Indo-Burman Range
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| Indo-Burman Range | |
|---|---|
| ActiveRecorded as grown here since 2000 | |
| Location | |
| Coordinates | 24.68, 93.60 |
| Gene Pool | South Asian Gene Pool |
| Country | India |
| Provinces/States | Arunachal Pradesh,Nagaland,Manipur,Mizoram,Tripura |
| Area | 75,400 km² |
| Growing history | |
| Dated news reports | 2020–2026 |
| Conservation | |
| Populations | none documented yet |
The Indo-Burman Range growing region is a landrace cannabis growing region in the hill ranges of north-east India, along the borders with Myanmar and Bangladesh. Its growing areas are Patkai Bum in Arunachal Pradesh, the Naga Hills in Nagaland, the Manipur Hills, the Mizo Hills and the Tripura Hills. A 2014 case study of a village in Ukhrul District of Manipur found that, with no other means of livelihood, ganja cultivation had been the mainstay of many families in the district for decades.[1] In Tripura the state government destroyed cannabis on 12,479.98 ha in the three years to March 2026.[2]
Geography
The hills of the region belong to a mountain arc that Encyclopædia Britannica traces for about 950 km, from Cape Negrais in Myanmar north to Manipur, taking in the Naga, Chin, Mizo (Lushai) and Patkai hills. The arc stands between the Rakhine coast and the interior of Myanmar, and keeps the south-west monsoon rains from reaching the centre of the country.[3] Hossain and colleagues (2022) call the fold belt of Tripura and the Chittagong hills the outer Indo-Burman Ranges, and connect its deformation with the oblique convergence of the Indian and Burmese plates since the latest Miocene.[4]
The Naga Hills reach 3,826 m at Mount Saramati on the frontier with Myanmar.[5] In Manipur the ranges average 1,500 to 1,800 m and surround the valley of the Manipur River, about 1,787 km² at about 790 m.[6] The Mizo Hills are compact parallel ridges of Cenozoic sandstone, limestone and shale running north and south and rising to about 2,100 m.[7] In Tripura the ridges fall away westward, from the Jampai Tlang at 600 to 900 m to the Deotamura at about 240 m, with valleys between them; west of the Deotamura the Agartala plain carries the lowlands of the Ganges and Brahmaputra basins into the state.[8]
The region is drawn on the Indian side of the ranges: Changlang District of Arunachal Pradesh, and the states of Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram and Tripura, about 75,400 km² in all. The hills of Meghalaya and the Mikir Hills form the Shillong Plateau region, and the floor of the Assam valley the Brahmaputra Valley region.
Cultivation history
The Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94
The Indian Hemp Drugs Commission found that the wild hemp plant spread along the mountain ranges on the frontiers of East Bengal, Assam and Upper Burma, "from Independent Tippera, through Lushailand, Manipur, and the country of the Kachins, to the frontiers of China".[9] J. J. S. Driberg, Assam's Commissioner of Excise, told the Commission that in the Naga Hills ganja "grows profusely". Of the hills round the Surma valley he named Hill Tippera, the state of Manipur, "a State where both opium and ganja are produced and surreptitiously brought down to the plains", and the Lushai country, and he called all the hill tracts round the districts of both valleys "ganja-producing tracts".[10] Another Assam witness, R. B. McCabe, who had lived for years among the hill peoples, said he had never seen the people of the higher Naga Hills or the Lushai Hills smoke ganja, and that the Naga tribes of Manipur did not use it.[11]
For the hill tracts within the province and on its southern frontier, the Commission judged that the evidence pointed to "cultivation of a very inferior sort, if indeed the plant is tended at all".[12] In Hill Tippera, the princely state of Tripura, it found cultivation "of the ruder sort, the seed of the wild plant being often used"; a local officer put the crop at a few seers, and the state's own memorandum said that hemp was not cultivated there.[13] A Bengal excise inspector, Abhilas Chandra Mukerjee, wrote that ganja was "regularly cultivated in the territories of the Maharaja of Hill Tippera".[14]
In The Ao Nagas (1926), J. P. Mills wrote that the high price of ganja in the plains had lately led Nagas to cultivate it secretly and sell it quietly to Assamese buyers.[15]
Since 2000
The Narcotics Control Bureau has named Tripura among the states where the "illicit cultivation and wild growth of Cannabis in hilly and remote areas" leads to the trafficking of cannabis within and between states.[16] Its state-wise figures for cannabis destroyed put Tripura at 123 acres and Manipur at 23 acres in 2014, Manipur at 48 acres in 2015, and Tripura at 431 acres and Manipur at 18 acres in 2016.[17][18][16]
In Tripura the police conducted 793 drives against cannabis in the three years to March 2026, destroying 5,24,25,791 plants; Sepahijala district had the largest area destroyed.[2] In January 2026 a Tripura police official said that forest and other government land had often been encroached on for cannabis, and residents, women among them, said they grew it in hilly and inaccessible areas for a living.[19]
The Federal reported in 2020 that cannabis was cultivated mainly in Manipur's Churachandpur, Tengnoupal, Ukhrul, Kamjong, Kangpokpi, Chandel and Imphal East districts.[20] A four-day operation in the interior of Ukhrul district in January 2014 destroyed 23 acres of ganja and 22 acres of opium poppy, and Eastern Mirror wrote that Manipur's growers had gradually turned from cannabis to poppy, which they considered more profitable.[21] In February 2025 the Assam Rifles and the Manipur Police uprooted and burnt about 6,000 plants on three hectares in Pherzawl district.[22]
In Nagaland, residents of a ward of Kiphire town destroyed about 100 marijuana plants growing there in August 2017,[23] and in April 2018 a joint team destroyed marijuana growing on the banks of the Dhansiri near Beisumpuikam, in Peren district.[24] The state's Inspector General of Police (Crime) said in 2017 that local people were "slowly and discreetly turning to cultivation of especially cannabis";[25] a Morung Express editorial of December 2022 said that local cultivation had not been reported in Nagaland.[26]
In Changlang district in February 2021, the local administration, with the police and paramilitary forces, destroyed poppy and cannabis grown on about five hectares at Dirak Pathar and Kumung Pathar villages, in the Bordumsa circle; the report does not divide the area between the two crops.[27]
Trade
The Narcotics Control Bureau reported in 2016 that ganja was trafficked from north-east India to the eastern states mainly by surface transport, and named Assam and Nagaland among the main transit routes.[16] A Tripura police official said in January 2026 that the state's dry ganja is not consumed locally but smuggled to Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, where it fetches a higher price, and that consignments are often seized from trucks and passenger trains.[19]
Growing Areas
| Growing Area | State | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Mizo Hills | Historical | |
| Tripura Hills | Active |
Accessions
No accessions documented yet.
