Tribals – Who are they ?
- Part 3 -

* L Memo Singh

Besides, the administration which was carried on by the British political Agent in consulatation with the Vice President or President of the Darbar over the tribal areas on behalf of the Maharaja and further the exclusion of tribal administration from the jurisdiction of the Darbar had widened the distance. The eminent leaders of the Nikhil Hindu Manipuri Mahasabha had realised the worst effect of the encounter of the ruling Manipuri elites against the attitude and outlook of the British and the policies of the British rulers to exclude the tribal administration from the purview of the Maharaja and the jurisdiction of the Darbar.

The Mahasabha had deleted the term "Hindu" from its name and title in its fourth session held at Chinga in 1938 with the evolving of the Mahasabha from the religious and social platform to a political platform. The Mahasabha's founding leader, Hijam Irabot became the President of the newly formed political platform. The formation of the political platform had sowed the seed of Indian national politics to the soil of Manipur. The ideologies of different Indian political parties and philosophies of different Indian political leaders reflected on the political leaders of Manipur.

Maharaja Churachand had sincerely loved his people of Manipur. He had his own consummate statecraft to enlighten his people with his temper and urged of modern age which was influenced by the high peak of British imperialism. He stood firmly as an exemplar facing all sorts of contemporary challenges to build up the synthesis of the old and the new systems of polity of Manipur. In other words, Churachand Maharaja was the symbol of synthesis of tradition and modernity in upholding the civilizational antiquity of Manipur.

He asked the Darbar to submit in time proposals on different matters to reform State administration including uniformity of administration in both the hills and the valley considering the sentiments and aspirations of the people. He did not care for any difference with the Political Agent. In the later part of his life, he suffered severe injuries of self-reverence due to the clash between him and the imperialist. It is an undeniable fact that Sir Churachand Maharaja K.C.S. I.C.B.E. was the patron of modern Manipur.

Before the second world war broke out the Maharaja had passed away in 1941. But the successor, his son, Maharaja Bodhchandra had inaugurated the Constituent Assembly of Manipur on March 10, 1947 and granted his consent to the enactment of the Manipur State Hill Peoples (Administration) Regulation, 1947 and the Manipur Courts Act, 1947 submitted by the Constituent Assembly. Both the laws had been enforced from August 10, 1947 and on the same day the Governor of Assam had discharged the Hill (Tribal) areas administration of the State to the king of Manipur. It was taken away from the king by the British Government in 1907. In fact, the term "tribe" is a legacy of British rule. There was no mention of tribals in the monarchical history of Manipur until the arrival of the British.

The imperial power came to the end and the loss of Indian empire was too painful to the British because they dreamt of the permanent dominion over India and they thought that this dominion, like time, was eternal. They treated Indians like Aristotle's slaves-perpetual children always in need of strong guiding hand and concluded their reason that how they could go free if they were incapable of growing up. This was impossible and incredible, for time and circumstances were working against the dream and thought of the British.

Everyone knew that one day, however distant and remote, the British would return to their homeland. Ultimately the fateful day was the ever celebrated 15th August, 1947. From this day Manipur was also set free from the yoke of British Imperialism. But the British had left certain conditions as regards the relations between Manipur and Dominion India. The conditions were reflected in the Stand Still Agreement which dealt with particularly common subject like defence, external affairs, communication, currency, trade and commerce, etc. The aim of the Agreement was that both the countries should jointly honour the conditions without imposing upon each other.

After 56 years of British rule, independent Manipur successfully conducted general Assembly elections in the 53 Assembly constituencies of the State in accordance with its own Constitution, "the Manipur State Assembly Constitution Act 1948" which had restored the undivided administration of both the hill and the valley. But the Assembly did not last long. Manipur was merged into India on October 15, 1949. The merger was affected before the submission of the Draft Constitution of India to the Constituent Assembly on November 4, 1948. The Draft Constitution was finally enacted, with suitable amendments after thorough discussion clause by clause, on November 26,1949

The Constituent Assembly which had framed the present Constitution was set up in 1946 under the Cabinet Mission Plan. The Constituent Assembly, when it met for the first time on December 9, 1946, was not a sovereign body. Before its transformation into a fully sovereign body on August 15, 1947, the Constituent Assembly had also set up various sub-committees to report on the various aspects of the Constitution.

The two sub-committees: the Committee on Chief Commissioners' Provinces and the Advisory Committed on Tribal Areas were very much concerned with Assam and particularly Manipur. Dr. Ambedkar, the Law Member of the Government of India was the Chairman of the Drafting Committee and he was to give a legal form to the decisions embodied in the reports. Gopinath Bordoloi, the then Chief Minister of Assam, was Chairman of the North East Frontier (Assam) Tribal and Excluded Area Committee and the Committee was popularly known as Bordoloi Committee after the name of its chairman.

