The other day, the Mao-Poumai Baptist Church, Langol celebrated Gospel and Cultural Sunday under the theme. The celebration had a message which said, ‘A person becoming a Christian or embracing a new religion is not about denouncing one’s culture. Our conversion has nothing to do with our dresses, indigenous food habits, our language and our traditional songs.’ There can be nothing truer than this. If we remember correctly, the state government led by BJP’s N Biren Singh sanctioned an amount of Rs 3.88 crore for construction of 37 numbers of Tribal Museums across the state, just before Christmas in 2020.
The government move was aimed at preserving the cultural heritage of the diverse hill communities inhabiting the state. There are at least 33 recognised tribes in Manipur, while a few other tribes are yearning for recognition as a different entity from the larger groups. Before the advent of Hinduism, Manipur had a heterogeneous population. While the Meitei people in the valley areas were basically ancestor worshipers and its cultural and traditional practices were based on a core value system developed over the centuries, hill tribes of the surrounding hill areas had their own traditional and religious practices before the advent of Christianity.
Prior to the coming of Christianity, several mission societies including the American and the Welsh missions had made an attempt to establish its mission centre in Manipur. But until the end of the 19th century, they were not allowed to enter the state, because of strong opposition from the Manipur King. The British administrators wanted to maintain the status quo in religious matters. After the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857, the British rulers had a social policy in their relationship with the princely states that they should not interfere with anyone's religion but maintain strict neutrality.
Reverend William Pettigrew was the first foreign missionary to arrive in Manipur on February 6, 1894. After six months of working among the Meitei people, he was not allowed to continue his work in the valley. This happened when the then Political Agent Major Maxwell returned from a furlough. As he found the Hindu Meiteis were alarmed by Pettigrew's work, he immediately ordered the missionary to stop working and leave Imphal. Having wandered through some of the neighbouring villages, he finally came back to Ukhrul and decided that it was the most suitable place for his missionary work.
In 1901, the two communities of Nagas and Khongjais were the first to have received Christianity. And the rest is history. Today, most of the hill tribes have converted to Christianity except for a few. In fact, the age-old traditions and culture of the hill tribes had waned with the advent of Christianity and a modernity devoid of cultural heritage had taken roots among the hill population. Many among the youth population in the hills had lost track of their own roots and value systems evolved through generations of shared history in this part of the country.
In the last few decades, the tribal population had begun looking inwards with a search for roots. Through a series of traditional festivals broadly supported by the state, the songs and dances embedded with their cultural heritage and value system had slowly returned. As we said before, the tribal museums were indeed a path-breaking approach which would certainly help in evoking that sense of history and lost heritage.
We also hope that the newly injected Christian values would be able to go hand in hand with the traditional values and indigenous knowledge systems of the tribals. One cannot help but remember Alex Haley’s classic novel ROOTS where he, an African-American, traces his roots back to Africa. Understanding of one’s own roots, cultural heritage and identity is fundamental to understanding or knowing oneself.
