Miyas’ verse of protest

Amit Sengupta

…Miyahbhai doesn’t know
That I want to see the world
So that there can be no camps anymore.
When Miyahbhai plants his staff in front of the plough
And lights a beedi I try to explain.
Miyahbhai looks at me and an Eiffel grows in my heart.
Napoleon’s Marengo licks salt off my fingers.

— From Mirza Lutfar Rahman’s I Want to See the World

The recent Art East Festival at India International Centre in Delhi hosted a fabulously crafted show on the languages and dialects across India’s eastern and northeastern geography, with its landscapes often pushing the limits of both language and culture, creating and re-creating hundreds of narratives, many still invisible and some slowly becoming extinct…

The inaugural session showcased songs by youngsters from Assam, some of them deeply influenced by the folk traditions of the region, especially East and West Bengal, and Assam. These included the Baul songs of Lallan Fakir and others and the oral traditions involving the rivers, wetlands, islands, rural landscapes and boat people/fishermen. Besides this, there was a session on Miyah poetry, a genre of protest poetry that has come to prominence in the recent times.

Miyah is a term used for Muslims who trace their roots to East Bengal. The term basically means a ‘gentleman’ and Miyah poetry depicts the pain and anguish of Muslims being branded as Bangladeshis.

It started in the summer of 2016 in Assam. The genre being just four years old, its poets are young, educated, modern and secular, and do not carry any baggage or prejudice. Like the topography around the Brahamaputra and its sandbars (chars), the poetry has originated from this fluid landscape, with migrations, roots, exile and longing intertwined with multiple languages and dialects.

In these four years, Miyah poetry has taken different directions. It has talked about the lived experiences of the poets, their struggle with constant demands to prove their citizenship and to spread the message of the need for a more inclusive and equal Assam. The NRC process, in fact, first triggered the poetry as an assertion of the Miyah identity, both as a resident of Assam and a citizen of India. The president of the Char Sapori Sahitya Parishad, Hafiz Ahmed wrote a poem and posted it on his Facebook page. This poem, among others, became a trendsetter. He wrote:

Write
Write Down
I am a Miyah
My serial number in the NRC is 200543
I have two children
Another is coming
Next summer.
Will you hate him
As you hate me?

Indeed, apart from identity questions, Miyah poetry is also talking about memories, love and angst. It also speaks of empowerment, gender justice, education and social harmony. As a young genre, it is still struggling to find its own, deepest sensitivity. However, it is raw and intrinsically rooted in the multiplicities of Bengali, Assamese, and the other languages and dialects of the East.

Like this poem, My Mother, by young Rehna Sultana, in her early 20s. Excerpts:

Sometimes I wonder
What did I gain by falling in your lap?
I have no identity, no language
I have lost myself, lost everything
That could define me
And yet I hold you close
I try to melt into you
I need nothing, my mother.
Just a spot at your feet.
Open your eyes once mother
Open your lips
Tell these sons of the earth
That we are all bothers…

“Their poetry is search for and assertion of their identity in the contemporary times of crisis, where your citizenship itself in crisis,” says an academic who has been following Miyah poetry.

A Miyah poet from Assam, who does not want to be named, says, “Our poetry is our existential angst. It is the bitter realism of our daily humiliation. It is the description in lyrics of our historical tragedy. It is also our assertion of our own land, roots, residence on earth and citizenship. Our poetry is our resistance.”

Today more than 30 poets write Miyah poems across various languages, including Assamese, English, Hindi and regional dialects. The body of Miyah poetry consists of more than 200 poems and shows the promise of thriving amid the intermingling of cultures, food habits, arts, social mores, music and languages.