Through the eyes of the women

I recently got my hands on a unique collection of essays that seeks to provide a general overview of the problems and issues confronting the Northeast through their daily experiences of the people, especially the womenfolk. Published by Zubaan and edited by Preeti Gill, the book, The Peripheral Centre: Voices from India’s Northeast, fills an important gap by depicting the general response of people residing in the Northeast, as well as outside, to the region, its people and the issues plaguing them.

The editor of the book says the decision to publish this compilation was fuelled by a desire to provide space for people in the region to narrate their daily experiences. “When Thangjam Manorama was arrested and killed by the Assam Rifles in July 2004 in Manipur, it unleashed a protest the likes of which no one had witnessed before. In some ways, this was one of the triggers for the collection – to provide a space to women and men from the ‘Northeast’ to tell us about the issues that confront them daily, to talk about the pressures, the insecurities, the uncertainties confronting them in an area that has been witnessing low intensity warfare for many decades now. It is now many years since the Th Manorama incident but it is an image that has stayed in the mind, transformed into an icon of protest in the popular imagination,” says Gill.

The act of protest of the Manipuri women, their anger and frustration, is what every contributor points out to in their essays. The act of the Manipuri women becomes the focal point around which the contributors puts forth questions about a host of associated issues like identity, the feeling of alienation, and the like. The best part of the whole collection is that while many of the contributors are writers, academics and activists from the region, many of them are also so-called outsiders. “All the articles are intensely personal responses to what is happening in the region, the changes, the growing asymmetries, the fault lines that are causing rifts,” says Gill.

As feminist publishers, Zubaan has done a wonderful job by depicting the stories through the eyes of the women. As Gill says, “The conflicts, which have been given voice to in this book, have been intense and have had devastating and long term effects on local communities. The impact has been particularly complex for women who have faced greater violations against their persons at the hands of the State’s armed forces as well as exploitation by non state actors. Women have to cope with the realities of daily life – they are responsible as mothers of the children, the hurt and the wounded, who are innocent victims to conflicts not of their creation. They suffer as civilians with their freedoms curtailed and shackled. The loss that women face in conflicts is not just emotional, or physical in terms of losing a loved one, but also transfers into the economic and social sphere.”

The list of contributors include the likes of Dr. Temsula Ao, Monica Banerjee, Sanjib Barua, Rahul Goswami, Rupa Chinai, Mamang Dai, Lal Dena, Sumita Ghose, Tilottoma Mishr, Mitra Phukan, V Sawmveli, Shyamala Shiveshwarkar, Esther Syiem, Ashley Tellis, Nandini Thockchom, N Vijaylakshmi Brara, MK Binodini, CS Lakshmi, Freny Manecksha. The book has been edited by Preeti Gill who is an editor with Zubaan. Gill, who had earlier co-edited Shadow lives: writings on widowhood, has presented papers and contributed chapters in various publications on women and conflict in the Northeast. She has also researched and scripted three documentaries on the Brahmaputra and the north-eastern States.

A refreshing compilation.

Shared tales of the Himalayas

Indo-Bhutan literary festival seeks to initiate rich cultural dialogue between both countries

It seems intellectuals and litterateurs of Northeast India are all about solidifying and exploring the region’s age-old relationship with its immediate neighbours. After the much hyped inter-cultural dialogue between Northeast India and South East Asia, another interesting festival is now on the anvil. I am talking about the literary festival being organized by the India-Bhutan Foundation on May 17-20 next at Thimpu in the neighbouring country of Bhutan. Titled ‘Mountain Echoes – A literary festival’, the four-day fest has been organized in association with Siyahi.

A source in the India-Bhutan Foundations said, “We have decided to organize ‘Mountain Echoes – A literary festival’ in association with Siyahi in order to provide a unique literary and cultural experience. Her Majesty the Queen Mother Ashi Dorji Wangmo Wangchuk is the chief patron of the festival, while Namita Gokhale is the chief consultant of the entire festival.”

The Himalayan mountain range and the influence of the majestic terrain in the lives of the people in both the neighbouring countries would be a major feature of the festival, with a number of sessions and special programmes lined up between writers of both regions to explore this very aspect. The source added, “Bhutan provides a perfect setting for the festival, which will communicate tales of our shared landscape in the Himalayan region, both as places of ecological and inspirational value and the region’s cultural leitmotif redolent with the spirit of the mountains. Surrounded by a sense of serenity and mysticism, come treasure moments of stories being told, poems and songs being sung, signifying a rich exchange of inter-cultural dialogue between the two countries.”

The event will be inaugurated on May 17 by Her Majesty the Queen Mother Ashi Dorji Wangmo Wangchuk and Prime Minister of Bhutan Lyonpo Jigmi Yoser Thinley. The next day will see discussion on a host of topics, including culture and identity, the influence of the Himalayas in daily life, cinema, poetry reading, and the like. Similar interactive sessions will be organized on all the days with representatives from both Bhutan and India taking part in, what is assumed to be, fruitful literary discussions. Mamang Dai, Prof Temsula Ao and Dr. Kympham Singh Nongkynreih are some of the writers who will represent the Northeast in the festival, along with mainstream writers like Chetan Bhagat.

Popular Blues-Rock band from Shillong, Soulmate, is also scheduled to perform there in Thimpu and give the Butanese people a heavy dose of the Shillong-flavoured Blues that has earned them acclaim globally.

It goes beyond doubt that Moutain Echoes will go a long way in fostering Indo-Butanese ties and also explore how the Himalayas, which is such a major entity, have influenced literature in its unique way in both the countries. A commendable initiative indeed.