JOURNAL 2018 Arteast 2018

Home , Lake of No Return, Lohit district

JOURNAL 2018 ArtEast 2018

Art and Livelihood, Migration and Displacement

Co-authored by Monica Banerjee and Kishalay Bhattacharjee. Organised by National Foundation for India (NFI) in collaboration with India International Centre, The Sasakawa Peace Foundation and New Imaginations, Jindal School of Journalism and Communication.

2 NEW IMAGINATIONS Jindal School of Journalism and Communication

ArtEast Journal Vol 2 Second Issue Editor Kishalay Bhattacharjee Editorial Assistants: Ashima Sharma Khushi Gupta Published by National Foundation for India (NFI) Core 4 A, India Habitat Centre, Lodhi Road, New Delhi 110 003 91-11-24641864, 24641865 91-11-24648490, 24648491 [email protected]

Design Aspire Design, New Delhi Printed at Aspire Design, New Delhi Cover Photo Standing in his bamboo house, a Nyishi headman checks his traditional headgear (now made of fiberglass and not of hornbill casque) before setting out for a meeting. Arunachal Pradesh, December 2011 by Arati Kumar Rao Back Cover Photo Umsning village, Mawkynrew, East Khasi Hills district, Meghalaya 2007 by Sudharak Olwe 05 06-12 13 16 Curator’s Note An Ode to Did you Dream a An Unseen Tunnel Kishalay Bhattacharjee Bamboo Fortune? Inside a Displaced Parasher Baruah Proletarian M.P. Ranjan Sukant Panigrahy & Sujatha Shankar Kumar Kaur Chimuk

BamBoo Sumana Roy

Exhibits Arati Kumar Rao Siddhartha Das Vijay Jodha

18 20 22-52 53 Black Clay Photo Gallery Intersections In the Pottery of the at ArtEast 2018 Neighbourhood Sung Valley The Other Silk Route: Sirawon Khathing Spookery, Trade and the Milda Shylla, and Ben Ezra Ning Great Game 3 Yophie Shylla Rida Gatphoh Beyond the Bengal Famine

The Game of Thrones: China-Burma-India Campaign of WW II

59 Films Catalogue

61 Participating Artists February 1-3 2018 ©

Curated by Kishalay Bhattacharjee o

4 a Ra R r a ma m u Ku K i t at a r

Ar Exhibitions Installations : y sy s e

te Workshops Inter/ r ur u o co c Sections Films Adda e g ag a m

im i History Pottery © Folk Bamboo Music Art Livelihood Migration Climate Change www.arteast.org.in

Organised and Presented by Collaboration Supported by Partnership NEW IMAGINATIONS Jindal School of Journalism and Communication

India International Centre (IIC) Gandhi King Plaza; Art Gallery- Kamaladevi Complex; Quadrangle Garden; Seminar Rooms I to III, Kamaladevi Complex; Fountain Lawns; C D Deshmukh Auditorium Curator’s Note

February KISHALAY BHATTACHARJEE 1-3 2018 ©

1- 7 FEBRUARY, 2018

An Ode To Bamboo

Curated by Kishalay I grew up in Shillong where our house had a bamboo grove in the backyard; tall and Bhattacharjee imposing grass that provided me the secret playground by day but turned mysterious by night with the culms creaking in the wind making the bamboo music. o a 5 Ra R The front yard had a different variety of bamboo, This exhibition is therefore a tribute to M P Ranjan. r a much tamer and shorter that provided a half of the ma m u

Ku K Taking off from Ranjan’s book Bamboo and Cane

i natural fence. We used this bamboo to make picket t at a r fence for the flowers and often they would double Crafts of North East India that he wrote with Ar Exhibitions Installations :

y Ghanashyam Pandya and Nilam Iyer in 1986, we sy s up as wickets when friends came over for a game of e te Workshops Inter/ r have reproduced some paragraphs and illustrations

ur u cricket. o co c Sections Films Adda to introduce bamboo as it were in it’s many avatars. e g I never saw bamboo as anything but part of our ag a m im i History Pottery daily lives. The centre piece of the exhibition is a new-media © Folk Bamboo Music installation that takes the viewer through a slow When we were visualising this edition of ArtEast, a ecological degradation and loss of traditional Art Livelihood festival of art and livelihood that focuses largely on livelihood due to migration and other urban Migration Climate India’s Northeast, we wanted to imagine the region pressures. Change beyond the borders with a completely different lens and while searching for the dots we found the most We have collated photographs and paintings of how enduring and resilient connecting thread is bamboo. bamboo is used in the region from building the most www.arteast.org.in daunting bridges across rivers and high mountains Though I spent my childhood with bamboo around to even a fishing trap and rice baskets. A story and me, it is only much later when I realised how life in a poem on bamboo help us look at the grass in a the region is inextricably connected to bamboo; completely different light. The charming story of how livelihood, art, craft, dance, architecture and objects dreams can buy you fortunes in Shillong through of everyday use. While researching on this theme, a game of bows and arrows on a bamboo mast we encountered the seminal work of designer M P displayed in a multi-media installation. Ranjan who documented bamboo in the Northeast Organised and Presented by Collaboration Supported by Partnership and believed that the people across the states of ARTEAST 2018 IS AN ODE TO BAMBOO NEW the region had a philosophy around bamboo. He IMAGINATIONS continued his mission with the grass through a Jindal School of Journalism and Communication project called Chalo Katlamara in Tripura.

Exhibition Installation Poetry Stories Arati Kumar Rao, Sumana Roy, Sukant Panigrahy, Kaur Chimuk, Parasher Baruah, Pankhi Saikia, Vijay Jodha and Siddhartha Das

Curated by 6 Kishalay Bhattacharjee

Opening on 1st February 2018, 5 p.m. 2st – 7th February 2018, 11a.m.- 7p.m. Art Gallery, Kamaladevi Complex, India International Centre

Organised and Presented by Collaboration Supported by Partnership NEW IMAGINATIONS Jindal School of Journalism and Communication

M.P. RANJAN (1950 – 2015) Design learning started early for better products and giving them a Exhibition Installation Poetry Stories Ranjan when he was growing up platform. with his siblings Manohar and Arati Kumar Rao, Sumana Roy, Sukant Panigrahy, Meera in his father’s toy factory in Ranjan envisioned a revitalization Kaur Chimuk, Parasher Baruah, Pankhi Saikia, Vijay Madras called Modern Agencies of the crafts industry. His docu- mentation of bamboo with Nilam Jodha and Siddhartha Das and their shop Rocky Toys. He used to tell me, “When other children Iyer and Ghanshyam Pandya in the

Curated by were playing with toys, we were Northeast led him to the realiza- Kishalay Bhattacharjee making toys!” Design could go very tion that traditional wisdom would 7

far, he realized in solving prob- forever be lost if it was not made lems. Ranjan then joined National relevant in new forms. The de- Opening on 1st February 2018, 5 p.m. Institute of Design where he would signer had to create the complete st th 2 – 7 February 2018, 11a.m.- 7p.m. later teach. He loved working with network and establishment for this transition to happen successfully. Art Gallery, Kamaladevi Complex, his hands and became involved We see this in his project at Katla- India International Centre with the toymakers of Chen- napatna. mara in Tripura.

When his wife Aditi - at that time For him, bamboo was a way to

his colleague at NID - went to the bring livelihoods, design and sus-

Northeast in 1977, Ranjan was tainability together. In bamboo,

in Ahmedabad developing her Ranjan found his medium through photograph rolls. He was hugely which he could speak, write, dance excited by what came out of the and celebrate. He would sow the darkroom. There were a fantastic seeds for a thousand plantations range of products - bridges, fences, and hundred thousand designs mats, containers and baskets - all would be churned out fulfilling mil- made of bamboo; the possibilities lions of dreams and rejuvenating that one material could become billions of lives. so many forms was a driving force. Ranjan saw the big picture - how an entire village could subsist by SUJATHA SHANKAR KUMAR growing bamboo, working with it Organised and Presented by Collaboration Supported by Partnership A writer and visualiser based and selling products. He saw the in Chennai, Sujatha is a design NEW designer as someone who could graduate from NID with an MFA IMAGINATIONS Jindal School of Journalism and intervene and create the linkages from The School of the Art Institute Communication for the craftsperson to connect of Chicago with the world markets by making India International Centre (IIC) Gandhi King Plaza; Art Gallery- Kamaladevi Complex; Quadrangle Garden; Seminar Rooms I to III, Kamaladevi Complex; Fountain Lawns; C D Deshmukh Auditorium A faculty at National Institute of Design since 1976, M.P. Ranjan taught and practiced design with rare energy, garnering world recognition as a design thinker. A passionate advocate of democratising resources, MPR walked the talk, relentlessly publishing papers and creating platforms for exchange and knowledge sharing.

Ranjan was instrumental in the setup of the IICD, (Indian Institute of Crafts and Design) Jaipur, acting as Director in its formative stages. He and textile designer Aditi Ranjan, his life partner, compiled Handmade in India, an encyclopaedic ‘labour of love’, receiving Craft Council of India’s Kamala Samman award. Their daughter Aparna Ranjan is a graphic designer.

Ranjan became Head, NID Centre of Bamboo Initiatives foreseeing 8 enormous possibilities for what had been achieved in the crucible of the North East, where relatively isolated, bamboo’s creative exploration was pushed to its zenith. From 2000, he was involved with reinvigorating the Bamboo and Cane Development Institute (BCDI) in Agartala, where more than 150 master craftsmen were trained. Ranjan’s commitment that design should marry craft to create formidable progeny came through in the project Katlamara Chalo.

SUJATHA SHANKAR KUMAR Bare-limbed, motionless, prop and protagonist, it stands, as if mimicking its own sculpture, holding its breath permanently, immune to fatigue. (Occasionally, only occasionally, fugitive leaves – leaves like bird beaks, open, always hungry.) (Its node-knots, soft, but only to the eye – like a girl’s first sense of her breasts.) To be able to reduce a life to two lines requires the grace of darkness. || Only parallel lines are resistant to shock – anything that is joined will break. Time bleaches away colour – hair loses its blackness, the sky its ceremony, the greenness of bamboo is taken away. And when you begin to see it as human, you look for a flaw, the biography of an accident. Not finding any, you try to move it, like parting a woman’s legs, and the question arrives without air – How would one make love to a bamboo? BamBoo 9

SUMANA ROY Arati Kumar Rao

10 Siddhartha Das

11 Vijay Jodha

12 Archery in Shillong is not just a sport but also a gaming/gambling livelihood that was banned till the Did you 80s. The conspicuous teer kiosks in every corner of the town are shops many wouldn’t enter because of the Dream taboo of cheap gambling. Teer is indeed about shooting arrows at a target. Designated clubs are selected to shoot on their given days of the week and the arrows counted a Fortune? to arrive at various digits that determine the gambling prize.

But the gamblers wouldn’t hazard a guess without Shillong’s own Teer Interpretation of Dreams where a woman is a 5 and a man is a 6!

Parasher Baruah conceived this multimedia installation to depict one of the most engaging conversations and activities of Shillong and one where the arrows and the target are all made of bamboo.

13 14 15 16 An unseen tunnel inside a displaced proletarian

Sukant Panigrahy & Kaur Chimuk

A mixed media installation combined with the physical experiential object and subtle performative appearance. This installation is a creative way of sharing the crisis of ecological disorder and the unsustained urban pressure. The crisis of internal migration and the displaced ecological site has complex similarities. Viewers can travel through the tunnel and experience the transitional point of green space to grey space. The tunnel is conceptualized with both organic and non- organic life.

17 18 Black Clay Pottery of the Sung Valley

Traditional black clay pottery from the Jaintia Hills of Meghalaya

Potters: Milda Shylla, Yophie Shylla Designer: Rida Gatphoh The word pottery typically conjures plates and other tableware. “By up images of artisans bent over a understanding the market needs potter’s wheel shaping a lump of and giving them design inputs, we clay into pots and platters. Many aim to improve their livelihood and traditions and practices are as- sustain the traditional craft. And sociated with this ancient art form create a sustainable ecosystem for and in Meghalaya, the Sung valley these craftsmen”, says Rida. pottery community still practice the age old tradition of making pots, pans and other tableware. A predominantly female group of potters who work on the clay standing up, shaping it with their hands using techniques that have been passed down generations. Dak_ti Crafts - Impressions of the 19 Hand, led by Rida Gatphoh who has been working with this community says “The technique is not pinching, “it has to do with the way the women stand – their position – as they shape the vessels on a wooden plank”.

Dak_ti has been working for a number of years to revive and preserve this dying tradition. The black clay, unlike terracotta is hard to source. The clay lies beneath the terracotta layer under the earth. With limited resources, “we cannot be sure how long we will be able to fetch this quality of clay, as the mix might change due to climatic conditions,” says Rida. The number of families practicing this skill has also gone down from two villages to one and the number of families into pottery-making reduced from 15 to five. In order to make the products relevant to the times and to create a market, Dak_ti has worked with the women artisans to create small bowls, glasses, 20 21 22 The Other Silk Route: Spookery, Trade and the Great Game

The ‘Old Silk Route’ or the ‘Other Silk Road’, which passes through east Sikkim, was probably discovered by traders in 1st century ACE. A part of an ancient network of trade routes, for centuries it served as a lifeline connection between China and India. But besides trade, the ‘Roof of the World’ has held an irresistible allure for many political powers that have fought to dominate the Tibetan plateau. By the 19th century, the Great Game was afoot and the British colonisers of India launched dozens of spies disguised as pilgrims and monks across the Himalayas onto the plateau; in many ways that Game continues to play out today even as some players have endured and others have not.

ishalay Bhattacharjee: My going to be moderated by my had no idea of the kind of covert Klittle excursion to the Silk colleague Dr. Gitanjali Surendran operations that have happened 23 Route was when the Nathula pass who teaches in the O P Jindal out of say Kalimpong. So welcome reopened; it was drizzling that Global University. We have the to a morning of forgotten histories. morning and for the first time we academic Dr. Siddiq Wahid, and were doing a live broadcast at an Parimal Bhattacharya, a teacher itanjali Surendran: Thank you, altitude of 18,000 feet. There are and writer. In fact, all of them are GKishalay, for that introduction anecdotal accounts of people who writers and joining them is Diki which wonderfully summarizes the have traded through these high Sherpa, a young researcher. I am idea of this panel. Welcome to all passes and that interested me but happy that Diki comes from that of you for our session today on ‘The I didn’t connect the dots that go area that we are talking about. Other Silk Route- Spookery, Trades back into ancient times. Though I reported from the area, I and the Great Game’. Usually when realize I barely knew the history of we think of the Silk Road we are I am really grateful for a panel the region. It’s not an area that you really thinking about the western of extremely distinguished and can cover well at any point of time side of it that includes the fabled interesting people who have and I didn’t know many of these lands of Central Asia and so on. We worked in this area and are stories that are now emerging. I forget that one of the most critical wings of the Silk Road was the part connecting China, Tibet and India. And as we all know, it wasn’t just a trading route, it was much more than that. Although trade was a very critical part of it, we will see that the Silk Road’s is the story of trade in commodities other than silk, of exchanges of ideas, of the geopolitical maneuverings of empires etc. Without further ado, let me ask our speakers to each present for 10 to 15 minutes their As a historian, I know history can be very boring for people in general if it doesn’t affect them directly. But today, it does affect us directly, particularly in South Asia. So, it is back in fashion. But we are still not looking at it from a historian’s perspective. I hope you will permit me to be a bit indulgent and try contextualize the history of the area with a review of its geography and history, space and time.

