The Mising people or Miri people ( or ) are a Tibeto-Burman ethnic group living mostly in the Northeast Indian states of Assam and Arunachal Pradesh. Their Mising language is a part of the Tani languages and the Tibeto-Burman language group. The Misings are a major ethnic group of Assam, the second largest tribe after the Bodos. 15.4% of Assam's tribal population speaks Mising, but many more speak Assamese (24.7%) and Mising organisations estimate that the unofficial Mising population is 1.2 million rather than the 587,310 declared by the 2001 census of India.
Etymology The Misings are officially listed as Miri in the Constitution of India's order of Scheduled Tribes, but they prefer the term . is an endonym and demonym which literally means 'man of the soil'. , on the other hand, is an exonym once applied by the Assamese. There is still much scholarly debate on the origin of as an ethnonym. The Misings also use the endonym Tani, 'man', for identifying themselves.
Some British ethnographers argued that referred to a status as intermediaries between plains people in the Brahmaputra Valley and hill tribes towards the north in Arunachal Pradesh. Another theory — Bhandari (1984) — associates with being religious functionaries of Tani hill-tribes. When some ritualists migrated to the plains they were identified as coming from the ('Miri hills'), whose feats of magic would have been well-known back then, and the name stuck. However, this exonymic ethnonym was perhaps not used to designate the entire community of Tani language speakers. Nevertheless, the exonym became widespread and for the non-Miri people living in the plains, the Mising eventually became known as the Miri.
History Early history The Misings were an oral community until the early 20th century. Accordingly, there are no detailed written records of the people in their earliest habitat and culture. Some Assamese literature from the Vaishnavite period, and the Ahom Chronicles, the Buranji's, mention the Miri's (Misings) in relation to their interactions with Vaishnavite saints and Ahom kings. The ethnonym was used by the Ahoms to designate many communities inhabiting the hills of the north-east region between the gorge of the Subansiri River and the Siyang River in Arunachal Pradesh. The British also left behind accounts about the Misings, starting in the 19th century. These sporadic accounts form the basis of attempts to reconstruct early Mising history.
According to Sharma, the Misings are related to the Tani speakers of present-day Arunachal Pradesh. Their original habitat may have been the hills of Arunachal Pradesh from whence they migrated to the plains. The Misings may have entered present-day Assam around the 13th-14th century during the reign of Chutia kings in search of fertile lands. This migration continued, gradually, for centuries, and today, the Mising population is concentrated around the districts of Dhemaji, Lakhimpur, and Majuli.
According to Bhandari, the Misings have social and cultural differences between themselves. Bhandari argues that these differences might originate in different waves of migrations, which led to some differences between kinship groups, namely, the Barogan and the Dohgam, meaning 'twelve-chiefs' and 'ten-chiefs'. Some Dohgam Mising clans have traditions indicating that they migrated to the plains as late as, or later than, 1826, when the East India Company had annexed most of the Ahom Kingdom. On the other hand, Lakshmi Devi states that the distinction between the Barogan and the Dohgam are based on Assamese tradition, and devoid of "any structural or other importance". Devi advocates an interpretation in which the Miri's are generally divided between "Plain Miri's" and the "Hill Miri's".
There is no written history about Misings migrating to the plains of the Brahmaputra Valley, but history was passed down orally in the form of folk songs and stories by their ancestors from generation to generation and is still prevalent among their society. Although they were initially hill-dwellers, they later migrated to the plains in search of fertile land and started living on the northern banks of the Brahmaputra. One account by a British ethnographer suggests they migrated due to conflicts with the Abor or Adi peoples. Another tradition suggests they settled under the patronage of an Ahom king. While it is not known precisely when they were settled in the plains, many Mising peoples had already settled in the region before the British annexation of Upper Assam in 1838–39.
The Misings inhabiting parts of the Chutia Kingdom were designated as the Chutia Miri by the Ahoms during the reign of Suhungmung, the Dihingia Raja. These Miris were better known as Barogam Miris or Sadiyal Miris (named after the Sadiya state). The later migrant group Dohgram Miris call the Barogram Miris as Pagro meaning "one who has less purity" owing to their intermixing with Chutias. The Buranjis, on one occasion, record that a group of these Miris living near the Dikrong River (Lakhimpur district) had earlier been subjects of the Chutia kingdom and were required to serve as Hatighahis (suppliers of grass for royal elephants) under the Chutia kings. Some Misings living near historical Sadiya (which included parts of Dhemaji) continued to raid Ahom territory.
17th century In 1615, the Misings attacked Ahom territory during the reign of Susenghphaa, 'Pratap Singha', and the force sent to subdue them failed. The Miri's of Sadiya were conciliated by their enrolment in the posa system of trade relations, by which they could avail themselves of the commercial networks of the Ahom kingdom.
