Tag: Shillong

January 23, 2024 /

The Chief Minister of Meghalaya, Conrad Sangma, recently released the state anthem in Tura, which generated a fair bit of controversy. One of the criticisms about the anthem was made by the Jaintia Students’ Union, wherein they demanded corrections be made to the anthem by removing the English words and replacing them with Jaintia.

August 15, 2021 /

My father passed away almost 20 years ago but I remember him every day. I remember him as a loving and doting father, a jolly, generous, kind, often compulsive person, always ready to lend a helping hand to anyone in need. He would buy us gifts – clothes, toys and food whenever he felt like. I would always be so happy and glad just to be in his company.
He had many names and identities you might say. He was known by his Muslim name as Abrar Hussain, his nickname was Khuku and Johnky, his Christian name was Peter.

August 15, 2021 /

Uba i-don burom, uba don ka maiῆ ka muh, ka dei ka dur jong uwei u rangbah uba baroh ki ithuh khmat bad shait їohi barabor ha ki thaiῆ Mawkhar jong ka Nongbah Shillong ha ki snem 1932 haduh 1948. U dei u briew uba lieh ka sniehdoh bad uba pdeng ka rynїeng, uba jrong tmaiῆ bad u ju sngewtynnad ban phong pynsyiad da ki shinakut bad patlun jrong kiba syiad. Um ju pep ban deng tai, kup tupia bad rah ia u diengduh haba u їaid ha surok. Ki nongshong shnong jong ka shnong Mawkhar bad ki shnong ba marjan ki burom bha ia u bad u ju їarap ia ki briew da kaba sumar bad ai dawai ei. U dei u doctor uba sumar bad ai dawai homeopathy. U briew u bym ju bunktien bad haba u kren u da nang ban jied ia ki kyntien bad kren da thew.

June 23, 2021 /

Ki nongdiemadan wat la ki long ka kynhun kaba don ha trai duh jong ka pyrnon, pynban ki long ka kynhun kaba laitluid tam bad ki bun kiwei pat ki para nongshong shnong kiba kwah ban їoh lem ia ka kajuh ka jinglaitluid ban long kynrad bad long shakri hi da lade їalade. Kum kane ka jinglaitluid mano bym kwah? Ha kajuh ka por pat ka jingim ki nongdiemadan ka dap da ka jingїakhun lynter, khamtam ha kane ka Nongbah bad ka Jylla Meghalaya ha kaba ka aiῆjong ka Sorkar India kam pat shym la treikam satia bad kane ka buh ia ka jingim bad ka kamai kajih jong ki nongdiemadan ha ka jingeh bakhraw. Hynrei ym tang ia ki nongdiemadan, ki paidbah nongshong shnong ruh ki shem jingeh namar katba ym pat pyntreikam pura ia ka aiῆ kan long kaba kaba shitom ban wanrah ia ka jingkylluid bad ka jingitynnad jong ka Sor Shillong.

April 18, 2021 /

The first record of any European having crossed the Khasi Hills from one valley to the other is that of the journey made in 1824 by David Scott, the Agent to the Governor-General on the North East Frontier with headquarters at Sylhet. In 1826 the Syiem of Nongkhlaw was persuaded by David Scott to allow the construction of a road across the Khasi Hills. In 1833 Cherrapunji was established as the headquarters of the hills districts. For the next twenty years all effort was concentrated on establishing communication between Cherra and Sylhet.

March 3, 2021 /

Kyrham was a professor of sociology at my alma mater, North Eastern Hill University (NEHU). The department was his second home. He had joined it as a young student in the 1980s, learning the mysteries, myths and methods of the discipline from an array of energetic scholars like Virginius Xaxa, M.N. Karna, A.C. Sinha, Nikhilesh Kumar and others. For him, the department epitomised cosmopolitanism and the free exchange of ideas among equals. He was enthusiastic about every pedagogic aspect that it undertook, first while it was located in the Nongthymmai campus and then when it moved to Umshing Mawkynroh where NEHU is currently located. The department reciprocated this affection and respect, awarding him with a PhD in 1990 and then inducting him as a member of the faculty soon after.

