History, landscape, and indigeneity in Chotanagpur, 1850–1980

Introduction The pioneering work of writers such as Eric Hobsbawm, Terence Ranger, and Benedict Anderson in Europe, and Leroy Vail in Africa has served to challenge the a-historical and primordial assumptions underlying nationalist and ethnic ideologies. In the words of Leroy Vail: 'If ethnic consciousness was a product of historical experience, then its creation and elaboration would be a proper subject of enquiry for historians'. One can perhaps make a similar argument for the concept of indigeneity. Crispin Bates has recently argued that there is nothing indigenous about the adivasis of India, and that the tribes may be seen as 'an invention rather than as victims of modernity'. He goes on to note that claims that they are the 'original inhabitants' are used by the adivasis to legitimise demands for the redress of present day economic and political inequalities. Despite claims of a past golden age, their identity is of recent origin and rather than being the 'original inhabitants' they are the 'recently dispossessed'. This may or may not be true, depending on different case studies; for instance, the Chakmas of the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) were by no means the first people to enter the region, but were recent immigrants, following the Arkanese and Tripurans. Yet today Chakma identity is firmly linked to the hill tracts where they have sought to develop an 'indigenous' model of state, society and culture.