Abstract
Those who are known to the outside world in the following terms today - CHIN, CHIN-KUKI-MIZO-ZOMI or KUKI-CHIN-MIZO - are in fact belonging to a single ethnic group of Mongoloid Stock. The term, CHIN, was orignally a Burmese word andKUKI a Bengali. However, they had known themselves - and called themselves as well - from ancient times only in any of thefollowing terms: ASHO, CHO, LAI, MIZO or ZOMI. There were originally around 100 tribes and sub-tribes, which have now been reduced to some 70 tribes and sub-tribes since several of them have adopted the common nomenclature of MIZO.Although all of them cannot yet agree upon a common nomenclature that encompasses them all, ZO or ZOFATE(descendantsof ZO) have become more and more popular among several sectors of the society. Hence this term - ZO - is interchangablyused with CHIN/ZO throughout this paper of mine(for CHIN still being the official usage inside Burma and universal).And they do not have a common language yet as well until today, but the “Mizo language“ which is also known as the
Duhlian
or
Lusei dialect
is spoken and understood by at least about 1 million Zos. Other major Zo dialects that are spoken by more than 100 000 people are Haka(Lai), M‘ro, Thado-Kuki, and Tedim(
Fraser,
p
.
15). The Zo dialects belong to theSino-Tibetan linguistic groups.
Their ancient country was divided into three parts, namely Bangladesh(formerly East Pakistan), Burma and India -first by the British and later by Bangladesh and India. They have got now two internationally recognized federal states:- Chin State in Burma and Mizoram State in India, with a combined population of 1.5 million within these states.Another conservatively estimated 1.5 million Zos are living outside of these states. Mizoram State has an area of 21 000 sq. km and Chin State 37 000 sq. km. That means Chin State alone is nearly as large as Switzerland.
They Zos were originally adherents of their traditional religion, i.e. Animism. And their cultural heritages are the fruits of this ancient religious belief. Nowadays, the great majority of them are Christian of several denominations. Approximately10 -15 percent of the Zo population inside Burma profess Buddhism and their traditional religion. As they were warrior tribes the British needed decades to suppress and bring them under their complete control with anumber of punitive and suppressive expeditions under the command of a number of outstanding generals; among them four who would later become field marshals. The first expedition under the name of Arakan Frontier Expedition took place in1842, and then several followed between 1888 and 1894. And then two more suppressive expeditions were staged onceagain between 1917 and 1919. During the Chin-Lushai Expedition 1889-90, for instance, the British deployed altogether 7,300 fighting men in three columns under the command of two generals and a full colonel. (One of them, the ChittagongColumn, alone consisted of 3,780 men, 3,300 coolies, 2,200 mules and 71 elephants as transport.)The Mizos attained statehood only after having fought a 20-year old war(1966-86) against the Central Indian Govern-ment. The Chins inside today‘s Burma had agreed to voluntarily form up a federated union on equal terms and equal statuswith Burmans, Kachins, Kayas(Karennis), and Shans by signing a well-known treaty called “The Panglong Agreement“ onFebruary 12, 1947, at Panglong in Southern Shan State. Without this treaty the Union of Burma would have never comeinto existence at all.Thousands of Chin soldiers in Burma have had played some of the most crucial roles in saving and maintaining the Unionof Burma at its most critical moments during the course of its 63-year old civil war since her independence from Britain in1948. However, the successive Burmese governments have been completely neglecting the welfare of the Zo people from thevery beginning of Burma‘s independence, and human rights violations committed against them by the Government itself are rampant everywhere, that tens of thousands of them have left and still are leaving the country and migrating to severalcountries around the world. ____________________________________________________________________________________________
An Explanation:
Many readers of this paper may surely be wondering why I am using blue and red colours profusely in it. I know that itmay look not only childish but could be very irritating as well for many readers. The simple reason behind it is that nowadays there arevery few young Zos who are interested in their own people‘s history and it was recently found out that they thought nearly all books on Zohistory are too boring to read. So it is hoped that, by highlighting a few key information with colours in this lengthy paper, they, who alsohappen to be one of the “main target groups“ of this paper, may find it a bit less boring to read. And non-Zo readers who are not familiar with Zo history may certainly find some sections of it odd or irrelavant to the whole context. APPENDIX EE, Footnotes under 13.3 ARMEDRESISTANCE MOVEMENTS AGAINST THE JAPANESE and APPENDIX Z are some examples in this respect.
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About this Update; A number of corrections and additions have been made from the previous version. The most important additions or changesare in
19.10 ZU AND LUNG 'BEER AND STONE' CULTURE OF KCHO; 19.11 CHIN FACIAL TATOO CULTURE; 21.4 CHIN STATE'SUNEASY COHABITATION WITH THE REGIME;
TABLES (SPECIAL PAGES 1 & 2), APPENDICES EE , FF, GG, O and Y, PHOTOS F,1 - 11 & 22 - 25. Starting with Update XV or XV I, 9.7 THE CHIN-LUSHAI EXPEDITION 1889-90 will be newly rewritten for it‘s oneof the most important parts of Zo history.
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THIS PAPER MAY BE USED FOR NON-COMMERCIAL, PERSONAL, RESEARCH, OR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES, OR ANYFAIR USE. IT MAY NOT, HOWEVER, BE INDEXED IN A COMMERCIAL SERVICE.
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