Three factors were crucial in the Jharkhand movement: (1) the administrative unity of the region; (2) exploitation of the people and the material resources of the region by 'outsiders', mainly north Biharis; and (3) ethnic differences between the people of Chhotanagpur and Santhal Parganas and the people of north Bihar. The various movements in South Bihar and Santhal Parganas were not apparently 'political' before 1940s; they only aimed at tribal awakening and social and economic uplift. But later on the leaders of the movements realised that unless they ejected the north Bihar leaders and other 'outsiders' from positions of power and authority, they would not be able to deliver their own people. This paper argues that the basic forces underlying these movements were economic and ethnic and not 'political'; the 'political culture' of the movements was a strategy or a consequence of these forces rather than a determining factor.