'Miya Poetry' Divides Assam Down the Middle

Guwahati, July 27, 2019:

Controversy continues to swirl around the Assam Police's filing of an FIR against 10 'Miya' poets for inciting "communal hatred" in Assam.

After the FIR was filed in Guwahati, More than 200 people, including academics, research scholars, journalists, writers and film-makers, have criticised the Assam Police for filing first information reports against 10 people, most of them Bengali Muslim poets and activists who are often pejoratively referred to as Miya. Their body of work is known as Miya poetry.

Now, the issue has seen the people of Assam divided right down the middle, with some supporting the right of the poets to express themselves, whereas others have accused them of staging theatrics.

In response to the statement supporting the Miya poets, the intelligentsia of Assam have responded to the statement supporting the Miya poets and have issued a statement in response to the statement.

In the statement undersigned by many prominent large number of academicians and activists from around the world have recently shown great support in a ‘public statement’ and written: "the conscious sections of the Assamese society have strongly protested against such evil tactics of using FIR to suppress the voices of poets. We, the signatories of this statement, condemn the use of FIRs as a punitive action against any form of expression of emotions, values, norms, and even political ideologies. However, we wish to draw the attention of the civil society to the fact that, the much circulated Karwan-e-Mohabbat YouTube video of Dr. Hafiz Ahmed and other ‘Miyah poets’ carried a sub-title “Miyah poetry is a reclaiming of one’s Muslim identity."

Therefore, Miyah poetry has also to be understood in the context of identity politics.

A reading of the ‘public statement’ of 21 July on ‘Miyah poetry’ reveals certain

contradictions and inconsistencies. In the very first paragraph of the statement, Dr Hafiz

Ahmed has been referred to as a ‘senior Miyah poet’. We would like to point out that Dr

Ahmed’s PhD thesis was on the contribution of the Bengal-origin Assamese Muslims

towards Assamese literature. The reference to this Assamese Muslim as a ‘Miyah’ poet is

unfortunate.

The public statement has also interchangeably used the terms ‘Bengali-origin

Muslims of Assam’ (2nd para) and ‘Bengal-origin Muslims of Assam’ (3rd para) (emphasis

added). It surprises us that the esteemed signatories of the public statement have

overlooked the obvious differences between the phrases ‘Bengali-origin Muslims of

Assam’ and ‘Bengal-origin Muslims of Assam’.

The Assamese intellectuals stated that in the discourse, the term ‘Assamese’ has been conveniently erased from all references made to the said poets and their poetry, whereas the majority of the population referred to by the term ‘Miyah’ by these signatories has been calling themselves Asomiya and alleged that the signatories have in fact themselves driven a wedge between the communities by inserting the term Bengali.

The Assamese intellectuals have further claimed that the politics of creating divisions amongst various sections of the people of Assam under the pretext of protesting against the atrocities on the immigrant Muslim population settled in Assam becomes obvious from the fact that both the poetry and the discourse sought to be constructed around it ignores the very fact that the democratic sections of Assam have actually been making serious efforts to eradicate the unacceptable practice of using ‘miyah’ as a derogatory term.

"These ‘Miyah’ poets and their supporters seem to project the offensive trolls of a small

section of the wayward Assamese young boys and girls as representative of the entire

Assamese community while forgetting that the larger Assamese community", the inllectuals have claimed.

The intellectuals also stated that the ‘public statement’ about the timing of the controversy

and the associated vilification of the poets must be considered carefully, because the

entire discourse around ‘Miyah poetry’ began in 2016, mainly in the context of the NRC.

The people of Assam, including the leading light of this discourse, Dr Hafiz Ahmed, have

welcomed the NRC.

The signatories appealed to all sections of the Assamese people to maintain peace and harmony at this very crucial juncture and desist from any such actions which will give a "handle to those forces which might wish to see the Assamese people divided on communal lines."

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