Rebellion, exile and the forced displacement: The history of Mappilas of Andaman Island
Authors :M. Sasikumar
Abstract
The study of displaced people and immigrants is now a major area in the disciplines of Sociology and Social Anthropology. It examines the process of displacement, migration and adaptation of the communities in alien lands. Ethnographic accounts of labour migration and narratives from victims of development-induced displacement has widened the scope of interdisciplinary studies of displacement and migration further. The last decades of the 20th century and right through the 21st century witnessed a surge in the refugee population. It added another dimension to this field of research. Uprooting, exile and forced displacement of victims of rebellions were not a rare phenomenon during the colonial period. However, studies of such societies did not find much attention in the traditional anthropological discourses. In this paper, an attempt has been made to overview the historical antecedents of the exile, deportation and forced resettlement of the Mappilas of Malabar in a far-flung and isolated island inhabited only by hostile aborigines and deported convicts. It also enquires what had happened to them once they were left in a culturally uncongenial and ecologically inhospitable island known as kalapani (the black water); to find their own way.
Key Words: Mappila, rebellion, convicts, deportation, penal colony, settlement, importation, Jarawa.
