Arunachal Pradesh Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Sbas yul gyi dkar chags ‘khrul med bshugs so (The unmistaken register of the hidden land, hereafter referred to as URHL) is a fascinating example of Tibetan Buddhist sacred landscape literature. It describes the minor sbas yul of Sbas lcags shing ri (Secret Iron Wood Mountain, hereafter referred to as Pachakshiri) located in the environs of Mechuka in Arunachal Pradesh, India.1 This paper examines excerpts of a dkar chag, or catalog, composed as a dialogue between the imperial Tibetan Buddhist figures Ye shes mtsho rgyal and Padmasambhava. In it, they discuss the sbas yul of Sbas lcags shing ri located in the Mechuka (Sman chu ka) valley in the Eastern Himalayan region of Arunachal Pradesh, India. It explores a section of the dialogue in which Ye shes mtsho rgyal asks Padmasambhava, “How is this sacred place arrayed?” His response describes the establishment of this sbas yul via a quadruplicate process of tantric enactment. The boundaries are set and maintained via the four enlightened activities (phrin las rnam bzhi), of pacification (zhi), increase (rgyas), magnetism (dbang), and wrath (drag). The study examines sacred landscape by considering the progressive formation of this sbas yul via these four enlightened actions and how each functions as geomantic referents for deep levels of embodied meditative accomplishment. Examining this framework expands our understanding of Buddhist tantric landscape beyond the paradigms of subjugation and suppression. This quartet of actualizing engagements is of equal significance in the formation and maintenance of a wholly transformed tantric ritual domain.

ABSTRACT Floriculture is commercial production, marketing and retail sale of cut flowers and potted plants as well as home gardening and flower arrangement. Arunachal Pradesh has started to promote floriculture, especially orchids for export oriented cut-flower industries. The diverse agro-climatic condition provides an ideal opportunity for growth of agro-based industries. Floriculture is one of such industry having great potential in the state. In this paper an attempt has been made to analyze the problems and prospects of floriculture in Arunachal Pradesh with a focus on orchids. A comprehensive survey and interview was conducted for the existing orchid research and development centers to derive suitable conclusions. The study reveals about 550 species of orchids in the state, out of which about 100 species are ornamental belonging to genera Aerides, Ascocentrum

- by Gibji Nimasow
- •
- Diversity, Arunachal Pradesh, Orchids, Floriculture
- by Parimal Ray
- •
- Arunachal Pradesh, New Range Extension
- by Jelle J P Wouters
- •
- Indigenous Studies, Southeast Asian Studies, South Asian Studies, Nagaland

The talk, invited by the Minister for Research, Dr. Mohesh Chai, discusses the language situation in Arunachal Pradesh, with a particular focus on language endangerment and assessing the status of minorities. It publishes a recent language map and list of languages. It continues by exploring the process of orthography development with a focus on recent developments in Idu and Kman and makes recommendations for further action.

‘Duncan McDuie-Ra has not only written a thoroughly readable and well-researched ethnography on Northeast migrants in Delhi, in more general terms he has also produced an important contribution to what could be labelled ‘big city ethnographies’. Cities such as Delhi, Mumbai or Bangalore not only feature prominently in a particular narrative on economic growth that infuses how the cities present themselves and how their inhabitants reflect on them, but they are coloured by the kind of diversity that is the result of large-scale internal migration. Understanding what all these people—not just north-easterners—are doing in the city in terms of work and lifestyle, and how they experience being in the city on the one hand and how they are part of the urban landscape in physical and mental terms on the other, is something that will hopefully be the focus of many other works of ethnography in the future. I have no doubt these will benefit greatly from McDuie-Ra’s insightful and carefully researched work.’ Dr. Michiel Baas. South Asia 37 (2), pp. 359-361.

- by Duncan A . McDuie-Ra
- •
- Race and Racism, Race and Ethnicity, Masculinity, Neoliberalism

This report-cum-appraisal of the life and works of (late) Prof. Ravi S. Singh (1971-2021), Professor of Geography at Banaras Hindu University, narrates the academic story and the research themes dealt with him (covering 8 books and anthologies, 108 research and appraisal papers, 25 book reviews, 6 INSA evaluation reports of Cultural and Historical geography, and some popular articles), which includes geographical thought, status of geographical teaching, intricacies and fallacies of geography in higher studies in India, and several innovative ideas that would be taken in future. Full list of his publications are also presented.

