Speech Excerpt of Alung Khumba| On Inpui and Zeliangrong Normenclature

 Rongmei damsels in their traditional attires. Credit: unknown

Speech Delivered on One Day Consultative Meeting (Inpui, Liangmai, Rongmei and Zeme) on 20 July 2018 at TRI, Chingmeirong, Imphal, Manipur

Ladies and gentlemen, although my speech may not represent a specific opinion of the Inpui community at large but I believe that it is the popular opinion of the same. Topic for today’s speech has been given by the organizers of this meeting i.e., (1)Ways Out With Present ZLR Situation (2) ZPC Movement and Development. Thus I would like to express my views on the first and third topics, I have no opinion on the second topic since I don’t have much pre-knowledge about it.

Regarding the first topic I would like to say that there is no doubt about the need of having a common platform to sustain the blood relationship which we share and we have been bound together under the banner of Zeliangrong which is an acronym coined by taking the prefixes of Zeme, Liangmai, and Rongmei. Although the Inpui name is not represented in this acronym, the Inpui community had been part and parcel of the four kindred tribes’ organizations. 

It was only during the 1990s that the Inpui organizations had dissociated from Zeliangrong organizations. However, dissociation of such social organizations had not caused any cultural or emotional dissociation, till today we are emotionally knit together in strong terms. There are three reasons for the Inpui organizations for dissociating from Zeliangrong organizations: (1) the Inpui tribe name is not represented in the common nomenclature, the acronym ZE + LIANG + RONG; (2) the Zeliangrong organizations were not willing to concede to the repeated requests of the Inpui organizations to include the

Inpui name in the common nomenclature or to coin another one which could cover all the kindred tribes; (3) the Inpui organizations were not ready to give up the use of Inpui tribe name and desired to maintain its separate tribal identity in the same way as the other three brethren i.e, Zeme, Liangmai, and Rongmei. 

At one point of time Zeliangrong sections or writers attempted to convince the Inpui community that Inpui is included in the word Rongmei. For example, some wrote “Zeliangrong (including Inpui)” or some wrote “Zeme, Liangmai and Rongmei (including Inpui)”. This attempt was not acceptable to the Inpui organizations. If we go a little more critical, if Inpui can be treated as included in ZELIANGRONG, can’t both the Rongmei and Inpui be treated as included in “ZELIANG” which is a recognized tribe in Nagaland?

Why did the Inpui community actively join the Zeliangrong organizations for so long even without Inpui name in the common nomenclature? The answer is simple. Some writers had even maintained that Rongmeis and Inpuis are the same and are recognized together under KABUI. This is not wrong to the extent that there is a wide overlapping of Inpui and Rongmei populations.

There is a large population of Rongmei speaking Inpuis who do not take part in Inpui organizations. More than twenty years ago, in an interview with my great-grandmother (Mrs. Namgalu, mother of Mr. R. Kujinang) who died at the age of 104 years, she said that when she “started visiting Imphal valley as a little girl along with parents, Inpui dialect was heard spoken in most households in Majorkhul, Muchi, Kakhulong, etc. but the Inpui dialect was gradually given up”. 

You will see that a large population of Inpui community had totally assimilated into Rongmei, this has been a continuous process till today. The latest and living example is the Tamphagei village (an Inpui village) near Changangei Inpui village. Here currently the Inpui dialect is almost given up, only very few elders can speak and few more elders can understand; youth and children speak only Rongmei; they hardly can understand Inpui dialect. 

This is the reason why Rongmeis and Inpui are considered closer among the so-called Zeliangrong brethren, and this is also the reason why Inpui community actively participated in Zeliangrong organizations even when the Inpui name is not represented in the common nomenclature. In fact, the more educated, the more well-to-do Inpuis who shifted from hills of rural areas to urban areas had been continuously assimilated into Rongmei.

Over the past many years, the petitions of the Inpui organizations to include Inpui name in the common nomenclature had not yielded desired results. But with the increasing awareness among all of us in recent days that we cannot be separated socially, culturally, emotionally, etc., I would also like to express the general views of the Inpui organizations that we also share the same views; and that we the Inpuis would be willing to take part in any attempt to have a common platform for the four kindred tribes, and if such a common nomenclature is constituted which is agreeable/acceptable to all, it will be taken up by the INU in its Assembly to decide upon it.

Further, I would also like to express my views on the third topic i.e. Development. I don’t know the central point of this topic, I believe that the organizers of this meeting will highlight the same to us. However, while I am standing now, I would like to express my views from my past experiences.

When I was teaching at Patkai Christian College, Dimapur I was also the president of All Inpui Students Union and also the INU Representative to Naga Hoho. During those days there was an initiative to form Zeliangrong Development Authority (ZDA). Since the Manipur based Inpui Naga Union officers could not attend the ZDA meetings regularly, I was authorized to attend the same on behalf of INU. 

I had attended several meetings where I made the position of INU very clear that the Inpui community would take part in the ZDA provided the name of the proposed development authority is something which could represent all the four kindred tribes and not the kind of ZE + LIANG+ RONG. After several consultations, one day a key person among those who took this initiative Mr. G. Gaingam (former president, Zeliangrong Naga Union) called me on my telephone to inform me that he felt sorry to say that the demand of Inpui community to include the Inpui name in the name of the proposed development authority could not be conceded to and so Inpui tribe would be dropped from the proposed ZDA. I could only say “Okay uncle, I’m also helpless in this matter, I would inform the same to my Union”. After that, there was no more communication about the proposed ZDA and I don’t really know if it was successfully launched and functional.

Alung Khumba, ex-vice president, Zeliangrong Students’ Union Manipur (ZSUM:1988-89) and ex-president All Inpui Students’ Union (AISU:1991-2007) and former INU Representative to Naga Hoho.