India has around 645 dinstinct tribal communities. North-East India has been the abode of diverse ethnic groups possessing their own distinct culture, custom, tradition and rich historical background. Assam has around 23 scheduled tribes and the Mech Kacharis' are one of them. The Mech Kacharis' fall under the larger Bodo community. Though there have been mentioned pieces of evidence in various texts and scriptures, there are not muct data in the form of books available on the Mech Kacharis'. The Mech Kacharis' has faced several problems and is still facing such as changes in terms of culture, customs and traditions, and has also gone through the phase of identity crisis. In the pages of history, there has been mentions of the Mech Kacharis' but there were no written works on them, hence, many parts of their history was lost with time as it was passed orally within the community. Once, the Mech Kacharis' were being classified as a strong community in terms of population and culture, but due to governmental error or mismanagement and less consciousness of the community led to the agglomeration of the population with the larger Bodo community in the censuses from 1881 to 1991, and the actual population strength of the Mech Kacharis' was mixed with the Bodo community which couldn't be distinguished later on. The population as per Census 2001 has come down to 11546 and the population as per Census 2011 was just 9883.
This paper will provide a brief history and the present position of the Mech Kacharis' of Assam. This paper would also look into the changes that took place with and within the tribe. Lastly, this paper will will also look into the problems that the Mech Kacharis' have faced and are still facing.