- by Rana P.B. SINGH
- •
- Cultural Geography, Cultural Heritage, Water, Heritage Studies

The present investigation was conducted to evaluate the comparative economics of two methods of Vanaraja chicken rearing under backyard system i.e. improved technologies demonstrated under Front Line Demonstration (FLD) and Farmer’s Practice (FP) traditionally adopted by the farmers. All together 120 farmers from 12 randomly selected villages of West Siang district of Arunachal Pradesh having experience of poultry rearing for more than two years were selected for FLD. The study (from August, 2015 to July, 2017) reveals that, the technologies demonstrated in FLDs recorded higher body weight gain of male chickens (2300g) over FP (1800g) at 20 weeks of age, which was 27.78% higher than that of Farmers’ Practice. Mean annual egg production under FLD was recorded as 110 numbers which was 37.50% higher than that of FP (80). The estimated technology gap in body weight gain was recorded as 200 g/bird, whereas for egg production it was 20 numbers/bird. The extension gap of body weight gains and egg production was recorded as 500 g/bird and 30 numbers/bird, respectively with a technology index of 8% in body weight gain and 15.38% in egg production. The benefit cost (B: C) ratio for Vanaraja chicken rearing under FLD and Farmers’ Practice was recorded as 2.62:1 and 1.71:1, respectively which indicated that under improved rearing techniques demonstrated under FLD Vanaraja chicken gives much more profit than that of rearing techniques under FP. Non availability of improved germplasm of poultry (93.33%) was given the top ranking while weak market linkage to dispose the produce (35.00%) was given as bottom ranking in the constraints matrix ranking in poultry production. Under client satisfaction index over the performance of FLD analysis reveals 63.33% of high satisfaction index over the performance of FLDs while 27.50% respondent expressed medium level of satisfaction and only 9.17% respondent expressed low level of satisfaction index.

Few Indian regions evoke political, economic, and cultural marginalisation as much as North-East India. Solutions to its political instability often assume that, provided the vicious circle of under-development and violence can be broken, the region will eventually build a stable relationship with the Indian nation-state. This understanding in turns rests on a long intellectual genealogy that associates development with the state and the nation. By examining development schemes in the North-East Frontier Agency (NEFA, today's Arunachal Pradesh) in the 1950–1960s, a hitherto scarcely administered region where these were the primary mode of state-building, this article cautions against the tendency to see the Indian state's developmental ambitions as an instrument of nation-building. Instead it argues that, in North-East India at least, state-making and nation-building have not historically gone together, and that developmentalism played an important part in this rupture. On the ground, tribal development did little for NEFA's integration into the Indian nation. In fact, state-making processes resulted in the disintegration of the links that had tied NEFA with its regional hinterland in India. In the process, some of the seeds of tensions plaguing today's North-East India were planted.

The ‘Northeast’ is a category constructed by the Indian state for the purposes
of controlling, governing and applying extraordinary legal provisions to its
rebellious eastern frontier. It homogenizes and depoliticizes the peoples and
territories claimed by the Indian state and subjects them to a perpetual process
of state-making characterized by violence and (mal)development. Yet the
peoples subject to the category – both the idea and the institutions that are
enabled by it – use it. They speak it, respond to it and identify with it. In part,
this is acquiescence to the national and local state that shapes everyday life
for people in the region; layers of public and private institutions that use the
category to describe everything from small business finance initiatives to trade
fairs. The category is also used throughout India by the media, in committees
formed to address ‘Northeast issues’, and ‘on the streets’, as it were, to refer
to people from the region and to misidentify others assumed to be from the
region (and vice-versa). Thus being a ‘North easterner’ or ‘from the Northeast’
ascribes a set of attributes to groups and individuals, whether they like it or
not. On the other hand, the category Northeast can also be an affirmation of
solidarity by people from the region. Not by all people, and not all the time,
but certainly the category is used enough by those subject to it to warrant some
consideration of its value for those seeking to claim it as a positive affirmation
of who they are and where they fit, or don’t, in the national picture.

