The article discusses the case of the Kol tribal people who have been working as bonded labourers in the stone quarries and silica sand mines near Allahabad, India. It analyses the conditions and factors that have been responsible for keeping them bonded for many generations. The article details and discusses a social intervention made by us to ensure sustainable freedom for these bonded tribal. The intervention focused on conscientisation of the public and government departments and also of the larger community. It sought to reduce fear of freedom of the bonded, and attempted to change their agency beliefs. It also focused on developing the binding and bridging components of social capital to improve their inter-personal functioning in order to strengthen the SHGs (self-help groups) which they had formed and also the Federation of the SHGs.