Guwahati: 132 converted Christian Tiwa people returned to the Sanatan Dharma on February 27 at a religious event held in Tiwa Shong village in the Jagiroad area of Morigaon district in the middle of Assam.
The ‘Ghar Wapsi’ ceremony was held under the initiative of Goba Deoraja Raj Parishad, which is the present-day monarchy of the Tiwa tribal community.
A religious function wherein the family members of the converted Christians returned to Sanatan Dharma.
The general secretary of Goba Deoraja Raj Parishad, Jur Singh Bordoloi, said, “there are around 1100 families who had converted to Christianity due various external reasons. Now they have decided to return to Sanatan Dharma to continue the age-old Tiwa customs and traditions.”
He mentioned that these people are willingly returning to their roots and want to continue the Tiwa tribe’s way of living life.
Rupsingh Deuri, a social worker who is working on preserving tribal tradition and culture, said that the Tiwa people are originally Hindus by birth; however, few of their forefathers and fathers adopted Christianity due to their economic conditions and lack of education.
The missionaries take advantage of the poor economic conditions of the tribal people. But now, the scenario has changed, and tribal people benefit from the government schemes. Now they don’t need to convert to other religions for their children’s education and a few hundred Rupees, Deori added.
The Gobha Deoraja Raj Parishad has also worked on providing ration cards to these tribal people so that they can get the benefits of the Government schemes.
It should be mentioned that European missionaries targeted the tribal population of Assam and Arunachal Pradesh to convert to Christianity for a long period. In October 2022, 7 German missionaries were detained by Assam police from Kaziranga who were attending conversion meets on tourist visas flaunting the visa norms.
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