- by Duncan A . McDuie-Ra
- •
- Indian studies, Identity (Culture), Race and Ethnicity, Racism

This paper presents a progress report on the historical phonology of Puroik. The first part lists recurrent correspondences between three Puroik dialects, including the two hitherto undescribed varieties of Kojo-Rojo and Bulu, and proposes reconstructions for Proto-Puroik, the hypothetical common ancestor of these languages. As an external control the reconstruction was further compared with Kuki-Chin (data from (VanBik 2009)). Based on these comparisons and a brief lexico-statistical evaluation, possible hypotheseses for the phylogenetic affiliation of Puroik are evaluated.

A case study was undertaken from March 2017 to February 2018 recently in the river Hillem of Basar, Lower Siang district, Arunachal Pradesh. The sampling of fish was done from three sites of the river time to time using fishing devices and techniques practiced by Galo tribes. A total of 33 species of fishes belonging to 12 families were taxonomically confirmed with 19 species under Cyprinidae followed by 3 species within Balitoridae, 2 species within Amblycipitidae and 1 species each within Mesonoemacheilus, Clariidae, Sisoridae, Olyridae, Siluridae, Badidae, Channidae, Anguillidae and Mastacembelidae. The physico-chemical parameters of the river water remained at permissible limit of Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), thus free from pollution and congenial for aquatic life. The sampling of fishes were restricted only in three sites for the study period because of social ban on fishing by the natives aiming restoration of the ichthyofaunal abundance declined due to various anthropogenic factors.

- by Renu Loyi
- •
- Ichthyology, Diversity, Fisheries, Rivers

This is a wordlist of the Koro language of Arunachal Pradesh, with etymological analysis.

- by Roger Blench
- •
- Languages and Linguistics, Linguistics, Sino-Tibetan Linguistics, India

Floriculture is commercial production, marketing and retail sale of cut flowers and potted plants as well as home gardening and flower arrangement. Arunachal Pradesh has started to promote floriculture, especially orchids for export oriented cut-flower industries. The diverse agro-climatic condition provides an ideal opportunity for growth of agro-based industries. Floriculture is one of such industry having great potential in the state. In this paper an attempt has been made to analyze the problems and prospects of floriculture in Arunachal Pradesh with a focus on orchids. A comprehensive survey and interview was conducted for the existing orchid research and development centers to derive suitable conclusions. The study reveals about 550 species of orchids in the state, out of which about 100 species are ornamental belonging to genera Aerides, Ascocentrum, Calanthe, Cymbidium, Dendrobium, Epidendrum, Paphiopedilum Phaius, Renanthera, Rhynchostylis, Vanda, etc. So far five hybrid genus -Renades "Arunodaya" Arachnocentron "Tipi Jubilee star", Esmeranda "Millennium Dawn", Cymbidium Sessa "Green Beauty" and Ascocenda "Tipi Blue Boy" were successfully introduced in the state.

- by Gibji Nimasow
- •
- Diversity, Arunachal Pradesh, Orchids, Floriculture

Since the mid-twentieth century China and India have entertained a difficult
relationship, erupting into open war in 1962. Shadow States is the first book to
unpack Sino-Indian tensions from the angle of competitive state-building -
through a study of their simultaneous attempts to win the approval and support
of the Himalayan people. When China and India tried to expand into the
Himalayas in the twentieth century, their lack of strong ties to the region and
the absence of an easily enforceable border made their proximity threatening -
observing China and India’s state-making efforts, local inhabitants were in a
position to compare and potentially choose between them. Using rich and
original archival research, Bérénice Guyot-Réchard shows how India and China
became each other’s ‘shadow states’. Understanding these recent, competing
processes of state formation in the Himalayas is fundamental to understanding
the roots of tensions in Sino-Indian relations.

Pakke Tiger Reserve is one of the two Tiger Reserves of the state Arunachal Pradesh, North-East India, and known for its dense vegetation and highly diverse faunal wealth. Total 282 species have been recorded so far in the area, based on present survey and previously published studies. Total 141 species were recorded in present study including some interesting and/or new records for the area such as Greater Coucal Centropus sinensis, Banded Bay Cuckoo Cacomantis sonneratii, Roseringed Parakeet Psittacula krameri, Jungle Owlet Glaucidium radiatum, Greenish Warbler Phylloscopus trochiloides, Striated Babbler Turdoides earlei and Baya Weaver Ploceus philippinus.

