By H H Mohrmen
Much ink and paper has been spent debating the Khasi Hills Autonomous District Council (Khasi Social Custom of Lineage) (Second Amendment) Bill, 2018 but this piece will be different as the argument is on the fact that the Bill inadvertently pulls down the very foundation of being Khasi instead of protecting the indigenous community that the Council is mandated to protect.
The definition who is a Khasi is has been debated earlier but it needs to be reiterated that ‘Khasi’ is the name that others give us. There are variations in the spellings; some spell it Khasia, Khosia while others spell it Gossayah. Similarly the Pnars are called Synteng or Suteng perhaps from the fact that the Jaiñtia monarch was once upon a time called the ‘ki syiem Sutnga’ or the kingdom was also known as ‘ka hima Sutnga’ from Sutnga the place it originated.
What does it mean to be a Khasi-Pnar or Khun u Hynñiewtrep? It is the identity and it is something that makes us unique; it is something that defines us, or something that identifies us to others. The Bill infers that being Khasi is by virtue of blood or our bloodline and that is why it was proposed that the offspring of mixed marriages should be denied Scheduled Tribe status. The argument that a true Khasi is one who has pure blood does not hold water because of the very fact that there are intermarriages of both sexes with men and women from other communities and also “Tangjait” is one of the causes for the dilution of this idea of pure blood line.
But there are those who are of the opinion that our identity is based on our being a Jaidbynriew with a unique culture. It is considered to be a culture because of the custom and other unique features we follow that distinguish us and from others and which also defines us.
The clan system and the matrilineal system that we follow are the fundamental features of the Jaidbynriew. In fact clan and lineage are synonymous in the Khasi-Pnar tradition; they are like two sides of the same coin. And the next important aspect of the Khasi-Pnar in my order of priority are the three cardinal principles, ‘ka kamai ïaka hok, (earn righteousness) ka tipbriew tipblei (know man and know God) and ka tipkur tipkha’ (to know one’s clan members and those of the father’s clans) Tipkur tipkha is secondary because unless a person knows and lives in ‘ka hok’ and ‘im tipbriew tipblei’, chances of a person to ‘tipkur tipkha’ are very less. It is ‘ka kamai ïa ka hok’ and ‘ka tipbriew tipblei’ which guides the heart and the mind of a person in the Khasi-Pnar way of life.
The Megalithic culture that we see around us is another physical aspect of our culture. Our relationship with the nature and the indigenous knowledge and wisdom we learn from our ancestors are other points on the list. Then there are the folk stories, the indigenous food system that we eat, the songs, the dances, the festivals and the dresses we wear and even the indigenous religion that we have left behind are part of our identity.
Then there is another pertinent question that we are to ask ourselves. Are we still a tribe, a community or a society? We will leave the task of deciding our status to the experts, but one thing that is for sure is that we have all changed and evolved with time. And the two factors that help increase the pace of this change is the blitz of modern way of life and conversion from the indigenous religion to other faith groups.
I don’t think I need to justify my first argument but the fact that conversion has only distanced us from our roots is there for all to see. Any scholar who wishes to understand the Khasi-Pnar way of life knows that, that information can only be collected from the areas where the predominant population comprise those who still follow the indigenous religion. We talk about the importance of the Clan among the Khasi-Pnar and the living example of this can be found only in the place where there are those who still follow the Niamtre (indigenous faith).
In Jowai the concept of “Ïung-blai or Kmai-ïung” is one such example which unites the families to the Kur. Niamtre was never an institution like the other faith groups and there is no church but instead of that the “Ïung-blai or Kmai-ïung” because religion/faith is a family matter. All the rites of passages of the individual members of the family are conducted or performed at the “Ïung-blai” and the maternal uncle is the chief administrator of all the activities. Of course there are many “Kmai-ïung” in spite of the fact that there is one clan but the Kur are still related although they have different “Ïung-blai or Kmai-ïung”.
In a family which does not follow Niamtre, there is no “Ïung-blai or Kmai-ïung” anymore; instead they now have what they call “Ïung-Kur” and it constitutes mainly families from one grandmother only while a Ïung-blai or Kmai-ïung comprises of families from different grandmothers or even great grandmothers. In the traditional Niamtre family the many families are united by the Ïung-blai to which they belong, while the unity of the modern families is very loose as they are not bound by religious rites and tradition and also the families tend to be nuclear families. Nevertheless clan is still a very important feature of the Jaidbynriew.
The Khasi-Pnars are therefore not homogenous anymore because our blood line is already diluted and there is no homogeneity in the very fundamental aspect of the Hynñiewtrep because we also follow different family systems. Regrettably the strong clan system on which the community is built is gradually eroding.
Marriage is the central and fundamental aspect of this Bill and again because it was constructed bases on the western idea, it contradicts with tradition (at least with the one followed in Jwai). Marriage in Niamtre is a contract between the two maternal uncles and the wedding ceremony is called “ka lam ïungtang” because it is the two maternal uncles which make a covenant (ïutang) on behalf of the couple and their respective families.
The different facets of the Khasi-Pnar culture like customs, the clan system, taking lineage from the mother and the cardinal principles etc are the bedrock of the Khasi-Pnar. But to consider the genuineness of a person based on a bloodline only, reduces the marriage to a contract between the couple and not a contract between the families led by the maternal uncle for which a traditional marriage is. The Bill therefore looks at marriage from a western context and ignores the traditional aspect of the institution.
The Bill is not only an attack on the traditional marriage system but it is an assault on the very fundamentals of the Jaidbynriew and that is the clan system. It is against the clan system because it considers marriage to be a contract between two persons and also ignores the important role of the maternal uncle. In one genius stroke the Bill does away with both the clan and the maternal uncle from being part of a very important institution of marriage.
The Bill is therefore an attempt to save a matrilineal family system albeit by looking at the problem using patriarchal lenses.
If the Bill is allowed to be enacted into a law then gradually the family lineage system will change from matrilineal to patriarchal because blaming women for all the ills of the society was first propounded by the likes of Syngkhong Rympei Thymmai which proposed to do away with matrilineal family system. If we keep on blaming the transfer of tribal land to non tribal and the benami transaction on women we inadvertently fall into the trap of those who want to change the entire system from matrilineal to patriarchal. And if lineage system change then not only the entire structure will collapse under its own weight but the very identity that we struggle to protect and preserve will fade away.
In reminds me of an incident when we arranged a meeting of the Khasi mandarin farmers from Amlarem Block with the scientist of ICAR. We were only helping with the translation. The farmers and the scientist arrived at a conclusion that there are two diseases which attack the orchard, one is a bore which can be treated by closing the hole and using syringe to inject insecticide inside the tree trunk and for the parasite one needs to remove the part of the branches affected and burnit.
There are problems in the Jaidbynriew, no doubt about that, but this Bill is not the solution to any of the problems. The Bill rather than providing remedial measures to solve problems has instead uprooted the tree in its effort to remove the problem.