*The Word That Changed Everything

*Every school has its moments of prid and moments of shame.
Mine came on the 15th of August.
That morning, one of my classmates walked in dressed as a lady Naga freedom fighter. Instead of admiration, we chose mockery. We bluntly and shamelessly targeted her:
“You were asked to represent freedom fighters in their attire… But you seem to be a total blockhead, as your attire suits more a joker in the circus than a heroic figure.”
The more her eyes welled up with tears and her head sank in disappointment, the more electrified we felt. We did not care to listen even for a second, because listening to another’s say is the most laborious of all acts.

A Word That Pierced Through

Hours later, when all the participants were anxiously waiting for results, my mother quietly came up to me.
“Who is that girl?” she asked, pointing toward the same girl we had just finished humiliating.
“Is she your classmate? How differently she thinks. Her traditional dress unearths the gatha of a lesser-heard but true saintly fighter—Our Rani Maa.”
Our.
The word penetrated deep into my psyche and froze me for a moment.
I almost stuttered:
“Our…? Do you know whom she portrays in this attire?”
My mother, without a moment’s pause, replied proudly:
“I, too, had forgotten her, but thanks to this girl, she enlivened my hazy past and the history of almost an era. She is actually in the avatar of Rani Gaidinliu, a lioness hailing from Manipur, whose one call for action sent shudders down the Britishers.”

The Forgotten Lioness

As I listened, Maa pointed out details with childlike curiosity:
“Beta… come, come… just look at your classmate. Rani Gaidinliu would exactly wear the same dress—the traditional Naga skirt and the shawl printed with local Naga myths and legends. And her speciality was the dark sunglasses that became inseparably tied to her identity.”
I listened to her attentively while intermittently looking at the girl—now with a gaze cleansed of ignorance.
Soon, I asked, almost helplessly:
“But what makes her so special that you said Our Rani Maa?”
My mother’s reply came softened with nostalgia, but strengthened with pride:
“I said ‘Our’ because Rani Gaidinliu’s blessings run in the veins of my family. I have felt the tenderness of her palms as a child. My grandmother was one of the soldiers in her gang of patriots. Rani Gaidinliu, along with her people, raised arms against the Britishers and suffered inhumanely to free the Zeliangrong community and her region from brutal oppression.”
“She was living destruction for the evil and a divine incarnation for the oppressed. Her veer gaatha moved Nehru so deeply that he exclaimed:
‘The Rani of the plains is Laxmibai, but the Rani of the mountains is Rani Gaidinliu.’”

The Weight of Realisation

Her vivid narration extinguished the arrogance within me.
It deadened my ignorance, my prejudice, my blind conformity.
How shamelessly I had laughed at her courage.
While we chose the familiar—Gandhi, Nehru, Savarkar—
She chose what history had neglected.
She brought to light what longed for expression beneath the fog of time.
Her act, which we had mocked, was in truth an act of awakening.

Honouring the Unheard

Just like my classmate, Nalanda Literature Festival is set to celebrate the life and legacy of such patriotic warriors—those whose stories still tremble beneath silence, those for whom even now, words have not been rightly etched. Perhaps history is not forgotten because heroes disappear. Perhaps it is forgotten because we never looked for them. But sometimes, it takes just one child— dressed in courage, conviction, and an old Naga skirt—to remind us of the heroes we owe our freedom to.