Wishing our readers and well-wishers a Happy Rongali ... - Assam.Org

Assam Society of America :: April 2006Rongali Bihu in the Twin CitiesIf we had no winter, spring would not be sopleasant..." goes a famous saying. This cannotbe more apt for us living in the northstar state of Minnesota, home of the Mississippiriver. It is that time of the year whenyou feel like "whistling even when yourshoes are in slush". But fortunately this timethe slush and the snow was long gone andspring has sprung in its most sweetestway.With this the Assamese community ofMinneapolis and St.Paul have celebrated thesoul of our springtime festival with traditionalexuberance and festivity.It is heartening to see the Assamese communitygrowing with every passing year andthis time too we had a few new families addingto the fun to the bihu celebrations. It washeld on the 15th April 2006 at the 'Pointe'downtown St.Paul ( residence of Geeti andPrantor Bora). The renditioning of Sree MoiOxomee by the ladies started our day longbihu celebrations. This was followed by adazzling cultural fare which includedbihugeets, lokageets, modern assamesesongs and dances.- thanks Meghna, Devika,Minti, Nilanjona, Namita, Parvez, Pranabforyour wonderful contributions. Thehusori and the mukoli bihu saw thepartciaption from all our enthusiatic souls.Our young talents also enthralled us withtheir keyboard and flute recitals. Meghna,Devika, Ashmita and Sabriyah- way to go!!.The delightful and traditional bihu treatslike pitha, laru, doi, sira and of course thesumptuous lunch made us indulge to ourhearts content. Thanks to the ladies for preparingall the appetizing assamese dishes.The outdoor games were the crowning gloryin terms of fun and joy. The marble in aspoon race, the tug of war and three leggedrace brought peals of laughter and was enjoyedby all. The kids ( needless to say theadults too!) played the marble in the spoonrace again and again as everybody wantedto be the winner and most importantlywanted the marble too (which was replacedby chocolate malt balls!)With all the games, fun, food and music theday came to an end . As we were headinghome after the fun filled day our five yearold daughter said " I want Bihu to comeagain soon". Yes indeed, we too anticipatewith fondness for the next year's bihu andthat it comes soon for us to indulge in therevelry.By Sabina Zeenat, MNSouthern California Rongali BihuSouthern California Assamese people gatheredto celebrate their dear festival RongaliBihu on 15 th April.It was real fun that day.The get-together started at 4p.m with a potlucksnaks.But it was really a good collectionof snacks. We had starting from Pitha,Laru toChat as snaks. Til Pitha was prepared byDeepa baidew. Not less than 15kinds of snakswere there. After that Drawing competitionfor kids started. For toddlers, we had fancydress competition. It was really awesome, seeinglittle kids in different attires like panditNehru, Texas-cowboy etc. Easter egg hunting wasanother game for kids. We adults had Koni-Juj.Then came main attraction, the cultural show. SouthernCalifornia Kids performed Bihu dance, Oddesseydance, Kuchipudi dance, Gujrati dance and Hindisong medley dance. In a word they were just awesome.Then ladiesperformed chorus.Kuxal Bordoloi andChandan Goswamiperformed soloHusori followed by Mukoli Bihu.And then came dinner. Another potluckwith more than 20 dishes starting frommasor tenga to sandesh as sweetdish,all prepared by ladies of SouthernCalifornia.Assamese songs. DeepankarSonowal was the host of thewhole cultural show and he assistedin Guitar for all thesongs.Last but not least we hadAt around 11pm the get-together wasover. More than 100 people enjoyedBihu that day across the seas.By Sudipta Khound, CAPage 2

