This article argues that the contemporary contestation over Bishnupriya Manipuri identity in Northeast India is deeply shaped by the enduring legacy of colonial classification, which continues to structure claims to recognition, indigeneity, and institutional legitimacy. The study draws on colonial records, judicial decisions, and empirical field data to demonstrate how colonial authorities classified the Bishnupriya Manipuris as a distinct socio-linguistic community and how this classification was subsequently mobilised as a political resource in disputes over nomenclature and identity. The article situates the Bishnupriya case within broader debates on ethnic boundary-making and regimes of recognition and shows that identity operates simultaneously as a historical archive, a political claim, and an institutional category embedded within colonial and postcolonial governance frameworks. The article foregrounds this gap and demonstrates how colonial systems of classification, along with the documentary precedents they established, continue to shape postcolonial debates over nomenclature and institutional recognition.
Y. Monojit Singha (Fri,) studied this question.