Performing the Northeast : Cultural Events in Delhi

 

Racism against the Northeast people in Indian metropolitan cities is construed in two ways: based on “race” and based on cultural differences and general ignorance about it. Those fighting against racism, including government agencies, student collectives, social activists, and lawyers, believe cultural ignorance is the most crucial factor. If cultural ignorance indeed underlies racism, an important question follows: what exactly constitutes “Northeast culture(s)”?

Drawing on extensive fieldwork in Delhi, I suggest that there is no singular answer. Instead, understandings of Northeast culture vary depending on who articulates them—whether government agencies, campus-based student collectives, or community associations. In the National Capital Region, five broad types of cultural celebrations can be identified: community festivals, campus-based Northeast cultural events, government-sponsored annual Northeast Festival, irregular/one-time cultural events such as Ishan Manthan, and mixed festivals where the Northeast forms only one part of a larger programme. Although food, dress, and dance are common elements across all these celebrations, their emphasis on particular cultural themes distinguishes them. These events offer insight into how different actors and institutions imagine and represent “Northeast culture(s).”

Community Festivals

Northeast community festivals are important in marking their presence in people's cultural imagination. Different communities organize many annual festivals. While they invite the other community/student organization’s council members and local people to attend the programs, the audience mainly comprises people from the same community.

Prominent examples include Bihu, celebrated by the Assamese community; Nyokum Yullo, observed by Arunachali communities; the post-harvest festival Chavang Kut, organized by the Kuki community; and Pawl Kut, celebrated by the Mizo community. Christian-majority communities such as the Naga, Kuki, Mizo, Khasi, and others also mark Christmas as an important collective occasion. In addition, some cultural events take the form of annual meets—particularly among Naga communities—or social gatherings organized by the Meitei community.

These festivals occupy a central place in the social life of the communities. They are often organized by student organizations or their affiliated wings, with financial contributions coming from community members. Logistical support, however, is typically mobilized through political and social networks. Events are held in venues such as stadiums, seminar halls, and state bhawans, access to which is facilitated through contacts with members of parliament, bureaucrats, university student councils, or officials of state bhawans.

Campus-based Northeast Cultural Events

Students constitute a significant proportion of migrants from the Northeast, and universities in Delhi host students from across India for higher education. Together, these factors make university campuses important sites for implementing policies and initiatives recommended by the Bezbaruah Committee. While students from relatively privileged backgrounds have been coming to Delhi for decades—as reflected in the long-standing presence of Northeast student associations—their numbers have increased significantly over time, alongside changes in their social backgrounds and aspirations.

In the late 2000s, as incidents of racism against Northeast students became more frequent and social activists began to mobilize around these issues, several colleges in Delhi University with substantial Northeast student populations established Northeast societies. These societies, composed entirely of Northeast students, functioned through elected councils and organized activities such as freshers’ parties, orientation programmes, and Northeast festivals.

Unlike ethnic or tribal student unions, which primarily connect students from specific communities, these campus-based Northeast societies create an additional layer of cross-regional connectedness. This categorical network helps reproduce a sense of “Northeast” commonness through organized activities such as Northeast festivals, sports days, and academic lectures. The festivals themselves bring together dance, dress, food, and collective participation. Significantly, these occasions often serve as the first point of exposure to the region’s internal diversity for many students. For instance, a student from Arunachal Pradesh may never have visited Nagaland or Mizoram or attended festivals of other Northeastern communities. Northeast student societies thus enable students—both from the region and beyond—to encounter this diversity, reinforcing a shared sense of Northeast identity and interconnection.

Northeast Festival

When the Bezbaruah Committee recommended organizing Northeast festivals as a means of “mainstreaming” the region, it emphasized cultural forms such as festivals, dance, dress, music, and handicrafts. These festivals typically comprise two broad aesthetic registers. The first draws on what are presented as traditional forms—tribal and folk dances, customary attire, and songs. The second highlights more recent cultural expressions from the region, including K-pop–inspired performances, rock music, fashion shows, and related popular forms. Together, these elements form the backbone of Northeast festivals, whether large-scale public events or campus-based celebrations.

The central objective of the Northeast Festival is to enhance the visibility of the Northeast and its constituent societies within the national cultural imagination. Initially funded and organized by the Union Ministry of Development of the North Eastern Region (MoDoNER), the festival was held for the first time in 2013. The festival attracts a wide range of participants and attendees, including singers, dancers, musicians, bands, fashion designers, intellectuals, and political figures.

In addition to stage performances, the festival features exhibitions and stalls showcasing handicrafts and cuisines from across the Northeast. Based on my fieldwork observations, the primary audience at these events consists largely of middle-class youth and students, reflecting the festival’s orientation toward a young, urban public curious about the region.

Irregular Cultural Events

Religion and culture are deeply intertwined, and this connection is central to recent cultural initiatives focused on the Northeast. The Union Ministry of Culture, often in collaboration with the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts (IGNCA), has organized events such as Ishan Manthan and Ashtalakshmi Mahotsav (2022), which foreground themes of ancient cultural linkages and indigenous religious traditions in the region. These representations are frequently framed through Hindu—and occasionally Buddhist—idioms, while other religious traditions, particularly Christianity and Islam, are ignored. This selective emphasis points toward an emerging religious imagination of the Northeast.

Ishan Manthan: Brainstorming the Northeast was organized by the Union Ministry of Culture in association with Pragya Pravah, an RSS-affiliated think tank, and hosted at the IGNCA. The programme combined cultural performances, exhibitions of crafts and regional cuisines, and panel discussions on history, colonialism, “lost cultural connections,” and indigenous religions. The Ashtalakshmi Mahotsav (2025) showcased the region's rich textiles, handicrafts, tourism potential, GI products, and cultural heritage, featuring investor roundtables, fashion shows, and cultural performances to foster development and integration

Mixed Cultural Events

Mixed events, in which the Northeast appears merely as one component—such as the Republic Day parade or broader tribal fairs—do not centre the region, but instead subsume it within a larger national or pan-tribal cultural framework.

Therefore, we can see that although many Northeast cultural celebrations in Indian metropolitan cities initially emerged as responses to racism, they have since come to signify much more. These events now function as sites for claiming and negotiating public space—particularly by Northeast students on university campuses—while simultaneously enabling new, and often contested, state-led imaginations of the region.