Meitei language


Meitei, is a Tibeto-Burman language of northeast India. It is the official language and the lingua franca of Manipur and an additional official language in four districts of Assam. It is one of the constitutionally scheduled official languages of the Indian Republic. Meitei is the most widely-spoken Tibeto-Burman language of India and the third most widely spoken language of northeast India after Assamese and Bengali.
There are million Meitei native speakers in India according to the 2011 census, million of whom are found in the state of Manipur, where they represent the majority of its population. There are smaller communities in neighbouring Indian states, such as Assam, [|Tripura], [|Nagaland], and elsewhere in the country. The language is also spoken by smaller groups in neighbouring Myanmar and Bangladesh.
Meitei and Gujarati jointly hold the third place among the fastest growing languages of India, following Hindi and Kashmiri.
Meitei is not endangered: its status has been assessed as safe by Ethnologue. However, it is considered vulnerable by UNESCO.
The Manipuri language is associated with the Ningthouja dynasty, the Khuman dynasty, the Moirangs, the Angoms, the Luwangs, the Chengleis, and the Khaba-Nganbas. Each had their respective distinct dialects and were politically independent from one another. Later, all of them fell under the dominion of the Ningthouja dynasty, changing their status of being independent "ethnicities" into those of "clans" of the collective Meitei community. The Ningthouja dialect was predominant, and received heavy influences from the speech forms of the other groups.
Meitei is one of the advanced literary languages recognised by Sahitya Akademi, India's National Academy of Letters.

Classification

Meitei belongs to the Tibeto-Burman branch of the Sino-Tibetan languages.
During the 19th and 20th centuries, different linguists tried to assign Meitei to various sub-groups. Early classifier George Abraham Grierson put it in Kuki-Chin, Vegelin and Voegelin in Kuki-Chin-Naga, and Benedict in Kuki-Naga. Robbins Burling has suggested that Meitei belongs to none of those groups. Current academic consensus agrees with James Matisoff in placing Manipuri in its own subdivision of the Kamarupan group—a geographic rather than a genetic grouping. However, some still consider Meitei to be a member of the Kuki-Chin-Naga branch.

History

The Meitei language has existed for at least 2000 years.
According to linguist Suniti Kumar Chatterjee, the ancient Meitei literature dates back to 1500 to 2000 years before present.

First Millennium CE

The earliest known Meitei language compositions is the ritual song Ougri, which was used in religious and coronation ceremonies of Kangleipak. It may have existed before the Common Era. Numit Kappa, a religious epic that tells the tale of how the night was divided from the day, was also composed in the first century.
Poireiton Khunthok is a 3rd-century narrative work describing the establishment of a colony in Kangleipak by a group of immigrants led by Poireiton, the younger brother of the god of the underworld.
The Yumbanlol, a copper plate manuscript was composed in the 6th century or 7th century CE for the royal family of Kangleipak. It is a rare work of dharmashastra, covering sexuality, the relationships between husbands and wives, and instructions on how to run a household.
The Khencho, an early Meitei work of poetry was composed by the beginning of the 7th century CE. Although it is obscure and unintelligible to present-day Meiteis, it is still recited as part of the Lai Haraoba festival.
One of the best-preserved early Meitei language epigraphic records is a copper plate inscription dating to the reign of King Khongtekcha. During the same time period, Akoijam Tombi composed the Panthoibi Khonggul, an account of the romantic adventures of the deified Meitei princess Panthoibi.

Second Millennium CE

In 1100 CE, a written constitution,, was finalised by King Loiyumba of Kangleipak. It was a codification of the proto-constitution drafted by King Naophangba in 429 CE.
Before 1675 CE, the Meitei language experienced no significant influence from any other languages. Beginning in the late 17th century, Hindu influence on Meitei culture increased, and the Meitei language experienced some influences from other languages, on its phonology, morphology, syntax and semantics. At the same time, the Hinduised King Pamheiba ordered that the Meitei script be replaced by the Bengali-Assamese script.
File:ANDRO INSCRIBED STONE.jpg|thumb|An 1822 CE stone recording a royal decree attributed to King Jai Singh, erected at Andro, Imphal East, Manipur
In 1725 CE, Pamheiba wrote Parikshit, possibly the first piece of Meitei-language Hindu literature, based on the story of the eponymous king Parikshit of the Mahabharata.