October 5, 2020 /

Not many young people may know now but the Hindi comic book industry was very vibrant during the 1990’s. There were so many titles coming out every month. You had Raj Comics (my favourite), Manoj Comics, Tulsi Comics, Fort Comics, Radha Comics, Diamond Comics and then you had characters like Super Commando Dhruva (my favourite), Najrag, Ram-Rahim, Chacha Choudhary, Abedh, Judo queen Radha, Inspector Crookbond, Hawaldar Bahadur, Bankelal, and many more. And then there were other publications like Rajhans, Chandamama and of course Amar Chitra Katha and Tinkle. I can say with pride that I had one of the early issues of Tinkle and a particular story of loan repayment which has always stuck with me. In short, my childhood was filled with comic books.

August 30, 2020 /

KA ÏING KHOM IEW HA BARIK
Da lah kyntiew
yn sa ieng kum u mot bah
ka ing tep ba ramhah kynsha
ba mih tyrpeng ba pyiar
ban kajoh ban dem sdien da jingsngewrain
ha ki biar, ki dak thoh kin khih kyrbeit
sha ki kyrteng jong ki paidbah…

A SHOPPING MALL IN BARIK
When it rises
it will stand like a large tomb                     
A monstrous mausoleum
with shoulders stretched
long enough to hang in shame
on its walls, alphabets will assemble
into the names of the people…

July 26, 2020 /

I’ve often been invited to strange places
To keep in company with strange people.
Or, it may be truer to say I am the strange one in all that
I am the unknown usually among the known faces
As we all sit there talking poetry

First always is the introduction
And some, though already known,
For fear we may miss out on any detail
Start shooting off long lists of books and awards
And important journals-domestic and foreign
I always dreaded my turn…

May 17, 2020 /

I have heard many who claim to have many things growing in their garden but also have well manicured finger-nails. You may own a garden but might not be responsible for what grows in it because you have outsourced this task to a gardener. So you cannot claim to have grown anything and it does not make you a gardener. You can’t have those delicate nails and also be doing gardening. Gardening leaves its marks. On a hot sunny day you can turn a burnished red and your hands are always rough no matter what hand cream you use, including those that claim to work miracles. I take about two hours daily to weed, prune, rake and ensure that the roots of the plants are well looked after and the leaves are healthy. Every once in a while one also has to look for little pests that devour the leaves and cruelly kill them for the choice is between allowing the pest to thrive or your vegetables.

March 9, 2020 /

In a letter to the editor of The Shillong Times dated June 24, 2016, a member of the public addressed what he believed to be a nuisance caused by hawkers. He compared them to cow dung. In comparing the working-class community to cow dung, the author of the letter stripped them of their humanity and, in its place, assigned them bestiality or even worse ―what bestial nature itself rejected. After reading the letter, I thought, “These are not the women I know/knew.” As the great-granddaughter of a woman who sold moonshine/kyiad and the granddaughter of a tea seller (both of whom belonged to the unorganized sector of the Shillong working-class community) I knew differently. The working-class women I knew possessed ethics, morals and they also possessed that most human of attributes, dreams. If mainstream society refused to see them for who and what they are, then I had to do something about it. I had to write. Hence, apart from the obvious sociological implications this essay is also intended to unravel the human attributes of the women whose identities are, more often than not, concealed and made politically “savvy” by their being working-class.

January 12, 2020 /

As regards the Bengali population of Shillong, we formed two rather conflicting impressions. One was that the women were very much more free at Shillong than at any other place we knew of, and the other was that the men were very much less so. It appeared to us that the men at Shillong spent their days shut up in a room and working at their desks. The impression was right because most of the Bengalis at Shillong were clerks in government offices. It also seemed to us that Shillong was a place where monotheism prevailed over polytheism and that in the face of the One-God or Brahma, as we called him following Brahmo theology, our familiar many-gods kept themselves very much in the background.

