Maredumilli - a weekend getaway from Hyderabad

Nationalism : A glimpse of Arunachal!

While a fierce debate on what constitutes Nationalism rages, I took the time out in March 2016 to visit the Eastern Himalayas for a few days.

Pura Sunya (Apatani tribe) from Ziro, Rijum Riram (Galo) from Aalo, Aniyak Nungnu (Tagin) from Daporijo, and Sengni Tangha (Tangsa) from Changlang.

This photo more than anything else, epitomizes what I learned about the idea of India. These four girls are from Arunachal Pradesh, and I happened to spend around half an hour with them.

All four go to the same college, three of them doing their B.A and the fourth studying B.Com. All four come from different regions and from different tribes.  They all have different mother tongues. They all talk to each other  in Hindi and some English. My Hyderabadi Hindi differs from each of them because of mother tongue influences. They all worship different gods. While one was a Christian, the others followed Donyi Polo (a collection of religions all under one umbrella).

Just in case you think these four are an exception, there are around 26 major tribes across regions in Arunachal each having their own language, customs, festivals and rituals. The number of religions is mind-boggling all under the broad umbrella of Donyo-Polo: Nyedar Namlo by the Nyishi tribe, Rangfrah by the Tangsa & Nocte, Medar Melo by the Apatani, Kargu Gamgi by the Galo and Donyi-Polo Dere by the Adi. The Jawaharlal Nehru Museum in Itanagar shows the diversity of this region.

Indigenous religions like Donyo-Polo Tibetan Buddhism are currently the only religions protected by law in India. Yes, there were some Hindus too - 30% - mostly migrants who had settled in Arunachal, mostly in Itanagar. And 1-2% Muslims.

There didn't seem to be anyone following 'Bharat mata' the goddess invented around 1905.  But they all knew India however – the Indo-Tibetan Border Force (ITBP) built roads across mountains connecting them (bad roads, but roads nonetheless). The hills could only be traversed by Tata “Sumos”, which criss-crossed the dirt tracks over hills, each carrying 14 passengers squeezed tightly in!

One of the girls had seen Bahubali and Bajrangi Bhai Jan. Another listened to Atif Aslam songs. Overall, the same themes seemed to repeat - Bollywood, Hindi film music are the great unifiers across these 26 different tribes who spoke different languages.  Before everyone gets all teary-eyed over tribalism, let me also add the other things they seemed to know about: Samsung phones, Android, Avengers and Justin Beiber.

Of course, let me also add Cricket. Even the hotel waiter seemed to know of the Indian -  Bangladesh match tension on the last ball (Bangladesh needing 2 runs to win) and  Dhoni stopping the Bangladesh win miraculously.

There were only two major theaters around the place I was staying in Itanagar. One was barely 1 km away, and the second was 15 km away. No signs of street hoardings normally noticeable in other cities.

As I caught a ferry across the Brahmaputra, I was struck by how different every face looked.

 The river we call the Brahmaputra is known as the Siang River in and around that region - East Siang, Upper Siang districts all get their names from it. And the Siang itself is a Chinese river, the Yarlung Tsangpo (more than 1800 kms out of 3000 kms as it flows).

Do “Arunachalis” think of themselves as Indians first and Arunachalis later, or as Chinese? For countless centuries, they were Adi, or Nyishi, or whatever tribe they belonged to. They were part of the British empire after the Ahoms were defeated in 1850’s and formed the North East Frontier Agency.

They were part of the British Empire just as much as America or Africa were – barely a couple of centuries. They’ve been a part of the newly formed ‘Arunachal’ (1972) for less than 0.5 centuries.

For some lay-Indians, we see all of them having “Chinky” features, just as the “White Men” always thought of all “Red Indians” as a single nation, instead of the Sioux, Pawnee and other nations. Or just as the "White Men" always thought of all “Africans” as “Negroes”.

They don’t even eat the same food though the menu looks the same! I loved that part.

I was treated by my hostess Joya to a drink of Apong. Apong is a local drink made by fermenting a semi-solid mix of rice and wheat for 4 to 6 months, and then pouring hot boiling water over it to release alcohol, which I drank with a bamboo straw. I had a similar drink called Chang in a Buddhist settlement in Sikkim a few years ago.

Joya, who works in the DC's (Dy. Commissioner) office, manages her 3 kids, and also supports Kuku Komba, her husband. 

In 1970’s, most of the houses were made of Bamboo with thatched leaf roofs. Roads didn’t exist (just to clarify they were not made in the last 1.5 years) to most places. The way supplies got into Tuting was mostly by defence aircraft (Dakotas). And every item was treasured, especially the Gunny Bags (bora) which brought in rice, wheat or even cement. They used boras for making stuffed blankets, and even cut slits in the bags to wear them as clothes.

Deepak Joseph, the government cook there, told me, “A lot of people complain about no progress. When I was a child, most people didn’t even have proper clothes to wear. The roofs are now made of Tin sheets. We’ve managed to clothe everyone. And we grow our own vegetables now. I call that major progress in a single lifetime to do that over such a vast geographically difficult condition.”

Luxury and progress are relative terms, as evidenced by the cat lying smugly warm at a fireplace in Kuku Komba’s house, while we enjoy a drink.

You should note that Kuku Komba was drinking a rich golden whisky (Imperial Blue) as all IMFL liquor is dirt cheap (Rs.40 for a quarter not being taxed), while I greedily drank the local liquor Apong. Even taste is a relative term.

Kuku Komba, my friend, the watchman of the PWD Dak Bungalow, who was my host in Tuting and took me around. He wears black goggles since he unfortunately had to have one eye removed, having reached several days too late after an eye infection to the remote hospital.

Some things are even now not developed. Like the nearest hospital is a racking 6-8 hour hilly drive away for most remote places and you have to buy tickets for the trip on a Tata Sumo at the local "counter". 

The easiest medicine is to place a gray mud pot in the Buddhist hut and pray that your loved one gets better

Organized Religion comes with its grand temples even in the midst of squalor

And uniformly well-dressed and healthy priests

And schools which train monks to pray for the sick so they get better

Arunachal is a Nation of nations, a mini-India with 26 major tribes, 30 to 50 languages, and religions. It is only the rank, ignorant outsider, who insists on treating this diversity as uniformity, and insists on making the men wear Tikas, or the women Burqas instead of lipstick.

Disorganization and Diversity is the characteristic of the mountains…

Valleys..

Forests…

Rivers…

And lakes…

As an Indian at heart, these call out to me forever. Yeh Wadiyan, Yeh Fizaein, bula rahi hain tumhein.

As part of the grandest Nation of nations, that the Portuguese, French, Spanish, Greeks, Huns, Afghans, Aryans, were all searching for and often grew to make their own, we should know better. India has been forged as a federal republic across 550 kingdoms, 122 major languages, 1550 dialects. Hyderabadi Hindi in fact can't even be properly spoken by anyone else, except we Hyderabadis.

In honor of the concept of India, I salute Arunachal for once again reminding me of the grandness of Unity we have forged and grander scale of Diversity we have nurtured.