|
After 100 years of keeping them in custody, the Pitt Rivers Museum under Oxford University council on Wednesday handed over thirty-nine sets of Naga ancestral remains to the representatives of the Forum for Naga Reconciliation and the Naga Tribe Hoho.
These 39 remains consisted entirely of skulls, which are estimated to have been removed between 1910 and 1940. These skulls formed part of a collection exceeding 6,500 Naga artefacts housed at the museum before it was withdrawn from public display in 2020 as part of institutional decolonisation efforts. Nagaland-based Forum for Naga Reconciliation (FNR), under the leadership of Naga Tribe Hohos, facilitated the repatriation. Reacting to the repatriation of remains, Dr Ellen Konyak Jamir, coordinator of Recover, Restore and Decolonise, emphasised that repatriation as a process has created an opportunity for both the museum and the Naga people to address their historical difficulties. "Repatriation is asserting the Naga right to ancestral human remains. Remains that have been in others' custody for more than 100 years, and now they are ours.... Repatriation, as a process, has really opened up an opportunity for the museum as well as the Naga people to address our historical difficulties... It has been a sustained process of continuous dialogue..." Jamir told ANI. Dr Jamir further expressed hope from Naga people to pay respect to these remains before burying them in the state capital Kohima. "We would like to make this Naga story culminate here in our homeland in Kohima at the Naga Solidarity Park, and we hope to have a gathering of the Naga people to pay respect to our sisters before we bury them," added Dr Jamir. Dr Visier Sany, a member of the Forum for Naga Reconciliation, while expressing gratitude to NSF and the Naga people's movement, mentioned that these remains will be kept for public viewing for around two to three days in the National Solidarity Park. "... We are really thankful to the NSF and the Naga people's movement for human rights for donating that land to be the final resting place of our ancestors. There will be two programs. One will be a homecoming program... The remains will be kept in the Solidarity Park for public viewing for around two to three days, and then we will have the burial ceremony..." Dr Sanyu told ANI.
|