What is the geographical context? thoughts on this eastern side of years because of my roles as an Basically, it is easily understood the Silk Route. Let’s begin with our administrator of higher education. if you picture the Eurasian first speaker, Dr. Siddiq Wahid, who The last six years have been spent landmass that begins with the is a widely published and well- revisiting the scholarship on it. One Ural Mountains in the west and known commentator on Kashmiri finds it just as exciting, but now ends with the Altai Mountains in affairs. What might be less well even more so because so many are the east. In the vertical axis recall known about him is that he is talking about it. in your mind’s eye the Siberian actually a historian of Central Asia Plateau to the north and mountain and Tibet The question, therefore, is: why massif formed by the Pamirs, and how did this happen? For Karakorum and the Himalaya to iddiq Wahid: First off, thank those of us who studied it and the south. From a South Asian Syou for inviting me. I was were struggling to define what perspective (which is mine) this delighted to hear about this topic the region meant to our students, forms the seam between Central and panel, although my idea of the it was a bit frustrating given the 24 Eurasia and South Asia. It is that “Silk Route” is in a slightly different vastness of the subject in territory, entire landmass that people over incarnation. My earliest memory of languages, histories, cultures the years have called Central Asia, the phenomenon is the story about and so on. Clearly it is because of Inner Asia and most recently (and how silk worms were smuggled current political events. probably most accurately) Eurasia. out of China in the head gear of traders’ womenfolk! Then later, The recent explosion in research China, South Asia, Iran, when studying history, Central Asia on Central Asia and the Silk Road Mesopotamia, Europe and and the Silk Route, the questions – the two terms are used almost Russia form its periphery, an of a graduate student were very interchangeably these days – ironic term for it given where the different, of course. We had to can be tracked to the events of power centers lie today! It is the respond to questions from many September 11, 2001. People started interaction between this “inner” colleagues (in other departments) looking at Afghanistan closely Asia and Europe and an “outer” asking “where exactly is Central and then, almost simultaneously, Asia and Europe, that the history Asia?”. So, you can imagine how discovered that there was oil of Eurasia is concerned with, pleasantly surprised I was when, and gas to be had in the vicinity. including of course between the ten days ago, I saw the book ‘The Apparently, somebody started intra “inner” and intra “outer” Silk Roads - A new history of the looking at the map and saying Eurasian polities. The “Silk Road”, world’ by Peter Frankopan on the “Wow, this seems like an important the subject of our discussion, newsstands at airports. place.” Unfortunately, because traversed this landmass from east of this Central Asia (or Central to west, with “feeder” trade routes It delighted me that this region Eurasia which is another name for along the way. The very center of of the world is part of today’s it) is looked at almost exclusively this “road” were two regions that imagination and read popularly, from a security studies point of were called, by most specialists, not just by experts. So it was view. In other words, basically “Central Asia”. This was what we a pleasure to then get this greed for sources of energy and know today as Chinese Xinjiang invitation to join in the effort to territory. That is alarming because and “five stans”, a popular name better understand the Silk Road. such a perspective provides little for the collective of states formally It is a field of study from which room for any kind of historical known as Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, I have been away for about ten perspective. Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Turkmenistan after the collapse of What, then, had all these wars and but only marginally. These the former Soviet Union. treaties followed by more wars struggles were extensive and and treaties resulted in by the time complex, a thought well summed What should be of interest about the early modern period rolled up by Mahbub Ali said to “Kim” these regions, apart from gas and in? Just prior to it, the Mongols in Rudyard Kipling’s book of that oil which we all know about now, and Turkic speaking peoples had name: “The Great Game is so big is that from the very beginning overtaken the Eurasian landmass that nobody really knows where of time it is from the above to ultimately create a series of it begins and where it ends.” It is region and Eurasia in general small empires, forming something a thought that we should keep that empires have been born and of a confederacy of empires led in mind in our understanding of many of them sustained to shape by Mongols, Turks and, literally, international relations then, and our world of today. I would like to blends of the two. These were today. take you through that history very consolidated for one last time, as quickly so that you get a general it were, by Tamerlane. Towards the Starting in the early twentieth sense of the flow and a historical beginning of the sixteenth century century, these colonial regimes perspective. This is where history they gave way to the “outer” began to collapse one after the can be “boring” so I ask you to hold Eurasian empires of the Safavid other, eventually giving way to on for just a little longer! in Persia, the Mughals in India, a phenomenon that came to Ottomans in middle Eurasia and be called the Cold War Regime. In the last two and a half millennia, the Qing in China. Simultaneously, This was another political “great Alexander the great was the first Russia and European expansions game” of its own. But all such to be reminded that there is a (thanks to seafaring trade) formulations collapse – and the settled region to the east of his also began making inroad into Cold War regime was no different. world that had fabulous wealth, Eurasia with a phenomenon It did so with the unravelling of so he invaded that area. He was followed by Han China and its incursions into Central Eurasia. This eastern reaction was followed by 25 the Romans, the Sasanians and Byzantium. (I have just recounted a thousand years of interaction between outer Eurasia and in inner Eurasia to you!) What this means is that the “west” and the “east” met well over a thousand years before Christopher Columbus! This interaction continued into “recent” history when, a second spurt in the spread of Buddhism and Islam between the 7th and the 12th centuries, began “binding”, as it that we came to call colonialism. the Soviet Union in 1991. Since were, the Eurasian world. (Incidentally, it was at the height then, we have been awaiting a “new world order” that has yet to The next important historical of this phenomenon that the term emerge after almost three decades phase in the central Eurasian “Silk Road” was popularized by now. The world has begun to call it landmass were the conquests of Ferdinand von Richthofen in 1877.) “globalization”, but the word is still Chinggis Khan (also known as From the late modern period open to finer definition if it is to Genghis Khan) who conquered (the nineteenth century) to the mean more than just the process vast stretches of this landmass middle of the twentieth century of the familiarization of the world’s and built an empire much larger we have the famous – and I hope various power centers to each than that of Alexander. His we hear more about it during this other, a process that has been successors were followed by discussion – colonial “Great Game” taking place since the beginning another political consolidation by that was taking place between of time. Temur (also known as Tamerlane) Russia, China and British India. in the 14th century, although it fell The French were also involved as Now let me conclude with some apart relatively quickly after his part of a land-sea power struggle) observations about globalization, death. a process that is connecting us, the world is also experiencing itanjali Surendran: Thank but not necessarily “familiarizing” unprecedented unrest. It is Gyou, Dr. Wahid. In ten minutes, us with each other. It is a process because although a few people you have covered a 1000 years that has been happening, if we talk globalization, fewer even think of history beautifully! There are remember our brief outline of its globalization but almost nobody many things you spoke of that history, for at least 2,500 years. does globalization. we could pick up later on in our What has changed is two broad discussion, For instance, China’s Let me close with this thought: factors. (a) It is happening at an One Belt One Road project has there appears to be one state incredibly accelerated pace and (b) generally been viewed with a that seems to be talking and the process has been “discovered” lot of suspicion here in India but doing globalization. The People’s more popularly but we have yet you seem to be saying that if Republic of China. And as evidence, to theorize the idea of globality viewed in the context of Kashmir’s I would cite the BRI – the Belt so that we can use the process of connections with Central Asia, a and Road Initiative, also called globalization to our benefit. different perspective might be had. somewhat less elegantly OBOR. It You have also astutely pointed seems to have an idea of globality. In that context, it is precisely what out that if this region has been That said, for me there is very little makes this kind of a conference, the site more recently of the Great to commend China’s politics given exhibition and festival very Game and espionage between the its treatment of my culture and significant. We are tuning in to British and Russian empires, then civilization, the Tibetan-speaking global studies or globality as an it has long been the site of more world. But the actions it has taken idea rather than as a process. ancient games too for control of in the sphere of globalization What should it mean? In that its rich resources and trade routes. is something that needs close context, historical perspective is This is the right moment for me attention, analysis and even important, because we don’t need to introduce our next speaker, emulation by the world at large. to make the same mistakes all over Dr. Parimal Bhattacharya, who again. However, both New Delhi and is based in Calcutta. A very well published author, his book No Path That said, we still seem to be Washington seem to be against 26 in Darjeeling is Straight: Memories making them, these mistakes if we it. Perhaps there are many ideas of a Hill Station, on the famous look at the current political climate of globality. One may be to British hill station, was published all the way from Washington encompass several categories a few years ago, but he has also to New Delhi to the Philippines of it, not just one. Among them recently edited Journey to Lhasa and Turkey. Instead of the world could be economic, political, social by the Bengali British spy, Sarat growing closer it is ironic that we and cultural globalization. So Chandra Das. are building bigger and harder far, we have focused only on the walls than we have known economic one. We need to inject arimal Bhattacharya: until now – during a period of the discourse with other kinds of Well, I am delighted to be here intensified “globalization”. They are “globalization”: political, social, P among the distinguished panelists. walls we cannot afford because linguistic, cultural and others. Professor Wahid has given us a of the problems we face from They will bring us closer, not divide very big canvas to work on. My environmental and ecological us. Thank you very much for your area, though, is limited. In fact, I degradation, to climate change attention. and human displacements because of war.

I have my own thoughts on globalization, but that can wait. Here, let me be provocative and say who is thinking about it? In truth, not many. Consider: to say globalization is not much of a statement. As I’ve just said it’s a process that has been taking place for millennia. Technology and communications infrastructure have made it proceed apace. But there are contradictions, as am not a historian by training. I am from literature and it is the stories that drew me to this other silk road, or other silk route as we call it.

