What does Assam’s moment of unity around Zubeen Garg’s death mean in a time of divisive politics?

Zubeen Garg entered the music scene in Assam in the early 1990s when the Assam Movement, with all its violence and state repression, was still fresh in memory. That was a time when the United Liberation Front of Assam was at its peak, with a whole generation of Assamese youth – both men and women – taking up arms to demand a sovereign state. The Army’s Operation Bajrang was just ending, leaving behind a trail of horror stories and a general sense of despair among the Assamese youth. There was violence in the air.

It was in that juncture that Zubeen Garg arrived with his melodies, changing – and slowly becoming – the rhythm of the Assamese society.

In the three decades that followed, Garg ruled the world of Assamese music, and subsequently cinema, until he suddenly left his kingdom on September 19 at the age of 52, drowning in Singapore, as if to fulfill a premonition when he had sung, “Xagor tolit xubore mon” (I wish to sleep in the depths of the sea).

For days, life in Assam spontaneously came to complete standstill. The Assam government declared three days of official mourning. Millions poured in from across the state to get one last glimpse of their hero. Millions more participated in his funeral procession. The crowd sang together. Assam’s sky reverberated with one of Garg’s famous songs, Mayabini.

He was cremated on September 22 with full state honours and a 21-gun salute. As I write this piece, mourners are still gathering at the site of his cremation, singing and offering prayers.

What was this phenomenon called Zubeen Garg?

The artist

Popularly known as the “King of Humming” in Assam, Garg started learning the tabla at the age of three and went on to master more than a dozen instruments.

His debut in 1992, Anamika, was hailed as Assam’s first rock album. With romantic tracks such as Hahile Tumi Mukuta Moni Xore (It Rains Jewels When You Smile), and soft melodies such as Gaane Ki Ane (What the Song Brings), it became an instant hit. There was no looking back.

Garg kept releasing album after album, each one creating a new record as he came to completely dominate the Assamese imagination.

Zubeen Garg wasn’t just a rockstar. His music kept evolving, expanding into new genres, embracing new styles. As he once said, “An artist needs to be like a river, always flowing, meandering, and not a pond.”

As a result, Garg became an icon for rock-crazy youth, folksong lovers, older listeners with a fascination for devotional music and Bihu-loving Assamese society as a whole. His music was rooted in Assam’s soil and its rivers, but composed with a sensitivity to musical ears that knew no borders.

After spending roughly a decade in Bollywood from the mid-1990s where his career reached new heights, with popular tracks such as Ya Ali, Jaane Kya and Kafur, Garg chose to shift his base back to Assam, for Assam was, what German sociologist Max Weber would call, Garg’s“calling”.

Once back in Guwahati, Zubeen diversified his interest into film – as an actor, director, music director and scriptwriter. His directorial ventures such as Mission China in 2017 and Kanchanjangha in 2019 were box-office hits. At the time of his death, he was finishing a musical drama, the first of its kind in Assamese film, titled Roi Roi Binale, written by him. He also acted as a blind artist. The film is set to release on October 31.

In stage, Zubeen Garg was Fredie Mercury+, with a wry sense of humor, laced with a generous dose of Assamese slang that young people loved. In his three-decade career, Garg recorded more than 38,000 songs in 40 languages and was associated with dozens of films.

The rebel

Zubeen Garg wasn’t like Chilean folk singer Victor Jara or street-theature master Safdar Hashmi or, for that matter, reggae star Bob Marley. That was because Garg never followed any playbook. He was a maverick and he redefined what it means to be a revolutionary artist.

He wasn’t a card-carrying leftist. Instead, he described himself as a socialist. In one of his last interviews, he said Che Guevara was his idol while also denouncing politics of violence, like that of the ULFA’s.

A Brahmin by birth, Garg spoke openly against casteism and all kinds of social discrimination. He famously threw away his “janeyu” (the sacred thread), using it, as he said, as a string for his mosquito net. At times, he called himself a Buddhist. It is now public knowledge that Garg quietly helped thousands of families by paying for their children’s education, medical bills and so on. Every evening, people lined up outside his studio in Guwahati with applications for help, and Garg gave generously.

When mass protests took place in Assam in 2019 against the discriminatory Citizenship Amendment Bill, Garg did not shy away from his responsibility as being an artist for all. He took center stage, singing, Politics Nokoriba Bondhu (Don’t Play Politics, My Friend). “Zubeen da” urged protestors to steer clear of violence and, despite provocations, they did.

Garg stood for human rights and animal rights equally, protested tree felling and child labour and remained a conscience-keeper for many ordinary Assamese. In his iconic track, Jontro, he talked about alienation under capitalism – how we have all become machines – in a language that was accessible to ordinary people.

The question before Assamese youth today is: “Now what?” They will have to write their own answer, for this time, Zubeen da isn’t around to give them a script.

We must recognise that in recent years, sectarian politics in Assam has been touching new lows. There is hatred in the air. Yet, in Zubeen Garg’s death, Assam witnessed unprecedented solidarity. People from all walks of life, across classes, ethnicities and religions, came together to mourn the giant’s death, for Garg belonged to all – he was a people’s artist.

How might we, then, make sense of this moment of solidarity and the Assamese “oneness” in a time of divisive politics? One can only hope that this is a moment of re-awakening for Assamese society. Garg dreamt of a society devoid of violence and hatred, and he was able to bring people together both in life and in death.

The real test of the love Assamese youth have shown for Zubeen Garg will be whether they are willing to stand in solidarity against the communal forces that are taking away our humanity.

Mitul Baruah is an associate professor of sociology/anthropology and environmental studies at Ashoka University. Views are personal.