January 4, 2020 /

This Graphic Novel contains the linkage between Tribal (khasi) folktales and Living root bridges construction. It also speaks about the cultural aspect of the matrilineal social structure, the myths and beliefs of the tribe, the geographical aspects and the materials used and the process of construction. When I was a school boy, the school library had a great collection of Comics, Graphic novels and illustrated books about Tin Tin, The Ramayana, The Bible, Japanese folktales, Celtic tales etc. Being inspired by these tales at such a young age, I had the passion to create a Graphic Novel that can communicate and narrate the stories of my land : The Khasi Hills. I hope with this graphic novel I can contribute at least a fraction if not a whole to my culture in sustaining and preserving it.

December 10, 2019 /

There was a parking lot in Shillong
that took a year and crores to build.
Why, I asked, was it not used to ease congestion?
It awaited the Minister for Roads to inaugurate,
who awaited the fall of his government.
And the waiting goes on,
for here they change parties and governments
like Hindi film stars changing dresses in a song.

December 8, 2019 /

My familiarity with the Shillong hills is not new. Probably Shillong will remind you of Amit and Labanya of ‘Sesher Kobita’ (the last poem). But however great a poet Rabindranath may be, there is no fitting image of Shillong in ‘Sesher Kobita’. The reason for this is that he never developed a kinship with Shillong. However, Rabindranath being an intelligent person, by naming it ‘Sesher Kobita’ he meant it to be a poem rather than a novel. If someone wants to write a novel, one cannot do it by excluding the inhabitants of Shillong, especially hill tribes like the Khasis. In his description and in the treatment, there is absolutely no flavour of Shillong.

September 4, 2019 /

Since the time Hawkers and Street Vendors of Shillong finally decided to organise themselves under one umbrella called Meghalaya & Greater Shillong Progressive Hawkers and Street Vendors Association, there has been hate spewed against them.
This Hate can be divided into Two Category.
By the Everyday Racist Joe
By the Rich and Pretentious Elites

In 1973 a Hindi film Yeh Gulistan Hamara came. Before the screening of the film we had read about the film in Filmfare. That magazine was very popular. After I read about the film, I realized it is politically motivated and I started campaigning against it. Dev Anand and Sharmila Tagore were the actors. Sharmila played a Naga girl and she was named Sekrenyi which is the name of a holy festival of the Angamis. The actor came with elephants to a Naga village. He brought sweets and biscuits to court the Naga girl and teach her writing and reading. And in the end the Indians conquered Naga country with the help of the forces. We said our country was never conquered by Hindustan. The Naga students protested and tried to get the Khasi students to join us because the film also depicted Khasis as backward. But Khasis did not understand. On top of that, the Meghalaya government relaxed the entertainment tax also.

August 1, 2019 /

SOULMATE was formed in Shillong, in October 2003 when Rudy Wallang and Tipriti Kharbangar decided to start a band dedicated to playing the Blues and committed to spread awareness about the music to the rest of India, whether the country was ready or not. Rudy was already a legend in North East India, making his name with the region’s most respected and seminal bands like Great Society and Mojo, while Tipriti was the little girl with the big pipes whom everyone knew was going places.

March 12, 2019 /

When the Tang family returned to Shillong, they found that their shoe shop had been confiscated by the Custodian of Enemy Property. The only compensation that the family received was about 500 rupees, which was only a fraction of the thousands that the building and merchandise were actually worth. Nothing else was given back to the family, not even the sewing machines.It goes without saying that life was hard after returning to Shillong. Mr. and Mrs. Tang had to work hard in order to regain what had been lost. But their story is unlike other internees’ stories in that Mr. and Mrs. Tang were offered help—and they accepted it. Though the couple had struggled to make ends meet, the local Khasi people in Shillong and the missionaries there were extremely kind and generous.

