Nilgiris district: Difference between revisions

It was originally tribal land and was occupied by the Moundadan Chetty, Badagas, Thodas, Kotahs, Kurumbas, Irulas. [[Moundadan Chetty]] around what is now the Gudalur area [[Todas]] around what is now the Ooty area, and by the [[Kotas]] around what is now the Kotagiri(Kothar Keri) area. The [[Badagas]] are one of the major non tribal, where Badagas was in Triblist earlier(Reference, British Gazette 1931) .The Badagas are the largest aboriginal indigenous group among the native tribes of The Nilgiris District.Unlike any other region in the country, no historical proof is found to state that the Nilgiris was a part of any kingdoms or empires. It was originally a tribal land and was occupied by the aboriginals such as the Badagas, Todas, Kota, Moundadan chetty, Kurumba, Irula, Panniya, and Kattunaicken. Todas had “munds” that is their settlements in Ooty, Kodanad, and Ketti Mandhada, Garswood, and PPI Mund. The Badagas had their “Hatties” that is villages throughout the district, some of the main hattis are Katteri, Nanjanadu, Nandhatti, Pandhaluru, Yedakadu, Nedugula, Yedapalli, etc. The Badagas are the predominant tribe as per the Madras Gazetteer 1908. The hills were developed rapidly under the British, who also termed the District as a “Dark Country”, akin to Africa being called the “Dark Continent”, the term “Dark” connoting that its hinterland was largely unknown and therefore mysterious to Europeans until the 19th century. Henry M. Stanley was probably the first to use the term in his 1878 account Through the Dark Continent. It has no history of its own. It had neither kingdom to conquer nor fort to capture . During the British raj Ooty served as the summer capital of the Madras Presidency. Most historians, reporters, handbooks, regime reports and writers have but a myopic view restricting the canvas of the District to Ooty only but have ignored the other regions of the Nilgiris District. The Madras Gazetteer published by the British Government is the first and only authentic report with regard to the Nilgiris, its demography and its culture almost all other studies quote different versions and are debated extensively, even reports submitted by the regime do not portray the real cultural, linguistic and ethnical mosaic of the Nilgiris District as there is nothing recorded in writing like stone inscriptions, ancient monuments (excepting dolmens belonging to the Badaga people as a symbol of respect to mother nature/Earth as they were Nature Worshipers before they were influenced by Hinduism) or books because none of the aboriginal people living in the Nilgiris district had a script to record their history and most of what was gathered by the modern historians is through interviews with locals at different points of time, on interpreting some of the ballads sung by the local people, and hence there was leeway for distortion of facts and as the District borders three different states, there are different stories and versions to the history of the district, none of which can be taken as authentic. Moreover to lay claim to the District, which is a Natural Treasure house blessed with nature's bounties the non-native's from the plains/vested interests belonging to different regions have tried to create facts suitable to their claims on the district and none of these are authentic. Hence the recorded history of the District is only after the advent of the British to the District that is after 1799. Almost all of the names of the places in the Nilgiris District are derived from the Badagu language spoken by the predominant Badaga community, e.g., Othagai, Doddabetta, Coonoor, Kotagiri, Gudaluru, Kundae etc.,. Further to establish that the Badagas were the Pre-dominant people of the Nilgiris, the dominant landholders belonged to the Badagas. One vague theory propounded by these non-natives is that the Badaga people migrated from the area of old Mysore state more than three centuries ago this is not correct, as there could have been trickles from the plains but these migrants migrated to the Land of the Badagas as the Badagas were the original sons of the soil of The Nilgiris District. Population in the district who reside in the mountain. Although the Nilgiri hills are mentioned in the [[Ramayana]] of [[Valmiki]] (estimated by Western scholars to have been recorded in the second century BCE), they remained all but undiscovered by Europeans until 1602. This was when the first European set foot into the jungles. A Portuguese priest going by the name of Ferreiri resolved to explore the hills and succeeded. He came upon a community of people calling themselves the "Toda." This priest seems to have been the only European to have explored this area. The Europeans in India more or less seem to have ignored the ghats for some two hundred or more years.

[[Tamil language|Tamil]] is the principal language spoken in the Nilgiris. Many people speak and understand English. [[Kannada]], [[Malayalam]] and [[Hindi]] are also used to an extent. The Nilgiris is also home to the [[Cheetylanguage]], spoken by the [[Moundadan Chetty people]], [[Toda language]], spoken by the [[Toda people]] and [[Kota language]] is spoken by the [[Kota Tribes]]. The [[Paniya language]] is spoken in the western parts of the district.