gilli-danda

noun

A game played in several Asian countries, in which a large stick is used to hit a small oval-shaped piece of wood. It is played much like tipcat, baseball, and cricket.

Meanings

noungilli-danda (uncountable)

alternative Gilli-danda · alternative Gilli-Danda · alternative gilli danda · alternative Gilli Danda · alternative gillidanda · alternative guli danda

  1. uncountableA game played in several Asian countries, in which a large stick is used to hit a small oval-shaped piece of wood. It is played much like tipcat, baseball, and cricket.

    1970, Instructor, Volume 80, Instructor Publications It is played by children of all ages. Boys like it especially, but it is not unusual to see girls and even adults playing Gilli Danda!

    5 more examples

    Bhuvan the hero of the film to understand 'cricket', relates it to his understanding of their native folk game of Gilli Danda. He says: ball (image of the silli thing) is gola-gola-ball, bat-phalli-phalli-bat.

    2004, Triveni: Journal of Indian Renaissance, Volume 73, Triveni Publishers

    The indigenous games like gilli-danda, goli, kabaddi, tash, kabootar urana (pigeon flying), erhi koodna (long jump), surra, cheel jhapatna, tahat etc., were commonly played by both children and adults of the village[...]

    2011, Bhaskar Majumder, Rethinking Villages, Concept Publishing Company, page 110

    This happens because the hero of the film asserts that cricket is only a poor copy of their own age-old children's game of gilli-danda. So this mockery inverts the colonizing mission of civilizing the childlike natives on its head and also 'desecrates the "purity" of cricket roots' asserted by the British.

    2013, Subhas Ranjan Chakraborty, Shantanu Chakrabarti, Kingshuk Chatterjee, The Politics of Sport in South Asia, Routledge, page 156

    Also called guli danda, Gilli Danda is a sport for an amateur which is very popular among rural youth. It is known as Danguli in Bengali, Kuttiyam Kolum in Malayalam, Kitti-Pullu in Tamil, Chinni-Dandu in Kannada, Gooti-Billa in Telugu and Lappa-Duggi in Pashto. It follows the structure of cricket or baseball, only it is played with sticks.

    2013, Hachette India, Indiapedia: The All-India Factfinder

    A game of gilli-danda continues until all players have had a turn at being on strike. The winning team is the side that records the most danda lengths and thus scores the most points.

    2015, Victoria Williams Ph.D., Weird Sports and Wacky Games around the World: From Buzkashi to Zorbing, ABC-CLIO, page 122

Origin

  1. Sanskritदण्ड
  2. Englishgilli-danda

Ultimately from Sanskrit दण्ड (daṇḍa).

Full word history & related roots →

Translations

Bengali ডাংগুলি, ড্যাংবাড়ি
  • ডাংগুলি (ḍaṅguli)game
  • ড্যাংবাড়ি (ḍêṅbaṛi)game
  • গুটবাড়ি (guṭbaṛi)game
  • ট্যামডাং (ṭêmoḍaṅ)game
  • ভ্যাটাডান্ডা (bhêṭaḍanḍa)game
Hindi गिल्ली डंडा, गुल्लीडंडा
  • गिल्ली डंडा (gillī ḍaṇḍā)game
  • गुल्लीडंडा (gullīḍaṇḍā)game
  • गुल्लीडण्डा (gullīḍaṇḍā)game
Punjabi ਗੁੱਲੀ ਡੰਡਾ
  • ਗੁੱਲੀ ਡੰਡਾ (gullī ḍaṇḍā)game
Tamil கிட்டிப் புள்
  • கிட்டிப் புள் (kiṭṭip puḷ)game
Cite this entry
APA

gilli-danda. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gilli-danda

MLA

“gilli-danda.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gilli-danda. Accessed November 3, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “gilli-danda,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gilli-danda.

Source: gilli-danda on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.