Recent news
See also
References
- ↑ Raman, Vino (16 August 2014). "Dynamics of Ganja Cultivation in Manipur: Case Study of a Village in Ukhrul District". Reports from the States. Economic and Political Weekly. 49 (33). Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 "Tripura destroys ganja cultivation on over 12,000 hectares, arrests made for obstructing drives". Tripurainfo. 17 March 2026. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ "Rakhine Mountains". Encyclopædia Britannica. 22 September 2011. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ Hossain, Md. Sakawat; Ao, Songjian; Mondal, Tridib Kumar; Sain, Arnab; Khan, Md. Sharif Hossain; Xiao, Wenjiao; Zhang, Pengpeng (18 April 2022). "Understanding the Deformation Structures and Tectonics of the Active Orogenic Fold-Thrust Belt: Insights from the Outer Indo-Burman Ranges". Lithosphere. 2022 (1). 6058346. doi:10.2113/2022/6058346.
- ↑ "Naga Hills". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ "Manipur". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ "Mizoram". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ "Tripura". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. I: Report. Simla: Government Central Printing Office. ch. III, "The existence, prevalence, and character of the spontaneous growth", paras. 84–85, pp. 33–34 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Mr. J. J. S. Driberg, Commissioner of Excise and Inspector General of Police and Jails". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. IV: Evidence of Witnesses from Bengal and Assam. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. Assam witness no. 2, answer 70, pp. 532–533 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Mr. McCabe". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. IV: Evidence of Witnesses from Bengal and Assam. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. Assam witness no. 5, p. 539 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. I: Report. Simla: Government Central Printing Office. ch. IV, "Extent of cultivation, and its tendency to increase or decrease", paras. 101–102, pp. 39–40 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. I: Report. Simla: Government Central Printing Office. ch. IV, "Extent of cultivation, and its tendency to increase or decrease", paras. 96–100, pp. 37–39 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Indian Hemp Drugs Commission (1894). "Evidence of Babu Abhilas Chandra Mukerjee, Brahmin, Deputy Magistrate and Deputy Collector, on deputation as 2nd Inspector of Excise, Bengal". Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893–94. Vol. IV: Evidence of Witnesses from Bengal and Assam. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing, India. p. 174 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ Mills, J. P. (1926). The Ao Nagas. London: Macmillan. p. 148 – via Internet Archive.
- ↑ 16.0 16.1 16.2 Narcotics Control Bureau. Annual Report 2016 (PDF) (Report). Narcotics Control Bureau, Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India. PDF pp. 9, 16, 26. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ Narcotics Control Bureau. Annual Report 2014 (PDF) (Report). Narcotics Control Bureau, Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India. p. 20.
- ↑ Narcotics Control Bureau. Annual Report 2015 (PDF) (Report). Narcotics Control Bureau, Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India. p. 21. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ 19.0 19.1 "Security forces destroy ganja plants valued at Rs 108 crore in Tripura". Nagaland Post. IANS. 4 January 2026. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ Purkayastha, Samir K. (12 October 2020). "Marijuana: What brought Bollywood to its knees keeps Manipur 'high'". The Federal. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ "Poppy, ganja cultivation destroyed in Manipur". Eastern Mirror. 27 January 2014. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ "Manipur: Joint operation destroys marijuana plantation in Pherzawl". The News Mill. ANI. 17 February 2025. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ "Marijuana plants destroyed in Kiphire". Nagaland Post. 19 August 2017. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ Morung Express News (21 April 2018). "Marijuana destruction: AR say did not violate law". The Morung Express. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ Morung Express News (26 June 2017). "'Nagaland a fertile ground for drug dealing and usage'". The Morung Express. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ Jamir, Moa (7 December 2022). "Combating substance abuse in Nagaland". The Morung Express. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ Zauing, Pisi (25 February 2021). "Poppy, cannabis plantations destroyed; cultivators flee". The Arunachal Times. Retrieved 19 October 2026.