From CK Nayak
NEW DELHI: Bharat Mata is yet to get a tribal makeover but Manipur Governor Najma Heptullah has already been widely appreciated for flaunting northeastern ethnic attires during the recently concluded Sangai Festival in Imphal.
As per the demographic profile of Manipur, Najma who was a senior leader in the Rajya Sabha, donned Meitei, Naga and Kuki dresses on the three days of the festival.
This received wide appreciation from the crowd at the fair in particular and the people of the state and the region in general.
Speaking to The Shillong Times at Raj Bhavan during a visit, the only lady governor in the North East said she felt proud to be in the ethnic dresses of different communities of the state.
“This will also help in removing the sense of alienation in the minds of local people,” she said.
Several leaders from the rest of the country have donned tribal dresses when in the North East. But Najma was the lone lady governor who wore ethnic dresses with all paraphernalia for the first time in the history of the state, pointed out a senior official of the Manipur Raj Bhavan to the visiting journalists.
In election-bound Tripura, according to recent reports, the Bharatiya Janata Party’s favoured mascot for election campaigns has been customised to appeal to four different tribes in the state: the Tripuris, the Reangs, the Chakmas and the Debbarmas, or Kokborok-speaking people.
“The traditional attire of each tribe will be represented in posters. A sari-clad Bharat Mata will still be doing the rounds to appeal to the state’s Bengali Hindu population,” party sources said.
Eventually, BJP plans to customise its collection to include 300 tribes across various states of the North East. The idea is to make the “alienated tribes” of the North East feel part of Bharat and claim Bharat Mata, said a BJP leader in Tripura.
The posters in Tripura will show the mother goddess and national deity will not be of strictly mystical origins.
BJP has recruited women in their twenties to pose for the posters, smiling and clutching the national flag.
In the election victories of Assam and Manipur, the party showed political dexterity in the way it adapted to local contexts and forged a coalition of indigenous groups and interests.
In its North East campaign, local tribal symbols and icons have been tinted with saffron. BJP has also handpicked local historical figures, emphasising strands of their story that fit into the grand narrative of Hindu nationalism and enlisting them in the project of patriotism.
In Nagaland and Manipur, which have both seen movements of secession, the party found Rani Gaidinliu, a woman from the Zeliangrong tribe. She was cast as a freedom fighter who had turned against not only the British but also Christian missionaries because she felt they were trying to stamp out indigenous culture.
In other states too, the party retrieved various freedom fighters – Tikendrajit Singh, a Manipuri prince who was hanged by the British; Gopinath Bordoloi from Assam; in Meghalaya, U Tirot Sing, a Khasi chief who fought the British in the 18th century, and U Kiang Nangbah, hanged in 1862.
In Assam, the Sangh found Sankardeva, a 16th century socio-religious reformer believed to be instrumental in spreading Hinduism.