Assam Society of America :: April 2006Rongali Bihu 2006 in ColoradoThe Assamese people in Colorado had theopportunity to celebrate Rongali Bihu onApril 15, 2006 at the beautiful home of Jugaland Bonmayuri Kalita in ColoradoSprings amidst a lot of fanfare and gaiety.The daylong program started with traditionalsnacks like doi chira with gur, variouskinds of pitha, narikolor barfi, katanimki etc., courtesy Anima Goswami andSubalita Baruah of Fort Collins. MukoliBihu, in which everyone joined in withgreat enthusiasm, followed. Paban Sarma,Bharat Baruah and Rinku Dewri kept theMukoli Bihu going in full swing, with theirspirited participation in both the dancingand rendering of the dhol. The next itemon the agenda was the delicious lunch,some of the favorites at which wereSagarika’s mutton biryani, Bonmayuri’smutton curry, Reeta Kastner’s chickencurry, Nandini’s maasor tenga, BhaskarDas’s coconut chicken and Ranjan’s specialfish preparation, for which we failedto come up with a name, but was sumptuous.prizes. There were also special prizes forall the children for participating, which leftAbhishek, Jishu and Anoushka all smiles.Jukti Kalita, who was visiting from NewJersey with his son Abhishek, gave awaythe prizes.Lunch was followed by games. Jishu Dasand Subalita Baruah won the first and secondprize in tekeli bhanga. The winners ofthe koni juj were Reeta Kastner and BharatBaruah. Finally Subalita Baruah, followedby Chandan Das in second place, won themusical chair, which was enjoyed by everybody.Ranjan Saikia who was also thecoordinator of the games gave away theNext was the gift exchange program, whichwas a simple and inexpensive way to recapturethe spirit of giving and receivinggifts in Assam on the day of Rongali Bihu.The evening ended in a relaxed mood witha cup of tea, more snacks and a lot of laughterand jokes.This Rongali Bihu witnessed several newadditions to the Assamese community ofColorado. Chandan Das and his family whohave recently relocated from South Dakota,Rajib Das who has arrived from Guwahatito pursue an MBA Degree at the Universityof Denver and last but not the least, littleAnannya Kalita, the four-month-old daughterof Jugal and Bonmayuri Kalita whoseemed to have enjoyed the Bihu festivitiesas much as anyone else, capturingeveryone’s hearts with her cherubic smile.By Nandini Borah Das, ColoradoJishu Das, age 9, of Centennial, Colorado, is a budding entrepreneur; he mademoney selling lemonade on a hot May day to pedestrians and motorists, outside hishome on 5-5-2006.Page 3

Assam Society of America :: April 2006Patricia Rashbrook: to be a motherat the age of 63 : a controversial modernmedical researchA consultant child psychiatrist by professionis to become Britain’s oldest mum at63 by having an IVF treatment abroad. Sheis Patricia Rashbrook from Lewes, EastSussex who has two grown up children byher first marriage. Now she wanted a babywith second husband academic: JohnFarrant, 61.Doctor: Severino Antinori who has causedoutrage with his policy of helping O.A.Pmother, agreed to secretly put her on hiscontroversial IVF course. It is thought sheand Mr. Farrant paid maverick fertility doctor:Severino Antinori up to £50,000 tomake her Britain’s oldest mum. Now sheis seven months pregnant and is due to havea son in two months time.While watching “Question Time” in BBCONE, this Thursday, it amazed me howDavid Dimbleby had to deal with an interestingdebate about this baby business. Becausethose comments from audience werereally amusing such as - “this woman is obviouslyworking through some deep seatedissues: most likely about the way shebrought up her older children but ifshe has regrets she would be betterof concentrating on being a goodgrandmother than on being amother again”.There will always be those whocriticise but the only person whoshould be able to decide on awoman’s right to a baby is the womanherself. Is it worth it? Of course it isnot. After all child is not a product. Althoughit is none of our business but her, as she willbe pushing baby’s pram to collect her old agepension!I have seen one of our family friend: a youngdesperate childless woman and her frustrationwhen she sees Rashbrook and someother sixtysomethings using cash anda cynical doctor to buy a baby.I admire her courage! This is a reallyegotistical move. The pregnancy isall about the mother’s needs and certainlynot about the welfare of thebaby - which should always comefirst. There are thousands of kids inUK desperate for a home, abandonedkids at the Social Services departmentdoomed to spend their life in“care” which I can see cases everydayin and out. May be, their lives could havebeen turned round if adopted or fostered bythis wonderful mum to be – PatriciaRashbrook.I must conclude and