North by northeast: India's story of 'the outsiders'

India’s northeasterners are victorious disruptors; braving racism and fighting their way to survive... and thrive

India’s remote northeast, comprising seven contiguous states (the Seven Sisters) — Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Tripura — and (the eighth one) Sikkim (separated by a stretch of north Bengal), is home to less than 3.5 per cent of the country’s over 1.3 billion population, and does not find any significant mention in its history books.The region is home to more than 200 ethnic tribes known for their distinctive socio-cultural norms and identities, their East Asian features often make them a butt of ridicule and racist slurs in mainland India. The mutual distrust often takes diabolical name-calling: such as vai or outsider for mainland Indians in Mizo, or Duhlian language, or dkhar in Khasi dialect, which is spoken in Meghalaya’s Khasi Hills. The mainlanders use pejoratives such as chinki and chow mein that are hurled thick and fast at the northeasterners.

The 'lookist' conspiracy

As Covid was reported across India since March last year, the northeasterners became targets for racial discrimination (for instance, a Manipuri woman was ‘spat on’ and called “coronavirus” by a north Indian man in Delhi) and were branded as one of the primary causes that led to the spread of the contagion. They have been vilified for their East Asian looks, called “coronavirus” and told to go back to China, where the virus traced its origin to Wuhan.

Rachungailiu Gonmei, a Rongmei Naga from Manipur and a student at Delhi University, is no stranger to such racial taunts: she’s been battling them since she came to India’s capital to pursue higher education a few years ago. “It’s been a daily struggle to adapt to new languages and different cultures… we’re often subjected to frequent racial discrimination,” she sighs. “Hostile landlords and insensitive employers take advantage of our helplessness and hate crimes in big cities are commonplace.”

Black lives may matter in the faraway US, but closer home, “when people from the northeast are suffering silently, you don’t even feel the need to raise your voice? It’s only when it’s an American issue that people appear to find it an ‘in thing’ and speak out,” says Alana Golmei, also a Rongmei Naga, a lawyer and activist, who runs the Delhi-based Northeast Support Centre and Helpline. Alana, who herself was called ‘coronavirus’ several times, says daily distress calls to the helpline had more than doubled to over 200 since Covid cases were first reported in India.

However, the data and cold statistics do not tell the tale of dehumanisation. Most victims, community members say, choose not to go to lodge a complaint with the police, who are often found to be apathetic to their cause.

Alana delineates the challenges of the victims because the “police are so insensitive”. “Justice, at best, is elusive because they mock us and laugh at our Hindi, as strict enforcement of laws to punish racial abuse is few and far between,” she says. “Democracy is all about demographic dividends and our numbers have seldom been a determining factor. We’re a disparate tiny minority lumped together as a homogenous bunch. No wonder, punishment for racial abuse under Indian law is seldom meted out. The law stipulates the use of derogatory racist terms is punishable by up to five years imprisonment, but where is the enforcement?”

Against the odds

Be that as it may, the northeasterners have conquered racial slurs and prejudice, delivering a sucker punch despite daily travails. Their individual contributions in all walks of life — from sports and fashion to performing arts — are keenly felt on the world stage. At the Tokyo Olympics, (Assamese) boxer Lovlina Borgohain and (Manipuri) weightlifter Mirabai Saikhom Chanu have overnight become heroes. Sanjib Baruah, a professor of Political Studies at Bard College in New York and a scholar from Assam, in his latest book In the Name of the Nation: India and its Northeast, has explored the relationship between the manager (read: mainland India) and the managed (read: the northeast, or the post-colonial neo-life).

Baruah’s exploration of history and ethnography lays bare how deep-seated neglect, corruption, lopsided development and repression have intensified the region’s alienation from the rest of the country and its people are often treated as cannon fodder for vote-bank politics.

However, striking an emotional chord with the region can spawn creative pursuits of a lasting legacy. For instance, Matamgi Manipur, the first feature in Meitei — a language spoken by the majority of Manipuris — was released on April 9, 1972. Ironically, it was Debkumar Bose, of Bengali ethnic origin, who directed the Meitei family drama, which went on to win the President’s Silver Medal for the best regional film at the 20th National Film Awards. Bose’s empathy, a rarity, did much more than win accolades for Manipur and laid the foundation for a vibrant film industry in the conflict-hit state. Manipur has since produced over 60 and 40 feature and non-feature films, respectively, and many award-winning works, and has been celebrating April 9 as Mami Numit or, Day of Cinema; this year was the golden jubilee.