February 9, 2019 /

Migration is a universal phenomenon and no part of the world can be completely immune from it. Meghalaya, one of the states in Northeast India, is not an exception and has been experiencing migration of the outsiders particularly the non-tribals over a fairly long period of time. However, it was in the 1970s that the process of its problematization started with the tribal educated elite undertaking the leadership role under the influence of several factors that worked collectively. Though the process eventually led to the occurrence of a series of violent ethnic conflict in the state, yet it was largely responsible for the prevention of the emergence of existential crisis situation for the indigenous tribals.

December 22, 2018 /

Mr. Bashan J Laloo, SP(Traffic) of Shillong needs a better press agent. Rather than defend his ‘subduing’ action which resulted in fractured hand of Manavon Massar, Mr. Laloo should go back to his textbooks. Even some of those who want to balance the story of a ‘Musician with Broken Fingers’, need to know that no traffic offence or for that matter any offence allows the Police to inflict violence on any person. We will repeat for you balanced heads – no traffic offence or for that matter any offence allows the Police to inflict violence on any person. Even Manavon Massar agrees that he had violated traffic laws by overtaking and he should have been punished accordingly. But Mr. B J Laloo reads some other rule book where sticks do the work rather than fines. So to help Mr. BJL (and you loyal readers), we provide you with short guide to punishments and fines for traffic violations.

December 7, 2018 /

Let’s start with the positives – a novel about the Bengali experience in Shillong, especially during the troubles, is always welcome. The novel has some nice passages and some wit at times, for example ‘…..he transformed himself into an amalgam of Devdas and Descartes—a perpetually intoxicated mathematical genius, composed, in equal parts, of alcohol and algebra’, to describe Debu’s tutor, Professor Bose… The novel’s treatment of the Sylhet-Calcutta divide imbibes it with an angle that will be new to Khasi readers while the episodes around the first TV in Upper Jail Road and the Bengali fish embargo during the troubles are well recounted. The loss of home or the lack of it, the longing and sorrow that emerges as a result and the plight of people who have suddenly become outsiders in a place they love can be felt throughout the novel and is movingly rendered in parts. But the novel also fails on many fronts. It surrenders too easily to stereotypes and it miserably fails to overcome the tropes that have become a bit tiresome in novels about Shillong…

October 20, 2018 /

Ki Nongeh beijot ia ka doh bad longrynnieng jong nga: 
1.U (Br.) Francis Gale (uba la tip ruh kum u Frank Gale) uba dei jong ka Christian Brothers, St Edmunds Shillong.
2. (Br.) Muscat, Don Bosco, Laitumkhrah, Shillong (ka tnat shon kot)
Lai snem mynshuwa, ha ka rta kaba 37, nga shim ka rai kut ba nga dei ban wad jingiarap na ki nongiasyllok kiba la pyntbit ha ka kam bad nga shem ia ka nongiasyllok kaba paka bad ba phylla shisha. Lyngba bun tylli ki bnai jong ka jingiasyllok ka la don kawei ka khep kaba nga shem bad mad ba la weng noh shi syndon ia u mawbah mawsan uba la ban khia halor ka met bad mynsiem jong nga naduh ba nga dang dap 5 snem ka rta. Kaei ba kata ka nongiasyllok ka ong ia nga ha kata ka khyllipmat ba ma nga ka khynnah kaba wan na ka longiing longsem kaba kynrum kynram bad ba duk bad ba la shu ieh noh marwei ban iada ia la ka longrynnieng bad ka doh nga long iba suk ban shah bam klep bad shah leh bein ha kum kine ki riew sniew. Hoid kum kaba la san nga tip shai ba kam dei ka jingbakla jong nga, pynban ka long kaba eh ban ym kynnoh ia lade. Hynrei kaei kaba ka nongiasyllok ka ong ia nga ha kata ka sngi ha kata ka khep ka la jubab ia ka jingkylli kaba nga la kylli baroh shi katta “balei”? Balei ia nga? bad ka jingiasyllok ka la pyntngen ia nga namar ba nga la shem ia ka jubab. Ka la long ka jingiaid lynti kaba jlan bad kan nang jrong ka lynti bad nga dei ban skhem ka jingmut bad kum ka briew kaba la shah leh be ijot ha ki rta 5 haduh 12 snem nga dei ban bat ia la ka jong ka jingtip briew.