respect her decision. Ithink “good on her” ‘Cause when celebritylike Des O’ Connor who became a father laterin life, nobody says a word.By Rini Kakati , LondonRongali Bihu at El Paso, TexasRongali Bihu was celebrated for the first time inEl Paso, TX on April 15 last in Tunna Baruah'sresidence. All the assamese families living in ElPaso, TX and Las Cruces, NM joined the festivities.It was a nice informal gathering of nineassamese staying away from Assam in this bordercity of United States. As it was the first gatheringof all the assamese people staying in thispart, it was a nice chit-chat followed by traditionalJalpan and Bihu-bhat. Overall, it was apleasant gathering and we were very happy tocelebrate the Bihu in El Paso.By SantanuGoswami, TexasPage 5

The Assam-Oxom-Asom DebateSo, the debate is on for the correct phoneticspelling for a new name of the state whetherit should be Asom or Oxom. In this debate,however, it is important to understand theessence so that we are not too much caughtin some non-issues and fail to see the forestbecause of the trees. There are basicallythree main issues to the debate.FIRST Issue: Assam Sahiya Sabha ex PresidentMr. Chandra Prasad Saikia proposed,as recorded in the February 2006 issue ofAssamese magazine, ‘Gariyoshi’, that thename ‘ASSAM’ is a word coined by theBritish during the colonial rule for theirconvenience, and therefore the nameASSAM should be changed.SECOND Issue: Mr. Chandra Prasad Saikiaalso proposed that the name should bechanged to the spelling ASOM suggestingthat is the proper Roman spelling of theAssamese pronunciation of the wordOXOM (O+Dontiyo-XO+ MO).THIRD Issue: Based on the above suggestionfrom Mr. Chandra Prasad Saikia,Assam Government hastily adopted a resolutionto change the name of the state toASOM without discussing the merits of thesuggestion in any democratic manner withany official literary organization or anyother entity.In the following analysis, we will try to seerational of these three issues. .The FIRST issue brings us directly tothe question how the English spellingof the name of ASSAM actually cameto be. Records show that the British firstused the spelling ASHAM in 1590which was later on changed to ASAMand finally to ASSAM. Now the questionis, did the British coined this phoneticspelling ASSAM for their ownconvenience because they could not pronouncethe Assamese spelling OXOM(O+Dontiyo-XO+ MO) or this ASSAMpronunciation was already in vogue outsideAssam in India before the arrivalof the British? From the followinganalysis, it is clearly seen that the lateris the correct situation. The pronunciationASAM or ASHAYM was there invogue outside Assam with the Mugholsduring the Ahom days. This is evident fromthe various treaties of the Mughols and theAhoms. Also, this ‘Assam’ pronunciationwas popular among the Indians outside ofAssam during that time. In order to understandwhy that was so, we will have to knowa little of Assamese vowels sounds in comparisonto the Hindi-Urdu-Sanskrit vowelsounds. There is a basic difference how weAssamese pronounce the letter Hosro-O inwords and how the Hindi-Urdu nonAssamese belt pronounce the same letterHosro-O sound. In Assamese the basicHosro-O sound is invariably pronounced asO as in the English word ‘hot’. Now, inHindi as well as in Sanskrit, the Hosro-Ohas the sound as the U as in the Englishword ‘but’. (Please note that in Sanskrit thisHosro-O is called Hosro-Ah for this reason)This is evident from any Sanskrit orHindi dictionaries. It is also evident fromthe Roman script spelling of the Hindiwords such as ‘Pundit’, ‘Punjab’, ‘Suttee’etc adopted by the British for these Hindiwords with Hosro-O-kar sound. The letterU sounding as in ‘but’ is being used for theHindi Hosro-O sounds. The British listenedcarefully to the local speakers and foundthat is how they pronounce the Hosro-Osound. (Please note the spelling of the wordDalda in Hindi which is actually spelledwith the first vowel as Hosro-O but pronouncedas U as ‘Dulda’). So the Britishalso heard the pronunciation of the nameof the state clearly as ASAM or ASHAMfrom outsiders in Assam, although the localAssamese spelling was OXOM. TheBritish simply used that Indian pronunciationand finally used the English phonemeSS as