Actually, I was working on a book on Darjeeling a few years back. I had worked in Darjeeling in the 1990’s, it was my first posting as a teacher in the government college there. A few years back when I was working on the book, I came upon an address. There is a locality same as that of London. So it was British Royal Geographical Society in Darjeeling -- it’s called Lhasa a huge thinly populated swathe of awarded him a gold medal. He was Villa. So I was a little intrigued land, and completely unmapped. the first Asian to win that medal. that Lhasa Villa is actually the And by early 19th century, when name of a villa somewhere in the the British were mapping the But a problem for the British was locality, and I tried to find it out. entire Indian subcontinent and that many of these men died on Very few people knew about it, found out this big blank spot, they the mission, many were captured and then I made some inquiries were uncomfortable. There was and killed, some of them came and discovered a very small and this Great Game that was being back. All of them were basically decrepit villa in the concrete played out in this region. There mountain people who didn’t jungle that Darjeeling has now were China and Russia, and the have much exposure to western become. And I found out that it British were very suspicious that education. All the data that the was owned by a man named Sarat Russia was building roads into British were getting were mostly Chandra Das. I knew a bit about Tibet. So they began to send spies. topographical, but they needed more than that. A place is not just him, but not much, and then I 27 began to find out more. These spies were mostly drafted its geography, it also has its history from the local mountain tribes. and people. So, they needed Sarat Chandra was a spy who had Only two types of people were someone educated and sensitive gone to Tibet twice, in 1879 and allowed to go into Tibet, the who would go there and collect then in 1881. He was sent there by merchants and Buddhist monks. sociocultural information and the the British, and then he became a Many of these spies were sent historical perspectives as well. They Buddhist scholar, a Tibetan scholar. dressed as monks. They carried found their man in Sarat Chandra He had lived most of his creative survey instruments, and very Das, a young civil engineer from life in Lhasa Villa and had worked cleverly -- they had compasses Kolkata, then Calcutta. there. Then I started to work on fitted to their walking sticks. They these really exciting stories and had prayer wheels inside which Sarat Chandra had studied at found out that since the early 19th they’d keep their instruments and the Presidency College there century, since the Great Game had notes. Sometimes they wouldn’t and he was sent to Darjeeling begun, the British were sending even carry papers. They would as the headmaster of a new spies into Tibet. These men were memorize the survey data as boarding school. It was called the called Pandits. Tibet had closed mantras and chant them. And Bhutia Boarding School, and it its borders by that time and those they’d carry unusual prayer beads. had been set up to teach the hill impassable mountain passes were Normally, the prayer beads have boys survey techniques. It was closely guarded. There were a few 108 beads in them, but these had actually a school for espionage, hostile tribes who inhabited the 100; they’d use them to count was built to groom native spies. region and fiercely guarded these their footsteps. That way they Sarat Chandra Das was brought frontiers. would measure the distances. They there as its headmaster and he would carry boiling thermometers soon developed a great interest The Pandits were doing espionage, to record the altitudes. Many of in Tibet. Unfortunately, we don’t particularly for mapping the them were marvelous men, very know much about this part of the territory of that country. The size brave men. One name that stands story, except for a very slender of Tibet is huge -- it is ten times out is that of Nain Singh Rawat. autobiography that he had written the size of England, and at that He covered a huge area and even much later. And he didn’t go into time the population was about the went to Lhasa. In recognition, the the details. But Sarat Chandra had this great curiosity about this espionage and then he returned to Sold and resold as a slave, Kinthup forbidden land across the great India. Unfortunately, it had a dark spent four years in Tibet. He mountain ranges of Darjeeling. aftermath. It was soon found out returned in 1883, after completing When he went to Darjeeling in that Sarat Chandra was a spy, and his mission. But because he was 1774, he was just 25. The British all the people who had hosted him illiterate, and the fact that he had wanted someone like him were put in prisons. These prisons had carried all the survey data in Tibet, and a passport was were actually dungeons, dark in his memory, nobody took him arranged. So, Sarat Chandra went caves, where many of these people seriously. Thirty years later, when to Tibet along with a lama from died. The minister priest was the Mac Mohan line was being Sikkim and a group of servants and executed in a spectacular fashion drawn, a British military officer was porters. It was a small group. He -- he was drowned alive in the river sent to map these areas again. went there dressed as a Buddhist Tsangpo. So, that was it. He found out that Kinthup had monk. mapped them so accurately. Sarat Chandra came back, He sneaked in through Sikkim from him detailed reports were So Kinthup was summoned to and Nepal and went directly to obtained. And then, about 20 Shimla to the conference that Shigatse, to the great monastery years later in 1903-4, Francis took place to map the MacMohan of Tashilunpo and met the Younghusband made that military line, where Tibetan and Chinese Panchen Lama there. He went a expedition. Tibet was prised open representatives were also invited. second time for an extended stay. like an oyster carrying pearls. And By then Kinthup was an old man. That was in 1881. He stayed at the mystery that had surrounded But he reeled out from memory Tashilunpo for six months, studying the country for so long was gone. the fascinating story of his Buddhist scriptures and texts, There came a full stop on the adventure in those remote places. and he came back and wrote his espionage. The Great Game, too, He died the very next year. Twenty reports. It was a transformative stopped. Sarat Chandra became a years after Sarat Chandra’s visit, experience for him, Sarat Chandra forgotten figure. He even became Francis Younghusband’s expedition was transformed. Spying attracts a a figure of caricature, because in broke open some of the dark cave 28 lot of suspicion, but there is also an Kipling’s novel Kim we find him as a prisons in Tibet and found out that aura of romance around it. Sarat comical Bengali called Haribabu or some of the men who had hosted Chandra fell in love with Tibet. Hari Chandra Mukherjee. This was the spy from Calcutta were still the end of the fascinating story. alive. In Shigatse, Sarat Chandra was hosted by the prime minister Then I found out that there was So, this is the fascinating story that of Panchen Lama who was a another man from Darjeeling had drawn me to the Silk Roads. great figure there. The minister who also went to Tibet at the This, of course, is the old silk road, was a priest, and not only did same time. He was an illiterate the one that goes into Tibet via he have great affection for this tailor named Kinthup, and he east-Sikkim and Nepal, not the young Bengali from Calcutta, was sent to map the mysterious big silk road that Professor Wahid but also a great fascination for course of the river Tsangpo. Now had drawn. This is a very old one, the West – the Western science the Tsangpo, which originates at more than a 1000-year-old route. and technologies. On his second 24,000ft in the western part of Actually, from the Bay of Bengal visit, Sarat Chandra carried for Tibet, takes an interesting course the trade and commerce with the minister a telescope, a box and enters into an impenetrable China used to take place along this camera and a magic lantern – gorge. In fact, it was navigated for route. In late 18th century, Warren the fascinating gadgets of the the first time in 2002 by a group of Hasting had sent a Company western world. And the minister kayakers. Before that nobody had representative named George priest began to write a book on successfully penetrated the heart Bogle. Bogle had gone to Shigatse photography, on the working of of it. There are sheer cliffs, some and had met the Panchen Lama. A the camera, a technology that was of them towering up 15,000 to book was compiled from his diary newly emerging. Sarat Chandra 18,000ft, very narrow gorges and notes and Sarat Chandra was was deeply immersed all the time rapids. Kinthup was sent to map deeply inspired by that book. in Buddhist literature and texts. that area. So it was sort of a great cultural So that was it. Not only trade or exchange. The story of Kinthup was equally merchandise, but also technologies fascinating, but also unfortunate. were travelling along these routes. But he also did his primary job of A Chinese lama who took him to That included silk and paper Tibet, sold him there as a slave. making from China. The British were desperate about this new itanjali Surendran: Kate emerged as a nation state only market in China. The sea route was GTeltscher’s A High Road to in the 1900’s. There are historians difficult because the Chinese king Tibet, recounts some of this history like David Ludden, Prasanjeet had imposed heavy taxes at the and suggests that in fact, it was Duaar and recently Tansen Sen Canton port. So the British wanted through Bogel’s expedition that who have been critiquing such to open this route. the Panchen Lama of Tibet came use of the silk road rhetoric as it to know about the British. In turn leads to a presentation of linear, As Professor Wahid has noted, it was when the Panchen Lama monolithic and the top-down these globalizations were going on visited Peking, that the Chinese history invoked by the nation- for so many centuries. And it was a emperor himself heard about the state. Such presentation not only very diffusive kind of globalization, British for the first time. Let me distorts the history but it also unlike the globalization we know now introduce our third speaker inhibits the proper understanding since the1990’s, that is so imposing on this panel. Diki Sherpa is a of the particular subversion in and monopolistic. When we read PhD candidate at Delhi University a particular period of time. One Sarat Chandra Das’s book, we and also a research assistant at should study history especially pre- find it remarkable that here is a the institute of Chinese Studies 20th-century exchanges without man with very much an Indian there. She is working on the wool the constraint of the nation-state. or Asian sensibilities and also trade and the old Spice Route I will give you some of the snippets western education, looking at connecting Tibetan traders and of the work that I have been doing. a culture not from a positivist markets in India at Kalimpong objective viewpoint, like earlier My area of research is the eastern Western explorers. He is looking iki Sherpa: Firstly, thank Himalayan town of Kalimpong, at the architecture, the sculptures Dyou for allowing me to be a in North Bengal. This area has a of Tibet, their food, their clothes, part of this panel. And secondly, I history of being a very important all aspects of their lived culture am really intimidated to be here commercial site. It had acted with such sensitivity and keenness. with such great historians. Before as an entrepot for Indo-Tibetan These exchanges stopped in 1903- I start, I want to discuss a bit commerce until the mid-1950s; a 1904, when the military expedition about the topic we have today, place where you can process the 29 took place. ‘The Other silk route’. Can we call raw wool that was imported from Nathu la a part of the silk route? Tibet. This place was basically itanjali Surendran: Thank has it really been a part of the chosen because of its geographical Gyou! You have raised so ancient silk route? Because it’s location. During British India, it many interesting questions and been quite some time that I have was the farthest eastern-most issues through a rich telling of been working in this area but I post that British India had at that the story of Sarat Chandra Das. have not come across any primary time. Imported raw wool from here You mentioned George Bogel, an source which informs about Nathu used to be flown down to Calcutta eighteenth century British envoy to la and its association with the and from there it was either sent Tibet. The British even at that time greater ancient network. Since the to woolen mills located in the then seemed to rely heavily, as Bogel reopening of Nathu la, it has been United Provinces or was exported did, on Indian interlocutors and difficult to read a newspaper and to Liverpool and America. And the spies known generally as ‘pandits’ to visit North Bengal and Sikkim amount of wool that was coming without noticing the multiple in this period was huge. Over the arimal Bhattacharya: No, references of the ancient silk route. period of time it emerged as an actually when Bogel went P Even the Chief Minister of Sikkim important convergent site not only Tibet was not that closed. Actually, repeatedly uses the rhetoric of for the goods but for the people Bogel went in 1774 or 1775 and the silk route. Using this kind and the various activities that in 1784 there was a Gorkha of rhetoric is little problematic were happening during the period. aggression in Tibet it continued for because such representation Like commerce, this town itself has four years and initially the Tibetans shows that India and China as a huge history of rise and decline. lost and then China helped them a nation have existed since the What makes this trade distinctive to push back the Gorkha’s and ancient times. Such rhetoric has is its composition; the economic after that Tibet became very strict. been used by China as well – quite actors involved. It is not that there The business of British and Russian often. There has been a reference are only Indians and Tibetans. government was there so they to the Silk route with regard to There are various ethnic groups all just stopped it. After Bogel it just China and Bangladesh relation the way from Nepal, Ladakh etc. stopped. as well. However, Bangladesh Apart from that the commerce This enterprise in Tibet provided significance of Nathu La and Jelep had geopolitical imperatives. But income for many and wealth for La? then, this has been a common a few. This long-distance trade phenomenon in the Himalayan from Lhasa to Kalimpong involved iki Sherpa: Nathu La and region. Even in 1800’s when the complex networks of actors that DJelep La both of them are in claims were made on Tibet was transcended territory and ethnicity. Sikkim – TAR border but then they partly because, British thought The wool that was imported are 7 km apart. Nathu La connects that Tibet can be used as a to British India was taken from with Gangtok, if one travels from backdoor to ‘China’ to introduce remote villages of Tibet with the Gangtok, Nathu la is nearer but their products and also for the help of trade Intermediaries such then if one goes from Kalimpong strategic expansion. Even in as Hui Muslims and Tibetans called through Jelep La, the distance 1903-1904 when Tibet was thrown Tromo. The Tromos controlled between Tibet and India is much open all the commercial institutes the transport, which was vital shorter. The Nathu La route was that were ostensibly set up for for trade. Since they controlled considered to be longer, so British managing commerce was actually the transport, they were able to opened Jelep la route to connect set up for preventing Russia, China make huge profits during this India with Tibet. Jelep la was and later Japan. Commerce and period. Marwaris in Kalimpong considered as an ‘all-season route’ politics were hugely intertwined. acted as business merchants and as it was penetrable all throughout British expansion leads to the financiers. Trade along these areas the year but not so with Nathula. occupation of Chumbi valley – continued even after India became itanjali Surendran: Thank the present tri-junction between independent. Even after 1947, the you for your presentation. The India, China and Bhutan. Once trade continued unabated until G kind of commodity history you are the valley was occupied one 1950. But with the Formation of doing of wool is really critical for thing that happened was despite PRC and the occupation of Tibet, our understanding of globalization having Nathu La as the main trade began to get got cut off. and wider connections over a trade route, Jelep La was made Many traders after 1962 were longer historical period. There are operational. They thought that given a very short period of time fantastic global histories of sugar 30 Jelep La should be the prime route to transfer their trade and some and more recently of cotton that connecting Tibet and India. There of them reoriented towards Nepal reveal the tremendous possibilities are various reasons for that; one is, because Nepal-China route was of doing this kind of research. I also even though Sikkim was a British opened. When the Jelep La was really appreciate your comment on protectorate the presence of titular opened in 1904, what happened globalization and how we might head proved to be troublesome. was the trade from Nepal to Tibet think about globalization in the Second is, Kalimpong was a got reoriented towards India and time of nations versus the time non-regulation district, it implies with the re-opening Nepal-TAR of non-nations. Let’s open up our that whatever law was passed trade, the Indo-Tibetan trade discussion. It seems to me that for Bengal is not applicable here. volume decreased. the importance of Darjeeling to Hence, all the laws and legislation the eastern Silk Road cannot be was at the discretion of the itanjali Surendran: Diki, would overemphasized. Darjeeling is one colonial official. Glike to explain to everyone present, the distinction and of India’s oldest hill stations, and The areas have much to do with the wool rather than silk. In this exchange relation, wool was the major imported commodity as informed by many of the respondent and the archival records. The archival records show that almost everything was sent to Tibet in exchange for wool. The trade was slow in the first 10 years, it picked up only during the 1st world war. The sheer shortage of raw wool suitable for the war material made the wool import from Tibet. was certainly one of the grandest myself, “Wait a minute, Silk Road is his marvelous memories of of the British empire. I believe a very specific term”. But I desisted Kanchenjunga. I was also talking to it was the first town to have from saying anything about it Gitanjali earlier that my memories electricity… because I was afraid it would of Darjeeling is not that standard betray parochialism on my part picture post card that people arimal Bhattacharya: as a specialist on the subject just carry back -- of Kanchenjunga or PSindrapong hydel project being technical for the sake of it. sunrise over the Kanchenjunga. in 1880’s. It was the first Asian But I am glad that Diki raised it. But it’s a soundscape. I was telling hydroelectric project in India. her that every hour, at different Yet the term Silk Road has in fact hours of the day, you can hear Gitanjali Surendran- So Darjeeling become somewhat of a metaphor; in Darjeeling amazing sounds enjoyed a certain kind of privilege what is it a metaphor for? We of the temple bells, the church especially in the late nineteenth need to see it as a metaphor bells, the Tibetan horns in the century? One of the things that for cultural exchanges, linguistic monasteries and all. It is this always struck me about Darjeeling borrowings, commercial contracts fabulous multi-ethnic community is what a fantastic