Activities of Department of History

Title: - The Reification of the Neo-Vaishnavism and the space of the Satras in Post-industrial society: An Analysis with special reference to the Aunaiti Sattra (2018).
Start Date - 2018-01-01   End Date - 2018-11-12   Duration - 300 days.
Nature of the Activity: - Research Project
Summary: -
A Department Research Project was done on 'The Reification of the Neo-Vaishnavism and the Space of the Satras in Post-Industrial Society: an analysis with special reference to the Auniati Satra (Kaliapani Branch, Jorhat)' was done by Dr. Bikash Nath who is one of the faculty member of the department and presently the head of the department.

The project work in the neighbouring area of our institution was started with a study over the branch of the Aunaiti Sattra one of the famous sattras of the Brhma Samhati . The major objective we arranged in our study how far the changes in the sphere of the society through the modern ideas has been impacting the organization of the sattra in fundamental way. We also tried to look in to the changing attitude of the sattra institutions like the branch at Kaliapani of the Aunaiti regarding the beliefs about the different forms of the social institutions. The sattradhikar of the sattra Pitambar Devgoswami very candidly said to us about the changing nature of the organization of the sattra and the steps taken by the Aunaiti sattra in mitigating the principles of the Vaishna faith among the tribal population particularly among the Mishings and how the other powerful religious structure with their huge international networks in terms of procuring money and power for influencing the backward and poor communities to their influence. The successive government has taken up steps to give several amenities to the sattra like the grant of huge acre of land to establish the branch where the late Prime Minister Atal Bihari Bajpayee played an important role.The famous entrprenuers like Hemendra Prasad Boruah and Prasanna Kumar Dutta gave immense contribution in building some of the specific centres of activity in the sattra premise. We interviewed the organizers at different level of their experiences and their response to the changing routes of the modernity .Above all , their interaction revealed some of the important points of the change in perspective regarding the age-old beliefs in the social interactions and one of the major aspects of that   important   change has been their willingness to accept the rational justification of the present modern age. Although ,the basic structure of functioning of the institution in its internal and external activities have been remained same with the earlier methods of functioning but there have come up some fundamental changes in this respect which has defined the core of the institutional relevance of the sattra in a new way. It also became clear through our interactions with the organizers of the institution how natural calamities like flood have compelled to shift their activities in the summer to this branch at Kaliapani.