26-725: Barua (also spelt as Baroa , Baruah , Barooa , Barooah , Baroova , Baroowa , Borooah , Baruva , Baruwa , Borooah , Borua , Boruah ) is a common Assamese surname shared by the Assamese communities much like Aroras of Punjab . Originally, the Barua surname was used as a military rank in the Sutiya kingdom held by individuals from the Buruk clan. The historical examples, such as Borhuloi Barua , Gajraj Barua , Manik Chandra Barua and Kasitora Barua were Sutiya officials. During
52-553: A Kalita . At the end of this tribal-caste continuum were the Brahmins and often the pontiffs of Sattra's were Brahmins called Goswamis. Some of these Goswamis were a few generations earlier Kayasthas , and some Kayastha pontiffs were earlier tribal and low caste. It is this process by which many groups such as Chutia , Borahi, Moran , Deori , Boro peoples to become Assamese peasants, especially in Upper and Central Assam; and it
78-796: A Sutiya revolt against the monarchy led by a Sutiya Barua in 1673. Ahom Barua was a position held by the family of the Sutiya Kataki who joined the Ahoms, after the defeat of Sutiyas; while Sutiya Karhi Barua was an officer under whom the Sutiya archers of the king's palace were posted. During the reign of Siva Singha , the Dulia Barua and Kukurachuwa Barua were Sutiyas . Other examples of Sutiya Baruas include Moi Barua (Buruk-Chutia origin) and Aruwandhara Barua . The Kachari , Sonowal and Thengal Barua s were of Kachari origin, while
104-475: A linguistically and culturally heterogeneous population. Though there is a political dispute over the definition of Assamese people, in general; the people belonging to the state of Assam are referred sometimes as Assamese people or more appropriately as People of Assam. The lack of a definition has put stumbling blocks in implementing clause 6 of the Assam Accord , an agreement signed by the activists of
130-644: A road near the border for the patrol and quicker deployment of Indian security forces, as well as maintain a mandatory birth and death list of citizens. All open police charges against the participants and the leaders of the Assam Movement, prior to and on the date of signing the Accord, were also withdrawn and closed. The families of those who died during the Assam Movement were given monetary compensation. The Government also agreed to open an oil refinery, reopen paper mills and establish educational institutions in
156-643: A significant part of this identity. The total population of Assamese speakers in Assam is nearly 15.09 million which makes up 48.38% of the population of state according to the Language census of 2011 . The name "Assamese" is of British colonial coinage of the 19th and 20th century. Assamese is an English word meaning "of Assam" —though most Assamese people live in Assam, not all the people of Assam today are Assamese people. The Government of Assam faced difficulties in defining Assamese people for Assam Accord due to
182-487: A temporal limit: All those whose names appeared in the 1951 National Register of Citizens and their progenies should be considered as Assamese . Despite the lack of a legal definition, social scientists consider the Assamese identity to constitute a tribal-caste continuum that has been the result of a historical process. Assamese as a nationalistic identity was seeded when the Ahom kingdom came under repeated attacks from
208-555: The Ahom reign, Barua represented by the Tai word Phu-ke (literally: "Leader of 10,000 men" in Ahom language ), meant a superintending officer of the Paik system of the Ahom Army . Appointments as Barua s were made irrespective of the paik's religion or ethnicity. Among other ethnic groups, there is mention of Sutiya Barua s in several instances of Buranjis . For example, there was
234-583: The Assam Movement and the Government of India in 1985. Since a legal definition is important to provide "constitutional, legislative and cultural" safeguards to the Assamese people, the Government of Assam had formed a ministerial committee to finalise the definition in March 2007. To address the clause 6 issue, AASU had announced a definition on 10 April 2000 which was based on residency with
260-583: The Assamese people and agreed to revise the electoral database based on that date. Further, the government agreed to identify and deport any and all refugees and migrants after March 25 1971. In 1971, millions of citizens of Bangladesh – then called East Pakistan – fled the abuses of a civil war and associated genocide between East Pakistan and West Pakistan triggering a mass influx of refugees into Assam , West Bengal , Tripura , various other nearby states of India as well as Myanmar . According to
286-574: The Bengal Sultanate in the early 16th century and the people banded together under Suhungmung (1497–1539) to resist a common enemy. The kingdom not only succeeded in resisting the invasion, but a general pursued the invaders to the Karatoya river and freed most of the Kamrup and Kamata regions. The process of identity formation sped up during the rule of Pratap Singha (1603–41) when
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#1732788029411312-775: The Motoks , the Kacharis ( Sonowals and the Thengals ), besides the Sutiyas . Assamese people The Assamese people are a socio- ethnic linguistic identity that has been described at various times as nationalistic or micro-nationalistic. This group is often associated with the Assamese language , the easternmost Indo-Aryan language , and Assamese people mostly live in the Brahmaputra Valley region of Assam , where they are native and constitute around 56% of
338-508: The Mughals began repeated incursions from 1615 and the Battle of Saraighat in 1671; and finally the Battle of Itakhuli (1682 CE) when the Ahoms took direct control over western Brahmaputra valley. Many Muslim soldiers and professionals who had accompanied invading armies or immigrated peacefully since the 13th century, including those from the 16th century, were given power and eminence by
