Indigenous People's Movement in Tripura

Tripura has been facing distinct socio-economic, political and ethnic problems, which are essentially driven by long spell of immigration from across the international border. The final partition of Bengal in 1947 resulted in an influx from East Bengal (now Bangladesh) that forever changed the demography of Tripura. This demographic change paved the way for a fierce ethnic conflict that has ravaged Twipra, as the indigenous tribes-people of the state call it.

It has been sixty-four years since Tripura merged with India; unfortunately, Tripura has only one precariously maintained National Highway (NH-44), connecting to the rest of the country, which remains blocked in an event of insurgent activities or natural disaster. Though there is an operational airport in Agartala, as of 2013, the total length of railway tracks in the state is only 158 Km[i]. With only two members in the Indian Parliament, Tripura can hardly make any impact in India’s legislative arithmetic.

Historically, Tripura had been ruled by as many as 184 kings belonging to the Boroks. The Borok people have about 19 sub-clans of indigenous people who share common features and identity. The Borok comprises of many sub-clans, viz. Debbarma, Reang, Jamatia, Koloi, Noatia, Rupini, Halam, Hrangkhawl, Ranglong, Kaipeng, Tripura, Morasing, Molsom, Darlong, Mog, Bongcher, Chorai, Uchoi, and the likes.[ii] Except one or two of these sub-clans, all of them speak a common language called the Kokborok.

On the eve of partition, the indigenous tribes of Tripura were not in a decisive majority like the tribal of the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT). In the CHT, Bengalis were less than 2 percent of the population at the partition. But in Hill Tipperah, the Bengalis accounted for more than 40 percent of the population and the indigenous tribes of Tripura were barely in majority. This development in Tripura had serious implications in the rest of the Northeastern states. As a matter of fact, the fear that other northeastern states would ‘go the Tripura way’ has weighed heavily on indigenous people and early settlers throughout the northeast and provoked the more militant of them to take up arms.[iii]

Subsequently, the end of princely rule in Tripura and the introduction of ballot-box democracy meant that the indigenous peoples of Tripura would soon be marginalised as far as control over political power was concerned. After the king was gone, it would take Tripura more than 40 years to see the first and only tribal Chief Minister Tripura has ever had – Dasarath Deb (at one time known as Raja Dasarath in the hills), who was the Chief Minister of Tripura for four years before a non-tribal returned to power in 1993. Powerful nativist movements in Assam and Meghalaya and elsewhere in the region hold up Tripura’s example of demographic transformation to justify their campaign against unrestrained migration from neighbouring countries. That, in turn, intensifies the nativist-settler conflicts and unsettles the volatile region.

While there is a general lack of development in the state, largely, the tribal people of Tripura have been the worst suffers. It has been noticed that the bulk of the benefits of whatever little development that took place in the state was captured by the Bengali immigrants. Consequently, such threats had given rise to emergence of various socio-political organisations based on ethnic lines in the late 1960s and 1970s. Tripura Upajati Juba Samity (TUJS), Upajati Yuba Samiti (Tribal Youth Party), the Tripura National Volunteers (TNV), the Tripura Tribal Students’ Federation (TSF) are some socio-political organisations to name a few.

The dismal scenario marked by an unsympathetic state government and decimation of the only political force that cared for the tribal interests, TUJS raised four specific demands: Autonomous District Council (ADC) for tribals, extension of inner-line regulations in Tripura, introduction of Kokborok as medium of instruction for tribal students in Roman script, and restoration of alienated tribal land. In their party conference of 1969, the TUJS also raised the demand for setting up district council for tribals on the basis of Sixth Schedule of the constitution. By 1971, the TUJS also floated a force of armed volunteers under the leadership of Bijay Hrangkhawal under the banner of ‘Tripur Sena’. It is worth mentioning here that the rapid growth of TUJS and its brand of virulent ethnic politics were successful in exerting tremendous pressure on the state government and on the CPI (M), who ruled the state. However, the TUJS’s militant agitations for district council evoked adverse reaction from the non-tribal Bengalis who perceived a threat to their land holdings and other rights. Thereafter, the ‘Amra Bangali’, the political arm of the ‘Ananda Marg’, launched a counter campaign to stall the formation of ADC.

The campaign and counter-campaign led to ethnic violence in Tripura in 1980 engulfing the entire state. This conflict resulted in what is popularly known as the Mandai massacre of June 1980 wherein nearly 350 settlers were killed and over 1000 peoples lost their lives in the ensuing riots after the massacre.[iv] The fact of the matter is, the end of princely rule affected all sections of the tribal and left them with a sense of ‘being orphaned’.[v] In order to address the concerns of Tripura’s tribal communities, the Tripura legislature resolved in 1979 to set up an autonomous district council to represent the interests of all the tribal community of Tripura. Subsequently, the Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Councils (TTAADC) Act established the autonomous district councils in January 1982, and a 1985 constitutional amendment brought the TTAADC into the ambit of the Sixth Schedule. The years following the June 1980 riots, Tripura witnessed the rise of TNV insurgent activities until the signing of a tripartite TNV accord on 12 August 1988. However, the emergence of nationalist/militant organisations’ namely the All Tripura Tiger Force (ATTF), the National Liberation Front of Tripura (NLFT) in the mid 1990s rekindled insurgency.

Also described as the Rajiv Gandhi-Bijoy Hrangkhawl Agreement, the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the TNV was signed in New Delhi by Hrangkhawl and five other members of the TNV, representatives of the Government of India, and the Tripura State Government. The MoU provided for the restoration of tribal lands and the prevention of further alienation of land to immigrants, mainly generations of Bengali settlers. The government also committed to securing the borders against illegal immigration. The TTAADC was to be reorganised to include tribal areas but exclude non-tribal areas.

Further, a section of the All Tripura Tiger Force (ATTF) signed a Memorandum of Settlement in 1993 with the Tripura State Government (also known as the Agartala Agreement) after which ATTF militants surrendered to the government. In turn, the state government reiterated its 1988 commitment to reorganising the TTAADC. The Agartala Agreement also provided cultural safeguards for Tripuras, which ranged from the setting up of a cultural development centre in the TTAADC area to restoring traditional tribal place names, language development, and the codification of tribal laws. 

Unlike in the other northeastern states, no underground organisation in Tripura has fought for secession of Tripura from the union of India but their “struggle” mainly appears to be for protecting minority tribal within the state itself.[vi] Before the peace accord was signed in October 1988, TNV was considered the most powerful and dreaded underground set-up in Tripura and its activities caused panic throughout Tripura in the late 1980s. In the recent past, counterinsurgency in Tripura has become a model of the most extraordinary success, bringing some of the country’s most virulent and bloody movements to a near complete end.  However, insurgency movement in Tripura may gain impetus if there is a failure to keep the promises made in the peace accord.

The author is a Research Assistant at CLAWS

Views expressed are personal