Geographical distribution

The majority of Meitei speakers, about 1.5 million live in the Indian state of Manupur. Meitei is the official language of the Government of Manipur as well as its lingua franca.
There are nearly 170,000 Meitei-speakers in Assam, mainly in the Barak Valley, where it is the third most commonly used language after Bengali and Hindi. Manipuri is also spoken by about 9500 people in Nagaland, in communities such as Dimapur, Kohima, Peren and Phek. Meitei is a second language for various Naga and Kuki-Chin ethnic groups.
There are around 15,000 Meitei speakers in Bangladesh mainly are in the districts of Sylhet, Moulvibazar, Sunamganj and Habiganj in the Sylhet Division of Bangladesh. In the past, there was a Meitei speaking population in Dhaka, Mymensingh and Comilla also. Manipuri is used as a second language by the Bishnupriya Manipuri people.
[|Myanmar] has a significant Meitei speaking population in the states of Kachin and Shan and the regions of Yangon, Sagaing, and Ayeyarwady, among others.

Name

According to the Ethnologue, the alternative names of Meitei language are Kathe, Kathi, Manipuri, Meetei, Meeteilon, Meiteilon, Meiteiron, Meithe, Meithei, Menipuri, Mitei, Mithe, Ponna.
The name Meitei or its alternate spelling Meithei is preferred by many native speakers of Meitei over Manipuri. The term is derived from the Meitei word for the language Meitheirón. Meithei may be a compound from mí 'man' + they 'separate'. This term is used by most Western linguistic scholarship. Meitei scholars use the term Meitei when writing in English and the term Meitheirón when writing in Meitei. Chelliah notes that the Meitei spelling has replaced the earlier Meithei spelling.
The language is also referred to by the loconym Manipuri. The term is derived from the name of the state of Manipur. Manipuri is the official name of the language for the Indian government and is used by government institutions and non-Meitei authors. The term Manipuri is also used to refer to the different languages of Manipur and to the people. Additionally, Manipuri, being a loconym, can refer to anything pertaining to the Manipur state.
Speakers of Meitei language are known as "Kathe" by the Burmese people, "Moglie" or "Mekhlee" by the people of Cachar, Assam and "Cassay" by the Shan people and the other peoples living in the east of the Ningthee River. "Ponna" is the Burmese term used to refer to the Meiteis living inside Burma.

Dialects

The Meitei language exhibits a degree of regional variation; however, in recent years the broadening of communication, as well as intermarriage, has caused the dialectal differences to become relatively insignificant. The only exceptions to this occurrence are the speech differences of the dialects found in Tripura, Bangladesh and Myanmar. The exact number of dialects of Meitei is unknown.
The three main dialects of Meitei are: Meitei proper, Loi and Pangal. Differences between these dialects are primarily characterised by the extensions of new sounds and tonal shifts. Meitei proper is considered to be the standard variety—and is viewed as more dynamic than the other two dialects. The brief table below compares some words in these three dialects:
Standard MeiteiLoiPangalEnglish translation
chaabachaapachaabato eat
kappakapmakappato weep
saabibasaapipasaabibato make
thambathampathambato put
chuppibachuppipachuppibato kiss

Devi compares the Imphal, Andro, Koutruk, and Kakching dialects of Meitei.

Status

Meitei is the sole official language of the Government of Manipur, and has been an official language of India since 1992.
Meitei language was the court language of the historic Manipur Kingdom, and before it merged into the Indian Republic. The Sahitya Akademi, India's National Academy of Letters, recognised Meitei as one of the major advanced Indian literary languages in 1972, long before it became an official language in 1992.
In 1950, the Government of India did not include Meitei in its list of 14 official languages. A language movement, spearheaded by organisations including the Manipuri Sahitya Parishad and the All Manipur Students' Union demanded that Meitei be made an official language for more than 40 years, until Meitei was finally added to the Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of India in 1992.
Meitei became an associate official language of Assam in 2024, following several years of effort by the Meitei associate official language movement to protect the identity, history, culture and tradition of Manipuris in Assam.
The Meitei language is one of the 13 official languages of the India used to administer police, armed services, and civil service recruitment exams.
The Press Information Bureau of the Indian Ministry of Information and Broadcasting publishes in 14 languages, including Meitei.