proposal was rejected completely and accepted by the Oriyas, and the much-awaited declaration regarding education in Odia schools was published on 8.11.69. The Bengali-speaking students studying in schools in Odisha were forced to learn through Odia language as they did not give any specific list for Bengali-speaking students when Odia students studied in Odia language due to his ‘Extra language’ remark about textbooks in government schools.
Those who argue that Ravensa has a role to play in the introduction of Odisha’s education system clearly understand the true mentality of Ravensa from all these facts. If you look at the examination rules framed in 1871 to appoint Odia youth as deputy collectors, Ravensa’s abominable mentality towards Oriya becomes quite evident. In which he had made it mandatory for a child to produce a medical certificate before the examination, which would be issued by a doctor from Calcutta. There was also a rule that bengali children will take the exam in Bengali, Bihar children will take the exam in Hindi, Odia will give Odia, who is the main hero of this conspiracy to separate the modern educated Odia before the examination in Bengal?
Ravenshaw came to Odisha only as an administrator. He did not do any good work for Odisha, which Odias will remember him for.
Dr. Subrat Kumar Prusty
https://utkal-university.academia.edu/DrSubratPrusty