used in the English words ‘issue’ or‘tissue’ for the S sound in ASSAM. Thismakes perfect sense with the phonetic soundof the name of the state as used by outsidersduring that time. So to answer our basicquestion, the word ASSAM is not a wordsuddenly coined by the British overnight fortheir convenience, but they simply used theproper English phonetic spelling of ASSAMfor the existing Indian pronunciation for theword OXOM. By claiming that the wordASSAM is a British colonial invention, bothMr. C.P Saikia and the Government ofAssam have simply shown that they do nothave proper knowledge of the developmentPage 6Assam Society of America :: April 2006of the spelling ASSAM, and the proposalto change the existing name does not haveany justification at all.Now let us see the claim made by Mr.C.P.Saikia, that the spelling ASOM actuallyrepresents the proper Assamese pronunciationof the words OXOM(O+Dontiyo-XO+ MO). For reasons statedabove, the first vowel A in ASOM simplydoes not represent the Assamese vowelsound of Hosro-O. It represents the soundof U as in the word ‘but’. So with the wordspelling ASOM, people will pronounce iteither as USOM or as ESOM. In all Romancelanguages, the letter S stands for thesound S as in ‘sun’. It is well known nowthat S does not represent the Assamese velarfricative XO sound which is a gutturalkh sound. So the claim made by Mr. Saikiathat the S letter would represent theAssamese ethnic XO sound is simply notcorrect. So we see that Mr. C.P.Saikia aswell as the Assam government is wrong inselecting the spelling ASOM for theAssamese word OXOM (O+XO+MO).They have simply shown that either theyare not familiar with the Assamese phoneticsor they donot care.Now let us come to the THRID issue of theaction of Assam Government in hastilyadopting the wrong suggestion made by Mr.C.P. Saikia. In a democratic country likeIndia, one simply cannot think that such animportant issue of changing the name ofthe state will be taken so lightly without adiscussion or debate with any official literaryorganizations such as the SahityaSabhas or any other entity. This simplyshows a mockery of Indian democracy, andconcerned citizens should strongly voiceagainst such dilution of democratic valuesin the biggest democracy in the world.By Rajen Barua, Houston, Texas

GNU/Linux Users Group - AssamAssam Society of America :: April 2006Some of us must have heard about the GNU/Linux operating system The GNU Projectwas launched in 1984 to develop a completeUNIX like operating system. The wordGNU ( pronounced guh-noo, like canoe ) isa recursive acronym for “GNU's NotUNIX”.The GNU/Linux Users Groups, as youwould have assumed, consists mostly ofpeople using the GNU/Linux operating system.They in turn preserve, protect and promotethe freedom of using freesoftware as a whole. '' Free software''is a matter of liberty, notprice. To understand the concept,you should think of ``free'' as in``free speech,'' not as in ``freebeer.'' . It is a matter of the users'freedom to run, copy, distribute,study, change and improve thesoftware. The freedom to use aprogram means the freedom forany kind of person or organizationto use it on any kind of computersystem, for any kind ofoverall job, and without being required tocommunicate subsequently with the developeror any other specific entity.The GNU/Linux operating system or Linuxas a whole is not command line based aswas used to be in bygone days. People arestill unaware of this fact and as such theyare reluctant to use GNU/Linux as the operatingsystems in their desktops. Timeshave changed and so has the GNU/Linuxoperating system. Cute user friendly GUI'shave been developed in the recent times tocater the needs of the users.Now the question arises how do we keep intouch with the recent developments in thefield of Linux, share your experiences withit and also how to find solutions to the problemswhile you are still in the learning phase.Search engines are always there for help butthe best way of getting answers to specificquestions and discuss them, is through thehelp of the mailing list wherein you interactwith the group members who may have alreadyfaced the same problem and so canoffer you a detailed solution. A mailing listis a collection of names and addresses