melting pot and more. It was all of them; living over there for more than a for different communities and perhaps even more than anything 100 years, which is something very different peoples doing different else. Instead, because today we rare and very unique, and very kinds of things as well, it has speak exclusively about states, not peaceful. All these agitations and always been. It was also a frontier nations, so less about people and statehood movements had never town of a kind, located at the more about territory, real estate. affected this community feeling crossroads of major civilizations. If we talk about the Silk Road that people have over there. I invite our speakers to tell us in terms of the peoples who live There have been intermarriages a little about their experiences along these routes it would serve between different tribes, so that is of Darjeeling and its historical to make them more comfortable something that’s very important. significance in the late nineteenth in its use as a metaphor. It will Coming to what Diki had just and early twentieth centuries. allay the possible apprehension said, whether we should at all among those who inhabit the iddiq Wahid: I was born call this silk route. I don’t know, 31 lands along the road, that they in Kalimpong and went to after this we might as well call S will be dominated even more. school in Darjeeling, in which this wool route! But as Professor Often these societies tend to district Kalimpong is situated. Wahid had very rightly said, it is see their relationship between So, one could perhaps say that actually a metaphor. Not just that, themselves and the larger powers for me there is a connection the particulars of these routes who ply along the route in terms of with the region from birth. Of also; the trading communities dominant and dominated. In that my schooling years, I remember and the spies sometimes took sense, even Nepal or Bangladesh having this magnificent view of different routes. For example, Sarat can become “dominating powers” the Kanchenjunga range from Chandra Das went for the first in that they are states. At times my dorm window and, to my time through Sikkim. He returned these forget what lies between embarrassing regret, complained through another route. So actually, the powers, or “in the middle” as it about it every single day! I did not if you look at it holistically, not were. know that Darjeeling was settled just wool or other commodities, there was another thing we are as a sanitarium. And I am also This is precisely why one possibility overlooking – that is gold. Tibet surprised to hear that it was the is, or should be, fear that the entire had these gold mines. I don’t earliest hill stations, because that Himalayan massif all the way from know how commerically viable would mean it was created late in the Pamirs to Arunachal stands they were, but the British had a the day, and by the British. in danger of becoming a conflict lot of hope that there was a lot of zone, located as they are between I also want to second what you gold in Tibet. Gold used to come two of the world’s most populated were saying about Diki’s careful to India from there. Between states, China and India, who are understanding of the “Silk Road”; Nathula and Jelep La, I think Jelep fast becoming rivals in the region. of its use as a metaphor in La was more popular as a trade So…there’s yet another complexity ascribing the name to several route because it remained open to throw into the bucket! trade routes that were feeders or throughout the year. But in 2006, even unrelated to it. When I first arimal Bhattacharya: We Nathula was reopened. When it got the announcement about the Pwere talking about Darjeeling was reopened another interesting exhibition and festival, I thought to when Professor Wahid shared thing happened in geopolitical history of the region: that China, are quick to talk globalization arimal Bhattacharya: Actually, that earlier didn’t recognize Sikkim but we absolutely refuse to do PKorosi’s life was very as part of India, now had to. India globalization. This is for a lot of interesting. He was a Hungarian also had problems with Tibet as statist reasons, which does not and he wanted to dig out the part of China, but when Nathula have anything to do with people. roots of his race. And somehow he was reopened, there was a de had a suspicion that these roots facto recognition. That is another itanjali Surendran: Is this originally lay in central Asia, among interesting twist in the history that Gbecause they couldn’t get a tribe. When he came to India we should also look at, I guess. visas? he took the long land route, not the sea route. He travelled across iddiq Wahid: In the case of iki Sherpa: This region has Siberia. He learnt about a dozen the University of Kashmir, it been a trans frontier zone. S languages just to cover these D was very much the inability to get Being at the border, the area has places. He came through that old visas. What is worse, it seemed less experienced a drastic and rapid silk route at a time when there conspiratorial and more just bad economic fluctuation. The town were disturbances and troubles. bureaucracy. For example, we could has experienced the remarkable He came to Afghanistan and now manage a visa for somebody from rise and fall within a short period what is Pakistan, and then to Pakistan but not for someone from of time. People in the town still India. For a few years he did some a country considered “friendly” to romanticize the pre-1962 as a espionage work for the East India us, Bangladesh, as happened in “golden era” because of the easy Company. His purpose was to find one case at least. It shows you the availability of job opportunities out the old manuscripts in the randomness of it and how we have etc. Now the economy in the hill, Tibetan monasteries. especially in Kalimpong, has gone created unnecessary structures so much down and most of the and barriers between neighbors. Another thing we must say people are moving out. when we are talking about Sarat itanjali Surendran: One Chandra Das is that when Sarat wonders if the current political iddiq Wahid: Speaking of G Chandra was going to Tibet in impasse in Darjeeling has anything Darjeeling and my own 1880’s, not much of the ancient 32 S to do with constricting these flows experience of living there, it was Indian history was known. Because of people as well? Perhaps, the a different world then: we had a the excavations had not yet economic decline springing from school population of about 350 - been made. He thought the old this strangling of the free flow 400 students in all from class one manuscripts were destroyed by of commodities and peoples has to Senior Cambridge, as class 11 invasions. So he thought that been far more damaging that we was then called. It was an all- India’s past was preserved in the think. And yet from the earliest boys school and we had students rare manuscripts that were there times, Darjeeling was politically from as far away as Thailand, in the Tibetan archives, in the important too. Didn’t the Dalai Burma, Nepal, Sikkim (then an monastery libraries in these dry Lama and Panchen Lama at independent kingdom) and cold places. That’s what he wanted various times in the early twentieth Bhutan. It was a melting pot, a to discover. That’s what Korosi century also flee to Darjeeling globalization process in microcosm Csoma also wanted to go there on the run from the Chinese, in the most amazing way. Now you for. And Korosi stayed a couple causing headaches for the British? cannot even dream about such an of years in Ladakh and he was Let’s also get into the stories of environment in our schools. scripting his theory about the espionage. Sarat Chandra Das origin of his race. His ultimate In this context, recently I was was not the only figure of his purpose was to go to Tibet, to the involved in a SAARC initiative kind in Darjeeling. The British central Asia. He came to Kolkata. in Kashmir that was trying to were themselves quite suspicious He became the librarian of the bring people from all the SAARC of people passing through. For Asiatic Society there. He worked countries to the University of instance, there was the Hungarian there for many years, wrote Kashmir. It was near impossible, linguist Alexander Csoma Korosi. articles. Unfortunately, he had thanks to a mood of anti- Here was someone who undertook malaria and died in Darjeeling. In globalization, not understanding quite a heroic journey all the way Darjeeling, you must have seen the long-term significance of from Europe through Tibet and did in the old cemetery there is a such an initiative or for some a lot of work on Tibetan language memorial which is maintained very other inexplicable reason. That is in Darjeeling. I think he died in well. what I was talking about when Darjeeling too … I said a little earlier that we Korosi thought the root of his ancestry lay over there, but later historians have substantiated that it was not true. So there is this perception that a country’s past is lying locked up over there, and these explorers were going to unlock it. The Tibetans also looked at Sarat Chandra Das as a representative from the country where Buddha was born. People were asking him about the condition of Buddhism in India, about Varanasi, Bodhgaya and other places. This was as if we think about ‘The Great Game’ mid-19th century. Sikkim, Bhutan, two civilizations trying to open again we are thinking about the Nepal – all of them were in the a dialogue with each other, but Afghanistan side, we are thinking process of early “state formation” unfortunately it was very brutally of figures like Moorhead, the at that time. Another less known, suspended through military veterinarian- turned- spy but we but equally important, state that aggression and the earlier Tibet see it play out in a very interesting cropped up during this period was crackdown on these people who way on the other side too. Perhaps, Kashgaria, under a man named had hosted Sharat Chandra Das. as Kishalay suggested the Great Yakub Beg. These things were Game never really ended and the happening as both a resistance iki Sherpa: In regard to Silk Road remains the site of more to, and in imitation of, colonialism. Despionage, in Kalimpong you modern games. Let’s talk about Ironically, they were creating had a press that used to produce that. Dr. Wahid, you suggested states of the kind that had Tibetan newspaper called ‘Melong’ that it was not that different facilitated colonialism. Therefore, and they also had an English from the ancient games and yet it is not surprising that we have 33 newspaper called ‘Himalayan when you think about the nitty- controversies about sovereignty in Times’. Now both these presses gritties of it, it is said that modern many parts of Himalayan South are closed but if one reads the espionage began with the mid Asia today. Whether, it be in publications these presses had to late nineteenth century Great Jammu & Kashmir, Sikkim, Bhutan then one can have an idea how Game… or further to the east. The sooner dynamic these towns were, that these are addressed in the light of there were so many foreigners iddiq Wahid: In a sense it is history rather than power politics, who wanted to go to Tibet but Svery different, particularly after the better. Otherwise, the worse th th weren’t allowed and who waited the 16 and 17 centuries when off we will be. so long but at the end the border nations fell into the background was closed. Tibetans not only and states started to come up arimal Bhattacharya: That is came to do trade but also to front. This changed the whole Pa very interesting point. Could get involved in the revolutionary relationship. But my point was you give us something more on activities regarding Tibet and more regarding rivalries that were Sikkim? Sikkim had connections China. But then China was very taking place and that it continued with Tibet, Sikkim’s princesses had suspicious of the Tibetans that as we famously know Central Asia been married in Tibet. These were went for admission for example to as the pivot of Asia. In history very loose kind-of kingdom states, America, they used to go through things change dramatically. One unlike the ones that we know now. Kalimpong. So, Kalimpong was of the things that was happening But how come this Great Game the main point. It became so as a result of the Great Game, was solidified these states? suspicious that Nehru once called that a lot of state formation that it a nest of spies because of the was taking place in the Himalaya iddiq Wahid: The British people involved in such activities. and the trans-Himalaya during Swere very mature and smart that period. The most obvious about it. They placed the entire itanjali Surendran: In fact, example of that was the state Himalaya within the concept of Gsuspicion is something that of Jammu and Kashmir, it came suzerainty, a very undefined term runs way back but let’s talk about out directly as the result of the in political science. Essentially ‘The Great Game’. Usually what status of the Great Game in the they acted as a “chhatra-chaya” over the various territorial states history. When Tibet was closed, She went with her husband. Her along the Himalaya, allowing the borders were sealed, and then husband was a political officer in them a huge degree of autonomy they became marginal towns. A NEFA. They were carrying wireless as long as they behaved towards lot of political disturbances that boxes to communicate with the the British empire. If you did not are taking place these days have headquarters, and after a couple you got hammered Nepal, Sikkim their roots there. These histories of days the porters refused to carry and many others, including Tibet, teach us lessons that we tend to it. They said – “You are carrying found out. But the overall British forget. For example, when Francis your child inside it, and you are policy allowed for a kind of federal Younghusband went to Tibet and talking to him. We won’t carry your relationship in the true sense of the there was a suspicion that Russia child in a box!” word. We are very fond of saying had its military base in Lhasa, when the British departed from and they found out a primitive iki Sherpa: With regard South Asia there were two Indias, weapons factory. They didn’t have Dto the state formation, all one was princely India and the the heart to pull it down! Same these areas including Bhutan other one was British India. In fact, thing was repeated when there and Sikkim and also some of the there were three Indias; and the was an aggression in Iraq. The north-eastern areas, we have third was the entire length and patterns are being repeated and to understand that these areas breadth of the Himalaya. We need these unresolved parts of history during pre-colonial times were to think in these terms to solve will trouble us. confluent territories and had the current Himalayan border overlapping sovereignties – which problems. iddiq Wahid: I just want to add British failed to understand. Ssomething to the mention of arimal Bhattacharya: This is the telegraph line that the British Even with Darjeeling. British Pinteresting because Darjeeling installed in Tibet. It was during the considered Darjeeling to be their comes here in a very big way. The Younghusband expedition in late soverign territory which they British initially got Darjeeling as 1903 and 1904 and is an amusing bought from Sikkim through a a gift from the Rajah of Sikkim. story. I read somewhere that the “deed of Grant”. However, in 1975, 34 They were very smart but they had Tibetans saw the telegraph line an article written by Sikkim’s a shopkeeper’s mentality. They being constructed with towers princess argues that, according said that we will give you 3,000 to connect them along the to Sikkimese law, Darjeeling was rupees a year for the tract of land way. Today, as you drive from never sold but was merely given for as it was almost uninhabited. Kathmandu to Lhasa you still see a rent to the British. 3,000 rupees was a big sum then. the mud-brick towers to support itanjali Surendran: The British But ultimately, they had strained the telegraph wires along the were notorious for failing to relations with the king of Sikkim. route. When the British invading G understand land exchanges and So then Darjeeling became a bowl force was making the journey, land ownership in these areas. of contention. As, Diki said, these the Tibetans went behind the I want to come back to what were frontier towns and when lines and kept cutting the wire. you had said, Dr. Wahid, about Younghusband was making that It was obviously a nuisance for the ‘One Belt One Road’. I was a expedition it was a very bloody the British troops to have their part of an India-Pakistan track military aggression because communications disrupted time two initiative a couple of months the British army were carrying and again. Amusingly, the intent ago and there was nothing but sophisticated weapons like rifles, of the Tibetans was not to cut off tremendous suspicion by the whereas the Tibetans fought British communications, but to Indian delegates about OBOR but with their primitive matchlock make sure the British troops would you seem to have quite a different guns and arrows. They were lose their way on the way back. take… butchered and the whole path They thought that the telegraph was bloody. When Darjeeling wire was being installed to show iddiq Wahid: The jury is still was the war headquarters, a them the way back to British India! Sout on whether OBOR is a telegraph line was laid through security compulsion or an attempt arimal Bhattacharya: these passes to Lhasa. So you at regional cooperation. But Something similar happened can imagine during those times P there have been some errors in when in the 1950’s, the Indian till early 20th century, Darjeeling its implementation. For example, government sent a political mission and Kalimpong were frontier in the case of CPEC, a major part in Arunachal which was mentioned towns of possibilities and exciting of the OBOR initiative (it has in a book by Geeta Krishnatray. adventures, of crucial points in since been renamed the “Belt and Road Initiative”, BRI, since) it attractive proposition. But you should be clear that India cannot need not take my word for it. There participate in the enterprise when are enough brains in India to look it is called the “China Pakistan at it and see whether it can be Economic Corridor”. A different positive or negative rather than nomenclature for the project would such a proposal being rejected have helped in acceptance of it by outright. India. Instead it has fueled rivalry between the two countries. An example of this rivalry is that when an Indian diplomat objected to China’s growing presence in India’s backyard, a Chinese diplomat responded by pointing out that “South Asia is our backyard too”, or words to that effect. So regardless of whether the BRI is a commercial or a Chinese strategic project or more palatably a cooperative, I think there is a need for India and China to engage on a project that involves half the world. If truth be told, there are many positive things that can happen in the border areas and for the peoples along the boundaries if 35 the two countries were to engage. We should recognize that if one were to fly from Kashmir to Kashgar it would take about forty minutes; and from Leh to Yarkand probably twenty-five minutes; whereas to fly from Srinagar or Leh to Delhi, it takes more than an hour. This is part of the reason that the economy of Kashmir, “historically”, was connected to the economy of Kashgar for centuries. To understand that is to view the State of Jammu and Kashmir in its entirety, outside of the India-Pakistan rivalry and place it in a potential South Asia and Central Asia paradigm; a zone of commercial and social collaboration. It will help to contemplate solutions which are truly global in nature. As a resident of this borderland area and prey to the constant creation of new boundaries that isolate peoples from their neighbors and cultural compatriots, I feel it is an 36 Beyond the Bengal Famine: Film and Panel Discussion

