Margherita, Jan. 27: Dancing in ?Singpholand?, at large in Upper Assam. This is precisely what many visitors from Canada, China and Southeast Asia are looking forward to next month.
They will give a headstart to the annual festival of the Singphos, beginning here on February 13. ?People from China, Thailand, Myanmar and South Asian countries will be among the revellers,? said Rajesh Singpho, member of the organising committee of the Shapawan Yawng Manau Poi, the ?national festival? of the tribe.
?A group of tourists from Canada have contacted us, expressing their desire to be here during the festivities,? he said. The festival, hosted by this Upper Assam town in 2000, is celebrated at the end of the agricultural season in memory of the ancestors.
The Singphos, who belong to the Tibeto-Burmese group of the Mongoloid stock, inhabit the southeastern hills of Changlang and parts of Lohit districts in Arunachal Pradesh. They have also settled in and around Margherita. However, they are concentrated mainly in the Bordumsa-Miao subdivision in Arunachal Pradesh.
?Their ethnic origin is identical to the people in the western parts of Kachin in the Hukawng valley of northern Myanmar. They migrated to this part of the country in the last part of the 18th century,? said Bordumsa-based anthropologist Kumarjeet Sengupta. The tribe is also found in Myanmar, the Yunan province of China, Thailand, Tibet and Laos.
?The Singphos believe that humans evolved from one living organism. With the passage of time the organism split into seven parts, while the tribe is the progeny of sixth part ? or the sixth yawng,? Singpho said.
Shapawng Yawng ? the sixth son in order of birth according to the naming custom of the Singphos ? is regarded as the forefather of the tribe.
Manau poi, meaning festival of dance, generally takes place on a huge ground. In the centre, there is a set of pillars around which the revellers dance and swing to the music. A traditional Singpho orchestra has the ching-thong drummer, and bao gong-players and pi flautists.
The two pillars in the middle of the set or the shadung represent dungwi (femininity), while the pillars near them personify the masculine order, dungla. The shorter pillars are called dung noi or hanging pillars.
Arunachal pradesh minister for information and public relation and animal husbandry, C.C. Singpho, and Assam forest minister Pradyut Bordoloi are making a concerted effort to highlight the ?culture-treasure? of the Singphos. Bordoloi is the man behind bringing the festival this year to Margherita after attending its previous edition in Bordumsa.