God Died In Chains - June 9, 1900

About this episode

The episode explores the life and death of Birsa Munda, a tribal prophet who died in a British jail and led a rebellion for indigenous land rights.

On June 9, 1900, a 25-year-old tribal prophet named Birsa Munda died in a British colonial jail cell in India and the official record says cholera, while his people said something else entirely. He was a Christian convert who burned churches, a self-proclaimed messenger of God who led a violent armed rebellion, and a man whose central demand that the Munda people owned the land they had always worked was quietly granted by the British Empire eight years after they buried him in the dark. This is the story of the Ulgulan, The Great Tumult, and the question that indigenous communities on every continent are still fighting over today.

People in this episode

Host: Richard G Backus

Topics covered

• colonialism
• indigenous rights
• rebellion
• history
• Christianity
• land ownership

Keywords

• Birsa Munda
• British colonialism
• Ulgulan
• indigenous communities
• land rights
• Christian convert
• rebellion
• cholera

Mentioned in this episode

Places: India

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