October 19, 2018 /

My abusers:
1.(Br.) Francis Gale (also known as Frank Gale) of the Christian Brothers, St. Edmunds Shillong
2.(Br.) Muscat, Don Bosco, Laitumkhrah, Shillong (printing unit)
Three years ago, at the age of 37, I finally decided that I needed professional help & found a wonderful counsellor. Through the months of counselling, there is one session that stands out for me, where I felt literally like someone lifted this huge boulder lodged in my chest that was there since I was 5 years old. What she said to me at that session was that as a child, from a broken family, an economically poor background, left to my own defences, I made the ‘ideal profile’ of victim for a sexual predator. Even though as an adult, I understand and can differentiate that I was not responsible, it is hard to really feel and live that knowledge, to not blame myself. What my counsellor said to me that day- answered the ‘why’ I have asked over and over again ‘why me’ and it gave me such huge relief to have finally found an answer that I knew to be true. It’s a long journey and an ongoing one to stay whole, balanced, sane as someone who was sexually abused through my childhood, age 5 till age 12.

August 31, 2018 /

In 2018, the musical North, West, East and South of Shillong have all combined to give us this very talented group of young musicians whose EP ‘Tempted’ is out now in all the world’s digital stores. They call themselves Blue Temptation and comprise, at some point or the other, Gregory Ford Nongrum, his elder brother El Nathan Ford Nongrum, Shepherd Najiar, Manavon Massar and Vincent Tariang (also of Soulmate). These five young men encapsulate Shillong’s old histories and musical geographies but, as they should, also burn them to the ground. Greg, El Nathan and Shepherd (Shep) are from ‘the West’ but they barely remember the Highway Band anymore and their journey into the blues was as simple and complex as the music itself. Manavon is a keyboard player/sound system blaster/DJ from the ‘Roots Region’ and his dreadlocks and patois, are therefore quite historically grounded. Vincent too is a direct descendant of the ‘Roots Region’ and I’m sure, his father Rudy Wallang must’ve played a small part in his love for the blues.

August 19, 2018 /

JUNE 2002.
IT IS raining on the morning he leaves Shillong. It has rained for the past three days, alternating between drizzle and downpour. He looks out of the bathroom window as he brushes his teeth—grey skies, rain, pine trees on the far hills, red tin roofs—and feels an indefinable sadness in his heart. He quickly bids farewell to his mother and brother and walks through the rain with his bag to the car where his father waits.
He is dropped off at Police Bazar where a long line of Guwahati-bound Tata Sumos wait for passengers, their engines idling. A swarm of young touts encircle him as he gets down from the car; he allows one of them to lead him to the second Sumo in the line. He clambers into the last row where there is just one person at the moment.

June 26, 2018 /

What actually happened on the 31/5/2018 would be best known only to a few with whom the incident occurred. But when an incident is made sensational news for heavy sale, for political power, for organizational comeback, then facts are distorted and everyday the facts are woven into such lies that creates mayhem and breeds hatred among communities. Sad to see people reach to such a low with their vulgarities. We were known for being a loving race that respects man and God but the recent incident displayed all. Our level of tolerance was zero. All because the past Governments did not do their work all these years and one wonders why…

June 20, 2018 /

No other issue, in the recent memory, evokes the relevance of history more than the Sweepers’ Line Imbroglio. The week, following the incident of 31st May, misinformation and misrepresentation flew thick and fast. One such, being the nomenclature (name), ‘Punjabi Lane’. One does not deny the fact that there had been clashes in the past three decades, but never was it attached a communal colour, as this time round. That the situation, spin from a brawl to a communal flare up, stemmed from the ‘falsification’ of the name of the said ‘Area’, thereby unnecessarily, dragging the name of a particular community to it.

