Page 83 - Changing Living Spaces

Living Spaces of Ethnic Groups and their Relationship with the Ecological Environment

district, the proportion of Muslim immigrants from East Bengal, or pres-
ent-day Bangladesh, is relatively low, while it is higher in Nagaon district
and Kamrup district. Each district is inhabited by many ethnic groups:
indigenous and immigrant, tribal and nontribal, and Hindu and Muslim.
Some villages are inhabited by a single group, while others are inhabited
by multiple groups. In the latter villages, the dominant group was identi-
fied to make distribution maps.
Primary data were collected through an oral survey and field observa-
tions conducted in three districts between 2008 and 2019 to identify the
dominant groups in the villages and their livelihood patterns. The 2011
Census Village Directory was also used as a secondary source to analyse
the location and structure of villages in the region (Asada 2013). This da-
tabase contains information on characteristics such as code, name, area,
number of households, population, facilities, and land use.

Ecological Environment and Living Spaces of Different
Ethnic Groups

Location of Villages by Ethnic Group in the Lakhimpur District
First, information on the predominant ethnic groups from 981 villages in
Lakhimpur district was obtained from the oral survey. The number of vil-
lages by ethnic group was as follows: mixed groups (mainly the Asamiyas)
in 348 villages (35 percent); the Mishings, 235 (24 percent); the Ahoms,
145 (15 percent); the Ex-Tea labour tribe, 64 (7 percent); the Bengalis, 43 (4
percent); the Kacharis, 41 (4 percent); the Nepalis, 23 (2 percent); and oth-
ers 82 (8 percent). Although the number of villages with mixed groups is
the largest, most groups live separately from other groups and are clus-
tered in specific areas within the district. The location of these villages
provides information about the settlement pattern of ethnic groups (fig-
ure 2a). A comparison between their location and the ecological classi-
fication map (figure 2b) helped clarify the relationship between ethnic-
ity and ecological environment. For example, the villages of the Nepali
and Ex-Tea labour tribe are located near the piedmont zone bordering
Arunachal Pradesh, while the villages of the Mishing and Kachari are lo-
cated in the floodplains and river islands of the Brahmaputra and its trib-
utary Subansiri. The Ahom and Bengali villages are not located in these
ecological zones, but mostly in the lowland zone near national highways
and towns.

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