- by Anil Kumar
- •
- Conservation Biology, Ecology, Arunachal Pradesh, Birds

The Mishmi peoples of Arunachal Pradesh consist of three different groups, speaking three different languages. These are Idu [also Kera], Tawra [=Taraon] and Kman [=Miju]. Two of the languages are related, Idu and Tawra, but the third, Kman, is quite different although strongly identified culturally with the Tawra. These languages are usually classified as Sino-Tibetan, but the evidence for this is weak and they may well be language isolates. A fourth language, Meyor, spoken in Walong and Kibitho, shares many common features with Kman, but is probably not related genetically. The paper presents an overview of the main structural features of the three languages, which show strong similarities despite their lexical diversity. A particularly striking feature of these languages is the existence of three parallel languages concurrent with daily speech. These include a language spoken by hunters in the forest, a language spoken by shamans, and a poetic speech register, used for songs, which are an important current expression of identity in this region. The perplexing relationship between Idu and Tawra is discussed, characterised by near identity of lexemes in some semantic fields and a complete absence of relationship in others. The paper also describes existing attempts to create literacy materials and the current state of the present initiative.

- by Roger Blench
- •
- Archaeology, Anthropology, Languages and Linguistics, Linguistics

Arunachal Pradesh is the home for 26 major tribes and more than 100 sub-tribes, each one with their own dance forms, festivals, tradition and belief system. Arunachal Pradesh finds ownself as one of the least developed states of India according to Raghuram Committee Report (2013). Government of India and State Government has recognized the tourism potential of Arunachal Pradesh and is trying to promote Arunachal Pradesh as an upcoming tourist spot. Immense potential is stored in the cultures of Arunachal Pradesh to promote tourism. Varieties of handicrafts, traditional dance forms, fairs and festivals of Arunachal Pradesh can be a major tourist attractions. This paper attempts to discuss the potential of Arunachal Pradesh of becoming a Cultural Tourist spot.

- by Deep J Gurung
- •
- Tourism Studies, Tourism Marketing, Tourism Management, Tourism Planning and Policy

India is one of the richest countries in the world in terms of cultural diversity, and the
largest concentration lies in North-Eastern part of India. The rich heritage therein is
exemplified throughout from the ethnicity, tradition, livelihood, and also by the
architectural typologies. Several distinct architectural features are seen in tribes of
Arunachal Pradesh, which differ by climate, geological condition, and deep-rooted
traditions. They evolved in course of time and were majorly built by the inhabitants
themselves, without any formal training in construction. These houses, built with locally
available materials, were sensitive to the existing environment and took into
consideration the constraints imposed by the climate.
There are 26 tribes out of those, Monpa, Adi, and Apatani are renowned for their peculiar
lifestyle which has resulted in a sustainable built envelope and spatial organization. The
paper will analyze and study the architectural pattern in these tribes through their case
studies. The study is an effort undertaken to understand the relationship between the
geographical and architectural pattern of these tribes through various factors.

- by Praduman Bajaj
- •
- Sociology of Culture, Architecture, Culture, Architectural Patterns

Sherdukpen (or Shertukpen) is a language spoken in Arunachal Pradesh, India). This book in English, published in 2015 at Universitätsverlag Brockmeyer, describes the basics (and a bit more) of Sherdukpen language sounds, word forms and variations, sentence construction, with notes on time, bodies, groups and clans, attitudes, colours, and literacy. It includes some small texts and lexicons (Sherdukpen to English and reverse). Indexes of grammatical notions (with explanations), and some photos are added.
Can be dowloaded from : http://brockmeyer-verlag.de/epages/5e583940-b705-451e-894d-483666ca9504.sf/de_DE/?ObjectID=15594074