The report submitted by the Bordoloi Committee dealt with various aspects relating to administration of the tribal areas such as thoughts on development, special features of these areas, land, forest, jhumming, court, finance, control of immigration, service, etc Dr BR Ambedkar and Gopinath Bordoloi spok strongly in favour of special provisions relating to the tribal administration.

Dr Ambedkar said: "Tribal people in area other than Assam are more or less Hinduised, more or less assimilated with the civilization and culture of the majority of the people in whose midst they live but with regard to the tirbals in Assam that is not the case. Their roots are still in their own civilization. Dr Ambedkar further said, the position of the trbials of Assam was somewhat analogus to the position of the Red Indians of the United States as against the white emigrants.

The United States created boundaries or reservation in which the Red Indians live. They are no doubt, citizens of United States of America but they are actually independent people. The government of USA realised that their laws and mode of life, their habitat and manner of life were so distinct that it would be dangerous to bring them immediately at one time within the range of laws made by the white people for the whites and white civilization. This was the main reason why we insisted upon the creation of District Councils and Regional Councils on the lines adopted by the USA for the Red Indians.

It is true that Dr BR Ambedkar and Gopinath Bordoloi had formulated their views and theories in view of only the administrative set-up of the then undivided Assam and they did not take opportunities to study differences between Assam and Manipur. They might comprehend that the monarchical culture of Manipur was homogeneous in its unilateral love of heterogeneity for the last more than two thousand years. But they had remained silent and the reason of their silence may be presumed in such a way that any differences in this regard would be taken as an internal problem because Manipur became an integral part of India. On the other hand, their endeavour might be overshadowed by the integration plan of Sardar Patel who felt that integration of various units was far more important than forming cohesive units at that time.

Besides, the Indian National Congress which was represented by 211 out of 233 participating members, wisely decided to push on with the work of constitution-making. On December 13, 1946 Jawahar Lal Nehur moved the "Objectives Resolution", which was passed on January 22, 1947. Its beginning two paragraphs had clearly stated the plan of the integration of India which was accomplished within less than a year-and-a-half after independence. They run as follow:

"The Constitutional Assembly declares its firm and solemn resolve to proclaim India as an Independent, Sovereign Republic and to draw up for her future Government a Constitution:

WHEREIN in the territories that now comprise British India, the territories that now form the Indian States and such other parts of India as are outside British India and the States, as well as such other territories as are willing to be constituted into the independent, sovereign India, shall be a Union of them all".

Nehru's own outlook on India was fundamentally shaped by speaking to and reading Rabindranath Tagore. It was Tagore's provocation that Nehru developed a theory of nationalism that was inclusive, not exclusive. The future Prime Minister of free India had first met Asia's first Nobel laureate in the early 1920, when he accompanied Gandhi to Santiniketan following a Congress meeting in Calcutta.

The trip is recalled in Nehru's autobiography, the first footnote of which incidentally mentions the striking coincidence that Tagore was born on the same day in the same month of the same year as his own father, Motilal. He cited: "Rabindranath Tagore wrote in one of his famous poems about India: "No one knows at whose call so many streams of men flowed in restless tides from places unknown and were lost in one sea: here Aryan and non-Aryan, Dravidain, Chinese, the banks of Saka and the Hunas and Pathan and Mogul, have become combined in one body". But no one denies the fact that before independence the North-Eastern region was little known and obscure.

After a long trip through India's North-Eastern borderlands in 1953 Nehru wrote to the Chief Ministers of States that the region "deserves our special attention, not only [of ] the Government, but of the people of India. Our contacts with them will do us good and will do them good too. They add to the strength, variety and cultural richness of India. As one travels there, a new and vaster richness of India comes before the eyes and the narrowness of outlook which sometimes obsesses us, begins to fad away".

Now an unavoidable question arises: "How far Indians are prepared to overlook the difference between the inclusive nationalism of Nehru and the exclusive administration of Dr BR Ambedkar and Gopinath Bordoloi?" India respects and celebrates the linguistic, cultural and religious diversity of its peoples. But it is true that the yardstick of insisting on this diversity is the reintroduction of the tribal system in the Indian polity which has been envisased in the Constitution of India. During British imperialism the tribal system was the result of divide-and-rule policy of the British rule.

After independence Assam becomes the first victim of such British legacy. Assam has been divided into different parts. The political geography of undivided Assam is lost forever. The North-Eastern region has become the most trouble spot in the Indian Union since independence. In comparison to other States of India Manipur has the greatest tribal concentration. If Manipur is put into the foothold of Assam who would be bold enough to take its responsibility?

Concluded...