The Rise and Fall of the Koch Kirat People

It is mentioned in the First Part that a branch of Kirat people under the leadership of Kochu Hang had migrated to North Bengal and had settled there in a place called Koch Bihar. From this place, they spread to Assam, Burma, Siam(Syam) and Vietnam. There are various tribal folklores as to how they spread from the west to the east. The Chingphos or Kachin people claim that they spread from Nepal Terai. The Nagas also claim that they migrated from Eastern Nepal.212 Similarly the Khasis say that they had migrated from the Khas land of Western Nepal. All these tribal folklores prove that the people of Assam and Burma are the children of the Himalayan Mountains. When the other Mongolian and Chinese people migrated from North Eastern directions they intermingled with the people of Assam and constituted a big nation of various castes and creeds whom the Aryan people when acquainted with called them Kirats.

When they first came in contact with the Koch people of North Bengal, they were very surprised to hear their language which sounded peculiar to the ears of the Aryan people so they called their langauge Kubachya or bad speech instead of their good name Koch.As these Indian Aryans had known them in the North West India specially in Sindh by the name of Mlechha Asur people, they composed the following poetry in sanskrit:

"Sarba bhakchhyata murha Mlechha go brahman gharaka

Kubach ka parey Mlechha .. kutta yonaya

Tesam paichiki bhasa loka charona bidyate"

That is to say that the Mlechha people eat everything. They do no hesitate to kill cows and Brahmins.

Their original residence is a mountainous country. The Mlechhas or Meches were a class of the Kirat Ashur people who had fought against the Aryans for many years so they never talked any good of them.

Thus, this Koch people are divided into Mech, Koch and Tharu classes. Their first settlement in India was Kamrup. In olden days, the jurisdiction of Kamrup was from the Eastern Nepal to Lahut and from the Bhutan hill to Dinajpur. So long they were pure Kirat people there was a good unity among them. But when Hinduism influenced them they lost their identity and disappeared.

But the records of their ancestors as Kirat monarchs are so great that modern historians cannot keep quiet without writing in praise of their triumph.