The existence of anthropology as an academic and research discipline in Arunachal Pradesh is in its infancy. The traditional ethnographic studies among the tribes were initiated by the early British administrators, missionaries, travellers, explorers, etc. Professor Furer-Haimendorf and Verrier Elwin were perhaps the first professional anthropologist and ethnographers to delve into the various cultural aspects of Arunachal tribes. The official recognition of the discipline took place with the introduction of the Arunachal Institute of Tribal Studies (AITS) in 1995 under Arunachal University (Now Rajiv Gandhi University, Doimukh) which was established in 1984; for which anthropology – as a discipline – was introduced in 2001. The establishment of the Directorate of Research, Government of Arunachal Pradesh and the introduction of anthropology at the University and College levels significantly count towards the development of this discipline in the state. Research contributions have been witnessed over time in the field of social and cultural aspects of the tribes. Though not completely absent, research on physical-biological aspects, genetic studies, linguistic and archaeology, growth, nutrition and health have been witnessed but limited. Taking into consideration the broad scope of Anthropology as a discipline of a holistic approach, this paper urges a need for wider coverage of studies in terms of research, projects, and publications in developing tribal states like Arunachal Pradesh. The relevance of Anthropology in the state could be ensured through rigorous research taken up at various levels of standard, support from the government, and collaboration between academic institutions and funding agencies. At the same time, its dimension and scope as relevant research and academic discipline could be broadened and expanded through addressing new research questions, formulation of hypotheses, and through standard conduct of empirical researches.

- by Dr. Tarh Ramya and +1
- •
- Anthropology, Arunachal Pradesh, People of Arunachal and Their Culture, Cultural Practices of the People of Arunachal

A wordlist and grammar sketch of the Hruso language of Arunachal Pradesh

- by Roger Blench
- •
- Languages and Linguistics, Linguistics, Sino-Tibetan Linguistics, Arunachal Pradesh

As though responding to the unrelenting pace of modern life, 'The Legends of Pensam' by Mamang Dai offers a look into the slow unhurried lives of the Adi tribes of Arunachal Pradesh. Where in the midst of the greenery, jealous spirits can make harm befall travelers who don't observe the proper rites, children fall from the sky and fish can divine death. Simple characters with simple desires, live lives only plagued by the supernatural, and where even murder isn't always originating with a malicious intent. It is a refreshing view into a society of close bonds, where reason isn't always as necessary as we make it out to be. A collection of numerous stories, connected by people, places and legends, it exudes preternatural calm amidst stories of change, upheaval, tragedy and transformation. I set out to read with the intention to find out the secrets of this mysterious society and came out calmer, a little more wise and enlightened as to how tribal societies are dealing with change that comes with modernity, transportation and strangers beyond their world of the hills. An outlier, the book 'The Legends of Pensam' has a strange endearing quality , what prevents attachment to the characters allows for the viewing of the customs, traditions, stories and legends that make up its wonderful culture. A singular connection to the culture, the simple people and the surreal, fantastical, lyrical accounts of life in the hills.

- by Shivani Terli
- •
- Mythology, English Literature, Literature, Surrealism

Perhaps nowhere in India is contemporary politics and visions of 'the political' as diverse, animated, uncontainable, and poorly understood as in Northeast India. Vernacular Politics in Northeast India offers penetrating accounts into what guides and animates Northeast India's spirited political sphere, including the categories and values through which its peoples conceive of their 'political' lives. Fourteen essays by anthropologists, political scientists, historians, and geographers think their way afresh into the region's political life and sense. Collectively they show how different communities, instead of adjusting themselves to modern democratic ideals, adjust democracy to themselves, how ethnicity has become a politically pregnant expression of local identities, and how forms and politics of indigeneity assume a life of its own as it is taken on, articulated, reworked, and fought over by peoples.

Perhaps nowhere in India is contemporary politics and visions of 'the political' as diverse, animated, uncontainable, and poorly understood as in Northeast India. Vernacular Politics in Northeast India offers penetrating accounts into what guides and animates Northeast India's spirited political sphere, including the categories and values through which its peoples conceive of their 'political' lives. Fourteen essays and an Afterword by anthropologists, political scientists, historians, and geographers think their way afresh into the region's political life and sense. Collectively they show how different communities, instead of adjusting themselves to modern democratic ideals, adjust democracy to themselves, how ethnicity has become a politically pregnant expression of local identities, and how indigeneity assume a life of its own as it is taken on, articulated, reworked, and fought over by peoples.