364-528: The 16th century and the proselytising activities of the Sattra institutions created a path for individuals of tribal origins to traverse the tribal-caste continuum. Tribal people could take initiation at a Sattra—and a neophyte would be called a modahi if he still took liquor. A modahi successively advanced to the Sarania group (also called saru-koch ), Koch , Bor -Koch, Saru -Keot, Bor -Keot and then
390-476: The 17th-18th century and a composite Assamese identity comprising caste-Hindus, tribals and Assamese Muslims began to form. On the eve of British colonialism in the early 19th century the Assamese society consisted of the hinduised ethnic groups, the caste Hindu groups, the plain tribal groups, and the Assamese Muslims; and the expression of Assamese nationalism in the 19th/20th-century was confined to
416-604: The Ahom kings, and they in turn helped the Ahoms in repelling the Mughals. This was also the time when the Assamese language progressively replaced the Ahom language in the court and outside. As a result of the Ahom kings increasingly patronising Hinduism alongside the proselytising activities of Ekasarana Dharma since the 16th-century—a large section of the Bodo-Kachari peoples converted to different forms of Hinduism in
442-523: The Assam Accord, the Government of India agreed to secure the international border against future infiltration by the "erection of physical barriers like walls, barbed wire fencing and other obstacles at appropriate places" and deploying a patrol by security forces on land and river routes all along the international Bangladesh-India border . To aid this effort, the Government also agreed to build
468-666: The Brahmaputra valley. Scholars believe that with the arrival of Indo-Aryans in Assam, there was a simultaneous Sanskritisation and deshification processes beginning in the 5th–8th century during the reign of the Varman dynasty of Kamarupa ; —and all Assam's kings were originally non-Indo-Aryan who were gradually Sanskritised. This enabled many of the common folks to follow the ruling classes into Sanskritisation and also bring along with them elements of their own local customs and religions. The Ekasarana dharma that emerged in
494-562: The Valley's population. The use of the term precedes the name of the language or the people. It has also been used retrospectively to the people of Assam before the term "Assamese" came into use. They are an ethnically diverse group formed after centuries of assimilation of Austroasiatic , Tibeto-Burman , Indo-Aryan and Tai populations, and constitute a tribal-caste continuum —though not all Assamese people are Hindus and ethnic Assamese Muslims numbering around 42 lakh (4,200,000) constitute
520-720: The others like Bapu , Bez and Dewalia Barua s were Brahmins . Besides these, during the Moamoria rebellion , the Matak rebels also appointed Barua s among themselves. The rank bestowed upon the individuals within the Assamese community was adopted by and forms part of the continuum of the Assamese society of several groups – the Ahoms , the Brahmins , the Kalitas , the Koch, the Morans ,
546-660: The presence of the then-Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in New Delhi on 15 August 1985. Later, the Citizenship Act was amended for the first time the following year, in 1986. It followed a six-year agitation that started in 1979. Led by the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU), the protestors demanded the identification and deportation of all illegal foreigners – predominantly Bangladeshi immigrants . They feared that past and continuing large scale migration
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#1732788029411572-420: The state government completed a study and marked numerous names in its voter list with "d" meaning "disputed citizenship", with plans to block them from voting. Critics complained of disenfranchisement. The High Court of the state ascertained that the "d" is based on suspicion, not documentary evidence. All residents – citizens and foreigners – were allowed to vote in subsequent Assam elections. The supporters of
598-404: The state. The accord brought an end to the Assam Movement and paved the way for the leaders of the agitation to form a political party and form a government in the state of Assam soon after. Though the accord brought an end to the agitation, some of the key clauses are yet to be implemented, which kept some of the issues festering. According to Sanjib Baruah – a professor of Political Studies,
624-498: The task of identifying foreigners became politically difficult, affected vote banks, and attracted accusations of religious or ethnic discrimination. Hiteswar Saikia , a chief minister of Assam in early 1990s and senior Congress party leader, for example gave conflicting statements in his speeches. In the front of some crowds, he denied there were any foreigners; before other crowds, he said there were hundreds of thousands of illegal foreigners in Assam that need to be deported. In 1997,
650-448: Was overwhelming the native population , impacting their political rights, culture, language and land rights. The Assam Movement caused the estimated death of over 855 people. The movement ended with the signing of the Assam Accord. The leaders of the Assam Movement agreed to accept all migrants who had entered into Assam prior to 1 January 1966. The Government of India acknowledged the political, social, cultural and economic concerns of
676-409: Was noted that some kayastha sattradhikar s were originally Morans , Kaibartas , Chandalas , Tantis and Sankardev had himself instated gurus from Muslim, Kaibarta, Nagas , and Garo communities. Assam Accord The Assam Accord was a Memorandum of Settlement (MoS) signed between representatives of the Government of India and the leaders of the Assam Movement . It was signed in
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