Journey: From the forests of Chhotanagpur to tea garden of Assam

Journey : From the forests of Chhotanagpur to the tea gardens of Assam
         

        The title "Journey: From the forests of Chhotanagpur to the tea gardens of Assam" in itself reveals a history of the forceful migration of  Aadivasis from Chhotanagpur region to the tea garden of Assam. The forceful migration of Aadivasis was done by the Britishers of East India Company for the labor work in the setting of tea gardens in Assam and north of West Bengal. It showed the destruction of environment, culture, language, livelihood, etc. of the Aadivasis, in short it happened to be destruction of knowledge. 



Looking at the tea gardens while travelling from Kokrajhar to Gossaigaon I remembered a real story narrated by my aunt about the migration of our people to Assam. It went on in this way: The Britishers arrived at the village to take away the Aadivasis to work in the tea gardens, and it was because the Aadivsis in Chhotanagpur were hard working and could survive in extreme weather conditions. The village people were forcefully been taken away, specially the young ones and the older people were left in the village because they had to travel by walking to such a long distance. One of the old lady got frightened and anxious about looking at the manner in which people were taken away, she grabbed on to one of her grand child and wrapped him in the mat and laid down on the corner of the room. The whole family went away but the kid was left alone with the old lady. The kid stayed wrapped inside the mat for days. After a week, the old lady opened the mat and found the kid to be alive and had urinated and latrine on the same mat. This kid grew up to be a man and married my mother's aunt. After ages, in the month of may 2018, the family that had migrated to Assam contacted us and came to visit. On reaching the village,  our family members and the relatives from Assam cried in happiness and embraced each other in love. Everyone could feel the joy of reunion after ages.


Daisy Kujur
daisykujurofficial@gmail.com

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