Bengal Shadows 3:45 p.m. - 6:00 p.m. (45min/English) Directed by Partho Bhattacharya and Joy Banerjee

Screening of Bengal Shadows followed by a panel moderated by social scientist Shiv Visvanathan in conversation with the filmmaker Partho Bhattacharya and historian Rakesh Batabyal.

The Great Bengal Famine of 1943 hiv Vishvanathan: Rakesh, as larly blackout my work because is considered by many to be one Sa historian would you like to this is the only work which directly of the worst holocausts in modern discuss as to why so many official counters them. In fact, in Mad- history owing to what is perceived historians were coy on discussing hushree Mukherjee’s book a large the Bengal Famine? number of factual details have as either the willful negligence or 37 the active connivance of the British been sighted from my work but she akesh Batabyal: You used Prime Minister Winston Churchill. is based in Germany. She is only exactly the right word which is Yet many questions remain around R a candidate in academic history ‘coy’. I started working on the fam- the famine. Was it even a purely here. When her book came out, ine in 1990 in my MA seminar pa- localized Bengal famine or were Google and Wikipedia, newspapers per. I continued working on this but its effects felt further afield? What and magazines trashed saying this did not fetch me a job. In every was the real cost of these millions that this is not history this is trash. interview this was sidetracked. I of deaths from mass starvation So this is the intense politics of his- initially thought it was just about and why is it an almost forgotten tory making and history writing networking. Then I gradually re- episode of history? alised when I heard from the film- hiv Vishvanathan: Do the Partho Bhattacharya: This movie makers that even those who speak Ssupporters do anything to is a tribute to my mother, my on the famine would not speak rescue this? grandmother and to all members from a decade back. The famine akesh Batabyal: No, some of my family. I wanted to find has remained confined to popular of them go on legitimizing some answers through this movie myth and memory but not in Cal- R these. Even Lizy Cunningham’s and i tried to interview some his- cutta’s University or the history de- book Test of War, supporters would torians. We tried to concentrate partment there. And interestingly come out and say during the previ- our energy to record testimonies when I finished I did not have a job ous 10 to 15 years there is a class from the people. because of this thesis but I realised that my work has been regularly which emerged in Bengal which is cited by the Irish historians. For rich and did not protest about the them the famine is a huge thing so famine in that sense the colonial they sympathised and empathized position gets legitimized and it with this. Therefore, there is a poli- also gets defended. tics of history. Secondly after this hiv Vishvanathan: Most work is known, even today when historians think that their I am speaking, a couple of PhDs S narrative is about table manners and works which come up regu- rather than of genocide. And that you read some of the narratives on discussed much. Starvation was a bothers me. In fact, that is what the Israeli concentration camps or very tough thing so how to recall worries me about the gentleness of some of the new work on Bosnia, those situations but I don’t know the memory as opposed to say the there is anger in the narrative. for how many hours do we need narratives of the partition. People When you read these guys it’s sort to starve before we start feeling here are so gentle that it almost of a tame. Within Bengali literature the hunger. So yes there is a kind feels like the Britishers are still many of the scientists and social of gentleness as you say. Now it is around. Here are Rudranshu and scientists say and N K Bose even again a question of our relation- Madhushree who are outstand- wrote about it in a very different ship with our past and our history. ing historians talking about one of way. Where are those narratives? Are we the same or are we ready the greatest acts of genocide. The to expose our past? Or do you just word genocide is not even men- akesh Batabyal: Again, a want to hide up your past? I was tioned in our history. We almost Rsocial science oriented and going through a piece which was think it’s a demographic cen- very antiseptic narrative, but let published in January regarding sus. 3.5 million people died which me begin with that we have tried memories, myth and memorial on is even more than the partition, to avoid a template of victimhood. how we negotiate with history. then why is the narrative so soft? We are not the victims like a chunk Probably an Indian does not re- of Jewish. We wanted to come out quire a fiction because he is living a akesh Batabyal: That is the of the sense of victimhood that is fiction constantly. Rpolitics of history writing. His- one notion and therefore they are tory writing is almost like the link- avoided talking about it. When it hiv Vishvanathan: Partition ages with colonial establishment. comes to Indian Universities and Sis a narrative industry. Bengal Say you need to have a fellowship the academic world coming out, famine is the history of silence. in Oxford or you can’t write about what happens with the politics you Also, a history of silence which this. But we also need to think see is that you have to make Neh- is supported by historians. Why as to why we should write. The ru the victim to make Congress the is it that the new stories are not partition industry has grown in the victim to make BJP the victim and coming out? There are tremendous 38 sense that with publication and so on. So this victimhood system records of the Ramkrishna Mission politics, there are also museums is getting closely stirred inside the which worked on the Bengal fam- in Amritsar. In the case of famine, country. As a society you need to ine but also capture the narrative there are vested interests which do have aggregate discourse to talk of carrying dead bodies in bullock not like Bengal to be together. In about the genocide. The Roosevelt carts. Day after day, it reminded that sense, ArtEast is a fantastic paper actually shows how Winston them of the concentration camps. move because the reason we are Churchill was hated by Roosevelt Why are the narratives erased? still talking about the national reg- for all these issues. This raises a second question for ister of citizens in Assam is because me, which is Bengal famine trig- of the famines. The famine pushed hiv Vishvanathan: Even in gered a lot of modern ideas of vio- the people into Assam. Assam was Sfolk history, there is a gentle- lence, of violence through policy. Is crowded and already demanding ness which is startling. There is no it that the Bengal famine was the some sort of a relaxed situation sense of accusation. Why does it real making of the Indian state? from 1930s. So if you do not dis- almost seem like fatalism? cuss famine you cannot discuss the akesh Batabyal: A person who artho Bhattcharya: Around northeast politics. Northeast also died two years back Neeti the idea of victimization if we R has a vested interest here so there P Sengupta, he was the rationing of- say that before 15th August 1947 a very few people who will actually ficer in the 1960s. In fact, I grew up there was no victim but after that come out and say that look this in Bihar and when we used to cross there are many victims of inter- is colonial genocide. Accidentally, the border into the Purulia district communal violence. According Amartya Sen got this after he tried there were constant toll gates. We to statistics 1 million people were to debate on how many people could not take rice from Bengal to dead. Around 14 million people died during the famine Bihar. This is as late as 1970. Ban- were displaced. There was a loss gladesh got a famine in 1974-75 so hiv Visvanathan: Do you think of property for billions of dollars you could see Bengal facing crisis. Ssocial science is the language on both the sides including East Entire Bengal politics was based for genocide? When you read Am- Pakistan. So I think today many on rationing so even Mamata artya Sen or Madhushree Mukher- people don’t want to recall. That’s Banerjee has come from the ration jee they are sort of antiseptic. If very strange approach towards queues. Shortage management is history. Even my family has not what the Indian state is all about. hiv Vishvanathan: In India a My book was the first book which Sdisaster is not a disaster till it connected the Bengal famine to is officially recognised. So the mo- the Noakhali riot or the Calcutta ment there is famine you have to riot. The Calcutta riot saw 6000 send a letter saying please recog- official figures. Maybe it is being nise this as a disaster. How did the pre-empted. Whereas in Calcutta famine did not remain a memory riots there are exact testimonies of the state? that are coming out. In Bengal, there is politics of riots. 120 Rupees akesh Batabyal: Im using an were being taken per body to be Rautobiographical reference. My taken out of the manhole. So the book is cited by the Irish because politics of violence on one hand from 18th century most of the and the India’s state as of crisis British administrators who actually or shortage management was wrote dissent notes were actu- poor. The third is the silence. Those ally Irish men who were sent here. who are the vocal historians say Many of them had a very gentle that Gandhi’s non violence policy and a pro Indian attitude. In the was the reason people were non sense what happened to our going violent. This is when a communist to that side was instead we ended party actually took a decision on up in the other side of history. His- a pro war effort. Now with all the tory writing is an ongoing process effort, all the congress leaders and therefore it will come out. were in jail and had also been very hiv Vishvanathan: We need popular in Congress mobilization. new projects which capture the One of the districts had a very S fate of people and populations. powerful communist movement A history of the Body. A Feminist coming up. This was the time in the 39 history of the Partition. We need a communist working when number new language to confront violence. of workers actually went for mobi- Social science is a bit antiseptic lizing more food. All this campaign now. was against the state. Historians in the state did not come out saying that they took a stand against the state and therefore it will take two or three more generations to come out and say that it was a genocide.

hiv Vishvanathan: Would you Sadvocate a truth commission on the Bengal Famine? Like a mock trial where there’s not only a mention of Churchill but also other people?

akesh Batabyal: I would not Rtake such a political stand of naming people here. There was a famine commission and a dissent note was given by Nanavati. And these famine commission reports and papers are all in the national archive. I would support a commission to talk about it for our next generation to know this. 40 The Game of Thrones: China-Burma-India Campaign of WW II Date: February 3,2018 Time: 02:00pm Venue: Seminar Halls I, II & III

The jungle war that was the China-Burma-India campaign of the Second World War was the most unconventional, colourful and dramatic of battles. Marked by internecine squabbles and political intrigues, and coupled with enormous stakes, neither the Allies nor the Axis powers were willing to let go of this front. From the heroic transport flights over the “Hump” of the Himalayas to drop supplies to the Chinese resistance to the mot prodigious engineering feats of the Manipur and Ledo Roads, this battle was amongst the fiercest and demanded ingenuity at all levels. Who were these mavericks and why were the powers so desperate to control this front? What was really at stake in this, till recently, little acknowledged and yet critical, theatre of war

Panellists: Kai Friese, Journalist; Hemant Katoch, Author and Researcher; and Catriona Child, Writer Moderator: Prof. Kishalay Bhattacharjee, Author and Journalist Photos: 41 Kai Friese, Harsh Man Rai and Madhu Kapparath

ai Friese: This is a personal distinctive ‘Chung’ symbol. But my some of these pictures We flew to Kstory and an extra-curricular personal journey began in 2001. I Dibrugarh and then proceeded to one for me. An extra-curricular di- was working for a travel magazine, the banks of the Lohit river. At that version that emerged from another Outlook Traveller. We got an offer time, this was where the highway extra-curricular diversion. It’s all to from the government of Arunachal ended and you had to proceed by do with a type of plane which took Pradesh to do a feature on the a boat, or several boats actually, me on a long strange journey. It state. In a destination of my choice from a place called Alubari ghat to took me back to my childhood and and I decided to go to what was Digaru ghat. well into my fifties, to Arunachal at then the expanded Lohit district. I Today there’s a bridge which least three times and also to the had a reason of my own: because makes it much less romantic but US. I was fascinated with the India- China war of 1962 and I wanted this is how our trip began. And This is a Douglas C-53 Skytrain, a to visit the battlefield of Walong, heading to the hills, this is looking variant of the very famous Dakota which was one of India’s more or DC-3. It’s also in the markings honourable defeats in that war. of the China National Aviation I travelled with a photographer Corporation or CNAC, with the friend Madhu Kapparath, who took down on the Lohit from a place finding the crash. whom, a Chinese Radio Operator called Hawa Pass which is now in named Wong, was killed. But the the Mishmi hills. We did make it to But at the end of the same trip we two pilots, Ridge Hammel and Joe Walong eventually and to Kibithu had had another stroke of luck. Rosbert had survived the crash and the China border. After reaching Dibrugarh we were and ultimately made their way back to the airbase a month later. He also told me that one of those pilots was still alive—Joe Rosbert. He put me in touch with him and ultimately I was able to call him and speak to him about the story and he sent me a written account of it as well. Basically the plane was flying from Dinjan to Kunming, ice had started building up on the wings—they ran into bad weather. So they turned around and flew into a mountain. In the snow at that time, it was at 16,000 feet, Joe Rosbert was seriously injured, his ankle was shattered but Ridge was substantially okay. Wong of course was dead. Joe told me that they initially stayed in the aircraft to regain their strength. All they This is the image that I acquired allowed to travel in AN-32 trans- had to eat was a gallon jar of later a U2 spy plane image of the port plane to Bijoynagar which is coca cola concentrate which they 42 Lohit valley. an isolated town in the middle of were taking to Kunming to sell. Namdapha National Park, uncon- They used to eat this with snow. Returning from Walong I was nected that time by road. After a few days they realised no insistent that I wanted to spend one was going to rescue them, so a night in a Mishmi village and And here you can see we are they used the door of the plane to we stopped at a place called approaching the air strip of slide down the snowy slope until Sarti where I pestered this old man Bijoynagar which is not a WWII they crashed off that and then whose name was Mun Thalum for air strip but is constructed with they followed streams and rivers, stories about the 1962 war. He was ‘Marston mats’, perforated steel walked for several days, slowly with actually fairly irritated by this and planks left over from the Second Joe’s injured foot, ate a dead crow said “that war had nothing to do World War. that they found along the way. But with us,” though he had memories after 3-4 days they came across of it. Then he started taking about As I said, I wrote about this story a hut with people, with smoke the ‘American war’ and he said and couple of months after the “in those days I had never seen issue appeared I got an email a motor vehicle, I had never seen from an old American War veteran a truck. But we used to see Tam called Fletcher Hanks who told Tam Gaaris flying overhead.” And me he was a veteran hump pilot. then he said once there was a He was now in his 80s and was crash nearby and and ‘our people’ involved in locating the crashes in actually rescued two American which some of his colleagues had pilots. I was fairly fascinated by perished and others had survived. the story and it took me back to And reading my account he said childhood memories of Commando that it sounds very much like a par- comics and earlier obsessions with ticular plane called CNAC 58, and aeroplanes. Then I returned to he told me the story of this crash. Delhi and wrote a travel piece in It was a crash in which the plane which I mentioned this anecdote, had gone down in the Mishmi while dreaming already of actually hills. It had a crew of three, one of PHOTO: MADHU KAPPARATH PHOTO: coming out of it. They marched in in another crash the next year. Joe world had seen. It was also very there and found a family. It turned found work in America in 1946 as a dangerous. In the summer of 1944, out to be a community of Mishmis technical consultant on a Holly- it was statistically far more dan- who looked after them and moved wood B movie about Hump pilots gerous to fly an unarmed transport them to a larger village. And he in India. It was a movie called ‘Cal- plane on the Hump than it was remembered a few names in par- cutta’ made by John Farrow (Mia to fly a bomber over Germany. ticular: of the head of the Mishmi Farrow’s father). Joe said it was a Around 600 planes crashed on family whose name was Daino La- terrible movie but what he liked this route and there were around mad. He remembered a man who about it was that they actually 1500 casualties. It is also interest- he recalled as Aw Shaw. He said had a DC-3 Douglas on the sets, ing that the airlift that ultimately he was a very important man who which they cut in half, in section, so superseded the hump, logistically, was in touch with the British. And they could film the interior. was the Berlin airlift that was Aw Shaw ultimately got in touch based on this experience and run with a British Army party that was by General William Tunner who was reconnoitring a possible road route in charge of the Hump operation into China. They were carried back towards the end. from here by Mishmi porters. CNAC, the company or aviation group to which CNAC 58 belonged, was actually a Chinese airline but funded by the American government in a tie-up with Pan Am. It was staffed primarily by American This is a still from the movie. commercial pilots who were effec- tively mercenaries here. They had I was by now quite excited about a very strong record of safety and finding this plane and Fletcher success and were more efficient Hanks who originally told me than the army fliers on the Hump, 43 about it said he was trying to partly because they were more raise money to find the crash and experienced commercial pilots. retrieve it because apparently the plane was more or less intact at As I said I became quite taken the time it crashed. He said the by the idea of going to find this This is a wartime coca cola adver- Chinese were now interested in plane, ‘Ship 58’. And these are tisement. honouring the Hump operation some shots to explain some of my and it would be worthwhile and sources of fascination. Now that we should try and do something. I I had dumped the 1962 obsession promised to find out more. temporarily. I have a complicated family history in which three of my This is a wartime map of the uncles, or one grand uncle and two Hump. uncles, fought in the Second World War in three different armies.

