ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses the roots, course, character and significance of the Reang rebellion in Tripura during 1943– 45. This was a collective tribal protest movement, violent in form and autonomous in mobilization. This rebellion inaugurated the tradition of radical politics in Tripura. The chapter argues that ethnic identity is not always a matter of elite manipulation of symbols, as some studies on ethnicity would suggest, but a product of indigenous mass mobilization. It uses the term 'rebellion' to refer to 'organized armed resistance to established authority'. The chapter objectives are three-fold: examination of the roots of the rebellion; analysis of its course and character; and examination of the implications of the same for future radical politics in Tripura. The counter-insurgency reports of the government of Tripura mainly described the Reang rebels as 'dacoits' or 'dacoits party'. That was the official, negative version of the rebellion. The Reang rebellion was a minority rebellion within the Tripura tribal-peasant society.