- by Jelle J P Wouters
- •
- Indigenous Studies, Southeast Asian Studies, South Asian Studies, Nagaland

In this article, I examine the relationship between state, ethnicity, territoriality and neoliberal capitalism in the tribal areas of highland Northeast India, where I focus in particular on the socioecological and socio-political corollaries of its rediscovery as a resource and capitalist frontier. In so doing, I apply (capitalist) ‘desire’ and (ethnic) ‘closure’ as key analytics to capture the contentiously unfolding history of the region’s present. This article shows how new resource and capital flows lead both to the production of capitalist ‘desires’ and socioecological destruction through the privatization, acquisition and depletion, mostly by ethnic tribal elites, of communal assets now embedded in newly capitalist relations, and to the intensification of a politics of exclusive ethnoterritorial belonging and rights. The latter comes in the form of volatile social processes of ethnic ‘closure’; an increasing preoccupation, that is, on part of tribal ethnic communities with the protecting, patrolling and legislating of ethno-territorial rights. The upshot of this is a dialectic between new neoliberal connectivities and ethnic ‘closure’, one that ensues in a frame of the specifics of governance and law in highland Northeast India.

- by Jelle J P Wouters
- •
- Indigenous Studies, Southeast Asian Studies, Border Studies, Sovereignty

Perhaps nowhere in India is contemporary politics and visions of 'the political' as diverse, animated, uncontainable, and poorly understood as in Northeast India. Vernacular Politics in Northeast India offers penetrating accounts into what guides and animates Northeast India's spirited political sphere, including the categories and values through which its peoples conceive of their 'political' lives. Fourteen essays and an Afterword by anthropologists, political scientists, historians, and geographers think their way afresh into the region's political life and sense. Collectively they show how different communities, instead of adjusting themselves to modern democratic ideals, adjust democracy to themselves, how ethnicity has become a politically pregnant expression of local identities, and how indigeneity assume a life of its own as it is taken on, articulated, reworked, and fought over by peoples.

- by Jelle J P Wouters
- •
- Indigenous Studies, South Asian Studies, Southeast Asia, South Asian Politics

The article concerns itself with the current phase of the Indo-Naga peace talks, seemingly rendered intransigent on the contentious issue of administrative integration of contiguous Naga-inhabited areas. It historically examines the ethno-territoriality of the Naga national movement in the states of Nagaland, Manipur, Assam and Arunachal Pradesh. This article finds that notwithstanding the soundness of the claims, Naga territoriality is not a non-negotiable given but an active construction of the changing politics of the movement. The findings suggest that any proposed federal arrangement should balance ethno-territorial urges with historical peculiarities. A substantial measure of non-territorial autonomy, in a mutually binding federal arrangement, would necessitate a redefinition of both Naga ethno-national aspirations and the post-colonial Indian state’s insecurities. However, it holds the potential for sustainable peace in the region.

The title of this special issue; ‘Nagas in the 21st Century’, is both an adaptation and a (modest) self-proclaimed sequel to Verrier Elwin’s (1969) iconic Nagas in the Nineteenth Century. In this anthology, Elwin introduces and brings together a collection of administrative reports, tour diaries, and ethnographic descriptions on Naga tribes, all written in the 19th century.

- by Jelle J P Wouters and +1
- •
- South Asian Studies, South Asia, South Asian History, Nagaland

This is a comparative wordlist of Miji and Bangru, little-studied languages of Arunachal Pradesh, with etymological analysis.

- by Roger Blench and +1
- •
- Languages and Linguistics, South Asian Languages, Arunachal Pradesh

The Naga struggle for sovereignty, which began in the 1950s, and the Indian state’s response to it, has now analysed and theorised from multiple angles, frames and narratives, and so with varying degrees of success and failure. In this chapter we draw attention to the make-up and workings of the cosmos in relation to the Naga uprising. In so doing, we engage a locally omnipresent but under-theorised understanding of the Naga struggle, which is that of a salvific movement spurred by a millenarian prophecy of an imminent, radical spiritual and societal transformation after which the world will be reconstituted as Christian and Nagaland/Nagalim emerge as an independent, sovereign country. Drawing on our variously mediated experience, we point towards (1) ) the centrality of proclamations and experiences of ‘chosenness’ and 'covenant’ in the conviction of commitment of the Naga rebel vanguard and many of their followers, and (2) the failure of most political analyses of recognising the Indo-Naga conflict as also an ontological conflict, including taking seriously, as most Nagas do, the notion of God as its primary political agent. This leads us to argue that the lived experiences and persuasions of chosenness, covenant and prophecy, and their political potency, are indicative of a blind spot in the political theory and analysis of the Naga Movement (and political conflict more widely). That is: how can we engage the nonhuman and prophetic revelations as sites of political agency, and what are the implications of doing so for our theorising and understanding of Naga revolutionary philosophy and praxis?