This is Ridge Hammel on the left and Joe Rosbert on the right on their return to Dinjan, a month after they went missing. Behind them is a plane with the Chinese CNAC marking.

Joe who was injured went back to America to recover. Ridge Hammel I could say a little more about the went back to flying and was killed Hump. It was the largest airlift the This is one more famous aircraft fantasy, a still from ‘Lost Horizon’ from which the story of Shangri-La comes.

This is my father’s youngest and most favourite uncle, Oberst- This is my uncle Ranbir Bakshi, leutnant Kurt Friese who went on his wedding day, marrying my missing in the last weeks of WWII mother’s cousin Timmy aunty. He in a place called Ortwig which is fought in Burma and won a mili- now on Germany’s border with tary cross there as well. Poland. I was also drawing on my childhood fascination with comics. This is the famous frame from Tintin in Tibet. It’s a Dakota DC-3. Actually an Air India plane if you remember the story one of these 44 takes off from Safdarjung Aero- drome in Delhi. And in my childhood you could see three Dakotas standing on the tarmac at Safdar- jang with their distinctive nose-up, This is the first picture from my puppy-like stance. Also i remember second trip back to the Lohit in Dec 1970, being taken by my district. This is taken from the Terai father to see my first crash site, in the middle of crossing the river. when a Dakota that had taken off The bridge was still not there. It This is my uncle Jack Saroff who from Safdarjung crashed behind was a lucky clear day just after was the husband of my Khala. He INA market. rains and you can see the snows of was in the US Navy in the Pacific. the Hump. He went on to have fairly long and happy life.

This is near the district headquarters, place called Loiliang which was the home of my friend Jogin Tamai, a man I met on my earlier trip. It is a beautiful part of the and it was a Swiss watch company world. Jogin and I travelled up the whose marketing was focussed on Lohit by motorcycle asking people Asia particularly on the Himalayan more about the story. I had made region and was popular with pilots. a useful mistake on this trip in that I had not looked at my notebooks He was a one armed man He lost from the earlier visit. I realised later his other hand he said in the 1962 that if I had I would have gone di- war when he found a grenade and rectly to the village of Bhao which was playing with it and it went Mun Thalum had mentioned to off. Also in Hawai we went to the me. I should also have immediately compound of the Pul clan who thought of tracing Daino Ramat/ apparently had stories to tell. This Lamad’s family who Joe Rosbert was actually the compound of the had mentioned. But instead we family of the late Arunachal Chief just followed rumours, which Minister, Kalikho Pul who sadly turned out to be a good thing. killed himself recently. Here we have left our bike at Lohit This was another old man who and walked up a valley to the right gave me an ultimately very useful called the Halai valley. We heard piece of information. He said “If that there was a story of a crash you are looking for anything from there. This is a typical upcountry the Wartime you should find out Mishmi village where we stopped about a ‘Klai Klumfung’ a ‘big and sure enough people remem- white man’ of that time whose bered a crash from the war. name was ‘Mingphlai.’ He was the government officer who was the in charge here and he knew everything about everything.” 45

Meanwhile we went back to the main valley and continued to the town of Hawai which is now the headquarters of the bifurcated district of Anjaw which is the upper part of the former Lohit district. This man showed me this shot gun and said that it had been given to the Pul clan for their part in rescuing two American pilots after the war. We now continued to try and find the Lamad clan. The Lamads lived in a village called Bhao which was further upstream. So we crossed the river and we met this man, and told him what This man told me he had actually we were looking for. And he said been to the crash we were looking that he was the younger brother for. He also told me he had found of Dino Ramat and that he was This man is holding a piece of cast the body of the dead Chinese radio there when the pilots came to the aluminium from a nearby plane operator Wong, and that he had village. And then he reproduced wreck. taken a wristwatch off that body. that conversation. One pilot said He had a very precise memory of But it soon became apparent that he was “Rigzin” (which sounds of the watch: a Westend Watch Com- this was not a crash we were look- course, like Ridge) and then he pany ‘Sowar Prima’ he said. Noth- ing for. By now I recalled the story pointed at the other one and said ing I had ever heard of but he said of the Lamad family. “Chau” (which has to be Joe). He he had later given it to his stupid also remembered the pilots say- son who had lost it. But I did find ing “Wong thumla”, which means out about the Westend company ‘Wong is dead’. This was very excit- hut. And not only there is smoke ing because it was an unprompted coming out of that hut, it was a tale. We hadn’t told this man the moment of salvation”. I was further names of the pilot or anything. We emboldened and determined to go went up to his village Bhao where to the crash site itself. Returning to I met his wife Minga Ramat who India and being a cautious fellow was a fabulous old lady and was I asked my friend Jogin Tamai to actually the wife of Dino Ramat. ask the people in Bhao to send me When he died, she married his a photo of the crash, since hunters younger brother who we had just went there very often. And about met on the way. She said she was a month later I got a bunch of pho- also in the hut when the pilots had tos taken by Checheso Ramat. It first crawled in and she remem- reminded me of that Tintin in Tibet bered it well. frame. They also said at the crash site they had encountered a group of Burmese hunters and spent a They confirmed that the plane couple of nights with them. With crash was a considerable distance that confirmation I returned to further uphill from their village. Lohit, this time with a friend Harsh They said they went there in their Man Rai. youth and so had other people. They introduced me to another man who said he had spent a lot of time at the plane crash site. Originally the plane was intact and looked like a wounded bird. And they went on hunting trips trying 46 to find musk deer and would often shelter in the plane. But he also said it had later been burnt. There

was a lot of debris still to be seen. HARSH MAN RAI PHOTO: He gave me some bits and pieces There I met Minga Ramat again. She imitated the mewling sound which he had retrieved from that Here she is doing her routine of Joe made as he crawled in with his site. Pieces of rubber and a metal imitating Joe’s condition when he injured foot. box which he said came from the crawled into the hut. She liked that plane. Now I was confident I was story a lot. And then we set out going in the right direction. Unfor- from Bhao, uphill of course. It was tunately, I did not have that much ultimately a 5 days walk from Che- time and returned to Delhi deter- kwinty bridge. For Mishmi hunters mined to follow up the story. Since it takes 2 days. For me it was 5 I was working with a travel maga- days up and 2 days down. We were zine I was able to go to New York walking from 5000 feet to 15000 and visit Joe Rosbert. I went and feet, initially through fairly dense spent a night with him. I told him jungle. There were tree leeches. I I thought I knew where the plane had sixty leech bites in the end. I was. I showed him the box that had an infected foot, considerable the old man had given me. And he exhaustion, I had a bad time with immediately said oh that’s the in- food because my Mishmi friends terphone connector. It contains the were basically shooting animals circuitry to communicate between and boiling them and . it didn’t the cabin and the cockpit in the taste good. On the fifth day we plane. He also said he still dreamt reached the site. The big thing was of that trip and the crash and said This is her son who is also the son that the piece of the wing and his favourite part was the Mishmi. of Dino Ramat. there was tons of debris. Some of “I have a vision of Ridge down the cargo was there. Some truly on his knees and ahead of us is a heavy pipes, cockpit instrumenta- I received a lot of information from It mentions the CNAC-58 which is tion, circuitry, two engines were fellow enthusiasts who I met in the plane we were looking for and there and the tail. America. It turns out that there gives the original registration as was a whole community of avia- 4215890. So the 4 was not discern- tion and hump-nerds who were ible on the image we had. And the into this quest. 0 was missing but we could safely assume that we had found it. I also started trawling the internet and I found out a community of people who log all the information they can find about air crashes and here too 4215890 was listed as a CNAC That’s a cockpit dial I picked up 58. I also saw references to another from there. Basically, I thought I plane with the Indian registration had cracked it and I was happy to VTCZC. Turned out to be another have found the wreck I was looking Douglas C-47 of the same batch for. A little later I went to America as the plane I had been looking again to attend a reunion of fami- for. Also 42 meant manufactured lies of CNAC veterans and families in 1942. This was the plane crash of veterans still alive including I had seen this with my father in Fletcher Hanks. It was a wonderful INA market. This led them, I think meeting but I also encountered a to shut down Safdarjung airport as lot of scepticism. People were say- This was a photo we had taken a civil aviation airport. This plane ing, “oh this is just a local story” or of the tail without paying much was also a leftover Dakota from “how do you know for sure it is that attention to it at the time. It was WWII which had been flying in plane?” I was taken aback because useful because there were ghost India until 1970. the stories I had heard from the inscriptions and it’s discernable people of Bhao were very convinc- that the numbers were 21589. We Remember I mentioned this blind 47 ing for me. But I now became thought it must be the registra- man who told me I must look for obsessed with nailing it down as tion number of the plane before it ‘Mingphlai’? Ultimately I found precisely as I could with whatever became CNAC-58. The trouble was out that it was a Mishmi pronun- information I could find. One thing that there were two digits missing, ciation of ‘Mainprice’. I found the was to identify the engines and the first one and the last one. So archive of the personal papers they turned out to be Pratt & Whit- there was a lot of debate around it. of FP Mainprice who had been a ney Twin wasp which were the kind One argument put to me was that Political Agent in Lohit in 1943. In of engine used on the C-53. it would be 4215893. But thanks to them he recounted the story of the a collaborator that we found out pilots. He wrote up the whole story That’s me holding up another piece that 4215893 was another Douglas and also mentioned all the names of cockpit instrumentation. This is that has crashed in Tunisia in the of characters. He spelt the names verifiably from the control pedestal war and had been identified. better. So ‘Aw Shaw’ turned out of a C-47 which is another variant to be Osha Pul. From the Pul clan of the Dakota. Ultimately a very useful friend, Mi- who had the shotgun, related to chael Little, sent this to me which the late chief minister. is a data-card from the Douglas Air Corporation. PHOTO: HARSH MAN RAI PHOTO: ishalay Bhattacharjee: The Khistory that we read out of history books is actually nothing. Hemant, you have walked the battlefields of that area. Why do you think this was such a critical battle for Great Britain? And if it was so critical, why wasn’t it acknowledged till recently?

