By Mike M. Sangma
Bansali. It’s a strange name for a small Garo hardware town sandwiched between Garobada and Mankachar on the State Highway 6, South West Garo Hills. I have no clue how the name came about. My best guess is that a Bania-Rajput businessman established a hardware trading shop which gradually grew into today’s closer alternative hardware hub to Mankachar to cater to Tura ’s growing demand.
It was an eye opening in many ways as I reflect upon my trip back to Garo Hills after 25 years. Besides criss-crossing Tura, I travelled to parts of South-West Garo, bordering Assam and Bangladesh.
In the course of over a week, I met many students and teachers, reconnected with relatives and re-bonded with old friends. Thank you people of Garo Hills for ensuring such an awesome time. One thing for sure, there is a palpable wind of change and the churning within the the Garo society bodes well for the future of the community.
In this part series, I want to share my perspective on some of the issues I see both as an insider as well as an outsider, someone who has stayed outside of Meghalaya for far too long, with a keen interest on the welfare of our people. I really dont think any of my views offer new perspective or is unknown to others. But sometimes the beginning of a change is the acceptance of the problem.
First, let’s get on with the fun part. A late evening drive from Tura towards Rongram with the monsoon drizzle, thunder rumbling and lightning flashing in the distance like a discotheque is perfect recipe for an amazing evening. Traditional Garo villages are often located deep amid dense forest and narrow roads. Gondenggre, however is no ordinary village. One of the last remaining indigenous Songrarek villages in Garo Hills, it is a perfect showcase of how Garos lived on the land for ages: on a red earth, thatched houses, raised above the ground and surrounded by nature all around.
Songsarek is an ancient Garo faith system and traditional practices that is deeply rooted in our agricultural practices and the age old belief in the Supernaturals.
Thanks to the one and only Abi Gunme @GunnMarak, I was privileged to be a part of a traditional Chu-Bitchi/Dikha session at Gondenggre. For the uninitiated and and non Meghalayan readers, Bitchi/Dikha is a traditional alcoholic Garo drinks that is brewed from sticky rice. I have had the fortune of sampling Naga, Manipuri and Assamese rice beer. Trust me, this Garo brew beats all of them fair and square. If you ever come across this Garo brew, drink it you won’t regret it.
Nokma Dirot Ch. Marak and Pa Poljen T. Sangma the resident Songsarek along with their family members were such a gracious host. I too must admit it’s was easier to be a kindred guest with bitchi floating around freely. I am told the annual Wangala festival attracts thousand here.
Unfortunately, as a society, we are on the verge of killing off this ancient system of ours. Most of us today, view Songsareks as an alien system that is in contradiction to our adopted Christian faith. What is yours own, natured over hundreds of years and handed down through generations can never be alien and nothing can be more alien than a Judeo-Roman and American ideology. Christianity is an ideology so powerful that it morphed into faiths and so powerful that it found mass acceptance across the modern human existence. This not just about indigenous Garos but thousands of others systems and traditions that went extinct after the advent of Christianity.
The question is not about the rejection of our ancient faith but the need for a collective effort from the society to ensure that both Songsarek and Christianity co-exists. And that the society appreciate and preserve a system what was once the nurturer of who we are today. And that, no undue pressure is exerted on the last remaining Songsareks to be folded into one or the other Christian denomination.
It’s only matter of time, before the Last Man Standing Songsarek become a Christian. And why not? He sees the economic and societal benefits of being mainstreamed. He see a better future for his children. For him benefits outweigh his beliefs. Therefore the onus is not on them but on all of us to incentivise him to be a Songsarek.
I may be in odds with both the Church and the faithful on this. To begin with, I would like the the Church to refrain from erecting crosses and establishing shrines in places which are of historical importance to our Songsarek beliefs. I believe every concerned Garo knows rest of the solutions.
To where I started from. I saw a visible transformation of Tura. I would rate, the construction of Paver roads connecting each and every colony as the most basic and yet fundamental transformation. Yes, Chandmari Ground is upgraded and a Stadium is being build but nothing beats a good road that is paved with solid pavers. Good roads are the very foundation of economic activity and societal development.
In one of the trips, we drove from Wadanang to Edenbari and came out from Rongkhon. In my Bosco Mount days, you would hardly call them roads. They were just potholes and ditches. With good roads, I also saw mushrooming of good houses and children being dropped and picked in cars and scooters.
‘All Roads Lead to Rome’ and might I as well say, all these new roads lead to Tura. That too is problematic. Like every hill town, there is pretty much no land for road expansion. As Garo Hills grow so will the traffic menace.
I see a red flag for the South West Garo Hills. It’s unique in many ways and it’s slightly different from other districts. With large swath of plain fertile agricultural land bordering both Assam and Bangladesh, the district hold immense possibilities. But with the demography finely balanced between the indigenous Garos, Bengali speaking Muslims, Hajongs and Kochs, it is a powder keg.
In the current context of Assam government’s action against illegal migrants, demolishing large swath of land in so-called eviction drive from government land and current political turmoil and rising Islamic radicalisation in Bangladesh, there is real danger of displaced population from both Assam and Bangladesh making inroads into the district.
Human migration is like a water. No matter what the obstacles are, it flows through the path of least resistance in search of better economic opportunities. Case in the point: Bansali, a Rajasthan businessman setting up a hardware hub in the most unlikely of places and earning a name for himself.
Personally, I believe the issue of illegal migration, radicalisation and so-called systemic Islamisation, all rest on the one fundamental issue of economic depravity. Unfortunately, these border districts are hardly economic engines of the region.
Therefore, both the BSF and the Meghalaya government will have to be extra vigilant as situation pan out both in Assam and Bangladesh. Whatever is happening in both the places are unprecedented and historical and every human race, tribe or community carries historical a baggage.
History is therefore not just the study of the past. It is also the explanation of the present and the prediction of the future.
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”:- Spanish-born American philosopher and novelist, George Santayana
Mike M. Sangma is a Delhi based former journalist and media professional. He writes on various social issues and is also keen observer of economic and geopolitical issues. He is a post graduate alumni of Indian Institute of Mass Communication and holds MBA from Indian Institute of Foreign Trade.
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