Sir Athelstane Baines' classification of caste Meithei (Meitei/Meetei) in Hill tribe group

Maheshsana Rajkumar *

The first census exercise of British India began in 1881. The caste Meithei (Meitei/Meetei) was grouped in Hill tribe in the locality of Manipur in Appendix B. Caste Index mentioned in the report "Ethnography (Castes and Tribes)", 1912, authored by Sir Athelstane Baines, the first census commissioner of British India.

The caste Meithei (Meitei/Meetei) of Manipur in 1891 census of India for the first time was grouped in Hill tribe. The status of caste Meithei (Meitei/Meetei) remained as Hill tribe until 1931 census spanning four decades in accordance with census exercise of the Govt. of India.

The terms "Tribal Animism", "Tribe", "Caste" and "Hill Tribes" as specified by Sir Athelstane Baines are of great importance to know the classification of particular caste as Hill tribe in British India as follows:

Tribal Animism

Refers to the religion returned under the tribal name by those who adhere to none of the wider creeds. Again, the title "Hinduism" is only recognised by the community to whom it is applied as denoting a distinction between them and the foreigner. The word was first used by the Muslim invaders for all Indian creeds in which the uncompromising Unitarianism of the follower of Prophet detected signs of the worship of idols.

It is here taken in its conventional sense of "the collection of rites, worships, beliefs, traditions and mythologies that are sanctioned by the sacred books and ordinances of the Brahmans, and are propagated by Brahmanic teaching" (Lyall). In practice, this amounts to the application of the title to any Brahmanic community that has not returned one of the more specific denominations which can legitimately be included under the general name. Consequently, the great mass of the people come under it.

One of the most interesting ethnographical questions entering into the Census inquiry is that of the rate at which Brahmanism is in name, at least, absorbing the Animistic tribal population. Unfortunately, this cannot be fully solved from the returns, owing to the different interpretations given to the instruction for recording tribal creeds and languages.

The enumerators, or those who instructed them, adopted somewhat arbitrary standards of orthodoxy and philology, and what was set down as tribal in one tract appeared under the more general title in another, just across a political frontier.

Speaking generally, the tendency seems to have been to return the tribal terms wherever the community in question is in predominant occupation of a continuous and well-defined region, and is thus in comparative isolation from the civilization of the plains. Where, on the other hand, the tribe is interlaced with the Brahmanical peasantry, the distinction was less noticed, and probably the line is in reality less discernible.

Tribe

It is mentioned throughout the greater part of continental India, the region most influenced by foreign blood, distinctions of race have been practically effaced by centuries of cross-breeding. It is to be noted, however, that wherever a race can still be geographically demarcated from its hybrid neighbours the ethnic constitution tends to be tribal, consisting, that is, of groups with a common name, the tradition of kinship or descent from a common ancestor, human, demi-god or wild animal, as the case may be, and claiming or occupying a definite territory. The system on which the tribe is organized varies considerably according to the race and the conditions under which it lives.

The mongoloid tribes of Assam and the eastern frontier are also divided into sections professing blood–relationship, and therefore not marrying within the section, but trusting to their fellow-tribesmen of other divisions to provide them with brides, either by arrangement or capture.

Caste

It is mentioned amid the bewildering variety of the complicated civilization of this last the one and only characteristic which can be said to be universal is the sentiment which underlies the scheme of life upon which the whole of the social edifice is based and its component parts are respectively distinguished and coordinated. This sentiment, moreover, may be said to be the very spinal cord of the main religion of the country, supplying the vitality and support which neither doctrine nor ritual are sufficiently coherent to provide.

By its means, Brahmanism has become, as has been said by a competent observer, "a way of life, interwoven into the whole of existence and society; placing every natural habit and duty upon a religious basis so entirely that it is impossible for a Brahmanist to draw a distinction between sacred and profane. A man’s religion means his customary rule of every-day life. His whole social identity belongs to his religion". (Lyall, Asiatic Studies.)

The social divisions which form the units of the system in question are known in the West by the name of Castes, which was given them by the early Portuguese travelers. It is said to be derived from the Latin word casta, pure or unmixed, in itself connoting segregation. Of the many definitions which have been given by various authors, the most satisfactory, on the whole, is that adopted by Mr. Gait, the joint author of the last (1901) Census Report, in dealing with the castes of the Province of Bengal, "A caste", he says (p. 354), "is an endogamous group or a collection of endogamous groups, bearing a common name, the members of which by reason of similarity of traditional occupation and reputed origin are generally regarded…..as forming a single homogeneous community, the constituent parts of which are more nearly related to each other than they are to any other section of the society".