In 1655, however, the Miri's of Sadiya launched another raid, which resulted in a successful counter-raid by Ahom forces during which the Miri's were defeated. They agreed to pay an annual tribute of wild cows, horses, twenty tortoises, yellow pebbles, woven blankets, and Shikaradao, a type of knife, to the Ahoms. They were placed under the governorship of the Sadiyakhowa Gohain and a new officer known as Miri Barau was appointed as a subordinate to the Gohain. An officer called the Barbarua remained the chief officer over the Miri's of Sadiya in matters relating to war and other important royal concerns. The Barbarua was ordered to employ the Miri's in the kanri, 'archery', khel or division.
In 1665, during the reign of Supangmung, 'Chakradhwaj Singha', the Miri's of Sadiya rebelled and refused to come to terms with the Ahoms. During the reign of Udayaditya Singha (1670–1672), a dispute arose between the Chutias and the Miris when a group of Chutias attacked the Miri villages of Dimauan (possibly modern-day Dimow, Dhemaji) and Rupia (possibly modern-day Rupahi, near Dimow), killed several inhabitants and carried away Mar-boats which the Miris were required to supply as tribute to the Ahom king. The dispute continued into the reign of Ramdhwaj Singha, when Ahom officials operated through Miri intermediaries and from a post at Tinimukhia, while the Sadiyakhowa Gohain and Marangikhowa Gohain were ordered to establish a fort at the mouth of the Sessa river (present-day Dibrugarh district, opposite to Dhemaji). Officials stationed at Tinimukhia subsequently proceeded by boat along the Dihang towards the Chutia settlements, where Chutia groups at times assembled or took shelter in Miri villages. The Ahom Buranji records that the Chutias of this tract were then called upon to acknowledge the Ahom king as their sovereign and to furnish elephant tusks, wild cattle, sikaradaos, jin cloth and female slaves as tribute. They complied with the demand, marking the establishment of tributary relations for the first time with these Chutia communities following the conflict.
The construction of earthen rampart fortifications by Supatphaa, 'Gadadhar Singha', halted the Miri raids. It was only by 1685 that these Miri's were fully subjugated by the Ahoms. Despite tense relations, the Miri's were given positions in the Ahom army and administration throughout the 17th century. The Miri's served in the Ahom army of Sutamla, 'Jayadhwaj Singha', Supatphaa, or 'Gadadhar Singha', and Sukhrungpha, or 'Rudra Singha', the last of whom campaigned against the Kachari and Jaintia kingdoms at the turn of the 18th century.
18th century
By the beginning of the 18th century, the Miri's were fully pacified and conciliated into the Ahom kingdom. During the Moamaria rebellion, the Miri's remained loyal despite many hill-tribes raiding Ahom territory during the period of chaos and confusion. The Ahom kings encouraged Ahomisation. In the reign of Suhungmung, the Dihingia Raja, a Miri man was ennobled by the Ahom court and raised to a high-rank. A Miri child was adopted by the Bhokola Gohain, a member of the Borgohain family, and received the name "Miri-Sandikai", and his descendants came to be known as the "Miri-Sandikai" family. It was a descendant of this "Miri-Sandikai" family that was made governor of Sadiya during the reign of Supatphaa or Gadadhar Singha.
19th century
The Miri's were well-conciliated to the early British colonial regime that succeeded the Ahom kingdom, in part, because the British retained aspects of the "posa" trade system introduced by the Ahoms. The hill-tribes on the frontiers of the Brahmaputra Valley were deficient in labourers and raw materials, and committed raids on the fertile plains to alleviate these deficiencies. However, the Ahoms had granted the Hill Miri's — who cultivated the advanced tracts of Bordoloni, Sisi, and Dhemaji — the rights to participate in the "posa" system, by which these needs could be addressed. During the British period, colonial administrators persuaded the Hill Miri's to commute their claims in return for a fixed monthly payment.
20th century Beginning in the 20th century, modern education spread amongst the Misings through Christian missionaries. This led to the development of an educated class that pursued socio-economic advancement and political rights during the colonial period. In 1924, Mising leaders in the Brahmaputra Valley gathered under the banner of the Sadou Asam Miri Sanmilan (All Assam Miri Conference). The Sanmilan was the precursor to the Mising Bane Kebang (Mising National Congress). The Kebang emerged as the vehicle for the educated Misings, raising its voice for employment and political power for Misings. Although opportunities were limited, some Misings gained colonial era jobs as revenue officials and school teachers, which formed the nascent Mising middle class. However, this educated class felt marginalised and suppressed by the non-tribal Assamese speakers, especially those who followed the Hindu caste system. The Misings were amongst the tribal peoples in Assam who actively competed with the non-tribal Assamese, who saw any assertion of socio-economic and political rights by tribal leaders with mistrust and suspicion.
In 1932, the Bodo, Mising, and other tribes formed the Tribal League, with the view of advocating for their political rights and socio-economic advancement. The Tribal League secured five seats reserved for the tribal population in the Assam Legislative Council election in 1935, with Karko Ch. Doley as the Mising representative. However, the League became engulfed in inter-personal competition, and many leaders joined the Indian National Congress after the independence of India in 1947. Although an important part of the independence movement in Assam, the tribal leaders did not feel recognised, and became alienated from the non-tribal Assamese caste Hindu dominated Congress which advocated assimilation policies towards the tribals.