June 16, 2018 /

In #Shillong, never is #masculinity as intensively interrogated as during the World Cup…Personally, I had never developed a love for any sport, let alone football. This year’s world cup for me is a time machine. As it takes me back, I rediscover an old feeling of resilience. Each time the world cup happened, it has allowed for me to become a target of collective bullying. “Why are you such a sissy?”, “What kind of man are you?”, “Hijras like you should not be born”.

June 11, 2018 /

Hasmukh P. Modi and his wife came with their young daughter to Shillong in 1979. A Gujarati family from Rajkot, they had settled in Africa, but were forced to leave during the civil war in Ethiopia. Their quest for a suitable school for their daughter, a place where they could strike roots and establish means of livelihood ended during a holiday in Shillong. In Ethiopia, Hasmukhbhai had worked in the marketing department of French and British firms selling everything from pins to jet planes. In Shillong he decided to take up the business of his grandfather— grocery—and deal in spices imported from Kerala—cardamom, cinnamon, cloves—and from Gujarat—coriander, cumin, fenugreek and fennel seeds (jeera, methi, sauf ).

June 9, 2018 /

This essay describes socio-economic profile of the Mazhabi Sikhs (and other ‘sweeper’ Punjabis) settled at Shillong for more than a century. These safai karamcharis (sweepers) have been keeping the city clean but themselves live in worst slums. The essay tries to locate survival strategies of Punjabi sweepers in a milieu hostile to ‘outsiders’. What makes them stick together, maintain their ethnic and religious identity and resist various attempts to ‘relocate’ them.

June 5, 2018 /

No one goes to Iewduh, now burning.
“Too crowded, eww”, they say.
Dirty and living, too like OUR city.
We are non-tourists,
It’s not even famous on Instagram!

Five days my city burns
And the non-tourists have disappeared.
Kashmir is burning too.
Where will you go now?
Fucking tourists!

June 4, 2018 /

I intend to go beyond the Punjab and seek to review the Mazhabi Sikh past of two important urban centres of north-eastern India. They are located in Shillong and Guwahati, and have so far escaped the attention of scholars engaged in studying the Dalit past of the region. Situated in the Khasi Hills, their early presence in Shillong goes back to the days of colonial rule, while in Guwahati of the Brahmaputra Valley they may have settled around the time of the country’s Independence. Their emergence in two different cities under dissimilar political conditions perhaps offers an interesting point for the enquiry.

June 2, 2018 /

This is the best time to read Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih’s poem Sundori, while we sit amidst angers, rumours and curfews in Shillong. Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih is the key Khasi modern poet whose rooted yet critical verses uncover the unsaid of Khasi society. Sundori was written during the troubles of 1990s when the local nationalist anger and resentment was at its peak. 

April 8, 2018 /

I was twenty-four, fresh out of University and eager to put my skills to the test. My first teaching assignment was at a private college where my cousin, upon hearing about my incursion to the relative unknown, jokingly remarked, “There are colleges for First Class students, so there must be colleges for Third Class and Simple Pass students as well. If there aren’t any of the latter, you and I can establish one. We will have many takers. ” It was also the first time that I saw women in burqas

March 31, 2018 /

The quaint hillside house was larger than it had looked from the outside and the first room led to a wide hallway. She coughed mildly as she entered the aisle, her footsteps disturbing the dust that had settled undisturbed for a long time. The dust was now dancing in spirals in thin sunbeams that seemed to magically cut across her. Her backpack felt heavy, so she slid it off and left it on the ground. There were two broken windows on the west of this long hallway, or maybe it was large enough to be a room.