The Eka Movement emerged as a significant agrarian uprising in 1921, where peasants in Awadh collectively resisted oppressive colonial taxation, landlord exploitation, and unjust tenancy practices.
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- The Eka Movement began in late 1921 in Bahraich district of present-day Uttar Pradesh, led primarily by Pasi tribal peasants against British and landlord exploitation.
- The movement derived its name “Eka,” meaning unity, symbolising collective peasant resistance across caste and regional divisions in rural Awadh.
- It emerged in response to high land revenue demands, arbitrary rent increases, illegal levies, and forced labour imposed by landlords and colonial authorities.
- Peasants demanded reduction in rents, abolition of nazrana payments, removal of illegal charges, and protection against arbitrary eviction from cultivated land.
- The movement spread rapidly across districts like Sitapur, Hardoi, Barabanki, and Unnao through village committees known as Eka Samitis.
- Participants took collective pledges near symbolic river sites, committing to pay only recorded rents and boycott landlord-imposed illegal obligations.
- British authorities suppressed the movement through police action, arrests, and coercive measures, leading to its decline by early 1922.
- Despite suppression, the Eka Movement strengthened rural solidarity and influenced future peasant uprisings in colonial India.




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