It appears, then, that at the comparative advanced stage of progress which the Vedic Aryas had attained by the time represented in even the earliest invocations of the collection, the community was organized into clans, or groups of related families which, in turn, were collected into tribes, to which the clan was subordinate. Various other terms are met with implying subdivision of either tribe or clan. They all refer to a pastoral life and indicate as by no means high degree of cohesion.

Alongside of these sections were two classes or orders, evidently of later development: the nobles, headed by a Chieftain, and the ministers of religion, who conducted the public sacrifices. The mass of the community below these orders is collectively referred to as the "clans", or "peoples", always in the plural. The Family, as a unit, was strongly developed. Its worship was purely individual, strictly secluded from that of its neighbor, and conducted in private by the Pater familias conjointly with his wife.

Hill Tribes

It can be easily inferred from what has been set forth in the course of this survey that the importance in the ethnology of India of the pre-Aryan inhabitants can scarcely be overrated. There is, on the one hand, the gradual extension among them of the foreign forms of speech; on the other, the assimilation of their forms of belief into the religious system of those who have dispossessed them of their territory and position.

In the preceding portion of this work, too, instances are given over and over again of the incorporation of communities, wholly or in part, into the Brahmanic social system, showing the extent to which that system and the racial constitution of the population at large is permeated from top to bottom by the Dasyu element. It becomes necessary therefore, to give some consideration to the remnants of these primitive communities which have, so far, more or less escaped absorption, and have preserved in a modified but still distinguishable, shape their independent tribal existence.

It is obvious that in the present day the chief interest of these tribes is found, ethnographically speaking, in their constitution, customs and beliefs. Into these subjects it is impossible to enter in the detail they merit in a review of this description.

It is also unnecessary; as they have been treated for the most part by experts, in works devoted to such investigation, and the rest are still the subjects of inquiry in similarly competent hands. All that is here attempted is a cursory sketch of the position, strength and geographical distribution of the more representative of these bodies, in order that their place in the Indian Kosmos may be duly appreciated.

The hill communities of Mongoloidic race are found chiefly in the ranges separating Assam from Upper Burma, and in the dorsal range of Assam itself, made up of Garo, Khasia, Jaintya, Naga and Mikir hills, between the Brahmaputra valley and the Deltaic plain. The remaining group inhabit the Himalayan southern ranges, and, being chiefly resident in Nepal and Bhutan, countries beyond the census limits, come but slightly within the scope of this review.

Caste Meithei

The exogamous sub divisions of the tribes, however, are still in existence, and seem to consist of the descendants of an individual, by whose trade or nickname the section is called." Appendix B. Caste Index in the report "Ethnography (Castes and Tribes)", 1912, inserted caste Meithei in group 43 (f) in "Hill tribe" in the locality of Manipur.

Sir Athelstane Baines writes, "The population of Manipur is divided into four tribes, the Khumal, the Luyang, the Ningthauja or Meithei, and the Mayarang, of which the Meithei (69,400) seems to have absorbed the others, and is used as a general title by the inhabitants.

The Timeline

Census of 1881

In 1881 the first census was held in India and the census commissioners were advised to enter the tribals under the heading ‘Animists’. However, many of the census commissioners did not accept the proposition.

Census of 1891

In 1891, the then census Commissioner Sir Athelstane Baines said;-"The distinction between tribal people who were Hinduised and those who followed their tribal form of religion is futile because every stratum of Indian society is saturated with animistic conceptions, but little raised above those which predominate in the early state of religious development."

Census of 1901

The Census Commissioner for the 1901 census Sir Herbert Risley writes, "Hinduism itself was animism more or less transformed by philosophy…..that no sharp line of demarcation could be drawn between Hindusim and animism as the one shaded away insensibly into the other". The census officers for Bihar, P.C. Talents and for Bombay, Sedwick found it difficult to differentiate between those professing Hinduism and tribal religions.

