Topic: Indigenous and Colonial Memory
How does India mark Indigenous and Colonial Memory?
जनजातीय गौरव दिवस
- Local date
- November 15, 2026
India tied its day to one man. In 2021, during the Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav marking seventy-five years of independence, the government declared 15 November Janjatiya Gaurav Divas, the birth anniversary of Birsa Munda, whose Ulgulan — the Revolution — was an armed rising against colonial rule, part of a history of Santhal, Tamar, Kol, Bhil, Khasi and Mizo revolts that mainstream accounts long passed over. The Ministry of Tribal Affairs runs it as a policy date rather than a ceremony: the Bhagwan Birsa Munda Memorial Park cum Freedom Fighter Museum opened at Ranchi on the day in 2021, PM-JANMAN for Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups was launched at Khunti in Jharkhand on the day in 2023, and 2024 marked the 150th birth anniversary, with Tribal Freedom Fighters' Museums opened across states where tribal communities resisted British rule. For scale: the 2011 census counted a Scheduled Tribe population of 10.42 crore, 8.6 per cent of the country, spread across more than 705 distinct groups.
What is this topic?
In the United States the second Monday in October is one square on the calendar claimed by two names. Federal law has not moved: 5 U.S.C. 6103 still lists Columbus Day, and 36 U.S.C. 107 still asks the President for an annual proclamation marking "the anniversary of the discovery of America." Everything else moved around it — South Dakota replaced the day with Native Americans' Day in 1990, Maine renamed it in 2019, Alabama keeps three names on one line, and the White House issued Indigenous Peoples' Day proclamations for exactly four years. Taiwan wrote three such commemorations into statute and gave a day off to none of them, Brazil renamed its day in 2022 without making it a holiday, India created one in 2021, and Japan recognised an indigenous people without giving it a date.
Sources and dates
Dates follow local time zones, calendars, and official notices. Check the source when a date is estimated or locally variable.