The recently held Namami Brahmaputra festival was a five-day event held from 31 March to 4 April 2017 to drive the message that the Brahmaputra "is not called ‘lifeline of Assam’ for nothing as this perennial river presents incredible business opportunities" and the entire length of the river through the state of Assam "is a bridge to drive economic progress in Southeast Asian markets, and is now vital to India’s ‘Act East Policy’.
While everything looks fine with the festival but the image and symbols invoked in the promotional songs of the festival seems to have not gone down well with many communities living in the state. While the cinematography is great, the video fails to capture colloquial nuances starting from this nomenclature - Namami. This is the upteempth time Sanskrit has been used to define the cultural matrix of the north eastern region. The word “Namami” is a forced import. At the heart of the controversy has been the name itself, which detractors contend is an import from the phrase “Namami Gange” and has very little to do with Assamese culture.
What I now understand from the local conversation in the region is that the “pranamo” and the “namami” invocation is the language of a latent “conservative” ideology which got its boost with the new government in Assam. According to some, tribal cultures that have grown around the river were ignored. The video could have included some stock footage of riverine tribes such as the Misings, if nothing else. A spokesperson of the Takam Mishing Porin Kebang, a Mising students’ organisation, complained: “The tribal people form a key part of Assam and its culture, all of us consist Assam together. The festival and its theme video doesn’t quite seem to represent that fact.”
Hafiz Ahmed, president of the Char Chapori Sahitya Sabha, a literary body representing Muslims living on the riverine islands of the river, said the community was not represented in the river festival at all. “Our cultural identity is not even recognised,” he said. “People on the chars [riverine islands] face the wrath of the Brahmaputra all the time, but a festival celebrating the river doesn’t even feature us.” This exclusion is perhaps not disconnected from the popular perception that people on the chars have always been branded as “illegal migrants”.
The Bordeori Samaj’s Rajib Sarma was scathing: “This the not the Hinduism we follow here in Assam. This is the RSS brand of Hinduvta being forced upon us.” According to Sarma, the organisers of Namami Brahmaputra did not extend a formal invitation to any of the priests of the Kamakhya Temple. “Not even the deol - the head priest, was invited,” he said. Only a priest close to the current dispensation was called and asked to perform some rituals, claimed Sarma. “So basically, according to this government, people from outside the state will teach us our customs now,” he said.
Some say that tribal sensibilities around the river have been relegated to the backburner for a long time now, is simply a manifestation of an aspiration of the affluent urban citizens of Assam whereby they increasingly want to be part of north-Indian cultural practices and theriefore is their enthusiasm for Namami Brahmpautra - which translates into the Ganga-esque treatment of the Brahmaputra.
Brahmaputra is a river that is revered, not worshipped. According to Arupjyoti Saikia, a historian of the river who teaches at the IIT Guwahati, there were no 'spectacular displays of public and community rituals' around the river till around the mid-20th century. Historical texts suggest that there was a sense of submission to the river from everyone who had anything to do with the river, which was pretty much anyone living in the region.
The prayer abiding hands in the logo, in the video (Namami Brahmaputra - Theme Song (Hindi Version)) evokes a religious sacredness which is very different from the kind of folk forms of worship that exists in this region. The tribes of Assam have through their folk history preserved their own stories and experiences about the river Brahmaputra, which were untold in the video. Instead, it got reduced to a patronising, Hindutva-heavy fantasia, a series of images that add up to northern India’s fantasy of the river, rather than reflecting the local, plural, inclusive cultural experience around it.
For instance - there was an evening aarti where Hindu priests, flown in from Haridwar, manoeuvred massive metal fire lamps as they offered prayers to the river in thelines of Ganga Aarti. In all these years, I have never seen the Brahmaputra being worshipped like that. The Brahmaputra is not the Ganga. Reportedly, thee is now a feeling of alienation among many when the priests from Haridwar conducted aarti in a manner highly similar to the ones conducted at Dashashwamedh ghat in Varanasi. This is being interpreted by many as an insult to Assam's Sattriya culture which does not propagate idol worship. The aarti happened when many Satradhikars, the heads of different Neo-Vaishnavite monasteries from all over Assam, were present at the banks of the Brahmaputra, specially invited for the festival.
Thankfully, over the last few days, the contents of the video have received mixed responses from people within Assam and outside. After following the gist of some debates, I re-watched the theme song (Namami Brahmaputra Promotional Video) and realised from my memories of growing up at Guwahati that some of riverine rituals depicted subtely in the video are as unlikely as watching Amitabh Bachchan praying on the banks of the Brahmaputra!
Not surprisingly many from the Brahmaputra valley now appear confused about the objective of the festival. While some believe it had something to do with the river linking project, some feel it was for promotion of Assam as a tourist destination. In the incumbent political party's short period of running the state government in Assam, a pattern seem to be emerging where there is a tendency to present the state as homogenized entity from the lens of Hindutva. The Namami Brahmaputra festival in its promotion appears to have been limited in demonstrating the presence of multiplicity of cultures in the region and in light of other policies, it looks more like the state of Assam must be ready for more imposition of brahmanical Hinduism.
Disclaimer / Caveat: Whatever has been stated is based on publicly available information, and the post does not represent the view of the organization the author works for. The article reflects the views of the writer alone and does not seek to offend any community within or outside India. Its purpose is to purely encourage discussion.
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