- by Jelle J P Wouters and +1
- •
- Christianity, Indigenous Studies, Southeast Asian Studies, Violence

One of the most characteristic ethnonyms used in Arunachal Pradesh in Northeast India is ‘Monpa’. It has been used to cover a wide range of languages, which have nothing much in common other than a putative Sino-Tibetan affiliation. There is a spectrum of local publications in Arunachal Pradesh referring to the Monpa, conflating both anthropological and linguistic data. Monpa is a generic term for non-Tibetan-speaking peoples south of Tibet proper, and applies to a number of highly diverse peoples, and so should not be used for classification purposes. This paper begins the process of sorting out the affiliations of the various Monpa groups in Arunachal Pradesh, their external links and place within the larger framework of Tibeto-Burman.

- by Roger Blench
- •
- Languages and Linguistics, Tibetan Studies, Linguistics, Sino-Tibetan Linguistics

What characterizes the Naga kin universe? What was lost and gained as Nagas transitioned from a stateless to a state society? What happens to a society when long entrenched in political conflict, violence, and brutality? What is the place of Naga traditions and customs in the contemporary historical moment? What are the political paths and possibilities that fork off into the future? With Nagapolis: A Community Portrait, Jelle J.P. Wouters addresses these and related questions through a varied range of topical essays, from feasting to factionalism, customs to cuisine, prophecy to politics, and colonialism to capitalism. Delving deep in history, politics, culture, and social mores, Nagapolis traces and places Naga society, relating changes, continuities, and changing continuities, to ultimately ask, just what is the Naga community all about?

- by Jelle J P Wouters
- •
- Southeast Asian Studies, South Asia, Indigeneity, Nagaland

India is the largest refugee absorbent countries in the whole of South Asia. But in spite of being the host of substantive asylum seekers and refugees, India is never a signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention or 1964 Protocol. While the Indian state does not offer any defacto protection to refugees, the absence of legal framework for refugee protection makes the status of the refugees a precarious one. The approach of the Centre and respective state governments were kind of ad hoc, hence their marginal status is based on the goodwill of the government in power. The Chakmas of CHT were the worst sufferers, as they fell into the category of ‘stateless persons’, which was more derogatory and confusing to define a migrated community.
With this background, this article will focus on the situation by which the Chakmas were compelled to leave their place of origin and had taken shelter first in Arunachal Pradesh and later in Tripura, by the consent of the Centre. They faced opposition from every quarter. So when the Chakmas in Arunachal Pradesh remained, as ‘stateless persons’, the Citizenship Act of 1955 was never ‘applicable’ in their case, in Tripura they finally opted the policy of repatriation, yet many of them remained as illegal migrants. So, the article intends to argue that the Chakmas in both the states became the marginal community chiefly because of the absence of a legal regime. They fell amidst the state-Centre binaries, faced local undercurrents and resentment from the domicile tribals; the nature of their merginalisation was complex and different in both cases.

- by Anindita Ghoshal
- •
- Northeast India, Arunachal Pradesh, Tribal studies, Chittagong Hill Tracts

The focus of this research is to study language contact and resulting language mixing in two states of India; Arunachal Pradesh (AP) and Meghalaya. It will be argued that the effect of borrowing/interference is not compartmentalized to certain grammatical subsystems. It will also be proposed that mixed languages can have more than two participants and several participants can contribute at distinct linguistic levels. This paper focuses on the interplay of several Indo-Aryan languages such as, Hindi, Assamese, Bangla, Nepali, Maithili and Bhojpuri with the Tibeto-Burman (TB) and Austro-Asiatic (AA) languages. The paper would present certain similarities between two Contact Hindi (CHs) and also note their certain peculiar features. The data findings would be tested against several proposed theories of contact language formation. The present paper is divided into separate sections; theory, methodology, data, results and conclusions.