emant Katoch: Just to set Hthings in context of what Kai has been talking about, it is Northern Burma, China and Arunachal Pradesh that we have been talking about. He is talking about a period from 1942 to 1945 when pilots used to fly over the Hump from the Dibrugarh area to China. But if you step back on it and look there are various components in it. The key event PHOTO: CSAS, UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE OF UNIVERSITY CSAS, PHOTO: in 1942 is the Japanese invasion and occupation of Burma. Why It’s not a great photo but a par- This was the best thing I found were the Japanese so interested in ticularly meaningful one for me. from ‘Mingphlai’s’ archive. This Burma? By the time the Japanese It reminds me that in the midst of photo of a hut on the back of invaded, the last supply route to this obsession and this fascination 48 which he has inscribed, ‘Hunung. the Chinese was through Burma. with white men in planes crash- Small house where Daino Lamad It was through a single road and ing into the wilderness, there was and family live part of year to that was the road the allies were also another crash taking place. cultivate Hunung slopes. Here the using to supply to China who were Which is the story of the encounter American Fliers Rosbert and Ham- also battling the Japanese. Once of people like the hill Mishmi with mel stayed. April’ 43 after crashing.’ the Japanese occupied Burma modernity and the state. It has put It was a place I had been to. It’s they cut the road and China an end to many of their old villages a little above Bhao., we had seen was isolated. Now the force was and much of their traditional way it on our way up to the plane and isolated and allies were thrown out of life and economy. Today com- this is what remains of this hut. It of Burma. They were ill prepared munities like the people of Bhao would have been reconstructed for the Japanese invasion and were are encouraged to come and settle many many times over the years, a thrown out essentially to the North near the roads. The Ramat clan ‘ship of Theseus’ of sorts. East India whereas some others used to get a lot of revenue from were thrown back into China. Now controlling Chekwinty bridge which how do you re-establish supplies was an important point of com- to the Chinese? The Americans merce from Burma. But that trade came up with two solutions; one has now been extinguished by was to construct a Ledo road. So modern borders. from Assam they started building a Ledo road which went through Northern Burma and then to China. But it would have also taken very long. So they thought we would start flying supplies over the Himalayas and that lead to the flights over the hump. So this process for the Americans had priorities in Burma and upper Assam as they wanted to send PHOTO: HARSH MAN RAI PHOTO: supplies to the Chinese. There 84,000 men and the casualty the fateful day Japanese landed were a lot of tensions between rate was about 50,000. They lost, at midnight. In front of him was the Britishers and the Americans. about 30,000 Japanese died, the Red Hill and hence the battle They were so badly defeated and and about 24,000 were injured. named Battle of Red Hill that thrown out of Burma that how do They lost most of their army in the turned one of the decisive battles they take their fight back there battle so for them it was their larg- of World War II. Before the Japa- was the question. So they started est defeat ever on land in Japa- nese arrived, the entire hill was reconstructing and rehabilitating nese history. evacuated. So the 11 year old hid North East India. Before they himself because he did not want could try and attack the Japanese Also what were the stakes in 1944? to run away and waited to see in Burma, in 1944 the Japanese People talk about Netaji Subhash what was happening. When the attacked Imphal. The Japanese Chandra Bose and they talk about Japanese arrived he was there and were defeated and Imphal and Indian National Army but with it was too late for him to figure Kohima was a turning point in the Japanese there was a very small out where to go. So they told him battle. Because the Japanese were contingent of the INA. There were to be a water carrier and yes he defeated, the British and their only 6,000 men or so. But Imphal carried water to the soldiers. He allies used this as a springboard to was supposed to be the precur- then took us to a little attic which defeat the Japanese eventually. sor. If the Japanese won Imphal, he thinks is a secret chamber in the INA were being able to bring his house. He takes out a trunk full So when I talk about stepping in more people, if Netaji would of memorabilia of little helmets back its just to think about North have come, Laxmi Sehgal and and water carriers and all. Across East India during this period. We the Jhansi regiment of INA would Manipur and Nagaland you’ll come are talking about more than hun- have been there, who knows what across many people who have seen dreds and thousands of people in would have happened. Perhaps, the war, who have been there and a region which was fairly remote at India would have been on stake have fascinating tales of the war. a time, not very well connected to because if gates were opened at the war. So we got people fighting Imphal and Kohima, the forces Now Catriona it’s your turn for to here over the land and flying over would have come into Assam and relate that riveting story of your 49 the Himalayas. There were a lot of further into Bengal. Then it would life. How were you involved in this? people who were crossing borders have perhaps excited people to You told us you had family who here further down near the Ara- join the INA, to the cause of an were a part of the Great Game. kan. Arakan by the way is where uprising but these are the ‘What And now you will tell us of some- Rohingyan problem is now. It is the Ifs’ of history. But why Imphal and one who was a part of this battle. old coastal strip which is now the Kohima is important is because of Rakhine state of Burma. We still the scale of defeat of the Japa- atriona Child: My family had don’t know the impact of this on nese, the potential of what could Cbeen in India for generations. the local people of that area. have happened if the Japanese We have four cousins living within have won, and the fact that until 2 kilometres of each other in Delhi. That’s just the overview of 1942 1944 in Imphal and in Kohima, the So let’s go back to 1935 or so. We to 1945. I will bring the discussion British and the Japanese had only have a young woman called Ursula back to Imphal and Kohima. Why been defeated. Bower who has a dream to go to Imphal? Why were the Japanese Oxford. But it is the financial crisis so interested in Imphal? It’s about ishalay Bhattacharjee: I was and the depression and she has geography. The best route out of Kgoing from Imphal to Chura- a brother who also needs to be India whether it is in 2018 or 1944 chandpur and had a flat tyre. educated. And in a story that will or 1942, the best and easily acces- There was a Japanese memorial sound familiar, guess who gets a sible route along this entire frontier out there on the roadside. We chance to go to Oxford? It is the is Imphal or the Manipur valley. wanted water and walked to a brother. My mother never took That is the only place where a small village, walked there and met things lying down. She was sent large force can move from India to this elderly gentleman who was off to finishing school in Switzer- Burma. So for the Japanese, that sunning himself. In front of him land. Her mother who was a great was the main valley from where was a hill, a bare hill. I was talking socialite was desperate for her to invasion could come so they tried to him while the car was getting find a husband. But my mother and blocked it and that is where fixed when I found his name was had a friend whose brother was the invasion came from. I think its Gourmohan Singh. He told me a going to be a political agent in numbers. The Japanese sent some story when he was 11 years old and Manipur, Ronald McDonald. She said I am going to be bored as out the way. She does understand your own comic strip linkages. hell out there why don’t you come and she does make good rela- Would you like to tell us a few? along for the winter and join me? tions with the people. Suddenly At least we could play cottage after the Japanese advance in the ai Friese: As part of the songs and remember our days hills, this great mosaic of different Kaftermath of all this I started walking in the hills. So my mother tribes who live there looked like the trawling internet archives of vin- went, she went for polo, she went Japanese. What if they turned and tage comics looking for evidence to the governor’s house, did the went to the Japanese? British had basically of the same story finding entire social stuff for three weeks. never done very much for them. No linkages of the fantasy of these Then she got a chance to tour the infrastructure, no schools. So sud- white men coming and crashing in hills around Imphal. She just fell in denly my mom gets a visit from an the unknown. Basically related to love with the tribes and the hills. official called Ronald Wright who the hump. These stories get told Then she said, never mind about is an elderly colonel desperate to in many forms back in the 40s. Oxford and never mind about a get out in the field again. So they Another thing I found peculiar in husband I am going to settle here could go out in sort of an uncon- these is that immediately after the and make a career in anthropology. ventional way to serve people. war the American adventure war Not surprisingly she encountered They are called the We Force. They comics suddenly switched to Sci Fi a huge amount of opposition from had the people who led those units and aliens invading. On one side authorities. Women were supposed and were not always in the army. there are these big bombers flying to sit in the club wearing big hats, They were tea planters and other over Japan and the next issue is play rummy, drink gin and tonic administrators who really under- the Martians attack. My favourite but never to go into the hills. She stood the tribal people. They said is where Fletcher Hanks who told went back home to make a career. it is better if you are with the allies, me about CNAC 58, his father who She found some support both from the Japanese are pretty nasty. was also called Fletcher Hanks was academics and from family friends. But they were also going out and a very famous comics originator in The photographs were good and actively searching for Japanese the 1920s. He produced a comic yes she could find a job to do patrols and leaving some food. called Fantoma. 50 including pottery, stitching and The authorities had recognised ishalay Bhattacharjee: What weaving and stuff. She got ready my mother’s relationships with was the comic strip that your to go back. the Zemi-Nagas and she could be K mother inspired, Catriona? useful. So she was recruited in the There was this one trip where she We Force and was the only woman atriona Child: The Jungle made a lot of effort to go back in the combat on the frontline Queen or something. There and really hoped this would work. C certainly within that theatre of were several actually and my The authorities told her that you war. Because a woman could not mother hated all this stuff. The can not tour the hills and she has be on the frontline in a war, as American soldiers called her the this nervous breakdown because it wasn’t allowed, she was in the Naga Queen as she always moved she put so much of her heart and books as a typist. She didn’t talk around with Naga men who wore soul into this. By then and by good much about it. There is an awful lot the traditional Nagas dress with a fortune she met an officer who that is not talked about. She was shawl and some beads around the was farsighted and sensitive and made the captain and there was neck. So it created a picture which a visionary. And there were lot of another officer who came with a made an impression one could say. Nagas who are now actually in platoon of rifles. Since she did not the present day Assam. He said have any rank, so the guy took off ai Friese; One of the series there has been a rebellion in this some pips off his one shoulder and KI found of 1940s comics was area and it involved a new religion put it on her shoulder. The Nagas Raja Bill. It involves a pilot who and many other elements. I don’t were very happy. Instead of going crashes or somehow winds up in a understand what has made these out they used to go out and hunt kingdom called Manipur which is at people so unhappy. They won’t birds. They had guns, they had 150 the border of India. This kingdom is talk, they wont communicate and scouts and they had only a few weirdly run by a white princess who they wont accept help. Perhaps, encounters. is trying to resist colonisation by you with a box of medicines as Gandhi and Nehru. a non-official in the guise of an ishalay Bhattacharjee; She anthropologist can go and see Kalso inspired a comic strip ishalay Bhattacharjee; what is going on. So off she went character, didn’t she? Kai you have KHemant, I know there have with various adventures through- been some clubs and some societies in Britain and Japan and other were cut off from the rest parts for Joseph was a much smaller player places, where they have been tourism as well. Especially, in the in that sense. He was not the com- trying to document or at least find years of unrest and insurgency. It mander of the whole theatre. We their history. How are historians was very difficult to head out un- get to hear the stories of the Allied in India looking at it? Is there any less you were a local, to head out Forces. We don’t get to hear the interest in India about this? of Imphal or to head out of Kohima stories of the Japanese. And the even if you wanted to see the main Japanese have consistently been emant Katoch; It is about the sites of war. That has begun to coming more than the others actu- Hgeneral idea of how we are change now. Tourists have begun ally to visit their graves or to visit taught history. History was taught to show up, we can actually go the areas where they have war me- to us in a very dull, drab, dates, outside of Imphal as far as possible morials. In fact, I am going to ask names and eras sort of way. So safely specially for foreign tour- Yui Nakamura who comes from Ja- by the time you give your exam it ists not that there was ever really pan and represents The Sasakawa jumbles up and you are just sort of a threat against them. You can Peace Foundation supporting this trying to put it down there. From now really explore the interiors of festival. She told me about those my own experience of how I was Manipur and Nagaland in what- Japanese survivors who came to taught history in school, it doesn’t ever you are interested in whether Nagaland and asked the Naga really get you involved in these it is culture or food and so on. That war veterans why the Japanese parts. Another thing is how much has also positively impacted the story was never written and now we cover of the Second World War. interest in the Second World War. apparently there is an account but It is always more about the British You can walk into the cemeteries. in Angami and translated in parts and the Americans and so on. And So when you talk of crash sites, to Japanese. it is only off late that the people one can actually head out now who have been writing about it and indulge into your interest in Hemant Katoch: If you are a as well, have started to bring out the WWII. Also, Myanmar is finally Japanese you might’ve heard more Indian stories of the Second opening up. So increasingly there of their generals. The problem World War. So they have started to is a lot of interest on cross border is what literature do we have to say that it is just not just the Brit- sort of travelling with interest in access this history? Almost all the 51 ish war or the Allied war but also the Second World War. histories that one has access to our war. And I think it is the perfect have been written by the British description. ishalay Bhattacharjee; When veterans, military historians and Kwe read the history or read Americans and so on and that’s From 200,000 men of India in these stories of the China, Burma, why you get a greater sense of the army, before the WWII started India campaign, one of the names characters involved on their side. there were 2.5 million in the army that still comes up is the maver- But we don’t have access to a lot spread out all over the world not ick rogue General Joseph Stillwell of Japanese material. I have heard only in Imphal, Kohima but in because a road had to be built from a lot of Japanese people and North Africa, Italy and so on. There from what is the Assam-Arunachal its not like it is not being written. were also flights over the hump. So border via Burma to Yunan. This It is being written. There is a lot of we know that India was a critical road had to be built really fast if literature apparently on Imphal part of the war. I think we are now the war had to be won. And no one itself. But it is in Japanese. So if you starting to acknowledge that and could build it because of impossible don’t speak Japanese it limits your taking ownership of it. The British logistics. So the task fell on some- access to it. So I think its there and have always been quite involved one the Americans did not like very we don’t always get to hear of it. in their military histories. We can much. It was Joseph Stilwell who I’m sure you have heard of General all learn from how interested they built the road at the rate of one Slim who commanded the 14th are. In not just remembering their kilometre a day laying a pipeline army, went on to become a Field history but also walking the battle- along it. It continues to be the Marshall and was there through field. You got to go and see the most daring engineering feats of the campaign and saw defeat in places. Remember the Common- any war. I have walked that Stilwell 1942, turns it around, has this fan- wealth War Graves Commission? road. I have done just 12 Kilometres tastic victory in 1944 in Imphal and There are five cemeteries in the from the pass from where you see Kohima and in Rangoon and then North East of India. Those are im- the Lake of No Return. But why gets sacked by his General and maculately maintained cemeteries don’t we hear of the Japanese then gets him sacked. In 1942 the that sort of keep that part of his- names? I mean if the Japanese Japanese themselves stopped at tory alive. Manipur and Nagaland army was there in such strength, the border. They had already taken over Burma. There was nothing Dimapur. Mutaguchi knew Kohima there to stop the Japanese from was important as that is from coming to Imphal and all the way where road from Imphal passed. to Calcutta, there was really no Sato did not like Mutaguchi at defences to speak of because no all. He doubted every intention of one expected an attack to come Mutaguchi. If they had gone to Di- from that side. The Japanese were mapur in early April which is when already stressed, the monsoon they were trying to, Dimapur would was starting, it’s a difficult border have fallen. The British reinforce- we have seen some of the pho- ments would have not come and tographs from Kai. The Japanese history could have been different. themselves stopped. Imphal and Kohima had already been going atriona Child: The other on for two months. It was clear Cplayers whose story has not that Japanese were not going to been fully told, of course are the capture any of those two towns. local people. The Allies are pretty Both General Sato and General well recorded, the Japanese too, Mutaguchi knew it was the time but what the local people thought to accept, if not the defeat then a about two great powers beating withdrawal and to sort of gather hell out of each other over their your horses and go away. But there land. And the reverberations of is a great account, which says that that continue today in many ways. they were talking and they both And unfortunately so many of the knew what was on each other’s people who were there, who were mind, they both were hoping that children at the time of the Second the other person would call off the World War, have passed away. So operation. Neither of them wanted enormous amount of material has 52 to be the one to say it. When you been lost. It grieves me very much. talk about cast of characters there Works can still be done and more are a lot of them with huge egos, work should be done. also very competent men. Also very brave soldiers, some who didn’t treat prisoners of war well.

atriona Child: The dynamic Cbetween Mutaguchi and Sato is really interesting. Sato is very cautious. Mutaguchi is sort of more worldly ambitious. These things make for terrific drama for the personalities involved.

emant Katoch: General Sato Hwhom she talked about was the division commander who was supposed to take Kohima. Muta- guchi said okay you take Kohima but also aim for Dimapur, which you know today, is at a distance of about 80 kilometres from Kohima. Kai mentioned those flights. Now a lot of those flights were carrying supplies from Calcutta, ferried across the Brahmaputra and then carried along the railway line. That railway line passed through 53 Sirawon Khathing and Ben Ezra Ning DOWN THE ROAD Local shops in Shillong, India

PICKLE STALL A snack made with boiled potato, puffed rice, tamarind water, masala and mustard oil. Popular with school and college kids, the aloo moorie stand can be found in strategic locations.

