During my internship with North East Network (NEN) in 2011, I got a chance to transcribe Birubala Rabha’s interview. At that time, I was 20 years old and I did not know why she was significant. But today, when I read that she passed away, the woman’s significance suddenly dawned on me.
Birubala Rabha was an anti-witch hunt activist from Assam. Although originally from Meghalaya, Assam was her karmabhumi, particularly the district of Goalpara, which is at the Assam-Meghalaya border. Her becoming an anti-witch hunt crusader was facilitated by personal reasons. Rabha’s son had become mentally ill in 1985, and a local deudhani had said that he would die within three days. But he did not die after three days or even much later. The same deudhani accused five other women of being witches in 2000. Rabha denied the accusation, standing in support of the women accused as witches. At that time, she was the Regional Secretary of the Borjhor Regional Mahila Samiti as well as the secretary of the women’s group in the village. Her strong stance in support of the women accused as witches meant that she faced severe hostility from the public. But it did not deter her and she continued her grassroots activism against witch-hunting.
In Rabha’s lifetime, it is believed that she helped save around fifty-five women’s lives, who had been falsely accused of being witches. Her initiative Mission Birubala, which was formed in 2012 – aimed to create awareness among people against witch-hunting as well as provide rehabilitation to the survivors of witch-hunting. She also played a crucial role in the passing of the Assam Witch Hunting (Prevention, Prohibition and Protection) Act in 2015. The act makes any offence related to witch hunting cognizable, non-bailable and non-compoundable. It also awards a punishment of imprisonment of up to seven years along with a fine of up to 5 lakh rupees for identifying and calling a person a witch. Her interventions were not just social, but also legal.
This leads us to ask why is an anti-witch hunt activist needed. A 2015 study titled Witch Hunting in Assam: Individual, Structural and Legal Dimensions was conducted by Partners for Law in Development, Assam Mahila Samata Society and North East Network. It found that witch-hunting is prevalent amongst the Rabhas, Bodos and tea plantation communities which include Santhals, Mundas, Orangs, Kharias, Majhis, Gourhs, Bhumijs and Kishans. This cuts across several blocks in Goalpara and Sonitpur. As part of a witch-hunt, a woman – often single and/or widowed – is branded a witch and tortured to death. Very often it is because of the fear that she will claim a share in property and land. As such, witch-hunts involve the scapegoating of women who are seen as assertive and independent. Thus, what facilitates witch-hunting is when women claim their legal and rightful share in property and land. There is a complex interplay of economic and social factors that impact women negatively, ultimately resulting in them being branded as witches.
What makes Rabha’s journey even more remarkable is that she mostly worked at an individual level. She did not work as part of any women’s organization in Assam or elsewhere. It took a lot of courage and strength to stand up against a form of social evil in the interior villages of Assam. Her story is also significant in the contemporary context, in which feminism is often vilified as ‘unnecessary’ and ‘redundant’. With the visibility of a few high-achieving women in the public sphere, it is now believed that all women have equal rights. But as Rabha’s life history shows us, it is not the case. In fact, Rabha’s works are a perfect example of what intersectional feminism looks like. She was a tribal woman who struggled with poverty and yet managed to make a mark in the country’s illustrious feminist history. There are several women – particularly from marginalized communities – who continue to be killed because of patriarchal practices. Witch-hunting in Assam is only a microcosm of such gendered structures and practices.
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Rabha was honoured with the Padma Shri by the central government of India in 2021 as well as nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize by North East Network in 2005. These are material accomplishments of the highest order. But her contributions to the struggle for women’s rights and justice are what makes her stand apart. It took indomitable courage, resilience and strength to stand up against evil in a society that heavily favours men. Ultimately, it was cancer that took her life. We can only hope that her courage remains.
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The author teaches Sociology at the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Guwahati. She is one of the co-founders of Doing Sociology – an academic e-resource dedicated to making sociological knowledge accessible to the public.
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