usedby an individual or an organization to sendmaterial to multiple recipients. It's a placewhere you can post your queries irrespectiveof how simple it is. And for a noviceuser that's quiet handy. The very usefulnessof the mailing list is that when the query getsreplied all the members of the group are alsobenefited by the answer. As a result you notonly educate yourself but also educate thegroup. You can share knowledge with thehelp of the mailing list. That's the power ofit.There exists many mailing list so why createanother, to add one to the ever growingmess? Requirement differs from place toplace and so are the problems.The bigger the number of people in thegroup the better would be the service thatwould be rendered by it's fellow mates. Butthe very important of all this is that the groupmembers should be active rather than beingpassive to the recent activities.The GNU/Linux Users Group -Assam (http://assam-glug.org ) first came into beingon 13th March 2006. The site has beenstarted with a mission to ultimately exposethe people of Assam to free software especiallyGNU/Linux so that they can reap thebenefits of free software.It is possible that quiet a few people ofAssam are using free software but they maynot have an opportunity to be in touch witheach other. If through this site all this peoplecan come together then we can use this freesoftware more effectively and with our increasingpassion the word will spread to ourfriends and so on. Thus more and morepeople will get to know about the free softwareand will be curious to try it out. Henceif a mailing list exists wherein they can gettheir queries cleared they will be comfortableusing it with long term benefits as theywill start realizing the power of free softwaree.g. you can customize your systemto work to suite your needs and interest.User's interested in free software and theGNU/Linux are most welcome to join ourgroup and share their knowledge. To participatein the discussions, to post relevantqueries and solutions one needs to be amember of the mailing list. You can easilyjoin the mailing list by going on the followingurl,http://mm.assam-glug.org/mailman/listinfo/assamTo sum up, the purpose of the site being intoexistence, is to bring all GNU/Linux usersof Assam within one group so that we canshare our thoughts with each other. This isjust a beginning which we hope will takeoff in making a great impact on the peopleusing GNU/Linux.By Prasanta Baruah.(Mr Barua is working at HBCSE, TIFR,Mumbai. He is working in the field ofknowledge management, developing freesoftware using Python and Zope.)Page 7

This is anOfficial Publication ofAssam Society of America, USAThe ASA Newsletter is published monthly. Sanjib Bhuyan, NJ, on behalf of Assam Society of America, has published this issue of ASA newsletter.The editors are Satyam Bhuyan (Ames, Iowa), Ganesh Bora (Lake Alfred, Florida), Prasenjit Chetia (Atlanta, Georgia), Babul Gogoi (New Delhi,India), Jugal Kalita (Colorado Springs, Colorado, Co-Editor-In-Chief), Vavani Sarmah (Secane, Pennsylvania), Rini Kakati (London, UK), UmeshSharma (Cambridge, Massachusetts), Alpana Sarangapani (Co-Editor-In-Chief, Houston, Texas), Nandini Borah Das (Centennial, Colorado) andRam Sarangapani (Houston, Texas). The ASA Executive Committee is composed of Sanjib Bhuyan, President (Franklin Park, New Jersey), UtpalBrahma, Vice President (Burlington, New Jersey), Ganesh Bora, General Secretary (Lake Alfred, Florida), Probal Tabhildar (Kendall Park, NewJersey), Mantu Baishya (Omaha, Nebraska), Kedar Bhuyan (Mays Landing, New Jersey), and Sangeeta Duorah (California). Graphic Editor andDesigner: Babul Gogoi.We invite contributors from all over the world. We appreciate your valuable feedback, comments & suggestions, and of course, news from your partof the world for inclusion in the coming editions. Please send your written contributions to asanewsletter@yahoo.com. If you prefer, you can sendyour contributions directly to any of the editors listed above as well. Any contribution must be 750 words or shorter in length. Please include ascanned image of the author. We also request you to submit other pertinent photographs if possible.Assam Society of AmericaPO Box 254Mays LandingNJ 08330USA