RAJBANSHI PRIDE

RESOLVING IDENTITY CRISIS OF PEOPLE FROM KAMATA-KOCH-RAJBANSHI ORIGIN All Rajbanshi groups of ethnic people have mixed features of Mongoloid, Dravidian and Aryan but, Mongoloid features predominate.  Due to displacement from urban areas/towns, these people form the majority in population only in rural areas. Poverty, lack of education, distorted identity and influx of refugees from erstwhile East Pakistan(East Bengal) and settling down in North Bengal and Assam;  are the main reasons for selling their lands in urban areas and as such, the result is their displacement. In Assam, differences in social status exist between mainstream Assamese people and Koch Rajbanshi. In North Bengal, mainstream Bengali society and Rajbanshi people are different. All efforts for considering Rajbanshi people as Bengali has not succeeded. Although, number of highly placed Rajbanshi people pretend to identify themselves as Bengali but,

The news on likely grant of scheduled Tribe status to Koch-Rajbanshis in Assam has been hailed by young Koch-Rajbongshis of Assam as they are hopeful to get jobs. While intellectuals among them are silent and shy, most of the educated lot of Rajbonghsi(including Rajbanshi Kshatriyas)) communities have taken it with mixed feelings. It happened earlier also; ST status was granted to Koch-Rajbongshis through an ordinance in Assam once before, but was in vogue for only few years. Is the move a step to put the clock back once again? Article 342 of the Constitution of India notifies Scheduled Tribes as having five major characteristics - primitive traits, geographical isolation, distinct culture, shyness of contact with community at large and economic backwardness. Do these characteristics still exist in Koch-Rajbongshsis of Assam? Not going by the answer in proper, let us see its implications. This time, motive of grant of ST status is different – to stop foreigners (Banglad

RAJBANSHI-KAMTAPURI - AN OLD LANGUAGE AND NOT A MERE DIALECT It hurts my feelings if someone says that Rajbanshi or Kamtapuri is mere a dialect a not a language. After painstaking work of almost ten years, I endeavoured to find out the truth about the language and penned it down in my book ‘Koch Rajbanshi Kamtapuri – The Truth Unveilled (Guwahati, 2007) . To clear the doubts about this language, I wish to reproduce some relevant portions of the book as follows: [ “…. It was not an easy task to ascertain the circumstances under which today’s North Bengal and its neighboring areas lost their pristine glory, which, otherwise was once a central hub for acculturation among various races in northeastern part of India. Their language that was once believed to be the lingua-franca of the entire Koch Empire is dying today due to non-recognition. It still holds good for the Rajbanshi people to take Bankim’s suggestion seriously and get onto the job of writing history lest Koch or Rajb