Category: Article

North East India: A Region in an Endless Ordeal

Article

By Sarup Sinha

15th August 1947; a date that transcends beyond a mere entry in history books, it is a meaning that resonates with every Indian as the day of Independence, as an event of freedom, and above all birth of the largest democracy in the world. Independence was however not an overnight process nor was the formation of the Indian landscape as we visualize today. British left India with more than 500 princely states and the herculean task of integrating those princely states lay on the capable shoulders of Sardar Vallabhai Patel and V.P Mennon. One such event that leaves behind a legacy of varied tastes is that of North East India. It is a potent case to examine the nature of nation making and its consequences. The northeastern region is the hub of multiple tribes and communities each having their distinct identities with their own historical past. Today, the region is lagging behind other parts of the country in terms of infrastructure and economic development due to myriad reasons. In addition, we encounter many separatist and militant movements from different quarters of the region such as Nagaland, Assam, Manipur beginning with Naga Insurgency in 1950s.The methods adopted by the Indian state to tackle such situation of unrest is marred with stories of widespread human rights violations coupled with militant violence. Armed Force Special Powers Act remains as an instrument of military force asserted by the State which persists up to the present.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12781649

From Marginalisation to Stereotypes — ‘North East India’ in Indian Media: Evidences from Focus Group Discussions in Manipur

Article

By Shipra Raj

Previous media studies have noted that India’s North East often remains absent from the mainstream media. As news media plays a formidable role in minorities recognition and representation and it is important to ask how media represents the North East.1 Building from the role of media in democracy this paper analyses how media reports the North East. The traditional journalistic ethics of fair, balanced and truthful does not mean that everybody gets equal representation. Three Focus Group Discussions were held in Manipur which involved 30 participants through purposive and snowball sampling technique. This paper analyses how and when the North East gets space in mainstream media. Participants noted that the coverage of Manipur in the mainstream media has widely been negative and their issues and interests are underrepresented. Majority of the participants noted that the coverage of mainstream media has often been incorrect and subject to stereotypes and has largely been focused on insurgency and conflict.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12781535

Status of Development in Meghalaya: An Inter-District Analysis

Article

By Sangeeta Dasgupta

Poor development status of Meghalaya and the North Eastern region as a whole has been a significant concern to policy makers. The centralised system of planning followed in Meghalaya so far could not bring about the desired level of development in the state. Although the condition of the people of the state has improved over the years, their situation remains backward as compared to the rest of the country’s population. Further, the state has already gone through seven five-year plan periods with various sectoral strategies adopted in each plan, but inequality in sectoral development in the different regions and districts of the state have been observed. A number of areas in Meghalaya are still lacking in many respects and there exists intra regional variations in terms of the level of development. Thus, micro-level studies for better understanding of the various factors affecting the development of the state are crucial. The present paper made an attempt to determine the comparative state of development and the magnitude of inter-district disparities of the then seven districts of Meghalaya. In order to address the existing socio-economic differential and related behavior in a development perspective, it is essential to determine the comparative state of development of the districts of Meghalaya.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12781423

Autonomy Demands in the Hill Areas of Manipur: Issues and Challenges

Article

By Seikhogin Haokip

In contemporary multi-ethnic nation-states of the world, autonomy has been often seen as a panacea for solving ethnic conflicts. However, when ethnic groups do not settle compactly in a particular geographical area, granting of autonomy to minority ethnic groups becomes problematic. It is often faced with overlapping land and territorial claims between groups and the tensions and conflicts thereafter. In India’s Northeast, ethnic groups are seldom found settled compactly in defined geographical areas. As such, autonomy demands in the region often involve contesting identity, land and territorial claims between groups, thereby, becoming the source of ethnic tensions and conflicts in the region. This paper examines the various issues and challenges in ethnic-based autonomy demands in the hill areas of Manipur.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12780865

Lacking Legitimacy? State, Civil Societies and
Trust Crisis in Manipur

Article

By L. Letkhomang Haokip

This paper examines the movement against three bills passed in Manipur Legislative Assembly on 31 August 2015. The agitation against the bills is seen to be a much deeper one. It represents a strong sense of insecurity among the subaltern class in Northeast region over their land and natural resources. It questions on the integrity of existing laws on landholding and resource management in the region which would be helpless in the face of a larger economic force such as India’s Act East Policy. People wanted a stringent law to protect and galvanise them from an intrusive capitalism. It is also about questioning the legitimacy of the government whose intention is going against people’s interest. Tension such as one saw in the case of anti-bills agitation in Manipur looms substantially from the moral trust deficit and the trust crisis between different communities in particular and state and civil societies in general. Such crisis invariably arises when the confidence of people are not taken or when their interests are mindlessly floated. Any bill, how good the intention would have been, must first adhere to public consultation and consensus before it gets passed.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12780768

