Why the 'Miya Museum' in Assam was sealed 2 days after it opened

The 'Miya Museum', set up in a house allotted under Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (PMAY), in Assam's Goalpara district was sealed and its owner was taken into custody on Tuesday a district official said. The museum was opened to the public on Sunday and was closed following protests protests by BJP leaders over the museum being set up in a PMAY house and inauthentic display of objects as belonging to the 'Miya' community.

The president of the Mia Assam Miya Parishad, Mohor Ali set up the museum on the premises of the house allotted to him under the Prime Minister's housing programme. A team of government officers sealed the museum at Dapkabhita under Lakhiur police station and put up a notice that it has been done on the orders of the deputy commissioner.

The opening of the Museum in a house allotted under the Prime Minister's Awas Yojana led to a controversy with senior BJP leaders demanding its immediate closure. BJP Minority Morcha member Abdur Rahim Gibran had filed a complaint against the setting up of the museum in the house.

Some agricultural implements and fishing equipment, hand towels and checked 'lungis' (sarongs worn by men) are on display as Ali claimed that these are the identity of the 'Miya' community.

In Assam, the word 'Miya' refers to Bengali-speaking migrants whose origin can be traced to Bangladesh.

Ali along with his two minor sons sat on a dharna outside the house demanding the immediate reopening of the museum. "We are displaying objects with which the community identifies itself so that people from other communities can realise that the Miyas are not any different from them", Ali said. The police later took him into custody.

Earlier in the day, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said that such activities by some members of the Miya community posed a threat to the "Assamese identity". "How can they (Miya community) claim that the plough is their identity? It has been used by all farmers in the state for ages. It is only the lungi that they can claim as their own," Sarma said at the sidelines of a programme. Those who have set up the museum will have to answer to an expert committee on what basis the claims were made, he added.

The setting up of a Miya Museum was first proposed by former Congress MLA Sherman Ali Ahmed in 2020. He had written to the director of museums urging for its establishment at the Srimanta Sankardeva Kalakshetra to showcase the culture and heritage of Bengali-speaking Muslims living in the riverine areas of the state. Sarma had rejected Ahmed's proposal.