Cherrapunjee reverts to old name ‘Sohra’

Special Report Vol. 3 Issue No. 31

July 16-31, 2007

Cherrapunjee reverts to old name ‘Sohra’

Cherrapunjee, which features in the Guinness Book of Records as the place with the highest rainfall in a calendar year, will now be known by its local name of Sohra.
The original name of this quaint town in Meghalaya, which is very popular with domestic and foreign tourists, was Sohra but this could not be pronounced by India’s former British rulers, who corrupted it to Cherra.

Shortly after the British made Sohra their regional headquarters in the 1830s, the Bengali term punjo, which means a cluster, was added to the name to make it Cherrapunjee.

Following representations from the ‘syiem’ (chieftain) of Sohra and the influential Khasi Students Union (KSU), the state government’s general administration department last week made a decision to revert to the old name.

Officials of the department said that the change in nomenclature would be notified soon. The move has also been welcomed by historians and social activists.

Though the town, located about 55 km from the state capital, holds several records for rains – including the highest rainfall in a calendar year (22,987 mm or 905 inches during August 1860-July 1861) and highest rainfall in a year (24,553 mm or 966 inches in 1974) and highest rainfall in a day (1,563 mm or 61 inches on June 16, 1995) – it often faces water shortages during winters.

This phenomenon has led to Sohra being referred to as a ‘wet desert’ and experts say this is due to large-scale felling of trees, erosion, and unscientific coal mining in nearby areas.

The town is situated at the top of a plateau overlooking the plains of Sylhet district in Bangladesh. Experts say the deep gorges around the town help funnel and converge rain-bearing clouds, leading to the unusually heavy precipitation.

At a height of nearly 1,300 metres above sea level, Sohra receives the full brunt of the North-east monsoon from the Bay of Bengal. The heavily laden clouds offload their burden directly over high plateaus in the southern Khasi Hills, as a result of which the town gets the maximum rainfall in the region.

In recent years, Sohra lost its position as the world’s wettest place to nearby Mawsynram and then to Waialeale Crater in Hawaii. But locals point out that the rainfall in Hawaii was recorded over a much larger area than in Sohra, thereby giving it an unfair advantage.

Besides the rains, Sohra and its nearby areas have other tourist attractions, like the majestic Nohkalikai Falls, rare crowned monoliths and the old cremation ground of tribal chiefs at Pomsohmen stream.

One year of trade through Nathu La uninspiring: China
Describing as ‘uninspiring’ the much-hyped reopening of Sino-India border trade via the strategic Nathu La pass during the past one year, the official Chinese media has said India should lift ‘unilateral restrictions’ to facilitate enhanced business links.

The border trade through the Himalayan Nathu La Pass between China and India has been ‘uninspiring’ since the historic trade route re-opened just a year ago after 44 years of closure due to border conflict, the state media commented.

“China and India re-started border trade on July 6 last year through the Nathu La Pass, which sits 4,545 metres above sea level and is wedged between Yadong County of Tibet’s Xigaze Prefecture and ‘India’s Sikkim state,” the official Xinhua news agency reported.

The two sides also decided to open two border trade markets – the Renqinggang market in Yadong and Changgu mart in Sikkim, which the two countries have agreed will be open between June and September every year. “But figures show that the border trade has been uninspiring since the re-opening,” head of the Customs of Lhasa, capital of southwest China’s Tibet Autonomous Region, Zhang Weidong commented.

China’s Renqinggang market received 574 Indian traders last year while 1,217 Chinese traders went to India’s Changgu mart during the period, statistics from the Commerce Bureau of Yadong County said.

The trade volume reached about 1.49 million yuan (196,000 US dollars), including 1.04 million yuan of exports and 4,50,000 yuan of imports, statistics show.

Only 11 motor vehicles and 56 traders from the Chinese side went through the Pass and 12 motor vehicles and 38 traders from the Indian side crossed the Pass on July 2, which was nevertheless described as ‘the busiest’ day by local officials since the re-opening.

A senior official in Tibet said just a month after the re-opening of the Pass that the trade was running at a ‘low level’ and was ‘not ideal’ because ‘India has unilaterally imposed restrictions on trade through Nathu La.’

India authorises the export of only 29 items to China, and a mere 15 items are permitted to enter the Indian market from China, vice chairman of the Tibet Autonomous Region, Hao Peng said.

Such trade restrictions still exist today, local officials and traders in Yadong said, urging New Delhi to take actions.

In a move to change the situation, the two sides have agreed that the trade through the Pass this year should begin a month earlier (from May 1) than last year and will continue until November 30 compared with last year’s September 28.

“The two sides hope to enlarge the trade volume by increasing the duration of trade by three months,” director of the Commerce Bureau of Yadong County, Li Ping said.

Analysts and officials in Tibet say that it is still too early to conclude whether or not the re-opening of the Pass has been successful just by looking at trade volume figures.

“The re-opening of the Pass and the trade volume achieved within just a year are at least a good start for the two sides, considering the trade route had once been closed down for 44 years,” said Gao Shangde, deputy director of the Tibet Regional Commerce Department.

He said Indian commerce authorities and Sikkim state are upgrading the roads leading to the border trade mart and the infrastructure of the mart in an effort to boost trade. “We still need time for growth of border trade.”

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