1st Edition
Darjeeling In Search of People’s History of the Hills
History has always dealt with people, yet often gazing at the people from the perspectives of the non-people – colonizers, intruders, outsiders and the privileged elite insiders – who seem to have internalized the ‘mainstream’ perspective framed by the outsiders. In this context a group of scholars working on Darjeeling felt that there was a need for an inclusive people’s history of the Darjeeling hills.
The present volume tries to fill this gap of the missing voices of the people of the Darjeeling hills and their cultures through re-writing inclusive history of society and culture from ‘below’, not only by decoding the elements that are treated as tradition, but also the transformations in the realms of arts and ecology. For, the tribal-scape of the Darjeeling hills is not a static/frozen zone and the people (hence, the geo-space) are in continuous transition from traditional beings towards becoming neo-traditional. Accepting history as constantly ‘extra mural’ the objectives of the book are to focus on undocumented histories related to harmony, intimacy, belongingness and environmental care and thereby, interact the living with what is often projected as ‘dead’, by rejecting to abide by any given set of references as the final/‘scientific’/authentic and, thereby, opening up with other kinds of historical dialogue with the understated historical items that are accessible in Darjeeling.
Taylor & Francis does not sell or distribute the print version of this book in India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.
Introduction
DINESH CHANDRA RAY and SRIKANTA ROY CHOWDHURY
PART 1: THEORETICAL CONCEPTS AND CONCERNS
1. Do ‘People’ Exist?: The Problems of Writing People’s History
TANKA B. SUBBA
2. Darjeeling: In Search of People’s History
ICCHIMUDDIN SARKAR
PART 2: DARJEELING HILLS AND THE COLONIZERS
3. A Discourse on Control, Discipline and Punishment: Prisons in Colonial Darjeeling (1835-1947)
DAHLIA BHATTACHARYA
4. Transforming Land and Landscape in Colonial Darjeeling: Readings in History
TAHITI SARKAR
5. Popularizing Western Sports in Darjeeling Hills: The Context of Educational Institutions
AWASHES SUBBA
6. Tourism and Recreation in Colonial Darjeeling: A Social History of Leisure
SUMAN MUKHERJEE
PART 3: PEOPLE AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF AN IDENTITY
7. Multiple Imaginations: Exploration of the Different Notions of Homeland Present in the Darjeeling Hills
RAHUL GANGULY
8. The Formation of Nepal, Nepali and Gurkha in the Colonial Discourse
DEEPJOY KATUWAL
9. Contextualizing Nepali Nationalism in the History of Darjeeling: Issues and Challenges
SOMOSHREE DE
10. Geographies of Exclusion, Identity and Gorkhaland Movement
BISHAL CHHETRI
PART 4: PLURALITY AND SYNCRETISM
11. Cultural Pluralism in Darjeeling and Kalimpong: Reflections from Oral History
KISHAN HARIJAN
12. Christianity and Indigenization: Sociocultural Impact on the Lepchas of Darjeeling Hills
DEWAKAR THATAL
13. Politics of Ethnic Solidarity: A Post-colonial Analysis in Darjeeling Hills and sub-Himalayan Region of North Bengal
NIRMAL CHANDRA ROY
14. Cultural Synthesis of Darjeeling Concerning Leisure during Colonial Rule
VIVEK THAPA
PART 5: POLITICS OF REPRESENTATION: LANGUAGE, ARTS AND LITERATURE
15. Origin and Growth of Nepali Language in India: An Exploratory Survey
SUSHMA RAI
16. The Third Space in the Tea Garden Literature: Revisiting Select Works from Darjeeling
NIMA DOMA LAMA and RATHIKA SUBBA
17. Birth of ‘Gorkha Janapustakalaya’ in Kurseong: An Outcome of People’s Consciousness during the Colonial Period
ILLORA SHARMA
18. Ethnic and Cultural Identity in Music: Study of the Ethnomusic of Some of the Ethnic People of Darjeeling
SUDASH LAMA and ANAND SHERPA
PART 6: HISTORIES FROM THE PERIPHERY
19. The Unwritten History of the Balmiki Community in Darjeeling Hills: History from ‘Below’
LEKHRAJ BALMIKI
20. Misery of the Tea Garden Workers: Immediate Effect of the Garden Shutdown
SAURAV CHETTRI
Biography
Dinesh Chandra Ray, Ph.D., is presently Assistant Professor in History, Southfield College, Darjeeling. As Joint Editor he edited Discourses on Darjeeling Hills (2013).
Srikanta Roy Chowdhury, Ph.D., is presently Assistant Professor in History, Southfield College, Darjeeling. He has published From Bāngālār Itihāsa to Bāngālīr Itihāsa: History in Making (2007) and edited 1857: Text & Beyond (2013) and Darjeeling Hills University & the Prospects of Higher Education in the Hills (2020).
