Study of Ethnic Tolerance and Cultural Interaction (Cases from Sikkim and West Bengal)

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Diversity of Indian culture and society is at the same time celebrated and considered as threatening to the causes of national integration and communal harmony. Despite occasional incidents of destabilizing activities, which are sometimes violent, majority of the Indian population with their distinct cultural ethos and customs have portrayed an amazing sense of resilience in maintaining mutual respect and tolerance without compromising their distinct cultural and religious identities. This has made India a great nation retaining its multicultural and multi-religious tag without any threat to its sovereignty and nationhood. What makes an Indian mind so tolerant is an interesting area of study that demands multidisciplinary research. The Anthropological Survey of India, a premier research institution on People of India, has not only tried to fulfil this mission of multidisciplinary research, but has realized its importance in understanding interethnic relations in a multicultural situation. In order to understand interethnic relations, the Survey had undertaken a research project on "Study of Syncretism in India: Multi-disciplinary Approach", of which the present volume is a part.

Syncretism as a concept is considered as a process of multiculturalism that signifies interaction between different faiths and socio-religious groups that helps create a situation where the participating groups find themselves comfortable in each other's company and tend to share a common socio-cultural environment with mutual honour, integrity and trust. This process is mutually interchangeable and is not exclusively one-sided or a fixed goal oriented, as the result of such interaction does not depend on any single factor. India is particularly rich with institutions that are highly syncretic in nature, which put behind individual idiosyncrasies in favour of mutual respect and tolerance.

The chapters in this volume address the issues of ethnic tolerance, attitudes and identities in multicultural settings in two states of India, Sikkim and West Bengal. Intensive filed research was undertaken among the Lepcha of Sikkim and at the Mazar of Gazibaba to show mutual respect and tolerance between culturally and religiously diverse groups of people. Senior scholars across disciplines have contributed to the chapters in this volume with their deep insight into the issues referred to above. I congratulate them for their honest effort in bringing to light some of the most intriguing aspects of interethnic relations. The message that this volume gives is that people and their cultures may be different on many counts, but they are capable of pushing aside these differences to respect each other's views, wisdom and freedom of choice.

Ethnicity refers to a collectivity of groups of individuals who share similar cultural and/or biological characteristics. Culturally it implies that those people share social norms, values, beliefs etc. developed through social interactions. All these lead to social bondages strong enough to form ethnic identity for each group and to maintain it at any cost against all odds.

The ethnic conflict is a global phenomenon of the contemporary world. No country is free from this dangerous virus which is spreading by leaps and bounds as the time passes on. Ethnic hostility, discrimination, exclusion etc. are the indicators or consequences of ethnic conflicts. What is witnessed worldwide is societal aggression even to the extent of total annihilation of indigenous people as the extreme forms and denial of societal rights and opportunities to such people or use of derogatory languages as less violent means.

India is a land of diverse culture; this is the predominant characteristics for which the people of the country should feel proud. But this cultural diversity of India may be the cause of concern and anxiety for its various consequences. There is no shadow of doubt that the richness of these diversities is the out- come of collective contributions of large number of social groups, communities and cultural elements, diverse thoughts, ideas, faiths, practices, creative excellence, and collective wisdom and above all mutual sharing of each others environmental and socioreligious ethos and processes, which have made the Indian cultural dynamic and unique.

Historically people of India at the primordial level have shown allegiance and reverence towards all faiths, irrespective of the concept or institutional recognition; thus large number of folk deities, cults, and faiths have coexisted with the mainstream beliefs. The concept of Syncretism essentially in its reality is trying to discover that the mind of the people, in which plurality of faith and cultural existence and their relevance is not only a fact but it is also the essential quest of man to find out linkages of unity among the people.

**Contents and Sample Pages**