Language is a social event which may be considered as a tool of social control. In a state like Tripura in India where an aboriginal communities called Borok has been living since thousand years. Borok comprises of eight major indigenous communities having similar culture and life styles. They are also recognized as the Borok Race. These communities are Tripuri, Reang, Jamatia, Noatia, Murasing, Koloi, Rupini and Uchoi. Ethnically they are mainly Mongoloids.
All these groups have a common language called Kokborok. The term Kokborok is a compound of two main words; ‘Kok’ which means language and ‘Borok’ meaning human. So the combination of these words
means ‘language of human being’. However, the second word is used to denote the Borok people. The Boroks are with an approximate population of 15 lakh settled mainly in Tripura and in the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh. They are also found in some of the North-Eastern state of India, Myanmar and Nepal.
Kokborok has eight major dialects and each of these dialects has been named on the basis of a particular community. The dialects are:
1. Debbarma (Puran Tripuri)
2. Reang (Bru)
3.Jamatia
4. Noatia (New Tripuri)
5. Murasing
6. Uchoi.
7. Koloi and
8. Rupini.
There are different opinions regarding the number of sub-dialect of the above-mentioned eight dialect of Kokborok. The sub-dialect may be more familiar as clan and number of clan of each dialect have a distinct identity. Some are based on the name of a famous person and some are on skillfulness of the particular group of people like the handicraft, waving, sweet tune, and good speakers etc. The number of sub-dialect of Kokborok is as follows:
1. Debbarma - 11 sub-dialects
2. Reang – 17 sub-dialects
3. Jamatia -03 sub-dialects
4. Noatia – 21 sub-dialects
5. Murasing -09 sub-dialects
6. Uchoi – 06 sub-dialects
7. Koloi – 08 sub-dialects and
8. Rupini -11 sub-dialects
Kokborok had a script called Koloma. As the days passed it lost its own script. Later on the Borok communities started writing their language using Bangla script. But again, to them Bangla script was not suitable for their language. The educated Borok started searching for a suitable script with scientific basis to write their language. They found that Roman is the most scientific script for their mother tongue. Therefore 90% of the Borok people now have started writing Kokborok in Roman script. However, a very negligible percentage of people are using Bengali script for Kokborok.
In India, Kokborok now is a distinct language and is recognized by the Tripura government as a state language as well as official language along with Bangla. The language is also widely used in both print media and mass media.
Source: Kokborok: A Major Tribal Language of Tripura (Faijul Hoque)
Written by Neeti Chakma
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