Tirot Sing: The Khasi Hills’ Guerrilla War

Tirot Sing first agreed to let the British build a road through his hills. Later he led a guerrilla war to drive them out.

He fought with swords and bows against guns. His war began in 1829, nearly three decades before the Revolt of 1857.

1Who was Tirot Sing?

He was a Khasi chief who ruled with a council.

• His name is also written U Tirot Sing Syiem.
• He was the Syiem of Nongkhlaw, a Khasi hill state.
• Nongkhlaw lies in the Khasi Hills of present-day Meghalaya.
• He came from the Syiemlieh clan.
• He was a constitutional head, not an absolute ruler.
• He shared corporate authority with a council.
• The council had representatives of the leading clans in his territory.
• Big decisions were taken in a durbar, not by the chief alone.
• This shared rule explains why the road deal needed a full council meeting.

2Why did the British want a road?

The Khasi Hills lay between two British areas.

• The British gained the Brahmaputra valley by the Treaty of Yandabo in 1826.
• They now held Sylhet on one side and Lower Assam on the other.
• The Khasi Hills lay in between.
• The British wanted a road from Guwahati to Sylhet.
• It would save weeks of travel through malarious country.
• It would also let troops move quickly between the two regions.
• David Scott was the British agent for the northern frontier.
• He learned that Tirot Sing wanted the duars, or passes into Assam, back.
• The two sides struck a bargain: permission for the road in return for the duars.
• A durbar debated the plan for two days.
• The assembly then agreed, and work on the road began.
• A sanatorium was also part of the British plan.
• The road was thus meant to serve both trade and the army.

3How did the deal break down?

A quarrel over the duars made the Khasis lose trust.

• Balaram Singh, the Raja of Ranee, disputed Tirot Sing’s claim to the duars.
• In December 1828 Tirot Sing went there with armed men to press his claim.
• He expected the British to back him.
• Instead, British sepoys blocked his way.
• News then came that the British were sending more troops into Assam.
• Tirot Sing called the durbar again.
• It ordered the British to leave Nongkhlaw.
• The British paid no heed.
• For the Khasis, the road now looked like a first step to conquest.

4What was the Anglo-Khasi War?

It began with an attack on a British post.

• On 4 April 1829 the Khasis attacked the British garrison at Nongkhlaw.
• Two British officers died: Richard Gurdon Bedingfield and Philip Bowles Burlton.
• The British then began military operations against Tirot Sing and other chiefs.
• The Khasis had swords, shields, bows and arrows.
• They had no firearms.
• They were not trained in the British style of fighting.
• In open battle, the British could kill from a distance.
• So the Khasis chose guerrilla tactics.
• They used the hills and forests to their advantage.
• The guerrilla war dragged on for about four years.
• Other Khasi chiefs also fought the British in these years.
• The war is called the Anglo-Khasi War.
• Tirot Sing was shot at by the British and hid in a cave to tend his wound.

5How did the war end?

A betrayal ended his freedom.

• One of his own chiefs revealed his hiding place.
• The British had bribed that chief with gold coins.
• The British captured Tirot Sing in January 1833.
• They sent him to Dhaka.
• He died there on 17 July 1835.
• The Khasis lost the war, and the British gained control of the hills.
• After the defeat, the British gained supremacy over the Khasi Hills.
• His story ended in exile, far from his homeland.
• Meghalaya marks his death anniversary every year as U Tirot Sing Day.
• It is a state holiday.
• For the state, see Meghalaya.

6What are the exam traps?

This war is often forgotten, so exams like to test it.

• The Anglo-Khasi War ran from 1829 to 1833.
• It began decades before the Revolt of 1857.
• So 1857 was not the first armed resistance to British rule.
• Read it with the revolt of Kittur Chennamma.
• Do not mix him up with Pawibawia of the Lushai Hills.
• Do not mix him up with Rani Gaidinliu, who belonged to the Naga region.
• He was captured in January 1833, not in 1829.
• He died in Dhaka in exile. He was not hanged in the hills.
• He agreed to the road first, and fought only after the deal broke down.