ALOO MOORIE A snack made with boiled potato, puffed rice, tamarind water, masala and mustard oil. Popular with school and college kids, the aloo moorie stand can be found in strategic locations.

FRUIT STALL Kong (Elder sister in Khasi) sells seasonal 54 fruits. She has a wide variety that includes fresh pineapples, bananas, peaches, sweet plums and other local fruits all grown from the surrounding landscape.

TEER COUNTER They are spread all over the city. Teer (translates to “an arrow”) is a popular gambling sport where KWAI & HOUSEHOLD TOOLS several archers shoot Kong (Elder sister in Khasi) sells kwai (betel nut arrows at numerous and leaves) with lime paste that is popularly targets. Bookies bet, the chewed by locals. Also sold is dried bottle archers shoot, points gourd loofahs used as scrub and locally grown are calculated and cash brooms. prizes are handed out. Interestingly, even small or shoddy shops are prompt with dispensing cash even if it’s tens of thousands of rupees.

CHANNAWALLA A coneful right after class is almost a mandate. Much like in North India, channawallas have been in the hills for many generations. Known for his boxes filled with assorted peanuts and grams, he artfully mixes them with chilli powder, onions and a dash of lime and serves in a paper cone. Keep an ear out for his bell or find him near an aloo moorie stall.

Cultures as diverse, rich and unexplored lived by simple people. Music ranging from bamboo instruments to rock and roll, dancing in and out of occasion, local food be it on the streets or cafes’, hustling for space in the town buses, relentless monsoon rains, clouds that drape the green hills like a shawl, picnics under the trees; just the everyday. Northeast India Northeast EVERYDAY UTOPIA EVERYDAY

55 SEEN AROUND TOWN

TAXIS Small yellow and black cabs, mostly Maruti 800s, ACCESSORIES help cope with traffic Wooden and congestions and narrow metallic smoking streets. Don’t judge it by pipes. Cloth bags the appearance, the tiny and chappals taxi can often squeeze are made locally four passengers in the while checkered back seat. shawls are a popular fashion accessory for the all generation.

BASKETS Differently shaped, they are largely made of bamboo and cane for various uses. While 56 some are used as sieves, storage, or carrying goods on their back, some are fashioned with large hoods and knitted with leaves to be used as SHILLONG BUSES raincoats in farms and Found on the streets of Shillong, it’s easy fields. Bamboo is grown to mistake them for a truck. Mostly made in abundance in the hills, of wood and metal, these models from the and is a great resource for United Assam era used to have exhaust multipurpose use. pipes that turn upwards in an attempt to reduce air pollution. You’ll find an assortment of art and type design on these vehicles.

PICKLES Assorted and seasonal, pickles are made from fruits, vegetables, meats and even fish. Chillies and bamboo version are popular among locals who must have a pickle or chutney with every meal.

KWAI A customary welcome offer, betel nut and leaf (areca nut or supari) is popularly eaten raw with a tiny amount of lime paste for potency and heat. First timers might find themselves red-faced and flushed. Sugar is a quick and effective antidote. PEOPLE Locals are bright, friendly and trusting. These are some common clothes and cloth bags worn by the working people of Shillong. Women wear checkered shawls and an apron-like cloth to protect themselves from dirt and spills from working. The menfolk often wear coats or jackets and even interesting hats that have become fashion statements

PINE TREES AND CONES The scent of pine in the air and the landscape is filled thousands of pine trees heavily ladened with HOUSES fragrant cones. Surrounded by rolling Typical to ones found on hills, hills, Shillong is lovingly called the these homes have sloping “Scotland of the East”. roofs owing to heavy rains. Walls have a wooden frame and are plastered with cement or mud. And the floors are made of beutiful pinewood, kept polished and clean. Cool in summer and fairly warm in winter keeping the heat in (provided there is a chula going!)

STOOLS/KNIVES Women of the Khasi and Jaintia clan often carry traditional pen knives with wooden handles as pocket accessories. Used for peeling and cutting of kwai (betel nut) as well as prepping meals. Knitted stools (moodas) made of bamboo and cane. that are an example of the ingenious creativity of the people using local resources to benefit everyday life. Other kitchen accessories include a brush, local soap and metal holders to roast ingredients on the fire.

CHULAS Portable fire stoves, chulas use charcoal ORCHIDS for cooking food and Orchids The Northeast warming rooms on cold of India is a biodiversity days. During winter, hotspot. Orchids are one you’ll see people huddled of its many treasures. around these chulas, at Over 700 varieties of home or on a road side. this colourful flower can be found here. You could take a walk in a forest and spot orchids and flora that you won’t see elsewhere in the world. WHAT’S IN OUR KITCHEN Ingredients of North East India

BAMBOO SHOOT Bamboo shoot is a very RICE important ingredient in An absolute staple food, Northeastern cuisine and it’s found in four colours it’s used in many ways. – brown, red, black and Young shoots appears white. Puffed, pounded once a year in August and or dried, used to make are considered a delicacy. sticky rice, pancakes and Commonly boiled or used steamed cakes. in a curry when fresh, bamboo shoot is also dried, fermented and cooked with meat or fish.

CHILLIES Found in colours of green, red, yellow, orange and even black, chillies are either MUSTARD LEAVES dried, powdered or pounded & OIL AND SESAME SEEDS into a paste. King chilli (also They are used known as Bhut jolokia) is the as fresh greens, hottest chilli in the world and cooking oil and is grown in the Northeast flavourings. of India. Eat it plain (if you dare) or use it to season vegetables and meat.

58 DRIED FISH Powdered or Traditional Recipe: Simple Naga Pork Curry whole, tiny dried fish are a local • ½ kg pork washed and cut into bite size pieces delicacy. • 1-2 tbsp dried bamboo shoots • 5-6 whole chillies (green or dried) • 1 tbsp ginger and garlic paste (fresh) • Salt to taste In a pot, bring 3 cups of water to boil Add pork, chillies and salt. Cook till tender YAM Once soft, mash the chillies. Fresh, dry, sliced or pounded, it’s used in meat and Add dried bamboo shoots and freshly ground gin- vegetable dishes. In the ger garlic paste hills, it’s often used as an Cook for another 10-15 mins alternative to daal. Serve hot with rice

Traditional Recipe: Khasi Style Dried Fish Chutney • 6-7 fresh red chillies • 2 medium size dried fish (roasted dry on the fire or pan) • 2 whole red Sichuan peppercorns • 1 small onion (optional) • salt to taste PEPPER Whole or ground, black, Grind all the ingredients to a fine paste on a stone white and red Sichuan pepper is generously grinder. Eat with rice and curry as a side dish or as sprinkled in vegetarian and a spicy dip with boiled potatoes. meat preparations.

Yum! WHAT’S IN OUR KITCHEN Films Catalogue Ingredients of North East India

59 60 Participating Artists

AN ODE TO BAMBOO A tribute to M P Ranjan, design evangelist and one of the world’s top design thinkers. Ranjan was a senior professor and a principal faculty at the National Institute of Design, (NID), Ahmedabad till his death in 2015. 61

AN UNSEEN TUNNEL INSIDE IN THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF PINECONES AND SACRED A DISPLACED PROLETARIAN - FORESTS Illustrating life and living in the YEAR 2018 Presented by North East by Biscoot and Rain Rida and the Musical A mixed media installation that Folks and Dak_ti Craft takes the viewer through a tunnel Visual Artists: Sirawon Khathing travelling and experiencing the and Ben Ezra Ning transitional point of green space to grey space Sukant Panigrahy - New Media Artist Kaur Chimuk- New Media Artist

PHOTOGRAPHS-PAINTINGS- DRAWINGS-ILLUSTRATIONS- POETRY-BAMBOO OBJECTS OF EVERYDAY USE

Artists: Arati Kumar Rao, Photographer & Writer; Parasher Baruah, Cinematographer; Pankhi Saikia, Painter; Sumana Roy, Poet and Writer; Vijay Jodha, Photographer; Siddartha Das, Designer INSTRUMENT MAKING

by Bah Rojet Buhphang & Risingbor Kurkalang

Shaun Morehead- Bom (traditional big drum); Bah Rojet Buhphang- Tangmuri (traditional shehnai); Risingbor Kurkalang- Maryngod (traditional violin) & Sitar (traditional sitar); Amarnath Hazarika- Duitara (traditional guitar) & acoustic guitar.

BLACK CLAY POETRY/POTTERY BLACK CLAY POETRY/POTTERY SHA SHIAHKROT (TEA A display of traditional tableware An interactive session by Dak_ti CEREMONY) and cookware range developed Craft with Milda Shylla and Yophie By Dak_ti Craft by Dak_ti Craft and a team of Shylla. women potters from Jaintia Hills, Sha Shiahkrot is an indigenous tea Conceptualised by Rida Gatphoh Meghalaya. preparation from the root of a wild plant that is found in the forests of Potters: Milda Shylla, Yophie Meghalaya . Shylla The part that is used for the tea Designer: Rida Gatphoh preparation is the root that is 62 flashing red on the inside and brown on the outside. One single LECTURE DEMONSTRATION BY Shiahkrot plant can bear up to 10 RIDA AND THE MUSICAL FOLKS of such roots that supply the plant A musical storytelling session with rich nutrients and medicinal followed by the story of the properties. instruments, the ‘skit’ (beats and The major threat to Shiakrot today rhythm) and the craft of creating is the massive deforestation, which them. is taking place due to large-scale Presented by Rida Gatphoh- cash crop, coal mining and fire Singer, Writer, Composer wood exploitation. Black clay kettles and platters are used to serve the tea and snacks.

Menu: • Shiah Krot tea • Putharo – Steamed rice cake • Pu Maloi – Steamed rice cake made of Khasi red rice • Pu Sla – Rice and jaggery cake steamed in a leaf FILMS

UP, DOWN AND SIDEWAYS Directed by Anushka Meenakshi & Iswar Srikumar

A musical portrait of a community of rice cultivators and their memories of love and loss in Phek village, Nagaland.

MY NAME IS EEOOOW Directed by Oinam Doren

The film revolves around Kongthong, a hamlet in East Khasi Hills about 60km from Shillong, and a traditional practice called the Jyngwrai Iawbei. The tradition INTER/SECTIONS THE OTHER SILK ROUTE : is to have musical tunes as names SPOOKERY,TRADE AND THE in honour of the clan ancestress. BEYOND THE BENGAL GREAT GAME The song names come as an FAMINE: FILM AND PANEL The ‘Old Silk Route’ or the ‘Other expression of the mother’s love for DISCUSSION her new born. Silk Road’, which passes through BENGAL SHADOWS east Sikkim, was probably discovered by traders in 1st century 63 Directed by Partho Bhattacharya ACE. A part of an ancient network IMA SABITRI and Joy Banerjee of trade routes, for centuries it Directed by Bobo Khuraijam served as a lifeline connection Panelists : Rakesh Batabyal, between China and India. But Film on actor Heisnam Sabitri and Academic and Partho besides trade, the ‘Roof of the her incredible sixty years in theatre. Bhattacharya, Filmmaker World’ has held an irresistible Moderated by Shiv Visvanathan, allure for many political powers Social Scientist that have fought to dominate the Tibetan plateau. By the 19th The Great Bengal Famine of 1943 century, the Great Game was afoot is considered by many to be one and the British colonisers of India of the worst holocausts in modern launched dozens of spies disguised history owing to what is perceived as pilgrims and monks across the as either the willful negligence or Himalayas onto the plateau; in the active connivance of the British many ways that Game continues Prime Minister Winston Churchill. to play out today even as some Yet many questions remain around players have endured and others the famine. Was it even a purely have not. localized Bengal famine or were its effects felt further afield? What Panelists: Professor Siddiq Wahid, was the real cost of these millions Author & Historian; Diki Sherpa, of deaths from mass starvation Researcher; Professor Parimal and why is it an almost forgotten Bhattacharya, Author and Teacher episode of history? Moderated by Gitanjali Surendran, Historian MUSIC SPECIAL THANKS , The Sasakawa ELEMENTS Yui Nakamura Peace Foundation A concert by Mi Ku, a Lalsawmliani Tochhawng , India contemporary folk ensemble from International Centre Nepal Vibha Lakhera, Reachout Pushpa Palanchoke, vocals; Kobid Foundation , sarangi; , Bazra Samyog Regmi Parasher Baruah, Filmmaker guitars; Riken Maharjan, abss; Bikesh Bazra, nagara; Merit Ipsa Pratibimbita, National Maharjan, percussions; Prabin Foundation for India Maharjan - drums, Sangam Panta Moon Dutt, National Foundation - sound for India Santosh Nair, National Foundation for India Ashima Sharma, Intern Muskan Mascharak, Intern GAME OF THRONES: CHINA- BURMA-INDIA CAMPAIGN OF Khushi Gupta, Intern WW II Akshita Chembolu, Volunteer

The jungle war that was the China-Burma-India campaign of the Second World War was the 64 most unconventional, colourful and dramatic of battles. Marked by internecine squabbles and political intrigues, and coupled with enormous stakes, neither the Allies nor the Axis powers were willing to let go of this front. From the heroic transport flights over the “Hump” of the Himalayas to drop supplies to the Chinese resistance to the most prodigious engineering feats of the Manipur and Ledo Roads, this battle was amongst the fiercest and demanded ingenuity at all levels. Who were these mavericks and why were the powers so desperate to control this front? What was really at stake in this, till recently, little acknowledged and yet critical, theatre of war?

Kai Friese, Journalist; Hemant Katoch, Author and Researcher; Catriona Child, Writer

Moderated by Kishalay Bhattacharjee, Author and Journalist 65 66 67 68

OrganisedPublished and Presented by by Collaboration Supported by Partnership NEW IMAGINATIONS Jindal School of Journalism and Communication