Beating the Rhetoric
The history of the Northeast since the colonial and post colonial times have focussed predominantly on its relations with the rest of India and how it has shaped the communities over the years. While there has been some research on the Ahom kingdom of Assam, histories of the rest of the kingdoms and chiefs are completely missing. The case of prehistory is even worse. Despite Northeast India boasting of substantial prehistoric archaelogical evidences, there has been little effort to understand the same hence they languish as mere watermarks in historical records and often the people themselves fail to understand and appreciate their own heritage. While the Stonehenge of England or Bhimbhetka closer home in Bhopal makes for interesting historical trips such exmaples are unheard of in the case of Northeast India.
Among the many examples of such historical significances, the neolithic sites of Meghalaya stand out as shining beacons. Neolithic period referes to the last part of the Stone Age. The neolithic period is marked by development of human technology and acts as a precursor to the Iron Age technology when humans began to technologically evolve. Neolothic period is also marked by farming and domesticating wild cereals. It started in the Levant, West Asian region and by 8800 BC farming communties arose in Levant, WestAsia, Africa and Asia Minor regions. One such Neolithic site is the Lumsohpetbneng region of Ribhoi district in Meghalaya.
Since 2013-14 regular excavations have unearthered a number of neolothic pottery and agricultural tools in the Lumsohpetbneng region of Meghalaya.The site is a place of pligrimage for those who profess the indigenous Khasi religion. Legend has it that it was in Lumsopetbneng that a golden ladder connected Heaven and Earth, God and Man. Researchers have concluded that the evacuated remains go back to as early as 1220 BC. Evidences also suggest that later on these communities moved to other parts so the Khasi and Jaintia hills and settled there.
Another important Neolothic site of Meghalaya is the Ganol Rongram river valley in West Garo Hills. The site is triangular in shape and is spread over an area of over 16 square kilometeres. A number of tools both from the Neolithic and Paleleolithic age were discovered in these sites.
The third important and perhaps the most intriguing site in Meghalaya is the site that is located in the point of the Purana/Old Bhaitbari, a small village in the West Garo Hills district on the southern bank of the River Jingjiram, in a distance of about three miles from Phulbari (Garden of flowers) on the way to Tura. This site has revealed a number of interesting discoveries which make the history of Meghalaya unqiuely interesting.One of the first discoveries that was made was of fortifications signalling settlements which were of permanant nature of some kind. A second kind of discovery that was made was of debris of a burnt brick temple that was discovered. Interestingly, this temple had a number of terocotta figurines resembling Hindu gods like Parvati, Kubera etc. where figures of Ganesha seemed to dominate. The third and impressive discovery during the excavation was the discovery and exposure of the site of an octagonal Shiva temple with eight miniature octagons, each having a Shiva Linga. The structure is of a more magnificent architecture, having eight square sub-sidiary shrines radiating from the eight arms of the main octagon. Burnt bricks were used to make this temple. However the most important and unique discovery from this site was the discovery of a Stupa dedicated to Lord Buddha. While there is no evidence of Buddhism being practised in Meghalaya today, the discovery of Buddha indeed points out to the confluence and change that history undergoes.
A look at the pre historical Neolithic and other prehistroical sites of Meghalaya throw up interesting questions of history and the history of NorthEast more specifically. Today Meghalaya is a predominantly Christian state and yet it had a Hindu and more interestingly a Buddhist history to itself as well. Also, scholars often mistake the kind of Hinduism that must have been professed. Hinduism is often a way of life. The history of Hinduism in NorthEast India would necessarily not align itself with that of the more dominant themes. For example Hindusim in Assam in Pre Ahom era found its heroes among those who sided with the Kauravas during the Mahabharata. At the same time the story of the golden ladder in the Lumsohpetbneng region of Ri bhoi district is quite close to the Ahom story of the King and his descendents climbing down from a golden ladder from Heaven. Do they signal a common history or common origin? Do the Khasis and the Ahoms share a common ancestral link then since their stories suggest striking similarities? The history of Buddhism is something that remains even more unexplored. In summation, there is no doubt that the NorthEast has much diversity and interesting history to offer and efforts must be made to study and popularise the same.
(Views expressed by the author are personal)