The community culture

The northeast, a largely pastoral and subsistence-based society, lays greater emphasis on community bonding, religiosity, harmony and ecological sustainability than material wealth. There’s a strict code of conduct, or the way of life that the Mizos call Tlawmngaihna, which celebrates community bonding, irrespective of joy and sorrow. And much of the region believes in Tlawmngaihna, which is neither legislated nor enforced, even though the expression is diverse in each ethnic group, sub-group or clan.

Christianity played a dominant role to unite the various ethnic groups, who were largely animists till the middle of the 18th century. Data shows that Christianity got entrenched in the tribal populations primarily between 1931 and 1951. India’s independence in 1947 led to the Church playing an inspiring role.

Easterine Kire, an Angami Naga author and poet, weighs in on the role of the Church to lend a holistic shape to the northeastern society at large: “It’s a combination of our (oral) cultural practice and Biblical teachings that create a harmonious environment for our young generation. We encourage them when they display their interest in any skill or subject. Life is beyond the rat race of big cities and bright lights. From their formative years, our children hear words of encouragement from their elders. This habit goes a long way to support them in their future choice of vocations. What they lack in the way of governmental support is compensated by community aid. The efforts help them believe in themselves and the consequences are to overcome all odds and excel on a global stage.”

The lack of inhibition, indeed, has been a unifying factor, says Pastor Reverend Helien Singsit, a Kuki from Nagaland’s Peren district and based in Shillong, Meghalaya.

Dr Kethoser Aniu Kevichusa, an Angami Naga and an evangelist, has delved deep into forgiveness and politics, which are academically unrelated for a lay reader.

However, his publication Forgiveness and Politics explores the Biblical genesis of forgiveness and their concepts and practices of politics, justice, truth and reconciliation in a tribal society and finds echoes in the conflicts in Northern Ireland and his native Nagaland, which has been struggling for self-determination for over the past 70 years.

An adaptation of an organic sub-culture such as that of the Koreans have led to the emergence of K-pop, BTS, and Gangnam style across the region, where Bollywood — a dominant mainland idiom of expression — has become irrelevant.

The emergence of Korean subculture underscores that the northeast is intrinsically different from the mainland, bucking the trend of unity in diversity and, instead, celebrating its ethnic diversities in multiple subcultural hues — whose import is often lost on mainland India.

Away from the arclight

Assamese director Jahnu Barua’s depiction of the common man in Halodhia Soraiye Baodhan Khan (The Catastrophe), which won the National Award for Best Film in 1987, is a precursor to his ‘country cousin’ Rima Das’s coming-of-age Village Rockstars in 2017. While Barua learnt filmmaking at India’s premier Film & Television Institute of India (FTII), Pune, in the early 1980s, Das is self-taught and spent much of her formative years in her native Chhaygaon in Assam’s Kamrup district.

Village Rockstars encapsulates the raw talent of northeasterners; it premiered at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), earned four National Film Awards in 2018, including Best Film and Best Editing, and was India’s official entry for Best Foreign Language Film at the 91st Academy Awards in 2019. Das’s next film Bulbul Can Sing (2018) won best Assamese film at the following year’s National Film Awards and best indie honour at the 2019 Indian Film Festival in Melbourne, Australia. Das, who puts a premium on creative satisfaction over materialistic success like many creative northeasterners of her ilk, is clear in her mind that she’d “never trade autonomy of my stories for better funds.” OTT/ streaming services are music to the ears of filmmakers like her, whose evocative and unique sounds are often lost amid the cacophony of big-ticket Bollywood blockbusters.

Angami Naga Sesino Yhoshu’s The Pangti Story, a 26-minute documentary, caught the global eye: it featured Pangti, a village in Nagaland’s Wokha district, whose residents transformed themselves from slaughtering thousands of migratory Amur falcons to becoming conservationists. The film champions the pioneering efforts of broadcast journalist-turned-green warrior Bano Haralu — turning a “killing field” into a “safe haven” — in her native Nagaland, and won Best Environment Film at the 65th National Awards in 2018. Yhoshu, Das or Haralu could have found their place in the sun away from their native Kohima, Dimapur or Chhaygaon — but they are more invested in their ethnic roots and traditions than money.