Sedwick unhesitatingly proposed that the separate mention of tribal religions should be entirely done away with and they should be joined with the rest of the Hindus. About the policy of showing the tribals as separate from the Hindu society, Mahatma Gandhi had said-
"We were strangers to this sort of classification-animist, aboriginals etc., but we have learnt it from the English rulers." When Dr. Chesterman asked him whether his opinion also applies to the tribals residing in the Kond Hills, Mahatmaji said, "Yes, it does apply, because I know that in spite of being described as animists, these tribes have from time immemorial been absorbed in Hinduism. They are like the indigenous medicine of the soil and their roots lie deep there."

Census of 1931

But in spite of all this the census officer in 1931, Hutton showed the tribal religions as separate from the Hindus, Muslims and Christians, though at the same time accepting that to show a demarcation line between Hinduism and tribal religions is very difficult.

Manipur context in the Government of India Act of 1935

The British apprehended Maharaja Churachand Singh by setting forth conditions of all sorts, was using delaying tactics to evade joining the federation. His attitude was incompatible with the aims of the Government of India. The Government of India did not see any reason in meeting all the demands and the reservations put forth by the Maharaja. The question of immediate concern was whether to ask Manipur formally to join the federation. The higher officials, after considering the Maharaja’s demands and reservations, were of the view that he should be invited to join the federation.

In the meantime, a controversy arose as to, whether the Manipur State was confined to the valley under section 311 (1) of the Government of India Act of 1935, as an Indian State.

The British political Agent did not consider the hill areas as an integral part of the Manipur State although this was never declared view of the British Raj.

The separation of the hill areas from the valley was not at all acceptable to Maharaja Churachand Singh, who did not see any compelling reason for separating the surrounding hilly area of 7000 square miles out the State’s total area of 8000 square miles with a population of about 1, 50,000.

The impact of British policy to segregate the hills from the plains was profoundly reflected on social and political developments in Manipur. As a result of the experience of segregation, there were severe disagreements between the Maharaja Churachand Singh and the British Government. When the British House of Commons debated the Government of India Act of 1935, the arguments for separating the hill tracts from the plains areas became even more vociferous.

Interpretation of Section 311 (1) of Government of India Act of 1935:

311.–(1) in this Act and, unless the context otherwise requires, in any other Act the following expressions have the meanings hereby respectively assigned to them, that is to say:-
"British India" means all territories for the time being comprised within the Governors’ Provinces and the Chief Commissioners’ Provinces;

"India" means British India together with all territories of any Indian Ruler under the suzerainty of His Majesty, all territories under the suzerainty of such an Indian Ruler, the tribal areas, and any other territories which His Majesty in Council may, from time to time, after ascertaining the views of the Federal Government and the Federal Legislature, declare to be part of India;

"Burma" includes (subject to the exercise by His Majesty of any powers vested in him with respect to the alteration of the boundaries thereof) all territories which were immediately before the commencement of Part III of this Act comprised in India, being territories lying to the east of Bengal, the State of Manipur, Assam, and any tribal areas connected with Assam;

"British Burma" means so much of Burma as belongs to His Majesty;

"Tribal areas" means the areas along the frontiers of India or in Baluchistan which are not part of British India or of Burma or of any Indian State or of any foreign State;

"Indian State" includes any territory, whether described as a State, an Estate, a Jagir or otherwise, belonging to or under the suzerainty of a Ruler who is under the suzerainty of His Majesty and not being part of British India;

"Ruler" in relation to a State means the Prince, Chief or other person recognized by His Majesty as the Ruler of the State.

Census of 1941

Census Commissioner Hutton going a step further in the 1941 census the tribal people were shown as a separate community irrespective of the religions they follow with the comment that,
"….Community and religion may seem to many as one and the same and inseparable and intact in many areas. But when there are tribes, community and religion need not always be the same and in the present census they have all been classified on the basis of community and not religion."

In the absence of caste or religion sorting, the 1931 practice would have meant that there is no record of the number of person of tribal origin, which is so important a matter in Assam and represents one of the reasons for the extensive reserved areas in that province.

Sir Athelstane Baines’ report "Ethnography (Castes and Tribes)", 1912, holds great importance in the present context to the Meitei/Meetei inhabitants of Manipur valley. The hilly state of Manipur, the hills area constitutes more than 90% and the valley area less than 10% of Manipur’s territory. This development entails no further delay in enlisting Meitei/Meetei people of Manipur with the tag of Scheduled Tribe (ST) with the other hill tribes of Northeast India who were already categorized as Schedule Tribe (ST) under article 342 (1) of the Constitution of India.