By H H Mohrmen
The term Jaiñtia has always been abhorred by certain sections of the population who also blame the British for creating that name. Those who know very little about the history of the land detest the use of the term and even call it a non-local name, therefore not indigenous. Scholars who study the subject are ridiculed and questioned if they are not ashamed to be called Jaiñtia, which is obviously considered a non-tribal name. But the blame goes to those who detest the notion, for their lack of knowledge of the history of the place.
It is true that the name of the hills district, Jaiñtia, has its origin in the ancient kingdom in the plains called Jayantia, with its capital at Jayantiapur (Jayantia buranji), but it was the latter part of the history of the kingdom which is related to the highlanders.
The origin and the rise of the Sutnga kingdom
Sutnga was the kingdom of a small tribal chieftain who was able to consolidate his power and become the ruler of a powerful kingdom, not only in the hills but one whose dominion extended to the plains as well. Folk narratives have it that the Sutnga dynasty originated from a nymph who became the progenitor of the clan. History records that Prabhat Rai (not his real name, but a name given to him by the people he conquered), which means the Lord of the Hills, was the king who defeated the Jayantia kingdom and annexed it to his own kingdom (Jayantia Buranji / Gait, E. A., p. 253, 255).
After he had extended the kingdom’s dominion to the plains, he was attracted by the cultural advancement and development of the new kingdom and perhaps for this reason he decided to move his capital to Jayantiapur in the plains. The shifting of the capital to the plains also helped him gain access to the larger and wider world. This, in a nutshell, was how a small hill kingdom later became very powerful and entered into encounters and marriage alliances with other dominant kingdoms of the time.
The rise of the Jayantia kingdom
The Jayantia kingdom flourished between 1500 and the early part of the 1800s, and during the reigns of different kings they were able to issue coins, a very important achievement of the kingdom. The Jaintia kings were first mentioned in the annals of the Koch kingdom when Nar Narayan, the Koch king, defeated the Jaintia in the early part of the sixteenth century. Apart from the Koch, the kingdom had numerous encounters with other neighbouring kingdoms.
The Jayantia kingdom had at least three encounters with the British. The first was as early as 1774, when the British, under the leadership of Major Hennicker, led an expedition against the Jayantia (Gait, p. 260). The second uprising was in the 1850s and the early 1860s, when the British levied income tax on the hill people, and the last rebellion was the 1862–63 uprising led by u Kiang Nangbah (Giri, H., p 82).
Jayantia Connection with the British Raj
Jaiñtia, or what was formerly ka Hima ki Syiem Sutnga, was a flourishing country until the British annexed it on March 15, 1835 (Gait, E. A., 1906, p. 302). When the kingdom was annexed, it comprised the Jayantia parganas in the Sylhet district and the hills up to Goba, which is in Nowgong (Gait, E. A., 302.).
After the annexation, the king was left with only the hills portion of the kingdom, which provided him with very little or no revenue at all. U Ram Singh, the king of the Jaintia kingdom, had no interest in continuing to rule the hills section of the kingdom once he lost the Jayantia parganas, which constituted the plains part of the country. The hills portion did not provide him with the kind of revenue he had earlier collected from the plains. The king therefore opted to receive a pension of Rs. 500 rather than continue to rule the hills.
Two Political Entities under the British Government
The salubrious climate of the region was what led the British to set their eyes on the hills; they were in need of a sanatorium for the convalescence of British officers. Helen Giri, in her book, mentioned that David Scott was the first officer to suggest the setting up of a “convalescent station” in the hills, particularly in Sohra or Cherrapunjee (Giri, Helen, The Khasi under British Rule, 1824–1947, 1998).
Post-1835, the area we now know as the Khasi and Jaintia Hills was recognised as two political entities by the British government: the Khasi–Jaintia region and the Khasi States (Bodhi, S. R., 2020). The Khasi states were independent whereas the Khasi–Jaintia regions were those under the direct control of the British government. These were either kingdoms defeated and annexed to the British Empire, as in the case of the Jaintia Hills, or areas acquired through various agreements and treaties, as in the case of Cherrapoonjee.
There were three agreements between Dewan Sing Rajah of Sohra and the British government, represented by David Scott, in the year 1829: Treaties No. LXXVI, No. LXVII, and another relating to the ceding of land for the setting up of a haat near Panduah and Company-Gunge near Sylhet (Bodhi, S. R., 2020). These areas were included in the Khasi–Jaintia region of the British government. Later, the Khasi and Jaintia Hills were made one of the districts of the Assam Division, and a notification to this effect was issued in the year 1858 (Bodhi, S. R., 2020).
Initially, the British set up a base at Nongkhlaw, which was later shifted to Sohra (Cherrapunjee) (Bodhi, S. R., 2020). It was from Cherrapunjee that the British administered the Khasi and Jaintia Hills, the area under direct British control which also included the territory that was part of the erstwhile Jaintia kingdom.
The British, having direct control over the Khasi and Jaintia Hills region, for reasons best known to the government, decided to establish a thanah at Jowai in 1855 (Giri, Helen, 1998). The thanah was evidently the first government institution set up in the hills portion of the Jaintia Hills. The establishment of the thanah was one of the main causes of the rebellion under the leadership of u Kiang Nangbah.
Bodhi also mentioned that the Khasi and Jaintia Hills District included only the British areas that fell within the jurisdiction of the Jowai Subdivision. A notification to this effect was issued on 6 November 1869 and published in the Calcutta Gazette, 24 November 1869, p. 2067 (Bodhi, S. R., 2020). Perhaps the Jowai Subdivision, which was stationed at Jowai, was established by the British government in the year 1869. By then, there were two government institutions in Jowai: the thanah, established in 1855, and the Jowai Subdivision, established in 1869. Both these institutions were set up in the Ïawmusiang area.
Jowai’s Connection with Shillong
One of the factors that led to the Jaintia rebellion was the distance of Sohra from Jowai and the numerous problems that people from the area had to encounter when seeking redress for their grievances (Giri, H., p. 83). To address this problem, when the rebellion finally ended in the latter part of 1863, the government decided to station an English officer with full powers at Jowai (Giri, H., p. 95). The order stated”. . . a European officer as Sub-Assistant Commissioner to be stationed in the Jynteah Hills, who should exercise, in subordination to the Principal Assistant Commissioner at Cherrapoonjee, the same judicial, fiscal, and general powers as are given to detached Sub-Assistant Commissioners in Assam . . .” (Giri, H., p. 127).
When the station was shifted from Sohra to Shillong or Youdeo, the government felt the pressing requirements of public service and thus sanctioned two experimental offices, one at Yeodeo (Shillong) and the other at Jowai (Giri, H., p. 146). The transfer of British administrative headquarters from Cherrapunjee to Shillong occurred around 1864. The Jaiñtia Hills had been part of an independent kingdom and later part of the British Empire since 1823.
Jaiñtia is therefore not the creation of the British; it is part of the history of the hill people of the region, which later became one of the most powerful kingdoms in the area. Jaiñtia is also the country that u Kiang Nangbah had in mind when he rebelled against the British, and it was the freedom of this country that he fought for.
