Meitei with Water 2

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Sanamahi-Pakhangba
A living relationship of the Meitei with Water
- Part 2 -

By: Debabrata Roy Laifungbam & Anna Pinto *

A very brief overview of the aspects of Meitei life, lands, waters and our environment is useful for understanding its significance.

The Meitei nation was forged by alliances and treaties between more than nine different tribes, who still maintain their individual identity, but in a subdued form – subsumed under the pan-Meitei nation.

Some of these clans originated from separate tribes whose initial settlement of the valley by legendary ancestors is marked along key waterways.

For example, the Pleiades, the seven sisters of the sky, journeyed along the Iril river with Iril and gave birth to the ancestors of the Sarang-Leisangthem clan, one of the component clans of the Meitei nation and also a precursor of the Kabui people in the nearby hills.

The Meitei established its ancestral domain in the central region of what is Manipur today in a broad high valley that used to be entirely covered by lakes and wetlands (paat) and water channels or tuirel.

The settlement of this valley involved sophisticated hydraulic engineering, informed by a deep understanding of the hydro-dynamics of the valley, which was extremely hostile to human habitation and cultivated food production.

The precise origins of human habitation of the valley have not yet been determined, but it is clear that there were several waves of occupation at different periods, many of these pre-historic, some ancient and some of later date.

Extensive settlement and what may be clearly identified as a civilization and culture, was achieved at the latest by the 7th and 8th centuries during the time of Taothingmang and Naothingkhong, two brother chiefs, who together devised and engineered an extensive system of canals and dykes throughout the valley.

This of course made intensive settlement possible. The canals and dykes were designed in a grid, running precisely from North to South across the valley and with connecting channels from East to West.

The only deviations are where large natural features like hills in the middle of the valley intrude in the line of the dykes or when the natural course of the rivers strongly deviates from a straight line.

Meitei architecture, therefore, traditionally did not only encompass house or building design and precepts, but laid down strict norms for the planning and layout of settlements, in relationship with the ubiquitous grid of canals and channels.

Meitei longhouse settlements were built with every house facing east.

Every house therefore had direct access to flowing water for domestic needs as well as for maintenance of kitchen gardens and fishing.

Maintenance of this system required very careful and regular attention, which was achieved again through the spiritual, cultural and social institutions of the Meitei.

A Maibi
Photo Courtesy: Jinendra Maibam

These institutions are entrusted primarily to the Maibi, the institution of Meitei shaman priestesses that also occupied a high political profile by advising the chiefs on temporal matters, revenue, war and peace negotiations, domestic arrangements, and as oracular advisors of individuals and the collective.

The Maibi Loisang, a formal college or institution of the Maibi, is the repository and vehicle through which the Meitei cultural, spiritual and social – including traditional – knowledge is transmitted from generation to generation.

This is done in many ways but the most important is the prolonged annual ritual worship, called the Lai Haraoba or the 'Happiness of the Ancestors'.

During the Lai Haraoba, different clan and tribal ancestral deities, called Umang Lai or forest deities, are worshipped through complex and strictly ritualised ceremonies and devotional acts.

The community participates as a whole, but women, men, youth and children also participate as segregated groups. It is through these segregated groups, partaking in the Lai Haraoba, that the Maibi impart traditional cultural and technological knowledge and values.

The deities are always derived from and return to the waters, channels and wetlands at the beginning and end of each Lai Haraoba.

The spirits of our ancestors are in communication through the vehicle of water and rivers. This is one of the core elements of the Sanamahi Pakhangba worship among the Meitei.

To be continued ...

* Debabrata Roy Laifungbam & Anna Pinto jointly wrote this article.

Debabrata Roy Laifungbam is Director of Health Development and Human Rights at the Centre for Organization, Research and Education (CORE), Manipur, India. He coordinates various cross-sectoral research projects on public health, environment, human rights and gender and has participated in several international meetings to advocate ethnic minority rights.

Anna Pinto is Director of the Women and Children division at CORE. She is actively involved in the advocacy of Indigenous Women’s and Children’s Rights.

CORE (Website here ) can be contacted at coreloisanglen(at)gmail(dot)com . This article was presented by Hanjabam Shukhdeba, a PHD Scholar from TISS - hanjabam(at)gmail(dot)com . This article was webcasted on February 03rd, 2008.

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