In which of the following areas did the Uprising of Khurda in 1817 take place?

Correct — D. Khurda lies in Odisha, near Bhubaneswar, and the rising of 1817 there is the one usually called the Paika Bidroha, or Paika Rebellion.

Khurda had been the seat of the Gajapati rulers of Odisha until the British took the region in 1803, and the paikas were its hereditary militia, holding rent-free land in return for military service.

Resumption of that land and heavier revenue and salt exactions produced the revolt, led by Bakshi Jagabandhu Bidyadhar — so the area is option (d).

Why the others are wrong

• (a)
  Bengal — Bengal is the tempting answer because Odisha was administered from Calcutta as part of the Bengal Presidency in 1817. The stem asks for the area of the rising, and Khurda sits in Odisha.
• (b)
  Madras — The Madras Presidency covered the far south and its own coastal districts. Khurda lies well outside it, and no Khurda rising belongs to Madras.
• (c)
  United Province — United Province did not exist in 1817 — the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh were constituted only in 1902. A name that postdates the event cannot be its location.

The paikas were a peasant militia, not a professional army. They held rent-free service land from the ruler of Khurda in exchange for bearing arms, so a change in land tenure hit their livelihood and their standing at the same time.

After the British occupied the region in 1803, the resumption of those holdings, new revenue demands and a heavier hand on salt turned an armed peasantry into a rebellion in 1817.

It was put down within a few years, and it remains the standard example of an early anti-British rising in eastern India.

Key facts

• The Khurda uprising of 1817 took place at Khurda in present-day Odisha.
• It is commonly known as the Paika Rebellion and was led by Bakshi Jagabandhu Bidyadhar.
• The paikas were a hereditary militia who held rent-free land in return for military service to the ruler of Khurda.
• The British occupied Odisha in 1803, and the region was administered as part of the Bengal Presidency until 1912.

Common traps

• Answering with the presidency that administered the region rather than the area named in the stem
• Confusing the 1817 Paika rising with later tribal revolts such as the Santhal or Munda risings

No directly related past PYQ was found.