The introductory Indo-Aryan language of the Assam province is Kamrupi language, employed in North Bengal, Western Assam and parts of Central Assam, which since antiquity was exclusive literary language of the region.
The dark age of Kamrupi language come into being in nineteenth century, when Christian missionaries led by Nathan Brown inappropriately standardised Assamese language based on dialect of Sivasagar district, subsequently colonial government secured it as official language of entire province,overlooking objection of Kamrupi and Goalpariya intelligentsia, and missionaries working in Kamrupi language speaking territories, such as Brother Danforth.
The dark age of Kamrupi language come into being in nineteenth century, when Christian missionaries led by Nathan Brown inappropriately standardised Assamese language based on dialect of Sivasagar district, subsequently colonial government secured it as official language of entire province,overlooking objection of Kamrupi and Goalpariya intelligentsia, and missionaries working in Kamrupi language speaking territories, such as Brother Danforth.
The Petition
In 1873, the Kamrupi elites submitted a petition to lieutenant governor of Bengal, signed by 1,226 cross section of people from the region objecting imposing of Assamese language. It reads :
The Upper Assam dialect we beg respectfully to submit is spoken only by a small portion of the population of Assam, viz., those who reside in the two districts of Dibrooghur and Sibsagur and is altogether unimportant and meagre, and its capabilities and chances to make itself the language of this entire province are extremely limited, as its comparative poverty in respect to written and published works does conclusively show. The languages in vogue in the rest of the province, though presumptuously stigmatized by the Upper Assam people as provincial (Dhekie), on the contrary does manifest a remarkable and marked superiority in this respect over its rival, as the large majority of written works and all the most approved publications together with the sacred and religious writings of the people of Assam are found to have been composed in it, the conclusion evidently to be based on these reasons is that the claims and the prospects of the patois of Upper Assam to be made and adopted as the common language of the entire people of Assam are altogether unfounded and chimerical....The Upper Assam patois, the claims of which to be made the court language of the whole province have been advanced by certain agitators at Sibsagar is comprehended by the uneducated classes of Lower Assam with almost the same amount of difficulty as the Bengali. The people therefore instead of reaping advantages by the change will continue still under the old accustomed abuses such as being misunderstood by the judge and of being cheated by the Amlah....The presumption of the Upper Assam people to force their own patois to the acceptance to the people of whole Assam would bear an air of absurdity had their wishes not be seconded by noise of the noise created by missionaries who, we are sorry to witness, have already made a sad havoc with our language by adopting an abused system of spelling by phonetic representation, and by publishing a highly objectionable dictionary and one or two filmsy grammatical primers. ......the Lower Assam languages which is enriched with literature, and which is spoken over the larger part of the country and by the majority of the people be allowed to be enforced in all the courts throughout Assam.1
Sources
- Letter from the people of Lower Assam, signed by 1226 persons, to the Lieutenant Governor of Bengal, Fort William, (enclosed in the letter from the Officiating Inspector of Schools, Assam Circle, to Colonel Hopkinson, Agent, North East Frontier and Commissioner of Assam, 30 January 1873), Assam Commissioner's File no.471, ASF, State Archives, Guwahati