- by Maansi Sharma
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- Hindi, Arunachal Pradesh, Language contact, Meghalaya

This essay is a reflection on coming to terms with the category ‘tribal’ through a decade and a half of researching the Northeast. As a non-historian who has worked on issues as diverse as agricultural change, pro-development groups, Northeast migrants, race and the media, and inter-ethnic relations in urban India, I come to this essay from a position of puzzlement: What am I supposed to do with the category ‘tribal’? Challenge it? Adopt it? Stand up for it? Further, what are ‘we’, as scholars engaged with the Northeast professionally and personally, to do with the category? On the one hand, scholars are finely attuned to the category as a thin colonial construction, and scarcely a seminar or special issue goes by without a call to challenge the category, deconstruct it, rethink it, or lay bare its precarious assumptions. On the other hand, the category is used by those subject to it, is desired by those who do not have it, and is resolute in a great deal of scholarship on the region as evidence for an ongoing ‘identity crisis’ that offers a ready-made logic for almost everything. As many authors have pointed out, including many in this volume, communities of the region, particularly in the hill areas, are largely de-historicized in this process: history is for the valleys, anthropology for the hills. As such, the past is told as a series of recent encounters: communities in the region emerged out of primitive pasts through contact with colonial authorities and missionaries, were categorized and subject to forms of colonial subjugation which dramatically altered their previously unchanging lives, and were then forced to survive in the modern Indian state. Recent scholarship has posed a major challenge to these standard practices of understanding the region. Despite these welcome shifts, I still find the category challenging, particularly as much of my academic life has required me to explain ‘tribal’ for audiences outside the Northeast, and often outside South Asia entirely. Further, having used race as a way of analysing the politics of integration, solidarity, and representation for Northeast communities in India, I have noted a fascinating reaction from scholars anxious about the use of race lest it transgress the tribal/non-tribal distinction in the region. This has called for a careful retelling of a particular historical narrative by scholars and by activists and politicians. In this paper, I explore the resoluteness of the category ‘tribal’, and some alternative ways of approaching it, by using the example of Meghalaya. Although I have conducted little research in Meghalaya since 2010 as my focus has shifted to other parts of the region, Meghalaya was the first place I went as a researcher. I spent almost a decade researching here – almost all of it in the Khasi Hills – including all my doctoral work. Thus, it was – and remains – the setting where I have struggled most with the category of ‘tribal’: its past, its legacy, and what I am to make of it. Though this, I suggest, holds true for other contexts in the Northeast too.

- by Duncan A . McDuie-Ra
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- Race and Ethnicity, Colonialism, Nagaland, Northeast India

Meyor, spoken in a few villages in northeast Arunachal Pradesh, is a highly endangered language of possible Tibeto-Burman affiliation. A closely related language, Zha, is spoken across the border in Tibet in three villages. The paper is an attempt to unravel the language history of Meyor by comparison with Kman [=Miju] and other nearby languages. There is little doubt that Meyor shares much lexicon with Kman, but the similarities suggest this is possibly borrowing. Meyor also has borrowings from spoken Tibetan and some Naga-type languages. Nonetheless it retains a core of lexicon of no clear origin. Only further more detailed work may help establish whether it is a language isolate or a previously unknown branch of Tibeto-Burman.

On 15 August 1950, just as India was celebrating its third independence anniversary, an earthquake of 8.6 magnitude struck the remote north-eastern state of Assam and its surrounding borderlands. Rivers came out of their bed and landslides blocked Himalayan valleys, destroying towns, villages, roads, fields, and tea gardens in their wake. Beyond the disaster’s shattering impact on the physical geography of the region, this paper explores how it participated in another reconfiguration — that of Assam’s place within India’s political geography and national imaginary. The Indian public had hitherto known very little about India’s remote ‘north-east frontier’; the cataclysm and subsequent relief measures served to carve out a space for it on Indian mental maps. Simultaneously, by forcing a large-scale encounter between Indian authorities and the people of the scarcely controlled eastern Himalayas, post-earthquake relief and rehabilitation led to unprecedented state expansion in this newly strategic borderland. Yet in the same breath, the aftermath of the disaster fuelled stereotypes about Assam and its hinterland that would eventually further their marginality within India and undermine their continued unity. The crystallisation of Assam’s image as a place irreducibly subject to the whims of nature, and more importantly incapable of taking care of itself (and hence, of its highland dependencies), would poison centre-state relations for decades to come. Imperfect and contradictory, the re-ordering of this border space from a colonial frontier to a component of independent India’s national space did not end marginality, but instead reinforced it.