Filmmaker Nicholas Kharkongor, of Naga and Khasi origin, refused to pull back punches in Axone, which premiered at the BFI London Film Festival in 2019 and later released on Netflix. Axone is a heart-warming tale set in the south Delhi northeasterner ‘ghetto’ of Humayunpur, and holds up a mirror on how insidious prejudices become the fabric of everyday lives. Axone (pronounced ‘akuni’) is fermented soybean paste, commonly used in Naga cuisine, and Kharkongor uses food as a leitmotif to convey a power-packed human emotion: it smells like heaven to those who have grown up eating it but can equally repulse those who are not exposed to it.

Axone is a landmark as, overall, the Bollywood spotlight has evaded northeasterners (with the notable exception of Danny Denzongpa, who essayed villainous roles in the 1970s and 1980s). Manipur’s model-turned-actor Lin Laishram, who played a supporting role in the 2014 biopic on boxer Mary Kom, starring Priyanka Chopra in the title role, recently took a dig at ‘stereotyped casting’ in Bollywood. She questioned the casting of Chopra in the title role of Kom and has buttressed her argument with the rich pool of “many great actors” in her native Manipur. “A lot of times, the casting is stereotyped, and we’re stuck to a very small genre of our own... So, when a script like that comes up, from our place, it would be great to be given to somebody who is more eligible and who’s close to that land…,” she says. “It’s heartbreaking, but we are coming along, and I hope that this does not happen again.” Laishram has triggered an intense debate that, hopefully, Bollywood’s casting directors will take note of.

The sound of music

Neil Nongkynrih trained as a pianist at Trinity College and the Guildhall School of Music in London, and returned to his hometown Shillong in 2001 after over a decade-long stay in the UK, and formed the Shillong Chamber Choir. In 2015, he was conferred the Padma Shri, the fourth-highest Indian civilian award.

Nongkynrih (of Khasi, Scottish and Irish origin) wanted to start a school to impart holistic education; the choir evolved into an anthem of the region after their pop medleys won them the 2010 season of India’s Got Talent, a competitive reality television show. The choir has performed across the world, is involved in social work (for instance, Nongkynrih launched a delivery service Uncle’s Ark during the pandemic and supplied groceries to homes in Shillong), and believes in word-of-mouth publicity.

Lou Majaw of Shillong is known as the region’s homegrown Bob Dylan. There are several “unsung” voices, he says, such as Guru Rewben Mashangva, aka Mr Tambourine Man, who can be found at a roadside corner in Imphal, the capital of Manipur. His casual musical rendition is a happy blend of traditional Tangkhul Naga folk blues and powerful acoustic guitar riffs.

Singer-composer Joi Barua of Assam came to Mumbai at the invitation of his country cousin Zubeen Garg around 16 years ago. He reminisces that “though I didn’t face any challenge in my initial years to get a toe-hold in the music industry, I was perhaps one of the few singers who didn’t know a word of Hindi. I was brought up on the usual dose of Western blues, folk and rock and had little inkling about the Bollywood sound.”

However, over time, Barua got accustomed to it, as he considers that “mainland India” as a nomenclature is a misnomer and each part of the diverse country is at odds with each other.

Moments of truth

Senthila T Yanger, an Ao Naga, who was conferred the Padma Shri in 2008, is a craft revivalist and textile specialist. She set up Tribal Weave in 1999, which seeks to give a new lease of life to homegrown Naga textiles and also mobillise women to form self-help groups. “The loin loom is our inherent strength and 100 per cent handmade, where traditional motifs such as wild animals and spears can be woven on bedspreads, curtains, cushion covers and mats,” she says.

But enterprises such as Tribal Weave cannot be escalated because there are no economies of scale, says a bureaucrat, who has served in the region for long. “Similarly, [local] organic produce such as black rice, fresh vegetables, mushrooms, poultry and dairy products are not being marketed nationwide for lack of cold storage and warehouse… the pastoral economy would have got a boost with cogent policymaking, which has been grossly missing through the years,” he adds.

Robin Hibu, an Indian Police Service (IPS) officer, who belongs to Arunachal Pradesh’s Apatani tribe and is based in Delhi, has been a victim of racial discrimination. His personal trials and tribulations made him set up a non-profit organisation called Helping Hands in 2016 in a bid to field distress calls from young men and women from the northeast who were being victimised. Hibu is today the force of nature in uncaring Delhi, pulling out all stops to bridge the communication gap between mainlanders and hapless northeasterners.

But bridging the gap needs more than a helpline. The closed ‘doors of perception’ need to be opened up. And the divisive walls need to be felled.

joydeep@khaleejtimes.com

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