A Social Construction of ‘identity’ among the Indigenous and Immigrants in Assam

Article

By Kuntala Das

A complex web of representing, preserving or contesting one’s identity dominates societies across the globe today. Identity, in its simplest sense, refers to the idea of how one perceives the self. Identities prescribe who one is, what role one is to enact and how one is unique from others in a society. Identity invokes the concepts of ‘self’ and ‘other’. This paper is an attempt to study the role of ‘indigenous and immigrant’ identity in Assam. Identity as a contested subject was for the first time raised in 1979 when the Assam Movement began, with a demand to deport the immigrants from the region. Discords in the name of identity between both the factions of indigenous and immigrants turned hostile with time. The conflict of the Bodos with the Bengali speaking Muslims is one such example which has resulted in bloodsheds since 1993. The indigenous peoples struggle to preserve their identity in the name of being the ‘son of the soil’, while the immigrants try to establish an identity that helps them sustain in their adopted land. The study aims to look at identity from perspectives of the indigenous and the immigrants.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12780631

Land and Law in Manipur circa 1891-1947

Article

By Lalsanglen Haokip

This paper focuses on the problem of land possession and ownership in Manipur following the Palace Revolt of 1891 when the British introduced a Residency form of indirect rule. The paper will critically examine the changing rights on land from pre-British period to post 1947 period through the prism of land regulation. The prevalence of land pattas in the Manipur valley vested individual ryots with landed interests somewhat analogous to that of the ryotwari system. In contrast, the Raj recognised another type of land right for hill chiefs who collected house tax on behalf of the whole village; and as such, this practice reflects elements of the zamindari system. In the pre-colonial era, certain chiefs of Manipur hills were familiar with the idea of tauzi land tenure which indicated settlement of a village, partly mirrored in the later colonial collection of village house tax. The hill chiefs soon internalised the language of rights under the Raj; and even today they refer to dai (right) with reference to their chiefly domains. The coming of Anglo-Indian law of patta into the entire valley of Manipur and gradually in parts of the hill areas heralded the origins of private property in land. The British interpreted patta as ‘the right of occupancy to a land by a tenant, provided it pays revenue punctually’. Further, the paper will see demarcation of boundary not as a definition of territory, but rather as a way of generating revenue. Therefore, this paper will connect colonial boundary making, origins of landed property, and the dual system of land tenure in the valley and hills of Manipur.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12780188

The Role of Oral Tradition with Special Reference to the Thadou-Kuki Society

Article

By D. Mary Kim Haokip

Thadou-Kuki society is well known for its oral tradition that expresses valuable messages. The Thadous have a rich collection of folk literature in different genres that include folk narratives, songs, proverbs, riddles, tales, nursery rhymes, lullabies, war songs, sacrificial chants, etc. All forms of oral tradition in Thadou society contains various informational values on religion, history, customs and public practices, and information that has the values of local wisdom in the daily life of the community, as well as genealogical information or descendant of a family in the community. All of the information are received, developed, and derived and transmitted to the future generations through a wide variety of oral tradition. However, with the advent of education, modern entertainment, changing lifestyle and advanced technology, oral tradition has begun to be gradually abandoned and forgotten by the Thadou society. This has adversely affected the existence and transmission of the rich and valuable oral tradition of the Thadous. The aim of the present paper is to discuss the gradual decline in the role and status of oral tradition in Thadou society and the need for maintaining and preserving before it is lost forever. The paper argues for collective responsibility of every member to preserve and store this rich oral tradition. Additionally, documentation and information centres, such as libraries, archives institution, and museum can help to identify, collect, document the oral tradition and preserve the information contained in the oral tradition.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12780178

The Enchanted Community: Kaose and Doi (Witchcraft) Among the Kukis of Northeast India

Article

By Jangkhomang Guite

This paper examines the social history of kaose and doi among the Kukis of Northeast India. It begins with a discussion on two recent incidences of kaotom to show how the old belief continued to haunt Kuki society of the present. Then it went on defining kaose and doi, of their mythological origin, their characteristics, and the societal responses. In the final analysis, it discusses whether they exist in reality. From few historical evidences that we could gather here, this paper argues that the kaose and doi are largely the products of social and neighborhood tensions and community conflicts that engulfed the Kuki-Chin world during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. In other words, the gaining popularity of kaose and doi during this time was largely centre on the conflicting political and social relationship between different social classes in the village community on the one hand and between different villages/clans/tribes on the other where the powerful utilised them as a tool to dominate, defame, and criminalise the weak. They are merely a civilisational tool in the hands of the powerful who felt they are cultured and civilised against the weak whom they condemned as ‘uncultured’ and ‘uncultivated’. The broad argument is that kose and doi is a mere social construct and does not exist in reality.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12780165

India-Bangladesh Connectivity: Implications for India’s North East Development

Article

By Rajendra Prasad Patel

Connectivity is cornerstone to move forward greater bilateral cooperation and enhance trade, investment, people to people contracts and economic opportunities for India and Bangladesh. Both countries have all ingredient of transport connectivity as historical, cultural and political administrative familiarity and geographical proximity and both have been growing at 6 percent annually over the last two decades. But despite having these ingredients, India and Bangladesh are facing serious connectivity challenges both physical and non-physical that have limited the pace of economic growth and development and poor transportation infrastructure and connectivity impediments have limited the North Eastern Region of India and Bangladesh’s opportunities to find markets for their products within and outside the region. This article discusses the rationale for connectivity between India and Bangladesh.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.12780149

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